The Smiths Interview President Obama about Nobel Prize

The Smiths interviewed President Barack Obama after he accepted his Nobel Peace Prize. The interview aired during the Nobel Concert for Peace, but for those of us who weren't in the audience, here's our chance to hear what the President had to say about technology and peace and about his wife Michelle Obama. Plus, Will Smith wants to bite the President's rhymes.

ESSENCE.COM Dec, 20, 2009

Will Smith admitted to being nervous in front of the camera for the first time in a long time and asked Obama to explain part of his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech that calls for “the continued expansion of our moral imagination,” a line Will wished he could have used in his hip hop days.

“When you think about what’s happening in the world, on the one hand it’s shrinking. We see the internet, live feeds, Youtube–and that means nobody around the world should be a stranger, and that should be bringing us closer together, because it should remind us that we’re all fundamentally the same in terms of our aspirations, our hopes, our love for our children,” the President explained.

However, “it’s disorienting,” he continued, “so a lot of people pull back into their own specific identities — their race, their tribe, their religion, and that’s a dangerous thing because it can splinter people and cause conflict.”

“Hopefully what starts happening is you start figuring out are there ways we can work together to build a new well as opposed to fighting over the well we’ve got.”

When Jada Pinket Smith asked the President about the first lady, he replied, “Yeah she’s a star. She’s cute–that too,” a comment that speaks to the leading couple’s loving and strong relationship.