In his just-published memoir, A Promised Land, Barack Obama asks “Whether [he] was too tempered in speaking the truth, too cautious in word or deed.” Fielding a question about the passage from 60 Minutes’ Scott Pelley during a recent interview, Obama’s response was emblematic to a tee:

I understand why there were times where my supporters wanted me to be more pugilistic, to, you know, pop folks in the head and duke it out a little bit more. Every president brings a certain temperament to office. I think part of the reason I got elected was because I sent a message that fundamentally I believe the American people are good and decent, and that politics doesn’t have to be some cage match in which everybody is going at each other’s throats and that we can agree without being disagreeable.

Needless to say, the former president’s personal style — conflict-averse, wary of naming enemies or appearing even faintly radical, often determined to appear above politics entirely — came to define much about his two terms in office and his overall approach to governing. This naturally applied during his administration’s handling of the 2009 economic crisis, which would become one of the Obama presidency’s formative moments and arguably set the stage for the electoral drubbing Democrats faced in the 2010 midterms.