Barack Obama, whom National Journal ranks as the most liberal U.S. senator, downplays his liberalism in that same CNBC interview:
OBAMA: The thing you can be assured of is that I’m not going to be making these decisions based on ideology. I’m not a dogmatist. I know that my opponents to the right would like to paint me as this wooly-eyed liberal — or wild-eyed –
BARTIROMO: You’re not a liberal?
OBAMA: — but my attitude is that I believe in the market. I believe in entrepreneurship. I believe in opportunity. I believe in capitalism…
I think he accidentally mixed his metaphors. There was a Freudian slip in there when the thought crossed his mind to pull the wool over everyone’s eyes by saying he’s not a wild-eyed liberal.