President Barack Obama says the White House perk he'll probably miss the most is Marine One – the commander-in-chief's helicopter.
In a
GQ magazine interview covering mainly light-hearted issues posted Tuesday, Obama says Air Force One is kind of "amazing" too.
"So the clear answer would be Air Force One: an amazing plane with an amazing crew, they clear out airspace so you don't have to wait. And you land anytime, you leave anytime," he tells the magazine.
But, it's not his favorite.
"It may be Marine One, because even post-presidency, I may be able to round up a private plane sometime, but it's tough not to have your helicopter waiting for you," he said.
The president also speculated about what it would be like campaigning in 2016 against GOP front-runner Donald Trump.
"I would've enjoyed campaigning against Trump," he replied. "That would've been fun."
Other light issues he was quizzed on:
"That military exercises we were doing in Texas were designed to begin martial law so that I could usurp the Constitution and stay in power longer," Obama explained. "Anybody who thinks I could get away with telling Michelle I'm going to be president any longer than eight years does not know my wife."
- Top secret access. Obama said it's "a little disappointing."
"People always ask me about Roswell and the aliens and UFOs, and it turns out the stuff going on that's top secret isn't nearly as exciting as you expect," he said. "In this day and age, it's not as top secret as you'd think."
On a serious note, Obama conceded he ran up against a lot of resistance to his call for gun control to stop mass shootings.
"In the absence of a movement politically in which people say, 'Enough is enough,' we're going to continue to see, unfortunately, these tragedies take place," he said.
"The main thing that I've been trying to communicate over the last several of these horrific episodes is that, contrary to popular belief, Americans are not more violent than people in other developed countries. But they have more deadly weapons to act out their rage, and that's the only main variable that you see between the U.S. and these other countries."
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