De Niro on Obama: Leave Him Alone!

Robert De Niro plays a convincing tough guy on screen.

“Raging Bull.” “Taxi Driver.” “Casino.”

But when it comes to President Barack Obama, the Oscar winner gets all warm and cuddly. And he doesn’t take kindly to those who dare criticize the Commander in Chief.

Dissent is so 2008.

De Niro, talking to hopelessly biased NBC reporter David Gregory, answered as to whether he was “satisfied” with Obama’s first term:

You know, it’s very easy to criticize people. I think he’s done a good job.  He’s done other things that maybe he should have been a little stronger about, people will complain. But it’s not easy to be President of the United States. And he – and that was pointed out in the New York Times, I think in the last Sunday Week in Review, by Peter Bergen, about all the things he did, as far as Bin Laden and other things that he stepped up – being a liberal president, supposedly – that were effective. Not always – you know, there’s always the negative side of that. But he took the chance to do it, and he did it. And ultimately, with Bin Laden.And I think he’s doing – I give him credit, and I hope he does – I know he’ll do better in the next four years, when he won’t have to worry whether he’s going to be elected or not.

To De Niro’s credit, he managed to turn the standard celebrity talking points regarding Obama into a greatest hits montage of excuses:

* He’ll do better in his next four years

* Stop criticizing him

* Did you know being the President is hard?

* He got Osama. Did we mention he got Osama? ‘Cuz we should definitely mention it more than once.