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Musician James Taylor. (AP)
(CNSNews.com) – James Taylor said he “really suffered” under eight years of “Cheney/Bush,” while speaking at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. on Friday about election reform.
“It was sort of natural, being so politically active over the years, that I would get involved in the campaign of 2008,” Taylor said. “I really—I was hugely motivated also by eight years of Cheney/Bush, and I say it in that order on purpose.”
“Those were—it was a tough time for me,” he said. “I really suffered.”
“It made me deeply ambivalent about my country that we would choose that, even if we may not have chosen it,” Taylor said. “But that, that was our, that’s what represented us in the world. I felt as though after September 11, the diversion, the distraction of the nation’s concern and energy into Iraq was unpardonable.”
“I felt that it was inept, corrupt and opaque,” he said. “Those were tough years for me.”
“And I was very deeply motivated in 2008 to see Barack Obama—this wonderful, sort of a surprise, really, I couldn’t believe our luck that we had gotten such a real person -- as to make it through the filter system of our politics,” said Taylor, a five-time Grammy Award winner. “So, it meant a lot to me and I know it would’ve meant a huge amount to my father, because I think of him often.
Taylor, who campaigned for Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012, said supporting Obama “restored” his faith in the country.
President Barack Obama and former President George W. Bush. (AP Photo)
“It was the largest grassroots event that we’ve ever seen in this country and the people involved were such, just fundamentally such good people I felt that it really meant a lot to me to be involved in it,” he said. “They were smart, too, the people who handled his campaign.”
“They did it really well and they were committed to this mission, they really carried it out beautifully,” Taylor said.
The singer-songwriter was featured at a National Press Club luncheon to discuss election campaign finance reform. Taylor has been active as a singer-songwriter since the late 1960s. He was inducted into the rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000 and the Songwriters Hall of Fame that same year. In 2004, he was ranked 84th in Rolling Stone’s “The Immortals: 100 Greatest Artists of All times.”
Some of his well-known pop tunes include “Fire and Rain,” “You’ve Got a Friend,” and “Mockingbird.”