Obama Blackberry Update

Forget his economic stimulus plan, the big Obama news is that he may be losing the fight to keep his Blackberry.Late last year, The rANT ranted about how becoming president might deprive President-Elect Obama of his cherished Blackberry.

Well, a new interview with John Harwood in the New York Times reveals that Obama is losing the battle to keep the device. At the point, he says, the best he can hope for is some sort of computer access, which may or may not include email.

Here's a link to a New York Times story on how Obama uses the Blackberry and email, and here are the relevant portions of the interview:

President-elect OBAMA: ... I'm still clinging to my BlackBerry. They're going to pry it out of my hands. HARWOOD: Well, are you, in fact, going to overcome this idea as anachronistic that presidents can't use the most modern... President-elect OBAMA: Well, here's what I think I can get. I think I'm going to be able to get access to a computer somewhere. It may not be right in the Oval Office. The second thing I'm hoping to do is to see if there's someway that we can arrange for me to continue to have access to a BlackBerry. I know that... HARWOOD: As of this moment, you still have your BlackBerry. President-elect OBAMA: As of this moment, I still do. This is a concern, I should add, not just of Secret Service, but also lawyers. You know, this town's full of lawyers. I don't know if you've noticed... HARWOOD: Yeah. President-elect OBAMA: ...and they have a lot of opinions. And so I'm still in a scuffle around that, but it--look, it's the hardest thing about being president. ... HARWOOD: You were saying that it looks like you're going to maybe tussle to keep your BlackBerry. President-elect OBAMA: I don't know that I'll win, but I'm still--I'm still fighting it.

Well, if losing the Blackberry is the hardest thing about being President, I'm feeling a little better about the economy and national security.