On PBS NewsHour, some guests were discussing Obama's reaction to the gulf oil spill and how much time he should spend working on it. 

One of the participants was Kathleen Hall Jamieson , professor of communication and director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the Universiy of Pennsylvania.  She said, "When the President said the other day on an interview with Matt Lauer, that he wasn't holding academic seminars, he was meeting with experts for a purpose, and then went on to define the anatomical outcome of that discussion, it was nonetheless saying something very important about what presidents do."

At least one of the other participants laughed.  I know I did.