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Obama on ‘The Avengers,’ Kardashians, ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’

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Perhaps he is actually the first pop culture president. President Obama appeared on ABC’s ‘The View’ Tuesday for an interview in which he discussed Wall Street, gay marriage and the Hulk.

Co-host Joy Behar administered a zeitgeist quiz to the president during the show, taped Monday, asking him to name three characters from ‘The Avengers.’ ‘I just saw it, so this is easy,’ Obama said. ‘You’ve got the Hulk, Captain America, Iron Man.’

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Asked which Kardashian was married for 72 days, the president answered correctly, ‘That would be Kim.’ Obama quickly explained his knowledge of the reality star as accidental. ‘Because he was a ballplayer,’ he said, referring to Kardashian’s ex-husband, NBA player Kris Humphries. ‘That’s how I know, from watching basketball.’

Obama has made entertainment programs an increasingly important venue for his public appearances. In 2010 he became the first sitting president to appear on a daytime talk show when he visited ‘The View,’ and last month he talked about student loans on ‘Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.’ Such shows are a way to reach demographic groups key to the president’s re-election campaign — women and young people.

A record-setting fundraiser at George Clooney’s Studio City home last week also relied on the president’s Hollywood ties: Organizers used the joint star power of Obama and Clooney to lure campaign donations from tens of thousands of participants in an online contest vying to attend.

On ‘The View’ episode that aired Tuesday, the commander in chief seemed pretty pop culture savvy for a man with a country to run and a hotly contested campaign underway — he said he DVRs the shows ‘Mad Men’ and ‘Homeland’ for viewing on his long flights.

But the president did miss some questions. He didn’t know that Jessica Simpson had recently had a baby, and he deflected a query on the hot-selling erotic novel ‘Fifty Shades of Grey.’ When asked ‘What’s the controversial sex book that’s on millions of women’s bedside tables?’ the president said: ‘I don’t know that. I’ll ask Michelle when I get home.’

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— Rebecca Keegan

twitter.com/@thatrebecca

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