Obama: Race relations better despite police incidents

While police shootings and protests dominated the headlines this year, President Obama says race relations on the day-to-day level are better now than when he took office.

"I assure you, from the perspective of African Americans or Latinos in poor communities who have been dealing with this all their lives, they wouldn't suggest somehow that it's worse now than it was 10, 15 or 20 years ago," Obama said in an interview with NPR News.

Problems between police and communities of color are not new, Obama said, and are now being discussed in ways that are helpful.

The prevalence of cell phones that can be used to record arrests is a good thing, and "points to our ability to solve these problems," Obama said in the interview taped earlier this month.

When asked if the nation is more racially divided now than when he took office in early 2009, the nation's first African-American president said: "No, I actually think that it's probably in its day-to-day interactions less racially divided. But I actually think that the issue has surfaced in a way that probably is healthy."

In 2014, protests followed the decisions of grand juries in Missouri and New York not to indict police officers involved in the deaths of young black men. Tensions rose with the shooting deaths of two police officers in New York City.

"The fact that there's a conversation about it, and that there are tools out there that we know can make a difference in bridging those gaps of understanding and mistrust ... should make us optimistic," Obama said.

During the NPR News interview, Obama also discussed:

Relations with the new Republican Senate and House: "Now you've got Republicans in a position where it's not enough for them simply to grind the wheels of Congress to a halt and then blame me. They are going to be in a position in which they have to show that they can responsibly govern, given that they have significant majorities in both chambers. And, you know, what I've said repeatedly is that I want to work with them; I want to get things done. I don't have another election to run."

The prospect of a U.S. embassy in Iran, like the one being planned for Cuba: "I never say never, but I think these things have to go in steps. You know, Cuba is a circumstance in which for 50 years, we have done the same thing over and over again and there hadn't been any change. And the question was should we try something different with a relatively tiny country that doesn't pose any significant threat to us or our allies."

The U.S. role in promoting democracy in the Middle East: "We're the one indispensable nation. But when it comes to nation-building, when it comes to what is going to be a generational project in a place like Libya or a place like Syria or a place like Iraq, we can help but we can't do it for them."