Kanye West has vowed never to mention Barack Obama's name again.

The "New Slaves" hitmaker has been criticized a number times by the US president - including advising young people not to look to the wealth of the rapper and his fiance Kim Kardashian as an example of success, and branding him a "jackass" after he interrupted Taylor Swift's 2009 MTV Music Awards acceptance speech - but Kanye believes the politician only uses his name to be "down" with young people:

"I just think that we're pop icons, and the President likes to use that type of thing just to be down [popular]. People were fine with me being everyone's punching bag for about five years - 'This is the person we love to hate, so if you want to distract people from everything that's going on...  just say you hate Kanye and there's going be 30 other people who say they hate Kanye.' That was kind of my position in culture and he kind of used that too - 'Oh, he's a jackass' - because that's how the world felt. I'm not going to mention him anymore, I'm past that, that's out my thoughts. That's lowering my priority of thinking at this point."

Kanye - who has five-month-old daughter North with Kim - insisted he isn't impressed by the Statesman's status as he only cares about actions. "I don't care if someone's the president or not. I care about thoughts and how you are helping people and what you bring to the world," he added.