I'm reading "In ‘A Promised Land,’ Barack Obama Thinks — and Thinks Some More — Over His First Term" (NYT). This new book review, by the regular NYT nonfiction book critic Jennifer Szalai.
The book is 700 pages long and only goes up to May 2011 — which means it includes "his roasting of Donald Trump at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on April 30 and the killing of Osama bin Laden the day after" but does not reach "the 2016 election, his abdication of his own 'red line' in Syria, the entrenchment of the surveillance state and a discussion of drone strikes." But, Szalai assures us, "This isn’t to say that 'A Promised Land' reads like a dodge." Ironically, that reads like a dodge. Szalai could be thinking that cutting off at May 2011 was a dodge, but the dodge was well-shrouded in contemplative prose so that it doesn't read like a dodge.
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72 comments:
How many autobiographies is this guy going to publish?
I thought Obama was a piece of shit right away in 2008 and haven't ever changed my mind.
How does he use people, what postures does he strike.
It was good for picking up women. He probably learned it in a bar in Indonesia.
Ho-hum
Maybe I should get a copy. At 700 pages, when the power goes off again this winter, it will be good fire starter.
Probably be able to find the book in the discount section of Costco soon, next to the winter socks and underwear.
...but does not reach "the 2016 election, his abdication of his own 'red line' in Syria, the entrenchment of the surveillance state and a discussion of drone strikes.
Can we page forward to January 5, 2017?
She lost me at incommensurate.
Why doesn't he just leave us alone so we can eat our waffles?
serious question
This "A Promised Land"?? Who wrote it?
Obama got millions for his autobiography and wants millions more.
Can’t turn in half a book.
Unless it’s 700 pages.
He was an empty suit. He is an empty suit. He will remain an empty suit. But oh, the soaring rhetoric. That'll get you a peace prize.
Nobody was spooked by a Mom Jeans wearing weenie of a President, who's divided our Country by RACE, GENDER, RELIGION, and CLASS...and is STILL doing it. We loathe him because he HID behind his color.
who..not who's.
"A Promised Land"
I assume that there's an implication that Obama, like Moses, led us towards the Promised Land of racial healing, but our own sins have condemned our generation to never set foot in it.
Does the world need yet another hagiography of Obama?
At any rate, when I think about the ramming through of the ACA back in 2010, "commitment to modertion" doesn't exactly spring to mind. And "Hillary Clinton, John McCain, and a Somali pirate" sounds like the setup for a cynical joke.
"Obama — who in this book demonstrates an almost compulsive tendency to imagine himself into the lives of others"
This is interesting, because the quality that made me dislike him was his planted assumption that everyone who understood an issue knew that his policy was the correct one, but the stupidly ignorant wouldn't come around, and the bought-off would pretend he was wrong even though they otherwise.
Maybe he did compulsively imagine himself in the lives of others - but while in there he was still Barack H. Obama, with exactly the same opinions and premises, and what he saw confirmed for him that back in his own skin he was right. About everything.
I look forward to Volume 2 where he can expound on how he told the nation and the world that the Benghazi attack was inspired by a years old, unknown and unwatched video made by some unheard of guy in California. Or how he later spied on the Trump Campaign, set up Michael Flynn for a jail term, unmasked hundreds of US citizens to 'get the goods on them'. Or how he lied about sending pallet-loads of cash to the Iranian mullahs in return for them promising that they would be good boys.
Or any number of other Barack-like actions. He was, and remains in my mind, the most divisive and least effective President in my lifetime. Trump became, because Obama was. And Obama is gone now, but Trumpism is here for a long time.
"Whenever he felt stuck, he fell back on empathy and 'process.'(!)
Perfect.
In his next book will Barack discuss the FBI spying on the Trump campaign?
NYT loves their Affirmative Action stories.
Compare and contrast the Affirmative Action Dems vs the minority Repubs:
Susan Rice vs Condi Rice.
Karen Bass [reported HUD Secretary for Biden] vs Dr. Ben Carson
And even :
Barack Obama vs Senator Tim Scott.
Notice anything ? the Repubs are accomplished individuals outside of politics before entering office.
I see the blandness, but not the empathy, certainly not in comparison to Biden, who's been portraying himself as an inexhaustible, ever-flowing font of the milk of human kindness. Obama didn't do the one-on-one personal retail politics that Bill Clinton excelled at, the tactile flesh-pressing campaigning that was once Joe Biden's trademark. Rather he seemed to shun contact with the masses, avoiding with distaste everybody outside of his inner circle and his donors. He was the "Hope" that voters were supposed to put their faith in. They were to reach out to him, not he to them. He was supposed to heal us from a distance, not so much because he cared, but because, in the eyes of his supporters, he had that kind of power and would condescend to do us that favor.
Still, I kind of have a soft spot for the guy and his wife, though I doubt they'd spare much mercy for me. I had to wade through so many insults and fabrications about them online, that by the time I could express my own opinion, I felt sorry for them and they didn't seem so bad.
Who else do we know who rankles some progressives and is almost zealously committed to moderation?
We can only wonder who really write it.
Book deals for democratics. $$$$$$$$$$$$$$ + Yawn inducing bromides and empty BS.
Obama was an empty suit in 2008 and never got past that stage. I still wonder who was running him. Probably still is.
Dust Bunny Queen said...
Maybe I should get a copy. At 700 pages, when the power goes off again this winter, it will be good fire starter.
Might be handy to have when the toilet paper crisis hits, too!
You fell for the hype, and are reading the revised history of America, by the most Divisive President EVER.
Or he’s just a more polished version if the two bit big city race hustlers we’re used to.
"Book deals for democratics. $$$$$$$$$$$$$$ + Yawn inducing bromides and empty BS"
"A Promised Land" By President Barack Obama-ZZZZZZZZZZ-ZZZZZZZZZZZZ.
They don't call him Obummer for nothing.
Big Zer0 always did get high on his own supply of bullshit.
Still, I kind of have a soft spot for the guy and his wife, though I doubt they'd spare much mercy for me. I had to wade through so many insults and fabrications about them online, that by the time I could express my own opinion, I felt sorry for them and they didn't seem so bad.
All a part of their grift.
Obama was not only the worst President in American history, he was a fraud, whose history cannot be accessed except through his own telling.
Lots of gullible people are still listening to what Obama says and generally ignores what he did. He was manifestly not a moderate, except to extremists.
Obama will get a hysterically positive review in EVERY MSM newspaper and magazine with the occasional finger-wag that B.O. wasn't left-wing enough. BORING!
The key to understanding B.O. is that he only became President because he was black and because Hillary was such a Horror. He the ultimate empty suit, a complete mediocrity, propped up by our Media Masters and Democrat Establishment. But at least our first Black President helped heal the racial divide....hahahaha.
In 2008 when appeared the Pres would be a D, I decided between H & O I preferred H as she was "relatively more conservative" than O.
However, I now wonder about that. I wonder if O was/is great with "getting out the vote" and leftist speachifying, but if in policy he might be equal to Michael Bloomberg.
Haven't made up my mind, but...
David Gergen said that Reagan talked "right" but governed "more moderately", while Bush 2 talked "moderate" and governed "more from the right".
43 percent of white men voted for Biden. How many voted for Hillary? God damn, i never realized how many mentally ill losers there are in the USA. It deserves to die.
So wait ... is this another instance of the NYT being less than worshipful of an Obama? Ooh, salty!
@Mark O, no, Buchanan’s administration made sure the armories in southern states were fully stocked with cannons and muskets On the dvd of the Civil War. Also the economy was worse under Carter. So Obama was only third-worst.
"43 percent of white men (of the 2% who were willing to be polled) voted for Biden"
Fixed it for you.
Seriously, we should look very critically at anything reported by the establishment press. This also includes academia and the scientific community.
2020 taught us that.
Imagine reading Obama on the “Wonderfulness of Obama.” Is there enough paper?
After the book will he move up the list from “worst President ever?”
FIFY:
“Obama writes... and writes some more... about OBAMA”
This sounds like a book that many people will buy to put on their bookshelf. ("Look how I think that Black Lives Matter!") They might skim through it, or read a Cliff's Notes version (are those still a thing).
The word tendentious comes to mind, based on that review.
And yet says nothing of substance. Like every Obama speech that he gave... about Obama. Someday he’ll find a purpose but until then Obama needs to ponder Obama some more.
Well it's a nasty job but somebody had to read 700 pages of ghost written bloviation.
But let's talk about Obama's "voice" and "vision for the future". I once saw a truly extraordinary performance of Strauss's opera "Salome". In it Jokannan (John the Baptist" is held captive in the bottom of a deep well. He cries out and the voice comes up the well where King Herod hears it. Jokannan has foretold the future and King Herod is quite visibly shaken.
Of course King Herod later grants his stepdaughter Salome's wish, Jokannan's head is cut off and given to Salome.
Is Obama foretelling the future? Are Obamaite bloviations where this nation is headed? I hope not.
Obama is the perfect Walter Mitty.
But the final laugh is on us.
Netflix gave Obama over 100 million dollars.
What did Obama produce that was worth 100 million dollars?
Obama is just another corrupt tool of the Aristocracy.
"And yet says nothing of substance"
After 4 years of incredible progress of getting real things done, we may have chosen through lack of adherence to principle to drop back into a time of meaningless messaging used to cover simple theft while our enemies and competitors regain ground on as we slumber and distract ourselves with talk of dreams that the wiser among us see as the nightmares of past history done on an ever larger scale. If we believe our higher principles to be good, abandoning them can only be bad.
"Moderation" is a tricky concept. Politicians talk bold, but don't succeed in doing much. When presidents are blocked from going in one direction, they charge off into another and burst through doors that nobody bothered to lock or even close. So whether they are "moderate" or not is in the eye of the beholder.
A politician's image is usually bolder in their own perception -- and more extreme in the perception of their opponents -- than he or she could manage to be in reality. Obama wasted his political capital on a flawed health care plan and eventually had to content himself with things like transexuals in the military. That was radical in a way, but also not something that truly shook the political or economic system. It's similar with Harris (simala with Kamala?): lifestyle radicalism and woke talk about the glass ceiling satisfies the believers and strikes the opposition as extremist without threatening the moneyed donors in any way.
All a part of their grift.
I doubt they started all those rumors themselves. Obama was a blank screen that his followers could project their hopes and wishes on to. He was also a blank screen that his opponents could project a lot on to as well. We got used to having a lot of stuff in the background of politicians to reproach them with. There was less in Obama's case, so stuff was just made up. It got to the point where one couldn't just excuse it with "They do it to us" or "They did it to us first." It was too much like middle school bullying -- Michelle a man, Obama gay and the murder of his lovers, mom and dad jaunting off to Kenya before he was born.
There is a lot to reproach the Obamas with now. His was hardly a scandal-free administration like his fans claim. He had some real failures, along with some successes, and never came close to being what his adulators thought he was. But if one makes one's way through all of the wild rumors and insults -- the Larry Sinclair and Mia Maria Pope bullshit -- one might be hesitant to add to all the abuse.
The man was, and always will be, a self-indulgent blowhard.
700 pages? Get to the fucking point!
Ms. Althouse - are you planning to read it?
Whenever he felt stuck, he fell back on empathy and 'process.'
This is something that occurred to me a few months ago with the article about how Obama and Hillary always "read the briefing book": they saw public life as basically akin to law school.
Their role was to read a set of briefings and cases carefully prepared by somebody else, choose between some narrowly defined alternatives, and persuasively explain the choice they had made. That made them very susceptible to the "three box con" (Kissinger joke: Box 1 is Nuclear War. Box 2 is total surrender. Box 3 is what we wanted to do anyway.) They chose box 3, when the correct action is to yell at the staff and make them bring you more boxes.
Hillary's going to write her memoirs entitled, "How to lose the presidency and become a bitter drunk without really trying"
He had a "Scandal Free" administration because the Liberal/Left MSM had ZERO interest in finding any scandal, and neither did the Democrat led Congress or Mitch McConnel and Paul Ryan.
If a scandal falls in a deserted forest, does anyone hear it?
If Biden gets to steal the Presidency, I confidently predict his administration and that of Harris, will be "Scandal Free." No doubt twitter/facebook are already getting their censors up to speed. "Remember guys, now that Biden's in office, any news report based on anonymous sources is a conspiracy".
"Presumably left for the future volume are, among other fraught subjects: the 2016 election, his abdication of his own “red line” in Syria, the entrenchment of the surveillance state and a discussion of drone strikes. "
...
"Once in office, Obama sought the help of experienced insiders instead of “fresh talent,” deciding that the dire circumstances “demanded it.” Obama says he had ambitious ideas for structural change, but that his team insisted that any attempts to mete out some “Old Testament justice” to the banks whose avarice and recklessness had pushed the financial system to the brink would send skittish markets into a full-blown panic."
The second paragraph explains the first. A prisoner of his own process.
"The midterms “didn’t prove that our agenda had been wrong. It just proved that — whether for lack of talent, cunning, charm or good fortune — I’d failed to rally the nation, as F.D.R. had once done, behind what I knew to be right.”"
No, they really did. He ran on Hope and Change, and then chose the status quo instead.
Count your blessings. Lenin wrote over fifty books, each over six hundred pages and packed with statistics and economic analyses. Wilson also churned out many volumes, but sadly, after the stroke, he was unable to write a multi-volume treatise on how he had established world peace at Versailles. What a loss to humanity....I saw on C-span some poor soul who had read all of the Presidential memoirs. He said Calvin Coolidge had written the best one. I'll take his word for it....I gave Dreams From My Father a shot. I got through a couple of chapters. It was okay, but Obama was wise to have kept his day job.
'But enough about me. Let's talk about you. What do you think of me?' - 700 pages
Lurker21 said...
Yes indeed. He raised mediocrity to a new level.
I never paid 10 minutes of attention to politics until this evil fraud showed up.
2020 taught us that.
Yes... among a great many other key learnings.
Obama interviewed tonight on 60 Minutes! Take your blood pressure pills and tune in!
Moderation. Yes, like "I won," and gaming the system for the votes on the ACA.
It is telling that they think him moderate. It says more about them thatn him.
He went with Romneycare.
It's become difficult to view newspaper book reviews as anything but "Politbook."
Because, whether they're reviewing fiction or non-fiction, it's become all too obvious that what counts is not the quality of the work, except insofar as "quality" is defined as "promoting progressive politics."
Thus, Politbook reviews become like the stopped clock: sometimes correct, yet seldom if ever conveying any useful information. Other than, perhaps, the motives and interests of the reviewer.
Are these reviewers aware of this (probably)?
Do they care (probably not, so long as it sells)?
Says someone who has read none of them.
This book is almost the same length as Chernow's biography of Alexander Hamilton -- the story of the entire life of one of the most important and fascinating people in the history of our country. Who in his/her right mind would waste their time actually reading such a huge tome about a part of the failed presidency of this over-rated (self-over-rated) person?
Hamilton's early life shrouded in mystery but. He died in late forties. Volume 1 of Obama's memoir takes him to 49!
Just watched the 60 minutes interview. Looks like there will be an interview in the Atlantic tomorrow that I will also read. What a guy. Sorry if you are blind to his qualities.
When one likes a politician, one loses all one's critical faculties. One's mind stops working. It's only when one sees the politicians one doesn't like that one is really questioning and thinking.
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