Reviewed by Jay Scott Kanes
Books by active politicians always seem shamelessly self-serving. Absolutely, that’s true for The Audacity of Hope (2006, Crown Publishers, New York, 376 pages), a second book by the United States presidential candidate Barack Obama.
If elected, Obama, a Democrat, will become the first U.S. president of African-American descent. In a wordy sentence, he writes: “As the child of a black man and a white woman, someone born in the racial melting pot of Hawaii, with a sister who’s half-Indonesian but usually mistaken for Mexican or Puerto Rican, and a brother-in-law and niece of Chinese descent, with some blood relatives who resemble Margaret Thatcher and others who could pass for Bernie Mac, so that family get-togethers take on the appearance of a UN General Assembly meeting, I’ve never had the option of restricting my loyalties on the basis of race, or measuring my worth on the basis of tribe.”
Not every presidential candidate has the time or foresight to prepare by pouring relevant thoughts and opinions into a thick volume for sale in bookstores. But Obama’s hardly a typical candidate.
Thoughtful, intelligent, earnest and optimistic, he sprinkles his pages with common sense on “sensitive” topics like religion, racism and U.S. foreign policy. The results make for interesting reading and leave little doubt that Obama could excel in Washington’s Oval Office where common sense has been in short supply.
Obama’s first-person narrative can be compelling, but sometimes drifts like a longwinded campaign speech, for example when analysing the world economy, the importance of education and how to cope with America’s oil addiction.
“Most of the time, legislation is a murky brew, the product of 100 compromises large and small, a blend of legitimate policy aims, political grandstanding, jerry-rigged regulatory schemes and old-fashioned pork barrels,” Obama writes.
“What every senator also knows is that during a single term, he or she will cast several thousand votes. That’s a whole lot of potential explaining to do come election time.”
Although better as a politician, Obama’s no slouch as an author. Several years ago, his memoirs, Dreams From My Father, became a New York Times bestseller. He’s charismatic and articulate, skillful with words. When he concedes that growing old heightens familiarity with personal flaws, it’s “as surely as the hitch in your walk turns to pain in your hip”.
Obama says the book emerged from his conversations along campaign trails. “Not only did my encounters with voters confirm the fundamental decency of the American people, they also reminded me that at the core of the American experience are a set of ideals that continue to stir our collective conscience; a common set of values that bind us together despite our differences; a running thread of hope that makes our improbable experiment in democracy work.”
From Chicago, Obama gained the limelight at the July 2004 Democratic Party convention in Boston with an impressive speech urging dogged determination and “the audacity of hope”. Trained as a lawyer, he devoted several years to community work in poor neighborhoods. Now he’s the junior senator from Illinois. Obama and his wife Michelle have two daughters.
Predictably, the book’s final passage reads like a slick campaign ad: “I like to take a run along the (Washington) Mall…. Most of the time I stop at the Washington Monument, but sometimes I push on, across the street to the National World War II Memorial, then along the Reflecting Pool to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, then up the stairs of the (Abraham) Lincoln Memorial.
“At night, the great shrine is lit, but often empty…. I look out over the Reflecting Pool, imagining the crowd stilled by Dr (Martin Luther) King’s mighty cadence, and then beyond that, to the floodlit obelisk and shining Capital dome.
“And in that place, I think about America and those who built it. This nation’s founders, who somehow rose above petty ambitions and narrow calculations to imagine a nation unfurling across a continent. And those like Lincoln and King, who ultimately laid down their lives in the service of perfecting an imperfect union. And all the faceless, nameless men and women, slaves and soldiers and tailors and butchers, constructing lives for themselves and their children and grandchildren, brick by brick, rail by rail, calloused hand by calloused hand, to fill the landscape of our collective dreams. It is that process I wish to be a part of. My heart is filled with love for this country.”
Obama has the vision and rhetoric for a viable presidential run. Readers who glide through The Audacity of Hope will know him much better and like most of what they learn.
Personal approval for Barack Obama, the politician: 77 per cent.
Approval rating for The Audacity of Hope: 59 per cent.
For more information: www.audacityofhope.com or www.obama.senate.gov/
(April 22, 2007)
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