THE LIFE AND TIMES OF NICK CROWSON

A Promised Land (autobiography) by Barack Obama

Book Review, December 2021

Barack Obama was the first black President of the USA. The 44th in its history. This work outlines his upbringing and early career and studies, before successfully fighting for a Senate seat for Illinois. The next chapters chart his support and campaign to gain the ticket for the Democratic nomination for the 2008 Presidential Election; where he met the stiffest competition from Hilary Clinton.

He provides an outline of his work, which he undertook shortly after completing his two terms in office and then represents his career and private life in seven sections. His preface apologises for the lengthy text, suggesting a more able writer would have been able to better condense what was being said. The sections comprise 27 chapters. He concludes with an index of subjects and surnames mentioned. There are two sections of black and white but mainly colour photographs. These give a strong background representation of his family life and the main milestones of his career and leadership of USA. The work does not feature any statistics by which to measure his electoral performance or means of evaluating the success or otherwise of his Presidential office.

We learn of his lackadaisical younger days as a student, where he was not driven and did not achieve the highest grades. One reason for his development he puts down to his greater interest in books, which presumably provided a boon to the political understanding and more skilled expression. Some of his political inspiration was derived from part of his upbringing in Indonesia, where he was conscious of a narrow wealthy powerful elite and the masses who failed to share such bounty. This grounding would provide some of the motivation in dealing with an arrogant and out of control banking sector in the financial crisis that blighted his early presidency and the campaign to relieve destitution through the foreclosure on homes with his Affordable Care Act.

After a successful Senate campaign, whose work is well documented; the author talks about his fight to win the 2008 Presidential election and first secure the right to lead the Democratic Party. His main challenger was Hilary Clinton, who outstripped him in terms of political service and know-how. It was a long drawn-out fight, but many spoke of a need for change and he was supported by many political insiders. He talks about the great work from his team running his campaign from strategists to speech writers and junior supporters, knocking on doors to harness support. He wanted to conduct these campaigns in a dignified way and his team were adamantly focussed on running a fair and genuine campaign, setting the right standards.

Having defeated Hilary, after a lengthy campaign, he faced John McCain, who represented the Republican's candidacy. He was not sure whether he would have beat the 2000 warrior McCain, but that was not the case in 2008, where McCain's position was one vacillating between postures, partly defending an incumbent president with a low 30 per cent rating and trying to appeal to new voters, with an alternative message from one he had espoused in government - for instance on climate change.

Some of his best writing is presenting the situations he finds himself in and the forces ranged against him both at home and abroad. He speaks of the lay-out of the White House, its rooms, walks, garden and aspects such as the gym and use of a chosen chef. He mentions how after taking office, he was spoken to as Mr President and addressed in a formal way, by all but family. It took a long time to coax household staff to use first name terms. The team supporting his household wanted to treat him in the same respectful way that all other Presidents had been addressed by. The aspect of having the chance to provide a roll model for black and ethnic Americans, was one of his strongest arguments for fighting the political struggle and appeasing his family when times seemed tough in campaigning.

On gaining office he is thrust into the ongoing climate from the previous regime, which involved dealing with a great financial crisis and managing the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. The picture of these situations was represented as one where decisions were only made after lengthy consultation processes, with the key players, involving strategies to assess the situations before seeking to make redress. This is the strongest aspect promoting his style of government. He would make decision when he felt he had herd all the salient facts.

We are informed of the due processes undertaken in his major political problems such as the aforementioned and the case of the BP Deepwater Horizon blowout of oil under the sea and Operation Neptune's Spear, concerning the tracking down of Osama Bin Laden.

The portrayal of his presidential years was the main interest for me and I was duly most fascinated by this section of the book.

Obama has written three books. The first is about his early days, when he was about thirty and before he stood for political office. The second The Audacity of Hope charts a more politically involved person and then there is this largely political autobiography, where he charts his rise from running for Senate to becoming the first black American president. The first 200 pages speak of his growing up, but mainly about his early political career running for senate and then the presidency. The bulk of this work revolves around an account of his time in office - about 500 pages. His second term is expected to be covered in a future work. There are interesting American based articles on his presidency, which assign a value to his time in office in comparison to other presidents and a look at his perceived successes, failures and general legacy.

The following link provides an assessment of Obama's Presidential legacy, written by David Wise

US Politics and Policy Obama Assessment