Obama’s Failed Narrative
Did the presidency ruin a good storyteller, or vice versa?
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President Obama has not given up on his narrative. Campaigning in Ohio earlier this year, he wearily insisted that he could still deliver on his early promise, if only we would give ourselves over to the grand story he promised before. “Because I still believe, Ohio,” he said in May. “I still believe that we are not as divided as our politics suggest. I still believe that we have more in common than the pundits tell us; that we’re not Democrats or Republicans, but Americans first and foremost. I still believe in you, and I’m asking you to keep believing in me. That’s not how we built America. That’s not who we are.” That’s not who he is.
The Story of Obama
From an early age, Obama imagined a better story for himself than the world was willing to provide. In the summer of 2012, journalist David Maraniss released The Story of Obama, an exhaustively researched look at the president’s early life, including background on many of the individuals who make formative appearances in Dreams from My Father. What Maraniss finds is that many of the stories Obama tells in that book are not strictly true, in the journalistic sense, and several of the characters have been reimagined to the point that they scarcely resemble their real-life antecedents.
This is neither unprecedented in memoirs nor undisclosed in the book: In the introduction, Obama admits to taking certain literary liberties with the truth. Some of the characters are composites or have had details changed to protect their identities; some events are combined or placed out of order. But the degree to which Obama has rewritten his own past is still somewhat surprising. Regina, a black female friend he meets in college, is cast as a representative of the authentic black experience who evokes “a vision of black life in all its possibility.” The character turns out to be based on a white woman. His grandfather was not imprisoned and beaten by the British, as Obama claims. Nor was the father of his stepfather killed by the Dutch army during a battle for independence.
Many of the distortions that Maraniss chronicles are not there for the sake of convenience or compression, but for their symbolic value. The story that Obama told himself—and everyone else—was not the story that actually happened. It was the story that felt like it should be true.
‘Tell a Story to the American People’
Presidents are perpetually interviewing for their own job. And inevitably, they get asked some version of that ever-present job interview cliché: What’s your biggest flaw, your greatest mistake? Here’s how President Obama answered that question when it was posed by CBS talk show host Charlie Rose in July. “The mistake of my first term was thinking that this job was just about getting the policy right. And that’s important, but, you know, the nature of this office is also to tell a story to the American people that gives them a sense of unity and purpose and optimism, especially during tough times.”
It was the politician’s version of the old businessman’s excuse: The problem isn’t the merchandise; it’s the marketing. And what that really means is that the problem isn’t bad management; it’s bad customers. The buyers just can’t see how great the product is.
Which may be the most revealing Obama degeneration of all. He could have said that he didn’t make any mistakes. He could have pointed to some piece of unpassed legislation that he didn’t manage to get through Congress. Instead, he talked about a failed narrative. He made all the right decisions, chose all the right policies, but the public just didn’t get it, so he’s just going to have to do a better job of rewriting history.
Stories are how Obama explains himself to the world. They’re how he explains the world to himself. And he admits as much. Speaking to Rose, Obama continued: “When I ran, everybody said, ‘Well, he can give a good speech, but can he actually manage the job?’ And in my first two years, I think the notion was, ‘Well, he’s been juggling and managing a lot of stuff, but where’s the story that tells us where he’s going?’ And I think that was a legitimate criticism.”
It’s no surprise that Obama thinks his biggest flaw is insufficiently effective storytelling. He wanted to tell a story that would obliterate the past and remake the world of politics from whole cloth. But unlike his early days, he has to live with the facts he’s been given, the history he’s actually made, rather than the myth of his own creation. Obama’s greatest strength has always been his ability to tell an engaging tale, to imagine more powerful narratives for the people who inhabit his world. But he could never live up to the one he imagined for himself.
Editor's Note: We invite comments and request that they be civil and on-topic. We do not moderate or assume any responsibility for comments, which are owned by the readers who post them. Comments do not represent the views of Reason.com or Reason Foundation. We reserve the right to delete any comment for any reason at any time.
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But the power to imagine is not the power to accomplish. Vague, high-minded goals get sullied when translated into specific, practical policies.
It's not his fault that everybody didn't clap their hands and believe hard enough. Cut the guy some slack, it take a lot of work to get a fairy off the ground.
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it take a lot of work to get a fairy off the ground.
Andrew Sullivan can definitely confirm this.
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Failed narrative? The narrative was failed long before the dunce adopted it.
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That's the part that gets me too. We've seen this shit played out many times before, and it doesn't get any prettier in the retelling.
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Like in a third-act revelation of a cheesy Hollywood screenplay, their stories are what help him find himself. Learning the tales of their lives, he writes, “helped me bind my world together…they gave me the sense of place and purpose I’d been looking for.”
Unfortunately, Cher is not available to slap that vacuous mooncalf face and yell, "SNAP OUT OF IT!"
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Interesting analysis and you obviously did read the books. I don't agree with the outcome,as for me, there are times I wonder what ever made Obama believe he was really a Democrat. I think if he had been the Republican that he actually is, he would not have pushed the right further over which they did just to make an opposition to his 'left' views, that no one else in the progressive party believes is left at all. He has sided with business, the stock market has never been healthier; the uber rich are doing great; there is still a paltry showing for middle class progress. Obama is progressive in that he does, as you describe, make more optimistic observations about culture, people and lives, which makes him a great ambassador, the U.S. foreign policy standing hasnt seen better times since just post world war II. But domestically in matters of trade, business, he is a redstate politician. That fact is born out of the financial situation today.
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Obama is progressive in that he does, as you describe, make more optimistic observations about culture, people and lives, which makes him a great ambassador, the U.S. foreign policy standing hasnt seen better times since just post world war II.
This is just unsubstantiated nonsense.
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That is some of the finest parody I have ever read.
*applauds vigorously*
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You bleach the meaning out of all the descriptive words you use, so you can recolor them again to mean anything. No matter Obama gives the 'private sector is doing fine' speech, no matter his race baiting and West Coast hippie stoking 'fuck the suburbs' rhetoric, no matter his empowerment of public employee unions über alles. He is just a right-centrist moderate. The elasticity of your rhetoric is very similar to that I see in a lot of young British writers. You sound like a Brit living in a left culture with the mistaken belief capitalism and Marxism of equally normative systems of political economy. That doesn't make you sophisticated; it just means you are unable to make distinctions in classification that give your argument any backbone.
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Marxism
ofare equally -
"..I wonder what ever made Obama believe he was really a Democrat."
A Republican occasionally has to pay lip service to staying within th bounds of the Constitution and respecting natural rights, Deomcrats do not. No need for you to continue wondering.
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One more piece of the proof that he's the second coming of Mussolini; the left is now redefining him as a man of the right. We have always been at war with Obama.
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He's the 2nd coming of Caligula, who also declared himself a God.
Caligula's end was not pretty. -
Is there someone pushing this idea now? Can someone find the article so we can mock it? No fun bringing up stuff from 2008.
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Ahhhh. This is the indicator that the bottom truly is falling out for Obama; when the Left concludes that Obama is really a closet republican.
But, the Left MUST do this. Either they blame the message or they blame the messenger. The Left cannot blame the message; they cannot admit that european style socialism is every bit as much a failure as marxism. Sooooo, they must blame the messenger.
As the article said, it's like the businessman who says it's not that we have a bad product, it's that we have bad marketing.
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How bad will it get when he loses? Will they disown him? Will he be shunned? Or will they blame the bleeting masses of gun-clutchers? Or claim a conspiracy to steal the election by racists? OR ALL OF THE ABOVE?
November is going to be sweet! So much schadenfreude, so little time.
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The SP 500 is below where it was 12 years ago. That's not what "never been healthier" looks like.
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Obama writes like a teenage girl longing for the captain of the football team, only more shallow and self centered.
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Somehow, reading this article made me think of that obnoxious Flowbots(?) song.
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The narrative of Barack Obama is alive and well among Americans. He's honest, unlike that lying Romney. He's genuine, unlike that fake, robotic Romney. He's for peace, unlike that warmongering Romney. He's going to make sure that the womyn are taken care of, unlike that patriarchal, misogynistic, rape-apolozing Romney.
As the Obama's time in office most resemble the failures of Carter, I have to ask myself: did the media help Carter this much?
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And then there was Obama's creating US foreign policy around himself and his experiences in Indonesia. Remember how everything was going to change on the day he was elected because of who he was?
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Let's face it; we had a perfect storm in 2008. Eight years of the incompetent Bush who jacked the national debt to $8T. Two unpopular and failed wars. And then six weeks before the election we had the most severe financial collapse since the Great Depression. McCain was tarred by association.
And what did we have? An elegant, debonair black man who successfully sold himself as the redeemer. Man, he was gonna change EVERYTHING; he was gonna make america post-racial, he was gonna usher in a "different kind of politics", he was gonna cut the debt and fix the economy. He was even going to heal the planet and cause the oceans to recede. The Left wing MSM utterly fell in love...literally in love...and lots of voters swallowed the whole thing.
Well, it was nothing more than hype and BS. Obama is inexperienced, a poor leader, and his BIG IDEA is...wait for it....1970s era european style socialism. The man is an unmitigated disaster, and hopefully future generations will learn to beware of the grab bag wrapped in pretty new bows bangles.
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Sad thing is...all that information about BO's true nature was easily available to anyone with the slightest curiosity and open mind. It's not like he was cloaked in mystery.
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reason. FREE MINDS AND FREE MARKETS... AND FREE BS. WTF? I'd like to leave some constructive criticism but it's hard to constructively criticize crap. Washington Times, NYDP level of reasoning. Have fun with the rest of your career as a right wing blogophite. I hear Redstate.com is looking for some conspiracy theory writers. And yes, this is the civil version.
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I guess you don't want to know what the REAL right wing blogophites think about this.
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Care to actually, you know, point out why you disagree rather than go off on a typical, left-wing rant?
At least you didn't say Faux-news.
Point to you...I guess.
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I'm guessing this is a reply to dbmd.
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Yes.
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Oh sure, I'll guess I'll bite. This is an "opinion" piece written by a right wing blogger... er... "writer"... who uses inference and suggestion to write a salacious narrative of the "illegitimate" President of the United States". I'm sure that the author (whatever his name is... won't matter next year) is heartfelt in his criticism and would "never call the President illegitimate". But it is ideologically motivated. It has no more truth than the fairy tales we read as children. It is opinion. It is simply one man's mental masturbation. There are people in America that consider Mien Kampf thougthful reading as well. This article is not a policy argument. It is an attempt to belittle a sitting president who "only believes in stories". I grew up poor and am now a rich physician. Long live America and Long Live the American "Story". Despite it's moribund detractors.
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You obviously didn't read the article at all.
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And again, you offer no actual criticisms of the author, you just make strange ad hominem attacks. And I mean REALLY out there. Where did this critique even come from? You REALLY didn't even glance at more than the first few sentences, did you?
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Should read, "criticisms of the article".
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I've never known a leftist who could read more than highlights.
Want to have some real fun? Argue with a leftist/Demo about one political subject for more than 30 seconds. Any political subject. Once the Maddow sound bites and Daily Kos headlines are exhausted, it's all emotion and invective.
And YOU will be the fucking idiot, naturally.
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I should probably be more specific. I'm not including the .2% of leftists/Demos who can articulate their beliefs, and stand on principle.
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This is so true. I can never get them to stay on the subject at hand. They just go from one boogey man to the next.
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Huffington is that way.
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I think we're a little farther left than Huffington Post, here. This is more on the level of Media Matters stuff.
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Like many liberals, Obama prefers to see the story in his head, rather than reality. Psychiatrists say liberalism is a mental disorder specifically because of this. Liberals ignore reality to avoid the pain of cognitive dissonance (holding contradictory thoughts).
And it explains much of Obama's lies, like his continuing lie (which he repeated in the debate) that if you like your insurance you can keep it.
I guess many folks bought his story, preferring to believe in him, rather than reality.
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Psychiatrists say liberalism is a mental disorder specifically because of this.
SURE they do.
Liberals ignore reality to avoid the pain of cognitive dissonance (holding contradictory thoughts).
Unlike people in other political persuasions, who NEVER ignore reality.
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I wonder if this white Regina with the vision of a black life is the same one who tied James Levy in knotts.
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He sure did "rewrit[e] uncomfortable truths about his own history? He wrote (in Dreams) that his dad got a scholarship to go to Harvard but was too broke to bring along wife and child. Lots of poor students bring their families: I doubt that was the reason. Then he writes "a separation occurred." Can you think of a more passive way to write that? Dad didn't leave me, he just magically got not there. He left his wife and kid in Africa to come for a scholarship then he leaves a second wife and kid to go back. It wouldn't be the last time. He would leave two more and die while married to the fifth, leaving seven children behind. Obama tries to make a hero out of an unheroic man by writing that he went back to fulfill a commitment to a continent, to apply what he learned in America to Africa. Sexual continence wasn't one of those things. This is what the incontinent father applied what he learned in America to Africa. 1) Since not keeping it in his pants had no adverse effects on him, he continued the practice, 2) Socialism is the answer to the single mother problem since I have no intention of taking care of my own.
I fail to see how "rewriting uncomfortable truths about his own history" is something praiseworthy.
Obama reminds me of those kids sent from relative to relative, learning to be charming in constant terror of yet another rejection. It may be that force, that search for love that led to his strange psychology and need to be adored. A loss would be grievous.
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very nice
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Great superman! People are missing you.
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good thanks sohbet
cinsel sohbet