Barack Obama and the Politics of Redemption
Barack Obama and the Politics of Redemption

Author: Stanley A. Renshon

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2012-03-15

Total Pages: 405

ISBN-13: 1135193983

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Every new president raises many questions in the public mind. Because Barack Obama was a relative newcomer to the national political scene, he raised more questions than most. Would he prove to be a pragmatic centrist or would his politics of hope ultimately flounder on the rocky shoals of America’s deep political divisions? What of his leadership style? How would the uncommonly calm character he demonstrated on the campaign trail shape Obama’s political style as commander-in-chief? Based on extensive biographical, psychological, and political research and analysis, noted political psychologist Stanley Renshon follows Obama’s presidency through the first two years. He digs into the question of who is the real Obama and assesses the advantages and limitations that he brings to the presidency. These questions cannot be answered without recourse to psychological analysis. And they cannot be answered without psychological knowledge of presidential leadership and the presidency itself. Renshon explains that Obama’s ambition has been fueled by a desire for redemption—his own, that of his parents, and ultimately for the country he now leads, which has enormous consequences for his choices as president of a politically divided America.

Redemption Song
Redemption Song

Author: Niall Stanage

Publisher: Liberties Press

Published: 2014-06-27

Total Pages: 185

ISBN-13: 1909718807

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In little more than four years, Barack Obama rose from political obscurity to become the 44th president of the United States. His election win in November 2008 was a moment of enormous historical magnitude, greeted with an outpouring of emotion in the US and around the world. However, on taking office, Obama was faced with unparalleled challenges as the global economy plunged ever-deeper into crisis and the US struggled with the two wars in which it was enmeshed.In Redemption Song, Niall Stanage tells the extraordinary tale of Obama's journey from community organiser in Chicago to leader of the free world through exclusive interviews with some of the new president's oldest friends and closest advisors. He explores the then-senator's long and acrimonious tussle with Hillary Clinton, sheds new light on his battle with John McCain and running mate Sarah Palin, and hears from the members of the grassroots movement that carried Obama all the way to the Oval Office.He also provides an intimate account of the first phase of the Obama presidency, reporting from within the White House walls on the new Administration's first tests, triumphs and tribulations.

The Black Presidency
The Black Presidency

Author: Michael Eric Dyson

Publisher: Mariner Books

Published: 2016

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780544811805

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A provocative, lively deep-dive into the meaning of America's first black president and first black presidency, from "one of the most graceful and lucid intellectuals writing on race and politics today" (Vanity Fair)

The Price of the Ticket
The Price of the Ticket

Author: Fredrick Harris

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2014-02

Total Pages: 229

ISBN-13: 0199325235

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In The Price of the Ticket, Fred Harris contends that Obama's success has, in reality, exacted a negative price. His victory has not only utterly transformed the forms of black politics that emerged in the 1960s and which laid the foundation for his eventual ascendance, Harris claims-it has profoundly weakened them.

The Race Whisperer
The Race Whisperer

Author: Melanye T. Price

Publisher: NYU Press

Published: 2016-07-26

Total Pages: 219

ISBN-13: 1479819255

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Analyzes the manner in which Barack Obama uses race strategically to engage with and win the loyalty of potential supporters. Price uses examples from Obama's campaigns and presidency to demonstrate his ability to authentically tap into notions of blackness and whiteness to appeal to particular constituencies. By tailoring his unorthodox personal narrative to emphasize those parts of it that most resonate with a specific racial group, Obama targets his message effectively to that audience, shoring up electoral and governing support. The author also considers the impact of Obama's use of race on the ongoing quest for black political empowerment. Unfortunately, racial advocacy for African Americans has been made more difficult because of the intense scrutiny of Obama's relationship with the black community, Obama's unwillingness to be more publicly vocal in light of that scrutiny, and the black community's reluctance to use traditional protest and advocacy methods on a black president. --From publisher description.

Dramatic Catharsis
Dramatic Catharsis

Author: Chris Marshall

Publisher:

Published: 2016

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13:

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The 2008 election of Barack Obama as America's first African American president was popularly held to represent a fulfilment of Martin Luther King's Dream and led to speculation about the implications of an Obama victory for a post racial America. This thesis argues that race was a recurring theme of Obama's election campaign, and that his rhetoric referred frequently to America's history of racial inequality. It explores how Obama constructed a racial identity that connected him to the African American struggle for civil rights and which placed him within a national progress narrative, and it argues that an important feature of Obama's campaign was the articulation of a rhetoric of redemption.Academic debates focussing on Obama's racial identity and the extent to which he spoke about race have been supported either by textual analysis of his speeches or by applying a historical perspective to the campaign. This thesis incorporates both approaches as it combines discourse analysis of a reference corpus of 172 speeches with intertextual and extralinguistic analyses facilitated through contextual knowledge of African American history and culture. The methodology embraces Ruth Wodak's Discourse-Historical Approach, consideration of Obama's appropriation of the Exodus narrative, and the application of Kenneth Burke's dramatistic pentad to explore the construction and representation of racial identity in Obama's rhetoric.The approach identifies an analytic corpus of 41 speeches which focus on race. This is used to identify how Obama presented his personal history within the context of the civil rights struggle and how he positioned his campaign to neither confront nor accommodate white America about racism and inequality. The results reveal Obama's desire for a national catharsis in repudiation of America's history of racial injustice; a redemptive moment made possible through unity, atonement and the collective effort encapsulated in the campaign slogan, "yes, we can".

The Persistence of the Color Line
The Persistence of the Color Line

Author: Randall Kennedy

Publisher: Vintage

Published: 2012-04-17

Total Pages: 337

ISBN-13: 0307455556

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A “provocative and richly insightful new book” (The New York Times Book Review) that gives us a shrewd and penetrating analysis of the complex relationship between the first black president and his African-American constituency. Renowned for his insightful, common-sense critiques of racial politics, Randall Kennedy now tackles such hot-button issues as the nature of racial opposition to Obama; whether Obama has a singular responsibility to African Americans; the differences in Obama’s presentation of himself to blacks and to whites; the challenges posed by the dream of a post-racial society; the increasing irrelevance of a certain kind of racial politics and its consequences; the complex symbolism of Obama’s achievement and his own obfuscations and evasions regarding racial justice. Eschewing the critical excesses of both the left and the right, Kennedy offers an incisive view of Obama’s triumphs and travails, his strengths and weaknesses, as they pertain to the troubled history of race in America.

The Obama Presidency and the Politics of Change
The Obama Presidency and the Politics of Change

Author: Edward Ashbee

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2016-11-09

Total Pages: 337

ISBN-13: 3319410334

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This edited volume considers the extent to which the Obama presidency matched the promises of hope and change that were held out in the 2008 election. Contributors assess the character of “change” and, within this context, survey the extent to which there was enduring change within particular policy areas, both domestic and foreign. The authors combine empirical detail with more speculative assessment of the limits and possibilities of change amidst a very dense institutional landscape and in an era of intense political polarization. Some see significant changes, the full consequences of which may only be evident in later years. Other authors in the collection present a markedly different picture and suggest that processes of change were not only limited and partial but at times leading the US in directions far removed from the promises of 2008. The book will make an important contribution to the debates about the Obama legacy.

Let Me Be Clear
Let Me Be Clear

Author: Katie Kieffer

Publisher: Forum Books

Published: 2014-06-24

Total Pages: 377

ISBN-13: 0804139768

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A SEARING INDICTMENT OF THE MASTER OF CHARM, BARACK OBAMA, FOR HIS HISTORIC WAR ON AMERICAN YOUTH “Let me be clear.” It was his come-hither call, his winsome whistle, his lingual lure. Barack Obama employed this phrase to sell his lies as maxims and his ineptitude as expertise. From JFK to Bill Clinton, America has experienced charming and coy presidents. But the most charming and coy is Obama, who seduced a generation of 95 million young Americans he used for his own political gain. Katie Kieffer is a gutsy commentator who gives it back to Barack. She turns his words against him. She grabs the high bar of transparency that Obama set for himself and snaps it with her wit. In Let Me Be Clear, Kieffer gives us an unflinching yet entertaining account of this administration’s exploitation of Millennials: · How: Obama spearheaded the Great Recovery—and young people could tell when their law degrees landed them jobs as baristas. · What: the “New Shacking Up” entails. (Hint: parents AND young people hate this trend.) · How: Barack’s buddy essentially wrote Obama-care without Congress. Plus, nearly 300 doctors offer free-market solutions to improve health care. · How: a constitutional law–professor president failed to rationally discuss gay marriage. · Why: Barack wouldn’t have been the best father for Trayvon Martin; he deserved better. · What: “Assuming We Don’t Die Tonight” reveals about the bloodcurdling story of Benghazi. · How: liberal lies about guns have “tattooed” all youths as criminals. Kieffer implodes the naïve War on Guns and presents solutions for mass violence with more love and more guns. Inspiring hope, Kieffer outlines how conser­vatives and independents can win electoral races and achieve entrepreneurial dreams. Kieffer’s got grit. She’s very clear with her president: she brings smooth-tongued bullies to justice. See for yourself.

Saving Obama
Saving Obama

Author: John A. Maxwell

Publisher:

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780595523511

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A philosophical examination of the cultural and spiritual significance of Barack Obama's candidacy. Maxwell's book is a political tome that is practically devoid of conventional political opinion or fact. Rather, it is a series of ruminations on the more ethereal aspects of Obama, including his persona, biography and potential as a cultural touchstone. Organized in sections of essay and poetry based thematically around the seven deadly sins (the "Sins of Our Fathers" from the book's subtitle), the author suggests that Obama is a politician who serves as a unique symbol to help us understand the errors our forebears have made, as well as an opportunity for redemption. Maxwell looks at Obama from a variety of fresh perspectives, including his role as both a devoted parent and a son who was abandoned by his father. At some points it is difficult to discern concrete ideas in the midst of Maxwell's sometimes overly flowery prose- he seems to imagine Obama more as a symbol than an actual person, let alone a political figure. For instance, he calls Obama "our American prince" and says that he "representatively is any troubled youth." Considering Maxwell's penchant for highly emotional, impressionistic writing, poetry fits his temperament most effectively, and many of the poems feature strong imagery and a clearer distillation of what Maxwell is trying to convey than his essays do. The major fault of the poetry is that it can at times be overly sentimental, too, which diminishes its impact and does nothing to allay the general vagueness of this book. But overall, Maxwell offers a provocative view of the aspects of Obama that can't be covered in a white paper or a policy speech. An interesting, if murky, take on what Obama means from a symbolic, rather than political, standpoint.-Kirkus Discoveries