Ever since I was eligible to do so, I've done my duty by voting in every presidential campaign, but it was only this most recent one in which I had any emotional involvement. No matter how it turned out, it was guaranteed to be a historic one, wrought with more drama than a year's worth of soap operas.
Barely more than a year later after the outcome, it's fascinating to revisit the story — and then learn the story behind the story — in John Heilemann and Mark Halperin's GAME CHANGE: OBAMA AND THE CLINTONS, MCCAIN AND PALIN, AND THE RACE OF A LIFETIME. Like ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN, it's one of those rare political books with mass appeal, as exciting as any thriller, even though you know how it ends.
To borrow a favorite sentence-opener from President Barack Obama, let me be clear: This is largely a story about the battle between not him and John McCain, but him and Hillary Clinton. Savvily, it doesn't even conclude with the night of the election, but a more suspenseful decision some time later. The Republican side of the equation doesn't pop in until page 271 of this 464-pager, because, at least at first, that race wasn't as interesting.
But how soon we forget that Clinton once bested Obama in the polls by 33 points, and that even John Edwards was solidly ahead. How those fortunes reversed is not an easy story to tell, but Heilemann and Halperin do so by piecing together some 200 firsthand accounts of those who were there, candidates included. One wishes a "cast of characters" list were included — or at least some photos — because a lot of the staffers tend to run together.
Ultimately, it's the story that matters ... and what a story it is. Some interesting revelations:
• Had Clinton run in 2004 as she initially planned, she might have won. Only her pledge to finish her first Senate term kept her from throwing her hat into the ring. Although indecisive and dubbed "Napoleon in a navy pantsuit," she emerges from the book strong with more humanity than ever; most of the failures of her campaign are pointed at her husband, who often did what he wanted, even against his wife's wishes (like rewriting her speech without her knowledge at the 11th hour).
• Edwards seems completely delusional. And for more on that, read the now-famous excerpt.
• McCain is even more hotheaded than we realized. I know that if I waved both my extended middle fingers at my wife's face and screamed "Fuck you! Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!" as he did to his spouse, because she dared interrupt him, I might be moving in to a one-bedroom apartment.
• It's known that McCain's team didn't properly vet truth-shader Sarah Palin, but what wasn't known — until now — is how she had to be schooled on our world wars, how she didn't even know Joe Biden's last name, and how she was more concerned with whether her "brand" was "hair up."
And, running counter to a slew of negative reviews this book has received, don't think Obama gets off easy. He doesn't. He's not portrayed as the "black Jesus" his staffers dubbed him, but as someone whose confidence equals his arrogance, with numerous foot-in-mouth examples given. I have to wonder, naysayers, did we read the same book? Clearer portraits of all candidates emerge, for good and ill, as Heilemann and Halperin are fair to both sides; neither is shown favoritism or cut slack.
For example, in the course of the campaign, the press leveled allegations of infidelity at four major players: Bill Clinton, Edwards, McCain and Palin. Which two really stuck? So much for the so-called "liberal media."
GAME CHANGE offers an insider's perspective writ large. If you thought the bombshell stories coming from both parties were incredible throughout the campaign cycle, wait until you read the ones that didn't make the headlines. In compiling them into this imminently readable account, the authors have made headlines of their own. I'm fairly certain they'll be able to do the same four years from now. —Rod Lott
Buy it at Amazon.
"And then it would hit them like a ton of bricks in their psychic solar plexus.”
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- The Ridiculous Race
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- The Execution of Willie Francis: Race, Murder, and the Search for Justice in the American South
- BOOKS 2 FILM >> Death Race
- CELEBRITY QUICK PICKS >> 4.25.08
- Race for the Dying
- Winds of Change
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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
This may well be the most fascinating book about politics I’ve ever read. Edwards comes off as a total sleaze and even his wife, Saint Elizabeth, fares badly. I’d say Hillary Clinton comes off better than any of the others, and I still sorta wish she were president instead of Obama. The most reassuring thing in the book, though, comes from the Republican side–the fact that even the high level McCain staffers were scared shitless at the thought of a possible Palin presidency.
I would’ve been cool with Hillary as president. I would’ve been cool with McCain as president … until he chose Palin to run with him, seemingly at random.
One reason I think Clinton comes off better in the book then she might have is because the authors essentially ignore the bitter battle over the super-delegates whose votes could essentially void the actual result of the primaries. I was shocked that the importance of Florida didn’t come up until the Republican chapters, when one of the greatest examples of Clinton’s dirty tricks came from her campaigning in the state even though all of the other democrats agreed to boycott it due to its changing its election date and then claiming that her landslide victory there represented a clear mandate for her candidacy and that any attempt to ignore those votes was a clear attempt at disenfranchisement. That, as far as I could see, was as dirty as the Democratic campaign got, so I couldn’t believe it didn’t even rate a mention in the book.
That may be the second dickiest move on the part of the Dems (and Clinton). The first is starting the “Obama’s a Muslim!” rumors to scare the hell out of everyone, which the Republicans then ran with.
But that also leads to one of the funniest lines in the book, when a woman in a focus group says she fears Obama for being “an Arab,” yet won’t vote for McCain because “if he dies, then Sarah Palin would be president.” Well, at least that woman had half a brain.