inside outlook
Kings rule, and other
myths about chess. b3North Dakota had to give
up on contact tracing. B4INSIDE book worldThe fire that torched
Nero’s reputation. b6Editing genes and
changing the future. b7here, from childhood to schooling to community
organizing to law to marriage to politics and
finally to the White House, and then from
financial crisis to health-care battles, from endless
war in distant lands to an endless spill at the
bottom of the ocean. Yet Obama himself remains
at a distance, immersed more in thought than
action, always on the lookout for contradictions
and symbolism, unveiling himself only in select
moments. If there is a narrative here, it concerns
what happens inside the writer’s own head.
And so the book’s main revelation concerns
that, too. Obama says he wrote “A Promised Land”
to invite young people “to once again remake the
world, and to bring about... an America that
finally aligns with all that is best in us.” Implicit in
such an invitation is an admission of his failure to
bring about that alignment in his time. Part of it is
due to obstructionism by congressional
Republicans, who turned opposition to the first
Black president from a means of politics to its
end. Part of it stems from the impossible
expectations with which Obama imbued his
see lozada on B 2I
’ve long been imagining Barack Obama’s
presidential memoir. Would it be an
extension of the life and mind found in
“Dreams From My Father” and “The Audacity
of Hope,” part three of a most introspective
trilogy? Would it see itself in conversation — or
competition — with the memoirs and reflections
of presidents past? Or might it somehow
complement Michelle Obama’s blockbuster 2018
memoir, “Becoming,” on the struggle to articulate
one’s purpose while shifting from private to public
life?
The answer is yes. Obama’s lengthy and still
partial account of his presidency is some version
of all of these books; its strength, like that of its
author, is in the ability to be many things to many
people.
But the deeper one wades through it, the clearer
it becomes that “A Promised Land” is less a
personal memoir than an unusual sort of history,
one recounted by the man at the center of it, a
man who seems always to be observing himself in
action, always wondering if he is guiding the
currents or driven by them. There is chronologyThe examined life
of Barack Obama
In his memoir, the former president is both the subject
and the judge, writes The Post’s Carlos Lozada
by Steven Levingston
F
ormer president Barack Obama sprinkles his
new memoir with some kind words for his
onetime wingman Joe Biden. “Joe had heart,”
he writes in “A Promised Land.” “He had endured
unimaginable tragedy.... Joe was decent, honest,
and loyal. I believed he cared about ordinary people.”
But haven’t we heard all this before? In one form or
another, Obama has uttered these plaudits again and
again.
Over eight years, he and Biden forged a historic
White House friendship: No president and vice
president had ever grown so close and demonstrated
such affection for each other. If anyone could
provide special insight into our new president-elect,
Obama surely would be that person. But you won’t
find much enlightenment on Biden as presidential
buddy, or as incoming Oval Office occupant, in the
pages of Obama’s memoir. The book stops short of
revealing how Obama really feels about his former
partner. Don’t look here for deep introspection on
our 46th president or even a recognition of the
so-called bromance that enthralled a large swath of
the American public. This first volume of the presi-
dent’s memoirs ends in 2011, before the relationship
hit its emotional peak amid the illness and death of
see obama on B 3Biden’s onetime boss
has nothing new
to say about him
wayne brezinka for the washington postP
resident Trump has report-
edly spent little time think-
ing about his post-pre-
sidential life. (“You can’t broach
it with him,” an anonymous
friend told the New Yorker in
recent days. “He’d be furious at
the suggestion that he could
lose.”) But he will surely avail
himself of the same consolation
prize his predecessors did: a
presidential library. What will it
look like?
The federal presidential li-
brary system traces its origins to
Franklin Roosevelt’s 1941 estab-
lishment of a library to make his
records more accessible in the
interests of transparency. But
lack of funding and weak over-
sight by the National Archives
and Records Administration
mean that, without significant
changes in the law, Trump will
have a perfect pedestal where he
can erect a shrine to himself. His
records won’t be available in full
until after he dies; he’ll be able to
raise millions to award sinecures
to his aides as they tout his
supposed successes at “making
America great again”; there is no
mandate to pursue historical ac-
curacy; he can whitewash his
legacy. This will be the headquar-
ters for Trump’s permanent post-
presidential campaign.
And while Trump’s presidency
was distinguished by constant
departures from norms, the li-
see library on B 5Trump’s
library will be
a shrine to his
colossal ego
It will obscure the truth
about his presidency, says
scholar Paul MusgraveT
he polls were promising;
the money was pouring in
by the tens of millions.
From Maine to Alaska, Republi-
can incumbents were facing loss-
es that would turn the Senate
blue. It was even tight in Kansas,
which last sent a Democrat to the
Senate in 1932.
Instead, after an election that
saw incumbent after incumbent
roll to victory by double-digit
pluralities, and with Democrats
needing two runoff wins in Geor-
gia just to achieve a 50-50 tie that
soon-to-be Vice President Kama-
la Harris would break, a familiar
lament is circulating yet again:
The Senate is, as Vox put it,
inherently “anti-democratic” —
and un-Democratic, making it all
but impossible for the party rep-
resenting a majority of voters to
win power in the chamber. Only
reforming the structure of the
Senate, which gives each state the
same number of senators no mat-
ter how many people live there,
can fix this. (“Abolish the Senate,”
longtime Rep. John Dingell (D-
Mich.) wrote in 2018, and the
Baffler made the same call this
September.)
But in reality, the Senate isn’t
quite the unsolvable problem
that Democratic critics think it is.
The chamber’s current Republi-
can tilt is political, not structural
— and it could be overcome
see senate on B 5No, the U.S.
Senate isn’t
rigged against
Democrats
Journalist Jeff Greenfield
says the small states
aren’t always red onesKLMNO
Outlook
sunday, november 22 , 2020. Section B EZ BD