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Obama: From Promise to Power. By David Mendell. 406 pgs. New York: Amistad, 2007. Written by a journalist intent on characterizing Obama as out of touch liberal, Obama: From Promise to Power is a book that gives interesting details about Obama's life experiences while highlighting one journalist's conspicuous effort to undermine Obama's presidential campaign. Mendell is a duplicitous journalist who harps on Obama's perceived shortcomings: his curt responses to journalists like Mendell engage in the sort of Washington politics that Obama decries, his inability to shake the persistent habit of smoking, and Obama's struggle to paint himself as a post-racial candidate in a country still obsessed with racial division. I bought this book because I thought I would read about the significant achievements Obama had made, but instead, I learned more about an intrusive journalist's deceptive and disingenuous tactics towards senator Obama. At times, Mendell tries to appear ingratiating to Obama, but Obama is perceptive enough to see through Mendell's deception. I originally bought Obama because I thought I would learn about Obama's meteoric rise to power. Instead, the book is designed to convince Obama supporters interested in his personality that Obama is just another ordinary politician who has used his speech against the Iraq War to score political points. While Mendell critiques MSNBC's Chris Matthews for feeling elated after Obama's 2004 Democratic Convention speech, it is obvious that Mendell is either a McCain or Hillary Clinton supporter. Mendell writes more about his opinions and his underhanded attacks on senator Obama; he seems to engage in the same slimy tactics Mark Penn and the supporters of John McCain engage in whenever they repeat Obama's middle name, "Hussein," as though having a Muslim middle name will condemn Barack Obama to political oblivion. In one passage, senator Obama shows his prescience and realizes that Mendelll is a journalist bent on smearing Obama's reputation:He [Obama] asked why I had been "taking all these jabs" at him in my Tribune stories. I was perplexed by what he meant. I thought my coverage had been balanced. But Obama referred to a line from a story that had run a couple of months earlier. Obviously, the line had been eating at him. I had written that while he was a talented orator, his debate skills might be suspect. I said that he had a tendency to be "verbose" in press interviews, occasionally meandering off his message and waxing philosophical about other policy views. He was also not a good "sound bite" politician--not the type who could deliver a quick one-line punch to the gut of an opponent. And the winner of a debate is often the candidate who delivers the most memorable punch" (Mendell 297). What is really eerie about Mendell's comment to Obama is that one wonders whether he was aware of the Reverend Wright clip that would be replayed incessantly to scare off white voters from Obama's multiracial platform of unity and change. If so, that makes his undercover hit job on Obama even more cynical. It appears that Mendell is one of those insignificant journalists who make a living from trying to smear others. Obama appears to have more character than Mendell attributes to him because I can't even imagine what would give him the impression that he should even tolerate Mendell's nefarious tactics. Since Mendell has such obvious objections to Obama's candidacy, it would be refreshing if he could give his readers concrete reasons to dismiss Obama as just another politician. However, Mendell often makes illogical arguments and appears to base his views on hearsay rather than fact. He is a journalist of the sound-byte generation, but he appears to be out of touch with the information age and with the electronic revolution that Broadband access has brought about. Mendell underestimates the ability of American voters to dig deeper into details when he makes sweeping statements, such as Obama is not good at making speeches. Obama's "More Perfect Union" speech has been viewed by millions; no other politician has possessed such a commanding audience in recent history. The only advantage to reading Mendell's Obama is that Obama may have trouble with people like him--it would have been better if Mendell had simply affirmed his bias instead of pretended to be balanced in his approach to Obama's life story. It would have been more interesting if Mendell had been honest with his readers and said, "Look, I have reservations about Obama. I think he is trying to score political points. I don't believe in his campaign because I feel it's empty rhetoric." If there are any potential flaws in Obama's historic candidacy, it may be that America is not ready for the type of change his mixed heritage and his experience promises. However, Mendell just tries to paint Obama as just another politician while manifestly harrassing Obama on the campaign trail. Instead of being balanced or forthright with his audience, Mendell tries to pass off his prejudices as fact, a strategy which fails and actually ends up turning his Obama biography into a reflection of Mendell's inflated ego. This type of one-sided journalism makes one wonder whether Mendell is another tabloid journalist bent on using his own ego to undermine Obama's reputation. Instead of looking like the caricature that Mendell describes him as, Obama becomes more lkeable in the wake of Mendell's transparent attempt to vilify him. The description of the book on the jacket belies Mendell's intent to ridicule Obama. While the Clinton campaign derided Bill Richardson as a Judas for having decided to support Obama, it appears that journalists like Mendell are becoming the real Judases in America. By masquerading as an Obama supporter, Mendell deceives his potential audience with his two-faced rhetoric. He should have renamed the book from Obama: From Promise to Power to How One Journalist Hounded Obama on the Campaign Trail. | |||
