David axelrod (political consultant)
No question, he wants to be seen in a good light, and he wants Barack Obama to be perceived positively especially since he still has two more years in the White House. When he functioned so well as a spin doctor, he would never have revealed such behind-the-scenes bumps and bruises. Believer , like most book-length efforts by reporters and former reporters, is long on facts and short on nuances.
In this context, Axelrod really misses an opportunity to depict his greatest candidate Barack Obama as a living, breathing person. How does he walk?
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Does he hum? What are his weaknesses on the basketball court? And about Obama himself. Carol was the daughter of an abusive father. In my experience, such struggles are not uncommon among men and women who are drawn to the great emotional risks and rewards of the public stage.
Biography of david axelrod book review
Dan Rostenkowski D, Ill. On the one hand, I credit much of my professional success to the drive and skills I drew from her. What did they think? At one point, as Obama was seriously considering a run for the presidency, the question arose over whether the candidate had the inner fire — because of his own ghosts or for other reasons — needed to win a race for the White House.
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By Jim Newton. Share via Close extra sharing options. More to Read. How Hollywood lost the culture war. In Believer: My 40 years in politics , he finally tells his own.
Biography of david axelrod book review new york times
This is a story encompassing a troubled childhood, the chaotic urban politics of Chicago and, ultimately, the White House. Obsession with politics drives Axelrod throughout, from seeing John F Kennedy speak in his hometown, when aged five. Themes of race, and backing the outsider, permeate the book. Could he turn Miliband into a vote winner?
The answer is implicit as Axelrod describes his intense relationships with senior Democrats across the decades. In contrast he is a distant adviser to Miliband, so distant he is rarely in the UK. Unsurprisingly Miliband does not get a look in as part of Axelrod's vivid story of winning elections in the US. In UK interviews Axelrod has awkwardly played down invitations from mischievous British interviewers to compare Obama and Miliband, stressing diplomatically that Obama had the dream life story on which to base an election campaign.
David axe: Axelrod’s Believer is a powerful and inspiring memoir enlivened by the charm and candor of one of the greatest political strategists in recent American history. DORIS KEARNS GOODWIN, author of The Bully Pulpit and Team of Rivals.
He did not state the obvious, that Miliband's life story, the son of a north London Marxist academic, was more of a challenge. In citing the importance of Obama's "life story" Axelrod highlights inadvertently one of the many differences between UK elections and those in which he played a pivotal role. In the US the individual candidate is often the sole "story".
Nothing else matters very much. Evidently this is not the case in UK elections.
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Miliband's ratings are terrible but he still has a chance of being the next prime minister. Cameron's "life story" is largely absent from the projection of the Conservatives' strategic thinking. There will be no mention of Eton, or the Bullingdon Club, or much about what Cameron did before he became leader of his party as he seeks to win an overall majority for the first time.