In the USA, on November 17, the first volume of the new book of the 44th President of the USA, Barack Obama, "A Promised Land" went on sale, which breaking sales records. Memoirs describe his political career and first presidential term. The book describes several political figures from the point of view of the former head of state, who was in power from 2009 to 2017.
Obama admitted that the writing process "didn't quite go according to plan", as evidenced by the fact that the book was eventually divided into two volumes, which will be released at different times. This is already the third memoir of the former president. The first book was published in 1995 and was called "My Father's Dream". The second, "Audacity of Hope", was released in 2006.
ElitExpert chose the most interesting moments from the book.
About Trump and Biden
Obama recalls that many considered Joe Biden, the likely winner of the last November 3 US presidential election, to be a skeptic. This was connected, among other things, with the fact that he had a bad attitude towards the participation of the USA in the war in Afghanistan.
In detail, he writes about the choice of Biden as his candidate for the post of vice president.
"I liked the fact that Joe was more than ready to take over the presidency if something happened to me — and that might reassure those who were still worried that I was too young," Obama said.
However, according to him, intuition was more important, which told him: "Joe was decent, honest and loyal." "I thought that he cared about ordinary people, and that I could trust him when things were going badly. I would not be disappointed," added the politician.
Speaking about his successor, Donald Trump, Obama noted that he took advantage of the mood of citizens before the elections. The ex-president recalled the rumors that he was not born in the USA and, therefore, was an illegal president.
"He [Trump] promised millions of Americans, frightened by the presence of a black man in the White House, a cure for racist fears," Obama wrote.
The politician also pointed to the Trump phenomenon: statements that were always considered vulgar and indecent suddenly brought him media success.
“In that sense, there wasn't much of a difference between Trump, [former House Speaker, Republican John] Boehner, or [Senate Speaker, Republican Mitch] McConnell. They also understood that it doesn't matter whether they told the truth, Obama wrote. "In fact, the only difference between their political styles was that Trump lacked restraint at all."
About racism among Republicans
The former president notes that initially Trump's antics were perceived more like a joke. However, the election of a black president in 2008 intensified the divisions in society, and Republicans began to use it for their political purposes. According to Obama, in the end, views that "moved from the periphery of politics to its center" changed the Republican Party. "It seemed that my very presence in the White House unleashed a deep panic, a feeling that the natural order of things had been violated," he wrote.
In general, the topic of confrontation with the Republicans and transformation of the party is mentioned more than once. In this connection, he recalls the candidate for the presidency in the 2008 elections, John McCain, and the vice-presidential candidate, Sarah Palin. The latter rose in the ranks of the party during the eight years of Obama's rule.
"It seemed that through Palin, the dark spirits that had been hiding in the corners of the modern Republican Party for a long time found their way to the center stage - xenophobia, anti-intellectualism, paranoid conspiracy theories, antipathy towards blacks and people of color," the former president wrote. According to him, it was she who became the template for subsequent Republican politicians.
He added that the struggle with them influenced some of his daily presidential decisions. He noted that even such a difficult election was often complicated by internal disputes, mismanagement on the part of the previous administration and obstructionism on the part of the Republican Party.
About Putin and Sarcasm
The memoirs contain Obama's impressions of a number of political figures, including foreign ones. The former American leader noted that the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, reminded him of "the harsh bosses who were brought up by the laws of the streets, who used to rule Chicago." At the same time, he noted that the physical politician was "unremarkable".
On the pages of his memoirs, he also remembered former French President Nicolas Sarkozy. According to Obama, he "stuck out his chest like a cocky rooster."
The 44th president also admitted that it was boring for him to participate in meetings with the former President of the People's Republic of China, Hu Jintao. It was noted that he was allegedly monotonously reading a pre-prepared text, which is why Obama thought to offer "to exchange documents and save each other's time by getting to know them at leisure."
Recognition of mistakes
The 44th president pointed out that mistakes were made not only by his opponents, but also by himself. Thus, he called his inability to carry out immigration reform a "bitter pill to swallow." Separately, he noted the poor state of the economy during the 2010 midterm elections, when the Republican Party regained control of the House of Representatives.
"The elections did not prove that our course was wrong. They simply proved that (…) I failed to unite the nation, as Roosevelt once did. It turned out to be just as terrible for me," Obama wrote.
Separately, the former president also admits to personal weaknesses. He told how the stress in the White House pushed him to start smoking. Obama sometimes smoked eight, nine or even ten cigarettes a day, and also looked for "a quiet place to smoke in the evening." He quit after his daughter Malia "smelled the smell of cigarettes" - then he switched to chewing gum with nicotine.
