Obama's Last Stand: POLITICO Playbook 2012 (Kindle Single) [Kindle Edition]

Glenn Thrush (Author), Politico (Author), Evan Thomas (Introduction)

Book Description

A series of four instant eBooks on the 2012 presidential election, POLITICO’s Playbook 2012 provides an unprecedented real-time account of the race for the White House. The third edition, Obama’s Last Stand, follows the reelection campaign of President Barack Obama as it struggles to find the winning formula in a political landscape that has changed dramatically since his history-making victory in 2008.
 
Though battered and bruised after nearly four years in office, Barack Obama remains the most competitive player on the field in American politics today. In Obama’s Last Stand, POLITICO White House correspondent Glenn Thrush chronicles the efforts of the president and his team to secure a second term in the face of a determined opposition, unfavorable economic headwinds, and a series of missteps by his own team.
 
This is a revealing portrait of the president at the most precarious moment in his political life, with insights and anecdotes drawn straight from the notebook of one of the most perceptive reporters in America. The trash-talking schoolyard athlete in Obama is very much in evidence, especially when he speaks caustically about his Republican rivals, including the man he thinks is trying to steal his legacy, Mitt Romney.
 
Yet apart from Romney and the uncertain economy, Obama’s greatest obstacle on the road to reelection may be Obama 2008. He and his team of talented advisers must try to reconcile their nostalgia for that once-in-a-lifetime campaign with the realities of an election fundamentally altered by the advent of super PACs and the evaporation of Obama’s superstar popularity. That challenge has led a campaign operation that once prided itself on flawless execution of strategy to commit several of the most dangerous unforced errors of Obama’s political career.
 
Yet the game is far from over. If Obama is sometimes his own worst enemy, he also has the talent and drive to reclaim this race. Spurred on by the realistic prospect of losing, and growing ever more impatient with the foibles of his campaign staff, Obama the competitor is gearing up for the most critical fourth quarter of his career. This is the story of the last stand that will either cement his legacy forever—or consign him to a roster of once-promising one-term presidents.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

As Glenn Thrush fastidiously demonstrates in Obama's Last Stand, "competitiveness is a presidential trait," one the incumbent has in droves. Quite tellingly, a banner which hangs in Obama's campaign headquarters in Chicago reads: Respect. Empower. Include. Win. The banner had once omitted "Win" from its de facto list of objectives, but the addendum is a testament to the shifting gears of the 2012 political campaign, as the threat of a Republican victory looms ever larger. For the latest installment of POLITICO's Playbook 2012, Thrush, a veteran political reporter now covering the White House for POLITICO, chronicles Obama's second battle for the Oval Office in great detail. Through his extensive reporting, Thrush uncovers a side to Obama's character rarely seen by the public--a cold, calculating and competitive man, a President who "is willing to play fast and rough to stay in the Oval Office." From Super PACs to the fading veneer of his popularity, everything seems to be standing in the way of a second term. Will Obama's Last Stand ultimately yield a victory? Only time will tell. --Raya Jalabi

Product Details

• File Size: 1858 KB
• Publisher: Random House (August 20, 2012)
• Sold by: Random House Digital, Inc.
• Language: English
• ASIN: B008QLT0ZG
• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• X-Ray: Enabled
• Lending: Not Enabled
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #52,902 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
  • #11 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Politics & Social Sciences > Politics & Government > Elections & Political Process > Elections
  • #24 in Kindle Store > Kindle Singles > Reporting
  • #35 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Politics & Government > Elections & Political Process > Elections

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 36 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars An entertaining narrative, with tidbits from the inside of WH August 21, 2012

By Milkman

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

This e-book can be read in less than two hours and is an insider account of the Obama reelection campaign since 2011. The book is presented in brief vignettes and they are focused around the timeframe of early spring 2012 (GOP primary) to the end of this July.

This is real embedded journalism, but to be clear the point of view is subtly pro-Obama. In fact the introduction to the book reads like a warning that you will read some ugliness about the Obama team but to keep in mind that both Obama and Romney are guilty of running campaigns that descend into the gutter, which is a subjective comment completely off topic for the narrative to follow.

Glenn Thrush seems to bend over backwards to make Obama into his narrative's sympathetic protagonist. Obama is portrayed as a reluctant warrior who supposedly belabors decisions by his campaign to go negative, but on the other hand he's described in more intimate scenes as the most competitive guy you'd meet... challenging staffers to pick up basketball and other games and striving to win at all costs.

The White House is male-dominated and mirrors the President's competitiveness, which leads to the Obama campaign's strategy of "killing Romney," and yes those words are quoted in the book from a Democrat strategist. You'll read how the campaign conducted focus groups and arrived at the strategy. Then you'll read how Obama and others at times are unsure of the strategy and bicker over its implementation.

Obama is shown at times as hyper-aggressive... he is said to want to run against Marco Rubio to kick his ass, and that he hates Mitt Romney as a human being. But then we are told that Obama is pulling punches... that he didn't want to form a Super PAC and he still desires to give his soaring speeches like 2008 instead of the taunting he does from the stump in 2012. These contradictory data points remind us that this is not an accurate psychoanalysis of Obama as much as an entertaining narrative with some insider gossip thrown in.

The best parts of the e-book are the insider details on the personality clashes within the Obama campaign and broader allied organizations like Priorities USA. Particularly enjoyable is how Priorities USA director Bill Burton and DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman-Schultz are each disrespected by most in the Obama sphere.

And for comic relief we have the hapless Joe Biden. Re-live his screw ups from the past year and see the fallout from the inside of the White House.

This is a good brief read for politicos and will likely be discussed around Capitol Hill and the like for the next couple of weeks, so I will recommend it if you want to spend a couple hours reliving the news cycles of the past few months and digging a little deeper into the personalities that surround Obama's reelection campaign.

33 of 40 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Informative August 20, 2012

By James B. King

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

This is so much better than the earlier titles in the series which were a rehash of the news. This one provides
behind the scenes glimpses in the tradition of Teddy White

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Good peek into the start of the 2012 Campaign September 6, 2012

By Tenderfart

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

As an e-book/Kindle single, this was a solid, interesting piece of investigative reporting. It's definitely set up for a deeper dive into the subject, regardless of the election's outcome, that can result in a great book. As a biographical sketch, they did a great job of outlining the key players and showing the tension points that have led to a less than stellar beginning to the campaign. I enjoyed the read very much and appreciated that the tone struck by the authors was more detached and journalistic than a lot of the slobbering, fawning pieces you see coming from people like Jodi Kantor and David Remnick.