Has anyone read this book?

[Writer]

Reading Obama: Dreams, Hope, and the American Political Tradition by James T. Kloppenberg. It just released on Halloween.

Here is the abstract:

Barack Obama puzzles observers. Derided by the Right as dangerous and by the Left as spineless, Obama does not fit contemporary partisan categories. Instead, his writings and speeches reflect a principled aversion to absolutes that derives from sustained engagement with American democratic thought. Reading Obama traces the origins of his ideas and establishes him as the most penetrating political thinker elected to the presidency in the past century.

James T. Kloppenberg demonstrates the influences that have shaped Obama's distinctive worldview, including Nietzsche and Niebuhr, Ellison and Rawls, and recent theorists engaged in debates about feminism, critical race theory, and cultural norms. Examining Obama's views on the Constitution, slavery and the Civil War, the New Deal, and the civil rights movement, Kloppenberg shows Obama's sophisticated understanding of American history. Obama's interest in compromise, reasoned public debate, and the patient nurturing of civility is a sign of strength, not weakness, Kloppenberg argues. He locates its roots in Madison, Lincoln, and especially in the philosophical pragmatism of William James and John Dewey, which nourished generations of American progressives, black and white, female and male, through much of the twentieth century, albeit with mixed results.

Reading Obama reveals the sources of Obama's commitment to democratic deliberation: the books he has read, the visionaries who have inspired him, the social movements and personal struggles that have shaped his thinking. Kloppenberg shows that Obama's positions on social justice, religion, race, family, and America's role in the world do not stem from a desire to please everyone but from deeply rooted--although currently unfashionable--convictions about how a democracy must deal with difference and conflict.

[LawnLover]

1. Unfortunately, we live in a world where

intellect, subtlety and nuance are no longer admired or rewarded.

[Phx_Dem]

4. Exactly. And people aren't realistic, they want everything right now.

[jpgray]

2. The library of a dilettante resembles that of a savant

I'm not arguing Obama is either, of course. This guy is doing that. If only the value of one's library matched the value of one's ideas--choosing leaders would be much simpler. Obama seems to pursue nothing so much as the appellation of "serious person." He is a tireless and intelligent worker in that regard. In Chicago that meant one thing; in the Beltway it means something else. It's a curious progression from Saul Alinsky to Larry Summers in seeking inspiration for public service--as to whether that comes from some inscrutable depth of erudition or a sort of schizophrenic ambition, or some mix of the two, who knows? Not the author of this book.

:)

[BrklynLiberal]

3. "It's a curious progression from Saul Alinsky to Larry Summers" EXCELLENT point!

[Bluenorthwest]

5. What nonsense!

"a principled aversion to absolutes" does not fit well with Obama's constant declaration of dogmatic theology as his rationale for opposing the equal rights of GLBT Americans. The President says "I am a Christian" as the explaination for his views that GLBT people should not be treated the same as others. That is one huge absolute, he takes up the guise of the divine, no less, and announces that the almighty agrees with him.
So where is this aversion to absolutes? He says "one man, one woman" and claims that straight people are 'sanctified by God' while others are not.
This is a piece that ignores most of Obama in order to creat a better version.

[noel711]

6. So what's on YOUR library shelves?

This is interesting..
but I am not surprised.

So... Governor Palin, what books have you read that influenced your world view?

National Inquirer?