"It's one of the best books on politics of any kind I've read. For entertainment value, I put it up there with Catch 22." --The Financial Times
"It transports you to a parallel universe in which everything in the National Enquirer is true....More interesting is what we learn about the candidates themselves: their frailties, egos and almost super-human stamina." --The Financial Times
"I can't put down this book!" --Stephen Colbert
Game Change is the New York Times bestselling story of the 2008 presidential election, by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin, two of the best political reporters in the country. In the spirit of Richard Ben Cramer's What It Takes and Theodore H. White's The Making of the President 1960, this classic campaign trail book tells the defining story of a new era in American politics, going deeper behind the scenes of the Obama/Biden and McCain/Palin campaigns than any other account of the historic 2008 election.
John Heilemann, national political correspondent and columnist for New York, is an award-winning journalist and the author of Pride Before the Fall: The Trials of Bill Gates and the End of the Microsoft Era.
Mark Halperin is editor-at-large and senior political analyst for Time. He is also senior political analyst for MSNBC, the author of The Undecided Voter’s Guide to the Next President, and the co-author of The Way to Win: Taking the White House in 2008.
Table of Contents
Authors' Note ix
Prologue 1
Part I
1 Her Time 19
2 The Alternative 36
3 The Ground Beneath Her Feet 63
4 Getting to Yes 88
5 The Inevitables 124
6 Barack in a Box 167
7 "They Looooove Me!" 199
8 The Turning Point 235
9 The Fun Part 258
10 Two for the Price of One 285
11 Fear and Loathing in the Lizard's Thicket 309
12 Pulling Away and Falling Apart 347
13 Obama Agonistes 374
14 The Bitter End Game 402
Part II
15 The Maverick and His Meltdown 433
16 Running Unopposed 460
17 Slipping Nooses, Slaying Demons 490
Part III
18 Paris and Berlin 517
19 The Mile-High Club 537
20 Sarahcuda 565
21 September Surprise 605
22 Seconds in Command 634
23 The Finish Line 671
Epilogue: Together at Last 689
What People are Saying About This
Kurt Andersen
“Riveting, definitive. . . . A great campaign book. . . . Halperin and Heilemann got insiders to cough up astonishing artifacts, including emails and recordings. . . . Game Change is really interesting, and puts you deep in the middle of it.”
Stephen Colbert
“I can’t put down this book!”
Michiko Kakutani
“A fascinating account. . . . Heilemann and Halperin serve up a spicy smorgasbord of observations, revelations, and allegations. . . . Game Change leaves the reader with a vivid, visceral sense of the campaign and a keen understanding of the paradoxes and contingencies of history.”
Tina Brown
“A smoking new book. . . . The real revelation in Game Change: Campaigns turn our politicians into lunatics.”
Tim Rutten
“Compulsively readable. Once begun, you can’t put it down. . . . Deeply and knowledgeably reported and presented with all the cool sophistication one would expect from two accomplished political reporters.”
Joe Scarborough
“The best presidential political book since What it Takes by Richard Ben Cramer and Teddy White’s books. These are the types of books that got me into politics.”
Don Imus
“You’ve got to read Game Change. . . . I read each and every word. . . . Game Change is a great book.”
Tina Jordan
“Riveting. . . . Its pages brim with scandalous tidbits. . . . This is a must-read for anyone interested in the cutthroat backroom hows and whys of a presidential campaign. . . . And it doesn’t hurt that Game Change reads more bodice-ripper than Beltway.”
Hendrik Hertzberg
“The authors of Game Change succeed in creating a plausible account of the emotional tumult of the 2008 campaign as it might have been—perhaps even was—experienced by the candidates, their spouses, and their staffs.”
Clive Crook
“An amazing piece of work. . . . One of the best books on politics of any kind I’ve read. For entertainment value, I put it up there with Catch 22. . . . An absolutely gripping read . . . they can write.”
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