Audacity: How Barack Obama Defied His Critics and Created a Legacy That Will Prevail

by Jonathan Chait

Overview

The veteran political journalist presents "a compelling case that [Obama] was one of the most successful presidents of modern times" (The Guardian).

Over the course of eight years, Barack Obama amassed an array of outstanding achievements. His administration saved the American economy from collapse, expanded health insurance to millions, negotiated an historic nuclear deal with Iran, helped craft a groundbreaking international climate accord, reined in Wall Street and crafted a new vision of racial progress. He has done all of this despite a left that frequently disdained him as a sellout, and a hysterical right that did everything possible to destroy his agenda even when they agreed with what he was doing.

In Audacity, Jonathan Chait digs deep into Obama's record on major policy fronts—economics, the environment, domestic reform, health care, race, foreign policy, and civil rights—to demonstrate why history will judge our forty-fourth president as among the greatest in history. Audacity does not shy away from Obama's failures, most notably in foreign policy. Yet Chait convincingly shows that President Obama has accomplished what candidate Obama said he would, despite overwhelming opposition—and that the hopes of those who voted for him have not been dashed despite the smokescreen of extremist propaganda and the limits of short-term perspective.

"An essential starting point for those assessing the Obama presidency." —Washington Monthly

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780062426994
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	12/15/2023
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	277
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Jonathan Chait is a political columnist for New York magazine. He was previously a senior editor at the New Republic and has also written for the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Atlantic. He has been featured throughout the media, including appearances on NPR, MSNBC, Fox News, CNN, HBO, The Colbert Report, Talk of the Nation, C-SPAN, Hardball, and on talk radio in every major city in America. He lives in Washington, D.C.

Table of Contents

Introduction xi

Chapter 1 America's Primal Sin 1

Chapter 2 Preventing the Second Great Depression 33

Chapter 3 Obama Cares 75

Chapter 4 To Halt the Rise of the Oceans 115

Chapter 5 To Stanch a Bleeding World 141

Chapter 6 The Inevitability of Disappointment 161

Chapter 7 Obama's America 205

Acknowledgments 239

Editorial Reviews

…a timely, trenchant and relentlessly argued book…

The New York Times Book Review - Peter Baker

Chait’s brilliant new book, Audacity, upends the conventional wisdom of the Washington commentariat — and a surprising number of liberals — that Barack Obama’s presidency was little more than eight years of disappointment…setting out a compelling case that he was one of the most successful presidents of modern times.” — The Guardian

“A timely, trenchant and relentlessly argued book presenting the 44th president in terms that he himself would approve. Not only did Obama change America for the better, Chait writes, he also cemented a new policy infrastructure that will resist Trump’s efforts to tear it down.” — New York Times Sunday Book Review

“Audacity, by Jonathan Chait of New York magazine, one of today’s must-read political journalists…documents the scale of Obama’s domestic policy, on health care, taxes, finance, climate, civil rights and education. Chait also explains why [Obama’s successes] won’t simply disappear… The book is a brave one.” — David Leonhardt, New York Times Op-Ed columnist

“Chait offers a well-organized, clearly written case that will be valuable to future historians in their assessments.” — Kirkus Reviews

“[Chait] lacerates wimpish liberals and the duplicitous cynics on the right. He points out, over and over again, that, ideologically speaking, Obama’s policies were largely derived from a liberal Republican tradition.” — Brooklyn Rail

“Chait’s command of policy and politics, and his clarity of thought, guarantee that Audacity will remain an essential starting point for those assessing the Obama presidency.” — Washington Monthly

“[Chait is] one of the most influential political journalists of our time…the verve with which he pursues his quarries has made him one of our great polemicists.” — New Republic

“Audacity is a sturdy defense of the past eight years and an attack on left-wing Americans who moan about Obama’s timidity. And in this endeavor it is a rip-roaring success. Chait tells the Obama story with enormous sympathy, but with enough detachment to make it credible.” — The Times (UK)

From the Publisher

[Chait is] one of the most influential political journalists of our time…the verve with which he pursues his quarries has made him one of our great polemicists.

New Republic

Chait’s command of policy and politics, and his clarity of thought, guarantee that Audacity will remain an essential starting point for those assessing the Obama presidency.

Washington Monthly

Chait’s brilliant new book, Audacity, upends the conventional wisdom of the Washington commentariat — and a surprising number of liberals — that Barack Obama’s presidency was little more than eight years of disappointment…setting out a compelling case that he was one of the most successful presidents of modern times.

The Guardian

Audacity is a sturdy defense of the past eight years and an attack on left-wing Americans who moan about Obama’s timidity. And in this endeavor it is a rip-roaring success. Chait tells the Obama story with enormous sympathy, but with enough detachment to make it credible.

The Times (UK)

Audacity, by Jonathan Chait of New York magazine, one of today’s must-read political journalists…documents the scale of Obama’s domestic policy, on health care, taxes, finance, climate, civil rights and education. Chait also explains why [Obama’s successes] won’t simply disappear… The book is a brave one.

David Leonhardt

[Chait] lacerates wimpish liberals and the duplicitous cynics on the right. He points out, over and over again, that, ideologically speaking, Obama’s policies were largely derived from a liberal Republican tradition.

Brooklyn Rail

A timely, trenchant and relentlessly argued book presenting the 44th president in terms that he himself would approve. Not only did Obama change America for the better, Chait writes, he also cemented a new policy infrastructure that will resist Trump’s efforts to tear it down.

New York Times Sunday Book Review

2016-09-21
A cogent argument that President Barack Obama has mostly succeeded in implementing his agenda. As reflected in the book's title, New York political columnist Chait (The Big Con: The True Story of How Washington Got Hoodwinked and Hijacked by Crackpot Economics, 2007), a former senior editor at the New Republic, claims that Obama established audacious goals and never lost sight of how to implement them despite the opposition of the Republican majority within the U.S. Congress and ongoing racism throughout American society. Without tipping his hand about his long game, Chait maintains, Obama decided to absorb short-term setbacks, believing he would win a second term to accomplish what could not be implemented during the first. The author does not pretend to offer a scorecard on every vital initiative presented during Obama's two terms; rather, Chait focuses on the presidents approaches to economic policy, which was designed to alleviate the recession inherited from the Republicans; health care reform and the Affordable Care Act; combating environmental degradation; and navigating the wars being waged around the globe. Within each chapter, the author questions the perceptions of presidential success versus failure, not only among Obama's virulent detractors, but also among his leftist supporters. Chait attempts to unravel what he views as the mystery of how so many commentators put forth what became the conventional wisdom that Obama failed to achieve meaningful change during his presidencydespite the evidence to the contrary. The author predicts that after Obama leaves the presidency, this wrongheaded perception will dissipate. He also moves his argument beyond policy proposals to suggest that Obama's admirable character and steely mental makeup contributed significantly to policy successes. Chait offers a well-organized, clearly written case that will be valuable to future historians in their assessments. The question is whether readers with different opinions about Obama's performance will alter those opinions.

Kirkus Reviews