Thanks to Democratic Leadership for the 21st Century (DL21C), The Common Good presented a unique event with Jodi Kantor, award-winning New York Times correspondent and author of the bestselling book The Obamas, about the President and First Lady’s years in the White House. Jodi discussed her latest book The Obamas and shared her insights on the president’s first term and give a more personal picture of the powerful couple. In her work, she reveals the human beings behind the political figures—their ambitions, biographies, challenges and successes.
When Barack Obama won the 2008 presidential election, he also won a long-running debate with his wife Michelle. Contrary to her fears, politics now seemed like a worthwhile, even noble pursuit. Together they planned a White House life that would be as normal and sane as possible. Then they moved in.
In the Obamas, Jodi Kantor takes us deep inside the White House as they try to grapple with their new roles, change the country, raise children, maintain friendships, and figure out what it means to be the first black President and First Lady. Filled with riveting detail and insight into their partnership, emotions and personalities, and written with a keen eye for the ironies of public life, THE OBAMAS is an intimate portrait that will surprise even readers who thought they knew the President and First Lady.
Jodi Kantor is a prize-winning investigative reporter for The New York Times and a best-selling author. For six years, Ms. Kantor wrote about Barack and Michelle Obama. Her book "The Obamas" chronicles their behind-the-scenes adjustment to the jobs of president and first lady. Writing in the New York Review of Books, Ezra Klein said, “Jodi Kantor’s ‘The Obamas’ is among the very best books on this White House.” Before becoming a reporter, Ms. Kantor was the New York editor of Slate magazine and The Times’s Arts & Leisure editor. (1)
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(1) Material from the She Said (the book) website.
