Obama the renegade? Try anti-renegade

Heilmann didn’t say it, but a viewer couldn’t help but
notice that every reporter sitting there — Chris Matthews included — missed one
of the most interesting observations of the new book: that the establishment
candidate was not Hillary Clinton, but rather Barack Obama. In 2006 and beyond,
Obama was being courted by some of the most powerful of his colleagues in the
U.S. Senate. These guys — Harry Reid, Chuck Schumer and Tom Daschle among them —
assured the junior senator, who was not accomplishing much in his new job, that
he was destined for bigger things. He was their guy. Run for the presidency. Vanquish
Hillary Clinton in the primaries, they told him, and we’ll be with you even
though we can’t yet say so publicly for fear of retribution from the Clintons. .

There was another book about the 2008 campaign, about Obama
specifically, an insider’s account, published in June 2009, by former Newsweek White House reporter Richard Wolffe. I could not wait
to read it — Wolffe had been given special access by Obama — so I ordered it on
my Kindle and got going right away, only to find there wasn’t all that much in
it that I didn’t already know.

Wolffe quit Newsweek
a couple of months before his book was published to represent corporate clients
as a senior strategist for the public affairs and public relations firm Public
Strategies. He continued as an analyst for MSNBC amid outcries from people who
objected to Wolffe’s dual role and potential conflicts. He quit the firm late
last year and announced he is writing a second book about Obama.

I was reminded of Wolffe — who titled his Obama book Renegade:
The Making of a President — by Heilmann, who
mentioned on the Matthews show that the “renegade” in the race for the
nomination was not Obama. Next time, Wolffe will need to be more careful with
his title.