Steve Sailer gives us the real Barack Obama, who turns out to be very very different -- and much more INTERESTING -- than the bland healer/uniter image stitched together out of whole cloth this past six years by Obama's packager, David Axelrod. Making heavy use of Obama's own writings, which he admires for their literary artistry, Sailer gives the deepest insights I have yet seen into Obama's lifelong obsession with "race and inheritance," and rounds off this brilliant character portrait with speculations on how Obama's personality might play out in the Presidency.
You can find my whole 264-page book at:
Enjoy!
I'd like to ask my readers to help me out with publicizing this book by submitting this posting to DIGG and all those other sites that I don't know much about. Also, please email this to your friends and post links to it on websites.
It's a beta version, so we'll need to fix a few things, like the san serif typeface. But, it's a full-length, groundbreaking analysis of the Presidential candidate's 1995 autobiography and of his actual life. The posted version still has a lot of typos in it (I was up all night locating them), but we're working on it and hope to have a much cleaner version up by Monday.
The View Online option lets you start reading immediately. (If, in the unlikely event that you don't have the ability to read PDF files, you can download Adobe Reader for free from Adobe here.)
The PDF version is 1.9 megabytes. The Zipped version of the PDF is 1.35 megabytes.
Posts
110 comments:
Dear Steve,
Regarding the dedication, is your father alive still?
"To my father and mother, who, together, gave me more than just dreams."
Ha! How appropriate, given the subject. One can waste thousands of hours of one's life consuming modern pop culture products and never see a depiction of anybody, real or fictional, who was proud of having come from a normal, functional family. I think the surprise of seeing something like that got me even more than the relevancy to and contrast with Barry O's story.
I'll buy the paper book when it comes out.
Great job Steve, congratulations. In this internet age, and since you are giving it away to the really geeky, why not spend a couple days reading your prose, making it a downloadable for an ipod. Would make a great piece for that work commute.
"To my father and mother, who, together, gave me more than just dreams"
Really beautiful.
"Half-blood prince"? Really, Steve, I'm delighted you've written a book, but that title won't get you any mainstream attention.
So good to see you get out there with a book, Steve.
In the timeline section, it's said that Obama was send to Honolulu to live with his parents, but shouldn't it be grandparents?
Wow. Thank you very incredibly much. I will read this book as soon as I can.
I read the first few pages and I like it a lot. I think I'm going to wait to buy the print version.
Okay, I'm already on page 68 because I couldn't resist. I just want to know, what's going to happen to all these links in the print version? Will they be marked as footnotes or will they just disappear? I've never read a PDF book with web links in it before.
I will definitely buy the print version at some point but I'm pretty broke right now. I'm sure that at the rate I'm going now, I'll have this whole book read by tomorrow, so the physical book will just be for show ... I hope the book has an eye-catching cover with the word OBAMA in large print, because I'm intending to attract people who see me reading the book to come over to me and start a conversation about it.
seems interesting, going to download and have a read.
But I'm pretty much set on voting for obama.
AWESOME, Steve! And I had thought you were just slacking this whole time you were blogging less frequently!
The print version, which will be shipping quite shortly, will have an extra 30 pages of Endnotes. However, since most of them are to online sources, it will come with a note telling you where to look up the Endnotes webpage online, where you can just click on the note and go directly to the source document.
No, I actually wrote a 260 page book in exactly two months from when I agreed with Peter Brimelow to do it. And did some heavy blogging, VDAREing, and AMCONing at the same time.
I'm very tired.
From the chronology of the Messiah's life on page xxii:
"Received six-figure advance for analytical book on racial issues."
Um... I know of someone a bit more deserving of an advance for exactly such a book.
Steve, here's hoping that that's what your next one will be about.
Seconding comment #5--with a different title, with slightly less inflammatory rhetoric, you could share your important insights with a broader audience. You might want to rethink that.
A couple of typos that I found: In the opening timeline you write that in 1971 "Barack Obama Sr Visits Hawaii,this is the last to Barack Jr will see his father
alive." Also, on page 37 you refer to Harold Washington as "the first black mayor of Washington." It, of course should be the first black mayor of Chicago. I only point these out to help you since I think that this is a great book so far!
The book is great. But the title will turn off anyone who's not already a believer.
"Half-Blood Prince"...I know it's witty, but yowza, you're just setting people up to dismiss the book and say that you're a mindless racist. The title is nowhere near as subtle as the book. Imagine if Charles Murray had titled his book something like "White Men Can't Jump, Black Men Can't Think". It would have been needlessly inflammatory, and hurt sales and killed any chances he had of being reviewed. At least Murray had a bestseller while he was being denounced. Allow yourself the same option.
(Yes, yes, I know how perfect the title is in that it actually has a deep meaning regarding the War of the Roses comparison. But that just means it's a good title chapter -- "The Half-Blood Prince and the War of the Roses" -- something like that. This way you don't leave yourself open to attack-by-soundbite *quite* so much).
If you want people to Digg the .pdf, you must add the Digg button. You can also add buttons for similar services. (BTW, the buttons are easy to add to Blogger). Without the buttons, people cannot help spread the word.
Moreover, you would benefit from a simple "email this article" feature.
Scanned the TofC. It looks promising. I will be reading this, Obamanation & Fund's Stealing Elections for Halloween.
"With a different title, with slightly less inflammatory rhetoric, you could share your important insights with a broader audience."
Nah, keep it real, Steve.
This is absolutely awesome, Steve. Am up to Ch. 4 and I can't put it down, so to speak.
His father's abandonment obviously affected Obama emotionally and psychologically a great deal -- but, man, his mother's presence (whenever she was there) must've certainly had a toll. Sheesh. What a load of psycho-sociological cr*p to lay on your kid! She almost sounds more damaging than the absent father.
Cool that there will be a hardcopy version of the book, but I'm happier with the electronic version. Instead of buying the book, I'll be sending my $29.95 directly to Steve! :-)
I think this helps explain why Steve is so dismissive of Cashill's argument that Ayers ghosted Dreams. If Cashill is right, it means the "autobiography" actually fails to provide an unadulterated look into Obama's mind and some of the effort Steve has spent analyzing the book may have gone to waste.
Obama's own writings, which he admires for their literary artistry
Steve, I thought you didn't like his writing style at all?
ben g said:
"Steve, I thought you didn't like his writing style at all?"
I think Steve has acknowledged that Obama's writing is complex, highly professional, truly literary, but at the same time pretentious and boring.
An analogy: like a lot of people nowdays, I hate opera. I think that it's way over the top, melodramatic and phony. However, I see perfectly clearly that opera demands a lot of natural talent and a strong work ethic from its practitioners. Those guys and gals are true professionals at something that I happen to find ridiculous.
Mazal Tov on the book!
Though I personally favor an Obama presidency to a Republican one and indeed HOPE that he's (still) more socialistically inclined than he's let on, there's no question that the media has glossed over everything to do with the man (and his motivations) that doesn't match their prefer ed view of him - and that your knowledge is the antidote.
I'm downloading your book right now and I'm looking forward to skimming it (his psychic quarters don't interest me enough to read a few hundred pages of analysis) but most of all I want to congratulate you on an achievement that your talents have long deserved to see manifest - a worthy volume.
All the best,
mnuez
Impressive - especially since you only seemed to be slacking off a little here.
Please put this up in HTML format. Most people won't read pdfs, and zipping it just makes it worse. Also, you can't link to a specific portion of a pdf if you want to illustrate a specific point. If you send a link to Aunt Tillie telling her to download it, unzip it, open it in Acrobat and go to page 221, she probably isn't going to do it.
Google books is also an option. They release books in such a way that they look like pdfs, but run seamlessly in a browser, and you can link to a specific page, even with parts of it highlighted. They also allow you to control what parts are shown online if you want to hold some of it back.
Sites like Digg don't really have the attention span for a book so linking to selected portions would be the best bet there (although you have to accept the fact that the Obots will downmod anything which blasphemes against the Chosen One).
Steve, could you elaborate on this anecdote related on page 111? I would really like to hear the full story.
"In the unlikely event that I ever write my life story, for
example, I‘d make sure to include the time I was interrogated by
the police on suspicion of plotting to assassinate former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher with a letter bomb at a conference
we were both going to attend. (The bomb disposal robot was about to hurl a small dense package addressed to me into the
Chesapeake Bay when I finally convinced the police chief that
the package contained not plastique but my new business
cards.)"
the acknowledgements and timeline by themselves show it is a penetrating and intellectually honest take on obama. i will be buying the paper version. congratulations, steve.
Steve, because you are a born writer you imagine everyone else is too. And that 'Obama' states something in his book for the same literary abstract reasons you would.
Occam's razor indeed.
Obama cites Moby Dick because it's probably one of the few books he's heard of (in 'show-n-tell'), bet he hasn't even read it. Gen X reading a book when there are DVD's? Come on. He 'likes' the book because its about someone who 'achieves his life's goal' I'll bet, and he 'identifies' with that!
Subtle aesthetics? You really believe teleprompter-man even knows what they are? (Even if he knows the phrase and parrots it).
It was obviously written by Ayers, who is clearly a born writer and a subtle (evil) genius, a classic psychopath.
Why on earth would Ayers, the revolutionary lifelong racial obsessive, ghostwrite for commercial effect when he knew he could score more with a risk-taking mono-maniac Manifesto? (Thank you for pointing that out)
Obama is what Ayers always wanted to be - Malcolm X. This is Ayers second chance, and as always he was prepared to risk failure for the bigger prize.
Your problem is you are a nerd (no offense, so am I) and you don't know just how dumb the masses are. Assume Obama is as dumb as he looks till proven otherwise. He could not have written Dreams, he only supplied the life it was built on.
Way to go, dude.
Steve,
I'm enjoying the book so far. Thanks.
I believe there's a mixup of 'maternal' and 'paternal' on page 68: "Little is known about Obama's maternal grandmother...."
Stanley Ann Dunham is a warning to all fathers of what could happen if their daughter gets pregnant and becomes a single mother. She spends so much time practically worshiping the man who abandoned her that it seriously screwed up her kid.
On another note, have you seen the wormholes on Star Trek? A vessel goes into one of those wormholes and comes out somewhere else far, far away in the universe. The global network of colleges radiating outward from the First World are the same thing. An aspiring third worlder goes to his neighboring college, and BAM, is transported to my city here in America.
Thanks to everybody who is finding mistakes for me.
One thing that became clear to me in working on the book is the incompatibility of correcting for style and correcting for typos. It's very hard to do both at the same time. Changing words to make passages read better inserts an enormous number of new typos: I'm guessing about one new typo for every four words changed.
Page 77, lines 1-2: should be "Jack Daniel's."
Steve,
On page 41
"Obama and I wouldn't disagree much on the facts about race. We would likely differ on what to do about them."
Really? So Obama embraces HBD?
Page 82, paragraph 3: another mixup of paternal/maternal.
Jebus - so that's what the 22" screen was for! (downloads)
From the Brimelow introduction:
That this brilliant if eccentric autodidact...
I tell people that if there's an internet-based writer that ought to be read regularly, then it's Steve Sailer.
Congratulations on the book.
I'm very tired.
I bet. I've always been impressed with not only the quality of what you write, but also the quantity. Concentrating, and sometimes struggling, to write well can be very fatiguing.
I only point these out to help you since I think that this is a great book so far!
This could be a very important side-effect/benefit of putting the book out early on-line. I sometimes cringe at how poorly edited the Vdare site occasionally (i.e. too often) is, and I hope the same thing does not affect the book, especially the print edition. So I encourage readers to report all such errors.
Steve,
I'll read your book, when I have the time. Way to go.
Congratulations.
Obama voted for S2611 and other "amnesties", right?
Wouldn't those shift billions in wealth from the black South Side to the Mexican West Side?
He's no "race man" on this issue!
I hope that's addressed in the book.
Page 219:
"In case you're keeping score at home, a master’s in
physics at Stanford trumps a bachelor’s in poly sci at Columbia
in the IQ Score One-Upmanship Olympics. It’s not a big
difference"
No, you are wrong.
At the undergraduate level, physics is considered the most difficult major at Stanford.
Masters students would take many of the same courses.
It is much harder to get than a bachelor's degree in political science.
Page 95: "The funny things is...."
Page 98: 'terribly' should be 'terrible.'
Page 107: "welfare restriction of act of 1996."
Page 113: "went down flames" needs an 'in.'
Page 117: "Second, the plot dull." Needs an 'is.'
Congratulations to Steve on your first book. I hope to see another one and maybe more than that in future.
But of course it is Okay to relax and enjoy this accomplishment (for the moment).
Thanks, once again, for pointing out typos.
Thanks so much for writing this, Steve. I'll let you know if I see any typos. And I'll definitely be purchasing the book for family members come Christmas.
PH
Page xix second full paragraph second line you need to delete a "to between "best" and organize."
Whoops, actually it should be the "to" between "how" and "best" (don't want any split infinitives here).
Two points about people not remembering Obama at Columbia:
1. Isn't Columbia quite different from other colleges in that it doesn't have a good dorm life?
Many people live in their own apartments or in giant anonymous dorms.
It just seems to be a general complaint I've heard about Columbia, that it's just not much of a community.
Did Obama ever live in a dorm at Columbia? Didn't you say that he had some Pakistani roommate? Was this roommate a Columbia student even?
-------------------------------
2. Obama transferred to Columbia in his junior year.
At least when I was in college, people were said to be at their friendliest during freshman year. Then they formed their clique of friends and became markedly less friendly by sophomore year.
Dorms with freshman were the friendliest and most social.
Upperclassman were considered "unfriendly" and were definitely less outgoing.
-----------------
As a junior transfer to a place with an poor dorm life like Columbia, Obama could have had some difficulty making friends.
Two more:
p. 77 'African' should be 'Africa.'
p. 112 'boils' should be 'boil.'
One thing that I think you should announce is that while your first 2 chapters would already be familiar to your blog readers, the other chapters contains lots of interesting new material. So they shouldn't assume they've already seen it before on your blog and should continue reading.
A few great bits from the book:
1. The baseball analogy of Obama as a hotshot lefty pitcher who the Red Sox don't want but the Yankees desire is brilliant.
2. Has anyone else written about Lamb's "The Africans" and Updike's "The Coup" in conjunction with Obama?
3. Obama's attitude towards various Asians (Indonesians, East Indians) v. his attitude towards whites. Versus his father's and sister's attitude towards Indians.
4. Ann Dunham the white woman doesn't feel much sexual attraction for her placid Indonesian hubby. But she was hot for her East African husband, even after he abused her abominably.
Anonymous, I think it even was a 24inch...
Dear Steve,
I'm surprised you left out this bit from your chapter 2 on Ann Dunham:
"Strangely, Kezia and Ann became great friends, writing to each other often."
Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-506338/Barack-Obamas-stepmother-living-Bracknell-reveals-close-bond---mother.html
What sort of woman would become friends with her ex-husband's first wife, her "co-wife"?
In fact, she seems to have enthusiastically assumed the role of the friendly, loving "sister" that co-wives of a polygamous marriage are theoretically/ideally supposed to assume (as opposed to (1) scheming backstabbing b***hes, (2) being resigned to their fate (3) becoming hysterical and committing suicide, (4) taking up some hobby and becoming very involved in their children, which are various prototypes for how they often behave in practice).
Perhaps, she read about it in an anthro textbook? Or perhaps she was subjected to pro-polygamy propoganda by Obama Sr.?
When you listen to what promoters of polygamy say, among the benefits mentioned are, the women keep each other company and take of each other's children. No jealousy or hard feelings apparently.
In your book you ask whether Ann Dunham knew that Obama Sr. was already married when she took up with him.
Isn't the fact that she was able to be friends with her co-wife after her husband dumped her increase the probability that she very well could have known that he was already married?
Actually, when did she become friends with Kezia? Did they become friends even before the divorce? Were they really proper co-wives?
Ann Dunham's behaviour is certainly not the reaction of someone who is horrified and appalled by polygamy.
Why wasn't she jealous? If I'd gone through what Ann Dunham had gone through, I'd never want to think about Obama Sr. again. Didn't talking to the first wife pain her at all?
She was not your conventional monogamous woman, this Ann Dunham.
"On another note, have you seen the wormholes on Star Trek? A vessel goes into one of those wormholes and comes out somewhere else far, far away in the universe. The global network of colleges radiating outward from the First World are the same thing. An aspiring third worlder goes to his neighboring college, and BAM, is transported to my city here in America"
Still laughing, Ronduck. This is too true. Most such immigrants wouldn't have a toehold on residency or citizenship if it weren't for our universities. Yet I don't think they did this so much in a concerted effort to transport fellow travelers to the US but rather in an effort to increase their student body and thereby tuition revenue.
"Really? So Obama embraces HBD?" - richard h
Where have you been? From the creation of the black intelligence test along with its unfortunate acronym to rev Wright ranting about black musical talent vs the white man's classical music, there is a growing number of blactivists who are not only aware of racial differences but seek to exploit them by making traits typical of whites out to be pathological. One of the most common attacks is to label someone who is more analytical as autistic. Something that the families of the autistic should fight because the inference is actually that whites are less able to empathize therefore more likely to oppress or commit acts of violence against their fellow man.
Not only is "autism" the inappropriate label for such pathology it has the potential for harming those who are diagnosed with autism spectrum disorders for causing people to believe they are violent. Really, I should've recorded some of the interchanges I've had with blacktivists with an eye to encouraging them to be more sensitive to the disabled.
Of course they never back up their claim of emotional dysfunction by comparing the families or the civilizations built by analytical vs emotional racial groups nor even the percentages of each group responsible for violent crimes.
Typo pg. 112: "In contrast to the reductionism of Coolidge, who strove to boils complexities down to their plainspoken essence...."
Someone posted a link to your book on FreeRepublic, and then it was deleted.
"This thread has been pulled.
"Pulled on 10/29/2008 6:37:18 PM PDT by Admin Moderator, reason:
"Sailer is not welcome on FR."
Please add an Obama family tree. Perhaps you could put it on the page after the timeline.
Page 62
"When Obama went to Kenya to in the late 1980s.."
Get rid of the 'to' after Kenya.
We should standardize these typos. Let everyone pointing out a typo put the page number at the top of the post like I did so we can browse through and see if it's been caught before we post.
Also, I'm wondering, why didn't you put your book out a couple of months ago? Then there would have been time then for the book to potentially have an effect on the sorts of questions Obama gets asked.
Lefties like Matthew Yglesias and other mainstream media types like Ross Douthan and Reihan Salam do read you, don't they?
Steve,
I just couldn't help noticing that you sound like a Freudian here.
That's not what we at ISteve believe. He got the genius from his dad and his leftist hatred of human accomplishment and love of the earth's miserable from his mother through the genes.
Richard h said...
"Obama and I wouldn't disagree much on the facts about race. We would likely differ on what to do about them."
Really? So Obama embraces HBD?
Obama's self-obsessed personal history, writings, and brief life's work are fully devoted to the premise that race exits and is the central reality of individual identity and social organization and meaning. (see Steve’s book for numerous examples).
Ironically, Steve's writing spotlights how Obama crosses the HBD line into racism on many accounts. Steve simply lets the observable facts take him to a Human Biodiversity (HBD) conclusion and even writes about other groups with admiration and without resentment where supported by data. Steve frequently expresses sympathy and some sense of obligation for fellow minority Americans who are primarily victimized by unchecked illegal immigration.
Like Steve, Obama recognizes and even obsesses over the differences between groups that underlay HBD. However, unlike Steve, Obama only selectively recognizes some HBD differences that feed his white=evil victimizer/non-white=good victim narrative. Any differences due to HBD that contradict Obama's radical PC ideology are interpreted as imaginary white racism and used as justification to promote increasingly unfair real anti-white racism by any means necessary (IQ->anti-white/asian quotas, bad loans, wealth redistribution) in a futile attempt to achieve equal statistical outcomes for all races (but only in areas where whites excel).
Finally, any un-PC differences that simply cannot be wished, theorized or legislated away that acknowledge white virtue become sources of shame for the mulatto Obama (e.g. seeing the impressive history and architecture during his European trip before visiting Africa for the first time or rejecting the appealing genteel and cultured history and lifestyle of his once white girlfriend).
In the road to hell is paved with good intentions department, Obama's support of massive illegal immigration is far more permanently damaging to the American black community than any of even the most prejudicial organizing, lawsuits, policies or appointments he could create to benefit US Blacks even as POTUS.
Will you be offering signed copies? Perhaps a leather-bound, slip-cased signed and numbered limited edition? I'd buy one.
P. 72
"Barak H. Obama read his economics at Harvard University"
I assume it should be 'received' instead of 'read.'
TYPO: In the Obama timeline at the head of the book, "1983" and its event are repeated (p. xxi).
On p. xxii, replace comma with dash before "Barack married Michelle."
On p. xxiii, insert dash before "Final Presidential debate."
Prior to that, Brimelow has these typos:
P. ix: "who can be best be described" contains one "be" too many;
P. ix: "ageing" should be "aging";
P. x: the hyperlinking of "national financial journalism" spills into an adjacent word;
passim: periods are placed outside quote marks and outside independent parenthetical phrases; they should be placed inside instead (this isn't the UK).
Typo pg. 120: "By projecting his own inner racial anger onto real people who didn't, actually, share it, Obama was allowing himself to express a side of his inner being that might makes his friends...."
(Feel free not to post these typo comments, btw!)
Reading your book is a bit like reading a neverending vdare article. The entire time I can't help thinking I've read this some place before, as well as being proud that this "our Steve" making a splash out there. (<-- sentimental fool, I know, I know.)
First impressions are important.. Brimelow's "I disagree. I think the contradictions that Steve has
identified in this book will turn any Obama Presidency into
a four-year O.J. Simpson trial and that the consequent
melt-down will compare to the Chernobyl of the Carter
Presidency in its destructive partisan effects." is over the top and doesn't fit in the foreword.
The other thing I found jarring was the repeated (once might be ok) references to Palin on remarks that were probably cooked up by speechwriters; are they all really necessary?
Congrats and fix all the typos (isn't descendant the favored spelling and not descendent)
I think you should work on this (polishing) this for at least a month more before sending it out for publication.
Brimelow is trying to be nice but "For that matter, if Steve were more widely read, we
would not now, in the fall of 2008, be facing massive
reregulation and socialization in the financial sector..." appears ill-advised and reflects poorly on your credibility. It can be excised and replaced with some reference to your expertise on HBD and the Iraq war (one part where you agree with Obama).
p. 130
Two typos (one if you're British ;-) ):
"When the nasty nerd and the glamour guy ran against each other in 1960, they would up in a near dead heat."
the title is appropriate especially given that BO has read all the Harry Potter books to his daughter (according to the informecial).. He would appreciate the connection, I am sure.
A reader emailed me this excellent list of typos:
Hi Steve,
Congratulations on the publication of your excellent America's Half-Blood Prince!
Since you had requested it on your blog, I'll respectfully pass along the following minor typos I've noticed in the book. My apologies if I've flagged anything that's not actually a typo—it's not always easy to tell what's intended as house style or what was present in quoted materials (and then deliberately not standardized to a house style), and what's just inadvertently inconsistent.
p. xxi: December – Barack Obama Sr Visits Hawaii, this is the last to Barack Jr will see his father alive.
p. xxi, xxii and xxiii: There's an inconsistency in the use of simple dashes/hyphens, versus the longer en-dashes. In the 1961 entry for the timeline, for example, "August 4" has the longer en-dash after it, but most of the other entries on the timeline just use a normal dash in the comparable position. There are at least three instances of that inconsistency on those three pages.
p. xxii: February - Heard Rev. Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright, Jr.’s Audacity to Hope sermon
p. 27: Which perhaps indicates a second, more intimate theme to this book–namely, how I, or anybody in public office, can avoid the pitfalls of fame {The book has used the proper em-dash elsewhere, so the above should have a "—"}
p. 30: There appears to be an unnecessary indentation on the line: By God’s fair ordinance conjoin together!
p. 34: there. {pp. 301-302] {should use a square bracket, plus almost everywhere else in the book it's just "p."}
p. 38: Why hasn't Dreams proven “inconvenient politically?” {You probably want the question mark outside of the quotation marks, here}
p. 41: I suspect that that by this point in our lives, Obama and I wouldn't disagree much on the facts about race.
p. 44: Tonight is a particular honor for me because - let’s face it - my {The style used elsewhere in your book would have em-dashes here, without spaces before or after them}
p. 44: father - my grandfather - was {as for previous typo}
p. 48: (Not to mention GOP Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin‘s 17-year-old daughter, who aroused so much media frenzy in 2008). {You probably want the period inside of the parenthesis, here}
p. 49: When Obama was living in New York City in his early 20s, he is creeped out by his visiting mother’s insistence on seeing her favorite film, the 1959 Brazilian art-house classic Black Orpheus. {"was," here?}
p. 50: The 1960 census found equal numbers of black husband - white wife and white husband - black wife couples. {This looks as if you're trying to set off the inner clause with em-dashes; in my opinion, it would be clearer to the reader if it was written as, say, "black-husband/white-wife and white-husband/black-wife couples"}
p. 53: But, strikingly, it was during those other 4 years in Indonesia, from age 6 to 10, that his white mother {In edited writing, numbers under ten are usually spelled out}
p. 57: “you’re going to need some values.” [pp. 49-50] {text is missing the closing quotation marks}
p. 59: enough to bear.” {there's no corresponding opening quotation mark in the block quote}
p. 63: Racialism is simply a given to the memoirist. . {stray period}
p. 66: (Obama Sr. was 6'-1", Obama Jr. 6'-2.”) {You probably want the inches mark adjacent to the "2" here, and not done as a curly quotation mark}
p. 71: Zaiki Laidi and Patricia Baudoin wrote in The Superpowers and Africa: {Elsewhere in the book, the colon hasn't been italicized after a title, e.g., after Rolling Stone on p. 50, or on p. 29 after Newsweek}
p. 72: Barak H. Obama read his economics at Harvard University. {sp?}
p. 73: Well, we can be sure that Obama Sr. is “one who has read Marx!” {You may want to have the exclamation mark outside of the quotation marks, here}
p. 73: “There is an immense Indian mercantile class and the Black governments are trying to deal with them,” {the block-quote text is missing the opening quotation mark}
p. 78: If you go to Ngei‘s home, he has planted a lot of coffee and other crops. {The apostrophe after Ngei is backwards, i.e., it's an opening single quotation mark rather than a closing one. That appears to be an issue popping up throughout the book; searching for the characters [‘s] brings up many instances, which would leap out from the page in a different font.}
p. 79: The killer is said to have asked the police after his arrest, “Why don't you go after the big man?" {should be a curly double-quotation mark}
p. 82: [from the Wind in the Willows] {"The" is part of the title of that book: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wind_In_The_Willows}
The use of "p." versus "pp." is also not consistent throughout the book; likewise for the use of spaces before and after an ellipses; and similarly for "naive" versus "naïve." You'll surely want to search for each of those strings, and standardize your use of them.
That's as far as I could get by 3 a.m. last night; if you want me to vet the rest of the book for typos, I'll need some encouragement—not $, just a response. :)
p. 152
Missing a period:
"With his charisma, he could have been a great teacher and role model"
p. 153
Than have most Americans? Not have had most Americans?
"Obama has had far more ties to individual Muslims than have had most Americans."
p.31 should be Alberto Gonzales
p. 207 "With great power come great rewards."
p. 160
seemed
"Nevertheless, it must have sometimes seen a hopeless quest...."
p. 162
At the end of the second blockquote, missing bracket around page reference and incorrectly capitalized "P":
...whether a black politics that suppressed rage toward whites generally, or one that failed to elevate race loyalty above all else, was a politics inadequate to the task. P. 199]
Thanks, Steve. That was good reading. I will purchase a copy or two when it is printed and loan it out to the Obamaniacs I know.
p.45
"For instance, Obama’s convention claim that they were
motivated by American patriotism would have struck his parents
as puzzling."
wouldn't it be easier to comprehend as "For instance, Obama’s convention claim that his parents were
motivated by American patriotism would have struck them as puzzling."
The bottom of page 186 contains the typo "concentrations camps".
this sentence is obamaesque:
"The polygamous
Barack Sr. already had another wife back home in Kenya (who
was pregnant with their second child), whom he returned to
(accompanied by yet another white American wife) and with
whom he had at least one more child."
simplify for the retarded normals (and absolutely minimize or eliminate the parentheses)
Maybe you should style Barack Sr. consistently (font) so that it becomes apparent it is the father we are talking about.
I am repeating what others have said but the Obama quotes need to be in the standard format (smaller, indented?) that's used.
OK. I'll submit this blog post to Digg. (God! I haven't been on that bastion of whiny liberal nonsense, forever.)
However, before I do so, can you tell me the title you want you use (60 character limit)? Can you provide me your best description in 350 characters or less?
I can also make a submission for your other post on this book if you provide a title and a description.
p.48. please delete (distracting)
(Not to mention GOP Vice Presidential candidate Sarah
Palin‘s 17-year-old daughter, who aroused so much media frenzy
in 2008)
OMG, Chapter 11 missing from your TOC
I’m not a professional only have a degree in grammar/punctuation optional English but here’s what I found Cps 10, 11 & 12:
p.234
Connerly, who led the successful 1996 campaign for
Proposition 209, authored by Tom Wood and Glynn Custred, and
a similarly victorious initiative in 2000 in Washington, has anti-
racial preference initiatives on the ballot in two states this
November:.
extra punctuation after “November”
p 235
So I‘ve set this goal
for the country. We want 5.5 million more homeowners by
2010—million more minority homeowners by 2010.
Busheese or typo?
p. 194
Yet his role-model magic doesn't seem to have
worked on his own wife.
No reference books today. Why is “role-model” hyphenated?
p. 197
Of course, many of their African-American classmates
were affirmative-action recipients. (After all, that’s the whole
point of Princeton having an affirmative action program.)
No reference books with me. Why is “affirmative-action recipients” hyphenated while “affirmative action program” isn’t?
p. 223
not exactly, the strong, silent type
You don’t need a comma after exactly, do you?
Keep in mind that nothing Ochieng says about Obama Sr.
is not somewhere in Obama Jr.’s book.
State as positive, i.e. there is nothing, that isn’t construction, nothing...is not is confusing.
As for why I'm reading the end first?
p. 187
In second blockquote, missing "i" in the word "in" (just after bracket):
And if men like Reverend Wright failed to take a stand, if churches like Trinity refused to engage with real power [n Obamaspeak, “real power” means “The Man"]...
p. 207
Rogue parenthesis at the end of the penultimate paragraph:
Michelle defended her raise, saying, “My income is pretty low compared to my peers.”)
p. 212
End of last sentence -- rogue colon instead of period:
Auma‘s accusation is a less colorful version of Ellelloû‘s denunciation of Komomo‘s Zanj as “decked out in the transparent pantaloons of neo-colonialist harlotry:”
p. 218
Link to info about Ruth doesn't work -- only leads to Daily Nation main page, not directly to any article (URL's expired, I think):
Mark is one of the two sons of Obama’s father and his third wife (and second white American wife) Ruth.
p. 234
Rogue colon at end of first sentence on page:
Connerly, who led the successful 1996 campaign for Proposition 209, authored by Tom Wood and Glynn Custred, and a similarly victorious initiative in 2000 in Washington, has antiracial preference initiatives on the ballot in two states this November:.
p. xii in the Foreword
Very first link for "The Bell Curve" doesn't go anywhere. (Presumably should go to Amazon?)
I checked all the links in the Foreword and Acknowledgments and all are ok except for the one above.
Prolly a good idea to check all of the links as I happened to come across the one on pg. 218 that doesn't work (posted above).
If I have time tomorrow, I'll check some more.
Someone mentioned including an Obama family-tree -- that's a good idea.
6, 7, 8, 9
p. 148
As we've seen, his one private sector job was
as a copy-editor for a newsletter factory. And that low-ball salary
he took in Chicago was just for the probationary period.
My dictionary says copyeditor vs copy-edit.
Still, community organizing had its upside: Obama made a
name for himself and networked with what has become his
political base:
What is this? A colon connector in a verbal erector set? Second time for this construction, too clever by half, I say. : )
p. 162
elevate race loyalty above all else, was a politics inadequate
to the task. P. 199]
capital “P”, one bracket
p. 163
On p. 200 of Dreams,
Redundant but if you leave it in, I think you should spell out “page”
p. 164
in the Black Muslim manner is counter-productive,
because whites will have to pay most of the bills.
Last line. In my dictionary “counterproductive” isn’t hyphenated.
BTW, I really like the last paragraph.
p. 179
the pp. 291 - 295 & pp. 274 - 295. With so many page references, you might just indicate the chapters here. Also redundant when you follow with a quote & specific page reference.
From 180 to 187, especially, there are several long quotes that I think can either be cut down or simply paraphrased. This is a very long chapter and chock full of fascinating details, but to my mind the series of quotes makes for difficult reading and many could easily be summarized.
Cp 9 may actually be too long. You added some surprising new info that I haven’t seen on the blog and leave an almost tangible impression of Rev. Wright then continue with the pages overwrought with quotes.
Also, realized there’s a dearth of material on Bill Ayers, how come?
Good and witty overall, but some criticisms:
1. Excess of verbiage about Affirmative Action rather than Obama per se (esp. in the Michelle Obama section) distracts from the main focus. The book is ostensibly about Obama, not AA or other wars fought in your online writings. Similarly, some overemphasis of IQ/heredity issues.
2. Title is love-it-or-hate-it. More will hate it, I think.
3. Misses no opportunity to comment on black male-white female sexual themes. To some extent this has its place in the ambit of the book, but the degree to which it is emphasized makes the book (or rather the author) vulnerable to all sorts of hostile psychoanalysis from politically antagonistic reviewers, and ultimately distracts from the main points.
4. Good sense of humor throughout, but sometimes becomes a negative when the humor is caustic, sarcastic, corrosive or over the top. Keep it good natured even when making politically loaded or "incorrect" commentary at book length.
5. First instance of the Sox/Yankees/Mets analogy was brilliant, but the further elaboration later in the book (with Bobby Rush as the aging pitcher) was stretched and boring.
6. More could have been said about whether Obama's person and background fit the mold of DSM-enumerated narcissistic disorders (NPD, etc).
Those are what first come to mind. Overall I found it fascinating and entertaining enough to finish at one sitting, late into the night. Some passages and even more of the jokes were spot-on. Good job.
ALSO: dissection of Rev Wright's own background was excellent.
Heh -- the website's blocked for me by the City of Houston as "extreme"! You're now officially considered an extremist by the government...
"Half-blood"? What next, are you going to call him a "strapping buck"?
I made it to the part of your book in which you blame the mortgage meltdown on minorities. Oh, Steve, you have no idea. I work in the financial services industry and I assure you that we (my colleagues and I) are the ones to blame. If you think the CRA or Fannie and Freddie or Congress drove us off this cliff you are either grossly misinformed or desperately trying to spin the facts.
Half-Blood? Was this written in the 19th century?
Steve,
If you want your readers to help you find mistakes in your book (and we do, because we love you), then why not create a comment thread for each chapter of the book.
Chapter 1 Mistakes, Chapter 2 Mistakes, etc. Then people could enter the mistakes they've found under the appropriate heading, and this thread could be limited to actual comments on the book and not become so ungainly.
Also, if you have corrected mistakes in your book, will you upload your new corrected versions, so that people will not keep rediscovering the same mistakes? Can you upload a new daily version on Vdare?
Hey Steve -- I've read your book and have found some typos. I hope these are helpful.
p.234
Connerly, who led the successful 1996 campaign for
Proposition 209
This should read "On reflection, perhaps I shouldn't have used the phrase "Half-Blood Prince" in the title of my book."
p. 235
So I‘ve set this goal
for the country.
Should read: "Yes, now that I think of it, it makes me seem like a total racist clown to blow up any credibility I had in the TITLE. Not even the first sentence, the TITLE."
p. 197
Of course, many of their African-American classmates
were affirmative-action recipients.
This should read. "Good God, I'm an idiot. This is like Joe Biden blowing up his candidacy in his first press conference. Why didn't I just call this book, "Barack Obama, Clean and Articulate? Also, I'm a Total Dingbat"?
p. 304
"Obama's connections with Acorn"
This should read. "EPIC FAIL."
Your mother and father that you dedicate the book to, they are related by blood, no?
All your wood comes out of the same woodpile so to speak.
That would explain alot.
That and Sam Francis's corpse in your bed each night.
Maybe someone could create a short YouTube commercial advertising your wonderful book.
I am still fascinated by Ann Dunham's behavior regarding her ex-husband Obama Sr. and ex-co-wife Kezia.
Again, did Ann marry Obama Sr. knowing he was already married? And how could she have become friends with Kezia?
-------------------
One explanation: She fell headlong in love with Obama Sr. and they had anaffair in which she was impregnated. The then desperate Ann asked Obama Sr. to marry her. He was already married, but she didn't have any other choice other than to become an unwed mother.
-----------------------
Another possibility:
Today, when a woman carries on with a married man, she justifies it with something like, "But their relationship is already over." "He's going to divorce his wife" (Real Soon Now, as Steve would say).
So perhaps Obama Sr. the smooth operator told the 17 year old Ann told her that he and his wife were separated, and she used that to justify having an affair with him which then resulted in a shot gun wedding.
--------------
But then the next question is, why would Ann become friends with the first wife Kezia after Obama Sr. left her and *went back* to Kezia?
1. Did she feel *guilty* about having married Obama Sr? When Obama Sr. abandoned her and took up with a third wife, did she finally come to understand that she had wronged Kezia? Was she trying to make up for that? (I have no idea whether Ann even knew about wife no. 3 and woman no. 4).
2. In an advice column, I read about a case in which a man's mistress falls out with her lover, and then declares her solidarity with her ex-lover's wife. The wife is in the process of divorcing the husband, and the mistress wants to offer moral support to the wife.
Did Ann and Kezia swap complaints about Obama Sr. in their letters?
But if Ann's becoming friends with Kezia is something along those lines (the sisters uniting against the Man), then why would Ann have only good things to say about Obama Sr. to her son? Kezia also seems to have loved Obama Sr. to the dismal end.
------------------
Or perhaps, as I said in another comment, Ann Dunham is one of those (I used to think apocryphal) women who is okay with polygamy.
She really didn't see anything wrong with her husband having other wives. She enjoyed having a co-wife.
-----------------------
I marvel at how charismatic Obama Sr. must have been, as both these woman remained fond him to the end, even after he behaved abominably towards them.
error on p. 68 -
"Little is known about Obama’s PATERNAL grandmother, who left her two children and ran off with another man"
error on page 95:
"when he's 12, his father briefly drops by from the Dominican REPUBLIC", not Republican.
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