I Am the Change: Barack Obama and the Future of Liberalism

by Charles R. Kesler

Overview

Is Barack Obama the last liberal president? In I Am the Change, Charles Kesler, a leading conservative scholar, educator, and journalist, offers a sophisticated analysis of the president’s political thought, based on Obama’s own words and writings, to demonstrate that he represents either a new birth of liberalism…or its demise. Kesler’s writing is a potent mixture of philosophy, journalism, psychology, and history—seasoned with a delightful, razor-sharp wit—as he takes a greatly underestimated chief executive seriously and explores American liberalism in crisis.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780062073020
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	10/01/2013
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	304
Product dimensions:	5.31(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.68(d)

About the Author

Charles R. Kesler is the Dengler-Dykema Distinguished Professor of Government at Claremont McKenna College and the editor of the Claremont Review of Books. He is a senior fellow of the Claremont Institute for the Study of Statesmanship and Political Philosophy, and the coeditor, with William F. Buckley, Jr., of Keeping the Tablets: Modern American Conservative Thought.

Table of Contents

Preface to the Paperback Edition ix

Introduction xvii

1 The Audacity of Barack Obama 1

2 Woodrow Wilson and the Politics of Progress 31

3 Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Rise of Liberalism 103

4 Lyndon B. Johnson and the Politics of Meaning 147

5 Obama and the Crisis of Liberalism 177

Acknowledgments 239

Endnotes 241

Index 263

About the Author 277

What People are Saying About This

Ramesh Ponnuru

“Kesler is the reader for whom Obama has long been asking, in the sense of ‘asking for it’, and this book is the examination of the One we’ve been waiting for.”

George Will

“Obama has earned what he now receives, the tribute of a serious intellectual exegesis by a distinguished political philosopher.”

Editorial Reviews

Politically timely and of permanent importance to the study of the American mind. A serious but accessible study of the thinking underpinning the modern liberal project…This is a title - and an author - with a long shelf life and much to teach.” — Washington Times

“Drawing on his wide reading in philosophy and American political thought, Mr. Kesler argues that Mr. Obama has been shaped by the political tradition of Progressivism and that his 2008 triumph has helped, in turn, to reshape it.” — Wall Street Journal

“Obama has earned what he now receives, the tribute of a serious intellectual exegesis by a distinguished political philosopher.” — George Will, Washington Post

“Kesler is the reader for whom Obama has long been asking, in the sense of ‘asking for it’, and this book is the examination of the One we’ve been waiting for.” — Ramesh Ponnuru, National Review

From the Publisher

Kesler is the reader for whom Obama has long been asking, in the sense of ‘asking for it’, and this book is the examination of the One we’ve been waiting for.

Ramesh Ponnuru

Drawing on his wide reading in philosophy and American political thought, Mr. Kesler argues that Mr. Obama has been shaped by the political tradition of Progressivism and that his 2008 triumph has helped, in turn, to reshape it.

Wall Street Journal

Politically timely and of permanent importance to the study of the American mind. A serious but accessible study of the thinking underpinning the modern liberal project…This is a title - and an author - with a long shelf life and much to teach.

Washington Times

Obama has earned what he now receives, the tribute of a serious intellectual exegesis by a distinguished political philosopher.

George Will

Drawing on his wide reading in philosophy and American political thought, Mr. Kesler argues that Mr. Obama has been shaped by the political tradition of Progressivism and that his 2008 triumph has helped, in turn, to reshape it.

Wall Street Journal