The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream -- Barack Obama

<b>#1 <i>NEW YORK TIMES </i>BESTSELLER - Barack Obama's lucid vision of America's place in the world and call for a new kind of politics that builds upon our shared understandings as Americans, based on his years in the Senate</b> <br><b> </b> <br><b>"In our lowdown, dispiriting era, Obama's talent for proposing humane, sensible solutions with uplifting, elegant prose does fill one with hope."--Michael Kazin, <i>The Washington Post</i></b> <br><b><i> </i></b> <br>In July 2004, four years before his presidency, Barack Obama electrified the Democratic National Convention with an address that spoke to Americans across the political spectrum. One phrase in particular anchored itself in listeners' minds, a reminder that for all the discord and struggle to be found in our history as a nation, we have always been guided by a dogged optimism in the future, or what Obama called "the audacity of hope." <p/><i>The Audacity of Hope</i> is Barack Obama's call for a different brand of politics--a politics for those weary of bitter partisanship<b> </b>and alienated by the "endless clash of armies" we see in congress and on the campaign trail; a politics rooted in the faith, inclusiveness, and nobility of spirit at the heart of "our improbable experiment in democracy." He explores those forces--from the fear of losing to the perpetual need to raise money to the power of the media--that can stifle even the best-intentioned politician. He also writes, with surprising intimacy and self-depreca