Thanks, Obama Read online

  In consequence, the number of remaining speeches began to dwindle. Favs and Cody would remain busy through Election Day, but as rhetorical handyman, my work was drying up. I wasn’t the only one. At DNC headquarters, cubicle after cubicle was abandoned as employees were sent into the field. In typical, militaristic campaign fashion, this is known as “being deployed.” With just weeks remaining until Election Day, and not much writing to do, I began to plan for a deployment of my own.

  In late October, I completed my final speechwriting assignment of the 2012 election: a Q&A for Us Weekly. In “President Barack Obama: 25 Things You Didn’t Know About Me,” the commander in chief informed America that he was left-handed, that apples were his favorite healthy snack, and that he enjoyed both bodysurfing and shaved ice. If we lost, this would be my farewell address. Not long after sending in my draft to Favs and Cody, I dusted off my giant green backpack from college. Then I hit the road for Cleveland, my home for the campaign’s final days.

  THE CAMPAIGN ASSIGNED ME TO A ROOM IN A VOLUNTEER’S HOUSE, a two-story white Cape Cod, and I arrived sometime shortly before midnight. The moment I rang the doorbell, I heard a deep, murderous growl from within. There was a crash of giant paws. Then the softer padding of slippers. My cheerful host, Norma, pried open the door.

  I noticed she was middle-aged, with hair in curlers and a terry cloth robe. But the bulk of my attention was devoted to the beast behind her. A cross between a Great Dane and Satan, its giant blocky head raged with drool. I don’t remember the dog’s name. I do, however, remember the conversation between my host and me.

  NORMA: Don’t worry. Monster loves people. Come on in!

  MONSTER (translated): I’LL RIP YOUR ARMS OFF, YOU LOUSY BASTARD!

  NORMA (laughing): Really? You’re scared of my puppy? I suppose I can put him in the bedroom.

  DAVID: Yes, please.

  Confinement didn’t suit Monster, who immediately began beating his paws against the door in an escape attempt. Before he could succeed, I rushed my backpack up the stairs and into my room on the second floor.

  The following morning, I sprinted in terror from my bedroom to the car. Then I drove to an Obama for Ohio office on the city’s east side.

  In campaign euphemism, I had been assigned to a “base area.” In English, that meant residents were overwhelmingly African American and that many of them didn’t vote. Every four years, well-meaning white people appear in these neighborhoods like cicadas. They knock on doors. They hand out flyers. Then they return to their burrows to eat acai berries and purchase Jonathan Franzen novels they’ll never read.

  The Obama campaign hoped to replace this unseemly practice with something better: self-sustaining, locally run organizations, links in a nationwide chain. In some places, the plan worked. Where it didn’t, people like me were called in to “layer” the organizers in charge.

  I wish I could tell you I recruited all my volunteers locally. But with numbers to hit, and little more than a week until polls opened, there was no time for the high-minded principle of 2008. A few days after I arrived, Jacqui arrived with two friends in her ancient fiberglass Saturn. Others soon joined our yuppie militia, bidding farewell to their Brooklyn nonprofits or taking leave from well-paid jobs. Even the supporter housing was bourgeois. Jacqui was assigned a room in a mansion belonging to a pair of cheerful white attorneys and their lovable Brittany spaniel.

  Yet this style of campaigning, while hardly poetry, had its moments. One morning my friend Stephanie was sent to knock on doors with an eighty-four-year-old woman named Beulah. As they left the office, the redheaded Brooklyn lesbian in vintage clothing towering over the shrunken matriarch known locally as “Mother Carter.” I wondered if we weren’t asking too much. But the next day Mother Carter returned in her orthotic walking shoes. She would knock on doors all afternoon, she said—just as long as she got to team up with Stephanie.

  That’s the best part of fieldwork: with so much on the line, bridges build themselves. And as they do, the entire universe shrinks to just a few square blocks. For the first time in months, it was easy to ignore Nate Silver. In fact, I didn’t check FiveThirtyEight until the final Friday of the campaign. To my relief, I learned our odds were improving. Victory was once again within our reach. More at ease than I’d been in weeks, I fell into a peaceful sleep.

  I awoke at 2 A.M. Something wasn’t right.

  In my sleepy haze, it took a moment to figure out the problem. It was the outside of my stomach: my skin felt like it was on fire. Just the aftermath of some strange dream, I figured. Still, to be safe, I turned on the lights and lifted my shirt.

  I had never seen anything like it. Across my abdomen were row after row of red bumps. In the center of each was a puncture wound. It looked like I’d been assaulted by a madman with a thumbtack. With horror, I recalled Norma telling me the dog often slept in this bedroom. In a worst-case scenario, I had bedbugs. In a best-case scenario, I had fleas.

  Pivotal moments in a relationship are rarely the ones you expect. On our first date, I wondered what Jacqui looked like naked, and whether we had the same taste in TV. Never once did I ask myself, “Is this someone I can turn to in case of infestation?” Now, one year later, I could think of nothing else. When she answered my 2 A.M. phone call, I practically wept.

  “This is going to be fine,” she told me, although I could tell she didn’t believe it. “Here’s what we’ll do.”

  If you’re like me, you have never disposed of a body. After that long night in Cleveland, however, I’m confident I could. From a cabinet in Norma’s bathroom, I pilfered trash bags and duct tape. I put my clothes in the bags, tied them tight, and covered the knots with tape. The trash bags went into my backpack. My backpack went into more trash bags. More knots were tied. More tape was taped. Once outside, I placed everything in my trunk and sped off.

  Jacqui was waiting for me at the doorway of her mansion, and she immediately took charge. On her orders, I stripped to my underwear and ran straight for the shower. Then I stuffed as much clothing as I could in the dryer, leaving the rest in the car. Once our DIY extermination was complete, I passed out on the deliciously soft sofa in the living room, dreaming of lies to tell my new host and hostess in the morning.

  With that, Get-Out-the-Vote weekend began. The final four days of a campaign are always a blur, and these were even blurrier than usual. There was the persistent unease that came with parachuting comfortable white people into a neighborhood they were unlikely to revisit. There was the realization that, despite these moral compromises, we still did not have enough volunteers. And there were the insect bites, which stung rather than itched and grew more painful every day.

  With so many sources of discomfort, we had no time to reflect on what was happening. We knocked on every door in the neighborhood once during the weekend, once more on Monday, and twice on Election Day itself. Before we knew it, polls were just half an hour from closing. That’s when my BlackBerry vibrated.

  Run!

  It was the e-mail sent to all field staff in the waning moments of a campaign. Grabbing walk packets, Jacqui and I drove to a row of small brown houses, where we each took a different side of the street. I knocked on door after door, searching for would-be voters. No luck.

  Finally, at 7:26, just four minutes before polls closed, I heard shuffling from a living room. A woman appeared in a robe and sandals. She was registered but hadn’t voted yet. I was thrilled.

  “You’ve got to go now!” I told her.

  “Nah-ah,” she said. “I’m not voting.”

  “But the election’s going to be very close,” I reminded her.

  “I told you,” she said. “I don’t vote.”

  This was truly a fairy tale ending. A nonvoter! A last-minute conversion! All she needed was someone to believe in her.

  “This election is so important,” I implored. My voice dripped with emotion. “Ohio’s going to be so close. Your vote could make a big difference.”

  In the mov
ie version of my life, this was the moment when she raced to her polling place. In the my-life version of my life, it was the moment when she called me an asshole and told me to get off her porch. And with that inspiring exchange, time was up. The reelect was done.

  THE CUYAHOGA COUNTY DEMOCRATS HELD THEIR WATCH PARTY AT a DoubleTree in downtown Cleveland, and Jacqui and I arrived just as the first few states were being called. The first few were unsurprising: Vermont blue, Kentucky red, and so on.

  Soon, however, we allowed ourselves to hope. Early in the night, CNN projected Obama would win Pennsylvania, a state where Romney had made a last-minute push. Then we won New Hampshire, another potential tipping point. North Carolina went to our opponents, but we took Wisconsin, exactly as Joel Benenson’s internals predicted. The nervous chatter in the DoubleTree was replaced with a prayerful silence. If Ohio slid into Obama’s column, it would all be over.

  Ever since the first debate, I had stubbornly refused to think about winning. But now, eyes glued to a TV screen in anticipation, I granted myself the tiniest moment to reflect. Unemployment was near 8 percent. Obamacare wasn’t popular. Despite his once-in-a-generation talent, our candidate had belly-flopped on his campaign’s biggest night. And yet, despite everything, we stood on the brink of a second term. What better vindication of our efforts could there be?

  Ding-dong-thunk-thunk-THUNK-THUNK-ding-dong.

  A series of metallic sounds, half chiming, half clanging, echoed through the ballroom. Wolf Blitzer had a projection to make. “CNN projects that Barack Obama . . .” he said. But no one waited for him to finish. Beneath a picture of POTUS were the words I had scarcely allowed myself to imagine.

  * * *

  REELECTED PRESIDENT

  * * *

  The room exploded. It wasn’t a cheer. It wasn’t a scream. It was a supernova of relief. I threw my hands in the air. Jacqui turned toward me, laughing uncontrollably, and wrapped me in a hug. The noise faded just enough to hear Wolf Blitzer continue.

  “. . . because we project he will carry the state of Ohio.”

  The ballroom erupted all over again. “Yes we can! Yes we can!”

  And then, spontaneously, our time-honored chant evolved into something I had never heard before. “Yes we did! Yes we did!”

  I was almost too tired to cry. I was almost too happy to speak.

  Only now, with victory in hand, did I realize that part of me thought this day would never come. Anything can happen once, even electing a progressive black man named Barack Hussein Obama president of the United States. But twice? Like so much I had seen over the last four years, it was impossible, and then it was still impossible, and then it had been done. Now, thanks to a remarkable victory, we had four more years to change America. Four more years to close the gap between the country we were and the country we hoped to be.

  Was it 2008 all over again? Of course not. I had learned too much about delay and disappointment since then. Running my hand across my punctured belly, I was reminded that some scars don’t quickly heal. But jumping for joy with Jacqui, thinking of the years to come, I wished I could summon Sarah Palin to my side.

  “The honeymoon phase may be over,” I’d tell her. “But that hopey, changey thing? It’s working out just fine.”

  PART TWO

  OUR (TEENSY) PLACE IN HISTORY

  9

  HITLER AND LIPS

  On June 4, 2005, a skinny young senator delivered the commencement address at Knox College, a small liberal-arts school in Illinois. In Obamaworld that speech is like Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Casual fans may not have seen it, but it’s worshipped by the hard core.

  Rewatch the Knox commencement today, and here’s the first thing you’ll notice: the students are remarkably calm. Sure, there’s some cheering and clapping, but no one’s freaking out about Obama. A few audience members are doubtless wondering who he is. And with his opening anecdote, the speaker acknowledges his newness on the national stage.

  “I have not taken a single vote, I have not introduced one bill, had not even sat down in my desk, and this very earnest reporter raises his hand and says, ‘Senator Obama, what is your place in history?’”

  Here the young lawmaker pauses, a hint of the timing that will later serve him well.

  “I did what you just did, which is laugh out loud.”

  But if the senator’s amusement is genuine, so, too, is the sincerity that follows. In fact, after reflecting on the reporter’s question, he surprises the students with the central theme of his speech.

  “What,” he asks them, “will be your place in history?”

  This was part of what first drew me to Obama: he turned grandiosity on its head. For as he told the Knox College graduates, throughout most of human history, your destiny was certain. Your fate was sealed the moment you were born. America changed that. What made us special—what made us exceptional—was the promise that ordinary people could shape the national life. In fact, they were expected to. For 229 years it was our audiences, not our speakers, who made our country great.

  What will be your place in history? In America, that’s not such a dumb question after all.

  As President Obama’s second term began, it was certainly the question on everyone’s mind. Many exhausted top advisors, their personal legacies cemented and a second term secure, were finally ready to leave. David Plouffe, the electoral mastermind. Deputy Chief of Staff Nancy-Ann DeParle, who stewarded the president’s health care law. Axe, who shaped the Obama vision more than anyone except Obama himself.

  And Favs. At just thirty-one years old, Jon Favreau was already one of the most accomplished speechwriters in history. With no new rhetorical worlds to conquer, he left in early 2013.

  I was sad to see Favs go. He was a good boss and a remarkable talent. But President Obama’s loss was my gain—the chief wordsmith’s departure left an opening at the bottom of the speechwriting totem pole. When I returned to the White House in March, my days of professional promiscuity were over. I was now a full-time member of the president’s team.

  At the top of the totem pole, Favs’s spot was filled by his deputy, Cody Keenan. It was a smooth transition: Cody had been writing speeches for POTUS since the first campaign. Still, there were subtle differences between my old boss and my new one. I always thought of Favs as an architect, carefully crafting structures of great delicacy. With Cody, the phrase warrior poet sprang to mind. Like his mountain-man beard, which sprouted whenever the stakes grew high, his writing began with something visceral inside him. Emotions came first, only later to be trimmed. This difference in writing style was reflected in attitude. Favs’s confidence was tinged with cleverness; Cody’s with righteousness.

  I was especially grateful for this righteous swagger during a POTUS meeting my first week back. The subject was the Gridiron Club Dinner, which, together with the Correspondents’ Dinner and the Alfalfa, makes up the Holy Trinity of presidential comedy events. It had now been eighteen months since I first entered the Oval. I told myself I wasn’t nervous. But when I reached the doorway I froze, terrified of doing something dumb.

  Fortunately, Cody was completely comfortable. The president was seated behind his desk, and my new boss sauntered toward him like a detective about to crack a case. I tiptoed cautiously behind.

  “So,” POTUS asked, “are we funny?”

  This was less a question than an invitation to make small talk. Cody didn’t miss a beat.

  “Well, Litt’s pretty funny,” he said, nodding in my direction.

  A brief hint of confusion crossed the president’s face. He clearly wasn’t sure he’d heard right. But after a moment’s pause, he decided to keep going.

  “Yeah,” POTUS said. “Lips is funny.”

  As you might imagine, I have replayed this moment frequently in my head. Perhaps I simply misheard the president. Perhaps time has warped my memory. But I don’t think so. I’m fairly certain Barack Obama called me Lips.

  Here’s why I’m so sure. Number one,
POTUS enjoyed banter. Going out of his way to extend pre-meeting small talk is exactly the sort of thing he would do. Second, while I wish I could say otherwise, President Obama had no reason to know my name. I’d written scripts for tapings. I’d helped him with a Correspondents’ Dinner. But lots of people pop in and out of a president’s orbit each year. At most I was a familiar face, the barista at your local Starbucks, the robber who wasn’t Joe Pesci in Home Alone.

  Finally, it was not the first time this sort of incident had occurred. One friend, a fellow comms staffer who started at the White House in 2009, was named Jason. POTUS loved his work and would often ask his boss to pass along a thank-you. “Tell James, ‘great job,’” he would say. There was nothing anyone could do about this. After a few years, the president figured out Jason was Jason. Until then, James was James.

  So Lips it was. And to be honest, as I settled onto the couch in the Oval, I wasn’t embarrassed. I was thrilled. The president of the United States had referred to me by name! True, it wasn’t my name, but no need to get nitpicky. Besides, I liked having an alter ego. Litt was shy. Litt was timid. But Lips? Lips could be bold. Lips could be daring.

  Lips didn’t give a fuck.

  What better way to describe the growing sense of liberation I’d felt since the second term began? After the inaugural ball, for example, the wait at the coat check had stretched for ninety minutes. This wasn’t surprising; the coat-check line at the first inauguration was similarly dysfunctional. But back then, I would never, under any circumstances, have cut in front of Obamaworld’s elite. The building could have been on fire. The ballroom could have been swarming with killer bees. I still would have waited my turn.

  Now, things had changed. Thanks to a well-connected friend, Jacqui and I had tickets to Rahm Emanuel’s after-party at an underground blues club. And thanks to my spot on the Presidential Inaugural Committee, I had a plan. Ducking into a staff room, I grabbed a curly rubber earpiece, the kind used by Secret Service, and switched off the walkie-talkie. Then I held my hand to my mouth as though a microphone were clipped to my sleeve.