Thanks, Obama Page 28

  Yet without meaning to, I took his advice. I didn’t enter government out of high-minded principle. I did it because, for a brief period coinciding with my graduation, there was no more exciting place to be. My heart blazed a trail to the bureaucracy. I followed obediently behind.

  Which is how, entirely by accident, I chose wisely. My two terms in Obamaworld didn’t convince me everyone should go into politics. But they did convince me everyone should go into public service. This is not a matter of job description. Instead, it’s a matter of moral orientation, about regularly and honestly asking, “Am I doing enough good?” If you devote yourself only to yourself—if your heart strives above all else for fame, or money, or power, or even happiness—I’m not saying you’re a bad person. But you are making a bad choice.

  Choose service instead. Not because The World Needs You. It probably doesn’t. The world will be fine, and if it won’t be fine, you alone can’t fix it. Choose service because there is nothing more insufferable than a talented, driven person who is also completely self-obsessed. Those people are awful. They spend their lives trying to fill a hole and digging it deeper instead. Anyone can be successful. Only service can make you realize how insignificant—and yet how meaningful—your time on earth really is.

  No less important, if you’re a young person, public service will teach you stuff you didn’t learn in school.

  Eight years in Obamaworld taught me perseverance. As a twenty-one-year-old, I assumed people on the right side of history were accompanied by a serene, ever-present glow. I figured doing good meant feeling good. Otherwise, why bother?

  Today when I think about the right side of history, I remember a colleague’s going-away party. At the end of the evening, one of his mentors gave a toast.

  “For an entire year, Jacob took data from memos and turned it into PowerPoints. Then he took those exact same PowerPoints, and turned them back into memos.” After a pause for knowing laughter, the toast continued.

  “And because he did that, 140 million American workers got a payroll tax cut.”

  I have no doubt both halves of this anecdote are true. Yes, change comes from marchers, and visionaries, and freedom fighters. But I know now that change also comes from office workers in stuffy buildings with ugly wall-to-wall carpet. Change comes from people who set a worthy goal, put themselves in position to achieve it, and keep working long after the warm and fuzzy feelings disappear. Barack Obama’s election was a triumph of hope. But his presidency was a triumph of persistence.

  Eight years in Obamaworld taught me focus. Each news cycle—already shrunk to twenty-four hours when POTUS took office—lasted mere seconds by the time he left. He faced constant pressure to approach every issue with the frantic, hair-on-fire urgency of a tweet. More than once, I found myself frustrated by the president’s patience. To me it seemed more like delay. But nine times out of ten, Obama was right. The secret to solving big problems, I learned, is knowing which little problems to ignore.

  The list of Things Obamaworld Taught Me could go on for several pages. I learned that decisions are only as good as the decision-making process. That generosity is a habit and not a trait. That all human beings, even presidents, look goofy chewing gum.

  But here, beyond a shadow of a doubt, is the single most valuable lesson I learned in public service: There are no grown-ups, at least not in the way I imagined as a kid. Once you reach a certain age, the world has no more parents. But it contains a truly shocking number of children. These children come in all ages, in all sizes, from every walk of life and every corner of the political map.

  And this is the reason I’m most grateful for my time in Obamaworld. For eight formative years, often against my will, I was forced to act like an adult. Children strive for pleasure; adults for fulfillment. Children demand adoration; adults earn respect. Children find worth in what they acquire; adults find worth in the responsibilities they bear. And more than anything else, what separates adults and children is the way in which they love.

  I didn’t always understand this. One night in 2011, during the first month Jacqui and I were dating, I had a few too many Island Juleps and began to ramble.

  “The problem,” I announced, “is that there’s not enough love in our politics.”

  In hindsight, I had no clue what I was talking about. If you’re a certain type of young person in Washington, this is simply what you say to someone you hope will sleep with you. I consider myself lucky it worked. But if pressed, I suppose I would have admitted that by love I meant something more like infatuation. It was the way I felt the very first time I saw that freshman senator from Illinois. He’s flawless! He gets me! Only he can make the world as perfect as he is!

  What I know now is that this kind of love, while wonderful, is for kids. Real love—for a president, for a person, for a country—is more textured than that. Real love is about fighting for something long after its flaws are laid bare. It’s about caring so deeply, you have no choice but to place another’s well-being above your own. Love is not a feeling. It transcends feelings. Love is what allows us to be disillusioned and to somehow still believe.

  And love has a way of brightening even the darkest moments. Just four days after Trump was elected president, I got down on one knee and asked Jacqui to continue believing in me, no matter how disillusioned she became. I think I put it more romantically than that. It was kind of a blur. Regardless, I consider myself lucky she said yes.

  IT’S A STRANGE THING TO SAY, BUT I SUSPECT OUR NEW CHIEF executive has no idea how I felt when Jacqui agreed to marry me. Along with his other flaws—or really, at the root of them—Donald Trump is a seventy-year-old kid.

  By the time I visit Zoe Lihn in Phoenix, eight days after the inauguration, it’s becoming clear that installing a toddler in the White House has consequences. Week one of the Trump presidency has featured countless rounds of a game I call “How much worse is America since I last checked my phone?”

  The answer, usually, is “A lot.” EPA scientists have been placed under a gag order. New deportation rules are designed to tear families apart. The rule of law is already fraying, and the Republican Congress is too busy targeting consumer protections to care.

  It’s terrifying. But it’s not surprising. What is surprising is the number of people who love their country despite its flaws, and refuse to give it up without a fight. Friends who never before cared about politics are pouring out of the woodwork, asking what they can do. I don’t have an easy fix for them. But their question, in and of itself, is an answer. It’s the best of America: defiant, proud, optimistic in spite of everything. It reminds me of nothing so much as the 2008 campaign.

  It goes without saying that Stacey Lihn is part of it. She tells me that Election Night was devastating. The morning after, she had trouble getting out of bed. But she never doubted she would return to the fight. She had no choice. On January 15, she stood outside her senator’s office in Arizona and demanded that he protect her daughter’s care. The day after the inauguration, she was one of three million people who joined Women’s Marches across the country—the biggest single protest America had ever seen.

  “It’s kind of like our journey with Zoe,” she tells me. “You get dealt a rough hand, and you have to rally and you have to come back.”

  Sitting at Stacey’s kitchen table, I have so many questions. Does she think we’ll win? What does she do when she gets discouraged? Has she, too, been unable to sleep? But our interview is cut short by a hyperactive six-year-old. Zoe has recently acquired a scooter. She’s desperate to go outside and play. And that’s the way it should be. Thanks to a man who lived in the White House—and to all the people who put him there—Zoe is as bouncy and impatient as any other kid.

  That doesn’t mean everything will be okay. Pulling out of the Lihns’ driveway, I turn on my phone, play my new favorite game, and discover that America has become much worse in the hours since I last checked. President Trump is hoping to make good on his campaign promise to ba
n Muslims, starting with seven nations from Africa and the Middle East. The executive order he’s just signed is a stunning blend of ineptitude and malice. Translators who served with U.S. troops in Iraq are being held like criminals at the airport. Green-card holders are being illegally detained. Babies can’t get food. The elderly can’t get medicine. The stories are heartbreaking.

  But they’re not finished. Within hours, thousands of fellow citizens spontaneously descend upon America’s airports. Volunteer lawyers fan out to represent detainees. The ACLU takes the president to court and wins. Despite everything, I end the night smiling as I watch a video on my phone.

  The footage is from JFK airport, the same airport I flew into the night Barack Obama’s speech changed my life. This time, though, the terminal is packed. The energy is as intense as anything on the campaign. As the camera pans toward a security door, a middle-aged woman in a head scarf shuffles out of detention. Relatives run to embrace her. She looks almost dizzy with relief. As she slowly exits the airport, the crowd breaks into raucous cheers:

  “U-S-A! U-S-A!”

  To my surprise, quietly in my hotel room, I join in.

  THE FOLLOWING AFTERNOON, STACEY LIHN GOES TO THE PHOENIX airport to protest, and I go there for my flight home. The plane takes off. I look out over the shrinking sea of cars and houses. Then, like clockwork, Sarah Palin chimes in.

  “So . . .” she asks.

  But for the first time in eight days, her question is pushed aside by a million more important ones. Will Zoe Lihn be able to keep her health care? Will she grow up in a land of freedom and opportunity? Will she achieve her dreams, which at the moment include earning a black belt and becoming a school principal so she can order fire drills whenever she feels like it?

  I don’t know. No one does. But I do know this. While Donald Trump may be our president, he does not define our country. I don’t think he ever will. Zoe Lihn is six years old, and for now, this is still Barack Obama’s America.

  Anything is possible.

  ACKS

  All speechwriters know that it’s important to keep acknowledgments short. They also know that, if you can’t keep the acks short, you must under no circumstances accidentally leave anyone out. I’m about to break the first rule, and most likely the second as well. So with apologies in advance, thank you to the following people, without whom I could not have written this book.

  My agent, Dan Greenberg, for understanding what I was trying to do before I did.

  My editor, Denise Oswald, for asking me questions I had no answers to and sticking with me until I found some.

  Ashley Garland, James Faccinto, Meghan Deans, Miriam Parker, Sonya Cheuse, Emma Janaskie, and the rest of Ecco, for making sure this book is worth reading and that you’re reading it.

  Catherine Burns, and the entire Moth family, for their friendship, encouragement, and storytelling genius.

  Mike Farah, Brad Jenkins, and the team at Funny Or Die, for believing in, and making lots of, quality stuff.

  Amanda Hymson and Jason Richman at UTA, for being strategic and supportive in equal measure.

  Vinca LaFleur, Jeff Nussbaum, Paul Orzulak, and Jeff Shesol, for deciding I could write speeches when there was not much evidence to support that notion.

  Valerie Jarrett, Cody Keenan, Jon Favreau, and Mike Strautmanis, for giving me the chances (and sometimes second chances) of a lifetime.

  Everyone who wrote POTUS jokes—for no pay, and usually for no credit—while I was at the White House: Judd Apatow, David Axelrod, Beth Armogida, Kevin Bleyer, Jon Lovett, Andrew Law, Nina Pedrad, Pete Schultz, Nell Scovell, Rachel Sklar, Will Stephen, Katie Rich, Tommy Vietor, and the West Wing Writers crew. With so much extraordinary material, each monologue could have easily been five times as long.

  My colleagues on the POTUS and FLOTUS speechwriting teams: Dave Cavell, Laura Dean, Sarah Hurwitz, Susannah Jacob, Steve Krupin, Tyler Lechtenberg, Kyle O’Connor, Sarada Peri, Aneesh Raman, Carlin Reichel, Megan Rooney, and Terry Szuplat. I’ll always be grateful for your talent, your friendship, and for the fact that you only occasionally made fun of how messy my office was.

  The people (and the following is a partial list) who gave up their time to make this book just a little bit better—to read a chapter, offer encouragement, or share an invaluable piece of advice: Mike Birbiglia, Joanna Coles, Billy Eichner, Ashley Fox, Peter Godwin, Ben Orlin, Tig Notaro, B. J. Novak, Eric Ortner, Kevin Roe, David Sedaris, Erik Smith, Kimball Stroud, and Alexandra Veitch.

  And finally: To my Ohio volunteers, White House coworkers, and campaign colleagues, for inspiring me. To the friends I ignored while writing this book, for forgiving me now that I’m done with it. To my family, for being generous and kind. To my parents, for believing in me and always leading by example. And most of all, to Jacqui, for everything.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  DAVID LITT entered the White House in 2011 and left in 2016 as a Special Assistant to the President and Senior Presidential Speechwriter. Described as the “comic muse for the president,” Litt began contributing jokes to President Obama’s speeches in 2009 and was the lead writer on four White House Correspondents’ Dinners. He is currently the head writer/producer for Funny Or Die’s office in Washington, D.C. Litt has also written for The Onion, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Cosmopolitan, GQ, Vanity Fair, The Atlantic, and the New York Times. He lives in Washington, D.C., with his fiancée, Jacqui Kappler, and their two goldfish, Florence and Duane.

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  CREDITS

  COVER DESIGN BY SARA WOOD

  COVER PHOTOGRAPHS © SHUTTERSTOCK

  COPYRIGHT

  THANKS, OBAMA. Copyright © 2017 by David Litt. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

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  ISBN 978-0-06-256845-8

  EPub Edition September 2017 ISBN 978-0-06-256846-5

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