madmagazine
Member
- Joined
- Sep 17, 2003
- Messages
- 66
- Reaction score
- 0
As the midterm elections approach, Sen. Barack Obama talks more openly than ever about the possibility of a White House run in a first-ever formal magazine interview with Jacob Weisberg for the September/October cover of Men's Vogue.
Accompanied by intimate photos of his family shot by famous photographer Annie Leibovitz, Obama identifies with presidents of the past and reflects on how he has arrived at the completion of two books.
"If you read Robert Caro's biography of Lyndon Johnson -- I'm not Johnson, but I'm fascinated by him -- there's a piece of him in me," Obama told Weisberg. "That kind of hunger -- desperate to win, please, succeed, dominate -- I don't know any politician who doesn't have some of that reptilian side to him. But that's not the dominant part of me. On the other hand, I don't know that it was the dominant part of (someone like Lincoln). This guy was pretty reflective."
Weisberg explored how Obama's role as a writer distinguishes him as a political figure and how such intellectual charge may propel him to a much higher office.
"When you start writing you are able to discern where you're being false, where you're using cliches, where you're manufacturing emotion that's not really there, or where you're shying away from something that isn't necessarily flattering," Obama told Vogue.
Too candid to deny that he's thinking about the presidency, Obama said, "Look, it was highly unlikely that I would ever be a U.S. senator, so it's very flattering for people to talk about a presidential race. My attitude about something like the presidency is that you don't want to just be the president, you want to change the country. You want to make a unique contribution. You want to be a great president."
NBC5 dot com
Accompanied by intimate photos of his family shot by famous photographer Annie Leibovitz, Obama identifies with presidents of the past and reflects on how he has arrived at the completion of two books.
"If you read Robert Caro's biography of Lyndon Johnson -- I'm not Johnson, but I'm fascinated by him -- there's a piece of him in me," Obama told Weisberg. "That kind of hunger -- desperate to win, please, succeed, dominate -- I don't know any politician who doesn't have some of that reptilian side to him. But that's not the dominant part of me. On the other hand, I don't know that it was the dominant part of (someone like Lincoln). This guy was pretty reflective."
Weisberg explored how Obama's role as a writer distinguishes him as a political figure and how such intellectual charge may propel him to a much higher office.
"When you start writing you are able to discern where you're being false, where you're using cliches, where you're manufacturing emotion that's not really there, or where you're shying away from something that isn't necessarily flattering," Obama told Vogue.
Too candid to deny that he's thinking about the presidency, Obama said, "Look, it was highly unlikely that I would ever be a U.S. senator, so it's very flattering for people to talk about a presidential race. My attitude about something like the presidency is that you don't want to just be the president, you want to change the country. You want to make a unique contribution. You want to be a great president."
NBC5 dot com
). 
Oh, I but I guess you mean your actual Senator in political terms 
