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The content of Obama's character

Who knows but that, on the lower frequencies, he speaks for me, for you, for all of us? An educated, intelligent man, he is the very model of the roommate that every good liberal parent in Park Slope or Santa Monica prays that their son might bring home from college. He is proof of how it is possible to live the good life in America without ceasing to be a good person. Intimately acquainted with ambivalence, he pulled the trigger on Osama bin Laden while bringing our boys home from the deserts of Iraq. The quasi-accidental father of quasi-universal…

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is a contributing editor of Harper’s Magazine. His essay “Wild Things” appeared in the June issue.

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September 2012

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