Who Are the 10% Who Think U.S. on Right Track? | Newsweek Politics: Campaign 2008

The Editor’s Desk
Daniel Klaidman 11/22/2008 12:00:00 AM
Writing in The New York Times, columnist David Brooks lightly mocked the phenomenon as "O-phoria," the wall-to-wall coverage of Barack Obama's election—the insta-books, the quickie documentaries and, yes, the magazine covers. But it is hard to overstate the profound impact this election has had on the country. We in the media are, in some ways, giving voice to a collective expression of pride, a kind of national exclamation point, as if to say, "This really happened." The election of Obama hardly represents an eradication of racial prejudice; rather, it is an important milestone along a tortured road—an achievement in which all Americans, no matter whom they voted for, can take pride. But it is not a static event. The presence of an African-American family in the White House will force (allow?) all of us, no matter our skin color or ethnic background, to examine our biases and expectations.
SATIRE
Let’s Stop the Whining
Fake Steve Jobs 11/22/2008 12:00:00 AM
Example No. 1: the iPhone. True, it's the most advanced, elegant, sophisticated device ever created in the history of mankind. It's almost perfect. Almost. I mean, it's so close to perfect that you might call it perfect if you weren't a total, 100 percent perfection-loving perfectionist like me, in which case you have to add "almost."
POLITICS
Obama’s Lincoln
Evan Thomas 11/15/2008 12:00:00 AM
It is the season to compare Barack Obama to Abraham Lincoln. Two thin men from rude beginnings, relatively new to Washington but wise to the world, bring the nation together to face a crisis. Both are superb rhetoricians, both geniuses at stagecraft and timing. Obama, like Lincoln and unlike most modern politicians, even writes his own speeches, or at least drafts the really important ones—by hand, on yellow legal paper—such as his remarkably honest speech on race during the Reverend Wright imbroglio last spring.
PUBLISHING
Can Obama Save The Media?
Johnnie L. Roberts 11/13/2008 12:00:00 AM
The morning after the election, Barack Obama's supporters were not the only ones celebrating. Newspaper and magazine publishers from Los Angeles to New York had reason to be happy as well. After years of losing readers to the Internet, steep declines in advertising revenue, publication closures and round after round of layoffs, the print industry witnessed something it hasn't seen in a long time: sold-out newsstands. Throughout the country, some newsstand operators were forced to compile handwritten waiting lists for special election issues of certain newspapers and magazines like NEWSWEEK and Time. "We ran out in places and had to reorder to the extent they were available," says a spokeswoman for Hudson News, a national news retailer with outlets in 60 airports nationwide.
FASHION
The Clothes Make The Superhero
Jessica Bennett 11/13/2008 12:00:00 AM
In 1976, three years after her signature wrap dress hit runways, Diane von Furstenberg appeared on the cover of this magazine, which dubbed her the most marketable designer since Coco Chanel and the newest icon for liberated women. Three decades and millions of wraps later, the 61-year-old remains a dominant force in the fashion circuit, with a publishing house, a cosmetics line and a lifetime-achievement award from the Council of Fashion Designers of America, where she also served as president. She is also enthralled with another liberated lady: Wonder Woman. Inspired by the Amazonian superhero, Furstenberg has penned a comic book of her own, "The Adventures of Diva, Viva and Fifa," to go along with her new line. (She'll donate the book's proceeds to Vital Voices Global Partnership, a women's nonprofit.) Von Furstenberg spoke with NEWSWEEK's Jessica Bennett. Excerpts:
Periscope