George McGovern writes Lincoln book; former presidential candidate sees parallels with Obama
By: RON WORD
Associated Press
06/20/09 6:10 PM PDT
ST. AUGUSTINE BEACH, FLA. — The only president who came into office facing a "worse mess" than Barack Obama was Abraham Lincoln, said George McGovern, who's promoting his book on the Civil War president.
Decades after his own unsuccessful bid for president, McGovern, a former history professor, sees similarities between the Honest Abe president and Obama.
"I really think he has some of Lincoln's qualities," McGovern said of Obama. "The only president who inherited a worse mess was Lincoln, who inherited a four-year civil war that ruined the country."
When asked how his 185-page "Abraham Lincoln" differs from 16,000 other biographies on Lincoln, the prolific speaker replied simply: "It's briefer." The publisher asked him to keep it short.
At 86, the 1972 Democratic presidential candidate continues to write opinion pieces for newspapers and when he speaks to civic groups, there is usually a standing-room only audience. McGovern, who served three terms in the U.S. Senate representing South Dakota, said he learned plenty about Lincoln while researching the book.
He said he paid attention to handicaps Lincoln had to overcome, such as having only a year of formal education, McGovern said.
"I hadn't realized what an avid reader he was. He analyzed what he read. He thought about it. He took notes on it. There were certain fields he just mastered and one of them was the law," McGovern said.
Another handicap was bouts of clinical depression.
"He called it melancholy," McGovern said, though he still was able to function well as a leader.
Would Lincoln be successful in today's political climate?
"I think he could. My only question is how he would come across on television," McGovern said.
McGovern supported Obama in the 2008 presidential race after first backing his longtime friend Hillary Clinton, who worked for his failed 1972 campaign lost to Richard Nixon.
"He was emerging as the man of the hour, the candidate of change, the candidate of new politics and a new way of doing things," McGovern said.
Obama was able to beat Clinton and John McCain because he was the right man for the moment, McGovern said, adding he had never expected to see a black president in his lifetime.
McGovern recently bought a two-story, four-bedroom home in the southern end of St. Augustine Beach, an area steeped in history with milder winters than South Dakota.
Now that his book is written, McGovern said his passion is ending child hunger.
In 2000, Congress passed the George McGovern-Robert Dole Food for Education and Nutrition Act, which feeds 22 million children around the globe with a daily nutritious meal. McGovern wants to see another 100 million children fed through the effort run by the United Nations.
"I want to live long enough if I can, and so does Bob Dole, to reach all these kids," he said. "I've battled against hunger since World War II, I am very proud of that."
