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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. The acronym COIN carries which of the following meanings in the memoir?

2. Which of the following does Obama note meeting at Normandy?

3. How many are reported dead in the Massey Energy Upper Big Branch Mine incident?

4. The acronym START carries what meaning in the memoir?

5. Which of the following is Obama’s Commerce Secretary?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Obama note as his reasons for wanting to engage Medvedev at his first G20 summit?

2. To what does the “cap-and-trade” system of greenhouse gas reduction refer?

3. What “hard truths” does Obama note hoping to address in the “Muslim speech” (358-59)?

4. What parts of the UN Charter does Obama note matched his mother’s viewpoint?

5. What effects does Obama note the stresses of his second year in office have on his senior staffers?

6. What justification does Obama note for the vitriol of the Tea Party?

7. What does Obama note are historical reasons midterm elections go poorly for the party in power?

8. What does Obama note are the effects of the Spanish flu on the world?

9. What ideas does Obama note concerning war in preparing his Nobel acceptance speech?

10. What does Obama describe as the “Michelle Effect” in the memoir?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Explicate the symbolism of the Tea Party and its members’ trappings and presentations, as depicted in the memoir.

Essay Topic 2

Does the memoir as a whole support or deny the comment that “Running for president is supposed to be hard […] because being president is hard” (111)? How does it do so?

Essay Topic 3

Many sources attest to the presence of A Promised Land on the New York Times best-seller list. Assuming that sales figures reflect popularity, what accounts for the popularity of the memoir? How does it do so?

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