Jon Favreau: Obama's 27 Year-Old Speechwriter

Barack Obama's 27 year-old speech writer Jon Favreau. Not the guy from Swingers.

I'm sure he'll be making the news now.

Esquire ran an article on him:

He is too busy to read much. "I'm embarrassed to say that since college" -- Favreau graduated from Holy Cross in 2003 -- "I've been so busy speechwriting for Kerry and then Barack that I haven't been reading all the good literary stuff I used to read back in the day." As for speechcraft, while he says the speeches of Bobby Kennedy are his favorites, he also says Peggy Noonan is his all-time favorite speechwriter.

What he learned from Michael Gerson, who was President Bush's main speechwriter for five years:

"But it must be noted here that with that speech [to the joint session of Congress after the September 11 attacks] the discord between speech and speaker has never been more pronounced, for we have come to know that Gerson's boss never fully grasped the power of words. With an exalting script, Gerson could make George W. Bush sound like Winston Churchill for an hour. But it is Jon Favreau's task and his gift that he is able to make his boss -- a fellow who has been known to write a sentence or two on his own -- sound like Barack Obama."

Surprising to have such a young person writing speeches. Yes we can.

Source: Esquire