Two of the books the ABA donated to the Obama family.

Between budget battles and the coming reelection campaign, President Obama probably doesn’t have much time to relax with a good book. But he’s got plenty to choose from. This year, representatives of the American Booksellers Association presented Obama, his wife, and their daughters with some 300 titles, including bestsellers and “hidden gems” that the independent booksellers’ trade group selected over the past year.

The ABA’s donation to the White House library dates to 1929, when Herbert Hoover found himself wandering the White House on his first night in office before his belongings arrived, looking for a book to read. He borrowed one from a White House guard, and when the Washington Post picked up the story the next day, an ABA staffer decided the White House shelves should be stocked. The Hoovers were presented with 500 books that April, and the ABA has made a donation to every President since.

The Moviegoer

Maud Casey, University of Maryland associate professor of English whose latest novel is Genealogy, recommends The Moviegoer by Walker Percy: “This was my first favorite book, one of those life-changing reads. It’s a wickedly funny novel about existential angst, and it’s also full of summery things: malaise, sultry climes, and the cool, magical relief of the movies.”

Bob Woodward on Meet the Press in December 2009. Image courtesy Bob Woodward

It never fails. Every few years, the Washington Post’s Bob Woodward produces a new book, and within days official Washington has analyzed and argued about it. It becomes part of the conversation, its anecdotes shared at parties, its methods and revelations debated. But has anyone actually read it?

Woodward’s books aren’t the only ones to get this treatment, though he may be the only author whose books are all treated this way. And most writers don’t have the guarantee, as he does, of extensive excerpts in the city’s paper of record. (Whether the excerpts are fully read is uncertain, too.)

Woodward’s books are subject to what can be called the Washington Read—not to be confused with the Index Scan: a glance over the credits to see if you’re mentioned. Washington social doyenne Juleanna Glover, host of countless book parties, says she has often seen guests do Index Scans immediately up on picking up the featured book.

The Washington Read is the phenomenon by which, through a form of intellectual osmosis, a book is absorbed into the Washington atmosphere.

It’s an old story here. In the 1970s, Christopher Lasch’s The Culture of Narcissism influenced one of the most famous speeches in presidential history, Jimmy Carter’s 1979 “malaise” address—so called even though the word “malaise” wasn’t in the speech. According to Kevin Mattson’s “What the Heck Are You Up To, Mr. President?”: Jimmy Carter, America’s “Malaise,” and the Speech That Should Have Changed the Country, Carter aide Pat Caddell “hadn’t read Lasch’s book closely, if at all,” as he was beginning to make the argument for some kind of game-changing speech.

In the spring of 1979, Mattson writes, the Lasch book rode “a wave, becoming the most discussed, if not necessarily read, work of serious nonfiction.” It’s not clear whether Carter read the book, either. Mattson writes that, after meeting with Caddell to discuss the lengthy memo Caddell had written on the subject, “Carter told Caddell that he’d do some speed reading, books by Christopher Lasch and James MacGregor Burns (and even Alexis de Tocqueville’s old classic, Democracy in America).”

Poll Shows Support for DC Tax Hike: Faced with a $322 million budget shortfall, District voters responding to a DC Fiscal Policy Institute poll overwhelmingly support increasing taxes on residents who make more than $200,000 a year. "A large majority – 70 percent – of poll respondents said it is more important to preserve services than to hold down taxes." [DCFPI] 

Related: Council Chairman Kwame Brown "says the budget he will put before the council will not include any increases in property or income taxes, despite the mayor's proposal to raise incomes taxes on the wealthy." [Examiner]

Tim Kaine, George Allen in Early Tie: "George Allen and Timothy M. Kaine are locked in a dead heat 18 months from Election Day, according to a new Washington Post poll, suggesting that the U.S. Senate race between the Virginia titans may live up to its billing as one of the most competitive contests in the nation." [Washington Post]

Obamas Dine at Tosca: Saturday night, just before 8 PM, the president and first lady strolled in to Tosca (#33 on our list of 100 Best Restaurants) for a date night. [NBC4]

Alexandria Mulls New Parking Restrictions for Mark Center: That massive new housing development for Pentagon workers in Alexandria looks like it could force the creation of special parking district in neighborhoods on Seminary Road. "City officials are worried about nightmarish traffic conditions that are likely to occur once thousands of employees begin commuting to work along Seminary Road and Interstate 395, the intersection where the Mark Center office space is located. [Examiner]

Related: WTOP package on Why BRAC is About to Change Your World.

President Obama on 60 Minutes: 'Well, it was certainly one of the most satisfying weeks not only for my presidency but I think for the United States since I've been president. Obviously, bin Laden had been not only a symbol of terrorism but a mass murderer who had eluded justice for so long and so many families who have been affected I think had given up hope. And for us to be able to definitively say, "We got the man who caused thousands of deaths here in the United States" was something that I think all of us were profoundly grateful to be a part of.' [CBS]

Carman Wins James Beard Award: Local food critic Tim Carman, now with the Post, took home the James Beard Award for food-related columns and commentary over the weekend for three columns penned for his former publication, Washington City Paper. Links to those stories and well-deserved bragging rights can found here.

High schools always had students who were considered nerds or jocks. But kids today have a lot more labels for each other than they used to, says author Alexandra Robbins. Roam the halls of a typical school and you might find cliques of gamers, indies, loners, emos, freaks, normies, bros, scene kids, bandies, and tanorexics.

Robbins’ 2006 book The Overachievers: The Secret Lives of Driven Kids followed students from Bethesda’s Walt Whitman High School, her alma mater. For her latest book, The Geeks Shall Inherit the Earth: Popularity, Quirk Theory, and Why Outsiders Thrive After High School, out in early May, she interviewed hundreds of students across the country about labels, cliques, and social hierarchies.

We checked in with Robbins to find out what she learned.

Where did you get the idea for this book?
Since The Overachievers came out, I’ve been doing a lot of lectures and talking to kids across the country. One thing that struck me is that many of the students I was most drawn to were in some way different, and they felt that because they weren’t part of the “in” crowd that they were socially inadequate. I didn’t see them that way at all. I saw them as really interesting, cool people who were going to be really interesting, cool adults.