Obama sat with Suskind in bid to alter book’s ‘trajectory’

One question that has arisen since the publication of “Confidence Men,” an insider account of the Obama White House, concerns the care and feeding of author Ron Suskind.

Why did White House advisors let Suskind sit for an interview with the president?

As any White House reporter can tell you, scoring an interview with Barack Obama is no small feat. His time is pretty important; ours, not so much.

Here, though, Suskind was granted face time with Obama and went on to produce a book that portrayed him as a chief executive who struggled to manage his own team of economic advisors.

Not the ideal outcome if you work in the Obama White House.

It’s unclear what Obama feels about all this, but a White House advisor on Thursday offered some context surrounding the interview.

“We knew this would be a heavily promoted book,” he said.

Before the interview with Obama, White House officials picked up signals that the book might present what they believed to be an inaccurate portrait.

“Having Suskind talk to the president gave an opportunity to try to change the trajectory of that story,” he said.

Lesson learned. So will the president sit for interviews with book authors down the road?

“The Suskind book does not change our approach to authors. It changes our approach to Ron Suskind,” the advisor said.