Question of the day

Both followed up their initial national exposure with well-publicized books to tell the public more about their lives and views. Obama’s “The Audacity of Hope” came out in 2006, and Palin’s “Going Rogue” was published last year.

Both became nationally recognized as Washington outsiders with limited governmental experience. Obama was an Illinois state senator when he gave his 2004 convention speech, and he was elected to the U.S. Senate later that year. Palin had served less than two years as Alaska’s governor before running with John McCain in 2008. Prior to that she’d been mayor of Wasilla for six years.

Both share somewhat exotic backgrounds far removed from the continental United States, with Obama growing up in Hawaii and Palin moving to Alaska as an infant. In addition, out-of-the-ordinary familial circumstances — Obama’s bi-racial heritage and the Palin family saga — spark human interest in the two people at the center of the public’s political attention.