Today's guest is Anne Cook, the author Democrats in the Red Zone. The subject is President Barack Obama’s “First Hundred Days,” and what he has accomplished both substantively and historically.

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Anne Cook is an author, sometime blogger, and average American citizen whose recent book, Democrats in the Red Zone: an Independent voter’s take on the game of political perception, was published in November 2007. In her book, Cook suggests that Democrats have to be savvier about how they play the political perception game. She believes Republicans retain an edge in their understanding of American cultural biases, and that Democrats must sharpen their rhetoric and cultivate more mainstream perceptions of their constituencies to gain an upper hand.

In a direct challenge to the organizational culture of the Democratic Party in particular and liberal culture in general, Cook asserts that such a strategic shift will only occur when barriers to inclusion based on class and educational credentials are broken down within those two cultures. Cook believes that America’s voting majority — especially football fans — detests one trait even more than dishonesty: pretentiousness. Ms. Cook lives in Virginia, which she calls a “red state going purple,” and she was a guest on The Advocates on both January 2nd and September 3rd of 2008. Right before the election on October 29th of 2008, she joined political pollster Drew Zambelli and author Doug Garr, who is a keen observer of American politics in predicting a Democratic victory in November.