Obama ex-girlfriends' stories featured in new book

(CBS News) A new biography of President Barack Obama has some people asking if anything in a president's past is off limits.

Author David Maraniss relies heavily on the diaries, letters, and memories of Mr. Obama's old girlfriends. "Barack Obama: The Story" focuses on the president as a young man, living in New York and Chicago. It shows him in love, and in turmoil.

The young Barack Obama portrayed in David Maraniss' book struggled to feel at home in New York. It was at Columbia University where the future president felt lost, struggling with questions about who he really was - his race, his religion, and even his cultural and political beliefs. It was a deep, internal conflict that he only shared with his close friends, including his girlfriends.

One of those girlfriends was Genevieve Cook, the daughter of a prominent Australian family. They are shown in the pages of Vanity Fair, which excerpted Maraniss' biography. Cook and Obama met at Christmas Party in 1983 at an apartment in New York's East Village.

Early in their relationship, Obama confessed to Cook how he searched for the "perfect ideal woman...at the expense of hooking up with available girls." In her journal, Cook wrote: "I can't help thinking that what he would really want, be powerfully drawn to, was a woman, very strong, very upright, a fighter, a laugher, well-experienced - a black woman I keep seeing her as."

But Cook would fall in love anyway, and 22-year-old Barack Obama began having the deepest, most romantic relationship of his young life. Cook says in 1984, Mr. Obama rented a room in an apartment in this building on West 114th Street. She remembers how on Sundays Mr. Obama would drink coffee, solve crossword puzzles, and lounge around shirtless in a blue and white sarong.

Cook continued journaling through their relationship. In one entry, she wrote: "The sexual warmth is definitely there." But just one month later, she wrote, "Barack still intrigues me, but so much going on beneath the surface, out of reach. Guarded, controlled."

Once, Cook told a young Obama that she loved him. His response: "thank you." Later that year, Obama temporarily moved in with Cook. The irritation of each other's constant company eventually drove them apart. It was the beginning of the end of their year-long relationship.

Watch Terrell Brown's full report in the video above.

Presidential historian Douglas Brinkley said on "CBS This Morning" that Obama compressed the story of his life in New York in his autobiography, "Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance."

(For more with Brinkley, watch his full interview in the video in the player below.)

Maraniss' book, out on June 19, however, explores the president's relationships with these women, but Brinkley said the book isn't just about his girlfriends. "Maraniss is a fine biographer. He's written many good books, so he's credible, a long-time Washington Post reporter and he's done the best job of really giving us the factual timeline of the president's...college move to New York City and what he did in New York, not just who his girlfriends are, but how he was fighting for racial identity."

Brinkley said what compels him about the book is what the reader learns about the future president, his obsession with the Ralph Ellison book, "Invisible Man" and his affinity for African American playwrights.

"All of this adds credence to the president's own memoir," Brinkley said. "Here you see this young person -trying to, in his 20s, decide whether he's white or black or how to be an international person. So there's aspects - I think the girlfriend things are less interested than, here's a young man at Ivy League school, Columbia, what he's reading, what he's talking about. He doesn't get in a lot of trouble. His idea of fun is the New York Times crossword puzzle and debating the philosophy of Nietzsche."

[BexleyBlue]

I don't believe that Obama and Cook were really boyfriend-girlfriend. If so, why is there not one picture of them together?

[bilrobi1]

Left wing. I'm not the one who brought it up. Actually I'm obviously more enlightened than you and so are most lower primates. First of all referring to yourself as we usually indicates some level of psychoses. ( yes I am educated and have worked in the field for many years.) If I was gay,I'd admit it. But is is true that you do seem awfully obsessed with Our President's sexuality. Now calm down I'm only trying to help you come to terms with yourself. There is a term we use in the field. It's "projection" It means that you project your fears and feelings on to someone else. So we would say that your projecting.While I don't have any experience with being gay, I do have many years of experience in interpreting behavior. Your knee jerk response is indicative some very deep seated fears about one's struggle with coming to term with who they really are. Again you don't have to be alone. There's help out there for you. As for me. I have no fear about someone's sexual orientation. May be that's one of the differences between us. As I pointed out. It wasn't me that brought it up.I'm only responding to what was posted. There was a book written about Our Presidents relationships with at least two women. You and your ilk somehow began to question his sexual orientation. So by your reasoning your wanting to portray President Obama as being gay must bring you some comfort. Maybe your thinking ,well if the President of the United states is gay I must be okay." To quote you "Gays imagine everyone is gay deep down so they feel better about themselves." You apparently need to find some support group. I'm sure it will be a difficult time for you and your family. Perhaps someday they'll come to accept you for who you really are. Again I'm just following your rational.

[LILYGARLOW]

During the search for his racial identity--was that when he had the nose job---to look more white? It's not the same nose he has today---now it's much smaller/narrower ---and I know a mans nose continues to grow as he ages.His thank you remark speaks volumes about his expectations to be loved without doing anything in return-without caring about anyone but himself.

[pbaird2]

I sincerely doubt anyone over the age of 40 would like to defend the actions and decisions made before they turned 30. Not so much to be regretted or ashamed, but the naive ignorance we possess during that time. That is why life truely does begin at 40, when one has determined who and what they really are as a human being. We all often wish we could go back and relive those years, but chances are you would make the same decisions given the same circumstances. Reflect on the past, enjoy the present and take charge of controlling your future.

[stn_sage]

Yes, I think that's a fair assessment...
ex-girlfriend's stories...!