Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
Historian Andrew Roberts has taken to the Wall Street Journal today to admonish Americans for their superficiality and shallowness when it comes to selecting candidates who "look presidential."
How would Teddy Roosevelt have fared in a more look-ist age, with his spectacles, mustache and height of only 5 feet 8 inches carrying a 200-pound body? Yet he was light beside William Taft, a much under-appreciated president who would have been massacred by the late-night satirical TV shows for his 335-pound girth...
Andrew Jackson's long wavy hair, George Washington's ill-fitting hippo-ivory dentures and the distorted smile it gave him, Woodrow Wilson's tombstone-like teeth and lack of vision in his left eye, Ulysses Grant's grizzly little beard—all might have proven fatal at the polls if earlier ages had been as morally stunted, intellectually limited and looks-obsessed as ours. Yet even now one of the great American political parties is in the process of choosing someone to stand for president at a nerve-wracking moment in the history of the U.S., and we're saddled with commentary that not only ignores the issues but makes the jury of "American Idol" seem kind.
In Peter's Uncommon Knowledge interview with Roger Ailes last year, Roger pinpointed the Nixon-Kennedy debates as the moment in time at which Americans fundamentally reordered their priority list of qualities they look for in a president. "People who heard the Nixon-Kennedy debate on radio, believed Nixon won it," Roger said. "Nixon won it on voice and substance. But Jack proved that life was changing. They [the American people] had to look at you and see you. Jack Kennedy was magnificent in those debates. It was not Nixon's media. The times had changed and he had not."
So are we Americans morally stunted, intellectually limited and looks obsessed? Sure, just look at the success of reality TV shows like Real Housewives and Bachelor Pad for evidence of that. But to compare an America of 1800 with one of 2011 and conclude that appearances matter more now solely because we're a bunch of shallow dunces completely ignores the enormous impact that television has had on politics, for better or worse.
Parting question: Had televised debates been possible, in say 1824 between Andrew Jackson and William Crawford, or in 1908 between Howard Taft and William Jennings Bryan, would American history have turned out differently?
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Jun '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
A good chunk of the World doesn't speak English, and many in the World are illiterate besides. All they'll know about the American President, in an unfiltered way, is that he or she looks confident, or doesn't look confident. If they look and act like a wimp, they've already lost diplomacy points.
Jun '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
Because it's shorthand. We're all cognitive misers in our own way, because we choose not to think about more things than we actually think about we need short cuts. How much do you know about your transmission, Diane? If you are like most people, and dare I say it, like most women, when your transmission needs repair you console yourself with the impression that the mechanic that you left your car with for servicing looked honest. One might even say that sans the overalls that mechanic looked presidential or handsome or was Italian or just spoke to me in an uncondescending manner. News flash, Diane, none of the foregoing criteria have anything to to with fixing your transmission.
Edited on Sep 1, 2011 at 11:40amApr '11
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
Kennedy, with the overwhelming assistance of the media ushered in the era of political royalty. All that nonsense about Camelot created the idea that our president should be kingly in all ways but power. Thus looks and glamor and the first lady's dress are of vital interest. In the past the people were certain that no matter who the president was, he was not a king. According to the modern left, that's exactly our problem. On the right, we've simply decided to play the game by their rules. Which is the real problem.
Jun '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
Oh! I should add that there is nothing that turns a public personality into an idiot in my eyes faster than when they start crabbing about how "Americans" or "Canadians" are not as smart as they are because [fill in the blank].
Sep '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
Speaking of television, I was starting to think of an answer to your parting question when not one, but TWO video ads for some cleaning product called "Resolve" began playing on the webpage, complete with loud and irritating voiceover from some actress.
To stop them, I had to find them and hit the Pause button on both--I couldn't find a "close window" button.
This is intolerable. If Ricochet continues to host these ads, I will cancel my membership.
Apr '11
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
Another question: Had the media not willingly concealed FDR's wheelchair would things have turned out differently? My thought is no. And if a wheelchair bound candidate ran for office now? Would it have a negative effect? As with most other things, only if the candidate is conservative.
Dec '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
I learn a lot about people just by looking at them. Call me shallow.
Feb '11
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
Random thoughts: Washington, Jackson and TR had enormous energy, ambition, self-confidence, all the things that made them succeed in the military--it impressed those around them. We'd be able to see that today, we see it in Chris Christie. Progressives have long benefited from the willful silence of the press--i.e. Wilson's years of near-catatonia, Roosevelt's paralysis, Kennedy's open marriage. Sometimes I long for (some of) the nineteenth century's morays about presidential campaigns, in which it was unseemly to actually hit the road on your own behalf (McKinley's front porch campaign sounds great about now). How much better off might we be to put our minds to other things than the perpetual presidential campaign? Why else do sitting Presidents act as if they're constantly campaigning (no presidential speech is without extensive staging, backdrops with slogans, or people as props) if those out of power aren't doing so themselves?
Sep '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
Take a look at Fox News anchors. Look at most Pop music sensations, do you really have to look good to be a good singer? Of course not. Being a politician is a media job now, and in order to get attention you have to look good and/or look the part. It's not fair of course, but it's in every walk of life. My wife always gets extra attention because of her looks and presentation and she doesn't even realize it. Diane, your pic shows you aren't any ugly duckling...I doubt you know how much your looks open doors for you either.
Jun '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
On the other hand some say Washington got the job commanding the Continental Army because he was tall and made a habit of wearing his militia uniform every day to meetings of Congress. Looking the part never hurts your chances.
Sep '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
Emancipate the cat serfdom and elect a feline president.
Jun '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
We already did: President Garfield.
Aug '11
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
A certain part of it is that we want people that cast a good light on us, (for having chosen them to represent us,) even if, as a people in general, we are becoming less and less "camera-worthy"
We don't know what we really want, because we don't like what we really want, and when we get to know what we thought we liked, we don't want it anymore. What we think we want is a Cary Grant, and at the same time, to not know that someone else wrote all his lines, and at the same time not know, and never know about, all his short-comings and character flaws, not even his place of birth.
Jun '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
Joseph Stanko
We already did: President Garfield. · Sep 1 at 11:56am
Touché!
Oct '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
It's not Americans who are morally stunted, intellectually limited and looks obsessed when it comes to politics, it's the media. And I add lazy. Want to bet what proportion of the coverage and commentary on the President's 'jobs' 'plan' will be on substance, and what proportion on style? Anyone can comment on politics as horse race - and anyone does. But it takes effort to tease out the consequences of a policy proposal. That's not the sort of effort I see the media being willing to put in.
Oct '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
Cas Balicki
Joseph Stanko
We already did: President Garfield. · Sep 1 at 11:56am
Touché! · Sep 1 at 12:02pm
And what happened to Garfield ?
Jun '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
wilber forge
Cas Balicki
Joseph Stanko
We already did: President Garfield. · Sep 1 at 11:56am
Touché! · Sep 1 at 12:02pm
And what happened to Garfield ? · Sep 1 at 12:15pm
Dead cat bounce?
May '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
This is not just TV...I remember reading somewhere that even the "solid south" was not so solid for Al Smith when southerners heard his "noahthun" accent on radio. They either stayed home or secretly pulled the lever for Hooavuh.
Or so I hud...
Dec '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
If we simply adhered to the design of our presidential election we would not have this problem.
"It was equally desirable, that the immediate election should be made by men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station, and acting under circumstances favorable to deliberation, and to a judicious combination of all the reasons and inducements which were proper to govern their choice. A small number of persons, selected by their fellow-citizens from the general mass, will be most likely to possess the information and discernment requisite to such complicated investigations...The choice of several, to form an intermediate body of electors, will be much less apt to convulse the community with any extraordinary or violent movements, than the choice of one who was himself to be the final object of the public wishes."
In other words, yer doin it wrong.
May '10
Re: Why Do Americans Seek Out Candidates Who "Look Presidential"?
I, for one, join Megan in being unimpressed with the depth of thought among most of the American electorate. Churchill would not have been elected to the library board in the US.