That Presidential Look: The Bad, the Beautiful, and Voting-Booth RealitiesWhile there was more than one reason why John McCain was a long shot to win the 2008 general election, a big one was something almost no one talked seriously about: appearance.
That is to say, when was the last time an old-looking, white-haired, half-bald man won the presidency?
If you think this piece will be satire or fluff, think again. It rather will be very serious commentary about a very silly -- but painfully real -- phenomenon.
When people do discuss looks' impact on presidential fortunes, they usually treat the matter as a joke; we may hear, for instance, how a candidate must have "great hair" to enjoy rarefied commander-in-chief air. But if professional pundits and politics wonks think it's beneath them to wax anything but comedic on this issue, the joke is on them. After all, this is the age of American Idol.
To answer my earlier question, the last time Americans elected a bald president was 1956, when Dwight Eisenhower defeated similarly hair follicle-deprived Adlai Stevenson. Not coincidentally, this was just prior to the full flowering of the television age.
Four years later, America's first televised presidential debate made a star of relatively unknown but strikingly handsome John F. Kennedy and an underdog of his opponent, incumbent Vice President Richard Nixon. It's said that people who only listened to the event on radio thought Nixon won, but the TV audience -- perhaps numbering 74 million -- was a different matter. Wrote Time magazine, "Nixon, pale and underweight from a recent hospitalization, appeared sickly and sweaty, while Kennedy appeared calm and confident. ... Those that watched the debate on TV thought Kennedy was the clear winner. Many say Kennedy won the election that night."
Fifty-one years later, looks carry more weight than ever. Aside from the baldness handicap, can you imagine an ugly person winning the presidency? Then, how about someone who lacks that somewhat less tangible quality -- that of looking "presidential"?
When you understand appearance's true impact, you realize that you can usually look at a person and say with almost 100-percent certainty whether or not his appearance disqualifies him from the White House. Now, this is where some will get angry, behaving as if voicing an unpleasant truth helps give it wings. But know that I certainly don't cast my vote on a superficial basis; for my part, a candidate could be an ideologically sound goblin. Moreover, I realize that if you're reading this, you too are someone who is relatively unlikely to be swayed by the superficial. Many Americans, however, wouldn't read a piece of news or commentary if it were pasted to a stripper. And the fact is that if looks can influence five to seven percent of the vote, it's enough to sway most elections.
Read more:
http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/09/that_presidential_look_the_bad_the_beautiful_and_voting-booth_realities.htmlAmerican Thinker is a conservative media outlet, by the way.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_ThinkerLibs don't have the courage to admit it - APPEARANCE MATTERS. Thank goodness for conservatives.
