Identity Crisis

Boiling candidates’ personalities down to one defining trait has its benefits. Voters tend to recall recent or salient events; this priming effect accounts for judgments on the character of political candidates.

Because of the fractured identity of each political party, candidates are scrambling to position themselves- even one full year before the election- on an ideologically coherent platform. This usually translates into for or against Bush, for or against the “war,” for or against gay rights, for or against the right to choose. But it also translates into displaying a prominent personality or, increasingly, a physical trait, and the media and society at large have run with it.

Mit Romney? Cyborg.
John Edwards? Teeth.
Ron Paul? Crazy Texan. This distinction he shares with Ross Perot. In fact, he looks suspiciously like ol’ big ear and has the same initials, which is why he is destined to lose.


Conjoined twins successfully separated at the ears?

I invite you to boil down each candidate to one word – I’ll post it soon.

Candidates have long understood that dumbing down their positions, their personas even, aids the memory of dumbed-down Americans on election day- that is, if Americans were inclined to vote. Nearly every candidate in the race now does this; those who don’t stand out as more honest and morally upright. I’m not naming names.

But it’s similar to Brahma, who, coincidentally, is the Hindu god of knowledge and protector of the world.

Innnnnnteresting.