Malignant narcissism: seeing yourself in a candidate and voting accordingly

Today's declaration by Sarah Palin has left millions of her admirers crestfallen, to say the least. Her decision not to seek the Republican nomination has devastated many of her followers who have taken to airing their discontent on freerepublic.com and Yahoo News. The phenomenon of Palin is one that has galvanized the attention of media analysts since she made herself known to the majority of Americans in 2008. The appeal of Palin is often attributed to a few simple factors:

1. Despite being a university graduate, Palin holds a credential in something not seen as subversive (i.e., a degree in women's studies, ethnic studies, law, social work). In addition, her academic career is not a threat to those who view higher education with suspicion. As a graduate of the University of Idaho, not Berkeley or Columbia, there is less association with campus radicalism and associations with the "cultural elite." Also in her favor is the fact that Palin's formal education does not go beyond the bachelor's degree. As a result, she is not seen as "tainted" by further indoctrination in what detractors routinely describe as "centers of communist subversion." Had Palin attained a Ph.D. in humanities from Berkeley or a law degree from Columbia, she would be viewed as suspect by millions. As it is, Palin is not part of the countercultural threat that scholarships represents to so many "real Americans."

2. Palin's speech is plain. Rarely are polysyllabic words uttered and no listener has ever been driven to the dictionary after listening to Palin. This shows accessibility to her audience. No hint of superiority is given at any time.

3. Palin is seen as a person of action, not a person given to prolonged deliberation. The analytical are seen as ineffectual by many, and Palin benefits from being outside this categorization.

4. Palin is not "afflicted" with the cosmopolitanism of John Kerry or Barack Obama. No part of her childhood was spent in foreign lands; her parents have no immediate links to other countries and she does not show "disloyalty" through speaking the language of those outside the United States. As a result, her folksy demeanor is bolstered by these "all-American" characteristics.

5. Palin offers rejection of the status quo (i.e., condemnation of Obamacare, big government and a return to what is seen as "real America"), and this appeals to her constituents who rarely seem to object to negation without mention of what will take the place of the negated.

Palin is a figure who, despite her rapid rise to stardom, is easily identified with by those who see themselves as "real Americans," or "murcans." Of course, it would be unjust to label all her constituents with such a generalization, but it does hold true for the thousands of admirers whose comments I have been reading for over three years now. In recent history, one other politician has benefited from this association, however spurious, with the common man. That individual was George W. Bush. Despite being a scion of Connecticut blue bloods and a product of Andover, Yale and Harvard, Bush's handlers were adept at presenting him as anything but patrician. The Yankee aristocrat was widely perceived as a Texas rancher, a humble man of the people who shared their interests, eschewed such elitist activities as book reading and acted in accordance with the philosophy of that titan of industry, Jesus Christ.

No such luck befell Bush's patrician counterpart John Kerry. Kerry, a contemporary of Bush's at Yale, was the "elitist" candidate, guilty of transgressions such as windsurfing, bilingualism and dangerously low levels of good-ol'-boy charisma.

What characters like Bush and Palin show us is the supremacy of image over substance. This is nothing new, but with more and more means of communication, it has gone from important to supreme. The appeal of Bush and Palin is that they have been packaged well and marketed to the masses as "one of us," no alien to the values of "real America." The danger is, of course, that voting for a candidate because he is an extension of you is ultimately detrimental to the interests of our nation. Who among us is so sure of his abilities that he would want his equal, and not his superior to govern? What people see in populist politicians is not a mirror of their virtues, but often a reflection of their weaknesses. Why anyone would want a candidate whose level of skills matches his own is a mystery. Great leaders are those whose virtues set them apart from the masses, not make them part of that mass. Until we start demanding more of our leaders than their ability to be "the guy you want to have a beer with," we face dire prospects for our immediate future. Accessibility is a wonderful quality, but when it is not coupled with genuine vision, it is not enough for those entrusted with the stewardship of our society.