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Wednesday, September 01, 2004

Look, people, don't get too cocky about this

Kurtz asks, "What were they thinking?" and then pretty much answers his own question.
(Quoting the LA Times reaction) "The strategy Tuesday, apparently, was to have sisters Jenna and Barbara humanize and soften the grim-faced Politburo image that dogs the Bush-Cheney campaign, which hasn't made much of an effort to court those young Americans who call it a good day if they've remembered to TiVo 'The Simple Life.' So here they were, girlie and giggly and glammed-up (Jenna in some kind of Juicy couture-looking track suit top over white pants, Barbara in a black cocktail dress)."
That's exactly who they are appealing to.. and it works. It fits perfectly with the image the President clearly intends to project to the public. The President is a C student with little or no intellectual curiosity and poor command of the English language, but he's presumably a "likeable straight shooter." This image has stuck with the public, and it is a winning image. It only follows that his daughters assume the role of vaccuous party girls who "aren't very political." Look around, people. This, unfortunately, is most of America in all its inane, mindless, hypocritical glory. Poke all the fun you want at the Bush girls' giggling but don't think for a second that it isn't calculated.

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