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Gore's 2000 image was invented by relentless Republican repetition. Likewise Clinton's ice maiden aura. In each case a countervailing image--Bush the reformed reprobate good old boy, Obama the prophet, flatter national fictions .Obama, at any rate, is probably benign (it's his competence that's in question), but the heart is a questionable guide. Think of Bush looking into Putin's heart. As one of the columnists recently noted, Putin was a KGB agent, he had no heart. And in choosing leaders I prefer the head. The heart gave the world Reagan and lots worse--Napoleon, Hitler, Mussolini. Best to use one's head to cut through the pretty stories we're all prone to and the machinations of the propaganda machines that feed them. I realize that I speak as the veteran of several marriages. One tries to learn. Mark At 07:26 AM 1/9/2008, you wrote: >I don't understand your point, above derision. In any case, you >mistake me. I speak not of policy but of the connection of politician >to person. I did not like Thatcher, I did not like her policies. But - >and interestingly this is the bit you elided - Thatcher had a >*connection* with people, she spoke to them in the way that connected >her to a huge chunk of the electorate, partially rational. Which is >probably why she was elected so often. You could, if you had looked >above the parapet, seen the personal differences between Gore and >Bush. Over and above the dodgy Florida elections, there is a way in >which Bush spoke to people that Gore, or HRC did not until recently. > >Roger > >On Jan 9, 2008 11:01 AM, Dominic Fox <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > > Roger Day wrote: > > > A lot of politics is from the heart, but isn't that how it should be? > > > > > "And when he cried the little children died in the streets". > > > > On the other hand, "The Infant and the Pearl" by Douglas Oliver is a > > tremendous vindication of a particular politics of the heart, contra a > > Thatcherism which was widely reviled for its heartlessness. I'm still > > not certain that its heartlessness was particularly the worst, or even a > > particularly bad, thing about it, although she and her followers had a > > way of speaking about people that was intolerable. But that may itself > > have been emotionally driven; class contempt is no more a rational > > attitude than brotherly love. > > > > Dominic > > > > > >-- >My Stuff: http://www.badstep.net/ >"She went out with her paint box, paints the chapel blue >She went out with her matches, torched the car-wash too" >The Go-Betweens