Politicians are walking advertisements. They sell "big ideas" and persuade people to vote, and they don't even have to sell ideas. All they really have to sell are appearences and sounds. Thus, politicans are really living, breathing brands who make their mark with voices and body language.
Obama disappointed not only his small-l liberal supporters but also moderates and independents. Obama wowed the latter two in the 2008 presidential election with his strong command of the spoken word. In front of the world on that debate stage, Obama looked like a shell of his former self. All it took was one debate to shift the momentum back into Romney's direction.
Obama probably would have walked away with minimal damage had the economic recovery been stronger. But because the American economy was (and is) still in a pitiful state, Obama had to defend his record. By giving a poor debate performance, he came across as a person who could not defend his record at all.
The greatest irony, though, is that in this consumer era, an incumbent politician does not need to defend his or her record as much as in the past. All a politician needs to do is creative a narrative that people can run with. The narrative does not even have to be strong, for if the opposing candidate is weak, the narrative can look strong by comparison.
Some say that people today vote with their hearts, not their heads. I disagree. Rather, I think people vote with their eyes and ears. The image of the politician is the message, and the message does not have to be true. Instead, it just has to be appealing.
It has also been said that people want to vote for the candidate they would like to have a beer with. But I also believe that voters want a candidate that represents their best qualities. Richard Nixon appealed to blue-collar workers yet alienated many other voting blocs in the process. His message of law and order resonated with many voters, but many could not accept the message of a man with a stern voice and drooping jowls. No one wants to see their inner demon in the mirror, and to many, Nixon was their inner demon.
Many voters flocked to Barack Obama because they saw their best qualities within him. People like hope, and people like a candidate who propigates the message of hope. Four years later, they see a man who is wrinklier, crankier, and vastly more arrogant at least on television. Even if Barack Obama is not a failure, he looks like a failure on television. Voters hate failure in government, and even if they have lost faith in their candidates, they still demand a message that resonates. Barack Obama has a message that may resonate with economists and policy wonks, but he doesn't have a message that resonates with the ordinary voter. Raw data is useless to the eyes in today's political era. Voters want a good salesman, not just an economist.
