I know we’ve discussed this before, but…
…every now and then it hits me again: how is it that so many people still see Obama as likable? Or even saw him that way in the first place?
To me, it became clear early on in the 2008 campaign that Obama had a petty nastiness that was extremely unlikable, as well as being a ruthless narcissist. That’s different from just being a tough campaigner.
And it wasn’t about disagreeing with his politics, either. Back in the 80s I disagreed with Reagan’s politics for the most part, and I thought him somewhat of a phony as well. But he never seemed to me to be anything other than a basically nice guy. In contrast, Bill Clinton always roused a certain generalized distrust in me, although I agreed with him politically and voted for him twice. In other words, I didn’t much like him, ever, and this was long before Monica Lewinsky came into his life. So likability and political synchronization did not always go hand in hand for me.
I know that many people think the polls on Obama’s likability reflect polite lying by the respondents, who dislike Obama more (or perhaps like him less) than they let on. It’s a common notion that people are saying they like him more than they do because they don’t want to be perceived as racists. But my impression (based mostly on a small sample: my friends) is that the liking is very genuine, and it has not budged despite some disappointments with his achievements.
And these people are not generally gullible pushovers, nor do they ordinarily have poor judgment about people in regular life. Nor do I expect them to vote against Obama and for Romney; after all, they’re liberal Democrats. But this “he’s such a great guy” thing is a mystery to me.
I don’t see why anyone would like Obama either. On a related note why would anyone want to be a ‘liberal?’
His continued “likeability” probably reflects nothing more than the old PT Barnum sentiment “There’s a sucker born every minute”.
—
…granting that the quote is probably more properly attributed to one Joseph Bessimer “…a notorious confidence trickster of the early 1880s known to the police as ‘Paper Collar Joe’.”
Or maybe a Barnum competitor David Hannum (via George Hull) re: the Cardiff Giant hoax?
Part of being a “great guy” is having high character.
Maybe your friends are operating on the principle that, if Barack had deficient character, then media would inform us of his deficient character. I.e., if Wolf Blitzer and Bob Schieffer and Brian Williams seem to believe Barack is a person of high character, then it must be so.
Obama is too self-centered to be likable. Any leader who constantly uses “I” instead of “we” as any good team leader should is too ego-centric to be admired.
I suspect many who like him as a lefty wouldn’t find him so likeable as a righty. And the media would certainly have done their best to demonize him, which would be bound to influence the perception. I think he sounds reasonable, I just don’t believe any of it and despise what I perceive as manipulation and a deep seated totalitarian impulse. I might also point out that many are seduced by the totalitarian impulse, lots of academics are that way.
They’re scared that if they say they don’t like him someone will scream “RACIST!”
I am neither too sophisticated nor sufficiently historically ignorant to characterizing the phenomenon (O’s likability) as a mania — they are not unheard of. The Tulip Mania of the early Seventeenth Century Netherlands advises us, in its aftermath, that among those made to look foolish were the highly educated; and among those left destitute were the highly prudent. Medicine has no explanation for this phenomenon, mania, but does recognize its manifestations.
Shared Psychotic Disorder (DSM-IV) (297.3) and Induced Delusional Disorder (folie é deux) (F.24) in the ICD-10.
Folie é deux (from the French for “a madness shared by two”) is a rare psychiatric syndrome in which a symptom of psychosis (particularly a paranoid or delusional belief) is transmitted from one individual to another. The same syndrome shared by more than two people may be called folie é trois, folie é quatre, folie é famille or even folie é plusieurs (“madness of many”)
Welcome to the Folie é plusieurs Age. (It doesn’t sound nearly as bad when you say it in French.)
Obama strikes me as the smart ass high school kid who talks back to the teacher. The other kids think he is cool. Increasingly, America is about being cool.
He’s a black guy. Most everybody has been trained for decades to say the “like black people.” Many of most actually do. Many of most don’t really but really like the feeling that comes with saying that they do. As somebody wrote elsewhere awhile back, “Look at you. You’re gonna go out this fall and you’re gonna cast a vote to the tune of 90% for a guy that has shown you time after time that he doesn’t care anything about you.”
It’s a death wish. And sometimes wishes come true.
A person claiming to be a college professor in some relevant discipline (I honestly don’t recall which), explained that it comes from his body language and facial expressions. People like him at a subconscious level.
Most of us likely only see him with his chin jutted as he follows the invisible tennis ball between teleprompters. Those more inclined to democrat politics have watched him on talk shows, countless informal youtubes and seen him live. Essentially every politician who rises to this level is likeable in person [even Romney! 😉 ].
It’s also not just that he’s a black guy. He is still what most believe is the first black President. Kind of like your first love, that role will always lend a favorable light.
If you figure it out; let us know Neo, because it is a real mystery.
Sadly, the explanations provided by Trimegistus and Vanderleun are closest to my own.
Take some time to read about the mannerisms and such of sociopaths… ie. the people who judge by surface imagry are taken in by the orchestrated displays of the sociopath that mimic the real deal… in the absence of the nuances of what is real, they see obama and his mannerisims as indiciative of someone who carries themselves as they expect to be admired.
funny thing, but if you pretend and carry yourself a certain way, many many people will just fall into step with that.
how else could a man convince a 17 year old gilr to let him suck her toes for a reaity show at a walmart?
he acted like what she thought a reality show person would act like and so she responded to the script.
those who are programmed to see authority as special, expect a script, and when they see it, their conditioning responds.
its what the “most interesting man in the world” series of commercials exaggerates so much… (though many might think its machismo, it isnt… he isnt the most powerful man, he is the most interesting)
so Obama limp wrist, is characteristic of likeable from ole blue eyes, tony Bennett, to even john Wayne… its like you have a pasted together cultural pastiche of behavioral symbolism…
but once one realizes that carco cult, and sociopaths and narcisisists are all surface image mimics, then you would recognize the mash up of parts…
those that can, see a scare crow stitched together, those that cant, respond to the conditioned points.
ie… the gullible respond to affectations.
want to know how to pick up women? ignore the reality of who you are, and take up the proper affectations… people may make fun of players and the PUA world, but it works.. (even Richard Feynman in his book surely your joking, learned it works!!!!!!!!!!! but he didnt like it)
sad thing is that the woman will say that would never work on her… but then ask her about some of her worst relationships…
what women do is so out in the open, there is no secret to it… a push up bra, red dress, wide open nancy pelosi eyes… and perhaps a bit of belladonna to make the pupils really large so you look like your in love all the time.
the mens is more hidden…but thats because if you dont hide it, the ladies get pissed off at discoering their own natures they were told they didnt have.
[oh… the funny thing is the feminists trying to be equal and right guides for the female pick up artist… what a joke… a complete inability to even understand human sexuality. but i remember a while back when the femnazis discovered this. since then they been flooding.. so its a bit hard to get around the hundreds of guids to female pickups…(not to hard when sex clubs give women free membership)].
yes it is… its how sociopaths think.
disconnected from their own bodies and the consequences to it, they use their bodies the way a puppet master uses a puppet..
they are not in the moment, they are trying to orchestrate the moment by manipulation and surface conditioned responses… some are biological and don’t change, others are cultural… ie. you pretend your a hippy to get laid by the communist chicks..
just so you know… its no different than the social research that clues leaders in how to play the public… in this case, its one playing another given that the whole idea of an actual relationship, marriage, and all that is not on the table any more!!!!!!!!!!!
a player is a man who has learned the biological cues and responses that are necessary to take the 24 steps from start to finish (the 24 steps are from sociology papers, not players)
well, sociopaths, they do it to everyone, not just women, or men, or children… but its the SAME thing… (though unlike the pua, the sociopath never has a good ending in mind. some puas are puas because women are picking pua over regular guys. so the guys have to become that to be in the game! if she wants a problem guy, then guys become problems… if she wants to do all the work, then guys let them take over society (now they are complaining that with all the work, comes all the work))
the key is knowing what drives people and what signals yuou can give to them.
for instance.. what drives the provider? to the left the provider is the person obligated to give in excess to support others. they do not see the exchange… because if they did, they would have to acknowlege it.
so women will provide for their children.. as providers they will accept in exchange, love, respect, honor, a place, pride, and all that…
and a man? he is the provider too, and so will exchange has greater capacity for earning and doing, for her respect, honor, appreciation, pride, etc. [so now women are in the total provider place of men, they are going… whats my reward… the mens respect,appreciation, and all that has already been negated as having any value.. so they dont provide.. ]
THIS is why the sociopathic leaders talk in certain terms. if you study things to learn, not necessarily to do, you learn from PUA how terms and couching and so on changes the dynamic.
regular people dont believe any of this.. .to them they see hitler and have not the feeling for the time, and cant forget all the making fun of his style… but take a look.. there is a lot going on there..
and most of us dont get it..
even worse, there is half the population walking around having huge delusions as to what they are, how they work, and so on.
if you study this stuff at all, the stuff from the past that elders taught without explaining themselves starts to make a whole lot of sense.
want to know when a woman is fertile? if so, then she is much more receptive to strangers coming over for a fun time… well, women who are fertile, show off more skin (than they do when they are not fertile)… so, if she comes in most of the time, more covered up, and for a few days every month she is dressed up, guess what you know? she will also put on more red lipsticks… and towards the end they get darker red.. not brighter…
she will present herself to you… ie. find an excuse to walk away from the group she is in, and let you see more of her… if she doesnt like you, she will cover her neck with her hair, if she does, she will uncover it, and tilt her head.. (as if offering it)
funny, but when both are into each other, and not playing ones biology against them… we fall into the pattern naturall, we meet each step and escalate.. some are fast and can get through the 24 steps in an hour… others are slow.. both have to match each other.
well, what obama does is much the same..
this is why i reproduced the stuff on hilter and how he saw the people he needed votes from as a woman… or the society as such. it wants to be taken care of, kept safe, told lies to that are ok, and so on.
so when your a leader of no substance what you do is seduce the people…
next post… i will reveal the game from the past.. and what is going on, but not in terms of male female bar room seduction..
He’s ‘cool’. That’s it. It’s enough. Because it’s subconsciously appealing. It is the same social force that ‘cool’ kids take advantage of in high school. There is nothing objective about it, other than that we can all basically recognize it when we see it.
His skin color does play a role, but less because people don’t want to appear racist, than that people (in particular – and most relevant to his electability – white women) *genuinely* find (lightly) black guys appealing on, er, this or that level.
He also projects a calm personality who is comfortable with himself. That helps. I suspect it is something akin to an ‘act’ that he has cultivated carefully, but whatever the case, he’s good at it.
It’s not all that fruitful to go down this road of inquiry though. Because if you think about it too closely, you start seeing the argument against having popularly-elected Presidents (i.e. Homecoming Kings) and/or universal franchise…
A diagnostic sign of a psychopathic personality, known to old-time psychotherapists: the very likeable new patient leaves the office without paying his fee and with a $20 ‘loan’ from the therapist.
Darn.. to darn long again…
sorry…
ok.. what your looking to notice and make a distinction of with obama is:
Sprezzatura
its an italian word that basically means:
“a certain nonchalance, so as to conceal all art and make whatever one does or says appear to be without effort and almost without any thought about it.”
do you think Nietzsche the prince was the only manual to read? ever realize that there is a small library of them? nah… your normal, why would you want to spend your time trying to learn how to control people if your not a king, despot, or such?
The Book of the Courtier
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_the_Courtier
what affectations show the in crowd your in, and weed out the other riff raff.
funny… but when people look at my wife, and her broken english, and how she dont usually dress up… and they see me a professional.. and her maybe working a deli counter… they think… here is this man, who couldnt get a real wife, and who married this third worlder for sex and so on..
but its funny… we go out to eat… when we go to a fine restaurant… the common folk are confused… but she? well, she eats.. we switch whether continental or not… when the meal is over… like me, she knows to cross her knife and fork to tell the waiter rather than be interrupted by the help.
ie… outside their surface judgment she has the substance of a educated lady with upper class manners… which makes sense because back home, she is not poor, her family has factories, and in the government, and so on..
as an aspergers person, i had to learn all of this so i could tell the poisonous snakes from others… been trying to teach others here, but de nile is a big river.
Of the many qualities Castiglione’s characters attribute to their perfect courtier, oratory and the manner in which courtier presents himself while speaking is amongst one of the most highly discussed.
remember how upset so many were when obama bowed… why? because of the affectations we expect him to have and keep having… but why bow? to ingratiate himself to the subject he bows to… (call it royal brownie hound)
that is, take on the affectation that one has no affectation… then you can hide the game from others.
i would LOVE to know how many here have ever even heard of this book, the author or the library of such skills… but then again, many have heard of Cicero and Quintilian, but how many have read their works to LEARN from and not be ENTERTAINED?
as i have always said… people with unusualk interests will read more and deeper than people with no interest or casual interest.
the problem with enemies is that they force you to read what they are interested in, to know them well… and this forces you to learn how to read things you dont want to read…
but when you realize that survival is at stake… then you have little choice…
go ahead. try to catch up later in the game like now and read all this to learn what should have been known ever before the performer took the stage!!!!!!!!
after all, your supposed to kick the idiot off the stage before the performance not after..
Castiglione’s characters opine about how their courtier can impress his audience and win its approval.
most hate reading such things because most cant accept that they are not what they imagine themselves to be… those who at least are trying to be what they imagine and get the split are more receptive to such things
so like screwtape letters (Which clues you in to CS Lewis reading this kind of stuff and copying the format from the great literary works of the western cannon), these stories, and western koans describe exactly how a person can do what the missive says
nice people tend not to like it or think that they are sinking to being something they are not to be liked. sociopaths are empty inside, all carco cult, so they cant sink to being somethign they arent as they arent anything to start with, and never will be… all affectation, no real substance. (even the non clinical ones that dont act illegally or bad. which includes a famous researcher studying the subject that discovered he was a sociopath!!!! he then went to work finding out why he dont hurt people that way, and found out he does… ie. he is a cold bastard says others. and now he knows why)
Peter Burke describes sprezzatura in The Book of the Courtier as “nonchalance”, “careful negligence”, and “effortless and ease.”
[be interesting to see if this term suddenly crops up in writings after this… 🙂 ]
how many golf games has he had? how much like royalty and a courtier court does he run? how about the way he wears high school clothing in the briefing room?
my family used to own land and have title back in Europe, so i learned the rules of this game… why? because upper crusty families GROOM their children.. while regular under class families let them grow wild and feral (today).
do you think families that achieve go out and then put their learned stuff in a book? no… they groom their kids with the special information they have learned.. (ergo they destroy other families and so destroy that information in their competitors)
Under all nice nice is always a deep war of subtle movements and finessed games.. [where prevention is the easiest way to win by avoidance]
and obamas tool box is small. he was not groomed this way.. is affectations are too few.. so he repeats them endlessly… and nothing is so bad for spontaneity as the third time your spontaneous with the same thing
but how do you inform the public when the knowlege of whats going on in behind what they see is so huge, unappetizing, and the interest of the master who wants to be over them, it is why the founders called such a burden… but a necessary one…
if the courtier wants to attain grazia and be esteemed excellent, it would be in his best interest to have this appearance of nonchalance. By failing to employ sprezzatura, he destroys his opportunity for grace. By applying sprezzatura to his speech and everything else he does, the courtier appears to have grazia and impresses his audience, thereby achieving excellence and perfection.
ie. he plays the people to respond to the cues of the natural leader by gluing on a larger peacock tail and pretending!!!!!!!!!!
The cuckoo…
and substance? matters not… because substance relies on the listener being up to it… and substance can deny the end that one wants…so better just to avoid it… avoid morals, and lots can be allowed… morals are substance
“questions of whose language is privileged at any given historical moment are deeply implicated in matters of personal, social and cultural significance”
obama used the folk language of the regular joe… to be FDRs everyman… but you could always see it was a mask… because a person whose real deal is that way, doesn’t break down about a waffle in response to how tiring it is to hold up the mask
“it is right that greater pains would be taken to make what is written more polished and correct…they should be chosen from the most beautiful of those employed in speech” (Courtier 71). The success of a written speech, in contrast to the spoken speech, hinges on the notion that “we are willing to tolerate a great deal of improper and even careless usage”
but wont tolerate it if its not entertaining…
so wrap the crap in something sweet..
The Count explains that along with proper word usage, an ideal courtier must have a proper sense of style and flow to their words. These words must be factual yet entertaining as the Count states, “then, it is necessary to arrange what is to be said or written in its logical order, and after that to express it well in words that, if I am not mistaken, should be appropriate, carefully chosen, clear and well formed, but above all that are still in popular use”
when talking to the help, it helps to talk to them in the gutter slang they know.. not the higher english and proper ways you know. sink to their level as you cant lift them to yours
This form of emphasis on language is noted by Graham as; “Although the Count is aware that more traditional aspects of the orator (appearance, gestures, voice, etc.)…all this will be futile and of little consequence if the ideas conveyed by these words themselves are not witty or elegant to the requirements of the situation” (Graham 49).
ergo, the teleprompter break down in image..
since its fake, like a potemkin village in a hollywierd western… the gaps show when the preferred view is not maintained..
after all, be where the eye of the camer ais, where the director puts you, and you cant tel there is no reality there.
but move from where they put you, and you can see there is nothing bheind the walls..
well, when he goes off script, he stops being the director placed in the preferred location to see what he wants you to see.
bet this is too long too…
sigh
I don’t get him being likeable either. I have NEVER disliked a president as much as I do this one.
I just can’t like a snarky junior high kid in a grown man’s body.
closely related and with Sprezzatura is Glamour…
(whose definition no longer retains the special meaning that would reveal)
oh… big coluimns a la lenny reiffenstahl.. or yuor very own logo.. or your cool mannerisms of Sprezzatura
anyone realize that among those that play this game, are those who have no trouble seeing it for what it is… so next tie you see them patting each other on the back, you might realize that they may be doing so as a, boy you did really good with Sprezzatura this time…
Virginia Postrel says that for glamour to be successful nearly always requires sprezzatura – an appearance of effortlessness, and to appear distant – transcending the everyday, to be slightly mysterious and somewhat idealised, but not to the extent it is no longer possible to identify with the person. Glamorous things are neither opaque, hiding all, nor transparent showing everything, but translucent, favourably showing things.
to those receptive, the white coats behind him, the columns and so on, are all props to feed into this.
and why do all this?
to, in the words of the despot Hitler, seduce the people like a woman…
to see the halo photography (copying russian and rennaisance depictions of christ and saints), and other such things… are this
when you see an image with he halo, or the hand held magic sphere… there is nothing else there… you cant see the potus symbol, you cant tell where he is… its a glamour shot.. the image of this model shows the use of the light behind the head and so on..
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a1/Michele_Merkin_1.jpg/400px-Michele_Merkin_1.jpg
all of this leads into a sense of elegance… however, you cant take a farm boy and put him in the oak room at the plaza and expect him not to wipe his mouth on his sleeve when he forgets where he is… same with the big O..
if it was real, it cant slip.
after all, how often does your face slip
Artfl dgr characterizes one aspect of Obama’s likeability, the “fake it ’till you make it” approach. Just like buying an expensive house/car/vacation to appear wealthy, just affect the behavior patterns of likeability to appear likeable (drop your “g”s, tell a cute joke, chuckle, play some hoops, be seen bare-chested on the beach, etc.) just like all of us average kids down the block who were also raised in Hawaii and Indonesia and went to Columbia and Harvard. If people today can’t see through the pretense of media bias, how are they going to see through the con-man affectations of likeability?
A second idea that I offer here is, I wonder just how many people who claim to like him (from a distance) would really like up close, say as a neighbor and just can’t make that mental distinction? I mentioned in an earlier post I’d much rather have Romney for a neighbor than an Obama-type who expects/demands neighbors to bend to his own wishes. I’d bet Obama would be a real pain-in-the-ass to have in the neighborhood.
It is unproductive to criticize the irrationality of “love”. Especially when it happens at first sight.
Perhaps you can characterize and analyze their behavior as compulsive. Why would otherwise normal people be disposed to exhibit this behavior?
In a way, sprezzatura was “the art of acting deviously.” This “art” created a “self-fulfilling culture of suspicion” because courtiers had to be diligent in maintaining their faé§ades. “The by-product of the courtier’s performance is that the achievement of sprezzatura may require him to deny or disparage his nature.” Consequently, sprezzatura also had its downsides, since courtiers who excelled at sprezzatura risked losing themselves to the faé§ade they put on for their peers.
also, they must defend the image heavily… so past records, and friends and anything that would reveal the greasepaint is a BIG no no..
college transcripts, past history, peoples, etc… all are a danger to the person who does this without the reality backing it…
a man who acts like James bond, and gets into a real James bond situation, will not have the outcome of the real deal…
when you touch the illusion or look behind the curtain, the spell breaks, the glamour falls, and so goes the magic….
by the way, if you want to read it, be careful.. there are lots of versions and later versions and they are not the same.
THE BOOK OF THE COURTIER
BY COUNT BALDESAR CASTIGLIONE
http://ia700507.us.archive.org/13/items/bookofcourtier00castuoft/bookofcourtier00castuoft.pdf
this version was translated and worked on for sir Walter Raleigh
http://www.luminarium.org/renascence-editions/courtier/courtier.html
if you want to know why it was written… it was mostly written to teach the people that the trappings of royalty were just that, and that one should look beyond these games to find merit..
so stuff like this had a great influence on the early ideas of elections and so on… after all, in case you didnt notice, puritans hated such false imagery…
isnt it funny how the books that would clue the public in are not in the public conscience?
hayeks road toserfdom? the book of the courtier? the chatechism of the revolutionary… a whole library of books that are from those who converted…
heck… even williams the economist and others are asking as to why we know about hitlers crimes, but not really the crimes of the others
and just so you know they know here is a link to a columbia monograph for humanities classes…
http://www.learn.columbia.edu/monographs/raphmon/pdf/art_hum_reading_14.pdf
EXCERPTS FROM THE BOOK OF THE COURTIER, 1528
remember, castiglione is a dead white guy…
To all of the above I would add that liberals who like Obama believe him to be sincere. Irony of ironies, they believe him to be a man of his word.
Artfldgr, with his ‘Sprezzatura’ gets close to the heart of it.
“a certain nonchalance, so as to conceal all art and make whatever one does or says appear to be without effort and almost without any thought about it.”
And Obama has been very careful to limit his public exposure to carefully crafted events. Every time he’s gotten ‘spontaneous’, his artifice slips and he commits a gaffe.
Take away the softball interview, the teleprompter and the events where he is unchallenged and he stumbles.
Anyone who disagreed with his politics was immune to his initial seduction and then examined Obama’s history and prior actions. That plus his actions since his election have resulted in a much more close examination of Obama than the MSM reveals to gullible liberals enamored with Obama and, the contradictions exposed tear the veil of Obama’s artifice aside.
And once exposed, the ‘wizard of deceit’ cannot renew his disguise.
Their behavior may also be a side-effect of the self-esteem movement, which has been realized as self-esteem without merit. Obama may represent an exemplary outcome of that movement, which so many overwhelmingly embraced and who now embrace him. There are many contributing factors to skewed perceptions of reality. It may simply be about ego and personal ambition, if it is not otherwise induced by biological or chemical factors.
“Anyone who disagreed with his politics was immune to his initial seduction and then examined Obama’s history and prior actions.”
Geoffrey Britain,
I would absolutely concur, and once again remind us all that 47% of the 2008 electorate were immune to this Siren’s song.
“And once exposed, the ‘wizard of deceit’ cannot renew his disguise,” and we can only hope that this includes at least another 4% of the electorate as we approach November.
Obama is the president of kids, women, blacks and intellectuals. Take from that what you will.
Take a shot:
The folks who think zero is a really great guy don’t.
They think his policies are good, or that they’re supposed to think his policies are good because they’ve been taught that all their lives and so they have to. They can’t think his policies are disasters.
But they can’t very well make the case that his policies aren’t disasters to a rational person.
So, to buttress their political choice, loyalty, and vote, they have to say something. Scratching around, the only thing they can say that isn’t attackable on empirical grounds is they “like” him. Can’t argue with a feeling.
“Bradley effect” (aka the “Wilder effect”)?
See:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_effect
I think I really began to dislike Obama for his superficial dissing of George Bush. It seemed to be based on no understanding of the complications of foreign affairs. I saw how Bush had to weigh the timing and focus of his statements to avoid getting leaders who were real allies in trouble at home, and I had no respect for a presidential candidate who was so ignorant. I also thought his analyses of black problems was pretty superficial: throw more money at them and tell the kids to go to college and get a degree in …studies.
I think many people missed theforeign affairs part because they are equally ignorant in this area and because it isn’t important to them. They had little to hold against a man who was cool, credentialled, black, and willing to promise them that life would be a dream with him.
“foxmarks Says:
August 23rd, 2012 at 2:10 pm
A person claiming to be a college professor in some relevant discipline (I honestly don’t recall which), explained that it comes from his body language and facial expressions. People like him at a subconscious level.”
It doesn’t work on me. I see the body language and facial expressions as arrogance.
Given that Obama has continued so many of Bush’s policies, and blames him for everything, clearly he doesn’t hat Bush for his policies, so he must hate Bush for being white, so “raaaaacist!” is all that’s left.
I not only don’t understand why the President is considered so “likeable,” I *really* don’t understand why Secretary Clinton is, according to Gallup, the most admired woman among Americans.
I had thought she was a good choice when announced, figuring she would be tough… well, she is, but only on our good allies, and a marshmallow to those who wish us ill.
She has been a complete embarrassment, IMHO, from the junior-high Russian “reset,” gimmick, to Honduras, to Falklands, to Israel, to …
Unlike her husband, she is a deadeningly boring speaker… maybe we should send her to visit Iran so she could kill the leadership with boredom?
Or the polls they have taken are like the couple I’ve done..Questions are couched in extremes–Do you strongly think..Since most people don’t think in strong black and white terms, they will probably say so’t something that really doesn’t represent their stand, but since they aren’t starkly black and white, give an answer that doesn’t really represent their feelings on the subject..
Polls, At least the couple I’ve taken, are obviously formulated to project a certain answer desired by those requesting, or conducting the poll. After the first couple questions, it was easy to see how the results would be presented, so since I could guess what they might present as poll results were not what I actually thought, though I didn’t feel extremely strong about it I answered yes or no based on what the opposite was. One of the questions was Do you strongly feel that taxes should never be raised, even if it would benefit our schools? Do I strongly feel that? No, but my question was how would that be tabulated in the poll results. That I’m in favor with paying higher taxes?
So when people are being polled on Obama’s likeability, maybe it’s not that they find him so, but in how the questions are presented. And he can turn on the charm–when he wants, so that’s what they see.
I think people like Obama because dysfunction and incompetence loves the company of dysfunction and incompetence. Any competent authority figure offers a comparison to the narcissist that’s just too damn uncomfortable to tolerate.
Interesting points throughout. Geoffery Britain’s comments resonate. He does present a very carefully crafted image. I suppose all politicians do, but Obama seems to struggle more than most when he steps outside the frame.
Of course, he has compliant allies in the media who try very hard to cover the missteps.
Finally, for reasons that sometimes baffle me, although I suspect that Vanderleun and Trimegistus are particulary germane here, Republican politicians insist on telling us that he is actually a fine fellow, it is just his policies that stink. Maybe as this campaign wears on they will put that little white lie to rest.
Everything you said, Neo, seconded.
I first became aware of Obama when I watched his speech at the 2004 Democrat convention. I thought it sounded good. He seemed to be a rising star in the Democrat Party and I thought it was good to see a black politician who was rising above the obsession with ancient history and racial grievances.
I didn’t think about him again until he began his run for President in 2007. I don’t remember exactly when it happened, either in ’07 or ’08, but I became aware of the creepy “cult of personality” aspect of his campaign when I heard accounts of fainting fans at his rallies. That set off alarm bells in a big way.
When I started seeing photos in the media with his head surrounded by halos, the feeling quickly went from creepy to frightening.
A couple of times during the campaign, he surreptitiously showed his middle finger in public appearances. His supporters thought that was hilarious and oh-so-clever. I was disgusted that a Presidential candidate exhibited behavior that would be considered obnoxious in a 15-year-old boy.
All during 2008, I kept reading of his history and radical associations on the internet. American Thinker had a major article about the Cloward-Piven strategy, which is where I first heard of it.
Well before the Greek column speech at the 2008 convention, I had developed an utter loathing for him. I could no longer stand to see his smug, arrogant face or listen to his haughty voice. (Somewhere along the line, Neo said that there was “hostility” in his voice. You nailed it. That was the word I was looking for but couldn’t think of.)
On Election Night when it became apparent that he had won, I turned off my TV and didn’t turn it on again for a full three weeks. I had been watching less TV in general for several years but I had never gone cold turkey like that before. I just couldn’t stand the thought of seeing or hearing him.
To this day I no longer watch any TV news, and I’ll often lunge to change the station if I hear him on the radio. I rarely click on links to him on the internet.
Likable? I don’t think so. Rattlesnakes are more likable than him, and they pose much less of a threat to the country.
Well, this is interesting. Another data point: I was inclined to like Obama when I first heard him speak, sometime in the year or so before the 2008 campaign was in full swing. I thought well, maybe he actually is the sort of person who could bring us together instead of dividing us, who could appeal to what’s best on both sides of our divisions, etc.
That didn’t last long, but I still hoped he would beat Hillary for the nomination–because I have the visceral dislike for the Clintons that many of you seem to have for Obama. (I thought I was over that, but every time I hear Bill’s voice it comes back.) Even after he won the election, I was prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt, and hoped that he would be a decent president. And, yeah, I admit to a sentimental warmth about the election of our first “black” (i.e. visibly mixed-race) president.
Pretty soon, of course, I realized how bad he was going to be, and that his idea of conciliation was that everybody would do what he told them to. So I lost any good feeling toward him that I’d had.
But I still have not developed that strong personal dislike. I’ve been in the Oval Office with him, shaken his hand, looked into his eyes, said a few words to him (“God bless you”). (No, I’m not anybody important, it was a ceremonial occasion.) I didn’t have any gut-level sense of “this is a bad guy” or even “this is a phony.” I just think he’s a man with very bad ideas and a very bad agenda upon which he is very determined, and I want to see him gone. It’s not personal.
I read a comment once from some Bush administration official that many people had the idea that Bush was dumb, but a nice guy, and that both were false. Substitute “smart” for “dumb” in that sentence, and I think it’s pretty true of Obama.
I see I wandered somewhat away from Neo’s original question: “how is it that so many people still see Obama as likable? Or even saw him that way in the first place?”
I did see him as likable to begin with. I don’t now, but it’s pretty mild. More not-like than dislike, you might say. But my purely political opposition is now implacable. I guess he still doesn’t seem as personally dislike-able to me as Bill Clinton did (does).
My lefty acquaintances do still seem to like him. They are also quite nasty about conservatives/Republicans, so, since so much of O’s nastiness is directed toward the same people, I guess it doesn’t register on them.
I once had an “industrial sociopath” — one who functions on the right side of the law, but is still a sociopath — in my life for an extended period. He came off as a friend, someone who was good to “hang” with. That was until I found out he was manipulating me in ways that were costing me dearly in terms of money, other relationships, and my reputation. I then learned he was doing the same thing to other people, some of whom I also knew. We compared notes, and left feeling the way the Madoff victims must have felt when they learned they had been played for fools. The sense of freedom that came from telling this jerk to FOAD was palpable. Now, will Obama supporters ever reach that point? Or are they too far gone on the path of submission to ever see Obama for what he is: the same type of industrial sociopath who only sees others as potential suckers?
Obama likeable?
Oh, heck, I’ve been blind as a bat since the get go as I have NEVER seen the “likeability” in Obama or Clinton.
Both sort of make my skin crawl whenever I hear them speak – there is something about both of them that makes my sleazy radar take notice.
Both Bushes, Reagan, and even Carter did seem to me to be “likeable.” (even though I didn’t like Carter politically, he still seemed like a nice guy; now, of course, his politics makes me think that he is just pathetic)
Lastly, I remember Ford as being very likeable and VERY genuine! Somebody you would like to “hang out” with; maybe at a picnic or a night of bowling. Very down to earth.
Likabale. Hardly.
But I remember some discussions with people who seemed as if they’d lost their senses.
Such as my neighbor – a woman.
Such as coworkers – men and women.
Such as my girlfriend.
They did NOT engage. My neighbor supposedly was a Republican. Coworkers who have logic everywhere else in life (with computers and databases)
Why did Ann Althouse, Peggy Noonan, whoever else you want to name LOSE THEIR darn MINDS??
There was no amount of logic you could employ on any one of them.
What’s the answer?? I believe EVERY one of them have zero understanding of free markets and what a person says when they don’t believe in free markets. Obama back then even talked about the 25% taking of the oil company profits. I brought this up and told people that our oil companies are competing in the international marketplace. Blank stares. Utter incompetence.
I cannot and will NEVER FORGIVE Peggy Noonan, Ann Althouse and others for being such idiots. They NEED to LEARN and STOP being the “intellectual” with a keyboard.
Neo:
There you have it-multiple answers to your question. Will you now synthesize a group conclusion? As a skilled therapist?
To me it isn’t likability anymore when you won’t even engage somebody in debate. It’s cultism.
I sometimes try to step outside of myself and examine my feelings and beliefs. Not always successful, but it helps me try to gain a semblance of objectivity. Sometimes when Obama is on TV I turn off the sound and try to watch him through objective eyes. It is then that I can see what many seem to see. A well turned out black man who seems to be self assured and, yes, cool. (Whatever that is? It’s like porn, I guess. You know it when you see it.) I could be disposed to like him. But I know too much about him. That changes everything.
I used to think Bill Clinton was the most blatant prevaricator I had ever seen in public office. Obama has equalled if not exceeded him in that department. I really disliked Clinton because he was such a raging womanizer and was given a pass. Obama seems to be loyal to his wife, but his policies, prevarication, and inability to try to meet his political opponents halfway are so much worse than Clinton that it is exceedingly hard to separate the man from histhat no matter how likable he is.
Vanderleun has a point as well. I want to like Obama because he is black. I want to be, or at least see myself as, unbigoted. There are two young black men who are personal trainers at my gym. They are extremely likable; just fine young men. It gives me a little boost of good feelings that I know and like them. Proves to myself that I’m not a racist.
Neo,
How do those liberals you know react to the nastiness we as conservatives have come to expect e.g. we’re going to reintroduce slavery, poison the air, want someone’s wife to die so the rich can get richer? Do they even see that as nasty or is spewing poison at people not like themselves just such a common element of their lives they just don’t see it anymore? (I’m old enough to remember the southern segregationists, who also were oblivious to their hate.)
Obama’s nastiness is also aimed to conservatives, so maybe it’s just part of the world as liberals know it.
How about the time Mr. Likable gave Hillary the finger?
Time to ask the question i’ve asked before. Do liberals watch reruns of Leave it to Beaver now and see Eddie Haskel as the oppressed moral beacon in the story?
“”How do those liberals you know react to the nastiness we as conservatives have come to expect e.g. we’re going to reintroduce slavery, poison the air, want someone’s wife to die so the rich can get richer? Do they even see that as nasty or is spewing poison at people not like themselves just such a common element of their lives they just don’t see it anymore? (I’m old enough to remember the southern segregationists, who also were oblivious to their hate.)
Obama’s nastiness is also aimed to conservatives, so maybe it’s just part of the world as liberals know it.””
jvermeer
libs don’t mind this stuff because they think it’s true. Or, if something like the Soptic ad is sufficiently busted in their presence, they believe something else just like it is true.
Or, if they actually know better, they can’t afford to admit it because that would contradict what they really, in their heart of hearts, want to do and believe. That’s why a discussion of facts with a lib results in one or both of; they know so little there’s no point in going on or they start saying nutty stuff like–conservatives are trying to kill old people.
The MSM-Lapdogs(except, mostly Fox News)are all on auto-pilot for any reporting of the scum sucking gutter lies & nastiness of the Obama campaign: It goes like this: “The presidential campaign is really heating up and getting more bitter..” Meaning BOTH sides, which is flat-out patent bullsh**. But, whatever…! The newest FoxNews polling with Registered-Most Likely to vote is quietly wonderful.
I have a strong gut hunch, based on watching the Boy King for these years, that a Large Crisis will be brewed prior to the election: Say, hitting Iran’s nuke facilities–with or without Israel(or strategic support for Israel hitting them)–and a call for patriotic Americans ALL standing together..blah-blah-blah… Nothing, ABSOLUTELY Nuthin’, is too extreme for AxelBama in their present and building desperation to hold on to Power.
But, looking at the Fox numbers, maybe even pretending to like those evil Juden occupiers of Palestine won’t bring them the votes they need. Luv’in this.
I believe that the disconnect that a lot of people here feel reminds me of the difference between Meg Ryan the person and the characters she played.
The president is well dressed, and his outward persona is very well crafted like a character from a movie. He could very easily play the president in the television show 24. In speaches, he speaks like a preacher. He says the correct things such as trying to work together. He never argues with the other side directly. He argues with straw men which make his points seem more reasonable. He also says that he was clear when he wasn’t clear, or he says that he has held a view when he changed his view. If one has no knowledge of the background, he makes what he says seem reasonable. If one were inclined to believe that Dems do things for altruistic purposes while Repubs are only interested in money to the detriment of others, well, you would find him more likeable, just like a Bill Mahr audience member.
On the other hand, for a larger majority of people who are not paying attention, the propaganda does work, just like Germans who believed Poland started WWII. I have a friend who is very low on the socio-economic ladder, and he got mad at me because I was making fun of OWS for not protesting in mid-town, i.e. times square, since all the important people moved North after 9/11. He said that all of the problems were caused by Wall Street. I do not argue with him because I really like him, and he never watches the news, and he definitely never watches cable news. To get his point of view, he probably thinks the cable news shows are as interesting as watching C-SPAN, or any chanel that you cannot imagine how anyone could be interested in. Paying attention now is like watching pre-season football. I do agree with artfldgr, artful dodger, that the president has worked on the cool pickup artist persona for a long time. I think it probably started when he was in High School based on what I heard in his audio book. He definitely has acting in his blood, and he tries to tell people what they want to hear and make sure that he has outs as far as not being pinned down when he does say something.
When, several times during the campaign and in the first few months of his administration, Obama (covertly?) flipped the bird at his adversary and did so in public, I quickly realized that he was an immature, nasty, and petty a**hole and that I saw nothing at all likeable in him.
The more I’ve kept up with the current campaign, the more UNLIKABLE Obama becomes.
I became very worried about Obama as a president during the 2008 campaign when I read about his associations (which probably would have doomed anyone else) and the sheer lack of exprience (state senator from Illinois and a first term in the U.S. Senate make you an ideal candidate for President?!).
Maybe the best way to put the 2008 election was that the country had a collective hissy fit. Of course, it’s nothing new to be tired of a two-term president, and I think I realized that the Republicans could be in trouble when the events of the last six months of 2008 were very negative for the Republicans. I could have been naive about the fact that Bush might have not been so good in the rest of his second term either.
But I was afraid that Obama would make things worse, because of his worldview and the desire to radically change the country’s direction. I recall thinking that some of Bush’s policies amounted to governing from the extreme right (unlike previous presidents), but if that is not a good thing, neither is governing from the extreme left. But that’s what Obama promised. (Incidentally, I recall fearing Reagan becoming president because I thought he was an extremist. But compared to what came later, I know my fears were unfounded.)
Sadly, we have learned that Obama in many ways indeed made things worse. And, it seems, regardless of the loss of half the Congress and some of his own fellow Democrats having concerns, he’ll continue on the same path. He can’t seem to admit that he screwed up, preferring to blame Bush, Republicans, the Tea Party, allies around the world, and even some of his fellow Democrats. He thought that we wold be foolish to give the car keys back to the ones who drove the car into the ditch. But does it make sense to leave the keys in the hands of the one who drove it FURTHER into the ditch?!
Unfortunately, there is no convincing some people. Some people cannot be convinced to vote Republican regardless of what happens. (I make it a point to vote for the person and maintain my independence; I’m afraid that if I become too involved in one party or the other I will be like the people I described–vote for the party no matter what happens.) They can’t be convinced that there is anything wrong with Obama and his policies–or if they think so, they will claim that the Republicans will destroy the (liberal policies of the) country and take us back to the dark ages.
So maybe it’s not that Obama is so likable, it’s just that there are some people who will tell themselves that and hope people believe it. It’s hard to believe that when the evidence is there of
how nasty Obama would be. Apparently, Obama wants to win at all costs, including the country.
This is the kind of President that we all should be afraid of, especially if he wins a second term. Maybe it’s an irony that the Tea Party, which organized in response to an increasingly arrogant and borderline-dictatorial government, took the name of a historic event over 200 years ago which similarly was in repsonse to an increasingly arrogant king. Coincidence? Maybe some of Obama’s supporters would want to demonize them, but similar people are the patriots that we learned about in American history.
A president who will do anything to be re-elected, who is the worst president as far as I am concerned (even worse than Carter, and maybe we should check him against Grant, Harding, and the 19th-century presidents who have been acknowledged as failures to see if he is worse than they), and who behaves in a way that, if he were anyone else he would have been dropped long ago is not only not likable, but that is too kind a word for him. Let’s see if the electorate becomes finally fed up with the past four years and sends him back to Chicago and out of the public eye.
“Willing” victims of psychopaths and other control-driven individuals are not necessarily suffering from low self-esteem in a conventional sense of the term. In fact, they may have a very high opinion of themselves. But they do suffer from a highly dependent or mediated self-esteem. They need a “special” person’s control to feel good about themselves and to get a sense of meaning in life. These are the most loyal and promising long-term victims for psychopaths, who stand by the disordered individuals no matter what they do wrong. They give their psychopathic partners a kind of absolute power over the lives in a similar manner that cult followers do to their pathological leaders.
In so doing, they relinquish agency and control over their lives. Such highly susceptible individuals may stay with a psychopath even once he stops validating them on a regular basis, and offers only tokens of praise or fake “respect” from time to time. By that time, they’re already trauma bonded to the psychopath, which may keep them emotionally and mentally enslaved to him for life. The psychopath uses such dependent personalities for his own destructive purposes. He never offers them any genuine love, though he may offer them the false validation they so desperately need.
In life, you gain peace and fulfillment from your own healthy self-esteem and from cultivating a respectful attitude towards others. This sense of balance is largely internal. Nobody else can give it to you.
–psychopathy awarness’s blog…
psychopaths and other personality disordered individuals can’t maintain that mask on over extended periods of time for three main reasons:
a) they can’t keep straight all the lies and half-truths they tell us and other people, so inconsistencies and contradictions in their false stories start to become obvious in time
b) they don’t put as much effort into maintaining the false front since our value to them diminishes once the newness wears off and once they’ve gotten some of what they want from and
c) psychopaths form relationships in order to exercise control over others, which inevitably turns into increasingly abusive and unequal relationships
-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Sigmund Freud coined the term “denial” to describe a situation when a person is faced with an uncomfortable or difficult to accept fact and denies or rejects it despite all rational evidence that it has occurred. How often do people involved with psychopaths turn a blind eye to clear evidence of their lying and cheating? How often do they rationalize the psychopath’s wrongdoings, blame it on others, find excuses for it or accept the psychopath’s lies, projection of blame and (false) justifications? The more emotionally invested a victim is in the psychopath and the relationship with him, and the more he has succeeded in isolating her from others, the stronger the power of denial becomes.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
so what your seeing is people forming one sided relationships with the leader… (if only stalin knew) where the leader is a friend and like god without theology,is what the person wants perfectly because they constructed the front for the person…
ie. the sociopathic person gets you to construct the front that you will let through your defenses. if they did it, thye might be wrong, but they dont… they let you do it…
this is the effect of the other thing over the coolness… its the vague art where you let others define you the way they want.. (something said of obama early on and even said by obama too)
in this way, one man can appear as 10 different men to ten different people who think its the same person, when the 11th person is the reality.. (if they have not lost themselves to this process)
that is, they stack the deck by putting up the sand bags of all those things that they create themselves, or in this case, are provided by media… he is smart… failures are plans for successes too subtle to fathom, handsom, post racial, social justice, etc… thats the “front”, that you see.
the lies. signing statements, under the bus, associations, school transcripts, unlawful acts, collusions, birth certificate and so on, are the things that are pushed to the back… they can even be accepted this way… the person can even trick themselves this way by saying. maybe the birth cert is fake, but its not that big a deal…
so what your seeing is a process that puts the victims in the place of ego pain, and avoidance, and so then puts them in the right zone for control… as if they were blackmailed…
they either continue onwards or have to admit to someone, maybe themselves that they did something that if dsicovered becomes ego soiling..
so in this case, like a woman in a bad relationship, they give the bad type another try at it for two reasons… one, is to rescue the situation and put their ego back on good standing… two, to fix the mistakes they made in the last relationship..
while this may seem funny, its not when you notice that women (as a voter) tends to vote with her romantic heart not her critical head…
ie.. they did not focus on the rational points and extrapoliating futures, that was put ont he back burner… they focused on how cute he was, how effeminate and safe, and the coolness, and so on. (As hitler told such leaders to be and how to do what he did).
and the key here is isolation… the political process and magazines of feminists, tend to isolate the targeted group… a key point to sociopathic control. and the victims step into that ego saving place gladly rather than face up to it… (race hucksters are in the community themselves since their group doesnt read monotheistic magazines)
in wonder at what point people will figure out that the common thread and ideals and things that are at the fore for the left is what sociopaths would want in a state they were rulers in…
Wish–“In a perfect world”–that Mitt had it in him to call Baby Obam-Bam what he is: A Liar. Use irrefutable specifics and call him a LIAR.
Baa-Daa-Bing. Like Dat.
..speaking of which: Anderson CNN Cooper basically called Debbie Blabbermouth Schultz that on his show yesterday. Much more of this Reality Show from the lapdawgs and I’ll need cardiac paddles!
And Obama has been very careful to limit his public exposure to carefully crafted events. Every time he’s gotten ‘spontaneous’, his artifice slips and he commits a gaffe.
Take away the softball interview, the teleprompter and the events where he is unchallenged and he stumbles.
This meticulous packaging and marketing is exactly why I consider him as a spokesmodel selected by others. He himself is neither bright nor introspective enough to realize that he needs to be packaged. Quite the contrary, he probably believes that he is uniquely gifted (“I can do your job better than you can”), and that others will appreciate this even in unscripted encounters. Only his handlers realize that such encounters will be catastrophic to the image of their carefully crafted product.