Some of my most entertaining reading comes out of my hometown newspaper, especially the Editorial page, which usually serves as a message board for Kool-Aid drinkers.
Last week's paper arrived and I was not disappointed. Under the headline "President Deserves Our Support," I read one of the most hilarious LTEs I've ever seen. Unfortunately, this man is serious. For your reading pleasure, I give you... Cowboy-in-Chief!!
This newspaper does not publish letters to the editor online, and copyright laws forbid me from posting the letter in its entirety. But I'm confident that these passages will give you the essence of the letter, and quite possibly a few good laughs.
Our leader, our president, our commander in chief, is a straight shooter. He's a cowboy. Says what he means and means what he says. Says yes ma'am and no ma'am. Tips his hat to a lady and looks a man in the eye.
[Snip]
He's a straight shooter, he does not talk using vague language that might not mean what you think. Some folks just don't know how to take a cowboy who wears western boots. Some folks are so used to listening to officials who do not tell the truth or bend it a few times to suit their political standing or belief, that when a cowboy does talk from the hip with truth it's a culture shock.
[Snip]
Every time the president gives an interview or an address to the nation it's plain, straight, truthful and very understandable and it's in English. Our cowboy is honest. He talks straight and tells the truth because he doesn't know how to lie.
I just think that's so refreshing. He also believes in God. Yeah, that's right, God. The same one that we mention on all our money. Must be contagious because I believe in God too.
[Snip]
Our cowboy, President Bush, believes in a real God. I'm glad we have a praying leader in the times we live in when nuts are waving nukes in our face. We all need to pray for our cowboy, not bash him.
There you have it - support our cowboy! He's a God-fearin', hat-tippin', straight-talkin', no-nonsense Amurcan. What's not to love?
This would make a great movie, but we would have to find it in the Fantasy section. How can a (relatively) cognitively mature adult believe these things about Bush? The answer is actually quite simple: The Cult of Personality.
Cults of personality are nothing new - they are as old as politics itself. But the cult of personality has made great strides since the advent of mass media, so that handlers are able to present a carefully crafted image of their charge.
The most effective and powerful cult of personality in modern history, of course, was that of Adolf Hitler. The Führer Cult has been analyzed by historians, psychologists, and sociologists, but one of the best and most accessible works is Ian Kershaw's book, The "Hitler Myth": Image and Reality in the Third Reich (also available at Powells).
I want to be very clear: I am not equating Bush with Hitler. None of us likes Bush, and most of us, I suspect, would easily rate him as the worst president in American history. But Bush is no Hitler, not by a long shot. They aren't even in the same league. OK? OK.
Having said that, there are some striking similarities between the Hitler and Bush cults of personality.
1. Both take full advantage of mass media to achieve their ends of deceiving the public.
2. Both take great pains to create a false impression of the man's roots.
3. Both carefully portray the man as the embodiment of what they believe to be the national ideal.
There are many more similarities, of course, but these three capture the essence of the cult of personality as it has been constructed by Goebbels and Rove, respectively.
We are fully aware of the way Goebbels and Rove used mass media (particularly television or film) to portray their respective charges. Consider in Bush's case the infamous "Mission Accomplished" speech or the images of Bush touring the Gulf Coast in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.
The second and third similarities are actually closely related in the case of both the Hitler and Bush cults of personality. Both Hitler and Bush sought desperately to downplay their true origins: Hitler, the "German Savior," was actually an Austrian, and Bush, the "Texas Cowboy," was actually born to privilege in Connecticut.
In order to overcome these less-than-ideal roots, both leaders were constantly portrayed as personifications of what their portrayers considered to be the national ideal. In Hitler's case, he was constantly photographed in military uniform (emphasizing the Prussian ideal of military superiority) and in traditional Alpine dress or before Alpine scenes (emphasizing the Bavarian ideal of a rugged "Gemütlichkeit"). Bush, similarly, is constantly photographed with soldiers and in military situations (emphasizing the Republican ideal of military strength) and performing the ritual activities of a Texas cowboy (emphasizing the American glorification of rugged individualism and manly virtue). Consider these photographs:
In these pictures we see similar portrayals of each leader as personifications of what is perceived to be the respective national ideals. Hitler is portrayed as a Bavarian and as a military leader, while Bush is portrayed as a Texas cowboy and a military leader. In each case, of course, these portrayals are only partially based in reality.
Nevertheless, they serve their purpose. Many Germans believed that Hitler was the very manifestation of German national identity, and many Americans believe that Bush is the personification of rugged American individualism and military might.
And in many cases, these portrayals are successful, as we have seen in the case of the above-quoted LTE. Is Bush really a cowboy? Of course not. But many people clearly believe that he is, thanks to the careful construction of a cult of personality.