Primetime is difficult. It can be incredibly unforgiving --
especially in this season of high-def
politics. The exposure associated with 300 plus million
viewers watching every presidential miscue has never been
greater. Yet, primetime is the venue that the venerable Obama
chose when he turned hope and change into a 24/7 infomercial.
That his ratings are slipping is beyond debate. How and
when he reached his tipping point is the real
cliffhanger. No, his fade is not about policy, and it's not about
politics. It's not about economics and it's not about healthcare.
It's about style. It's about how President Barack Obama jumped
the shark in démodé denim.
Shark jumping has its origin
in an instant that happened 32 years ago this
month. It was on an inauspicious autumn night when most of
America had just finished dinner. Unsuspecting and innocent,
families of all stripes were winding their day down, yearning for
a little respite. They were looking for a break in the bluster of
Cold War contentions and deleterious disco. They were hoping to
get lost in primetime, in a better time -- in Happy
Days. What they got instead was anything but
happy. For, on the evening of September 20, of 1977, Arthur
Fonzarelli ("the Fonz") traded his patented blue jeans for
powder-blue swim trunks and water-skied an entire sitcom into
television infamy. On that fateful day, the king of cool donned a
crown of kitsch; Fonzie jumped over a shark, and Happy
Days became sad.
Before his fall, Fonzie was the incarnation of cool.
Conformity, college, convention -- none of that mattered. He was
an island of grit in a Great Lake of Wisconsin suburbia. His
motorcycle, greasy hair, and leather jacket asserted his style.
Fonzie didn't have to prove anything to anyone -- especially the
American television audience. But, trading a
Triumph for a gratuitous grasp at sitcom
survival, the brain trust behind the creative curtain took leave
of its senses and made a mockery of the Fonz.
That was the beginning of the end for Richie, Potsie, and
the entire cast.
Since that unspeakable autumn evening, many seemingly
immortal impresarios have followed the Fonz on his allegorical
odyssey -- pushing their political prestige into obscurity. From
the terror of a tank-touting Michael Dukakis, to the primal punch
and scream of Howard Dean -- those who jump their proverbial
shark forever place their best days behind them. They unwittingly
outwit themselves and forget who and where they are -- more
importantly, they forget who put them there.
Obama's unspeakable act of shark-jumpery, was not actually
spoken. It would be somewhat expected to point to his quip about
the Cambridge police department; but that actually occurred
months after his initial descent. The fact that much ado was made
of his comment confirms that he had already fallen from grace --
otherwise, no one would have bothered to care about his Cambridge
calamity. Neither was it his flat attempt at "Brewski diplomacy"
on the South Lawn. Ridiculous as that was,
it would have been cheered and lauded by fans of the erstwhile
Obama. Nor was it a matter of any other sage or seditious
significance. President Obama was not selected for his substance;
he was elected for his style.
Until recently, Obama spoke, taught, and presumed with
impunity. He was nearly unassailable, so long as he acted and
reacted within the parameters of his celebrity -- the patented
Obama style. His palavering proclivity betokened his commitment
to the Obama image. But on July 14, 2009, Obama left style on a
hanger and tossed out the first pitch at Major League Baseball's
All-Star Game,
dressed in an unfortunate pair of "frumpy"
jeans. "For those of you who want your president to look
great in his tight jeans," he explained, "I'm sorry, I'm not the
guy."
Not the guy is right.
The tragic truth of those trousers is that they confirmed
the critique of the Obama election. The marginal shift to Obama
from the previous Republican administration occurred not because
of Obama's substance or the intricacy of his ideas; people voted
for Obama's persona.
They hoped and changed for a different
style. The Nation -- 53 percent of them
-- wanted
some slick repackaging.
Obama had it; McCain did not. The Obama mystique convinced
just enough voters that Obama's style would clothe his rhetoric
with materiality. As long as his style was impeccable, his
message -- whatever it purported to be -- would resonate. But
when style fades, persona follows.
Michael Dukakis jumped his shark in the 1988 presidential
election. He staged a perfectly painful photo-op,
replete with tank, helmet, and flak jacket.
This ill-conceived venture turned out to be the final
maneuver of his campaign, as Dukakis plunged into electoral
lethargy and an eventual landslide -- for George H.W. Bush.
Dukakis: socially minded, executively experienced,
compassionately calibrated? -- check. Tank-driving tough-guy? --
checkmate.
For Howard Dean, style was equally important. Governor Dean
had experience and a reasonable record but that wasn't what
excited his sophomoric supporters, it was his status as an
irreverent party crasher. A straight-talking spoiler -- he was
the doctor who made unwelcome house calls to the mainstream of
the Democrat party. But on January 22, 2004, Dean's
fist-pumping
shriek of honest exuberance was demonstrably uncool and
unacceptably unhinged.
Suddenly, the dean of dissent had a fondness for the very
same mainstream that he was sent to unsettle. Suddenly, Dean was
generically goofy. Suddenly, Howard Dean had jumped the
shark.
For President Obama, style is everything -- was everything.
And spurning style has proven an irreversible pas
of the tres faux variety. If only
there had been something material to those loose-fitting jeans.
If there had been more, his self-deprecating admission would have
been endearing. If he had ridden in on something other than a
wave of words and artful execution, he might have had something
to fall back on. But Obama has nothing to fall back on; his
persona won't allow it. His coronation was a celebration of
savoir-faire. He was the advocate of
articulation, the sultan of suave, the patrician of parlance. He
was supposed to usher in the era of the erudite. He was supposed
to show the red-state rubes how consensus is crafted. He was
supposed to embody the end of rancor. He was supposed to be the
guy who looked great in his stylish jeans.
Turns out he's just "not the guy."
