The Benjamin Button Election - New York Magazine

Rage, powerlessness, magical thinking--why is how we think about politics increasingly mirroring the mindset of a small child? - Jennifer Senior

8 Novmeber 2010

• Progressives who pinned high hopes on Obama to marshal the government are now devastated to discover that he is far from perfect. The decisive figure who radiated adult authority couldn't deliver.
• This magical thinking belonged to the Tea Party in 2010 and their solution is to destroy the existing government.

We are thinking in fanciful, binary choices.

The candidates ran grass roots campaigns that made participants feel like they were empowered to enact those dreams whether they were about electing a superhero or destroying one.

Acts of rebellion in childhood comes from a sense that they are in total control and a sense that they aren't. The current situation makes everyone feel disempowered. We're hard wired not to think clearly when we are scared.

The Narcissism Epidemic - Jean M. Twenge and W. Keith Campbell

• Argues that we are much more narcissistic today than in the 70s, for example.
• Exploding number of vehicles our culture provides to promote feelings of entitlement and self-regard.
• Kardashians are promoted as much or more than Meryl Streep.
• Success is disentangled from talent and suggests that we are all potential celebrities.
• A plethora of personal broadcasting systems like Twitter and Facebook which leads us to believe that whatever we have to say has value.
• The Internet becomes less of a portal into other worlds as it is a mirror of our own.

We feel that we are up against lobbyists and big business.

• When people become more powerless, they become more distrustful of those that have power so they want systems that protect them against someone else---and that paradoxically disempowers them even more.

Voters also want identification with their candidates.

• Christine O'Donnell is exactly what you get when you have a culture that promotes self admiration, encouraging everyone to think as a giant.
• Passion and a few principles is all you need now to run for office.
• Not experience, sound judgement, intellect, humanity, or leadership skills.
• It is a misguided notion that desire equates to competence.

The successful modern campaign best appreciates a voter's sense of self-importance and vulnerability.

• Obama's campaign made supporters feel as if they were part of an important movement through tweets, emails, and Yes, We Can slogans.
• This has yet to translate into passionate interest in every day governing.

Mario Cuomo - We campaign in poetry, but govern in prose.

"We are the ones we have been waiting for" is kind of a less challenging quote than "Ask not what your country can do for you, but for what you can do for your country". It's a way of saying that there are limits that one guy can achieve, so help out.

Obama was supposed to offer the same promises of a third party--an intellectual and generational break from how business was done----which is what the tea party is promising now.

We expect quick fixes to the economy without sacrifices and if this isn't possible, we don't want to know about it.