Fatty Fatty Two by Four: Chris Matthews Makes the Intellectual Case Against Christie and Barbour

What should keep Chris Christie and Haley Barbour out of the White House?  According to picture of good health, Chris Matthews, they’re just too darn fat:

“Chris Christie is moon over New Jersey, he should not wear white shirts, I tell you that,” Matthews said. “I saw him the other day and I was amazed by it, he must be 300 plus, and that’s something he’s just gotta deal with because you’re not going to say, ‘I’m going to cut the budget,’ well, how about starting with supper?…”

Matthews also said Republicans might look at a dark horse candidate like Jeb Bush, “because Haley Barbour weighs too much.”

Human beings are often superficial and rarely are we more superficial and silly than when it comes to politics. Candidate appearance is often the subject of jokes, and sometimes some folks on the left think that mocking appearance actually constitutes a political argument.

The talk about Christie’s weight brings to mind two powerful stories, one from the Bible and one off the New York Times best-seller list.

The biblical story comes from the book of 1 Samuel. God told the Prophet Samuel to go to the house of Jesse to annoint a new king. When the first son came forward, Samuel declared, “Surely, the annointed of the Lord is before me.”  God vetoed this instinct of Samuel and said no to every one of Jesse’s son, until the youngest was called. David was that youngest son who famously faced Goliath, while his older brothers cowered in camp.

A more modern example of this same principle was highlighted by Malcolm Gladwell in his book, Blink which explained how humans often make split-second judgments. He wrote a cautionarty chapter that discussed the pitfalls of split second decisions called, “The Warren Harding Effect” named after our 29th President. Gladwell describes Harding briefly:

Warren Harding was not a particularly intelligent man…As he rose from one political office to another, he never once distinguished himself. He was vague and ambivalent on matters of policy. His speeches were once described as “an army of pompous phrases moving over the landscape in search of an idea.”
 

However,  on the strength of his looks, Warren Harding advanced in politics and became President because he looked commanding and presidential. The result of this was the Teapot Dome Scandal.

And there are a hundred politicians like it. Men and women who sure looked good on the outside, but on the inside, the only difference between them and your average conman is having won an election.

Unfortunately, superficial issues of appearance will always have a place in politics because abusive and cowardly people will always prefer to attack to attack the person rather than addressing the issues. However, the less voters pay attention to this nonsense, the less impact it will have, and the less acceptable it will be.

Read more at Adam’s Blog