Understandably, outrage and head-shaking seem to be the main reactions in the blogosphere to this morning's Wall Street Journal report, mentioned here earlier, into the electoral implications of the fact that Barack Obama is a member of a minority (at least among Americans of voting age) -- specifically, the minority of people who aren't overweight.
"Yes, this all comes from The Wall Street Journal, supposedly our most substantive newspaper," writes Ezra Klein, while Brad at Sadly, No! is rather less restrained:
In case you guys were wondering why I felt so down yesterday, it's because articles like this one keep popping up in our mainstream press corps. It's like the bastards have learned nothing from the past eight years and are happily going along with the GOP's identity-based smears yet again. Just shoot me.
Gawker searches for a silver lining -- "through clenched teeth, let us affirm that it's a sign of the health of our republic, and the strength of our two presidential candidates, that pettifogging bullshit has become a mainstay of this election" -- as does Matthew Yglesias, who makes a good point:
In all seriousness, if the predominant aspect of superficial physical appearance that voters have in their head is anything other than race, I think Obama should consider himself lucky. America can handle a skinny president.
Healthwise, of course, it's a good thing that Barack Obama is -- in the words of his doctor -- "lean and muscular with no excess body fat." But the implication of the WSJ piece is that, in the minds of some voters, a bit more solidity would add... well, a bit more solidity. That weight would make Obama more weighty.
If you care even slightly about real issues of policy, this kind of thing probably makes you so frustrated that you want to slam yourself repeatedly in the forehead with a brick. But I'm not sure that means the WSJ deserves condemnation for printing it. A non-insignificant number of people do choose one candidate over for another stupid reasons. More broadly, there's an instinctive, subconscious level to how all of us make political decisions that we probably we wouldn't be too thrilled to be confronted with. If Obama's being thin means he doesn't look like anyone you know, that's at least potentially a real electoral factor, and surely a topic worthy of one election-season article in a mainstream newspaper.
The hilarious graphic accompanying the WSJ piece also reminds us a) that John McCain is a tiny, tiny nano-candidate, and b) that Abraham Lincoln totally cheated in the height stakes by wearing a stovepipe top hat.
