Presidential Mimesis 2008! -- Mimetic Theory and Literary Study

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Date Posted: 11:58:29 02/09/08 Sat
Author: CS Holden
Subject: Presidential Mimesis 2008!

My dad is an amateur political scientist. He likes to lecture me on "the way our country SHOULD be run," "what the Constitution REALLY says," etc.

He likes to tell me about the presidency. "It's a figurehead, that's all it is," he says. "People blame the president--or praise him--for things he never did, or could do. He doesn't have as much power as people think he does. If the budget suddenly gets cut for some program, people cry for the president's head, when really, it's Congress that did it. Most of the time, all the president does is make popular suggestions on national TV."

I don't know how much of what my dad believes his true, God love him. But upon rereading chapter one of "Things Hidden," well, check this out:

"In the example of people who habitually attract wide public notice, such as political leaders, celebrities, notorious criminals, etc., we can easily observe the phenomenon known in psychoanalysis as ambivalence. This so-called ambivalence consists first of all in attributing excessive responsibility for currents of public opinion and sentiment to figures who have been artificially isolated or placed in the spotlight... Because the popular imagination tends to polarize its hopes and enthusiasms, and of course its fears and anxieties, around a chosen individual, the power of the individual in question seems to multiply infinitely, for good or ill. Such an individual does not represent the collectivity in an abstract manner, but rather represents the state of turmoil, restlessness, or calm of the collectivity at any given moment of representation" (Girard 37).

Happy voting!

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