{"id":2307,"date":"2011-09-10T19:50:15","date_gmt":"2011-09-11T00:50:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/?p=2307"},"modified":"2011-09-10T19:53:14","modified_gmt":"2011-09-11T00:53:14","slug":"the-blink-and-the-look","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/?p=2307","title":{"rendered":"The Blink and The Look"},"content":{"rendered":"

A friend at work recently loaned me a copy of Malcolm Gladwell’s \u201cBlink\u201d<\/a> and I’ve been cruising through it over the past few days (it’s a fairly easy read, with lots of anecdotes; interestingly, a movie is being made about it, to be released later this year). Gladwell’s main point is that we humans are built to make snap judgments about things and people that we see or encounter for the first time, based upon initial impressions; and that such judgments are generally more accurate than you might expect. He calls this the “thin slicing” technique of decision making.<\/p>\n

But Gladwell also points out that \u201cblink\u201d judgments are sometimes wrong, and offers some conjectures about what can throw us off when we start judging books by their covers. To be honest, Gladwell doesn’t really leave you with much to help decide whether and when to trust your gut instincts, and when to re-think them. He gives a few examples of the many overt and subconscious prejudices that people harbor, but doesn’t say how to detect when these are blinkering your blink. This book is kind of \u201cblinky\u201d in itself, actually; various critics have said that the evidence for Gladwell’s contentions is usually quite thin. But the stories in it are interesting enough.<\/p>\n

One of Gladwell’s stories regards Warren Harding, 29th President of the US and arguably the worst one ever. This was an instance when the “thin slicing” of a first impression let us down. According to Gladwell, Harding’s strongest asset was his looks; he was 6 feet tall and had the face and body of a Roman Senator. People supposedly viewed the guy and immediately thought \u201cgreat leader\u201d. But it turned out not to be so. Sometimes those thin-sliced \u201cblink\u201d judgments get us into trouble.<\/p>\n

I can’t help but wonder if Mr. Obama’s quick rise to power was fueled largely by \u201cThe Look\u201d. Sure, he gave (and still gives) a great speech, but half of the impact of a great speech comes from the look of the speaker. If the speaker looks great while speaking, the speech itself is already half way to greatness. Mr. Obama, standing at 6 foot 1 inch himself, certainly had \u201cThe Look\u201d, more so that the capable but somewhat dowdy Hilary Clinton, and much more that the over-the-hill John McCain. <\/p>\n

So Mr. Obama has ‘The Look’ (although his ‘Look’ is starting to tarnish as the stress of the Presidency takes its toll on his graying hair and his wrinkling face); but does he have \u201cThe Feel\u201d for leadership? A lot of people are questioning that. I, along with many of the pundits, can’t help but be reminded of Jimmy Carter. <\/p>\n

Carter wasn’t all that tall relative to modern presidents (5 feet 9 \u00bd inch; since 1960 and JFK’s inauguration, presidents have averaged 6 feet \u00bd inch tall; whereas the average American male height in 2005 was 5 feet 9 \u00bc inch). But he had great hair and a handsome boyish face when he beat the taller but older and balding Gerald Ford in 1976. Unfortunately, Mr. Carter turned out not to have \u201cThe Feel\u201d. He was right about most things, but Carter took reality too seriously and let it interfere with his governing process. This made him appear confused and uncertain. So America replaced him in 1980 with an older but taller actor who did not let reality get in the way of his leadership role. And the country felt better, even though it was by sheer luck that things eventually got better.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, Obama may soon be going up against either Mitt Romney or Rick Perry, both of whom are tall and have \u201cThe Look\u201d going for them despite their age. Rick Perry especially, as he has a broad-shouldered body and chiseled aging face not unlike Ronald Reagan. I can’t help but wonder \u2013 and fear, actually \u2013 that after four years of Obama’s reality-based leadership style, America will again turn to a broad-shouldered guy who sticks to his script no matter what the facts say. If that were to happen all over again, I’ll be praying that our country gets lucky once more as in Mr. Reagan’s eight years, when our economy strengthened and our enemies weakened. <\/p>\n

If not, then we are going to blink a lot, hoping that it is all just a dream. But all the blinking in the world won’t wake us up from the nightmare.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A friend at work recently loaned me a copy of Malcolm Gladwell’s \u201cBlink\u201d and I’ve been cruising through it over the past few days (it’s a fairly easy read, with lots of anecdotes; interestingly, a movie is being made about it, to be released later this year). Gladwell’s main point is that we humans are […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,7,22],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2307"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2307"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2307\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2310,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2307\/revisions\/2310"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}