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The Weakness of Weirdness
Politics is often about the messenger, not the message. Should third-parties be worried that non-traditional candidates like Vermin Supreme tank their chances of electoral success?
It’s a sad truth that politics is often more about personality than policy. Particularly in an era of partisan-based tribalism, there’s a greater perceived political reward in emotional victories than in intellectual ones: a point-for-point take down of a tax policy proposal is dry, complex and above the heads of most blue-collar, middle American voters. This is not to say that these voters are incapable of understanding, but rather that they’ve prioritized their own life goals over understanding dry academic treatises, a choice which is in keeping with the trustee model of representation. Under this model, constituents trust their elected representatives, who dedicate their time and energy to understanding complex policy issues, with making the choices that best represent their interests and preserve their livelihoods.
Understanding that your representative brought home a win for your district, on the other hand, is much more efficacious: it is not only a win in fact, represented by some sort of boon that demonstrably betters your living conditions, but a win in spirit. When a politician delivers, a voter’s judgment is validated: he feels he rightly identified a candidate who genuinely cares…
