The Personality Factor: Another Reason For Clinton's Poor Performance

[Spider Jerusalem]

At the beginning of this election season last autumn, Senator Hillary Clinton was a prohibitive favourite for the Democratic nomination, and polled 33 points ahead of Senator Barack Obama. She had every advantage: name recognition, a tremendous lead in early fundraising, and a successful and popular former President in her corner. Every advantage, except one: her personality.

Senator Clinton, as are some 25% of Americans, is an introvert. It's obvious in the way she communicates; she is in her element in a small, town-hall setting, discussing policy issues in which she is well-versed. In such settings, she lights up, and comes across as graceful, natural, and genuine. Where she does not succeed is in settings where she has to speak to a large audience, on broad themes; when she's done this she's been perceived as wooden, as forced, as having adopted a completely different personality to suit the occasion and audience. If this seems to be the case, well, that's because it IS the case; introverts do not naturally open up to people, and many find it easier to adopt a set script for a particular interaction tailored to a given situation. As an introvert myself, I know how difficult such interactions can be; I have to say I admore Senator Clinton's willingness to make the effort, to try to force herself into a round hole, but...it's not really working out.

Barack Obama, by contrast, is an extrovert (as is Bill Clinton); he has an innate instinct for communicating with other people, knows how to work a crowd, and has the natural politician's instinctive sense of how to talk to diverse groups of people without sounding forced.

The effects of this difference between the candidates have been understated, I think (from what I've seen, they haven't even really been observed); but nonetheless this factor has probably been an important one. Politics is a profession in which introverts rarely fare well; the classic case of an introvert in politics is Richard Nixon. And in recent times, we've seen Bill Clinton (an extrovert) win against George HW Bush (an introvert); and Al Gore and John Kerry, introverts both, lose* to the extroverted George W Bush (this is what those people who'd rather have a beer with him were talking about).

*Yes, I know, not really

[FrenchieCat]

1. Obama was not even right when he said that Hillary was likable enough.....

she actually isn't.

[Spider Jerusalem]

2. I wouldn't even say it's that she isn't likable.

I'd say it's more a case of her feeling she has to project a certain image in order to make herself likable. Al Gore had a similar problem; I know a lot of people who observed that away from the pressures of campaigning for the presidency, when engaged in his work on climate change, etc, he's seemed more relaxed, more natural, more himself, and generally happier.