Wow. I support Edwards, but I have to give Hillary a couple of points for this:

[BigBearJohn]

And this was on Fox News, no less.

While discussing Obama as being likeable, she also
points out that likeability attracted a lot of votes
for George Bush in 2000. (Wasn't he the guy everybody
wanted to have a beer with back in 2000?)

WHAM. Right to the gut. So, he's likeable. So is George !.
HA! (a la Tweety)

[Imagevision]

1. Interesting, Barack's numbers are the only ones to grow in New Hampshire...

[lapfog_1]

2. Yeah, I want my President to be likable.

Like, oh, say... Bill Clinton. He was pretty likable and very charming. I'd want to hang out and have a beer with him.

But I also want my President to be smart. Like Bill Clinton (Rhodes Scholar) or Hillary or Barak Obama (Harvard Law, summa cum laude) and John Edwards.

Then, after all that, I want my President to stand for something and to be a leader.

Finally, I want my President to show judgment. I think Hillary failed this test. So I don't want Hillary as my President. Nothing to do with race or sex or anything else. If Gore was running, I'd be for him. If Feingold was running, I'd be for him. If Boxer was running, I'd be for her. If Ann Richards was running (and still with us), I'd be for her (and I'd LOVE to have had a beer with Ann!).

[OHdem10]

3. McCains and Hukabees grew too---I just had to tease

[featherman]

4. So the reasoning here is something like:

Everyone who is likeable is as incompetent as George Bush?

Or what? So let's keep nominating unlikeable candidates? So the press will dislike them? So they can lose?

I'm not quite sure I follow.

[BigBearJohn]

5. The reasoning is, just because a candidate is likeable, it does not necessary follow that they

are qualified to be president. This is was a counter
to the idea that Hillary is unelectable because she
is considered "unlikeable" by some people.

[Naturyl]

9. No... the trick is to nominate intellectuals who are

Good at hiding it. Prime example: Bill Clinton.

People who are openly intellectual (like Kerry) can't win. The public is biased against them from the start. Intellectuals need to stay in the closet until they are elected, and go for the Big Mac factor on the campaign trail.

[Bicoastal]

6. Well, that tears it...

...from now on I'm only voting for thoroughly unlikable bastards.

Giuliani in 2008!

[Naturyl]

7. Yep, she's right

But she (wisely) avoided identifying the core issue behind all of that, which is anti-intellectualism. That is what the "have a beer factor" is all about. It is an expression of a basic American mistrust of people who are more intelligent than average - a mistrust which has been fed tremendously by the GOP.

It's one more example of how GOP cultural engineering has affected Americans of every political stripe.

[avaistheone1]

11. Beware that likeability thing also gave us Reagan.

Likeability should not be the most important factor in selecting a president.

None of us have to be the damage Reagan did.

[Warren DeMontague]

8. And, Obama is a carbon-based bipedal life form. Just like George W. Bush.

Scary!

[rch35]

10. the horror! nt

[OneGrassRoot]

12. I agree with her, but I've raised this issue before and got flamed:

Yes, yes, yes, in a perfect world people will elect candidates based on issues and performance, etc.

But we are HUMAN. Every single one of us.

How many of us here are going to vote for someone who may have a record we resonate with yet there is something about them THAT WE SIMPLY DON'T LIKE. A personality quirk, something that rubs us the wrong way.

Granted, I would think we're more apt to like someone BECAUSE we resonate with their issues, but the cult of personality is a huge deal with humankind. And we all like (and dislike) people for different reasons.

People can bitch and moan all they want about it not being about liking someone or not, but it is. And the harder someone tries to be liked by putting on airs or conforming based on who they're talking to, the more disliked they're going to be by those who are sensitive to pandering. I'm not thinking of any candidates in particular with this comment - it's a general statement.

Again, we're not all going to like the same people for the same reasons.
We're not all going to dislike people for the same reasons.

Many here who passionately support a candidate are able to not diss other candidates or their supporters. These are usually the people who can accept that we all like different people for different reasons, and that it is simply a fact of human nature.

The others who constantly state "you're a friggin idiot/robot for liking so and so" seem to be those who don't take human emotional and the "likeability" factor into account. They're pure policy...life is black and white.

How nice it would be to be so clear on everything and see others as idiots for not liking the same person you do. How nice it would be to not have emotions affecting your life and your decisions.

[robbedvoter]

13. Except W's "likeability" was pure media fabrication. No wit, no charm, nothing

Just a rude, petulant frat boy laughing at his own jokes. Without the power behind him, he'd be beaten & ignored by all cool kids - in any setting, any age.

[truedelphi]

15. Circa 2000 and the election cycle then, I am not sure

That is true.

Pelosi's daughter spent several months dogging Bush's campaign, including riding in his jet for her video. mSNBC has shown that documentary a few tiumes, usually when Bush's popularity is in freefall.

And in taht video, he comes off as human and likeable.

Not someone any of us here on DU would vote for, but likeable.

I really believe that the man suffered some nervous system disease such as Lyme's disease or worse.

He has gone in seven years from someone who had charm and empathy (at one point the press beats up on the filmmaker, and Bush offers her sympathy, in a very sweet way)
to someone that has been so isolated from other people that his own ego has expanded, imploded and expanded again. And he is no longer capable of putting together half a dozen words in a convincing way.

[Lerkfish]

14. well, she apparently finds his foreign policy "likable".

so not sure that was a hit out of the park.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

16. Well I guess she'd know about Bush's likeability.

[DaveJ]

17. I never saw Bush as being likeable...

Granted, I would need a beer to tolerate his company. Other than that, this "Bush is likable" thing never made sense to me.