The Wizard of Oz effect

Publius weighs in on the importance of the Cheney hunting story. He calls it the Wizard of Oz effect:

Ridicule is a sorely misunderestimated political weapon. When it’s done right, I think it’s an extremely effective line of attack – much better than angry frontal assaults or even direct slanders. In my own home state, Mitch McConnell is a master of the art of calculated ridicule. Ridicule was also a key to Bush’s victory. People can talk about the Swift Boats all they want, but I think the real political traction came from treating Kerry as an “object of humor and calculated derision.” After all, I doubt people were all that motivated by the Swift Boat stories by the time they actually made their decision. But I do think they were motivated by the flip-flop taunts, the wind-surfing, the lines about Massachusetts, and the other calculated ridicule heaped on Kerry in 2004...

Getting back to Dead-Eye Dick – slayer of octogenarians – I think the incessant jokes-to-come could undermine him (and the administration) politically – maybe not a lot, but they won't help. And yes, people ridicule Bush and Cheney all the time. But this one is different. To borrow from Ed Helms, he shot a 78-year old man . . . in the face. That’s so ridiculous that even people who pay no attention to politics will hear about it and find it pretty funny.

But here’s why it matters. Perhaps this is too snarky, but I think the continued political support for the administration has little to do with actual policy. How could it? Instead, it relies heavily on a cult of personality – a carefully-crafted aura or projection of toughness and decisiveness. To many people, Bush is still the 9/11 President, the decisive war president, the man who stood on the rubble with the bullhorn.

But the thing is – once you've pulled back the curtain, you can’t ever really believe in the Wizard again. It’s just an old man pulling some switches. Over the past year, the projected aura has lifted and revealed the bumbling incompetence of the administration. Call it the Wizard of Oz effect.