"The 'Authentic' Politician Is a Myth"

"This taste for the apparently uncoached and unscripted goes way back; more than a century ago, the rise of image management was already sowing skepticism about campaign-trail stagecraft and stimulating a hunger for unvarnished candidates. Yet despite its deep roots, our disdain for artifice is itself somewhat superficial. In reality, we're quite happy to tolerate some image-making when it produces a leader with political traits we find congenial."

David Greenberg in the Los Angeles Times looks back at presidential image-making since the early twentieth century.