Why politicians are so full of themselves

Peggy Noonan of Opinionjournal.com wrote a memorable column "Conceit of Government" last week in which she called attention to the incredible self-reverence displayed by many of our current political elite. Howcome, she asked?  I thought of her column this week while crafting the arguments in Quillnews' "new battlefield" series. In response to her question of why, I'd suggest the reasons today's pols shamelessly associate themselves with heroic persons of our history are their clumsy attempts to respond to the demands of creating a winning brand image in Media-ville.  Rather than acting like regular citizens, they say these things with such brazenness in order to create their political brand, deliberately associating themselves with images the public admires so they can create a political brand that will win them elections. How they do this and keep a straight face is beyond me. These guys (and gals) are not being appropriately self-effacing when they speak these lines. Their grandmothers would no doubt scold them if they saw such puffing and self-important preening.  To see these birds in a more appropriate context, I'd merely judge them as somewhat bad actors, unskillfully saying lines that their polling has told them will build the characters they will need to play in Media-ville "shows" for the rest of their political careers. We are all the spectators watching as they apply their make-up so they can be ready for their close-up when Mr. DeMille says: action.