- Jul 21, 2009
- 133,136
- 69,805
If they can't be honest about the little things, how can we expect them to be honest about matters of importance?
By Jay Mathews September 24
(Richard Johnson/The Washington Post)
In the flood of reporting on the presidential candidacy of Hillary Rodham Clinton, amid the e-mails, polling data, classified documents and position papers, no one seems to have noticed a medical miracle at the center of the campaign.
The candidate appears to be getting taller.
I’m excited. Americans of short stature, like me, can finally dream of someday reaching those upper shelves, looking good in the latest fashions and regaining the respect of our children long used to looking down on us.
I know this because I am the only journalist peculiar enough to have chronicled since 1988 the most important but least-covered issue in U.S. politics — the effect of height on electoral success. I have written about this every four years or so. This is my eighth article on the subject.
Height has had a huge effect on our politics. If we were an insect species in which adults are smaller than larvae, we shorter people might get more respect. But the data indicate strongly that if human voters have a chance to see candidates standing side by side, they tend to vote for the taller one. This has happened in 69 percent of presidential races of the television era, since 1948.
I used to be the only person writing about this. But lately several publications, perhaps influenced by my work, have begun to seek the same data. You can find their height reports all over the Internet.
They all say that Clinton is 5 feet 7 inches tall.
This is thrilling news.
When the then-senator first ran for president in 2008, she was only 5-foot-5. I got this official height report from the Clinton campaign and published it in my 2008 Style story “Is Voting a Measured Decision?,” in which I expressed disappointment that Clinton had been defeated in the primaries by the 6-foot-1 Barack Obama.Is Hillary Clinton getting taller? Or is the Internet getting dumber?
Is Hillary Clinton getting taller? Or is the Internet getting dumber?By Jay Mathews September 24
(Richard Johnson/The Washington Post)
In the flood of reporting on the presidential candidacy of Hillary Rodham Clinton, amid the e-mails, polling data, classified documents and position papers, no one seems to have noticed a medical miracle at the center of the campaign.
The candidate appears to be getting taller.
I’m excited. Americans of short stature, like me, can finally dream of someday reaching those upper shelves, looking good in the latest fashions and regaining the respect of our children long used to looking down on us.
I know this because I am the only journalist peculiar enough to have chronicled since 1988 the most important but least-covered issue in U.S. politics — the effect of height on electoral success. I have written about this every four years or so. This is my eighth article on the subject.
Height has had a huge effect on our politics. If we were an insect species in which adults are smaller than larvae, we shorter people might get more respect. But the data indicate strongly that if human voters have a chance to see candidates standing side by side, they tend to vote for the taller one. This has happened in 69 percent of presidential races of the television era, since 1948.
I used to be the only person writing about this. But lately several publications, perhaps influenced by my work, have begun to seek the same data. You can find their height reports all over the Internet.
They all say that Clinton is 5 feet 7 inches tall.
This is thrilling news.
When the then-senator first ran for president in 2008, she was only 5-foot-5. I got this official height report from the Clinton campaign and published it in my 2008 Style story “Is Voting a Measured Decision?,” in which I expressed disappointment that Clinton had been defeated in the primaries by the 6-foot-1 Barack Obama.
