There is a parable, told and retold across a quarter century, involving a prohibition on politicians wearing headgear in public. Calvin Coolidge was once photographed in a full Indian headdress, making him look like Big-Chief-in-a-business suit and forcing the president to defend his decision to don the feathered crown. John F. Kennedy famously swore off a top hat at his 1961 inauguration, the thinking went, to ensure that his youthful mane distinguished him visually from an embalmed generation of leaders.
Like all parables, the superficial meaning of the presidential hat ban belies a deeper instruction: it warns of the perils of portraying someone you’re not. The tenuous balance between who a public figure seems to be versus who they actually are is measured every day in American politics. Untidy advance work, a hot mic, an unguarded selfie or a misplaced prop can easily alter the equilibrium.
A real-life reminder of the cautionary parable took place in the East Room of the White House in the spring of 2013. In the pedagogy of Professor Barack Obama, a man renowned for his self-discipline and stripping the drama from public office, he called the lesson “Politics 101.” For everyone else, it’s called “Dukakis and the Tank.”
The president drew his lesson from a September 1988 campaign event in Sterling Heights, Michigan, during which the Democratic nominee that year, Governor Michael Dukakis of Massachusetts, took a ride in an M1A1 Abrams Main Battle Tank wearing an oversized helmet with his name prominently stenciled above the visor. The resulting video from the foray became one of the most famous attack ads of all time, inaugurating, in thirty seconds of airtime, the Age of Optics.
A quarter century later, in the East Room, the president found himself in a similar position to Dukakis. A crowd was gathered. The press was assembled. Cameras were rolling. And an imminent decision on whether or not to slide a helmet over his head was about to be rendered. For his audience at the White House, it was going to be a teachable moment.
By virtue of their 28–21 overtime victory over the Air Force Academy Falcons and their 17–13 victory over the Army Black Knights during the 2012 regular college football season, the Midshipmen of the U.S. Naval Academy recaptured, after two elusive seasons, the Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy, the accolade for the best record among the military academy rivalry. The trophy, whose three silver-plated footballs look like cannonballs stacked at the ready, had been held by the Air Force for two successive seasons, largely due to the pinpoint passing of quarterback Tim Jefferson.
The Midshipmen were arrayed on choral risers behind President Obama, much like the counterfeit Iowa debate audience stood behind John King in House of Cards.
Prior to the Air Force mini-streak, it was Navy’s honor to hold the coveted trophy in a glass case for seven straight seasons in Bancroft Hall, the Midshipmen’s dormitory at Annapolis. The 170-pound trophy, named for the U.S. president, was first awarded in 1972, providing a moment of national pride for the military during the Nixon years. In the years since, successive presidents regularly bestowed the honor on the winning team, either at the stadium at the end of the season or, once the punishing bruises of the gridiron campaign concluded, at a ceremonial event at the White House.
Handing out trophies to victorious teams in the East Room, under Gilbert Stuart’s Lansdowne portrait of the first commander in chief, George Washington, should be one of the unadulterated joys of office, a brief respite during days when presidents shuttle from room to room and crisis to crisis. These ceremonies happen with regularity, following Super Bowls, Stanley Cups, World Series, NBA Finals and a host of other professional, intercollegiate and Olympian efforts. They also allow the president’s communications team to stage events that invite rare bipartisan comity and front-page photography for the cities, towns and campuses that the victors call home. I helped to orchestrate many of them when I worked in the White House from 1993 to 1997.
In a typical gesture by the visiting champions, and to capture a memorable moment for photographers present, the team captain will bestow upon the president a customized relic of the athletic campaign. It could be a jersey with the president’s name embroidered on the back or, in the case of these Midshipmen, a tricked-out football helmet adorned with the iconic Navy anchor in blue with an interwoven gold chain.
These keepsakes often reference other aspects of the awardee’s legacy. A jersey given to Barack Obama, for example, may have the number 08 on it, pointing to the year of his election. In this instance, the helmet bore the number 44, Obama’s numerical place in the pantheon of U.S. leaders. Eventually, all but the most treasured of these tributes end up behind exhibit glass or in storage at the presidential libraries of the recipients, another shard of history consigned to the perpetual safekeeping of the United States government.
In the East Room during Navy’s visit, pride filled the faces of the Middies. The president, too, seemed happy, if only from the momentary reprieve of the weight of his office. Nearing the hundredth day of his second term, President Obama felt that weight heavily. Questions lingered over his handling of the attack at the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi; calls grew for action against Assad’s regime in Syria; doubts persisted after the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School that the president could influence passage of even modest legislation requiring universal background checks on handgun purchases. Fifteen minutes with the Navy football team offered a break when such weighty matters could simmer briefly on the back burner.
When handed his new protective headwear by Midshipmen Bo Snelson and Brye French, Obama graciously accepted it and examined the equipment, looking it over from all angles, wondering, perhaps, whether it would fit his greying head.
“All right,” he said, “that’s the official Navy helmet, fitted for me! Pretty sharp, huh?”
A voice from off-camera suggested that Obama put the helmet on, seconded by a murmur of approval from the team and the gathered audience in the East Room.
It seemed like the perfect photo op, a picture that would certainly earn placement on the front page of the next day’s edition of Stars and Stripes and Navy Times. It would live on as an inspiration for future classes of midshipmen in Annapolis, including those who would defend the Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy the following season, and take its rightful place in the annals of collegiate football history.
Obama knew instinctively, however, that the image had a better chance of living in the Hall of Political Infamy, the immediate focus of a thousand toxic tweets and retweets, fodder for his enemies who could ascribe to the image, whether through caption, Photoshop or creative video editing, any matter of negative metaphor. The cruelest use of a doctored version of the image might carry a racial overtone, as was the case with many other Obama shots coursing through the Internet. As the father of two young girls, he wouldn’t let this happen on his watch.
“Here’s the general rule,” said President Obama to the disappointed gathering. “You don’t put stuff on your head if you’re president. That’s Politics 101. You never look good wearing something on your head.”1
In offering the audience an impromptu course in stagecraft—Politics 101, as he called it—President Obama was recalling a long-established campaign taboo and sharing an established maxim of political survival. While few in the East Room made the immediate connection, Obama was rekindling memories of Dukakis’s watershed moment from Sterling Heights, forever ingrained in the minds of campaign operatives and consultants from Washington to Hollywood as the most disastrous image-making moment in political campaign history.
For that reason, this most routine of White House events earned a spot on NBC Nightly News that evening. Reflecting on Obama’s demurral, with video of the East Room event dissolving into a still image of the infamous moment in Sterling Heights, anchor Brian Williams reminded his audience of roughly 8 million viewers of what I knew all too well: “The example that comes very quickly to mind, Michael Dukakis and the tank; it has haunted politicians for generations ever since.”2