Easy Sunday: Super Bowl

I know that the Chiefs are playing the Eagles today.

I don't live under a rock.

The Super Bowl is a learning opportunity.

Super Bowl Sunday is America's real national holiday. 

I grant that Christmas is a bigger deal than the Super Bowl. There is the gift-giving, the familiar music, the whole Santa rigamarole, and lights. But Christmas has a religious angle, so the holiday isn't exactly for everybody.

The Super Bowl is the better unifying national event. Over a hundred million Americans watch it on TV, often in a group settings, like getting together to watch the moon landing, except that the Super Bowl has a halftime show. The country comes together to pay attention to the same thing. About as many people watch the game as who vote in presidential elections. Last year some 123 million people watched the game -- a number boosted because there was a camera in the suite-box where Taylor Swift watched the game. She will be watching again this year. There is speculation that Chiefs player Travis Kelce might propose marriage to her after the game. 

The Super Bowl helps me understand voting behavior. I will watch the game, at least a few minutes of it. I am idly interested. I don't know the name of a single Eagles player. I know the Chiefs have a quarterback named Mahomes, and they have Taylor Swift's boyfriend.

Yesterday I read somewhere that Trump apparently hates the Eagles because after the Eagles won the Super Bowl in 2018,  they did not want to go to the White House to be congratulated by him. Trump criticized Philadelphia and its balloting in the 2020 election. That would be reason enough for me to support the Eagles. Hating the Eagles should make Trump a Kansas City Chiefs fan -- except there is the Taylor Swift complication. She publicly opposed Trump. So, maybe, the Chiefs are the anti-Trump team. It is complicated, if one knows nothing. One needs to make guesses and inferences, based on scant information.

I remind myself of undecided voters. I am that guy in Michigan or Wisconsin who gets interviewed by a pollster the day before the election who says that he will probably vote, at least for president, but he isn't sure for whom. 

I get complaints from readers. They say that my understanding of politics emphasizes style over substance and policy. They say I overvalue charisma and branding. They say I think people vote based on first impressions and type-casting. I am flattered and pleased by these observations and complaints. It means people read and understand me.

Sitting here this morning I was trying to dig up some mentally-sticky facts to justify cheering for either team. Trump is a vile, narcissistic criminal, but he is interesting in his anti-hero demagoguery. In three elections, low-engaged, low-informed voters broke overwhelmingly for him. I pay attention to that. People knew something about him. Does the next Democratic leader need to be "like Trump?" No. That person needs to be much better than Trump. But he or she cannot be boring or read speeches from teleprompters. He or she needs some pizzazz.

What I know is that my wife prefers the Chiefs. That's reason enough.

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