The superstar politician
"The Germans have a new weapon of mass destruction," screamed headlines in the international press and on news websites. The media gave more space to Chancellor Merkel's new weapon than to discussion of wartime expulsions and Poland's refusal to return pre-war property to Germans.
Cleavage and nude photos
Intrigued, I read the news and discovered that the new German weapon was in fact Chancellor Merkel's plunging cleavage, which the world beheld at the April opening of the Oslo Opera House's artistic season. The photos which accompanied the story revealed voluminous feminine charms which the head of the German government usually keeps under wraps.
This is not the only case recently in which the "hard" news got lost in the deluge of paparazzi-style reporting - it is even harder to find details of Italy's situation following the center right's strong showing in the recent elections. First I had to plough through no small amount of post-election profiles of the triumphant once and future premier Silvio Berlusconi. This included, above all, reports about his frequent plastic surgery and hair transplants, his caustic tongue and how he touted the beauty of Italian secretaries as a reason for Wall Street financiers to invest in Italy.
News from France is even worse. In order to find out anything on the internet about the latest socio-political situation in France, one must scroll way down, skipping over a dozen or so stories dedicated to the shoes President Sarkozy wears so as not be dwarfed by his wife, Carla Bruni; how she dresses; the $91,000-auction of a nude photo of her in New York; whether the president wears a watch from his new wife; or about how his ex-wife Cecilia is doing. And none of this came from the tabloids.
The modern politician
Global pop-culture - and the discovery that a politician's success can be determined by his media image rather than his platform - has meant that statesmen must increasingly be showmen. A politician must increasingly sell himself as a media brand if his party is to win the next elections. He no longer has a private life - his hobbies, the sports he plays, the people he loves, his penchants, tastes, weaknesses and passions are all brought into the open and publicly discussed.
If John F Kennedy were alive today, the issue of his romances would be a national matter, nor would Franćois Mitterrand have been able to hide his double life for so long, had he been a contemporary politician. The age of electronic media and the rapid dissemination of information mean that any successful politician must be as glamorous as the hero of a soap opera - handsome, emotional, well-dressed, smiling and endowed with a happy family. Otherwise his modern constituency will just tune him out.
A member of the club
The growing popularity of Prime Minister Donald Tusk has also resulted to a large extent from good PR. Open and cheerful, he has many interests and a happy family life. The Polish papers recently carried photos of the PM, alleging that he had spent a good night with his wife when she came to visit him in Warsaw. It was reported that Tusk not only arrived late in the morning to his office, but was also bursting with humor and energy. Regardless of the intimate overtones, even the right-wing electorate applauded Mrs Tusk for fulfilling the role of a traditional wife.
It would seem that former Prime Minister Jarosław Kaczyński has little chance of fulfilling all of the criteria of the superstar politician. His image as a bachelor - one who shares an apartment and bank account with his mom - coupled with provocatively Freudian discussions of his personality traits, leave little room for a stylistic makeover.
I wouldn't count him out altogether, though. He could always put on some trendy shoes, turn up at a few receptions with singer Doda Elektroda, court supermodel Naomi Campbell and take up windsurfing - that might give him a shot at European superstardom. l
Joanna Wóycicka is the former head of the foreign section of the Życie Warszawy and Życie newspapers and the former head of the foreign department at the Polish Press Agency (PAP).
