He has not been on top long enough to develop a public image, which is why it is easy to link him to an established cultural figure like Professor Dolores Jane Umbridge (above).
For those unfamiliar with the Potter phenomenon, here is what you need to know about Dolores Jane Umbridge.
"Madam Undersecretary Professor Dolores Jane Umbridge was a witch and Ministry of Magic bureaucrat who served as Senior Undersecretary to the Minister for Magic under Ministers Cornelius Fudge, Rufus Scrimgeour and Pius Thicknesse. By order of the Ministry, she was installed as Defence Against the Dark Arts Professor at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and then later Hogwarts High Inquisitor and Headmistress. In all three of these positions at Hogwarts she had enormous power over the students, teachers, and the curriculum, which she wielded despotically."
Umbridge and Romney have several things in common. To start, in Harry Potter's world, Dolores Jane Umbridge served as Senior Undersecretary to the Minister for Magic.
Of course, Romney knows all about magic. Refusing to give details of his tax plan; refusing to release his own tax returns; pretending to embrace Obama's foreign policy in front of 59 million television viewers, Romney was doing what magicians do -- fooling the audience with sleight of hand. His followers loved it. Good old moderate Mitt, keeps the magic to himself.
Who is Barack Obama in Harry Potter's world? Katie Rolphe assumed, incorrectly, that her daughter would link Obama to Harry Potter, who in the novels is "the damaged hero. The chosen one. The boy who saves the world."
Her daughter rejects such an obvious choice. Katie Rolphe explains:
"No, she said, impatiently. Like why can't I see it? Why am I not receiving the message the universe is so clearly sending? Dumbledore! Wise, old, snowy-haired Albus Dumbledore (above). He has moral authority and gravitas, even when life at Hogwarts moves out of his control.
"He is also a master of wryness, of sharp comments delivered dryly. You can easily imagine Dumbledore saying, 'We also have fewer horses and bayonets.'
"When the evil forces of the ministry come to take him to jail, a magnificent orange bird swoops down, and together they vanish in flame. One of the ministry members, Kingsley Shacklebolt, says, 'You may not like him, Minister, but you can't deny: Dumbledore's got style.'"
Take it from Katie Rolphe's nine-year old Potter authority, this election will be a choice between Dolores Jane Umbridge, former Senior Undersecretary to the Minister for Magic and "wise, old [in experience], snowy-haired Albus Dumbledore," who posseses "moral authority and gravitas, even when life at Hogwarts moves out of his control."
No question but that life in Barack Obama's Hogwarts is constantly shifting "out of his control." But at least Obama can find Iran and Syria on a map.
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