viz.

So Barack Obama went bowling the other day, and it turns out he’s not very good. I just saw a Clinton speech where she suggested a winner-takes-all bowl off with the Senator from Illinois and she graciously agreed to spot him two frames. It’s an odd kind of visual to provide. Obama has been trying really hard to look presidential over the last few weeks, but is this the kind of presidential pose he wants to (sorry) strike?

Maybe he was going for a different look.

According this site, Truman wasn’t really an avid bowler, at least not like Ladybird Johnson was. Clearly, Obama is trying for a kind of blue-collar aesthetic when he paces the oily boards of the bowling alley. It is interesting to note, however, that he has embodied a rather familiar presidential visual grammar, and while its most famous iteration is Richard Nixon (clearly not the best president to imitate) it turns out that the Nixon image enjoys a much more interesting and hip afterlife than Nixon himself receives.

Photo credits:
Obama: AP Photo/Alex Brandon
Nixon: Ollie Atkins Photograph Collection, Special Collections and Archives, George Mason University Libraries
Truman: President Harry Truman bowling in the White House, The National Kegler magazine, June, 1947