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This research focuses on Belarus, a former Soviet republic that elected its first president, Alexander Lukashenko, in 1994. Lukashenko has ruled ever since, causing the country to become notorious as the last dictatorship in Europe. Having inherited a state system that was still socialist, Belarus enthusiastically preserved numerous Soviet elements of economics, politics, and everyday life. Within this context Lukashenko's official biography portrays him as the people's president: a peasant child, born to common people, who achieved his goals through diligence, simplicity, and modesty. At the same time, however, the intended audience for this biography often rejects its propagandistic elements in favor of a folk response in the form of an alternative biography. Ultimately, Lukashenko's life story as understood by Belarusians is highly ambiguous and incoherent, resembling a blend of legends rather than a monologic narrative. Based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted since 2011, this essay compares the official and alternative versions of Lukashenko's birth story and examines the broader vernacular picture that results from their intertwining. It also focuses on the various uses of Lukashenko's biography, paying particular attention to how certain details become relevant and assume different meanings within a contested political environment., Sargon, the mighty king, King of Agade, am I. My mother was a vestal, my father I knew not, while my father's brother dwelt in the mountains. In my city [...]

Political cartoons are a unique form of media message; they offer voters an opinion on the campaign or candidates encapsulated typically in a single image. However, for those images to be comprehended and appreciated, cartoonists make reference to other events or images to allow readers to receive and digest the message quickly. This study examines representations of presidential candidates in political cartoons to identify how often references to nonelection themes are made, with particular attention to allusions made to factors from popular culture. Keywords: political cartoon; popular culture; elections; mass media

We used Symbolic Convergence Theory to analyze 2,000 political cartoons on the investigation, impeachment, and trial of the president. The cartoonists' vision incorporates components from Starr's and Clinton's visions: 'Our public figures (Clinton, Starr, Congress, the news media) are engaged in a tawdry burlesque drama.' The number of levels in a rhetorical vision depends on the vision's complexity. We show that multiple, independent, rhetors can create a rhetorical vision. These messages, highly visual and generally critical, freely use metaphor and allusions, allowing multiple interpretations and rendering the fantasy themes in these dramas accessible to readers with widely divergent attitudes. Despite their fictionality, these messages concern important issues and make moral judgments on these public figures.

Issues concerning the fascination painter Marsden Hartley had for American President Abraham Lincoln are examined, focusing on three portraits Hartley painted of Lincoln in the early 1940s. Topics include Hartley's figurative approach to Lincoln though he was an abstract artist, the paintings' exploration into Lincoln's complex personality, and the depiction of Lincoln as a quintessential American common man.

This article examines the possibility that a collection of eight profile portraits of Alexander Hamilton painted by American artist William J. Weaver were created using a polygraph drawing machine. Weaver was familiar with the process of making polygraphic reproductions and his portraits are strikingly similar to prints by another artist.

The US motion pictures industry has produced a number of films depicting the president since Bill Clinton's election as head-of-state in 1992 and 1996. These movies categorized the president either as saviours, such as 'The American President,' 'Air Force One' and Independence Day' or evil men, such as 'Dave,' 'Clear and Present Danger' and 'Absolute Power.' These fictional images of the president are created because of the growing disillusionment of the public with the presidency.

There a several different discriptions of the president and the presidency in literature. Woodrow Wilson rejected the idea of a static political system tied by mechanical checks and balances, while Rose suggests that internal changes within America and the world, increase the possibilities of further transformations in a post-modern presidency. Rose suggests that controversies abound in the study of the presidency, and these should bee seen as signs of vitality rather than evidence of morbidity.

In their treatments of the presidency, American Government textbooks routinely provide direct evaluations of the 40 individuals who have held the office. Although introductory textbooks represent a huge portion of [...]

Recent research shows that idealized accounts of the presidency still dominate pre-college textbooks on American government. Little attention has been given to presidential presentations of the office and their relationship to the textbook presidency, despite the symbolic significance of the presidency and a president's opportunity to further define or refine the institution through rhetoric. This study compares the presentation of the presidency by three post-Watergate presidents to the textbook presidency. This study finds that while presidents do present a more realistic portrait of a president's economic and legislative leadership, they describe life in the White House, and their roles as Chief of State, Publicly Accountable Leader, and Commander in Chief, in ways that more frequently support than modify the textbook version of the presidency.

HEN BILL BARKER PREPARES FOR WORK each morning, he binds his slightly frizzy red hair into a queue (ponytail), puts on along, colonial-style frock coat, knee breeches and tricornered hat [...]