What is "cool" about Obama?

To answer that question, you have to get a good definition.  I'm a bit of a stickler about semantics sometimes, so off I go in search of what is cool.  Which reminds me of something:  if you have to look for it, you must not have it yourself.  Okay, I'm not cool.  See if I care.

My first stop is Wikipedia, as is my usual habit.  Something of interest came up as I perused the entry, so I'll quote it below:

According to this theory, cool is a zero sum game, in which cool exists only in comparison with things considered less cool; for example, in the book The Rebel Sell, cool is created out of a need for status and distinction.  [emphasis added]

One thing I have noticed about Obama is that everything is zero sum with this guy.  It is the rich versus the poor, or big oil v green energy, or men v women, or white people v colored peoples, or America v the world, and so on and so forth.  Everything it seems has to come down with somebody gaining something at someone else's expense.  Being "cool" in that sense, means you in the in group as opposed to the out group.  This makes your status higher than the out group.  Being of higher status makes you a better person somehow.  That makes you "cool".

Obama is black, so that is better than white.  He is for the poor, as opposed to being for the rich, so he is better.  Go on through the list and you can see how Obama is perceived as "cool", and how that can be especially useful in politics, which is a great big game.

Which segues into the next theory of cool in the Wikipedia article:  Cool as a marketing device.

According to this theory, cool can be exploited as a manufactured and empty idea imposed on the culture at large through a top-down process by the "Merchants of Cool".  [emphasis added]

Now, who would be the Merchants of Cool in our culture?  The media, perhaps?

Finally, there's the last theory which can fit Obama to a tee:

"Hey, whatever I select", suggesting that cool is primarily an attitude of self-assurance.

If there's any quality that Obama has in abundance it is self assurance.  But is that justified?  That's the question that should be answered before one decides for oneself whether or not Obama is really cool or not.

Update:

More thoughts on cool from Glen Reynolds of Instapundit.  He must accept the premise of "cool", which I don't.