Dreams Of Their Absentee Fathers

Barron YoungSmith wonders why so many of our most prominent politicians have troubled relationships with their fathers:

One possibility is that kids who are immersed in traumatic personal environments early in life become hypersensitive to the feelings of those around them and develop coping mechanisms that also make them better politicians. Quoting psychology literature, the best biography of Reagan notes that children of alcoholics become perceptive enough that they can "walk into a room, and without even consciously realizing it, figure out just what the level of tension is, who is fighting with whom, and whether it is safe or dangerous." The same instinct may have fed Reagan's desire to comfort the nation on the model of FDR's fireside chats.