Norman Rockwell's 'Which One?': Why it fetched $6.5 million
Norman Rockwell's painting is a tender sendup of the undecided voter. It might be tempting to see its sale symbolically.
Norman Rockwell鈥檚 gentle sendup of an undecided voter, 鈥淲hich One? (Undecided; Man in Voting Booth),鈥漵old Monday for $6.5 million in a Sotheby鈥檚 auction in New York, topping pre-auction expectations.
The painting depicts by the choice between the two main candidates in the 1944 elections, Democratic incumbent Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Republican Thomas Dewey 鈥� or maybe just befuddled by the whole business of politics itself. And for many Americans, Mr. Rockwell鈥檚 attitude toward his undecided voter lives on, even as decades of polarization may have made the artist鈥檚 ironic fondness seem like an unaffordable luxury.
The closest thing to Rockwell鈥檚 man today may be the 鈥渓ow-information voter.鈥� Only 29 percent of American voters who were still undecided in the weeks leading up to the election, as UCLA political scientist Lynn Vavreck in September, said that they paid attention to the news 鈥渕ost of the time.鈥� Most are just not all that into politics.
Undecided voters "are less interested in politics and the news, less partisan, and less likely to hold opinions on issues dominating campaign discussions. Essentially, they think less about politics,鈥� Dr. Vavreck wrote.
And many of them, she added, don鈥檛 really know what to believe about the campaign鈥檚 main issues.
鈥淥n the question of whether the United States should build a wall on its border with Mexico, a position central to Mr. Trump鈥檚 campaign for over a year, 28 percent of undecided voters are not sure whether they support or oppose this idea. That鈥檚 in contrast to only 7 percent of Mr. Trump鈥檚 committed voters (and 11 percent of Mrs. Clinton鈥檚).鈥�
There鈥檚 also a good many undecideds who are actually 鈥渄isgruntled partisans,鈥澛�noted 海角大神鈥檚 Peter Grier this month, in contrast with the Rockwellesque image. That might help explain the large numbers of "undecided voters" going into the Nov. 8 election, where both major-party candidates were historically unpopular.
Every so often, though 鈥� say, every second presidential debate 鈥� someone appears on our media radar who seems to fulfill our highest hopes for an undecided paragon. Someone who seems to trust in the good intentions of both candidates and esteem the importance of his or her own ballot-casting. Someone, in other words, who treats politics as if it works the way it鈥檚 supposed to.
In 2016, America got that person in Kenneth Bone of Bellville, Ill., who when he asked Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump a sensible question about how to transition from fossil fuels to clean energy while minimizing harm to fossil-fuel workers, as if 2016 had been a year of sensible debate on such matters.
鈥淢ost voters already know where they stand on climate change 鈥� and have chosen their candidate accordingly. That means further debate on the topic wouldn't necessarily add value,鈥� wrote the Monitor鈥檚 Ellen Powell after that debate.
鈥淎 recent Pew poll found that almost half of Trump supporters say natural patterns are causing the Earth to warm, and 30 percent are not convinced that the Earth is warming. This compares to 70 percent of Clinton supporters who say warming is 鈥榤ostly because of human activity.鈥欌��
That was part of the allure, for Mr. Bone鈥檚 fans. His appearance invited a storm of memes on social media about 鈥溾�� who went about snapping photos of the debate stage with a disposable camera.
鈥� and shake hands and smile and all that,鈥� he told the Washington Post. 鈥淎nd to see me try to be that huggable, likeable guy in the middle of a really nasty and divisive debate, I think, stood out to a lot of people.鈥�