This is former Senator John Edwards, one of the candidates for the Democrat Party in the US Presidential election. Watching the news tonight I noticed him as he came forward, family at hand, to announce the end of the campaign as far as he was concerned, and the end of his political life I suppose. But what do you notice? As he arrived he immediately put on the American smile! The first thing that appears every time one of these noble candidates arrives on the scene is the false smile. Now it is clear that politicians everywhere have to put on a certain acceptable appearance and look the part, this is fair enough, I would not vote nor trust someone with my fashion sense. However, there is something slimy in the practised American smile. It is seen in politics, it is seen in the church and I remember thirty years ago that all the Christian books that arrived from the US always had a picture of the author on the back cover, always dominated by a row of teeth that reminded me of a Commonwealth War Cemetery! Salesmen, newsmen all have the perfect teeth, all straight and fitting together in a nice straight row. All these folk must have spent billions on dental work, clearly the 49 pence I spent on Tesco toothpaste will not be enough to remove the film, much better than the ones shown on telly, from my big mouth. Pity....This smile is made worse by the image consciousness of the Yanks in that the teeth need to be perfectly white. No grimy UK teeth would ever won an election there, not even in Pennsylvania! Chat show guests, the home of the attention seeker and deviant, would happily come on and talk about their father being homosexual, their four husbands and their love of stealing form their granny, but never ever would they talk without specially whitened teeth! That would be seen as a disgrace! All people in all nations are image conscious even so the desperation for the perfect, although false, smile is very depressing. Real people for me please.
