Recasting Pelosi

Today's WaPost highlights Nancy Pelosi's swearing-in celebrations, which she hopes to use as a platform to recast her image from a San Francisco liberal to a working-class ethnic American:

This is important strategic repositioning," said Kathleen Hall Jamieson, who teaches political communication and rhetoric at the University of Pennsylvania. "Essentially, she's trying to embody the Democratic Party that she would like to offer the nation in 2008."

The truth is that Nancy Pelosi isn't trying to "recast" her image -- she's trying to make a favorable first impression on the general public (who doesn't know her, yet). You could definitely argue that she's going about it the wrong way, but Pelosi is certainly wise to try to define herself before her opponents convince America she is a San Francisco liberal.

If Madonna can reinvent her image every couple of years, then a politician can do it, too.