I was somewhat taken aback this morning when I read this:
We thought Rick Santorum’s sweater vests were just a regular old-fashion statement. Turns out, they’re so much more. Santorum explained to Laura Ingraham on Monday that he likes to wear the sleeveless numbers because they make him look “a little older.”
Said Ingraham, “When I think of sweaters I think of Jimmy Carter, I think of Lamar Alexander, so all I’m saying Rick, with how you and I are so aligned on social issues and world view, but I’ve got to take issue with you on the sweater vest.”
“Is it geek chic? What is it?” Ingraham pressed.
The 2012 candidate explained that saying yes to the vests has a lot to do with looking more like an elder statesman. Santorum, 53, pointed out that a man in Iowa guessed he was 32…
So he’s trying to look older? You mean, like Jimmy Olsen, cub reporter? Jimmy was often portrayed with a sweater vest back in DC’s Silver Age, and I see evidence, both here and here, that he hasn’t lost the look in his latter-day manifestations, either.
Nothing against sweater vests, mind you. Below, you can see the one I’m wearing today. Unfortunately, I’m not going the fully Jimmy today — no bow tie — on account of all my shirts being too tight in the collar all of a sudden. I think I was exposed to some kind of special Kryptonite over the holidays or something. More on that later, though…
Back to Santorum: Does it tell us something that someone who presumes to ask us to elect him president looks so much like a kid that the Jimmy Olsen look is a step up in gravitas? By the way, if you want to look avuncular, you need a long-sleeved cardigan, not a sweater vest. Do I have to explain everything to these people?
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You can see Rick Santorum in a sweater vest here and here and here and here. And for that matter, elsewhere…
More coverage on a candidate that has about as much chance of getting the nominee as Michelle Bachman.
I suppose it depends on how old the viewer is. I think of sweater vests as something little boys (and girls) wore back when I was a kid in the 60s, not grownups. I think since the 1970s, sweater-vest-wearing bespeaks of a certain preppy-nerdiness, like wearing round horn-rim glasses or tweed jackets with patches–not necessarily older.
Now, it’s different if you have a vinyl pocket-protector bulging out from beneath, the vest in in Orlon and the pants are Sansabelts.