The 1960 presidential debate between John F. Kennedy (JFK) and Richard Nixon has long held a hallowed place in America’s political folklore. JFK, it’s usually said, triumphed with television audiences, while Nixon, less polished but more substantive, fared better with those tuning in on the radio.

This account seems to be basically apocryphal. But, like most popular myths, it’s probably found its way into common parlance because it’s a useful shorthand for something that many people feel — in this case, that the age of mass media has turned politics into an empty popularity contest in which appearance trumps content. And so, as the jock in an ’80s movie beats the nerd to become class president, the flashy politician with whom voters would prefer to have a beer beats the charismatically challenged one with actual vision.

Or so the story goes. Since 1960, events have often appeared to vindicate it and, fittingly enough, many of America’s most successful politicians — Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama — have been those able to project the kind of oleaginous charm of which mere mortals can only dream. More recently, however, the country’s two major political parties have increasingly seemed to defy conventional wisdom: elevating a succession of comically overhyped figures with astonishingly little popular appeal to positions of national prominence.