KINGSTON, NY, 21 May 2012 — A recent Newsweek cover provocatively depicted Barack Obama beneath a glowing rainbow halo and carried the bold headline, “The First Gay President.” Days later, The New York Times broke the story of a billionaire-funded smear campaign that labeled the President a “metrosexual black Abe Lincoln.”
            
             The incendiary magazine cover and the revelatory Times piece set off a firestorm of commentary and accusations replete with racial overtones and sexual innuendos.
            
             While the sensationalistic Newsweek cover can be brushed aside as an obvious sales gimmick, the metrosexual label applied to Obama (minus the “black Abe Lincoln”) not only has merit, it aptly applies to Romney as well. Lost in the political mudslinging and shallow punditry are the deeper psychological aspects of the archetypal metrosexual that fit them both so well. Among these:
                
Mr. In Between Neither outwardly effeminate nor aggressively macho, these two contestants in America’s first “Battle of the Metrosexuals” manifest their metrosexuality as straight arrow, sensitive urban guys with a well-developed feminine side.
                
                Clean-cut, non-threatening, even-tempered, always dressed appropriately for the occasion, these physically fit soft-core jocks are as much at home on the basketball court or in the paddock as they are sipping tea with the ladies. “I like hanging out with women,” beamed President Obama, as he ingratiated himself with the flattered ladies of “The View,” this past week.