Down the rabbit hole of fashion again. I have such a love/hate view of Anna Wintour.

She’s the embodiment of much that I despise, one of the New York City elite who want to run the lives of everyone else in the country. As “pope” (some would say) of the fashion world, she sets the tone for much of what goes on in it. And of course, instead of staying in her lane, she is a huge donor to the democrat party and shills for the in the magazine. There’s footage of Huma Abedin getting hounded by reporters a few months back while she’s standing on a doorstep; when the door opens, it’s Anna. When Sarah Palin was still governor of Alaska, she was featured in the paged of Vogue which still shocks me to this day. Of course, she got maybe 1 or 2 columns and a small photo, whereas Hillary Clinton gets a full-length article and a double-page photo, but

Fashion is full of rabbity and left-wing people to begin with, but she condones the blatantly partisan behavior.

However, she’s an elegant woman at the top of her game. I admire how she commands respect and runs Vogue exactly how she wishes to (or at least that’s how it seems from the outside). Despite the fact that she seems to have a blind eye to the oblique way that most fashion trends grow (there’s a fun exchange between her and Bill Cunningham in Bill Cunningham’s New York where she acknowledges that they have diametrically different perspectives — he documented street style while she dictates from above), she exudes authority and does not apologize for who she is or the fact that she works in fashion.

While I don’t always love reading Vogue — it’s so very elitist — one cannot deny that it is a respected and influential publication.

So I feel that there’s a lot I can learn from her. Watching her interviews is incredibly inspiring. She’s well spoken, clearly an introvert, clearly intelligent, and she uses all that to her advantage. Perhaps the thing that resonates with me the most, and this is probably because I don’t feel this quality, is her philosophy on decisiveness.

“People respond well to someone who’s sure of what they want.”

This strategy is working out for her. In fact, you can see it in her magazine, both how she runs it and the soul of Vogue — the top down, “you should want this,” aspirational fantasy.

Even if Anna (and Vogue itself) can be cold, domineering, and out of reach — sometimes even completely decoupled from the real world — the decisiveness and authority that she exudes compels people to follow her.

Something to consider when crafting a public persona.

Other observations of note: a signature hairstyle is easily identifiable and hides much of her face, upping the intimidation factor; her clothing is always the same silhouette, recognizable and flattering and fewer decisions in the mornings; she does nothing to dispel the negative rumors; diversifying the Vogue brand beyond just the magazine, into digital and the Met Gala and all sorts of other things.