The obvious thing to keep in mind is that people dislike ‘inauthentic’ politicians but there are many things the people want in politicians. If a politician wants to portray a certain image to match what people like, they have to pick the policy positions that go along with it to avoid said label. Said images are not so evenly or finely distributed as policy positions, so that tends to lead to significant differences along these axes.
Then, over time, the parties accrete their own new images too, and people have to position themselves in relation to those too...
The obvious thing to keep in mind is that people dislike ‘inauthentic’ politicians but there are many things the people want in politicians. If a politician wants to portray a certain image to match what people like, they have to pick the policy positions that go along with it to avoid said label. Said images are not so evenly or finely distributed as policy positions, so that tends to lead to significant differences along these axes.
Then, over time, the parties accrete their own new images too, and people have to position themselves in relation to those too...