Smackie the Frog

I just read this online. It captures my thoughts so perfectly. The excerpt is from a piece about the VP debate (I know, I’m so behind), but I think that it is valid now more than ever.

It says that we haven’t learned our lesson after choosing an intellectually inferior president for the last eight years, after rejecting Al Gore in 2000 for being “wooden” or a “policy wonk.” I’m sorry, but when did being president require the office holder to be the life of the party? Shouldn’t we want a smart person in the job? Wouldn’t that be a good thing?

It should be, but what the response to last night’s debate tells us is that it’s not. At least not in the minds of too many Americans. Rather than reward knowledge and intellect in this country, we reject it, saying that it makes the candidate “arrogant” or “boring” or “elitist” (or, as two Southern Republicans referred to Barack Obama, “uppity,” but that is a whole other discussion). No, the U.S. has become an anti-intellectual society that scorns intelligence and ability and wants leaders that are “just like them.”

Well, as I often say, democracy works, just not always how you want it to. If you want someone “like us,” you’ll get someone “like us.” And most of “us” would be way out of our depth if thrown into the White House. Again, we had someone “like us” the last eight years. How did that work out?