The Know-'Em-All: How President Bush is smarter than the intellectuals who disdain him

Opinion Journal ^ | 02/04/04 | MICHAEL SEGAL

[Pokey78]

Many people look back on their college years and regret how much they missed of the great intellectual resources of the university. Not me. My regrets are about failing to meet more of the remarkable people who were my fellow undergraduates at Harvard and nearby MIT. I thought of such socializing as mere fun, which came after coursework. As a result, there were a lot of interesting students I never got to meet, from Benjamin Netanyahu to Benazir Bhutto, from Bill Gates to Scott McNealy, even though some of these people knew friends of mine. But my regrets are more wistful than realistic, since no one knew everyone in college.

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

How President Bush is smarter than the intellectuals who disdain him

When the libs consider Al Gore, Dick Gephardt, and Robert Reich intellectuals, that's not saying a whole hell of a lot.

[LiteKeeper]

read later

[okie01]

To liberals, "intellectuals" are those people who agree with them. I.e., their "peer group".

Those who follow liberals are known as "the little people".

Those whom the liberals follow are "the elite".

[maro]

I like this article, except that it concedes too much by all but saying that Bush is not too smart in the way that people usually think of smart. My guess is that Bush's problem is that he is not very agile verbally. In the academic world, people who don't have a certain amount of verbal agility come off as not too bright, since verbal transactions are the way that people basically check each other out. (Is he smarter than me? Dumber than me?) In the real world, when you get out of the Ivy League and have to deal with a broader spectrum of people, it doesn't take too long to figure out that verbal agility only gets you so far. A crucial part of intelligence is judgment; there are an awful lot of verbally dextrous people who have lousy judgment. All politicians are good are remembering names, and making friends easily. For President, I want a man who has good judgment. So, I would pick W any day over a goofball like Gore (did you notice that Dean started going downhill as soon as Gore endorsed him?) or those Rhodes Scholars Clinton and Clark.

[Lysandru]

Mr. McCain was the know-it-all; Mr. Bush was the know-'em-all. Both sets of skills are important, but the presidency is a job in which you can't know everything about every issue or make things happen just by yourself. Being a good judge of people and having a great team is of huge importance.

This is dead on. It is the key to sound management. I work with a bunch of rocket scientists-- and only a few of them would be good managers. My manager certainly doesn't know as much technically as I do-- but he is an incredible people person and knows how to motivate people. He also has a knack for picking the right person for the right job.

[T. Jefferson]

As we all know, when liberals lose an argument on easily obtained facts, they revert back to "he's stupid", like a child. This has been going on since the early 50's.

Sun Tzu in the Art of War said the greatest conqueror is the man who wins a battle without firing a shot. Reagan won the cold war without firing a shot, and brought down the Berlin Wall the same way. To my knowledge, he's the only leader to do this in hundreds of years. The liberals response: "he's stupid." Lib politicians are childish, jealous self hating people. The stupid comment, like most everything they say, is just a self portrayal.

[iopscusa]

Right on the mark, re: Childish Libs...they know their arguments will not survive the simplest test...thus they have to revert to idiocy.

[Cincinatus' Wife]

***When Mr. Bush ran against John McCain in 2000 presidential primaries, the Arizona senator was quick on his feet and had a good answer for every question. The Texas governor, on the other hand, had a great team. Mr. McCain was the know-it-all; Mr. Bush was the know-'em-all. Both sets of skills are important, but the presidency is a job in which you can't know everything about every issue or make things happen just by yourself. Being a good judge of people and having a great team is of huge importance. ***

Bump!

[CyberAnt]

Well .. the guy did great until he got to the last paragraph. I hate to be the one to tell him, but the President has already done those things he said the President should do, and the "elite" have continued to snub their nose at him.

And .. that is one of the things that riles Rush so much; Bush wines and dines them and they still call him awful names and treat him like dirt.

[texasflower]

This is an open question to anyone.

Is anyone aware of one single person in any part of GWB's past that has said anything negative about him?

(I'm not asking about those with an agenda of any type.)

I have never heard anything.

[AmericaUnited]

On Bush's National Guard exam, he scored in the 95th percentile for LEADERSHIP!

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Socialism centralizes decisionmaking for society, in government.

Central planning diminshes the utility of intelligence which is not at the "center," it is a self-fulfilling prophecy that society as a whole is, at least functionally, stupid.

Socialism is in that sense inherently predisposed to the "cult of personality" which is so common in central-planning states such as the USSR, the PRC, North Korea, etcetera ad nauseum.

In that sense the socialist is infantile and sets great store on exalting the "great leader." A truly great leader like Reagan, of course, is self-deprecating if anyone tries to put him on that kind of pedestal; he is not about himself but about getting more out of most of us than we think we have in us.

I think that is what socialists call "dumb."

[Democratshavenobrains]

If America liked know-it-alls with no people skills, we would have reelected Carter.

[bootless]

bump