Never a dumb Democrat?

Guest Editorial: Never a dumb Democrat?

by J. D. Lees

The massive media bias against U.S. vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin is disgusting but predictable. Much has been made of Palin's inexperience, given that she'll be a heartbeat away from the presidency. Meanwhile, Barack Obama’s far thinner resume has been virtually ignored as he prepares to assume the world’s top job.

Then there are Obama's other "qualifications": rogues gallery of crooked former associates (political and otherwise), friendly connections with unrepentant domestic terrorist William Ayres, racist pastor and mentor for 20 years, most left-wing voting record in the U.S. Senate, socialist/collectivist plans to confiscate wealth and redistribute it... all forming merely the tip of a largely unexamined iceberg.

The mainstream media have failed to shine much light on Obama's unsavory aspects, having been intensely preoccupied with portraying Sarah Palin as an unqualified redneck airhead. It's a familiar refrain, one that the media never stops recycling. Strange, too, that it's always Republicans that are said to lack the requisite brainpower for public office.

Gerald Ford had a solid 25-year congressional career (including eight years as minority leader) before becoming vice president and then president. Nonetheless, the media made him out to be a clumsy "doofus" who, in Lyndon Johnson's well-publicized estimation, couldn't "walk and chew gum at the same time."

Ford was narrowly defeated by the reportedly brilliant Jimmy Carter, who swiftly regulated the U.S. into an energy crisis that generated filling station line-ups, at least when gas was even available. Carter's policies were so intelligent that inflation and unemployment skyrocketed simultaneously.

Carter was challenged by Republican Ronald Reagan, another "amiable dunce" according to the media. But after Carter's diplomacy produced 52 American hostages in Iran and his personally planned rescue mission failed disastrously, the allegedly dumb Reagan restored the U.S. economy and won the Cold War, freeing the peoples of Western Europe, in Margaret Thatcher's words, "without firing a shot."

Bill Clinton was another brainy Democrat. He wound up impeached by the House of Representatives and resigned from the Supreme Court bar to avoid certain disbarment, all because he allowed the wrong piece of anatomy do his thinking.

According to conventional wisdom, George W. Bush is the dumbest Republican yet. But to the dismay of his defeatist critics, Bush’s "surge" seems to have turned the tide in the Iraq War. Furthermore, for the past four years Bush warned all those "smart" Democrats in Congress that their sub-prime interest pyramid scheme was headed for collapse.

The media gleefully pounces on every Palin mistake, but her Democrat counterpart Joe Biden’s frequent gaffs go mostly unreported. For example, he stated that FDR used TV to reassure Americans after the 1929 stock market crash. FDR was first elected in 1932, and TV hadn’t yet been invented.

We don't really know much about Sarah Palin, but the people of Alaska do. As their governor, she has the highest approval ratings in the nation. This she shares with Bush and Reagan; both were successful governors, both were re-elected by record margins. Simple common sense says that stupid people don't become highly effective state governors.

Palin may be a novice on the national stage, but she’s plenty smart. Equally important, she exhibits a sense of life that is upbeat, forward-looking, and grounded in solid American values.

In private, Obama sneers at those who “cling to guns or religion” because they're “bitter.” Palin, a gun and Bible-totin' “frontier” woman refutes Obama’s cynicism because she is the exact opposite of bitter. Her spirit is the spirit of America, a can-do attitude of optimism, grit and inspiring self-reliance, all excellent qualities for a potential leader of the free world.

J. D. Lees is a high school teacher in Steinbach, Manitoba, Canada and is editor and publisher of G-FAN magazine and writes a weekly column for his local newspaper.