The XX Factor: What women really think.

Bush, Palin, What’s the Difference? Part II

Anne, Marjorie, and Hanna:

Thanks to you all for your considered responses to the question I posed earlier—about whether there's any discernible difference between Palin's ability to lead the country and Bush's. Initially, I argued that there isn't, and that's why it's perplexing that so many conservatives are denouncing McCain's veep pick when they didn't say boo about Bush.

You've all mentioned, in one way or another, the fact that Bush belongs to a political family, whereas Palin does not. The logic is that Bush must've picked up something or other at the dinner table, and then at Andover, Yale, and Harvard—that he was assigned important books, even if he never read them, and that makes all the difference. All Palin's done is run a tiny little town and then govern a state that's so oil rich it doesn't need much governing. She's never heard of the books that Bush didn't bother to read.

So here's my follow-up: Bush may have a better, more reassuring pedigree, but he panders to the same contingent as Palin. And, in my opinion, you are who you pander to. Bush, inauthentically, cast himself as a dude from the heartland unspoiled by D.C. like the tree-hugging Al Gore or the French-speaking Kerry. He sold himself to America as an anti-intellectual who governs from the gut. Palin is doing the exact same thing, only authentically.

Hanna, you say the difference in authenticity is what's freaking out the conservative press corp—that Christopher Buckley, et al., could tolerate fake anti-elitism, but not real anti-elitism. You may be right, but that doesn't make complete sense to me. Bush pandered to people who dismiss book-readers as eggheads, and so he governed like a person who dismisses book-readers as eggheads. Shiite, Sunni, what's the difference? Who cares? Let's just get in there! The military can muddle through. Stem-cell research? Fuhget about it. Torture? I'll let my veep figure that one out.

I give credit to the conservatives who are speaking out against the worrisome anti-intellectual trend in the GOP—but I think they should've said something eight years ago.

But Is Palin Really Worse Than Bush?

First it was David Frum; then George Will followed by David Brooks; then Frum's colleague at the National Review, Kathleen Parker; today, William F. Buckley's son, Christopher jumped on the band wagon. Conservatives everywhere are denouncing McCain's veep pick because, essentially, they think she isn't smart enough to lead the country. True, they focus on the experience or rather the inexperience question, but it's transparent enough that what's sent conservatives into a tizzy is that Palin can't speak let alone process complex ideas. As Parker put it, she's just "Clearly Out Of Her League." I couldn't agree more. But here's what I don't get—since when do conservatives care about smarts? Or, rather, why didn't they care about smarts in 2000 and 2004?

Watching Sarah Palin talk to Katie Couric, and then watching her at the debate (where, admittedly, she did better than expected) gave me déjà vu. She's really very similar to Bush, and it's not at all obvious to me that she's any worse than he is, or was in 2000 and 2004. Maybe Bush isn't stupid, exactly, just lazy. And Palin's not stupid, exactly, either—just supremely uninformed. But ultimately, what's the difference? Either of these qualities should disqualify someone from running the country.

As Leopold Bloom put it (or thought it), "a defect is 10 times worse in a woman." He meant physical defects, but I wonder if this charming bit of sexism applies to mental defects, too. Why is Sarah Palin pushing Christopher Buckley over the edge—he's voting for Obama!—when Bush didn't?