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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.