From time to time Maureen Dowd says something that I couldn’t have said better. In her Op-Ed column for The New York Times, she raises the question, “When [did] elite became a bad thing in America?” From my viewpoint, I’d prefer to have the leaders of my country to be a bit smarter than me. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want the guy down the street to be president of this country. He might be a nice guy and all and can be president of the block association, but he’s not getting my vote for President of the United States of America. And forget about “Joe six pack.” We all know that “six pack” does not refer to his abs. And since when did we begin rewarding “C” students, and ridiculing the student that worked hard and finished at the top of his/her class? What is it about Republicans—some of which are smart people (I hope)—running toward and praising such incompetence in their candidates? Do they just want to win at any cost? Sarah Palin is sadly just another George Bush in a skirt (and lipstick). McCain’s campaign have nothing to be proud of in selecting her. In an excerpt from her Op-Ed column, Dowd offers her insight:

Being mush-mouthed helped give the patrician Bushes the common touch. As Alistair Cooke observed, “Americans seem to be more comfortable with Republican presidents because they share the common frailty of muddled syntax and because, when they attempt eloquence, they do tend to spout a kind of Frontier Baroque.”

Darn right. And that, doggone it, brings us to a shout-out for the latest virtuoso of Frontier Baroque, bless her heart, the governor of the Last Frontier. Her reward’s in heaven.

At Sarah Palin’s old church in Wasilla, they spoke in tongues. Maybe that’s where she picked it up…

…At another point, she channeled Alicia Silverstone debating in “Clueless,” asserting, “Nuclear weaponry, of course, would be the be-all, end-all of just too many people in too many parts of our planet.” (Mostly the end-all.)

A political jukebox, she drowned out Biden’s specifics, offering lifestyle as substance. “In the middle class of America, which is where Todd and I have been, you know, all our lives,” she said, making the middle class sound like it has its own ZIP code, superior to 90210 because “real” rules.

Sometimes, her sentences have a Yoda-like — “When 900 years old you reach, look as good you will not” — splendor. When she was asked by Couric if she’d ever negotiated with the Russians, the governor replied that when Putin “rears his head” he is headed for Alaska. Then she uttered yet another sentence that defies diagramming: “It is from Alaska that we send those out to make sure that an eye is being kept on this very powerful nation, Russia, because they are right there.”

Source: NYTimes.com