Educational Double talk and Double Standard

We had cocktails with some old friends earlier this week and, as we are inclined to do from time to time, called them out on a bit of double talk and double standard on the issue of education and whether it qualifies one for elective office.

Never mind that it's our longstanding opinion -- underscored by the plethora of putative candidates soliciting our signatures on their petitions at the train platform every morning -- that anyone who seeks elective office should be expressly forbidden from attaining it. "There are problems that nobody has been able to solve for years...maybe generations!" they appear to be thinking. "That's because they haven't let ME take a crack at them yet!"

Please.

The friends in question -- liberal Democrats both -- were carrying on about Sarah Palin, what an "idiot" she is and how she couldn't possibly be qualified to hold high office.

[We posted a bit to Facebook about this. We're no apologist for Sarah Palin, whom we think to be more than a little bit too right wing for our tastes, but we note that simply because one's deeply held convictions are at odds with someone else's deeply held convictions doesn't make either an idiot...it just means that the parties in question disagree.]

We couldn't help noting that Palin had spent six years as chief executive of an admittedly small city, and that she had also spent two years as chief executive of a very large (at least from a geographic standpoint) state. One could argue that she is better qualified to be President than the President himself, who, while admirable for a variety of qualities, had been Senator for only two years, and had been chief execututive of exactly nothing prior to his election.

[Further disclosure...despite our affiliation with the GOP, we voted for Obama in the last election.]

"Oh, but wait...Obama DID go to Columbia and Harvard Law...that has to count for something!" my companions protested.

We couldn't help pointing out that President George W. Bush -- whom they decried as an "idiot" because his deeply held convictions conflicted with theirs -- graduated from Yale undergrad and Harvard Business School. Those stack up nicely to Obama's attendance at Occidental, and subsequent degrees at Columbia and Harvard Law.

Unless you disagree with him, of course. Ivy league education justifies Obama. But not W.

Double speak. Double standard. Intellectual dishonesty at work.

PS -- Let's call the Harvard degrees a push. We'll take Yale over Columbia any day. Even in football.