Watching the mismatch between the complicated and mildly pro-Palin sentiments of the pundits on television and the poll results — people thought Biden was better — is interesting. It’s almost as if ordinary people don’t grade these things on a complicated “expectations” curve. When someone shows up and seems slightly dimwitted they don’t think to themselves “well, she’s not quite as dumb as I thought — what a triumph!” They think, “wow, she seems slightly dimwitted.”
UPDATE: Commenter younglady says:
Punits assume the average vote is dumber than we really are. They assume we’ll be taken in by her folksiness and winks, but we’ve learned a lesson from the last 8 years, a president with down home folksiness and charm without intellectual heft is dangerous for the America.
Or perhaps it’s just that the pundits aren’t as smart as they think.
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