The Difference Between Being Smart And Being Dumb
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EXTRAORDINARY, SOPHISTICATED AND NUANCED INTELLIGENCE
DUMB YOKEL
Really, it's a great thing about the internet that you can quickly go back and find a definitive record of what people have said in the past. And using this facility, we can get a handle on the significant difference between the really, really smart people and the rest of us ordinary nobodies, hicks and yokels.
Take Barack Obama. Obviously, he's really, really smart. Indeed, he's so smart that he's bored by having to deal with all the lesser lights around him. The famous recognition of his greatness is from his right-hand-woman and close aide Valerie Jarrett, quoted in the David Remnick biography:
“I think Barack knew that he had God-given talents that were extraordinary. He knows exactly how smart he is. … He knows how perceptive he is. He knows what a good reader of people he is. And he knows that he has the ability — the extraordinary, uncanny ability — to take a thousand different perspectives, digest them and make sense out of them, and I think that he has never really been challenged intellectually. … So what I sensed in him was not just a restless spirit but somebody with such extraordinary talents that had to be really taxed in order for him to be happy. … He’s been bored to death his whole life. He’s just too talented to do what ordinary people do.”
You may remember 2012 as the year with the then-highest gasoline prices on record. According to this report from the AAA, gas prices averaged $3.60 nationwide for the full year, and earlier in the year were closer to $4. And Barack Obama was running for re-election. On February 23 of that year, he gave a speech at the University of Miami that covered the subject of high energy prices. You'll enjoy some of these excerpts:
You know there are no quick fixes to this problem [of high gas prices]. You know we can’t just drill our way to lower gas prices. . . . So what does this mean for us? It means that anybody who tells you that we can drill our way out of this problem doesn’t know what they’re talking about, or just isn’t telling you the truth.
And then there are those really, really stupid Republicans:
You can bet that since it’s an election year, [the Republicans are] already dusting off their 3-point plan for $2 gas. And I’ll save you the suspense. Step one is to drill and step two is to drill. And then step three is to keep drilling. (Laughter.) We heard the same line in 2007 when I was running for President. We hear the same thing every year. We’ve heard the same thing for 30 years. Well, the American people aren’t stupid. They know that’s not a plan. . . .
Because Obama is not stupid at all, and indeed is really, really smart, he was completely confident that the right strategy to lower energy prices was to move away from hydrocarbons and replace them with things like solar and wind:
The potential of a sustained, all-of-the-above energy strategy is all around us. Here in Miami, 2008, Miami became the first major American city to power its city hall entirely with solar and renewable energy. Right here in Miami. (Applause.) . . . . On a typical day, the wind turbine at the Miami-Dade Museum can meet about 10 percent of the energy needs in a South Florida home, and the largest wind producer in the country is over at Juno Beach.
According to the AAA here, the nationwide average price of regular gasoline today is $1.715 -- actually well below the $2 goal that Obama was talking about in February 2012. And how did we get there? One and only one way: drilling. Anybody who thinks that solar or wind or some other kind of renewable had anything to do with it is completely delusional.
Then there was Sarah Palin. The famous quote from her is "Drill, baby, drill," actually uttered at multiple places and on multiple occasions. Here's an example from 2010. Dumb yokel!
Remember that socialism means putting all the important economic decisions in the hands of the really, really smart people.