Bush censored?

Originally Posted by Duo Maxwell

Eloquence might've been the noun you were looking for.

In regards to Bush, though, I'd expect more of a Yale Alumnus. Especially one that has been afforded the kind of lifestyle and resources the Bush family enjoys.

I'd expect more of our president, honestly. I don't understand the attraction to a president that's at the same (or in this case, a lower) intelligence level as I am. I want my president to be way, way smarter than me.

I know I couldn't lead this country.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Duo Maxwell

I would argue that it does help accelerate individuals toward their ultimate potential, though. As well, children raised in affluent environments also have a lot of advantages in their formative years. I consider myself lucky because when I was very young (less than 5 years of age) my parents had steady jobs that allowed them time to spend with me, reading and such, before I was even old enough to attend school.

+1, but with a caveat. Money can help you realize your full potential, but not everyone has limitless potential, especially as you get older and more set in your ways (say past your teens and early twenties).

Originally Posted by Duo Maxwell

It's a deeper issue than what you might think, actually. The question seems simple, but when you start deconstructing the different forces at play, it becomes quite complicated. Anti-intellectualism has sort of taken a foot-hold in American culture. It's related to the social revolution we went through in the 1960s, but its roots go even further back.

Traditionally, educated people, "intellectuals" were generally a product of the upper-echelon(s) of society. Not always, but it definitely was a vast majority. This plays into the whole classist struggle, which came into the eye of the mainstream public through all of the activists in the civil rights movement who advocated Marxist theory. The whole idea behind the classist struggle is that the educated, established, oligarchy would continually dupe the masses into perpetuating their (meaning the upper class') sociopolitical hegemony.

Therefore, those who spoke with eloquence and affectation were regarded as untrustworthy, sort of like the familiar serpent who used flowery language to deceive us. Conversely, those who attempted to communicate on the level of the average working class citizen was regarded as trustworthy, because they weren't trying to disguise their intent within oration.

An excellent summary of anti-intellectualism. It's a disturbing trend, although the exploitation of workers/the working class that was seen in the earlier part of the 20th and the latter half of 19th century was even more so. Luckily, collective bargaining is a great solution for when there's more workers than demand.

Sad to say it doesn't scale well to industries where demand is more plentiful than workers -- computer programmers, for example, do not have a union. I predict that this will change in the next ten years though. For an example of the same sort of exploitation that has led to the formation of unions in the past, look at EA. They're one of the most egregious offenders in this regard. I could go on and on, but this isn't the right thread for that, for sure.

There's nowhere I can't reach.