blatham
Quote:Still, applying a term such as 'genius' to the fellow seems to degrade that term to something nearly meaningless.
craven
Quote:Only in the same way that "basketball genius" does. The term was "political genius" and these subsets can't be held tothe same standards as pure mental genius.
Understood. But I think, if our goal is to undestand why this Bush administration has been successful in gaining a second term, and in what we've agreed above are unusual accomplishments, the term 'genius' in this particular instance obscures more than reveals.
First, I think your analogy is inappropriate. Those athletes we might label as geniuses (Tiger Woods, Wayne Gretsky, Magic Johnston, Hank Aaron, etc) demonstrate unusual expertise or talent across a broad range of the aspects of their sport - Woods can put, drive, play long and short irons, has excellent strategic skills, etc. We would be unlikely to apply the term to a ball-player who handles grounders exceptionally well, but who can't hit, can't catch fly balls, and can't run bases.
As another example...does it help our understanding to label Madonna a 'musical genius'? More appropriately, we might claim she demonstrates 'genius' at self-promotion, or at niche marketing, or some such.
My argument is that Madonna (and her PR team) is a far better analogy with Bush. And that if the range of skills/expertise is so narrow, then 'genius' is an inproper term that obscures the actuality.
An important corner to this is how communities mythologize leaders/heroes. And more to the point, how those surrounding a leader (or those who might somehow benefit from association with him/her) have an interest in forwarding a mythology which bestows unusual qualities upon that leader. Rove clearly has this one well understood. I've been pointing out for four years how every cabinet member or government spokesperson, in every speech and press interaction, gives attribution to Bush for every decision and almost every thought behind every decision (until something goes wrong, as we know). This presents a desired appearance of Bush being the intellectual fount behind the entire administration, behind foreign and domestic policy, and behind his electoral strategies, etc. It's false, of course, but the policy isn't designed to be accurate.
I have no qualms, none, with applying this term genius to Rove, or to Reed, or to Norquist, or to the Kristol father and son.
A little side note...on the day prior to the election, Dys, Dianne, Lola and I were watching a debate between a Dem Senator and Ralph Reed. It became apparent quite quickly that Reed had been instrumental in coaching Bush for the debates - his pacing, speech accents and most evidently of all, his hand movements were identical to Bush. And I do mean identical. It was quite amazing.
