Continuing the Discussion

Thanks to everyone who responded (online and in meatspace) to my article on meritocracy. I'd like to just respond to some of the blog comments and perhaps clarify what I was getting at a bit. I'm going to basically dump the term "meritocracy" from my remarks, because I was really dealing with what I saw as Douthat's framework rather than all the broader implications of the word.

Yang's summary of my final points is basically correct, so I'm going to quote it quickly.

It's logical that no one is perfect (clearly not even the greatest meritocrats), but I agree with you that the physicist's opinion is "worth" more even if it is ultimately based on a flawed experiment. I don't think it is a stretch to say that for government and public service, the Obama archetype will at least have the raw knowledge base that the Palin archetype might not. Never mind style (and I acknowledge that many voters look for that) or wisdom (of which Ivy League wisdom is only one type). When it comes to the day-to-day grind, I'll listen, analyze, and try to refine more from the politician with the raw knowledge and expertise.

The "of which Ivy League wisdom is only one type" qualifier is important. When Coates points out that the American Dream is "work hard, and you too can be President," working hard shouldn't have to entail a top-shelf school as a goal. There is an interesting distinction, however, between people who focus on Obama's education providing him with knowledge and his education providing him with the skill of intellectual engagement with policy and ideas. I think the latter idea is more interesting when advanced, because it makes the claim that academia provides a significantly better opportunity to enhance those skills than other possible life experiences.

Here's a big important clarification to make: when we bring in the idea that all Presidents will be equally informed by their advisers and end up with the same amount of information no matter what their previous experience, that renders many of my original thoughts irrelevant. But I'm not sure the President's knowledge base is entirely irrelevant--I'm thinking of the possibly apocryphal story of President Bush not knowing the difference between Sunnis and Shiites on the eve of war.

David, I think you're broadly right about the President's job being that of leader, which is what I think apologists for Governor Palin who admit to her weak knowledge base see in her most strongly. At the same time, as Leah has pointed out to me, Palin's opponents often see in her a weakness they saw in Bush--intellectual incuriousness. As for the gradations of intelligence, I was discussing more the knowledge base on an topic-by-topic basis, but you're right that "how informed must you be" is a difficult question. I suppose that on any given topic--say, the efficacy of different health care systems--I would continue to initially value the opinion of the person with the most information above the others. I think it would be nigh impossible to do the same thing for multi-faceted decisions based on value judgments like "What health care system is preferable?"

Liv, to address your question, it's a little about both but more about the quality of Obama as President. Your point on the importance of agency is very important though. It's a trickier subject for me when applied to politicians, because it is a very centralized means of decision-making--the few thoughtful people assessing all the evidence presented to them by their great minds and making a decision. This is why I think voting based on perceived character and judgment over particular issues can be sensible sometimes, as I presume from your comments you do as well.

Obviously, there's a difference between the patient who, taking the doctors' word as fact (or one doctor's word over another is there is a disagreement), comes to a different decision on what to do than the doctor did, and the patient who says to the doctor "With all due respect, despite what your tests say, I don't think this is a very serious illness at all." One is appropriately exercising control over her life as she sees fit, the other is saying his perception of the facts is as accurate or more so than the doctor's, despite lacking the experience to make that claim.

Dom, that's really what I was getting at. I think maybe a good example for you is in the media. I think it was Al Franken who said that if Republicans said the moon was made of green cheese and Democrats said rock, the headline would say "Left, Right clash over lunar makeup" to avoid taking sides on who was right and who was wrong. Similarly, it seems inappropriate to me to present a conservative pundit's opinion on global warming opposite a scientist's as though both are valid and come from serious research in the field.

The most important point of clarification is that I think I assumed Douthat's Ivy League crack was equivalent to "knowing more about more things", which under a democratic ideal would not lend his opinions a higher worth that Palin's. That was probably wrong, but now I am even further confused as to what he was getting at.

Also, on the original topic, Leah wrote a post at HuffPo y'all should check out. We had a discussion on Huckabee v. Palin that is reflected there, which I think I'll quote (but read the whole thing):

She comes off not just anti-intellectual but anti-knowledge as well. These attitudes are not actually a prerequisite for populist appeal.

During the 2008 Republican primary, Huckabee, who also tried to frame himself as a Republican populist made gaffe after gaffe on foreign policy after the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. Eventually, an aide admitted that the governor had been unprepared to discuss the issue and that he would refrain from further comment until he was "briefed and up to speed."

While Huckabee owned up to being under-prepared, Palin appears to feel no corresponding sense of shame. After her disastrous performance with Katie Couric, there was never a sense that the Palin camp recognized the interview as a failure.

This is true, and I had temporarily forgotten this from the campaign--the absolute refusal to come back with a thoughtful statement on an issue following a public botch. While I may go back and forth on how important previous information is for a leader with umpteen advisers, I will say that a leader who does not regard further learning on any issue as valuable is not one I would trust.