Leslie, I agree that it’s too bad that politicians need to figure out how to be slick and evasive. That’s the way the world works, though; tricky situations often involve siding with X without alienating Y, his mortal enemy. Whatever the sources of her problems, surely everyone involved in the campaign recognizes just how important her performance Thursday is going to be.

I’m dreadingwaiting for Thursday to be absolutely sure, but as a big initial supporter of Palin who has no idea of why it has come to be—whether she, the McCain campaign, or both are responsible—I must admit that she has stumbled badly in her television interviews and thus may not be good for the part of vice president. What makes me especially unhappy about this is that, while a defeat of the McCain–Palin ticket will not necessarily mean the end of Palin’s political career, it will unfortunately mean that, to keep rising politically, she will have to become much smoother, much more more adept, at evading questions and expressing those evasions.

In the end, it’s now a nonsense word, and just means “a liberal I dislike.”

I DO think there is a serious current of anti-intellectualism in America these days, though. There always has been, but I think it’s been cresting.