I just read Maureen Dowd's Op-Ed in today's NY Times about John Kerry and his "culture" and I wondered if anyone really cares about that stuff. I mean, sure I do but does the average American give a damn that Kerry loves Keats or that he enjoys folk music. After four years of beef jerky from a back pocket, do Americans want filet mignon served on a plate? Have Americans grown tired of down-home homilies and the "aw shucks ma'am" tone of GWB or during a time when the United States seems to be standing alone most of the time, do they want to embrace the cowboy image as purely American?

I learned a long time ago that the smart person isn't always the popular one (not necessarily because that's been my lot in life, mind you). And Gore was ridiculed in many ways for being that bookish, stiff, stereotype versus Bush's apparent ease with people, despite his mangling of the English language. But isn't it time that we put to rest the idea that the United States is sort of ambling along, helping the endangered farmer's daughter and going after the wanted bandits by electing someone who seems to have read a book above the 2nd grade level?

I'm an intellectual snob, I admit to it wholeheartedly. I love classical music and going to the theatre, and talking about how I read the entirety of Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales" in the original Middle English and I would love to have a president whose intellect I could respect. I just don't know if Kerry is that guy...or if that is enough to run a country these days. Can someone whose cultural leanings tend towards "Hee Haw" really be my choice to lead us? Does being book smart mean one can keep us in balance?

Sigh. Either way I just hope whomever is elected knows better than to try to dance with Ricki Martin at the inauguration ceremony in January 2005. That was just too sad for words.