re: Brains
Skill with the English language is not a reliable indicator of intelligence or even of common sense. It just means you can say things that sound good. If you look at what Kerry was actually saying, it starts to fall apart a bit.
While I intend no direct comparison to Kerry, Hitler was also a great orator. In fact, history is full of people whose voices rang like a bell, who could speak to the multitudes and have them eating out of their hands, but whose minds were rotting from inside. What's the point?
Kerry may have talked in long and complex sentences, but he never actually arrived at a point most of the time.