Compared to who?
Al Gore? John Kerry?
Have you ever noticed that the only real objective evidence that either of those two are that much smarter than Bush is that liberals keep repeating it as a "given" over and over again?
Slate used to collect "Kerryisms," too. IMO, some of those were less about a normal human inability to find the right wording or phrasing than they were about a man who had absolutely no solid core principles at all.
Add to that Gore's obvious inability to deal rationally with stress and setbacks, given his behavior after 2000, and I still say we dodged a bullet.
I was given a choice in the last two elections between Bush and these two Democrats. I went with the best choice I was given.