Americans have never liked or trusted smart people, and if they're smart themselves they've learned to hide it. Intelligence is associated with weakness, insincerity, effeminacy, elitism, cowardice and treachery. At the very best, smart people are clever at useless pursuits (like book larnin') but harmless nerds and geeks otherwise, with no social skills whatsoever and a congenital inability to be cool or get laid. This is constantly reinforced in popular culture, films, and TV.

Why a nation that has produced so many geniuses in such a short time be saddled with this is anyone's guess. Did De Tocqueville have anything to say about this?