and showed us how an absolute fucking wacko who's primary qualification was running a successful car lot can ascend to high public office and completely embarrass a state.

There is absolutely nothing about the office one holds that says a lick about their qualifications, ethics, or competency. Democratic elections for the most part work fairly well to bring decent people into office but much of that has to do with the fact that the candidates rise slowly through a political system that weeds out the airheads and lightweights. However, sometimes conditions present themselves that allow unqualified candidates to bypass the normal vetting process and cut to the head of the line. Clearly Palin didn't pay her dues to get to the position she holds and clearly the Alaskans didn't do their homework much as Arizonans fell down when they put Mecham into office.

How many voters that you talk to truly know the candidates they're voting for? I have some very bright friends and associates and yet I'm really appalled at how little they follow even local politics. In most cases I think they vote more by name recognition than any other single factor. In many ways I don't necessarily blame them. Life for most of us is filled to the brim. The amount of hours you have to even sit down and listen to the news or read a newspaper is limited by how much you're willing to strip away from your family or job time to keep yourself informed. If you do listen to the news or read a newspaper from a single source, you risk having that information skewed tremendously. I found in this election that in almost every case where someone firmly supported McCain and/or Palin that their primary news came from either conservative talk radio or Fox News. Obviously you believe all the rest of us were keyed in only to MSNBC between 6 and 8 at night.

Your logic is absolutely flawed as always and my guess is you don't even believe it. The extension of your thinking would have to be that Hitler should have been considered a respected and competent leader of Germany because he was elected to a very high office and that any deviation would be a slight against those German voters. Humans get it very wrong from time to time.

Art