Why Stupid People Love John McCain

You don't have to be stupid to love John McCain, but it helps. Last night, Rick Warren of the Saddleback Church held a Conference on Faith, and both men answered similar questions for an hour each. Video here. The questions were supposed to be identical, but McCain answered so quickly that he was able to receive more questions. More on that, but first.

Between the two Q&A sessions, both men were on stage for a brief moment together. Check out the picture: John is 5'7", Obama is 6'1". John was wearing lifts.

The deal with the questions is that they were good. They were interesting. They were the questions people should be asking, and Obama gave smart, nuanced responses to difficult queries. McCain gave one word answers that pandered. In a world of news bites, that's what the stupid people want to hear.

One of the questions had to do with confronting evil. Whether it existed, and what one did with it. Obama framed evil as existing in too many places: in war zones, in our cities, in the parents who did horrible things to their children. He spoke about how to confront it, and what to do. McCain said "destroy it". Done.

On the issue of energy, Obama spoke about needing to look at a variety of options, and explained how it would take multiple undertakings to get a grip on the situation. Later, in answer to another question, he alluded to the fact that solving the energy crisis would not be easy. John's answer? "Drill."

If you are bright, you appreciate the nuance, the consideration, and the understanding that the respondent understands the depth and breadth of both the question, and the solutions. If you're stupid, you like one word answers.

Like "drill" -- for people who like that response, they don't understand that oil is a non-renewable resource that the world will one day run out of. They don't care that if we all worked together in little ways, we could SAVE oil, and need less, and therefore make what we have last longer. Sadly, when someone doesn't know something, and doesn't WANT to know, they tune out anything more than 2 word answers.