Sarah Palin, Tommy Thompson, and Unexpected Greatness

Ronald Reagan was a movie star. Barack Obama is a rock star. Sarah Palin, on the other hand, may end up being a shooting star. But if that happens, it won’t be—at least it shouldn’t be—a result of the essential ordinariness of her mind and her education.

I haven’t made a systematic study of this subject, but there seems to be little correlation between IQ, schooling, and executive success.  Some of our smartest presidents—Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, and Bill Clinton, for example—will be remembered in large part for a single, massive, protracted exercise in poor judgment (Vietnam, Watergate, and Monica Lewinsky, respectively). 

Similarly, presidents with sheepskins from elite institutions—George W. Bush, George H.W. Bush, Gerald Ford, John F. Kennedy, and Herbert Hoover, come to mind—sometimes have presidencies that make you wonder, “Did that guy cheat on his SATs?”

Finally, and clearly most relevant to the case of Sarah Palin, there are presidents who lack the Ivy League credentials, who find themselves closer to the fat part of the bell curve than to the tail, but who nonetheless make highly successful chief executives.  These are men such as Ronald Reagan, Dwight Eisenhower, and Harry Truman.

One of Wisconsin’s favorite sons, Tommy Thompson, was also a chief executive in this mold. Thompson did not have a particularly impressive resume. (The Wisconsin Law School is nothing to sneeze at, but it carries little sex appeal or cachet outside the midwest.) Thompson wasn’t much to look at, either—he had the appearance of a middle-aged white guy from Wisconsin, which is what he was.  And he wasn’t much to listen to. He had a good voice for a politician, deep and resonant, but his choice of words, his accent, his unsophisticated manner of speaking failed to command admiration or respect. In truth, he sounded like the guy on the bar stool next to you at the local bowling alley. (I like that guy, by the way. He tells funny stories, he knows when it’s his turn to buy, and he can hold his liquor. I just don’t want to hear him talk about adequate yearly progress under No Child Left Behind.)

You know what else, though? Tommy Thompson was one of the most successful, effective, innovative, influential governors of the last 50 years. And I’m not just talking about Wisconsin governors. I’m talking about governors, period.

What can one conclude from all of this? A high IQ and a bunch of east coast diplomas, while enough to send guys like Joe Klein and Chris Matthews into paroxysms of puppy love, are neither  necessary nor sufficient for executive success. Wisconsinites know that about as well as anyone. I just hope they remember it in 2012, when I expect they’ll get a chance to vote for another Tommy Thompson type, but this time in heels, librarian glasses, and a beehive hairdo.