Jim Hoagland observes about Barack Obama’s recent handling of his first major general election blunder:

But what is important here is what this incident says about Obama, not about Johnson. The senator’s initial reaction was to portray himself as too busy to keep up with the obscure financial doings of people who are not significant to the campaign and to belittle the media for asking him to “vet the vetters.” To treat Johnson, Holder and Kennedy suddenly as mere fact-checkers is as disingenuous as it is ungracious. Obama is clearly the most intelligent candidate of either party since Bill Clinton. But he can outsmart himself if he goes on expecting the media and the public to accept just about any explanation he gives.

But is that right — the part about him being the most intelligent candidate since Clinton? Yes, it’s a small universe of candidates, but the assumption, which is constantly made by observers, that Obama is exceptionally intelligent perhaps needs further explanation. We know he has degrees from elite universities and we know he is articulate, although we have been lectured not to say that because it is somehow coded racial condescension. But what is the basis for the assumption of intelligence? And what is the definition of intelligence the pundits are using?

It cannot be “emotional intelligence:” that would have prevented him from falling into the ambit of Rezko and Wright. That is to say, he does not demonstrate uncanny judgment of others’ character. It cannot be meant to mean in-depth knowledge: he makes basic factual errors consistently about substantive matters small and large (e.g. the history of presidential summits). It cannot mean the ability to think quickly on his feet. His spontaneous utterances range from medicore to awful.

So perhaps that is just a more politically correct way of saying “articulate.” Or alternatively, it may simply mean that Obama’s razzle-dazzle has snowed many people into believing, without much proof, that he posses great intellectual firepower. But the liberal pundits have told us, during years spent observing Georg W. Bush, that winning elections doesn’t mean you are very smart.