Mom Cooks Fast and Slow

Today I learned that @MittRomney somehow had the gall to run for President of the United States of America without even so much as a basic Wikipedia education about the American Revolutionary War. For those of you who are not Americans, George Washington did, in fact, do a deal to end the American Revolution. The deal was called the Treaty of Paris. It was negotiated by Franklin, Jay, and Adams. It physically still exists in the national archives. Mitt Romney doesn't know his own country's history. He also doesn't understand asymmetric warfare, which is a thing that you kinda might want the Commander in Chief of the military might of the United States of America to understand. Asymmetric wars are always fought for the purpose of getting the larger force to decide the juice isn't worth the squeeze, and to give up and go home. Usually this is punctuated by negotiations. When you are in a war, that war is not just a military conflict. It is a contest on every level of society, and quite frequently it is punctuated by negotiations which leverage the strength of what you have achieved in other arenas. The real moral of this story is that the political class isn't smarter than you. And they aren't more knowledgeable, either. They're just better positioned and less scrupulous. When they run for office, they do not bring to that office any great talent or unifying vision. They are simply the central node of a network of advisors, policy wonks, lobbyists, and tame think-tank intellectuals. They will say nothing to that hasn't been scripted, and hear no questions they were not coached for in advance. George Washington, were he here to unite us today, would have these men tarred, feathered, and thrown in the reflecting pool.