Jim Hightower

It went unacknowledged by the mass media, but Sarah Palin recently made a major contribution to the public good. By abandoning her position in Alaska's state government and moving to Fox News, Palin instantly raised the IQ level of both places.

Let's give credit where credit is due.

Freed from the boring burden of having to be in office and actually govern, the Sainted Sarah of the Hyper-right can now use her Fox bully pulpit to tell President Obama, the Congress, and others how to govern, thus qualifying her to run for higher office. This is what is called "leadership development" in our fascinating new world of celebrity politics. Abe Lincoln could never have cut it here.

Nitpickers on the left point out that Palin is not exactly bent over double with smarts, but – hey – who needs that when you've got sparkle? She's the darling of the antiestablishment tea-party wing of the GOP, and with the FOX money she's raking in, plus getting $100,000 a pop for speeches, she can buy the smarts of others and learn enough sound bites to get by in a Republican primary.

Indeed, she has already put such "thinkers" as Randy Scheunemann on her political payroll to coach her on that confusing foreign policy stuff. Sarah and Randy are a bit of an odd couple, since she is posing as the voice of the farthest-out-outsiders, while he is a consummate Washington insider – a longtime GOP lobbyist who specializes in representing foreign governments. That's not exactly in the spirit of the Boston Tea Party, is it?

But such inconsistency will be glossed over by Palin's ubiquity in the media – Fox has even built a TV studio in her living room so she can wax wise at a moment's notice. Besides, she believes God is guiding her to "the next open door." With a backer like God, you really don't need a lot of human smarts.