Is Ryan’s Great Intellect a Matter of Smoke and Mirrors?

As only Barney Frank can!
by Charlie Leck

The following comes from an exceptional profile of Congressman Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney’s running mate, which appears in today’s New York Times (Paul Ryan Can’t Lose). The profile was written by Mark Leibovich.

“Skeptics say Ryan owes his superwonk standing as much to comparisons with his colleagues than to any great knowledge or depth. In a recent profile of Ryan by Alec McGillis in The New Republic, Barney Frank dismissed his colleague’s brainy reputation as being relative to that of other House Republicans, some of whom had just been implicated in a late-night escapade during a Congressional trip to Israel last summer. ‘He is being graded on a curve,’ Frank said of Ryan, ‘with a bunch of guys who jump into the Sea of Galilee because they want to be closer to God.’”

“As only Barney Frank can say it,” I thought to myself as I giggled awhile.

“He is being graded on a curve, with a bunch of guys who jump into the Sea of Galilee because they want to be closer to God.”

I tend to repeat things I really like! I tend to repeat things I really like!

Leibovich wonders what the voters on the right are going to think if this Republican ticket loses in the election that is only three weeks away. He surmises…

“But a far more vocal — and probably bigger — group on the right will maintain that the ticket was not conservative enough. They will insist that Republicans need to stop nominating the next establishment guy in line. They will say Mitt Romney ran a lousy general election campaign, except for his finest act, the elevation of Paul Ryan, who was a very good Boy Scout and who waited his turn.”

This profile by Leibovich is not brief, but it is a smooth and quick read and extremely interesting. You’ll know Paul Ryan better after reading it and I don’t think it will not make you like him any less or like him any more. It’s very, very fair.

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