Last week, it was interesting to see an educated, high-IQ person such as Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson being badgered with questions from a group of low-IQ, slug wannabes. One GOP senator, Kevin Cramer, somewhat semi-apologized for his colleagues who were asking stupid questions just to get attention and be invited as a guest on Fox News, Newsmax, or OneAmerica News. U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Dick Durbin of Illinois did a fact check on senator Lindsay Graham that showed he was lying. This rebuff got under Lindsay’s skin, and he took his football and stormed out in a huff because the Durbin kid wasn’t being nice. The whole hearing was similar to watching a brain surgeon being questioned by rabid weasels.
Because I’ve mentioned them a couple of times, I don’t hold much to IQ scores. Very often a high IQ doesn’t equate to material success in life or, more importantly, success as a human being. It’s what-you-do-with-what-you’ve-got that determines success in my book, anyway. Take me, for example.
Please stop the groaning and keep reading. I’m using myself as a negative example. When I entered a Catholic boys’ high school, all us boys were listed and assigned classes by IQ scores. I was No. 2 out of 446 for better or worse, so I got lumped in with the brainy kids. John, the guy ahead of me who was No. 1, had an IQ of 141.He was in that lump of brainy kids. So what did I do with my supposed intelligence? Goof around, become interested in girls and fast cars, and goof around (Did I mention goof around?). It was fun, but knocked me down about 200 places on the list. Eventually, in senior year, I made it back up to the 91st spot and the “A” Honor Roll. I became a friend to high-IQ John, because we were interested in the same things: Goofing around, fast cars, and girls. Different girls, fortunately.
One afternoon in junior year, our math teacher noticed John sitting in class with no books or a notebook. The teacher asked John where his things were. John said he’d left them in the trunk of his car. “Go out and get them,” the teacher said. “I can’t,” said John. “I traded the car in over the weekend.” The teacher threw him out of class. John continued walking and threw himself out of school, never to return.
Other guys in my school, who were not as high on the IQ scale became successful lawyers, scientists, doctors, engineers, business owners, even priests, donating time, talent and money to charities, doing what they could to help themselves and others, thereby making the world a better place. Even though I’m an internationally renowned author, what am I doing? As you can deduce if you’re reading this: Goofing around. That ship with the girls and fast cars left the dock a long time ago. By the way, my 141-IQ friend John eventually got himself a plane and started an air cargo service, so he made out okay without a high school diploma or all those extra IQ points. For the aforementioned people, it’s what they did with what they got and it wasn’t based on flashing around some test score.
I was ready to point out a verifiable fact this week to Mr. Bill Shady, a semi-regular contributor to The Voice in Reader’s Commentary, since he’s been concerned with the veracity of the facts I’ve been spouting (I don’t blame him. Consider the source.) He’s troubled by the way I’ve been referring to former president Trump, comparing him to something that I scraped off my shoe after walking through a dog park. Sorry, Bela, but I was facing a deadline and that was the most disgusting thing that first came to mind.
What was to have been my verifiable fact was based on what I’ve read recently in a few places: that before she died in 2018, Koko the Gorilla had passed the same cognitive test as Trump. Donny bragged ad infinitum about having surprised his doctors by how well he did (I’m sure they were surprised, but not for the reason Donny-Dum-Dum thinks). Question sample: Look at these two pictures. One is a meatball; the other is president Zachary Taylor. Put an X on the president.
Trump emphasized acing the memory section, but then couldn’t remember the name of the test he took. Probably because it contained more than two syllables.
Unfortunately, Koko didn’t take Trump’s Montreal Cognitive Assessment Test. Trump’s test is one administered to adult human-types to determine cognitive decline. Koko had taken some IQ tests for infants and toddlers and scored in the 70-90 IQ range. She understood 2,000 English words. That put her on an intelligence level only slightly ahead of Trump and had people suggesting that Koko should have been given the nuclear codes.
So, Mr. Suhayda, keep your prayer mat pointed toward Mar-a-Lago and your immoral, misogynistic, twice-impeached, habitually-lying (30,000 plus), Putin-and-dictator-loving, self-professed genius and Anarchistic Savior of All Mankind who resides therein, until he flies away in the new jet Trumpsters provided for him, all the while laughing behind their backs for their gullibility (as stated by his former press secretary Stephanie Grisham, who heard him). When he lands somewhere, probably Moscow, you’ll then have to face toward a new Mecca.
I hate to say this (not really), but what I’ve noticed in life is the kind of people a person admires says a lot about the kind of person they are.
Gumby is my hero.