I-CON INFO EXCHANGE

Wouldn't it be nice if time on the job and tickets punched translated neatly into superior performance? Then finding great Presidents would be a simple matter of weighing résumés

Experience, in other words, gets its value from the person who has it. In certain lives, a little goes a long way. Some people grow and ripen through years of government service; others spoil on the vine. At the same time, the value that voters place on résumé is constantly shifting.

When Americans pass over the best-credentialed candidates because their heart or their gut leads them elsewhere, they are only reflecting a visceral understanding that the presidency involves tests unlike all others. They are, perhaps, seeking the ineffable quality the writer Katherine Anne Porter had in mind when she defined experience as "the truth that finally overtakes you." An ideal President is both ruthless and compassionate, visionary and pragmatic, cunning and honest, patient and bold, combining the eloquence of a psalmist with the timing of a jungle cat. Not exactly the sort of data you can find on a résumé.

What I find more worrying than Palin's lack of experience is her lack of humility about it. "I'm ready," she declared, after Gibson challenged her to "look the country in the eye and say 'I have the experience and I have the ability'." You might be able to get away substituting self confidence for knowledge in a high school history debate, but it isn't a good mindset for a leader who may have her finger on the nuclear trigger.