Even some of the more conservative columnist have come to understand that Palin is not right for high office at this time. David Brooks, who is usually a thoughtful but conservative observer, writes in the NY TImes today about "Why Experience Matters". He contrasts elitist conservatives focused on rigorous standards, classical education, hard-earned knowledge, experience, and prudence. He contrasts this with the populous streak in America where "book knowledge is suspect but practical knowledge is respected. The city is corrupting and the universities are kindergartens for overeducated fools." He goes on to say, "The elitists favor sophistication, but the common-sense folk favor simplicity. The elitists favor deliberation, but the populists favor instinct."

Palin is the ultimate small-town renegade rising from the frontier to do battle with the corrupt establishment. Her followers take pride in the way she has aroused fear, hatred and panic in the minds of the liberal elite. The feminists declare that she’s not a real woman because she doesn’t hew to their rigid categories. People who’ve never been in a Wal-Mart think she is parochial because she has never summered in Tuscany.

He goes on to say, he would be more sympathetic to this view if we had not just lived through over seven years of it. Prudence is acquired through experience and "repertoire of events, through personal involvement or the study of history, and can apply those models to current circumstances to judge what is important and what is not, who can be persuaded and who can’t, what has worked and what hasn’t. ... but the records of leaders without long experience and prudence is not good."

Sarah Palin has many virtues. If you wanted someone to destroy a corrupt establishment, she’d be your woman. But the constructive act of governance is another matter. She has not been engaged in national issues, does not have a repertoire of historic patterns and, like President Bush, she seems to compensate for her lack of experience with brashness and excessive decisiveness.

The idea that “the people” will take on and destroy “the establishment” is a utopian fantasy that corrupted the left before it corrupted the right. Surely the response to the current crisis of authority is not to throw away standards of experience and prudence, but to select leaders who have those qualities but not the smug condescension that has so marked the reaction to the Palin nomination in the first place.

One can only hope that American voters come to understand this and vote for Obama and Biden in November. I fear the wreckage from the Bush years has done permanent damage to our country. Another four years of even less competence to govern who turn this nation into one whose glory was in the past.

The financial news is grim. The jury has come back in. The Bush economic policies, which seemed so mad 7 years ago to some, have proven to be quite mad in fact. The financial wreckage will continue to mount. Yesterday, I noted the parallels between 2008 and 1929. The news is not good. Lehman Brothers, one of the pillars of Wall Street, is now bankrupt and most likely will be liquidated. Nobody wants to assume the risk. Merrill Lynch will be sold to Bank of America. AIG is in trouble. The Dow dropped 504 points yesterday and the signs as I write this at 7:35 are for further loses today.

According to the Wall Street Journal, "One of the most tumultuous weekends in Wall Street's history began Friday, when federal officials decided to deliver a sobering message to the captains of finance: There would be no government bailout of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc." (The Wall Street Journal is a fee service.) This saga, which resulted largely from monumental incompetence both by the Bush maladministration and by greed has not ended. I hope we avoid the horrible nightmare of another depression, but every day the chances of a total meltdown of the 1929 type become more real.

Of course, McCain and Obama see this differently. McCain would continue the policies of the current administration. With minor involvement, let the markets work. (Hoover thought that too.) "He has often taken his lead on financial issues from two outspoken advocates of free market approaches, former Senator Phil Gramm and Alan Greenspan, the former Federal Reserve chairman. Individuals associated with Merrill Lynch, which sold itself to Bank of America in the market upheaval of the past weekend, have given his presidential campaign nearly $300,000, making them Mr. McCain’s largest contributor, collectively."

Obama has spelled out his general approach "calling for regulating investment banks, mortgage brokers and hedge funds much as commercial banks are. And he would streamline the overlapping regulatory agencies and create a commission to monitor threats to the financial system and report to the White House and Congress." There are signs that Wall Street, which is normally Republican territory, sees merit in Obama's approach. He has received $3 million more than McCain from Wall Street sources.

Obama may be short on direct experience, but his willingness to listen to those who do has been noted.

Time is short this morning. I may post a second note this evening.