He's a graduate of the Wharton school of finance, extremely smart, accomplished, and very knowledgeable about business. Not even comparable to Palin.

...is he academically smart? Yes. Is he a good businessperson? Debatable, but not the point. On political issues, he's either an idiot, or so cynically manipulative that you couldn't tell the difference.

He's a billionaire. I repeat. Billion aire

makes one automatically not an idiot?

I have no idea whether Trump is a idiot, I just take exception that Ivy League = not an idiot.

He's automatically not an idiot by virtue of that.

She cannot put together a coherent statement of more than one sentence.

Trump has a semblance of a platform that appeals to many on the right - he knows the "right" words and issues.

I think even a vast majority of those on the right recognize her limitations.

That's one difference. Another is that Chump is actually running for president. Palin is a grifter fleecing marks, and always has been. Finally, Chump can bankroll his campaign while Palin, who never seriously ran for president, would have had to raise the tens of millions required to run a serious primary campaign and she couldn't do that. Instead she never ran an official campaign and instead ran fake campaigns so she could loot her followers while not falling under campaign law scrutiny.

Americans are sick of politicians. I am too but since they tend to be the only truly qualified people who run for office we are stuck with them.

He has his toe in reality just enough to make it seem like the crazy shit he's saying might, in fact, be reasonable.

Palin, on the other hand, doesn't even understand what the hell she's talking about. It makes it difficult for all but the truly brain-dead to follow along with what she's even saying.

Listening to her or reading her remarks is like a game of political buzzword Mad Libs.
Trump is quite clear in his hate and deliberate divisiveness. Unfortunately, Trump is not an idiot. Would that he were.

Great point, djean111. Without a written speech and a teleprompter, Governor Palin is unable to speak in complete sentences and paragraphs that illustrate consistent thoughts. Her intellectual capacity is unable to focus her thoughts resulting in her mixing issues, people and events. The pathetic result is obvious even to conservatives, which is why she has been sidelined by the GOP.

Recently, a couple of friends and I re-watched her speech at the Iowa Freedom Summit from earlier this year. This was the speech that went so disastrously wrong for her that one conservative columnist wrote, "You betcha I was wrong about Sarah Palin." Governor Palin later claimed that the teleprompter went off-line and she had to improvise her talk. This is a richly ironic statement from someone who criticized President Obama for using a teleprompter when speaking in public. Anyway, we decided to play a drinking game where you had to sip your drink every time she failed to complete a sentence. Within ten minutes we had to quit or risk running out of liquor!

Curiously, I was able to vaguely understand what she was trying to say in this speech. Her random use of buzz words and talking points was intended solely to smear Democrats and President Obama. And they were intended to portray her as "smart" and "informed." But there weren't any logical connections between her seemingly random comments. I mean, throwing Saul Alinsky into her mixture of salad greens was just bizarre since there wasn't any follow-through of her point. Sadly, too many of her listeners nod lemming-like at her imbecilic statements. But I still love to follow her antics because it gives me hope for our side!

It's old news but from all accounts, the McCain campaign knew they had made a mistake shortly after announcing her as their VP candidate. The rest of the 2008 campaign was damage control and I suspect that Senator McCain places her selection among his five greatest mistakes. Following the Iowa speech, a colleague who is a hard-right Republican told me he didn't care about her foolishness because he still thought she was "hot." For me, that says it all.

Donald Trump is a lot of despicable things but he isn't stupid. More importantly, he is a master showman and his media-savvy is profound. In contrast, Sarah Palin is the living embodiment of the Dunning-Kruger effect.

When the going gets tough, she quits.

Unless I'm mistaken.... She's never run for president!

She hasn't run for President because she's smart enough to know she wouldn't win.

Her supporters may be loud but they are small in numbers. I think she knows this.

America prefers douchebags. Witness Kanye's popularity.

Also, probably sexism.

And as a showman, is much more aware of his audience.
Palin plays to please her benefactors, Trump plays for the crowd.

Trump has directed, calculated attacks demonstrating that he does have some intelligence however misdirected.

It's finally starting to wear off.

Sarah Palin was chosen as nominee for VP as a virtual unknown person at the end of August before a November election. Trump has been running in this campaign alone longer than Palin was VP candidate.

He is still feces, but a higher grade of feces. He has an education. He has real experience running something big. Those things make a difference.

She did have crowds while running in McCain ticket but unless she runs for president that question cannot be answered.

When confronted by her own ignorance or inconsistency, Palin will make word salad, because while she is monumentally ignorant, she is also ignorant of her ignorance, leading her to prattle away nonsensically at something she believes makes sense.

At some level, Trump appears to know he is full of shit. He can see the massive chasms in his bullshit, and knows where they are. One good example of this is when asked during the debate what is his evidence that the Mexican government has anything to do with actually picking and sending illegal immigrants to the US.

Now, everyone knows it is utter bullshit that illegal immigration arises from some deliberate program of the Mexican government deciding whom to "send". Even Trump knows that. He spouts it because it resonates with the crazy emails that get circulated by right wingers. Same thing as the Obama birth certificate.

So, when asked "what is your evidence" during the debate, his answer was, essentially "I heard it from some people and anyone who doesn't know it is STUPID! STUPID! STUPID!"

Now, after someone has responded to your question with a vague nothing and proceeded to say that anyone who doesn't know the answer is STUPID, are you going to repeat the question? At that point the response is simply "asked and answered", and by repeating the question you are firmly placing yourself into the "STUPID" camp. It's like the salesman's pitch that begins with telling you how smart you are. You feel good that someone thinks you are smart, and you surely don't want to blow that impression by acting as if you don't understand something. In the sales context, the point of repeatedly telling you how smart you are is actually to prevent you from questioning a gap in what the sales person is telling you.

Trump's supporters are pretty much used to being called stupid by liberals, and by the "GOP elite" which tries to tell them that there are reasons they don't understand why the GOP establishment tries to avoid backing blithering nutjobs. Well along comes Trump who amplifies all of their paranoid simplistic nonsense, and calls those RINOs and liberals "STUPID!" That's enormously satisfying to those inclined to support him, which constitutes a sizeable chunk of the GOP primary electorate. "Hey, you callin' me stupid? I agree with Trump and he's got billions of dollars. If you're so smart, how come you don't got billions of dollars?"

Palin tried to find escape routes from questions she couldn't answer. Trump meets those questions head on and beats them into submission as an alternative to answering them.

Palin's flaw was in prattling on idiotically in an attempt to make it appear she made sense. Trump's not interested in making sense. "Making sense", to the audience in question here, is a demeaning ritual which so-called "smart people" use to humiliate the ignorant.

Here's an example. Palin and Trump are in a grade-school math class, and the teacher wants to know what is 2+2:

Palin: Two plus two is a good question. Two and two are both numbers and important ones. When God created us, he made two people, Adam and Eve, to show how important it is that a couple be a man and a woman and, oh, Noah took the animals onto the ark two-by-two, which also shows how two plus two is part of his divine plan which was given to us by God and our founding fathers, so the answers are all in the Constitution and God's plan for this great country.

Trump: You know, we spend millions on education in this country to pay teachers like you to teach students what is two plus two. The fact that you don't know, and you are asking me, is a sad reflection on why we need to get rid of ineffective teachers. To have teachers who don't know what they are doing just shows that teachers are lazy, overpaid, not qualified, and highly overrated. Now, some teachers are really good. I've met with a lot of good teachers who tell me the same thing. So we need to stop with the stupid questions. We don't have time for stupid questions. We need to get rid of the teachers who don't teach, and who ask stupid questions like yours, before they ruin another generation like the one we have leading this country now.

Agreed--Palin is a foolish grifter, but Il Donald is an experienced professional con man.

heard of Palin before McCain chose her. Trump is an educated idiot and knows exactly what he is doing.

that engenders a lot of trust in authoritarian types. The same people like Palin, but it's on a different level with Trump.

They see him as The One who can fix everything, not only because he's wealthy (as if he's gonna pay for every single thing himself...lol) but because he is a white male.

That's my opinion at least.

There is a lot of truth to that. Thanks for that perspective.

Word salad sara is just too fucking stupid

At least tRump can speak in complete sentences, crazy words but complete sentences none the less

And they are usually in the correct order

There are not a whole lot of insults you can throw at Trump that hasn't been thrown at him before. He's been a public figure for many years. He knows how to deflect attacks. He's not afraid of media questions. He's very outspoken and confident. He expects the media to trap him. Palin was largely inexperienced dealing with that attention and was caught off guard constantly.

After the election 2008, Palin was better liked by the Republican voters than McCain with 71% believing that McCain made the right choice by picking Palin as his running mate, while only 65% of Republicans thought the party's choice of McCain was the right nominee for president. Palin had a 91% approval rating among Republicans (WAY, WAY, WAY higher than Trump).

Leading into the next election cycle (in 2012), Palin remained extremely popular with Republicans, well ahead of eventual nominee Romney:


In short, Palin did generate a following, and it was -- in all likelihood -- considerably bigger than Trump's, but she did not run in 2012 so you have no apples-to-apples numbers.

but chose not to run, fearing the hard work would cut into her lazy celebrity time.

Those on the left are not going to support Mrs Palin because she's an idiot, and those on the right are not going to support her because they are conditioned to have no confidence in female leadership. To a conservative type, when a male is an idiot and an ass and says whatever he wants, he's ballsy and takes no shit from anyone. When a woman does the same, well, the words usually used to characterize her are a violation of DU's TOS.

And I think jberryhill's answer upthread is also a great analysis of the quality of the two cons. Mr Trump is really very skilfull at what he does.

-- Mal

Palin was not taken seriously by the Chatterati and Party Machine because she was a woman. Her ideas, ego, and lack of intelligence is certainly rivaled or exceeded by Trump, but Trump has a penis.

Deserving or not, there are hordes of people who like Trump from his years in high-profile business dealings, and from his television show.

Sid

The Reagan Method done TV style.....

Graduation From Wharton

... then go into politics.

That way nuttery is expected...

Including men. Especially men. Palin was going to be the exception in the patriarchal club - like a couple of females in the old testament. Like Deborah. ( Deborah was said to be wise.)

And Palin was a good looking woman back then - turn the sound off the tv and she might even be appealing.

Let alone an election. I can't stand Ms. Barbie Doll, but she did win a couple of elections.

Trump knows why/what he's doing. Plain thinks she's much smarter than she really is.

Palin came from nowhere, and did nothing but carry water for billionaires. She was even less articulate. She was just an attractive woman, which got the public's attention but never triggered the public's instinct to obedience. It ultimately didn't help that she was openly deferential to men or that she reminded her fans that women are second-class citizens in her Bible.