SO WOULD SCALIA BE "GRUMPY"?

In a new poll that seems devised by students in a university statistics class -- after hitting the bong for a couple hours -- we learn that, among other things:

More Americans Can Identify The Seven Dwarves Than Supreme Court Justices

All seven dwarves! That's not bad. I always get tripped up after Doc, Dopey, Grumpy & Bashful. Sleepy? Sneezy? Queasy? Cheesy?

I'm not denying the basic premise underlying these results: that Americans have celebrated their rise from new nation to unchallenged global superpower by becoming profoundly stupid. It's true to a large degree, it's unfortunate, and it's a major concern. But this "poll" has so much sophmoric snark written into it, I'm not sure what it proves other than the already-known fact that the authors of the poll can & will feel smuggly superior to the unwashed masses around them.

I mean, we've all heard that X % of Americans can't find Texas on a map, or can't name the President whose first name is George & last name is Washington. Yeah, our education system is in shambles. We know. Here are a few other "findings" from the poll:

* 57% of American know JK Rowling wrote the Harry Potter books, while only 50% know Tony Blair is Prime Minister of the UK.

That's closer than I thought, actually.

* 60% know Superman hales from Krypton, while only 37% can identify Mercury as the planet closest to the sun.

Nitpicking! Fictional planet, real planet? Who are they to judge? Especially with scientists meeting as we speak to determine whether Pluto's actually a planet, now they're acting close-minded?

* 60% could name Homer's son on The Simpsons, but only 20.5% knew what Homer's epic poems are named.

If they watch The Simpsons rather than American Idol, they're probably ok anyhow. And I bet there are people -- though not too many, I'll admit -- that know The Iliad & The Odyssey, but don't know who wrote them. I mean, seriously: didn't Brad Pitt play Achilles in a flick recently? People know The Iliad.

* Speaking of American Idle, 23 % know Taylor Hicks, while only 11% know Samuel Alito. I wish I didn't know either of them. So Hicks peddles for Ford on TV, Alito'll defend 'em in court. What's the diff, right?

(And, yes, I called it American Idle on purpose. But the pun on "idling," like an engine was unintentional. You know, cause Ford makes cars, and cars "idle" . . . oh, never mind.)

* 74% percent could name all Three Stooges, but only 42% could identify the three branches of the American government.

Hardly surprising; neither can Congress!

But this one's frightening to me, because it has consequences. Think about it: who really cares if someone knows the name of the British PM, or the name of the latest Associate Justice? We can engage in the standard hand-wringing, or tut-tut that foreigners will look down on us. Admittedly, not good, but not of earth-shaking importance. As we all know, the fact of general ignorance is more worrisome than lack of specific pieces of knowledge.

But with the Executive Branch grabbing power as if it were low-lying fruit, with Congress derelict in its duties, I'd rather have an electorate going to the polls in November knowing what was at stake.

Not at steak.