“If any of you wonder how far a mastery of the English language can take you, just look what it did for me,” quoth President Bush in a recent smirky address to some evangelical college in Michigan. This wry self-depracatory joke from a man who provoked an unfunded mandate that no child should be left behind in education. This from the man who holds an office we should all respect in part for its standards of intelligence and dignity. It’s like the president of a company saying “I’m pretty goddamned stupid, but you schmucks should follow me anyway and laugh with me at my own ineptitude.” Yes, it’s a joke. But is it?