How Do We Decide Who’s Smart?

Back in 1990 or 1991, I happened to be at the New York Hilton Hotel for the annual charity dinner that raises funds for the Chaim Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel, founded by the Jewish State’s first President in 1934. The dinner is a ‘must go’ for everyone who is a person of influence or importance in New York’s Jewish community — in my case I was there to accompany a friend who was much more of a fixture in this group than I.

After the meal and the bestowing on various awards to the biggest donors, things quieted down for the after-dinner speech, which was delivered by none other than Henry Kissinger, who first announced that his mother had come down from her Washington Heights apartment to hear her son speak.

Like most Jews, who happen to be political liberals, I wasn’t a fan of Kissinger. In fact, I thought he was something of an embarrassment to the Jewish community because he had ‘sold out’ by working for Nixon and worse, promoting a military ‘solution’ to Viet Nam.

That being said, Kissinger delivered a speech that evening which may have been the best, the most intelligent and insightful public lecture I ever heard anyone give on international politics and the challenges involved in keeping the peace.

Kissinger had been at Harvard from 1947 as an undergraduate until he went to D.C. as Nixon’s foreign…