Is Donald Trump right about 'stupid' voters?

(CNN)In the wake of the terrorist attacks in Paris, establishment Republicans are hopeful that their voters will finally come to their senses, realize that they need a seasoned hand on the tiller of state and stop their dalliance with "outsider" candidates who have little idea how to handle foreign and military affairs.

"Bombast doesn't cut it. Inexperience doesn't cut it," former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge told The New York Times. "Those who have a record of governance and demonstrated leadership capabilities -- their stock is going to rise."

That's what you call wishful thinking. When was the last time the voting public responded to an external threat by becoming serious and thoughtful?

If anything, Republican voters are likely to be even more attracted to those who offer bombast and bluster -- and the truth is, that's what they're getting from most every candidate, experienced or not. Don't be surprised if Donald Trump -- who literally says that the answer to the problem of ISIS is, "We go in, we knock the hell out of them, take the oil" -- winds up even stronger.

And Trump isn't going to mince words. Unlike most politicians who shower voters with praise like they're preschoolers bringing home their first art project, Trump will tell them when they let him down.

Faced with the fact that he is trailing Ben Carson in Iowa polls (and some national polls as well), last week Trump went on a spectacularly weird 95-minute rant that laid into the good folk of the Hawkeye State for accepting some of the stories in Carson's autobiography and elevating him to the top of the pack.

"How stupid are the people of Iowa? How stupid are the people of the country to believe this crap?" Trump asked. "Don't be fools, OK?"

Trump seems to believe that only a fool would reject him in favor of any other candidate, a questionable assertion to say the least. But on the broader point, was he right?

Well, yes.
When it comes to politics, the American people are indeed not so sharp.

But perhaps "stupid" isn't quite the right word, since it suggests a fundamental and unchangeable state of their minds. "Uninformed" or "ignorant" might be better. "Foolish" works, too.