Do you enjoy "the life of the mind?"

Do you think of yourself as an intellectual? Ace at Ace of Spades says that "If you're strongly interested in ideas and you read a fair amount, and you enjoy abstract thinking and arguing about concepts and principles, you're an intellectual." Do you like learning things? Does that make you soft, or "liberal?" Ace has quit his "anti-intellectual habit":

Now as a personal matter I've now quit the anti-intellectual habit and like anyone who's quit recently, I'm a bit of an annoying evangelist for it. Just like an ex-smoker is very annoying about quitting smoking."

More of Ace:

So, a majority of people are either of average intelligence or lower. They're not particularly intellectual. And the ones who are kind of dumb but fancy themselves intellectuals are almost all in the Democratic Party. And they're welcome to them. The chief reason that self-identification as Intellectual has fallen out of favor among many conservatives -- because every time we see the Intellectual Card played, it's in service of knocking a conservative as "dumb." As a personal matter, sure, more people should just admit they enjoy the life of the mind (and those who haven't given that a shot should try it and see if it doesn't suit them). But as far as winning politics, intellectualism has never, ever been a strong bet.

Read more here: http://minx.cc/?post=335562