Context is everything. When Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson asked “What is Aleppo?” on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” he looked pretty out of it. But what if he were asking it as one of those question-as-answer replies to a question on “Jeopardy”? With the right video editing, Johnson could be brilliantly recognizing some obscure fact about the Syrian city that Alex Trebek cavalierly tossed at his contestants, never expecting them to get it. Would asking “What is Aleppo?” look so foolish then? The following video places Johnson’s deer-in-headlights moment in just such a context; watch it and see for yourself.

Actually, he still looks pretty out of it.