Posted on 08/28/2011 9:32:57 PM PDT by martosko
How smart do we want our presidents to be, and what does their academic performance tell us about their chances for success?
This month Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s college transcript was leaked, and the Republican presidential contender’s academic performance at Texas A&M turned out to be less than stellar. Perry’s critics seized on the document to suggest that he didn’t have the aptitude to serve as leader of the free world.
Is there a correlation between success in the White House and a president’s perceived intelligence, or at least between academic performance and Oval Office success?
in obama’s case, there’s simply not enough data.
Woodrow Wilson, now our 2nd worst president (Jonah Goldberg reviewed his writings for one of his columns, the man was deranged) was the only Phd to occupy the Oval Office.
Bet they don't rest until they find some more dirt on Perry ...
JFK was quite the scholar wasn’t he?
And LBJ. I doubt that Nixon was an A student. Ike graduated fairly far down the ranking at West Point. US Grant was near the bottom.
Why haven’t we seen Urkel’s records? Did he even take any courses? Does anyone even recall him in a class?
If it did, McNamara would’ve been the greatest SecDef ever. And Dick Cheney would’ve been the worst VP ever. I don’t think you can make a direct comparison. Al Gore was a dumbass rock in school, a worthless do-nothing VP, and is somehow an environmental expert even though he’s never produced anything but a plagiarized book and a ghost-produced movie on the subject.
As for Bush, I’m more impressed with a guy who was a fighter pilot than Gore, a rich kid who failed at everything and flourished in politics because other people were always blazing the trail for him.
This entire lame ass AnointedIdiot administration is chocked full of academics and they still fail!
Hell no, academic achievement has nothing to do with Oval Office success. One frakin’ idiot who wrote this article. =.=
I understand that Jimmah Carter was quite an intelligent man. Part of his problem is that he was not good at delegating so he ended up drowning in minutiae.
If I’m so smart why do I find myself in the gutter now?
I’ll take a fellow with COMMON SENSE who LOVES THIS COUNTRY — AND MANIFESTS THAT LOVE IN OFFICE — ANY DAY OF THE WEEK.
There can be no longer be a shred of doubt as to OBOWzo’s embrace of Marxism. That he is also is a veritable Mulligan Stew of psychological pathologies makes him even MORE dangerous. Even a shrink as bright at Charles Krauthammer has trouble finding enough words to adequately describe what’s going on in the guy’s head.
My take is that he is a rare form of idiot savant whose “gift” is an urge to engage in mindless and continual eloqution and public oratory. His egocentrism and narcissism — probably resulting from having been abandoned first by his father then his mother — found in ALL politicians has reached a far higher level in him than in others and requires him to be “on” and the center of attention at all times.
(Even MSNBC leftist talker Ed Shultz, fresh from a visit to the White House, reported that Obama has turned the place into a shrine to – surprise – OBAMA, with portraits of his first year – and hopefully, his LAST full year – in office EVERYWHERE! Can you say “egomaniac?”)
Couple that with the problem described by microbiologist P.B. Medawar that
“(…) the spread of secondary and latterly tertiary education has created a large population of people, often with well-developed literary and scholarly tastes, who have been educated far beyond their capacity to undertake analytical thought”
and you have a formula for the creature known as Obama.
He is as lacking in the ability to think critically as are the voters who put him in office and who now bear full responsibility for the possibly irreparable damage now being done to this country by Obama and his minions.
The bigger problem is that when the veneration by his former devotees fades and, like Hitler in his Berlin bunker, he begins to feel that they are not intelligent enough to appreciate his “brilliance,” he could become an even more dangerous and destructive creature than he is now.
I can’t help but wonder if these so-called black “flash-mobs” are the leading edge of more anti-white violence to come.
We should know soon.
Bump
A college degree does not mean someone is intelligent.
Nothing means anything.
Article filled with irony as we cannot assess our CURRENT president’s academic record in this paradigm...Current prez is a lousy leader, but we don’t know if that is correlated to his academic record.
Imagine Paul Krugman as president. Nuff said.
Harry Truman did not even have a college degree.
To be fair, let’s compare Perry’s to Obama’s transcripts. ;)
What ever gave you that idea. He wasn't called "Tricky Dick" for nothing. He graduated second in his class at Whittier College in 1934 and won a scholarship to Duke law school
It’s amazing that Perry just announcing he’s running, and his Aggie transcript has already been leaked. But has The Won’s, 5 or so years after he announced.
No, sadly it’s not surprising at all, come to think of it.
Without Affirmative Action and White Guilt Obama would still be a street sleezebag scamming dumb blacks into selling their votes for a few dillars and a bogus promise.
Now he is a President who got there by scamming dumb blacks and whites into selling their votes for a few bogus promises.
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