The Dumbest President...EVER! (Obama has surpassed James Buchanan in making the dumbest moves)

American Thinker ^ | 07/08/2010 | Stuart Schwartz

[SeekAndFind]

Barack Obama is the dumbest president...EVER.

That is a reasonable conclusion once you've assessed the first nineteen months of his presidency and compared it to the definition of intelligence put together by researchers in the field. Although the mainstream media have spent the last two years proclaiming Obama "super-smart" or, as Newsweek put it, "sort of God" in stature and brilliance, the 44^th president of the United States is poised to surpass our 15^th president, James Buchanan. Jr., as the White House occupant who has made the dumbest moves while in office. With two years left, he is on the fast track to last.

That takes some doing, for the leadership of the hapless Buchanan prior to the Civil War "has led to his consistent ranking by historians as one of the worst Presidents." This is the president who vetoed a college funding bill because "there were already too many educated people" in the young nation. Buchanan's judgment was so wretched that he thought anti-slavery forces could be convinced to give up their opposition by his personal assurances that slaves were "treated with kindness and humanity" and that poverty could be ended by simply printing more money. Sound familiar?

Barack Obama is dumb. How dumb? Alfred E. Newman dumb, says columnist David Limbaugh, who labeled him "President Alfred E. Obama" because of his blithe disregard of the basics of fiscal responsibility. Alfred E. Newman is the Mad magazine mascot, whose answer to every problem is his signature statement: "What, me worry?"

How dumb? How-many-Obamas-does-it-take-to-screw-in-a-light-bulb dumb. And in the answer lies the answer, the key to his pole position in the race to last: It takes 242. One to hold the light bulb, four to turn the ladder, eighteen to assess conformity to OSHA workplace requirements, four to assess the environmental impact of the burnt-out bulb disposal, twelve to participate in a task force to evaluate green energy solutions for a replacement bulb, eight to script his actions, four to script instructions and work the teleprompter, 23 to work with the justice department to sue the light bulb manufacturer...you get the picture. And, à la Buchanan, Obama never does get that light bulb changed.

That James Buchanan "fiddled while Rome burned" seems to be the consensus of historians. His approach to the raging controversy over slavery in the decade preceding the Civil War was based on ignoring evidence and acting upon events as he wished them to be, not as they were. Fast-forward to the present: Obama responds to the Gulf crisis by trying to move us toward the collapsed centralized green economy of Spain, ignoring the fact that even Spain acknowledges that "every 'green job' created with government money...came at the cost of 2.2 regular jobs, and only one in 10 of the newly created green jobs became a permanent job."

In all areas of his presidency, Obama has demonstrated a striking disregard of facts, lack of good reasoning, and inability to function at an executive level, all at the core of the textbook definition of intelligence derived from more than a half century of research. Intelligence, the experts tell us, comes down to understanding the meaning of the world around us, and then using that understanding to live skillfully and appropriately (i.e., to get stuff done). One survey of more than fifty researchers in the field of intelligence offers the following definition:

A very special mental capability that, among other things, involves the ability to reason, plan, solve problems, think abstractly, comprehend complex ideas, learn quickly and learn from experience. It is not merely book learning, a narrow academic skill, or test-taking smarts. Rather, it reflects a broader and deeper capability for comprehending our surroundings---"catching on", "making sense" of things, or "figuring out" what to do.

Obama is Buchanan-esque in his inability to function as an executive, a key part of intelligence. Even a cursory analysis of history shows that limited government and free markets have produced prosperity; so Obama expands government and takes over private businesses, causing one observer to throw up his hands at another Buchanan moment from Obama and exclaim, "It isn't rocket science, Mr. President!" Hands-on executives and laser focus are business school basics for solving problems; so Obama parties rather than roll up his sleeves, unleashes federal regulators on hapless Gulf state residents rather than cutting through the red tape, and appoints study panels even as the oil washes ashore (e.g., see video timeline). Radical Islamists are waging war against the United States; Obama does a full Buchanan -- or, if you will, an Alfred E. Newman-style "What, me worry?" -- and, denying the existence of Islamic terrorism, asks whom are you going to believe -- me or your lying eyes?

The ability to draw reasonable conclusions from everyday life and then use those conclusions to adapt is fundamental to high intelligence, says cognitive psychologist Robert J. Steinberg, the award-winning Tufts University dean and University of Cambridge fellow. In other words, the scientific community has established good reasoning, learning from past experience, and acting according to those experiences as integral to high intelligence.

It does not include, as David Brooks, tells us, having an exceptional and "perfectly creased pant [leg]" or -- in what Hot Air's Allahpundit calls "a loathsome expression of elitism" -- being able to "talk like us," Brooks, and others of the "smart set." If that were the case, all we would need to increase intelligence in the U.S. Congress is to provide our elected representatives with dry cleaning services. As for the "talk like us" part, it doesn't take intelligence to talk like a self-styled intellectual, a.k.a. a New York Times columnist. Hawkeye Pearce has already shown us the way in the classic "Love Story" episode of television's "Mash." He teaches Radar, the shy Iowa farm boy who has a crush on a nurse who reads the classics and enjoys Bach, to reply with, eyebrows uplifted, "Ahhh...Bach" when she discusses music and throw in the occasional "That's highly significant."

Want to impress David Brooks and others of the media engaging in what Bernard Goldberg calls "a slobbering love affair" with the president? Simple. Reply, as Obama has done, "Ahhh...Burke" to David Brooks, enthralled by a president who expressed appreciation for the "finer points" of political philosophy; or flash your degree to Christopher Buckley, formerly of National Review, awestruck by Obama's "Harvard intellect"; or simply present Marxism and mainline elegance as typical of the academic life, and media academics like Michael Beschloss will gush on mainstream news, "he's probably the smartest guy ever to become President."

But intelligence is as intelligence does, as Forest Gump might remind us. Harvard has produced more than its share of great men and women, but it has also produced the Unabomber, Barney Frank, and Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling...and now, the next James Buchanan.

So the next time Brooks or others in the mainstream media firmament tell you that Barack Obama is a towering intellect, the smartest president ever, just nod your head wisely and say, "Ahhh...pant leg."

Stuart Schwartz, a former retail and media executive, is on the faculty at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia.

[rw4site]

Zero is an intelligent, educated man, but his education is from the Marxist point of view. He is not dumb, but rather stupid in that he does not care for our Founders morals or ideas that created the united States.

BTW, our united States was created to allow the States to have power over everything except the things stated in the Constitution of the united States. Federal politicians corrupted that to the United States and have removed nearly all the powers from the States.

[pingman]

Flashcards, written on the back of shovels in charcoal.

[bmwcyle]

Obama is an angry little boy with the brains of a child.

[Danae]

OholyO is WAY below Buchanan. Buchanan had no teleprompter. He actually had to write his own speeches.

Obama, not so much.

[Always Independent]

Yeah if it wasn’t for his handlers he’d be hustling cheap watches on the chitown streets.

[karnage]

“Gay” meant something else in Buchanan’s day...

[Eagles2003]

“I’ll bet 0bama and James Buchanan have something special in common.”

You hit the nail on the head, took how many posts before anyone else figured it out.

They are fudgepackers.

[cowboyusa]

They both will probably lead to a violent Civil War.

[cowboyusa]

They both will probably lead to a violent Civil War.

[Guyin4Os]

I would like to know about ONE SMART thing obuma has done. He reads speeches from a teleprompter that someone else has written and takes orders from a higher power (NOT GOD). He displays no concept or connection with reality..he exhibits not a trace of common sense. Oh yes, we have been TOLD continually that this president (barf) is intelligent and I guess if its repeated often enough people begin to believe it must be true. Hogwash!

What he has done does not seem "smart" to you because you do not share his political philosophy. However, what he has done is indeed smart, given the presupposed agenda he came to office with. One simple example is Obamacare. It doesn't seem smart to you. But if one wants to the government to gain control over the private lives of individuals, it is a very smart way to go about it.

Calling him smart doesn't mean I agree with him. Not at all. I strongly oppose everything he has done and intends to do. But I won't make the mistake of thinking he is dumb.

[Mr. Wright]

I’ll bet people in all “57” States agree with that!!

[DontTreadOnMe2009]

I'm sorry, I thought almost everyone on FR had heard of Dr. John Drew. It's an amazing story.

He tried to get his story out before the election. He asked Fox News to interview him and he was ignored.

Dr. John Drew attended Occidental College at the same time as Barack Hussein Obama.

He has now given several interviews of what occurred at that time and what Barack Obama told him to his face in their several meetings that they had together.

The story is quite amazing.

Clearly, we have been duped.

Dr. John C. Drew, now a grant writing consultant in Laguna Niguel, Calif., tells Newsmax he met Obama in 1980 when Obama was a sophomore at Occidental College in Los Angeles. Drew had just graduated from Occidental and was attending graduate school at Cornell University.

During Christmas break, Drew says he was at Grauman-Boss’ home in Palo Alto when Obama came over with Mohammed Hasan Chandoo, his roommate from Pakistan.

“Barack [Obama] and Hasan showed up at the house in a BMW, and then we went to a restaurant together,” Drew says. “We had a nice meal, and then we came back to the house and smoked cigarettes and drank and argued politics.”

For the next several hours, they discussed Marxism.

“He [Obama] was arguing a straightforward Marxist-Leninist class-struggle point of view, which anticipated that there would be a revolution of the working class, led by revolutionaries, who would overthrow the capitalist system and institute a new socialist government that would redistribute the wealth,” says Drew, who says he himself was then a Marxist.

“The idea was basically that wealthy people were exploiting others,” Drew says. “That this was the secret of their wealth, that they weren’t paying others enough for their work, and they were using and taking advantage of other people. He was convinced that a revolution would take place, and it would be a good thing.”

Drew concluded that Obama thought of himself as “part of an intelligent, radical vanguard that was leading the way towards this revolution and towards this new society.” ..."

Referring to Obama’s quote from “Dreams of My Father” that he associated with Marxist professors, Drew says, “What he’s not saying is that he was in 100 percent total agreement with those Marxist professors.

When you understand that, Obama’s later associations and policies make more sense, including why he was taken in by Rev. Wright’s ideology.”

I was asked before to turn all of this into a Vanity post, but I've never done one before, and I am unsure of how to do it.

Perhaps someone on Free Republic could do it for me?

[1_Rain_Drop]

I don't think that obama can be classified as dumbest/smartest President. He cannot be compared to any other President because he is the first black, faux BC, muslim, America hating White hut squatter.

0bama is our first foreign pres__ent.

Only flies love him.

[SeekAndFind]

Let’s say that John Drew’s story is true ( and it has all the signs of a genuine story ), Obama can always use the politician’s excuse -— “I was young and idealistic then. People’s views change over the years and my political views have evolved since I gained more experience in life.”

Not that I would believe him, but hey, such an excuse would be totally accepted by guys like Chris Matthews (whose leg would tingle one more time ).