Why Obama is Mum about Harvard

World Net Daily ^ | 9-11-08 | Jack Cashill

[maggief]

ACTIVIST IN CHICAGO NOW HEADS HARVARD LAW REVIEW
Chicago Tribune - February 7, 1990
Author: Michael J. Ybarra.
Just a few years ago, Barack Obama was helping residents of the Altgeld

Gardens housing development challenge the Chicago Housing Authority over

asbestos in their apartments.

On Monday, the 28-year-old Obama was named president of the Harvard Law

Review, the nation`s most prestigious student legal journal. Obama is the

first black elected to the post in its 104-year history.

The Review is considered one of the most authoritative of the law school

reviews and is a forum for judges and scholars. It is also a high-powered

springboard for aspiring lawyers. Its presidents usually go on serve as a

clerk for a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for a year and then as a clerk for an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.

It took 91 years to elect a woman, and it wasn`t until last year that an

Asian was elected by his fellow editors to the position.

For Obama , it`s another victory in the fight against ``powerlessness.``

``People don`t feel that they can have much impact,`` he said in a phone

interview from the Review`s offices. ``I want to get people involved in having a say in how their lives are run. More and more of that needs to be done.``

As executive director of the Developing Communities Project, he had

attempted to persuade the residents of Altgeld Gardens to become more involved in their community. Obama worked for the Developing Communities Project for

four years.

(snip)

``Unbelievable talent is not cultivated; a lot of time it`s crushed,``

Obama said. ``Over the long run, the way to improve the conditions in the

cities and schools-to fight crime and drugs-is to work on the local level.``

To do that effectively, Obama said he wanted to know how the system works as only a lawyer can. To that end, he said he`ll spend a couple of years

practicing law after graduation next year and then it`s most likely back to

community organizing, maybe politics.

Probably back where he started.

``I`ll definitely be coming back to Chicago,`` he said. ``Chicago`s a

great town . . . an ideal laboratory.``

[ridesthemiles]

The Obama history just becomes murkier and murkier. The more I hear about this guy the more I’m convinced he’s been “groomed” for what he’s doing now.”

Think Goerge Soros.....

Nobama still hasn’t managed to come forth with a valid birth certificate, either. That’s plenty murky for me.

[Labyrinthos]

Biden graduated in the bottom third of his law school class at the (I think) internationally acclaimed University of Scranton.

Not quite. According to a 1987 New York Times Article, Biden graduated number 76 out of 85 from Syracuse University School of Law, which puts him at the cusp of the bottom 10% of his class. This was after he was allowed to retake a course in which he received and "F" for plagiarism. According to the same article, Biden earned mostly C's and D's as an undergraduate at the University of Delaware, except for two A's in physical education and an F in ROTC.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DE3DB143FF93BA2575AC0A961948260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=print

I agree that academic achievement is seldom a good measure for predicting leadership and success as POTUS. Nevertheless, the left wing and their comrades in the MSM have bashed President Bush for the last eight years as being "dumb," "stupid," and "an idiot" because he earned mostly C's and B's at Yale, even thought he has an MBA from Harvard. If academic achievement is significant when reviewing President Bush's qualifications, then it ought to be equally significant when considering Barry's and Biden's qualifications.

[palomonte]

Thank you for the corrections - my overall characterization of Biden as a less than stellar student still stands, which was my point.

I think the main point of the thread is the question of whether Obama is hiding MORE than a poor academic record - I got off track a bit - I apologize for that.

[Labyrinthos]

No need to apologise. The bottom line is that until Barry releases his complete academic records including SAT/ACT scores and proves othrwise, I am going to assume that neither Columbia nor Harvard would have accepted him if not for the fact that he is half black, just as I assume that Yale and Harvard would not have accepted GWB if not for the fact that he is a legatee.

[palomonte]

I agree with your assumption - I don’t think there is any question that he would not have been admitted to any Ivy League institution on the basis of fair competition.

[zeugma]

The specifics we may never know. As the New York Times concedes, Obama "declined repeated requests to talk about his New York years, release his Columbia transcript or identify even a single fellow student, co-worker, roommate or friend from those years."

Would that Bristol Palin could get off so easily!

Needs to be repeated often.This is weird to just about anyone I tell it to.

[VOA]

Why Obama is Mum about Harvard

Gad...if Obama simply soft-pedals his close ties to Bill Ayers...
he must be REALLY afraid to have his Harvard career closely scrutinized!

[aruanan]

They worked hard, and they figured out what the teacher wanted. That's wonderful, but it isn't necessarily the only thing that a law school or an executive position requires.

It's telling, then, that in addition to not having these things, Barack doesn't have anything else that a law school or an executive position requires. On a U of C note, I know one undergrad from Hong Kong who finished in 2 years.

[Lancey Howard]

Jack Cashill BUMP!
This guy is consistently good.

[ladyjane]

one of the few presidents of this prestigious journal who never published an article.

Have there been *any* other presidents of the Law Review who published nothing?

[E=MC2]

I am sure the transcripts would show Obama getting a C in Intro to Sociology while McCain an Sarah received A’s in Physics and Chemistry,

Biden's would show an "F" for getting caught for plagarizing.

[Philo-Junius]

Aren’t the Columbia years the years Obama describes as having lived “like a monk?”

That increasingly strikes me as odd: “nope, nothing to see here, I was living in a cloister—left no fingerprints anywhere—but take my word for it, I was there.”

[Political Junkie Too]

Would it be racist to "shroud" Obama?

-PJ

[PapaBear3625]

The Obama history just becomes murkier and murkier. The more I hear about this guy the more I’m convinced he’s been “groomed” for what he’s doing now.

Obama appears to be a front man for several entities, mostly the Chicago Establishment, but with some possible connections to the Saudis.

And still the media declines to investigate his connection to Ayers, Khalid al-Masour, Rezko and Auchi

[del4hope]

I graduated from HS in the mid 70s. I had a single mom who was earning so little that I qualified for 100% financial aid. I went to college in the late 70s entirely pd for by grants, student loans, work study, and part time employment.

I have 4 points to make for comparison.

1) I was limited to where I could go to school, especially “out of state”. An Ivy League school was not possible. Also, keep in mind that Harvard required an application to get an application, at least for their undergrads.

2) There was no financial aid available for grad school. “Someone” would have had to pay for me to go.

3) When Reagan got in office in 80, there were even more restrictions put on available financial aid.

4) Lastly, I would have never had enough money to do drugs even if I wanted to. I could barely afford beer in those days. LOL

I have been suspicious of his ed background from the get go.
There is no difference between what I was offered and what he should have been offered. There is NO doubt that he had an idividual(s) sponsoring him.

[dennisw]

Unlike you many people are interested in whether Obama got in due to affirmative action. Obama has zero slave blood. It’s ridiculous for him to get affirmative action benefits since “his people” (Kenyans) never suffered from slavery or discrimination here

[palomonte]

I think affirmative action is ridiculous in any case - slave blood or not.

[dennisw]

Yeah but how does someone with no slave blood get on the affirmative action gravy train?

[Wallace T.]

You also have to consider the periods in which the candidates were educated and the colleges they attended. The military academies are academically rigorous, and in the era that Joe Biden and John McCain attended college, so were the Ivy League colleges. But Biden attended the University of Delaware at Newark and finished in the bottom one-quarter of his class. McCain likely has the edge here. By the period Sarah Palin and Barack Obama went to college, academic standards had declined seriously from where they had been in the 1960s. Barack Obama is an Ivy League graduate, but also an affirmative action beneficiary. Judging by his malapropisms and incoherence away from a teleprompter, gaffes which make Dan Quayle look like a modern day Cicero or Quintilian, Obama is not a well educated man, even in the superficial sense that Bill Clinton or John Kennedy were. Sarah Palin is still an unknown, but appears promising. However, her skills are likely mostly from life experience rather than formal academics.