Obama's Mythical Intelligence

Much has been written about Obama's "mythical intelligence" by a media completely in the tank for the boy blunder. His intelligence is , in fact, a myth. Atlas reader Carolyn wrote an excellent  piece peeling back the layers of the mendacious narrative to uncover what a lightweight the Soros stooge really is. She describes the unmeritorious means Obama used to achieve his goals - particularly  President of the Law Review. When I was in Washington yesterday we were  discussing this little mentioned truth - Obama's year as President  produced little worthwhile or significant. Obama's year  is the least cited review. He produced nothing of import.

The smoke of Obama's 'intelligence' Carolyn 

Obama's much vaunted intelligence is in reality nothing but smoke and mirrors.   

As nearly everyone has noted lately, Obama's grasp on facts is being revealed as tenuous at best and embarrassing at worst, as evidenced by his recent gaffe about his uncle having 'liberated' Auschwitz when in fact NO American soldier did anything of the kind (in fact - as the quickest glance at a history book will tell you, no American soldier ever set foot in Poland where Auschwitz is located).  Now, this kind of lapse could be excused as a typical political mistake, etc. - but in Obama's case, that excuse can't be used.  It's not just because this type of typical 'political' mistake is what Obama has sworn he's not - i.e., a typical politician - more to the point, this silly mistake reveals Obama's ignorance of the bare minimum of historical fact.  And such ignorance shakes the very foundation of Obama's chief qualification for being President - i.e., Obama's vaunted intelligence.  Since everyone acknowledges he lacks experience for the job, the only reason left to support Obama's claim to the position is because of his intelligence.

Constant references have been given as to Obama's near-mythical intelligence - and over and over again, every one claims that the 'proof' of that intelligence is the fact that Obama was President of the Harvard Law Review.  And that is a staggering achievement.  Only the best and the brightest achieve that - only a student at the top of the grade scale, only a student of outstanding writing skills and superb legal acumen is accorded that honor.  It is such a high honor that this accomplishment follows that student through to the rest of his life - it is mentioned in his vitae, his honors, indeed in his very obituary as the incontestable proof of his intelligence.  Therefore, it is understandable that all doubts of Obama's intelligence are instantly assuaged by revealing he was President of the Harvard Law Review. 

Assuaged, that is, until one looks a bit closer.

To begin with, the NY Times 1990 article on Obama being elected President of the Harvard Law Review casts the first troubling clues that all is not what it appears to be. 

"Until the 1970's the editors were picked on the basis of grades, and the president of the Law Review was the student with the highest academic rank. Among these were Elliot L. Richardson, the former Attorney General, and Irwin Griswold, a dean of the Harvard Law School and Solicitor General under Presidents Lyndon B. Johnson and Richard M. Nixon.

That system came under attack in the 1970's and was replaced by a program in which about half the editors are chosen for their grades and the other half are chosen by fellow students after a special writing competition. The new system, disputed when it began, was meant to help insure that minority students became editors of The Law Review." 

There is the Achilles heel.  The former high standards which all previous Presidents of the Harvard Law Review had been forced to meet - grades, papers, etc.- no longer existed by the time Obama was elected.  Instead, the post was selected on something different than grades, papers, etc.  It was selected on race.  Obama was the 'right' race.  He was black.  Now of course, that doesn't mean Obama did NOT have intelligence - but what it makes clear is that by the time he was elected, Presidency of the Review no longer proved he DID.  Indeed, at the very moment of his election, the proof of his intelligence was so missing that his predecessor at the job refused to confirm it.  Of course, the predecessor trode very cautiously and carefully in his statement issued after Obama had just been elected - but the meaning was clear.:

"Mr. Obama succeeds Peter Yu, a first-generation Chinese-American, as president of The Law Review. After graduation, Mr. Yu plans to serve as a clerk for Chief Judge Patricia Wald on the of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. 

Mr. Yu said Mr. Obama's election ''was a choice on the merits, but others may read something into it.'' 

Mr. Yu's words are ominous - 'others may read something into it."  Clearly, Mr. Yu clearly can't say he's one of those 'others' recognizing 'merits' to instead mean 'race'.  After all, Yu sees which way the PC winds are blowing and he certainly doesn't want them howling in his face by saying Obama got his post for something other than his intelligence.  At the same time, however, Yu's unease at the choice of Obama is telling for what Yu does not say, as for what he does.  For instance, Yu does not cite Obama's grades nor does Yu cite Obama's legal writings.  Yu says nothing about them at all - and the silence is deafening.

Reading the NY Times further reveals other telltale signs that Obama did not possess the intelligence for that position.  As with Mr. Yu's painfully parsed statement, the signs are noticeable more for what they do not say, than for what they do. 

We begin with a brief explanation of the legal world Obama claims to belong to by reason of his intelligence.  That world is defined by 3 inescapable proofs of such intelligence.  They are: (1) high grades, (2) prestigious organizations (i.e, the Law Review) and (3) clerkship with a judge. 

We will begin with the first and most obvious sign of intelligence - grades. 

Obama doesn't have them.  Oh, he's given the aura of possessing them - but when one looks closely at that aura, it disappears like smoke before your eyes.  For instance, not once has anyone, ever, at any time, produced those grades.  In no publication, either Obama's or anyone else's, has any cite been made of that average - was it a 4.0?  (Straight A's?)  Was it even higher - 4.3?  (A+)  (And today's high school seniors are graduating with 5.0.)  Okay, how about a 3.9 or 3.8?  No.  The answer is none.  Never.  At no time have Obama's grades ever been cited.  And that is damning.  Because as any person who's ever graduated from elementary, high school or college will tell you, their grade point average is so close to their identity as to be the identity itself.  Therefore - for that 'identity' to be invisible as is the case with Obama, is quite revealing.  In plain words, if someone doesn't mention a high grade point average, it's for only one reason - there isn't a high grade point average.

(2) prestigious organizations

Yes, Obama was elected President of the law review.  But, as I've already cited, this election came when the qualifications of high grades had been eliminated.  Therefore one has to look at the other reasons for that election - which necessitates looking at how Obama was elected. 

As the NY Times article cites,  "Mr. Obama was elected after a meeting of the review's 80 editors that convened Sunday and lasted until early this morning, a participant said."  In other words, 80 people got together and in a wearying all night session in which fists were banged on the tables and the air was loud with 'we have to get a BLACK in this position, it's 1990, for crissakes and we haven't got one" - the weary people in the early morning hours, exhausted, worn out and unable, unwilling to fight any longer simply chose the only candidate they could think of to be President of the Review.  Obama. 

And if you think I'm laboring too much on the PC reasons for Obama's election, the NY Times itself describes the vicious political background against which Obama was elected.

"...Mr. Obama was the most prominent minority student on a campus shaken by racial politics. A group agitating for greater faculty diversity occupied the dean’s office and sued the school for discrimination; Derrick Bell, a black law professor, resigned over the issue.

The law review struggled to decide whether affirmative action should factor into the selection of editors, and how much voice to give to critical race theorists, who argued that the legal system was inherently biased against minorities."

Well, it is clear the committee choosing the President of the Review did 'factor in' affirmative action.  And it is just as clear they didn't factor in his grades.  Nor did they cite his papers written.  In fact, there was not a mention of either.  Instead, the committee abandoned them altogether and went to something completely unrelated - politics.  In citing Obama's qualifications, they pointed out that he had worked the political wards in Chicago before he came to Harvard.  You may well ask - what does this have to do with grades or legal acumen?  The answer is - nothing.  And the answer gets even more troubling when one then realizes that after Obama was elected to President of the Law Review, he wrote no papers.  That's totally unheard of.  Writing no papers for the Law Review is like taking a class in gymnastics without even putting on your leotards to work out.  The whole reason for existence of the Review is to write a paper.  And yet the very President of it writes none. 

(3) clerkship with a judge

This is a shocking failure of Obama's that he did not clerk with a judge after graduation.  The fact that it is a shocking failure is evidenced by the embarrassed committee admitting it up front so as to beat others to it.:

"The president of the law review usually goes on to serve as a clerk for a judge on the Federal Court of Appeals for a year, and then as a clerk for an associate justice of the Supreme Court. Mr. Obama said he planned to spend two or three years in private law practice and then return to Chicago to re-enter community work, either in politics or in local organizing." 

"..usually goes on to serve as a clerk".  This polite sentence means ALL Harvard Law Review presidents serve for judges after graduation.  Even Obama's predecessor, Mr. Yu, did that.  Indeed, Yu cited his clerkship with a judge so fast you almost thought it was part of his name.  And in a sense, it is.  There's a reason why ALL graduates who clerk with a judge trumpet their clerkships instantly in your face.  Clerking with a judge is the sign of a law graduate's intelligence.  Bar none.  That's why it's on their resumes, why it's the first thing they talk about in conversation "ah, yes, when I clerked with Judge so and so," etc.  It is so prestigious it's the first thing other attorneys cite when they discuss that particular person - 'Ah yes, HE clerked with Judge so and so", etc.  In short, clerkship is the shining golden symbol that this attorney is smart.  Why?  Because judges do not pick stupid people.  Why not?  Because the clerks oversee the papers for the judge, help write them, do the bulk of research for them, etc. The judge then stands on that work in reaching his decisions, rendering his judgment.  Thus, if the work produced by that clerk is faulty - which it will be if the clerk is stupid - than the judge pays for it with his own career, his own reputation.  And of course, no judge will do that.  Which is why no judge will hire a stupid clerk.   

Which thus brings us to the unstated but painfully obvious sign of Obama's lack of intelligence.  Despite holding the staggering position of the Harvard Law Review - NO judge, not one, not a single one, offered a clerkship to Obama.  It wasn't because Obama wasn't free for the asking.  As he made clear in his statement upon accepting the position of President of the Review, Obama eagerly made his availability known by declaring that he would be practicing law for 'two or three' years after leaving Harvard.  I.e., he was open for the clerk's position.  Except - no judge gave it to him.  None. 

And Obama painfully admitted he knew this would happen.  While other graduates went on to clerkships with judges, the Court of Appeals, even the Supreme Court, etc. or even to prestigious top flight law firms which take only the best of the best, Obama admitted he was not in line for any of that.  He would be going for something else.  The same 'something' which had landed him the title of President of the Harvard Law Review - but not the benefits of such.  Once the glitter and glisten of that title had worn off, the bare reality beneath was that Obama was nothing a politically glib individual able to talk well in abstract - but not produce in concrete.  And the judges had recognized that fact by refusing to give him a clerkship.  The brutally competitive law firms had also recognized that by not giving him a position at their firms.  Therefore, there was only one venue open to him - politics.  As the NY Times put it, Obama would be returning to Chicago to "re-enter community work, either in politics or in local organizing."   

Such then is the smoke and mirrors of Obama's vaunted 'intelligence'.  To this day, he has blown that smoke skillfully in the faces of the liberals to lull them into not asking questions - much the same way the ancient Kings of France blew smoke into the faces of their hunting birds to quieten and lull them into inaction.  The terrible problem is that modern bloody birds of prey like Ahmadinijad, Chavez and the Taliban, etc. are not lulled by smoke.  To the contrary, these terrorists have mastered the art of blowing their own smoke into the world's face to lull it into submission and inaction.  Such years of mastery means these terrorists will make short shrift of the untested Junior senator from Illinois's huffing and puffing.  Obama's smoke will be blown back instantly into his face by the hot breath of their hate and insane contempt for human life.

Which will leave Obama with only his intelligence to defend him - and us.  Unfortunately, as the above arguments sadly prove, Obama's intelligence itself appears to be smoke.  Thus leaving us with a potential Commander in Chief able to defend this country with --- what?

For this country's safety, we must pierce the smoke of Obama's 'intelligence' at the earliest possible moment.  If Obama's smoke of obfuscation obscures long enough to gain him the White House, that fatal smoke could be blown away only to reveal a greater smoke rising from the ruins of America - a deadly smoke which next time will surely dwarf the ghostly clouds which broiled up from the burning buildings and planes on 9/11.   

UPDATE: Alosio responded with this:

It looks like the Obama/Axelrod Committee for Reframing the Narrative has been busy for quite some time wallpapering  the issue of whether or not BO was asked to clerk: In a profile of "The Candidate" (The New Yorker, May 31, 2004), Axelrod tells William Finegan, writing for The Political Scene: "Abner Mikva, a five-term congressman from Illinois who was at that time Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. circuit, tried to recruit Obama as a clerk, a position considered a stepping stone to clerking on the Supreme Court, but Obama turned him down. “He could have gone to the most opulent of law firms,” David Axelrod, a longtime friend who is now Obama’s media adviser, said. “After Harvard, Obama could have done anything he wanted.” What he wanted was to practice civil-rights law in Chicago, and he did, representing victims of housing and employment discrimination and working on voting-rights legislation for a small public-interest firm. He also began teaching at the University of Chicago Law School, although he declined to pursue a tenure-track post, hoping to save time for politics." Mikva, a Carter appointee, was of course a Democratic Congressman from Chicago who once represented Hyde Park, graduated UofC School of Law and once taught at Northwestern -- no connections to Chicago political machine there, whatsoever, of course. Here's the New Yorker link

The overwhelming desirability of Obama as clerk is further reinforced in 2007 in "The Man That Got Away" from the Legal Reader, Wed., Dec. 12, 2007 (halfway down the page):

This links to an article by Tony Mauro of Legal Times, but it's a subscription site and I'm not buying.

The uniform suspension of disbelief, or even the most basic common sense, by the media has been wondrous to behold.

By the way, AFAIK, no transcripts of Obama's college years -- from Occidental, Columbia or Harvard -- have been released to date, and the media, after endless scrutiny of Bush's college years in '2000, complaineth not. It would suggest that not even affirmative action could sufficiently compensate for  Obama's intellectual shortcomings.

But Carolyn knows better. She replies:

Pamela, Mikva's claim that he 'tried to offer' a clerkship to Obama is bull.  There was no offer, no clerkship. 

Obama proves it.  And so does the Committee which elected him as President of the Harvard Law Review.  So does Obama's predecessor at the post, Mr. Yu.  And so does every single one of the publications at that time. 

NONE of them cite a clerkship.  If there had been, they would have.  But they didn't.  And the reason they didn't was because the offer didn't exist.  Ever.  And it was humiliating beyond words.  Indeed, the embarrassing spectacle of the President of the Review not receiving a single offer of clerkship (a deprivation which has never happened in the history of Harvard) was so humiliating that the committee had to instantly try to explain it away.  Obama didn't want it, they blathered, he was 'instead' going to be returning to Chicago to do something else.  That's how embarrassing it was - that they had to explain it away.

So, tell me - how on earth can a committee be embarrassed by Obama having no clerkship and yet simultaneously refuse to mention a clerkship?  Answer - there was no clerkship. 

Secondly - we now have the claim that Obama "could have gone to the most opulent of law firms".  Oh, really?  Name them.  Name a single firm that made him an offer.  If you were able to name the judge who made this mythical offer of a clerkship, you can certainly mention the law firm.  In fact, the law firm that did make that 'offer' would insist.  After all, law firms exist on their connections - and nothing, nothing is more prized than one's connection to the future President of the United States.  "Ah, yes, we offered the President a position.  We were that smart."  But do I hear a name of a firm, any name of a firm?  No?  Didn't think so.  Again, as with the 'clerkship', it's nothing but smoke and mirrors.

Finally - there's something else that about Obama's failure to get an offer from a prestigious law firm upon graduation.  What few people outside the legal world realize is that graduation is not the time when those offers are made - they're made years earlier.  Yes, a law school student receives his/her offer to join a prestigious law firm the FIRST year of graduate school.  Indeed, the offers begin by the middle of the first year when prestigious law firms descend on top law schools like locusts on succulent wheat to carry off the finest crop for themselves.  Tables are set up in the Commons, cards are handed out, letters are given, phone calls are made, etc.  The students are taken to dinners, to lunches, etc. where representatives of the law firm lean across the sparkling linen and the chilled glass of wine to tell the bright young student 'you'd really like our firm'.  Before Christmas is tolled, the student has already received countless offers - and made his/her choice.

My own law firm, for instance, has just received its first crop of Summer Associates.  They come from all over, Harvard, Yale, etc. to walk into our firm bright-eyed and eager to show their smarts.  They're given a generous monthly stipend, an office, a secretarial staff and then the student gets to work.  They turn out memos, they research, they stalk the library, they pull files, etc.  In short, they prove their mettle.  And, just as importantly, the law firm proves its.  There are banquets, cruises through the wine country, dinners with senior partners, lunches, etc. - all aimed at one goal - to persuade the bright young summer associate that he/she really really wants to choose this firm to work at after graduation.  Thus, when the summer is over and the student returns to their school to begin their second year, the law firm then waits with bated breath to see if the associate will agree to return the next year.  Of course, it is not unusual for a summer associate to pick a different law firm the following summer - but at the end of that time, everyone knows which firm they will pick.

One other point that must be made - all major law firms choose a specific kind of student to make offers to.  The firms do not choose on the basis of the student's major (i.e., whether he's criminal or civil or contract law, etc.)  The firm chooses on the basis of the student's intelligence.  And they do that by the student's grades.  Come on, this blather about 'no grades' given in law school is simply that - blather.  There IS a grade given on those students - and the firms know precisely what it is.  They know it so precisely that this is repeated ad nauseum when a firm brags about the high quality of their interns.  "We recruit in the top 10%."  Okay, so if the myth about 'no grades' is true, than how could there exist a 'top 10% of grades' to recruit from?  Answer - there are grades given - and the law firms know it.  They know your standing down to the littlest percentile.  And they know more than that - they know the quality of that standing.  As a matter of rule, lawyers pick students from schools which the lawyers themselves have already attended.  Thus, the lawyers know the profs - i.e., which are good profs, which are bad, and more importantly, which courses are harder and thus taken only by the brightest, the best students.  Trust me, the lawyers know the caliber of those students practically down to the socks they wear and the party they vote for.

Standing in that top 10% is so important, so necessary (in fact, high powered firms aim for  the top 5%) then it isn't worth it for you to waste your time submitting your resume to any of the firms if you're not in that percentile.  If you're not in that upper percentile, the only thing you pick is whether you want fries with your burger.

The point I'm trying to make is that the refusal of major law firms to make Obama an offer  was not a refusal made at his graduation - it was made years earlier.  In his first summer and his second.  And in those summers NO law firm picked Obama as a summer associate.  None.  Zip.  Nada.  Even by then, those firms (every single one of them crowded with Harvard law graduates) knew precisely the mettle of Obama, knew his courses, knew his work, his grades.  And as a result they all knew Obama wasn't smart enough to join them.

Obama and his handlers can blow all the smoke they want on law firms refusing to make him an offer.  But that smoke doesn't obscure the truth.  The truth that law firms didn't want Obama.  They didn't want him because he wasn't a sharp lawyer, he wasn't a smart lawyer.  Obama was only a glib, facile, political animal who used his race and not his brains to get him where he is.

Comments

[miira]

Pam, did you see this . . .
Crescent shapes with and without Islamic intent: the Obama logo example over at Error Theory?

The two most widely recognized symbols of Islam are the crescent and the sword. Kind of amusing that Barack Hussein Obama’s campaign logo can be seen to feature both a crescent and a curved Islamic scimitar

displayed with layered animation

[Francis W. Porretto]

Before Senator Obama, the previous presidential candidate bafflingly lauded for his high intelligence was Albert Gore. Like Obama, Gore had little else on his resume and espoused dangerously anti-freedom and anti-capitalism positions. More than coincidence?

Who is financing these candidates? Who is responsible for their ascendancy? Most critical of all, who is protecting them, their backgrounds, and their connections from proper exposure to the light of day?

[clyde]

Damn. After reading this, I realize that America will FINALLY discern the "benefits" of affirmative action and diversity in real time, if this empty suit is elected. God help us. Somebody has to.

[photoncourier.blogspot.com]

Extravagant claims were also made for the purported high intelligence of John Kerry. In both cases, verbal glibness is being confused with intelligence.

[Barbara]

Maybe we should focus on why McCain has to be the next President...

More support and good editorials on McCain..
please.

[Polymath]

What we are seeing in these gaffes is that this candidate is devoid of even elemental facts about American History.This is astounding.Memorial Day,July 4th, WW II?
I guess, Indonesia doesn't even teach elementary American History, nor high school, or Harvard, for that matter.
In regards to his Harvard career, did he write ANYTHING prior to becoming President of the Law Review for the Law Review, or any other significant publication? Did he write an Honors Thesis, a Senior thesis?
He's a perfect example of the demise of our educational system under the Liberal dunderheads.The dummies have been and are teaching the dummies.
He's no Thurgood Marshall, or George Washington Carver, nor is he in the ilk of
Barbara Jordan.
Let's face it, this is the Paris Hilton of the political, want-to-be presidential set.

[Mack the Nice]

As some of us are neither Democrat nor Republican, we who are immune to whatever form of mystification it is that generates partisan political thinking--well, it is always lots of fun to see how it is for the Republican admirers of G.W. Bush, that a man like Barack Obama will just have to look pretty dimtwo books on the market or no two books.

And as to the Democrat type thinking? I just heard Sen. Barbara Boxer on C-SPAN saying, on the subject of air-bags, that "we who know the truth" were first to be there.

I mean, why should anyone look further, for the truth than that? I don't think any Hindu guru sitting naked on a ledge of the Himalayas could have zeroed in on the question of what truth really is, any quicker or better than Sen. Barbara Boxer.

Does G.W. Bush know the truth? Should he be sitting somewhere out on a ledge in the Himalayas, mystically knowing, as we say, "the truth"--about permanent tax-cuts?

About air-bags?

Brethren! Sisters! Never fail to seek after the truth, and the truth will blow up in your face and pin you to your seat, cut your taxes, and "set you free!"

Truth is like that.

[PTG]

Most revealing. Too bad for Barack that there isn't an affirmative action plan in effect for the coming Presidential election.

[Jared Lee]

You write "In plain words, if someone doesn't mention a high grade point average, it's for only one reason - there isn't a high grade point average."

Maybe you'd care to explain how it is that Obama graduated Magna Cum Laude if he did not have a high GPA? I know different universities have varying standards, but at my school, Magna Cum Laude meant a GPA of 3.7-3.85.

Thus the fatal flaw of your logic. If he did not have a high GPA, than he could not have graduated with honors. However, he did graduate with honors, which is not something which proven wrong by anything written here.

[palad006]

I agree, please address the magna portion of his track record at Harvard Law. You are omitting this information.

[JJ-L]

I'm an independent and suddenly became curious to find out the IQ' scores of our candidates. (And when I say independent, I mean I have actually voted for both Democratic and Republican candidates in presidential elections.) I came upon your article and now having read it and the articles that you cite as your sources, I think your political allegiances (or dislike for Obama) are showing in your conclusions. I agree that both the modified selection process to be editor of the HLR and election for the position of President of the HLR are probably less indicative of intelligence (“probably” because the conclusion assumes a direct correlation of grades to intelligence and does not account for over/under-achieving), but you make a huge assumption that Obama’s selection was not based upon his grades, even going so far as to infer the opposite meaning to the plain language of Mr. Yu’s outgoing statements. One thing you overlook is that Obama graduated from Harvard Law School magna cum laude, which means his grade point average fell somewhere within the top 10% of the class, according to the Harvard Law School’s definition of magna cum laude. However, by not graduating summa cum laude, we also know that his grade point average was not 7.2 or higher (an A having a value of 7.0 and an A+ a value of 8.0). You also incorrectly state that no prestigious law firm selected Obama to be a summer associate. However, it is widely published that he served as a summer associate for Sidley Austin LLP (the 6th largest US corporate law firm) in 1989.

[coreground]

For harvard:
the degree magna cum laude is for those who have attained eighty per cent on the general scale, or have received Honors in any department, and carries with it the assignment of a dissertation;

[dmcongram]

Terrific article. Thank you for great reading. Of course the big deal about his intelligence comes from liberals trying to make us forget the Bell Curve.