Three weeks ago, Time magazine published a gooey profile of "brash and brilliant" Larry Summers, the chief economic guru to President Obama. Newsweek followed suit in this week’s edition, calling Summer "lucid" and "dazzling," a man who stands out on "a team of Harvard and Yale types whose SAT scores have not been equaled since the Kennedy administration."
Michael Hirsh and Evan Thomas probably didn’t undertake an investigative survey of the SAT scores of the cabinet officers of Reagan or Bush or Nixon or even Bill Clinton. They’re guessing, but are trying hard to spin readers into thinking a wave of intellect has swept over Washington. But are Summers and Company "lucid" because they’re liberal, or are they liberal because they’re "lucid"? Here’s the passage where the praise flows like syrup:
Last spring and summer he began to see that government's normal machinery for stabilizing the economy – the ability of the Federal Reserve to raise and lower interest rates and print money – was not working to head off a crash. He began writing lucid op-eds in the Financial Times arguing for swift government intervention and – more important – giving smart briefings to Sen. Barack Obama, Democratic candidate for president. The briefings were so good – dazzling, all present agree – that, when the time came, Obama made Summers his chief economic adviser.
Summers, 54, is perhaps the brainiest of the best and brightest assembled by Obama. The president has assembled a team of Harvard and Yale types whose SAT scores have not been equaled since perhaps the Kennedy administration.
At least the Newsweek duo is sharp enough to underscore that good test scores don’t always mean policy success:
JFK brought in the likes of McGeorge Bundy, who had been appointed dean of the faculty at Harvard at 34 and whom JFK made his national-security adviser. Bundy turned out to be smart but not always wise – he urged JFK, then LBJ, to become more deeply involved in Vietnam.
Hirsh and Thomas seem worried that for all his newfound humility and openness to new ideas, Summers will end up being a Republican wolf in sheep’s clothing:
While some economists have advocated even greater government intervention to solve the current crisis, including nationalizing troubled banks, Summers seems to be trying hard to avoid swinging back too far toward overregulation. "He's very much a market man. He'll come out more on the side of lighter regulation," says political consultant David Gergen, an old friend.
The "new Larry" may turn out to be like the "new Nixon."
—Tim Graham is Director of Media Analysis at the Media Research Center.
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The president has assembled
February 23, 2009 - 23:06 ET by motherbeltThe president has assembled a team of Harvard and
Yale types whose SAT scores have not been equaled since perhaps the Kennedy administration.
Perhaps, and perhaps not.
Newsweek doesn't have a clue what any of these guys' SAT scores were, nevermind those of Kennedy's guys!!
Just like Michael Beschloss, who told Don Imus that Obama's IQ was "off the charts." When Imus innocently asked him what Obama's IQ is, he said he guessed he was probably the "smartest man ever to become President." Imus asked again, and Beschloss had to admit he didn't know. (But he apparently knows it's off the charts.)
These libs are not used to having their assertions questioned, and being required to actually have a basis for their claims.
I didn't think it was physically possible, but this both sucks and blows. -Bart Simpson
mb... Oh you do refresh
February 23, 2009 - 23:08 ET by bigtimermb...
Oh you do refresh the memory, although it really wasn't that long ago, I happened to have it on Imus that morning when that happened....I could have kissed Imus, he was at his best there with Beschloss that morning.
And then Imus said that his
February 23, 2009 - 23:21 ET by motherbeltAnd then Imus said that his own was 164, which Beschloss said was well above genius level...
But no matter, Beschloss knows Obama is the smartest President E-VERR!! <Valley Girl accent>
I didn't think it was physically possible, but this both sucks and blows. -Bart Simpson
He's so smart
February 24, 2009 - 00:36 ET by KC MulvilleThey say this to prevent anyone from questioning any further. If a genius says something, who are we non-geniuses to question it? They want the title of genius to carry its own self-verification.
It seems that liberals will do anything to avoid a defense.
Evening KC... You summed
February 24, 2009 - 00:46 ET by bigtimerEvening KC...
You summed it up perfectly for me in a nutshell.
Center my @ss
February 23, 2009 - 23:03 ET by Mother0bama is about as far left as you can go and his true colors are starting to shock and awe the idiot centrists who helped vote his ugly arse in.
Get ready for a lot of wringing of hands and weeping into sleeves as the over-the-top Democratic power grabs become so blatantly obvious that even the smallest cretin mind can grasp it.
Lucid and dazzling? Great! Another political idiot who can do "Jazz hands" while they shuck and jive you behind the scenes.
Funny how the pansy assed Ivy League pussified pundits and political main players will NEVER be touched personally by the financial maelstrom. To Barack and his ilk, playing Monopoly is like the kid aiming his sun reflective magnifying glass at random ants and laughing with heartless glee.
Say What? SAT scores from 1960 ?
February 23, 2009 - 23:18 ET by Dont_Like_TheBluesI wish I had more time to dedicate to this post but it's getting a little late.
First in 1960/61 (JFK elected in 1960 and formed cabinet in early 1961) to the best of my knowledge SATs didn't exist (please let me know if I'm wrong on this point), at least not the way that the SAT / standardized testing business does since the mid 1970s. They definitely did not exist when JFK and his cabinet were in high school & applying to college or going off to war.
Secondly WHAT THE HECK IS SOOOO IMPORTANT ABOUT STANDARDIZED TEST RESULTS ? Real world practical business experience is what's important. Even if someone had a 4.0 GPA and spent their life in academia, it does NOT mean squat in the real world.
Third, the quote :
"He's very much a market man. He'll come out more on the side of lighter regulation," says political consultant David Gergen, an old friend.
So far I don't see anyone in this admin' pushing for LESS government regulation.
Good Night .....
Smart RICH people
February 23, 2009 - 23:18 ET by JWFLast spring and summer he began to see that government's normal machinery...was not working to head off a crash.
If he was so smart, whyfor did he not short the ENTIRE shadow banking line of stocks and take the TRILLIONS he would have made and solved the entire financial problem by his own self.
Sincerely,
a Veteran of a 1000 psychic wars.
This didn't help either...
February 23, 2009 - 23:44 ET by Clear thinkerThis didn't help either... I Hate AP News Service
Making Fun of AGW http://giovanniworld.wordpress.com/
could someone please clarify something for me?
February 24, 2009 - 00:44 ET by pmohbucki'm 42 years old with a bachelor's degree from virginia tech ... i am employed by udsa rural development ... my question is simple:
what in the hell does a standardized test score that someone takes when they are 17 years old (SAT) have to do with fixing our economic situation? aren't most of these people in their 50s and 60s now? i thought once i got into college, my SAT scores meant nothing. am i to surmise that if i screw up at work, i can mount a defense by referencing the spelling tests i aced in 3rd and 4th grade?
seriously, is anyone falling out of their chair when they read a "news" magazine referring to high school test scores taken 40+ years ago as defense to the president implementing a plan that is nothing short of stealing our childrens' future earnings?
and another thing ... what was so great about the kennedy administration anyway? am i suppose to cheer the move to send american "advisors" to vietnam ... the first major step to a war that killed almost 59,000 americans? celebrate the fact he almost took us to the brink of a nuclear war with the soviet union? appreciate the fine example the president set by regularly cheating on his wife? i seriously don't get it ... kennedy may have been popular, but his short term as president isn't something most americans would want to relive, now that we know the outcome of some of his decisions.
addict
February 24, 2009 - 08:38 ET by DontFeedTheTrollsDon't forget that Kennedy was also addicted to prescription painkillers, a foible the left says (at least in the case of Rush Limbaugh) disqualifies your discourse from relevance.
D
Keep the ILLEGALS out, join NumbersUSA to send free faxes to your reps.
I lost on Jeopardy, Baaaaaybeee!
February 24, 2009 - 01:19 ET by Joe BlogsHere's the deal. People who score tops on the SAT also score tops on the PSAT. So all one needs to do to find out if someone has an IQ over 145: check to see if they are a National Merit Scholar. Ben Bernake was. Robert Reich was. Here's a hoot: Steven Chu, the Nobel Laureate Energy secretary, was not. Neither were Hilary Clinton, Bill Clinton, Tim Geithner, Rahm Emanuel, nor...wait for it:
Barak or Michelle. In fact, not a single member of Obama's cabinet was a National Merit Scholar. I didn't even bother to check Hilda Solis.
JB... This was enough to
February 24, 2009 - 01:27 ET by bigtimerJB...
This was enough to get a chuckle out of to end the evening for me.
Thanks...
Btw...post more often...glad to meet you by the way, have a good time here...it can get addictive.
So now we're picking our
February 24, 2009 - 01:55 ET by marvlSo now we're picking our leaders based on SAT scores and collegiate pedigree? God help us.
Whenever people bring up this kind of nonsense I always think of Wm F Buckley Jr's famous quip, which goes more or less, "I'd rather entrust the government of the United States to the first 400 people listed in the Boston telephone directory than to the faculty of Harvard University."
All of our problems caused by smart people
February 24, 2009 - 06:55 ET by richb313All of the problems facing this country right now, especially the economic ones, have been brought to us by smart people. Intelligence is and never has been an indicator of how well someone will perform at a particular task. All that intelligence is supposed to indicate is how easily someone is supposed to comprehend new information. Remember that the bad paper that was written by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac was sold to other Banks etc. Then it was rolled into a complicated investment scheme that was created by former Rocket Scientists and Mathematicians. The result is that now no one can put a value on these investments. It has never been about Smart People being able to better Govern, Manage or Lead.
The mantra in the Kennedy Administration was the Best and the Brightest. Experience counts a lot more than smart. Experience alone is not enough if a healthy dose of common sense along with honesty is not included. One of my favorite Presidents, Harry Truman (I don't care if he was a Democrat) was never considered smart. He did however have more common sense than the whole of Washingtons clattering class. The only reason he became Vice President was that the Democratic Machine at the time wanted to muzzel him and stop him from ivestigating the corruption in Government Contracts. They had tried to stop him by defunding his commitee. That did not stop Truman. Truman had many good qualities but the main one was common sense. Truman left office with perhaps the lowest approval rating of any modern President until GWB. Historians in the last 1 or 2 decades have come to realise how good a President he really was.
Smart has never and will never be an indicator of how well someone will do at a job, especially when so much is a stake.
Yesterday the Dow broke a decade+ record
February 24, 2009 - 07:18 ET by TheHistorianYesterday, the Dow went the lowest in 12 years; yessir, boys and girls, that is lower than at ANY time during Prez Shrub's and the sneaky Repubicans tenure in office. And to whom do we owe this? Why it is Prez BO and his Dumbocrats who have brought this wonderful market to us.
I will not be surprised when George Soros shows up richer. After all, who else has the capital to cause the run on the money markets last September if it is not Soros and his ilk doing a coordinated "October surprise" a little early? Couple that with Frankie Raines and his mob who left Fannie Mae looking like the White House after 8 years of Clinton, and you now have all of the guilty parties assembled. And not a Repubican in the group.
Now Prez BO says he will save our failing Social Security by socializing health care. He thinks he can save Soc Security (and Medicare which is in the red already) from going into the red by "administering" his way out? You who think he is the smartest man; how can he save 27% of Social Security by adding another albatross, unless he intends to take in more money on health care taxes than he spends. Probably going to buy wheelchairs instead of hip replacements, oxycotin instead of chemotherapy, and lots of other "cost saving" moves.
The only group stupider than Obama is the 50+ percent that voted for him. You now have the Prez you hoped for and you wanted change; welcome to "Change". May God have mercy on your soul; Obama owns your wallet.
"What experience and history teach is
this - that people and governments never have learned anything from history,
or acted on principles deduced from it."
G. W. F. Hegel
That's funny
February 24, 2009 - 07:29 ET by 10ksnookerI really never thought of Marxism as being complicated and requiring deep thought.
I just thought the tyrants promised the ignorants other people's stuff for free, and the people who workled, usually in the minority, either paid up, or were marched off to the gulags. What's so complicated.
The funny thing is that
February 24, 2009 - 19:48 ET by RR GOPThe funny thing is that these Latte Liberals view the vast majority of Democrats (especially those in the fly-over areas) as dumb, racist, gun-toting, Bible-thumping rednecks, even tell them so in public...and they vote for these guys anyway!
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!
One of the 24% who thinks George W. Bush was a great President. One of the 89% who wants to bring back the stock and pillory.