<p>calmom - the subject of AA was only brought up b/c of this statement by NJ:</p>
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<p>I agree completely that BO is clearly intelligent and articulate (I don’t agree that he is such a fabulous public speaker however). Regardless of how one gets into an Ivy, they still have to have the chops to stay & graduate. Given that BO was the President of the Harvard Law Review as well, I don’t think anyone can dispute his intelligence.</p>
<p>Again, AA was only brought up in the context of “privilege”. </p>
<p>But btw -there’s no doubt that Obama was smart enough to graduate but could he have gotten IN in the first place w/out AA?</p>
<p>We don’t know, do we? But he was deemed smart enough by his peers to be elected head of the Harvard Law Review, and there is only one head at a time, not several thousands.</p>
<p>Now, I don’t think that McCain would have made it into the Naval academy without his family history, nor would GWB. McCain excelled at wrestling in high school (no doubt a great qualification for POTUS) and managed to graduate 894 out of 899.</p>
<p>Legacy status until very recently was pretty potent and continued to be so long after AA was introduced.</p>
<p>Why woundn’t he have gotten accepted? The only thing that would have kept him out would have been racial prejudice or possibly lack of financial aid. I mean, it seems likely that he had the grades and test scores to be well qualified for admission at every step of the way. </p>
<p>He attended a well-regarded [private high school](<a href=“http://www.punahou.edu/page.cfm?p=11”>http://www.punahou.edu/page.cfm?p=11</a>) in Hawaii. He started college at Occidental in LA, which at the time was not selective. (Good school, but it would have been a safety for my kids). As I noted, at the time when he transferred to Columbia, Columbia was not all that selective either – I think they took about 50% of their applicants. </p>
<p>Obviously, his background might have been something of hook – but there is no evidence that Obama didn’t have the grades and test scores in the first place.</p>
<p>Just for fun – while researching Obama’s high school I came across a You Tube video showing him playing basketball in high school. I’m told that we can’t post YouTube links here, but you can find this by Googling, “Classic Obama: His highschool basketball days”</p>
<p>Further research led me to discover this tidbit: “Barack Obama Led Occidental College Basketball Team In Scoring In 1979”. Since Obama was not rich - he attended his private high school on a scholarship – I’m wondering whether it was the basketball that got Obama into his first college. I have found from other sources that while Obama had a mean jump shot, he was not the best player on his high school team (which won the state championship the year Obama graduated) … but I can see that being the key to recruitment at a Div III college.</p>
<p>marite - there is MUCH more to ranking at USNA than grades (Regular Physical Readiness Tests, Company Officer Ranking, even Peer Ranking & other stuff I can’t think of right now). Those guys have constant inspections (rooms & uniforms), drill & parades, formations, Saturday Morning Training, Summer Training, Watch Standing, and tons of other stuff that reflects on your OOM (Order of Merit) which is their term for ranking. Not to mention that the whole place is full of “hard chargers”. (My youngest DS commented during one visit at age 13, “It’s like being surrounded by 4000 James Bonds!”).</p>
<p>Who knows, McCain might’ve been shooting for the “anchor” position (last in the class) b/c tradition holds that the Anchor collects a dollar from each of his classmates.</p>
<p>The point is… while McCain was (apparently) striving to be the bottom of his class, Obama was trying to be at the top. (Law Review in law school is generally a plum assignment reserved for the best student). There is a huge difference between someone who wants to be the best and someone who has content with being the worst, however the ranking is determined.</p>
<p>In fairness to McCain, he may have just been slow to grow up and get serious. We’re all works in progress, which is why I shrugged off Michele Obama’s supposedly “radical” senior thesis, written at age 21, or Barak’s drug use as a young man.</p>
<p>bz: Understood: But if he was shooting for last, he failed. And despite all the non-academic stuff, I still contend that it takes some doing to rank that low. Otherwise, if academics are so unimportant, I’m going to revise my confidence in our navy.</p>
<p>It would’ve been nice if we had a presidential candidate that had attributes of both Obama and McCain. Unfortunately, we don’t! So for me it comes down to experience. Obama needs more seasoning to get my vote! Less rhetoric and more accomplishments, it’s his achilles heel !!</p>
<p>And McCain’s Achilles’ heel, it seems clearer to me all the time is his lack of wisdom in foreign policy and his vague economic plans. The Economist has a good article comparing McCain’s and Obama’s; it’s critical of both.</p>
<p>Marite - where did you get the idea that Academics are “unimportant”? I never said that - only that there is much more that goes into ranking than just academics (& lots more expected of the Midshipmen as well).</p>
<p>USNA is one of the top 5 Engineering Schools in the country - no need to worry about the Navy.</p>
<p>So, he mus have been pretty bad across the board, both in academic and non-academic fields? As I said, it takes some doing to be graduating so low.</p>
<p>As I’ve outlined numerous times on these boards, a poor student at USNA is still MILES above the top students at most other schools.</p>
<p>Just graduating at all is a HUGE accomplishment. Let’s not rehash this AGAIN!</p>
<p>Man, I’m really gonna have to prepare some “copy & paste” documents for CC - the same stuff keeps getting brought up over & over! I thought we had put that whole “class rank” issue to rest. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>Oh my goodness, do you even know what you and marite were arguing about? Do you know why he or she said, “Otherwise, if academics are so unimportant, I’m going to revise my confidence in our navy?”</p>
<p>It’s because you were arguing that we couldn’t accurately determine whether or not McCain was a poor student because rank at USNA is not solely based on academics.</p>
<p>However, marite and I are not inferring that McCain was a poor student because of his rank; we knew he was a poor student because he said so. He has admitted to being a “D” student–which is something you claim to have already known.</p>
<p>If you know all this already, why are you still arguing about it?</p>
<p>Which top other schools? Granted, the Ivies do not have non-academic subjects as part of their graduation requirements; but a D student is a D student.</p>