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QotD: Celebrity Historian Dubs Obama a Genius, Without Evidence
Beschloss: “This is a guy [Obama] whose IQ is off the charts.”
Imus: “Well, what is his IQ?”
Beschloss: “Pardon?”
Imus: “What is his IQ?”
Beschloss: “Uh, I would say it’s probably — he’s probably the smartest guy ever to become president.”
The author of the article where I found this quote then comments, “On what actual evidence did “historian” Beschloss base his assertion? The SAT scores Obama refused to release? The college transcripts he also kept private? Any existing IQ scores he withheld?”
It’s revealing that Beschloss was unprepared for the most straightforward response to his statement. Imus’s “Well, what is his IQ?” is not a gotcha question. Beschloss viewed his comment as so obviously correct that he was nonplussed by Imus asking for details. Why does Bescholss view Obama as a genius? Is it because he repeated Leftist shibboleths that Beschloss thinks are the epitome of intelligence. Had Beschloss ever seen Obama struggle off Teleprompter? Beschloss is obviously a lazy expert.
In the age of Trump, many people are no longer willing to listen to such people, even if they claim to be conservative cognoscenti.
Published in Group Writing
According to PrepScholar, the average ACT score at Occidental is 30 (which is what they claim was BHO’s score), and the average SAT is 1320 (which is slightly less than what they claim for BHO).
More like a waterfront dive where the barmaid has a patch over one eye.
Bill Clinton was a “Rhodes Scholar,” but Al Gore was like Barack Obama, a mediocre student who:
He also “attended Vanderbilt University Divinity School (1971–72) on a Rockefeller Foundation scholarship for people planning secular careers.” (?)
If Al Gore avoided taking Math, his SAT score was a combo of Math and Verbal, and I sincerely doubt he came close to successful Engineering SAT scores.
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Sounds like they just took the Oxy average. The simple fact is that, due to affirmative action, if Obama had average scores for Oxy, he would have gotten into Cal or an Ivy instead.
A truly intelligent person, especially one who’s supposed to be a Constitutional Scholar and Professor, wouldn’t be so consistently wrong about the Constitution and etc.
But remember, he claimed racial/foreigner preference/affirmative action.
Ah, ha! So, there is a dark side. I thought as much. Thanks!
My dad likes to tell a story about how when he was a teenager the final exam represented 100% of a student’s grade for senior high school credits, and anybody could take the exam at the end of the year. He discovered he was missing a History credit so he borrowed the textbook from a friend and took the exam. The friend, who had perfect classroom attendance, was pretty mad that my dad scored higher on that exam despite never setting foot in the classroom.
He’s a constitutional expert in that he’s an expert at pushing the limits of what the Supreme Court will allow. That takes both education and talent.
(Counter-argument: In his short career as a practicing attorney, he never participated in any constitutional challenge before the Supreme Court. One could argue that the White House legal staff were the real experts.)
Who said I was successful? At the moment I am “Intermittently Non Essential”
Look at the ACT score.
1340 in 1979 was not a mediocre score. That’s top 5%-ish. For example, it easily qualifies for automatic acceptance into Mensa.
With my 1330 (and truly mediocre high school grades) I applied to three competitive colleges and was accepted at all three.
I know for a fact that in 1979 1340 was National Merit Scholar (99.5%+). I know because I was with a lower score.
That’s now. The test scores (and grade inflation thereof) have changed a *lot* since 1978/1979 (which is when Obama and I took the tests).
So that link has the ACT score of LBJ. Now call me skeptical but LBJ would have been in high-school in the mid 20’s I guess like 1926. Now the ACT wasn’t instituted until 1959. So did he take this test as an adult, while Vice President?
Yah.. I think we can safely assume these scores are pulled out of thin air. But even if they weren’t, can you even compare tests that are decades apart? How much have tests like the SAT and ACT changed over the decades? Is there even a standardized IQ test out there?
He could have gotten in as a foreign exchange student; they were desperate to boost their international/ racial diversity, and foreign students are not usually held to the same standards as Americans.
This tendency to assume a conclusion based on desires infects many places.
A church to which I previously belonged had a missions committee that vetted the missions the church supported. More than once when the committee asked a support-seeking organization about documented results and not just intentions, the organization had no data or evidence. The organization seemed to think that intentions or wanting to achieve a result were enough, and didn’t do any measuring of results to document their success. “Just believe us; we don’t need to produce evidence.”
My score in 1972 was 1390 and I was not a National Merit scholar. I probably could have improved it on a second try, but it sufficed to get me into an elite college.
Edit – MWM reminds me that the NMS was based on the PSAT. I don’t remember my score on that test.
I thought National Merit was based on the PSAT. I don’t remember what my score was on that, but I got a “letter of Commendation”. One of my older brothers was a Semi-Finalist. He also got an appointment to West Point.
Part of the reason SAT scores are so much higher are there are 3 700-point parts. When I took it in 1972, there were two.
The reason they want foreign students is that they pay full price. We know 0 didn’t do that, so it has to have been affirmative action.
Regardless, the claim that 0 was “the smartestest President, evah” is ludicrous on its face, and those purported SAT and ACT scores do nothing to change that.
They changed that back a few years ago. My kids recently took the PSAT, and it’s back to two tests.
This is true. I only took the PSAT as a Sophomore, but scored well enough I would have been a Semi-Finalist if I’d been a junior.
There’s a PIT story waiting to be written about why I didn’t take it again as a Junior.
I aced my SATs.
They said, “Sit here,” and I SAT for two hours.
I can’t remember how I did on that paper thingy they handed to me.
A year or after they rebased up SAT scores, I read an article congratulating the education establishment for the higher scores.
The fudging of data can be even more devious.
For example, in some (many? most?) climatology studies that examine the temperature record to determine if there’s a link between global temperature and CO2, when there are gaps in the temperature record they use computer models to estimate the missing data, and those models assume that there’s a link between global temperature and CO2.
It’s sorta kinda like if a study to determine a link between IQ and race filled in data gaps by assuming a link between IQ and race.
“The IQ number for this guy is smudged on the form.”
“Just plug in the average IQ for his race.”
About the first claim: the College Board actually wrote me a letter, and explained that, though I’d scored high enough, I wasn’t qualified because I was a Sophomore. I still have it somewhere. Right next to the letter from Drake University offering me a full scholarship based on my PSAT score. Not that I sent my scores to Drake, which I hadn’t even heard of prior, but that’s the sort of stuff one tends to keep.
I remember the incident clearly , it was hilarious , as I remember it Imus had to ask three times, the first two he went off on tangents about how lucky we are to have a President this smart. On the third try he asked ‘ Pardon? ‘ as if the question was an out of nowhere non sequitur. Then he said he didn’t have that information still sounding like he had no idea why it was being asked. Then bemused Imus said ‘You don’t know?!’
As recently as 2008 (my son) colleges were known to “buy” test scores. The young man carried a 3.6 GPA – a solid B+ – and a 1475 SAT, but his ACT score of 36 caught their attention. Had 2 colleges offer him full tuition sight unseen, and 2 others offer 75% (he ended up accepting one of the 75%). One of the school Deans confessed to me directly that they like to find “outliers” who skewed their average upwards.
I scored a 1300 on the then 1600 scoring test (new SAT has higher scores due to essay portion). At the time, it was considered the absolute minimum for consideration in Ivey league and my dad wanted me to retake it (I didn’t).
For both Obama and myself, our less relevant, but highly desired, characteristics would have been seriously bolstered by high scores (he, a minority, likely applying as a (african) foreign born student, and myself a girl declaring in math).