Donald Trump has now totally, undeniably injected race into presidential contest with his attack on Barack Obama's educational credentials.
"I heard he was a terrible student, terrible. How does a bad student go to Columbia and then to Harvard?" Trump told the Associated Press.
"I'm thinking about it, I'm certainly looking into it. Let him show his records."
Obama graduated from Columbia in 1983 after transferring from Occidential College. After working as a community organizer, he went to Harvard Law School where he graduated magna cum laude in 1991. He was president of the Harvard Law Review.
"I have friends who have smart sons with great marks, great boards, great everything and they can't get into Harvard," Trump said. "We don't know a thing about this guy."
The implication here, of course, is that Obama was somehow cut an unfair break because he is black. It's a fantasy that plays to one of the most cherished beliefs of angry whites who think they've been passed over for jobs and promotions because of affirmative action. The sky-high unemployment rate for African-Americans ought to burst this racist bubble, but the delusion lives on, and Donald Trump is happily feeding this prejudice.
In point of fact, Trump's own educational background is more shrouded in mystery than Obama's. Trump -- who continually tells interviewers that he is a very smart person who went to great schools -- attended a small private school in Queens before his parents shipped him to off to the New York Military Academy.
After graduating from the military school in 1964, Trump spent a couple of years at Fordham and then transferred to the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School. What explains Trump's jump from Fordham to the Ivy League? Could it have been the influence of his wealthy father?
We don't know a thing about this guy.
The former casino operator has been pushing the race button for some time with his fact-free "birther" claims. He professed outrage at the idea that his charges -- including allegations that Obama could not possibly have written Dreams from My Father -- were racist.
"I have a great relationship with the blacks. I've always had a great relationship with the blacks," he told an Albany radio station in an echo of the some-of-my-best-friends-are-black defense.
Trump draws most of his GOP support from birthers, according to a recent poll. For these voters, opposing Obama's policies and his track record isn't enough. They deny the legitimacy of Obama's presidency by claiming he was born in Kenya. Ergo, the United States doesn't have a black president. A comforting thought, no doubt, for these folks.
If Trump is going to keep wading in this muck, the least he could do is set an example. Let's see admission records and transcripts of Trump's grades. And since we're on the subject of documents, it's worth noting that Trump graduated from Penn in 1968, at the height of the Vietnam War.
But he never served a day in the military. He told Fox's Channel 5 news in New York that this was just a phenomenal stroke of luck. Trump claims that his number in the draft lottery was so high that he was never called to serve.
"I actually got lucky because I had a very high draft number... Do you remember those days? You're too young," he told the newsman who popped the question.
If anything cries out for documentation, it's Donald Trump's military history. Draft records, please.
Have you ever heard Trump credit his parents for anything? Anything? He also never mentions his siblings because he won't allow himself to be upstaged by any of their accomplishments.
Wanting to look important by puffing up your own accomplishments is one thing, but doing so by denying others their own accomplishments, by creating contrast where there is none, is pathetic. That is the essence of Donald Trump.
Thank goodness for Affirmative Action. The reason government needs to regulate is because others don't self-regulate. It's been a shame that minorities (including women and those with disabilities not just those of ethic, religious or racial diversity) have been denied their natural rights in a country that is the beacon of personal freedom because of the HUGE amount of immigration over the centuries.
Being against Affirmative Action is racism!
That is all.
Remember...
http://www.life.com/hdgallery/42102/lifes-best-vietnam-photos#index/2
so easily, simply by maligning the President and attacking him ? And, you are an instant presidential
candidate ? Why don't we have a new party, a hate party ?
I see so many posts with people calling him the "worst president ever."
Really? Really? The worst? Ever?
Worse than Nixon who pretty much was a part of a conspiracy to commit a felony?
Worse than George W. Bush who got us into Iraq under false pretenses?
Worse than Hoover who is widely regarded to have pretty much dug America deeper into the Great Depression.
Keep in mind I am not saying that any of these men were the worst presidents ever. That is up for debate.
I am not saying that President Obama is the Best President Ever.
I am saying that to call him the worst, when there are plenty of examples of the worst that actually have historical context, is based in racism.
And this is just another example of it.
It is subjective when someone says he is the worst president ever, and race has nothing to do with it. It is merely the opinion of the person making the comment.
By the same measuring stick, calling George Bush the worst president ever is racist. particularly if your race is different then his.
If you call George Bush the worst president ever, then there is historical context to do it.
If you want to call Jimmy Carter the worst president ever, you have historical context to back that up.
That doesn't exist here.
President Obama hasn't even served a full term yet.
At this point anyone who says that he is the "worst president ever" more than likely has a problem with the fact that he is Black.
Whether they want to admit it to themselves or not.
Bush got us int a war to save, Iraqis, Kurds, Kuwaitis, Iranians, 2 million died before his intervention.
What`s the Diff ???
When is he going to Save the Syrians... over 500 perished so far, What about the 35,000 Mexicans ??
1. He's trying to make other extreme Repugnut candidates look more moderate. This, in order to help a radical right candidate do well in the general election (see, we nominated a 'moderate'!)
2. He's sumultaneouly trotting out the race crap (he's black) and the elitist crap (oooohhh, he's an Ivy League elitist!). This scores doubly well with the ignorant racist constituency. The Flat-Earther-Birthers will eat it up.
I guess the biggest revelation to me in American politics in the last 25 years, is just how many certifiably insane people there really are out there in the American hinterland. Who ARE these people? There are clearly millions of them who deny all reality, and whose thought processes and models of reality are just flat bonkers!
That any candidate thinks that lying in such a nasty, yet easily refutable, manner is really, really shocking. It is an incredibly cynical condemnation of the American voter. It is ... sick.
The name calling diminishes your argument, and lowers perceptions of your intelligence.
Yeaaah
Something else, Ive never heard Obama recite the alphabet. Has anyone ever heard him recite the alphabet?
I don't know. You would think a guy who is said to be so smart could recite the alphabet.
This could be cleared up if he would just recite the alpahbet. Why dosn't he just recite the alphabet?
I heard he spent 2.3 million dollars to not recite the alphabet after the election.
I dont know. He should just recite the alpahbet and we could move on. Why dosn't he just recite the alphabet?
This isn't going to go away.
The Donald