Wednesday, October 1, 2008

Is Obama Intelligent Enough to Be President?

Is Obama Intelligent Enough to Be President?
Dr. Clifton Chadwick

One of Barack Obama’s major selling points is that he is intelligent. This is what has been said.

* Obama is a graduate of Columbia University and Harvard Law School, where he served as president of the Harvard Law Review.
* Obama worked as a community organizer and practiced as a civil rights attorney before serving in the Illinois Senate from 1997 to 2004.
* He taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School from 1992 to 2004.

Neither Palin (Bachelor in Journalism) nor John McCain (graduate from the U.S Naval Academy, near bottom of class) can top such educational merits. He is thoughtful and, as his own VP candidate says, articulate.

Sounds good.

Intelligence is a term to describe a property of the mind that encompasses many related abilities, such as the capacities to reason, to plan, to solve problems, to think abstractly, to comprehend ideas, to use language, and to learn. It includes breadth of storage capacity and speed of response. Good solutions to problems, a wide range of general and specific knowledge and quick reactions are typical signs of high intelligence. Let us concentrate on reasoning, thinking abstractly, problem solving, and quick thinking and good use of language

Quick thinking and use of language
First, when Rick Warren of Saddleback Church asked Obama if life begins at conception, Obama's non-response ran was as follows:

"From a theological perspective or scientific perspective, answering that question with specificity, you know, is above my pay grade."

Many have pointed out that the response was glib, flippant and inadequate. Presidents should not consider moral issues above their pay grade. This was not a positive example of quick thinking.

Second, many people gave Obama the benefit of doubt on the Bacongate thing. Several said that Obama couldn't possibly be so dumb and mean enough to call Palin a pig. But if he is so intelligent why did he not see that putting a pig and lipstick in the same sentence was going to be so interpreted? Personally I think it might have been a slip, but when the audience reacted as it did, he should have known he was in trouble and later should have explained himself better. Not explaining suggests that he knew what he was doing. He did not make the intelligent move.

Third, the latest of these gaffes came just a few days ago. Asked about his advert saying McCain could not send an email, he was told
“It paints him as an old man. You say he can’t use a computer, he’s never sent an e-mail. What does that all mean?” Cuomo asked.
“What it means is that we’ve got a 21st century economy. And John McCain does not have a vision for how to move that forward,” Obama replied.

Obama rejected suggestions that his campaign ad was a low blow.
“If we’re going to ask questions about, you know, who has been promulgating negative ads that are completely unrelated to the issues at hand, I think I win that contest pretty handily,” Obama said.

Yes, he does seem to be winning negativity quite handily.

Fourth, several commentators have said the Barack is good as long as he is reading from a teleprompter, but looks bad when he speaks extemporaneously. For example,

"Democrats know something, and desperation is setting in. They have a novice campaigner who wanders off message." (Jim Wooten , September 12, 2008, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

"Barack Obama is a lot like Sean Penn or George Clooney. If you give him a script, he can deliver it pretty well. But if he tries to talk without a script that has been written for him by others, he quickly reveals that he is poorly-informed if not downright ignorant. Today he delivered another classic, by claiming that if only we would all properly inflate our tires, we could save as much gasoline as "all the oil that they're talking about getting off drilling."(powerlineblog)

"Barack Obama without a teleprompter is an accident waiting to happen. Sometimes he reveals his ignorance of history, sometimes he stumbles incoherently, and sometimes he blurts out what he really believes. That's what happened today when Obama tried to talk about Georgia, a topic that has embarrassed him more than once already, beginning when, in the first hours after the invasion, he parroted the Russian line. "

About his verbal swiftness, Democratic lobbyist Lawrence F. Obrien, III said: "People like to say he is a black Jack Kennedy. Fine, up to a point. Kennedy was smart, elegant, very well spoken, slim, handsome -- but, he also was Irish. Sharp, quick and abundant sense of humor, able to make contact with people."

Extemporaneous speaking is a hallmark of intelligence. I hope you see what I mean about quick verbal facility, repartee, the kind of thing Kennedy and Johnson both had, but Obama does not have.

Reasoning and thinking abstractly
There are so many examples of problems here that I have just had to choose some of the more egregious and flagrant ones.

First, remarkably, Barack Obama has decided to take on John McCain on the subject of earmarks. This is somewhat like Al Capone taking on Eliot Ness on the subject of bootlegging. The McCain campaign released this response:

While Senator McCain has never requested a single earmark, Senator Obama has requested nearly a billion dollars worth during his short time in office. Though Senator Biden has been in the Senate for 36 years, he has only disclosed his earmarks for one year.

Senator Obama increased his earmark requests during each of his first three years in office. Governor Palin has cut requests for earmarks for Alaska by $150 million since entering office, and she has cut those requests every single year. She has also vetoed a half billion dollars in wasteful spending at the state level.

One might ask, what makes Obama think he can get away with this nonsense, when the facts are the precise opposite of his claims? But you know the answer to that question.

Second, for a guy with a reputation for being smooth, Barack Obama stumbled badly when he was pressed, only mildly, by a reporter in a campaign appearance in Pennsylvania recently:

It is striking how naive Obama sounds when he talks about foreign policy. He proposes keeping a "strike force" either in Iraq or somewhere nearby--presumably closer than Okinawa--to "deal with potential problems that might take place in the region." But that isn't a policy, it's a fantasy.

Third, Barack Obama gave a speech on patriotism recently in Missouri. As always when Obama waxes "eloquent," the media swooned. And, as always, the speech raised interesting questions if you actually read it. The implicit premise of the speech was that Obama's patriotism is being widely questioned. As far as I've seen, that isn't true. What has happened is that Obama's judgment and political ideology have been questioned because he has chosen to associate himself closely with people who manifestly are not patriotic, like Bill Ayers and Jeremiah Wright.

In one speech Obama said that America "is the greatest country on Earth." I'm happy to assume he means it, although whether Obama ever means what he says is an open question. But how, then, did Jeremiah "God damn America" Wright become Obama's spiritual guardian for twenty years? And how do we reconcile Obama's "greatest country on earth" rhetoric with the cynical comment by his political sponsor Bill Ayers on Ayers' own acquittal: "Guilty as sin, free as a bird. What a great country!" Obama failed to acknowledge, let alone answer, the questions that are raised by these associations.

Next blunder: plagarism! Just like his companion, Joe Biden!!

Campaigning in Terre Haute, Ind. on Saturday, Barack Obama, mocking claims by John McCain and Sarah Palin that they will challenge their Republican Party if elected, got off a pretty good line. "Maybe what they're saying is, 'Watch out George Bush,'" Obama said with sarcasm. "Except for economic policies, and tax policies, and energy policies, and health care policies, and education policies, and Karl Rove-style politics -- except for all that, we're really going to bring change to Washington! We’re really going to shake things up!"

It wasn't Obama's line, though. It came from Washington Post cartoonist Tom Toles, whose cartoon Friday featured these words along with a drawing of McCain and Sarah Palin in front of the White House: "Watch out, Mr. Bush! With the exception of economic policy and energy policy and social issues and tax policy and foreign policy and Supreme Court appointments and Rove-style politics, we're coming in there to shake things up!" (See the cartoon here.)

Asked about the borrowing, Obama spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Obama used Toles's lines unwittingly, after being alerted to them by a friend who didn't mention the source.

Problem solving

Proposed policies and programs can give an idea of a candidate’s ability to think abstractly and solve problems. Some of Obama’s proposals are pretty bad.

For example, he wants to renegotiate the NAFTA! “I will make sure that we renegotiate. … I think we should use the hammer of a potential opt-out as leverage to ensure that we actually get labor and environmental standards that are enforced.” —Democratic primary debate in Cleveland, Feb. 26, 2008 (If you want to know why these Ideas are bad)

He opposes the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement. “And I’ll also oppose the Colombia Free Trade Agreement if President Bush insists on sending it to Congress because the violence against unions in Colombia would make a mockery of the very labor protections that we have insisted be included in these kinds of agreements.” —Speech to Philadelphia AFL-CIO, April 2, 2008

In both of these cases he is wrong and he is pandering to the trade unions, instead of thinking about reasonable policies. Old-fashioned politics as usual.

Someone said that Barack Obama is a foreign policy realist with a strong, confident understanding of the world and America’s role in it. His philosophy is in the mold of T.R. Obama will speak softly and, always, because we are America, carry a big stick. Best of all, he will not continue the hysterical, fear-inspired, foreign policy failures of the Bush-McCain-Lieberman axis. But He has Talked Openly About Bombing Pakistan. Is that speaking softly? Does that show high quality abstract thinking?

“If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won’t act, we will.” —Speech at the Woodrow Wilson International Center, Washington, D.C., Aug. 1, 2007

As Dr. Phil would say, “What were you thinking?” In this case he was not thinking, he was rhetoricking. As none other than Joe Biden pointed out last August, “It’s not something you talk about. … The last thing you want to do is telegraph to the folks in Pakistan that we are about to violate their sovereignty.”

Asked if he’d be “willing to meet separately, without precondition, during the first year of your administration, in Washington or anywhere else, with the leaders of Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba, and North Korea,” Obama replied: “I would.” —Democratic primary debate, Charleston, S.C., July 23, 2007. Then, in the debate with McCain he got hammered for that remark, tried to use Kissiner as an example, and Kissinger said he was wrong!

“I’ll make oil companies like Exxon pay a tax on their windfall profits, and we’ll use the money to help families pay for their skyrocketing energy costs and other bills.” —Speech in Raleigh, N.C., June 9, 2008

Another attempt at pandering! Really NOT intelligent!
Oil companies are not the problem: supply and demand is.

Dubious double-dealing on Iraq

The well known Iranian commentator, Amir Taheri, says that Obama tried to convince Iraqi leaders to postpone troop withdrawals until after the November Presidential elections


WHILE campaigning in public for a speedy withdrawal of US troops from Iraq, Sen. Barack Obama has tried in private to persuade Iraqi leaders to delay an agreement on a draw-down of the American military presence. According to Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, Obama made his demand for delay a key theme of his discussions with Iraqi leaders in Baghdad in July.

"He asked why we were not prepared to delay an agreement until after the US elections and the formation of a new administration in Washington," Zebari said in an interview.

Obama insisted that Congress should be involved in negotiations on the status of US troops - and that it was in the interests of both sides not to have an agreement negotiated by the Bush administration in its "state of weakness and political confusion."
"However, as an Iraqi, I prefer to have a security agreement that regulates the activities of foreign troops, rather than keeping the matter open." Zebari says.

Though Obama claims the US presence is "illegal," he suddenly remembered that Americans troops were in Iraq within the legal framework of a UN mandate. His advice was that, rather than reach an accord with the "weakened Bush administration," Iraq should seek an extension of the UN mandate. While in Iraq, Obama also tried to persuade the US commanders, including Gen. David Petraeus, to suggest a "realistic withdrawal date." They declined.

McCain adviser Randy Scheunemann commented on this story:

"At this point, it is not yet clear what official American negotiations Senator Obama tried to undermine with Iraqi leaders, but the possibility of such actions is unprecedented. It should be concerning to all that he reportedly urged that the democratically-elected Iraqi government listen to him rather than the US administration in power. If news reports are accurate, this is an egregious act of political interference by a presidential candidate seeking political advantage overseas. Senator Obama needs to reveal what he said to Iraq's Foreign Minister during their closed door meeting. The charge that he sought to delay the withdrawal of Americans from Iraq raises serious questions about Senator Obama's judgment and it demands an explanation."

Puffing Up His Past and Future
After Republicans made fun of Obama's touting his experience as a "community organizer," MSNBC noted that Obama complained, "They haven't talked about the fact that I taught constitutional law."

There would seem to be an especially conspicuous absence of witnesses to the years after graduated from Columbia and before he moved to Chicago to work as a community organizer. Well, it turns out that one of his co-workers, Dan Armstrong, has in fact written about Mr. Obama during those days. And while he is an admitted fan of Obama’s, he claims that he has inflated his resume considerably. Others who worked with Obama at Business International have subsequently chimed in.

We know, too, that, according to Obama, we can look back on June 3, 2008–the date he wrested the Democratic nomination away from Hillary Clinton–as “the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal.”

In Conclusion
Extemporaneous speaking is a hallmark of intelligence. He does not have it. He rambles, and gets lost if he does not have his teleprompter. His reasoning and ability to think abstractly have definitely been put in doubt. He is not very good at problem solving. He has been accused of double dealing over Iraq. He plagiarizes and puffs up both his past and the future. He lies quite often and is not smart enough to cover up his stories. Enough said?
Clifton Chadwick posted: September 30, 2008 10:37 am

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