Democratic Primaries
Related: About this forumprimary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
maximusveritas
(2,915 posts)but an interesting question nonetheless.
Estimating intelligence is quite subjective. Based on their academic success, then Buttigieg and Yang are likely the most intelligent.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)Why is Andrew Yang?
Buttigieg went to Harvard and got a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford. Booker went to Stanford and got a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford. Booker also has a law degree from Yale, but Mayor Pete only has a BA.
Andrew Yang got his BA from Brown and his law degree from Columbia.
This whole thing is a crock. All the candidates are very intelligent people with great academic success.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
maximusveritas
(2,915 posts)He did not even graduate cum laude, whereas Buttigieg graduated Magna Cum Laude.
Buttigieg was valedictorian of his HS. He got into Harvard on his academics/intelligence alone.
To pretend Booker is the same as Buttigieg or Yang is, well, something other than intelligent.
And to insinuate that I or anyone is being racist against him is insulting to say the least.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
SaschaHM
(2,897 posts)You're saying Booker isn't as smart as Yang or Buttigieg because of how he got into college when he was 18 while discounting the additional higher education that Booker has. What nonsense is this.
Booker has 2 masters from Oxford and Stanford and a JD from Yale Law. Buttigieg has a BA. They're not comparable.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
maximusveritas
(2,915 posts)What is your evidence for such a correlation?
Baffling to me that anyone would even think that could be true.
Again proving that these questions say more about the respondents
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
Blue_true
(31,261 posts)To equate a high school valedictorian and getting into Harvard to a Master's from Oxford and a Yale Juris degree is obsurd in the least.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
dawg day
(7,947 posts)But Booker succeeding at academics at a top school even if not at the top.... while playing division 1 football? That's actually far more impressive than even greater academic success. For one thing, football at that level is almost a full time job in the fall semester.
And athletic ability is a form of intelligence just like reasoning ability, which he also has.
Being a division 1 athlete should not count against a person! And I'm sure mayor Pete whose dad taught at Notre Dame (football heaven) would agree.
Many poor students get into college with athletic scholarships. We should be impressed by that, because it is impressive.
And we are fortunate to be in the party where every candidate's IQ is double the GOP candidate's.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)Do you think the law school offers a football scholarship? And Booker got an honors degree from Oxford. Did Buttigieg? Not according to Wikipedia.
Which law school did Buttigieg attend again? I can't find it anywhere.
And I also don't know why you think Yang accomplished more than Booker, with Yang's degrees from Brown and Columbia.
Except Buttigieg is white and Yang is Asian, so there's that.
Which is why I said in the first place: this whole discussion is a CROCK. They're all highly accomplished and highly intelligent.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)Last edited Thu Nov 28, 2019, 02:53 AM - Edit history (3)
honors degrees like popcorn. In 2004 when Mayor Pete graduated, 90% of its students graduated with some level of honors.
In sharp contrast, Stanford doesn't give honors for GPA's, but it does note a degree with "Distinction" based on the GPA -- only for the top 15% of the class.
But there is one school they had in common: Booker was awarded a degree with honors from Oxford, but Buttigieg wasn't (according to Wikipedia.)
And Yang's degrees were from Brown and Columbia. (Wikipedia doesn't mention honors.) How you can pretend Yang's and Buttigieg's academic records were any stronger than Booker's is beyond me.
https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/:~:targetText=Last%20June,%20a%20record%2091,a%20Globe%20study%20has%20found.
HARVARD:
https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2019/4/30/rising-GPA-cutoffs-honors/
A 2002 Faculty vote set 60 percent as the maximum portion of each class that can earn honors. That policy change aimed to make Latin honors more exclusive more than 90 percent of the Class of 2004 graduated with honors.
While the world regards these students as the best of the best of America's 13 million undergraduates, Harvard honors has actually become the laughingstock of the Ivy League. The other Ivies see Harvard as the Lake Wobegon of higher education, where all the students, being above average, can take honors for granted.
It takes just a B-minus average in the major subject to earn cum laude -- no sweat at a school where 51 percent of the grades last year were A's and A- minuses.
Yet Pedersen also admits that grade inflation is real. As at many schools, at Harvard, the A to F grading range has unofficially turned to an A to B- minus range. As a result, the university's current honors requirements make Harvard unique: It inevitably rewards grade inflation with honors.
STANFORD:
https://exploredegrees.stanford.edu/undergraduatedegreesandprograms/#honorstext
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
Blue_true
(31,261 posts)Believe me, if Stanford comes calling my advice to him would be to take a scholarship offer from that school immediately. The fact that Stanford would even look at him would be an indication that they had assessed his ability to perform academically in college. Plus, going to Stanford as a jock will give him face time with some of the most influential people in the country and allow him to build important career connections.
I was thinking about kids and sports earlier today in relation to my nephew. Millions of kids played football this year, many hundreds of thousands at the high school level. In the NFL this year, there is something like 1700 men on active rosters of teams. A high schooler has something like a 0.05% percent chance of reaching the NFL, that is why I believe ALL parents with top athletes should focus heavily on academics, that is the thing that will give a child the best chance for a good life later on in life.
Your points of Booker are right on, thanks for presenting them.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)to get into Yale law school -- which does NOT give football scholarships. The people who are dismissing him because of his Stanford football scholarship are ignoring how much he achieved.
GOOD LUCK to your nephew!
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
BootinUp
(46,924 posts)That Im going to do a lot less advocating than I have in the past. For one thing I dont find it much fun this time. Im afraid Ill try and wring someones virtual neck and be put in virtual death row. Besides a mans gotta know his limitations. Im sure a bunch of real life cheers just went up, lol.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)and Stanford only the top 15%? So how does Buttigieg's magna make him smarter, when he wasn't having to juggle a football schedule on top of an academic schedule?
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
BootinUp
(46,924 posts)Buttigieg is perceived to be highly intelligent. I support the posters right to state said opinion and encourage everyone to do the same. My own opinion is that while we have a bunch of highly intelligent candidates to choose from, Pete does stand out to me as well.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)(other than Bloomberg, who hasn't participated in a debate) include an African American, a Hispanic, and a woman.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
BootinUp
(46,924 posts)I agree the rankings arent accurate. As far as bias that cant be eliminated with humans. Racial bias and gender bias sucks.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
Celerity
(42,643 posts)out falsehood to say 90% of Harvard graduates get that, and he started there almost 20 years ago.
I have no idea why you are going up and down the thread and spreading this divisive disinfo that jnvites conflict. It is not a bloody contest, it is a shit poll question where many people just say that their candidate is the most intelligent. It is meaningless.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)90% graduated cum laude. His magna cum laude was also affected by the rampant grade inflation that caused Harvard faculty to eventually vote to hold the total number of honors grads to 60%.
I agreed that the question was a crock. They're all smart; and nothing in his background proves Buttigieg is the smartest.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
helpisontheway
(5,004 posts)his dream school. He was recruited as an athlete and the coaches did help him get in. However, he had to work his butt off to stay in there. He graduates in May. Also, I dont think others that were admitted without help are smarter. Yes, they had higher standardized test scores but big deal. He took the same classes and had the same success.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
JonLP24
(29,322 posts)Cory Booker until he mentioned it.
Also this outsider from DC campaign is really old & not original.
primary today, I would vote for: Undecided
Blue_true
(31,261 posts)primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
madaboutharry
(40,149 posts)From Pete Buttigieg's Wikipedia page:
"Upon graduating magna cum laude from Harvard in 2004, Buttigieg was elected a member of Phi Beta Kappa and awarded a Rhodes Scholarship; in 2007, he received a Bachelor of Arts degree with first-class honors in philosophy, politics, and economics after studying at Pembroke College, Oxford."
Your comment about Mayor Buttigieg leaves a lot out.
FWIW, I think this poll is not intelligent.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
treestar
(82,383 posts)Just to read a book on that language? You have to be a genius even to think about doing that.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
Groundhawg
(517 posts)primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)Booker only graduated from Stanford, with a BA and a Masters, before going to Oxford on a Rhodes scholarship and then to Yale University for his law degree.
Castro also graduated from Stanford, and got a law degree from Harvard.
Amy Klobuchar got her BA from Yale, and her law degree from U of Chicago.
And yet Buttigieg is SO much smarter, because HE got a Rhodes scholarship, and a law degree from . . . nowhere. Oh, wait.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
SaschaHM
(2,897 posts)Branding is one hell of a drug.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)And I don't think it's an accident that the two who were lauded were white and Asian men.
I would have mentioned Kamala, too, but I knew her Howard and UCSF degrees would have been discounted by the Ivy league enthralled.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
SaschaHM
(2,897 posts)Was it difficult? Yes.
Was it even remotely comparable to a law program at a good school? Hell no.
Ivy League undergrad is undergrad with a few more bells and whistles, big money, and shady/prestigious pasts. Some programs of study are harder than others. The liberal arts are tedious. You might have to write a 40 page paper, but the thought required in it is still less than what a graduate school would expect of you.
There's a level of enthrallment in the Ivy League by people that didn't go that's always been odd having lived through the experience. Hell, I personally know multiple Rhode's Scholars. Would I ever say that they were smarter than someone who went through Yale Law or any other reputable graduate program? No. They were smart undergrads. There's a big difference.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)Last edited Thu Nov 28, 2019, 02:46 AM - Edit history (1)
They thought all their students deserve them. In 2004, Mayor Pete's graduation year, it was 90%.
Now Harvard's trying to keep the total down to 60%. Meanwhile, only 15% of Stanford students graduate with "distinction," based on their GPA's.
https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2019/4/30/rising-GPA-cutoffs-honors/
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
Sloumeau
(2,657 posts)In many colleges and universities, getting an advanced degree, such as a law degree or a medical degree, it is roughly twice as hard as getting an undergraduate degree, even an undergraduate degree from an Ivy League School. However, even getting an advanced degree from an Ivy League school does not necessarily mean that one is very intelligent. Please keep in mind that George W. Bush went to Harvard Business school, and he's not the sharpest knife in the drawer. Overall, I've found that one of the best ways of telling how smart someone is, besides knowing the education levels and what jobs they have held, is listening to them talk. From this, my best guess is that Warren, Buttigieg, Yang, Booker, and Harris are all extremely intelligent--probably in the 120+ IQ range, and most of the rest are probably in the above-average category of about 110+.
However, intelligence is no substitute for good judgment, and it does not necessarily make one more electable or even a better politician. When it comes to picking a President in particular, often what matters more than intelligence is the person's belief system. If Hitler were more intelligent, but still wanted to violently take over the world and exterminate the Jews, would his extra intelligence have made him a better leader of Germany or just a bigger threat to the world? I'm guessing the answer would be the latter.
All of our, say, top 8 candidates are smart enough to be President. The question is, how well are they positioned to defeat Donald Trump? If they cannot beat him, does it really matter how smart they are?
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
JonLP24
(29,322 posts)There could be a lot going on in someone's head that doesn't come out when they speak plus there are social anxieties and all sorts of things that affect smart people just the same as they affect regular people. Also someone could be a charming sociopath so you could end up being fooled by a smooth talker.
primary today, I would vote for: Undecided
Sloumeau
(2,657 posts)...100% accurate, which is why I also recommend people do a number of things to help gauge intelligence. This includes, in addition to listening to someone speak, review their education levels, read things they have written, review their work histories, and read what people who have associated with them have to say. However, as I wrote earlier, intelligence alone will not necessarily make someone a better President. I believe that our top 8 candidates are all smart enough to be President, so for me, it is more about things like electability. Bernie Sanders, for example, might actually be smarter than all of the other top candidates, but if I don't think he can beat Trump, for me, it really does not matter how smart he is.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
BootinUp
(46,924 posts)The candidates and rate them based on perception mostly. Thats how us martians do it.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
WheelWalker
(8,943 posts)primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
SergeStorms
(18,882 posts)They're all very intelligent, but Mayor Pete is on an entirely different level. Rhodes Scholar, and he has pretty much a photographic memory. Any one of them has every republican in the country beat by a country mile though.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)and got a couple masters degrees and a law degree from Yale University. Buttigieg has no law degree. And do you know how many Harvard students graduate with honors, like Mayor Pete? In 2001 it was 91%.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
Celerity
(42,643 posts)which is the very definition of an honour degree.
Also it is simply false to claim 91% of Harvard students graduate magna cum laude (what Buttigieg did) which is exactly what you attempted to infer.
https://handbook.fas.harvard.edu/book/requirements-honors-degrees
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)in his year (2004), it's clear many of them graduated magna. (You posted a page from the CURRENT handbook. In Buttigieg's era, grade inflation was rampant, and the number of honors degrees reflected that. Later the faculty agreed to hold the total number of honors degrees to 60%.)
Also, there's nothing in his academic background that ranks him above Cory Booker, a Stanford grad and Rhodes scholar with honors (Wikipedia doesn't say Buttigieg got his degree with honors); or Amy Klobuchar, also a high school valedictorian, who followed that up with a magna cum laude degree from Yale and a law degree from U Chicago, where she was associate editor of the law review.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
Celerity
(42,643 posts)a Rhodes scholarship in December 2004.
https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2004/12/rhodes-scholars-announced-2/
He was also chosen for Phi Beta Kappa as a Junior and a Senior, and at Harvard (now and back then) only 24 juniors are chosen from the entire school. Part of that is having a very very high GPA (typically the cut-off is 3.8 and up.) He was also the president of the Student Advisory Committee of the Harvard Institute of Politics.
He earned an 'First' for his PPE programme at Pembroke College at Oxford, that is the highest Honours degree in the system at Oxford and other British Universities (I know because I graduated with a First myself, just not at Oxford.)
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/05/13/deep-cuts-from-pete-buttigiegs-rhodie-resume#
List of University of Oxford people with PPE degrees
https://www.revolvy.com/page/List-of-University-of-Oxford-people-with-PPE-degrees?cr=1
Non-UK politicians
Tony Abbott, 28th and former Prime Minister of Australia
Liaqat Ali Khan, first Prime Minister of Pakistan
Solomon Dias Bandaranaike, former Prime Minister of Ceylon
Benazir Bhutto, former Prime Minister of Pakistan
Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, former Prime Minister of Pakistan
David Boren, former Oklahoma Governor and US Senator
Kofi Abrefa Busia, former President of Ghana
Pete Buttigieg, mayor of South Bend, Indiana
Gareth Evans (politician), former Foreign Minister of Australia
Malcolm Fraser, former Prime Minister of Australia
Bob Hawke, former Prime Minister of Australia
Imran Khan, Pakistani cricketer and politician, 22nd (since 2018) Prime Minister of Pakistan
Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, former Prime Minister of Peru and former President
John Kufuor, former President of Ghana
Farooq Leghari, former President of Pakistan
Kukrit Pramoj, former Prime Minister of Thailand
Aung San Suu Kyi, first State Counsellor of Myanmar, 1991 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate
Abhisit Vejjajiva, former Prime Minister of Thailand
Pembroke College at Oxford traditionally only takes in 7 students each year for its PPE programme, Buttigieg was one of the 7
https://www.pmb.ox.ac.uk/students/admissions/courses/philosophy-politics-economics-ppe
Pembroke aims to admit seven students each year for the PPE course, and regularly takes international students, including Rhodes Scholars. Our undergraduates come from a wide variety of backgrounds, and no prior detailed knowledge of Philosophy, Politics or Economics is required. Although a background in Maths is not formally required for admission, PPE applicants should have sufficient interest in, and aptitude for, Maths to cope with the mathematical elements of the course in economics, logic and data analysis.
PPE demands the ability to take stock of large amounts of evidence, arguments and scholarly material and apply intelligent analysis to it. It is very much a course for those who like wrestling with different theories, problems, and conflicts while developing their own views.
At Pembroke efforts are made to emphasise the value of interdisciplinary cooperation at all levels of study. For PPE students this may take the form of involvement in the Social Science Society, which meets termly to stimulate debate from the variety of perspectives represented by students and academics alike.
The College tutors teach the compulsory papers and a wide range if special subjects throughout the three year course. At Pembroke the tutorial team is led by Fellows Professor Stephen Whitefield, Dr Brian A'Hearn and Professor Guy Kahane. They are supported by a long-standing and very experienced team of lecturers and tutors to ensure excellent teaching and support for all undergraduates.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)at the top with Warren. Yes, he's very highly accomplished, but so are a bunch of other candidates -- and this is all about comparing Harvard's apple to other university's oranges.
I think the whole poll is a crock, and I said so. They're all smart, but look who we have as President now. Someone whose only genius is at thievery and manipulating people.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
Celerity
(42,643 posts)results based off people's presence of candidate, so we agree on that. Rump is arguably the least intelligent major US poltician ever, so we also agree on that.
I was only showing that Buttigieg has seriously heavyweight academic bona fides and he also has a presence that leads many to notice his innate intelligence. He is not some propped up plazzy paper tiger. Nothing more, nothing less.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
treestar
(82,383 posts)It would not be surprising at Harvard
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
madaboutharry
(40,149 posts)and has a law degree from The University of Chicago.
Julian Castro went to Stanford and has a law degree from Harvard.
Theyre at the bottom of the list.
This poll is an example of how useless a poll can be when those questioned are uninformed.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
Celerity
(42,643 posts)of choice is the most intelligent. These questions are meant to divide IMHO, just look at the sniping going on. Any and all our candidates are streets ahead of the orange piece of shite now infesting the POTUS.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
TidalWave46
(2,061 posts)Who the smartest is. Yeah, thats the way to go.
Each of the people listed seem really really bright to me. I think Buttigieg is in a field of his own but that doesnt really translate into anything else.
So the poll clarified two things for me. For the most part, we tend to think our candidate is the smartest. Second, white people are going to perceive that white people in a group as being of higher intelligence.
Neither a shocker.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
vsrazdem
(2,176 posts)primary today, I would vote for: Undecided
babylonsister
(170,962 posts)primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
PJMcK
(21,916 posts)First of all, it assumes that the respondents are intelligent. Since 60+ million Americans voted for Trump, I have to question their own intelligence. Therefore, their judgment about any of our Democratic candidates is suspect.
Secondly, and more importantly, how can people make such a judgment about candidates that they've only seen on TV or read about in the news?
Dumb question but it illustrates the depths our society has sunk to.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
Croney
(4,646 posts)"Which one of us is the most intelligent?"
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
oldsoftie
(12,410 posts)I know a few people who NEVER went to college who are far smarter than a few of my multi-degreed friends.
And many of the wealthiest people I know never went to college at all. None were raised wealthy either.
A lot of it is simply paying attention to the world and educating yourself. My good friend built a 75 million dollar commercial construction business with 4 years in the army & 4 as a roofer.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
pnwmom
(108,925 posts)primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
oldsoftie
(12,410 posts)primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
Kind of Blue
(8,709 posts)Thank you.
primary today, I would vote for: Undecided
TreasonousBastard
(43,049 posts)Nowhere is "intelligence" defined, and nowhere is it mentioned that this intelligence, whatever it is, is any more useful than any other attribute.
But, no one asked it before so I suppose it's a good as any other question to to start a silly, but fun, conversation.
FWIW, I have been a member of Mensa for years and got into City College of NY purely on the basis of my SAT's, since I was a "C" student in high school. I had discovered early on that I didn't need to study to get through, thanks largely to an excellent memory and ability to work my way through test questions without knowing much. It wasn't until I was in 6th grade that anyone knew I was so nearsighted that I couldn't see the blackboard, but could remember anything that was said about those weird marks on it. Those study habits followed me through life, and I could get almost any job by bullshitting my way through the interview, but often could not do the job.
So, in my case at least, being in the rarefied top one percentile didn't make up for sloppy and lazy work habits or some terrible personal decision making. I also found out that America Mensa is full of people a lot like me. I did, however, get laid a lot. Intelligent women, it seems, often prefer intelligent men who are not afraid of their smarts.
So, I have little interest in native intelligence (whatever that is) but how well people use what they have. All of our candidates seem to have put what brains they have to good use.
(All but one, anyway...)
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
highplainsdem
(48,721 posts)quality in a president.
So arguing about who's the most intelligent is silly. Especially if you're going by grades, scholarships, and which schools they attended years ago, versus their actual record of achievements after they left school.
I can recall hearing about a study suggesting a high IQ actually works against the ability to lead, once you get above an IQ of 130, since people with really high IQs sometimes find it hard to relate to and communicate with people whose IQs aren't equally high.
IMO what's often called emotional intelligence is probably at least as important as IQ, in terms of qualifications for president.
And that's especially true now that we have to defeat -- and then heal the divisions and deal with the crises created by -- a malignant narcissist.
And btw, I have nothing against scholarships awarded on the basis of test scores and grades. I've benefited from them. I just don't confuse a high IQ, good grades and scholarships with the ability to be a good leader. I especially don't confuse them to the extent of thinking it's necessary or even at all important to compare candidates' IQs.
Any leader who's at all smart, even if not possessing a genius level IQ, will surround himself or herself with very bright people who have very bright ideas, even if they might not possess any leadership ability.
That's what advisers are for.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
MineralMan
(146,190 posts)Asking people questions like that is a total waste of time. The only question that makes sense is "Who are you planning to vote for?"
Asking why people are planning to vote for a specific person can also be useful, but asking people to tell you which candidates are the most intelligent is a really stupid thing to do.
Just useless.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
myohmy2
(3,118 posts)...It's, B-B-BERNIE...
...without a doubt...
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden
treestar
(82,383 posts)All of them compared to you know who.
Pete might have the highest IQ.
primary today, I would vote for: Joe Biden