How'd Bush Get a Harvard MBA?

[SoDesuKa]

Did Bush learn his management style at Harvard? He rewards subordinates who flatter him and punishes those who stand up to him. The undistinguished Harriet Miers is nominated to the Supreme Court. By contrast, Bush fires policy experts who disagree with him.

Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill and economist Lawrence Lindsey both warned against big deficits. Army Chief of Staff Eric Shinkesi and Secretary of the Army Thomas White told Bush the war in Iraq would be unwinnable without a significantly greater commitment of troops. Bush fired all these people, and in each case he was wrong.

The failures of the Bush administration arise from his management style. He is an egocentric little man who has to have things his way; otherwise he lashes out. How'd he get a Harvard MBA? He certainly didn't learn anything.

[shraby]

1. Lotsa money works wonders.

[Buddyblazon]

3. Beat me to the punch....

I knew a wealthy kid that was a total idiot. Parents spent lots of money on his...ahem..."education".

Now he has a degree from a prestigious school. Great job (Mommy and Daddy got him from their pals). And I'm sure he sits there and just screws stuff up (haven't seen him in a decade).

And I still can't afford to finish my last semester of school.

Money runs the world. I may be jaded. But at least I'm realistic.

[amitten]

4. Love the Ralph picture...that's perfect!! n/t

[PowerToThePeople]

15. Damn, I was gonna say "Big donnations by Daddy." n/t

[Jack from Charlotte]

33. Nobody flunks out of The Ivys.......

Of course he got in because of Diddy. These are private schools that can take anyone they want. The Ivys didn't even take Jews until the 60's, in some cases. And once in..... it's easy, according to many. Worst grade given, if you just show up, is a C. It's referred to as... "The Gentleman's C."

The AWOL/Moron was denied entrance into Texas' Law School. Back in the 60's getting into many law schools was pretty easy, too.

[TahitiNut]

2. A Harvard MBA is about the most overrated degree that exists.

It's worth less than many "mail-order" degrees ... it just costs a lot.

[AllyCat]

5. Daddy's money.

Even a sociopath can pay enough for a sheepskin from an Ivy League school.

[blm]

26. It's called Affirmative Action for rich, spoiled white boys.

And they are usually the first to complain about Affirmative Action for deserving but underprivileged women and minorities.

[OrlandoGator]

6. Didn't one of his professors say he was memorably rude/ignorant in class?

I remember, it was an Asian guy who said this a few years back.

[MADem]

7. Back then the program was brand new

They were still figuring it out when they were ripping off those rich kids, who weren't quite ready for the job market like the rest of their adult peers. It was a 'sit around and jawbone' type curriculum, with a lot of group work, and not too much homework if you could con some sucker into doing most of the work for your little projects. They also went on field trips. It's still essentially the same curriculum, but I think they work them a little harder. It is still massively expensive, and I suspect the value is more in making contacts than gaining special knowledge.

Much drinking, much screwing around, and much making a big deal of doing postgraduate work at HAAAVAAAD.

[carpetbagger]

11. I remember hearing he got by because it was group work.

I think it was one of his professors.

[OrlandoGator]

21. Most MBA programs are heavy in group work.

UF's is.

[TahitiNut]

31. It's my impression there're two 'schools of thought' on that.

One, typefied by Harvard and Stanford, is predominatly groupwork and jawboning -- called the "case study approach." The other, typefied by the University of Chicago, emphasizes analysis and investigation and is called "the analytical approach." I've had people from both 'schools' working for me and found that the latter are far more competent. It seems to me that the former are equipped merely to employ the jargon in a country club or board of directors setting -- somewhat like a secret handshake in the boys club.

[mestup]

8. Remark he made about Harvard Bidness School

"I can remember taking an accounting course that was really interesting," Bush said. "I began to see the tools of capitalism."

http://www.boston.com/news/politics/president/bush/articles/1999/12/28/hallmarks_of_bush_style_were_seen_at_harvard/

[Erika]

12. Bush was an elitist who got the education handed to him

"Hard work" is something he complains about. See www.icasualties.org for hard work that this frat brat never experienced. Many of them are there in hopes for monies for college, which was handed to W.

[ComerPerro]

28. Yeah, I remember a similar moment.

I was in my first year at KU, taking ECON 121.

Bush is such a fucking dumbass.

[Erika]

9. Yeah, Daddy paid for it

W has no credentials that show discipline and education. Hes a brat whose first interest was setting up a T ball system.

[shanti]

10. he paid for it, dad gummit!

and don't you dare try to take it away! :evilgrin:

[SoCalDem]

13. His daddy was a big-shot with connections

just like a lot of the rich kids who go to ivy league schools..

There was a special on a while back that pretty much said the diplomas from those hoity-toity schools are not worth the money anyway.. Most classes are not taught by professors.. Profs are expected to fund-raise, do research and publish.,. they have no time for teaching, so grad students and assistants teach most the the classes anyway, and the grades get inflated because it's embarrassing if the scions of the 'leaders of industry and pillars of society' do poorly..

[tenshi816]

16. I thought that at the time Junior was at Harvard,

Bush Sr. was head of the CIA and that's why Harvard took him - they wanted to be able to say that the son of a prominent political figure was a student at Harvard. It's good for getting donors to cough up big bucks.

[moondust]

14. Legacy.

He's a perpetual legacy everything.

Jeff Skilling of Enron also has a Harvard MBA. Makes you wonder what they're smoking there.

[Skidmore]

17. Poppy bought it for him and he learned one multisyllabic word

during the two classes he attended--entrepreneuership.

[henslee]

18. I just discovered an old friend went back for a Havard MBA and he

was a dimwit.

[no_hypocrisy]

19. Be grateful that his application was turned down by the University

of Texas Law School.

There are enough incompetent lawyers out there.

[Kickin_Donkey]

20. It's called white man's affirmative action ...

legacy admissions.

[LostinVA]

22. Very rich people always pretty much always get a degree

No matter what school it is, or even if the wealthy kids have a famous last name. A girl I went to college with pretty much failed everything, but still managed to graduate. I know for a fact she failed an English class (I graded everything), but still got a D in it. Her grandfather owned controlling interest in a huge chain store corporation, and had "bought" a building on campus. This was a small, liberal arts school in the South.

[AllyCat]

29. Does that explain why Liz Cheney got through my school?

I don't know how she did...we were in different majors. She was a stuck-up little brat though.

[WilliamPitt]

23. The hardest thing about harvard

is getting in.

[TahitiNut]

32. Exactly. It also seems to be an 'accomplishment' few are able to overcome

One of the lessons of life is the need to "rise above" (move beyond) one's experiences, without which we don't progress emotionally/maturationally. While well-noted regarding life's "traumatic" experiences, I've also seen "victims of atrophied development" who were those admitted to prestigious schools. Even thirty years afterward, it's something they are sure to let you know in the first 15 minutes of meeting them. After many such encounters, I began to wonder whether these people had ever possessed a similar "sense of accomplishment" at any time since their late teens or early twenties. The thought saddened me.

[Bridget Burke]

24. Connections & money got him in.

How did he get his MBA? A niece recently got her Masters in Accounting at UT. She attended classes with MBA candidates and was NOT impressed.

[bridgit]

25. i like that line of: tina sabatini in 'the freshman' as to clark's grade..

to be, "An A!! My father said: An A!!" :rofl:

[ComerPerro]

27. Simple answer is $$$$. But I know what you are really saying, so I

won't just snap back with that quick, reflex response. I know its rhetorical.

What does this tell us about Harvard's MBA program, when they apparently awarded a degree to such an incompetent, inept moron.

The guy said he would run America like a business.

And he ran every business he ever headed right into the ground.

[AllyCat]

30. It was this fact alone in 1999/2000 that made me believe Bush* would

never be elected. How could the business conservative types support a guy who had never run a business in the black? He'd never get elected. I was too naive to see the stealing coming.

[ComerPerro]

34. Me too. Back then, I just thought he was a joke

I mean, granted, now I still think he is a joke.

But back then I never thought that Americans were dumb enough to vote for him.

[AllyCat]

35. They didn't nt

[ComerPerro]

38. Enough of them did to make the fraud look legitimate

[AllyCat]

39. True, true...

crazy that enough of them did it in '04 to make it look that way too, but then the Presstitutes were pretty much in the bag at that point too.

[xxqqqzme]

36. been wondering when the person they

paid 2 attend classes in his place would come forward. I've always wondered what his thesis was; who wrote it and how much did it cost?

[lateo]

37. He got "Gentleman's Cs" according to one of his former teachers.

The passed him just because of who he was.

[leftofthedial]

40. $$$$ and daddy's power

Yale and Harvard are bastions of aristocracy, rewarding and helping to perpetuate the priveleges of birth and class