“When Bush tries to articulate a vision, he will butcher the Gettysburg Address. Obama, he will make an A & P grocery list sing.”
—Recently retired Republican congressman Tom Davis, speaking of President Bush’s anchor-like impact on the Republican party.
Meanwhile, a certain other presidential daughter, having spent several years working at a consulting firm and going to fashion shows with Gwyneth Paltrow, is now working at a hedge fund and campaigning for her mother.
(One wonders: Has she been asked to resign or take leave from that fund, Avenue Capital? Or is the fund only too happy to continue paying Chelsea in the hopes that she would be a direct pipeline to the White House? If anyone were paying much attention to Chelse, this would be considered influence-buying, pure and simple.)
Meanwhile, Jenna, the young woman once derided as a party girl, taught at a charter school, volunteered for UNICEF, and wrote a book about poverty and HIV in Central America.
Did I mention that Chelsea worked at McKinsey & Co. and now works at a hedge fund?
Let me be clear: I wish no offense to people in the financial business, which does many good and important things.
Although I do wonder how Hillary can rail about Wall Street “greed” given her daughter’s employment.
I just believe that a child fortunate enough to grow up in the White House has a particular responsibility to give back.
Jenna’s dad may be a really, really, really bad president…but she seems like a pretty good daughter.
The Times clarifies, somewhat, the situation regarding Harvard’s—and other schools’—admissions confusion.
In what may be a happy surprise for thousands of high school seniors, Harvard plans to offer admission to 150 to 175 students on its waiting list, and Princeton and the University of Pennsylvania each expect to take 90, creating ripples that will send other highly selective colleges deeper into their waiting lists as well.
Why? Apparently the unpredictability of the admissions process due to several schools ending early admission and increases in financial aid.It seems notable that Yale, which did not end early admission, is only extending waiting list offers to about 45 students.
The Los Angeles Daily News, in a follow-up article, attributes the confusion to demographic changes in the applicant pool.
The problem is largely driven by a nationwide spike in graduating seniors this year - the largest ever at 3.2 million and topping the baby boomer class of 1977, according to the National Association for College Admission Counseling.
Adding to the issue are Internet-savvy students who are applying to as many as 10 to 15 schools, giving colleges more uncertainty about who might actually accept their admission offers.
Unlikely that this last would be Harvard’s problem….and indeed the Crimson reports that Harvard expects its yield to be around 78%, or essentially the same as last year’s.
What’s the takeaway from all this? We may look back in a decade and see this year and perhaps one or two before it as the beginning of a profound transformation in elite college admissions….and hopefully, a great economic democratization.
But the problem of how to improve elementary and high school education for poor people may be the more enduring challenge. Is it time for Drew Faust to take up the mantle not just of higher education, but of K-12?
…that Harvard’s abandonment of early admission has been a disaster for the university and that Harvard is going to have take a huge number—possibly as many as 200—students off the waiting list to fill its incoming class….
Her lust for power knows no bounds, no decency: Hillary Clinton is now arguing that she should be the Democratic nominee for president because white people like her better than they do Barack Obama.
“I have a much broader base to build a winning coalition on,” she said in an interview with USA TODAY. As evidence, Clinton cited an Associated Press article “that found how Sen. Obama’s support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again, and how whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me.”
“There’s a pattern emerging here,” she said.
The pattern is that of Hillary trying desperately to increase her power by dividing the country; and Obama, yes, trying to increase his power, but uniting the country to solve problems and reconcile past differences.
When will the Clintons go away and leave this country to build a future without them?
“The animals weren’t sacrificed. There wasn’t any viscera or anything like that, just the heads and the pelts.”
—Allison Price, a Cambridge Animal Control officer, speaking on the goat remains found in Eliot House on Saturday night
Good to know that the animals weren’t sacrificed…
Despite the almost mathematical impossibility of her winning the Democratic nomination for president, Hillary Clinton seems to have no intention of dropping out of the race. I think the only thing now that will prompt her to do so is the realization that she is damaging her own reputation and legacy; she clearly won’t drop out for the good of the party or the country.It is possibly time for party leaders to come together and quietly whisper to Hillary that they will go public with their disapproval of her unless she gets out.The only problem is, Who are the party leaders? Howard Dean? Clearly not. Ted Kennedy? Already endorsed Obama. Bill Clinton…?
In perhaps another sign that he really ought to be playing in New York, Patriots quarterback Tom Brady escorted his paramour, Giselle Bunchen, to the MOMA Costume Institute gala last night. The Globe is letting you vote on their fashion sense.
Anyone else notice how many Secret Service guys surround Obama as he shakes the hands of his supporters? I’m not sure I’ve ever seen quite so many of them around a candidate….
I don’t mean to gush, but it’s such a pleasure to hear someone speak English with such grace, eloquence, and passion.
Meanwhile, Indiana, at 9:36, is now only four points, HRC 52 to Barack Obama 48.
If it goes to 51-49, then it might as well not be a win for Hillary.