"Former vice president Joe Biden spoke to college graduates, and former deputy attorney general Sally Yates addressed the graduating class at Harvard Law school," and former secretary of state John F. Kerry spoke to the graduates at the Kennedy School of Government.
“And the truth is – no, this is not a normal time,” Kerry said. “It’s not normal to see a president of the United States decrying ‘so-called judges.’ It’s not normal for the leader of the country that invented the First Amendment to routinely degrade and even threaten journalists. And no, it’s not normal to see the head of the FBI fired summarily because he was investigating connections between Russia and the presidential campaign of the very man who fired him. And it’s not normal that when you close your eyes and listen to the news, too often the political back and forth in America sounds too much like it does in the kinds of countries that the State Department warns Americans not to travel to."
ADDED: This makes me think of the novel I've been reading,
"The Mosquito Coast" (by Paul Theroux). The narrator describes his father, a genius who dropped out of Harvard:
Father [was] talking the whole way about... the awfulness of America— how it got turned into a dope-taking, door-locking, ulcerated danger zone of rabid scavengers and criminal millionaires and moral sneaks. And look at the schools. And look at the politicians. And there wasn’t a Harvard graduate who could change a flat tire or do ten pushups....
[Father] boasted that he had dropped out of Harvard in order to get a good education. He was prouder of his first job as a janitor than his Harvard scholarship....
“Strictly speaking,” Father said, “there is no such thing as invention. It’s not creation, I mean. It’s just magnifying what already exists. Making ends meet. They could teach it in school— Edison wanted to make invention a school subject, like civics or French. But the schools went for fingerpainting, when they could have been teaching kids to read. They encouraged back talk. School is play! Harvard is play!”
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61 comments:
School for losers.
So, Mr. Kerry, why the long face ?
Clusterfuck.
Truly, he's preaching to the choir.
Kerry's advice to young graduates: marry a rich widow.
not a normal time
Even though They are trying to make mountains from mole-hills, that is a good thing.
“It’s not normal to see a president of the United States decrying ‘so-called judges.’
Judges are half-bright pompous assholes, so I rather enjoyed that.
“And the truth is – no, this is not a normal time,” Kerry said.
And, of course, Secretary Kerry, you & your band of miscreants in eight years of the Obama administration had absolutely no hand in poisoning the political environment.
None. Nada. Nihil. The null set.
Buttah wouddn't melt in yah mouths....
If your teenage son or daughter tried to pull such a total abdication of moral responsibility on you as a parent, you'd tell him/her "Now, see here, young man/lady. You're not a child anymore, & you've got to take responsibility for your actions."
And their response would be: "Not me, Mom. I'm a Democrat!".
Nor was it a normal time when John Kerry, arguably a traitor for his actions ca. 1971, even by the strict constitutional definition, was elected and repeatedly re-elected a US Senator, was a major party Presidential candidate who almost won, and Secretary of State.
If I had to pick 3 people who represent what is worst about the USA governing class in 2017, these three sanctimonious creeps would be on the short list.
Wow, Harvard is a liberal school , which has a mostly liberal alumni/staff. 50s news.
Market is over 21k.
The masses forgive a lot when they get their retirement statements.
The narrative is not viable, yet they continue to prop it up and animate it. A sort of Weekend at the DNC, I suppose.
It's hard to think of a contrarian indicator superior to John Kerry.
Is there any way to keep them on the Harvard campus?
In the same speech, Kerry also said that young Muslims would be less inclined to become jihadis if they had better schools and good jobs. Mmmmm...if memory serves, most of the 9/11 hijackers had attended college and the leader of Al-Qaeda is a surgeon. To Kerry's point, evidently the schools that they attended weren't good enough.
rehajm said...
Is there any way to keep them on the Harvard campus?"
Build a wall!
I'm trying to understand how Kerry's remark about the first ammendment is related to "journalists". How can we have freedom of the press when we have no press, just a bunch of democrat party operatives with bylines.
It’s not normal to see judges of the United States decrying ‘so-called president.’
It’s not normal for journolists in a country that invented the First Amendment to routinely degrade and even threaten the president and the People.
And no, it’s not normal to see independent inspector generals fired summarily because he was investigating friends of the administration of the very man who fired him.
This is not a normal time. This is a time of elective wars, catastrophic anthropogenic immigration reform, collusion between democratic parties and the press, foreign and extra-national influence of elections in America, Israel, and Canada, institutional [class] diversity, selective-child under a Pro-Choice Church, and a growing ball of yarns by former leaders of our nation.
An anonymous campus official told this reporter that after the ceremony, Joe Biden retreated to a windowless white van and asked passing coeds if they liked candy and puppies.
“It’s not normal to see a president of the United States decrying ‘so-called judges.’ It’s not normal for the leader of the country that invented the First Amendment to routinely degrade and even threaten journalists.
This just shows their cluelessness. Obama's attack on judges was worse than Trump's, and his wiretapping and threatening journalists was far worse than anything Trump has done to the media.
Every time these people open their mouths they disgrace themselves. They're so blinded by partisanship their statements don't even trigger the memory of these events.
This is not a normal time
https://sharylattkisson.com/obama-era-surveillance-timeline/
Harvard also gave us Obama. Iran is thankful for that.
A time when people are required by government force and legal warfare to deny life unworthy, who are audited or denied equal status by an administration for political progress, who are investigated by attorney generals and ethics committees based on innuendo, suspicion, and journolistic creation, who are displaced through mass outsourcing and insourcing, who are penalized through labor, environmental, and regulatory arbitrage, and who are penalized for pre-existing conditions specifically birth in order to sustain redistributive change, avoid emigration reform, and disenfranchise American citizens through domestic, foreign influence, and extra-nation influence.
Some judges should be attacked. We have too much respect for lawyers in robes.
John Kerry: apparently not part of the problem, definitely not part of the solution.
Has there ever been a more prominent yet less effectual politician? Not in my lifetime. What an odious human being.
Rick:
That's right, Obama decried the justices, directed the DOJ to target reporters, and spied on Americans, notably the campaign of a competing party and the current president.
"What an odious human being."
I'm not surprised that he and John McCain are big pals.
Lurch, Slow Joe, and Sally Yates.
Where was Hillary?
"Kerry's advice to young graduates: marry a rich widow."
Two widows are better than one.
Actually the first wife was just rich.
Thorne met Kerry in 1963 at her family's estate in Bay Shore, New York on Long Island. Kerry was a Yale classmate of Thorne's twin brother David. Thorne married Kerry on May 23, 1970 and divorced on July 25, 1988, after a six-year separation. She and John had two daughters together.
Fen said...
An anonymous campus official told this reporter that after the ceremony, Joe Biden retreated to a windowless white van and asked passing coeds if they liked candy and puppies.
5/25/17, 10:58 AM
OMG Biden is Laslo?!?!?!?!?
Today's commencement address at Harvard will be given by Mark Zuckerberg - another great genius who dropped out Harvard. Of all the schools you can drop out of, it's by far the best.
"We're getting the band back together."
@BL,
Joe Biden retreated to a windowless white van and asked passing coeds if they liked candy and puppies.
You know, at a level more profound than any of us here care to admit, it really makes sense that Joe Biden writes material for Laslo.
I'm thinking it's time to read Sheryl Atkisson's book. Just glancing through a preview and her blogpost timeline I learned a lot, including a mention of a Guardian article that detailed Obama's directive on cyber espionage issued early in his second term.
The directive also contemplates the possible use of cyber actions inside the US, though it specifies that no such domestic operations can be conducted without the prior order of the president, except in cases of emergency.
Were Brennan's concerns about Carter Page an emergency, or did Obama sign off on spying on him?
And look at the politicians. And there wasn’t a Harvard graduate who could change a flat tire or do ten pushups....
Heh, heh - he got that right. These Harvard geeks got straight A's in every subject, except common sense and practical skills:)
Average grade for Harvard undergrads: A-.
They are all above average when compared to each other, defying mathematics and the normal distribution.
"the schools went for fingerpainting" No: for creating SJWs.
rhhardin said...
School for losers.
Actually harvard graduates are generally very wealthy and successful in life. Harvard and Yale alums have been the mandarins for 200 years. This is a finishing school for children of the Right People to maintain their wealth and position despite not being very useful to society as mentioned above rather repeatedly.
There is an obvious attraction to sneering at people you don't like and condescending but in reality they hold positions of wealth and power that exceed almost everyone on this board. As long as you view your government as a spoils system you will always have mandarins.
I guess it's "normal" for a recent Sec. of state to denounce the current admin. during a commencement speech.
You go, Lurch.
John Kerry (quote): It’s not normal for the leader of the country that invented the First Amendment to routinely degrade and even threaten journalists
I've noticed a lot of usage of "degrade" like this lately. It's not really wrong but I always assume the person really means "denigrate." Further, the idea that it's unusual for the President to treat the press--or certain members of the press--with contempt is plainly false; Obama himself whined about Fox News and served up lots of bitchy-snarky quips against insufficiently Leftist journalists. Trump's people seem to care less about hiding the fact that they view reporters as the enemy, but that's in the context of most reporters, including plenty who shout that they're professionally neutral, declaring themselves to be bravely fighting against Trump. WashPo and NYTimes people aren't hiding the fact that they see themselves as fighting to "take down" Trump, and Trump & Co. aren't hiding the fact that they understand those people to be their enemies.
Sounds pretty normal, to me, w/r/t how the Media treats non-Dems...the only difference being the fact that Trump people aren't pretending things are otherwise.
I know I sound like a broken clock but WTF do we need a Kennedy School of Government? No one can answer that question.
And politicos and govt pencil pushers and pundits get kudos for having gone there! Trump should do a drone strike on it. But I'll be kind and recommend he do it when class is out.
"Actually harvard graduates are generally very wealthy and successful in life"
Yeah, other than pretty much running the country with other Ivy League grads - they're pretty mediocre.
Having read this, I all the more confident that my decision to routinely vote against Presidential candidates like George McGovern, Jim Carter, Walt Mondale, Mike Dukakis, Bill Clinton, Al Gore, John Kerry and Barry Obama, in spite of any reservations I've had about most of the Republicans I did vote for. Thanks, guys!
They are masters at using the perception bias of Harvard and Yale pedigrees to support their stolen or inherited roles as mandarins entitled to rule.
No wonder they now are sniffing something new in the air as DJT instinctively out does them all without trying hard.
Several Harvard grads in family (sniff!), but nowadays Harvard and Stanford (not Yale which just sucks now) make sense only for very rich or those who can get full needs-based scholarship. Any 18 year old who can get into either is now offered $100k plus packages - free tuition, board, housing in elite dorms plus spending money - by a # of state schools where they can shine and be treated like royalty in small honors colleges full of other kids who also could have got into multiple ivys. Add to that the parents saving hundreds of thousands a portion of which they can give to their kid as a graduation present in lieu of co-signing onto their massive student debt. Finally add the insufferable SJWs now crammed into the so-called top schools and it is hard to argue that a place like Harvard remains a rationale choice for a smart kid from the upper-middle class.
By the way, where is Laslo? I've not seen him here for a few days. Did I just miss his posts?
--Vance
"Heh, heh - he got that right. These Harvard geeks got straight A's in every subject, except common sense and practical skills:)"
Why should they bother knowing? They'll be paying their servants to change their tires and other such menial tasks.
After years and years of loyal donations to Harvard I quit. Looking back I don't know for sure why it took so long. My only excuse is that the deterioration of Harvard has accelerated in the last 10-15 years. I can't deny that many of the Faculty members, mostly in the graduate schools have some amazing accomplishments. The Faculty of Arts and Sciences which is the undergraduate wing is a lost cause. There are still some great kids that come out of Harvard ( not all are of the mandarin class, they are more of the Ben Carson profile, in fact, a lot of the mandarin types can no longer get in).
I would willingly join any group that is in favor of destroying the Kennedy school. That's where your mandarins are coming from today and they aren't helping.
People's assumptions about Harvard students are badly out of whack and have been for a long time. Here are this year's admission statistics: African American- 13.7%; Asian American - 22.1%; Hispanic/Latino - 12.6%; Native American/Pacific Islander -2.6%; all other - 49%. 50% of the students receive financial aid and 20% of student's families pay nothing.
It has been a long time since only the Cabot and Lowell types were a majority of Harvard's students. The students are not the problem. The monolithic "leftyness" of the faculty is the problem.
UW- Madison breaks down as follows ( students from US): White - 82.7%; Hispanic -5.2%; Asian- 6.0%; African American/Black - 2.3%; Native American/Pacific Islander - .3%; multi-race - 3.2%; ; unknown .3%; foreign students - 7.4%.
Which school has a more diverse student body? Harvard boasts 47 Noble prize winners, UW -Madison boasts 19. Not all Harvard students/faculty are debutantes.
@ Cookie I am interested in your comparison of the differences between the UW- Madison undergraduate makeup and that of Harvard. I know the school's have somewhat different missions, but U W- Madison's admissions would at first blush yield more children of privilege than Harvard's - if you only go by skin color or surname (which no one should.)
BTW those Harvard dilettante graduates hold the highest number of Medals of Honor (18) of any school other than West Point and the Naval Academy. Those guys were real pansies, I guess.
BTW those Harvard dilettante graduates hold the highest number of Medals of Honor (18) of any school other than West Point and the Naval Academy.
Kerry wasn't one of them.
Scratch a liberal, and you will burst a festering boil of America-hate. Kerry's words are directed at the 46% of Americans who voted for Trump. Trump didn't seize power. He was elected because he ran a better campaign than the Harvard guys. The Harvard guys have spent their entire lives as an alienated minority in someone else's country. They are willing to rule this country, but they are not willing to become a part of it. Never that.
Allie Fox (Mosquito Coast) is mad. He pursues his own madness like Ahab pursued Moby Dick. As the novel progresses his children come to loathe and fear him. At the end he is nothing, a weak, sick man, abandoned by everyone who loved him, his eyeballs pecked out by the seagulls he loved to hate. He made himself the thing he most despised about the world.
Blogger Unknown said...
By the way, where is Laslo? I've not seen him here for a few days. Did I just miss his posts?
--Vance
Rumor is it's a new job. Secret Service. White House. Very Hush-hush.
"Trump didn't seize power. He was elected because he ran a better campaign than the Harvard guys."
Did "the Harvard guys" run Hillary's campaign? The Clintons aren't from Harvard.
I wouldn't say that Trump ran a better campaign than Hillary; I would say she ran a much worse campaign than he.
@tcrosse Kerry is a Yalie.
By the way, where is Laslo? I've not seen him here for a few days. Did I just miss his posts?
Laslo's new movie is exceptionally Laslo-esque.
Once more, with feeling:
I am obliged to confess I should sooner live in a society governed by the first two thousand names in the Boston telephone directory than in a society governed by the two thousand faculty members of Harvard University.
-William F. Buckley
Harvard MOH recipients distribution is a bit skewed, 8 Civil War, 2 Spanish AM, 5 WWI, 2 WWII, 1 Korea, 1 Vietnam. The guy from Vietnam was an MBA. Teddy Roosevelt and son included. Good record but Harvard has changed from the old days.
There were actually 19 not 18.
I wonder if there will be a similar "reunion of sorts" in a correctional institution.
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