Page 6 - Florida Sentinel 2-21-17

White House News
Barack Obama Day Launched At Morehouse
Trump Lies About Graduating Top Of His Class
President’s Day at More- house College was declared the day to be Barack Obama Day.
“This year, we are seizing the traditional President’s Day holiday as an opportu- nity to take a nuanced look at the good, the bad and the complicated moments of the Obama presidency, and the future of his legacy,” reads a flyer for the event at the col- lege.
“Join us for a powerful day of dialogue, debate, and dis- course.”
The whole thing is going down on Facebook Live all
44th president Barack Obama being given honorary degree at Morehouse.
day, featuring keynote speaker Michael Eric Dyson.
And the president is seem- ingly caught in another whop- per. And by that doggone “fake press” at that.
As far back as the 1980s, the New York Times reports that Donald Trump had been claiming he graduated at the top of his class at UPenn’s Wharton Business School. Yet, despite these claims of being numero uno, school records suggest that Trump was not, nor was he even close.
The coldest part is that this exposure comes from the stu- dents at the institution itself. The University of Pennsylva- nia’s student-run newspaper, The Daily Pennsylvanian, found historical documents (or, primary sources,) to dis- pute the president’s claims.
It dug into the records avail- able during the time Presi- dent Trump was at the school (he finished at UPenn in 1968 after transferring from Fordham University as a jun- ior).
In 1968, The Daily Pennsyl- vanian published a list of the
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP
56 students who were on the Wharton Dean’s List that year—Trump’s name is not among them. The paper also found the commencement pro- gram from 1968 which does not list Trump as graduating with honors of any kind.
The school newspaper also notes that the university’s on- line alumni database lists 366 graduates of its business school in 1968, therefore, not being named among the top 56 means that Trump didn’t “graduate first in his class,” as
he’s reportedly claimed in past interviews.
The Pennsylvanian also found several of Trump’s for- mer classmates, whose obser- vations seem to jibe with the man in the White House today.
Louis Calomaris, a 1968 Wharton graduate, recalled that “Don ... was loath to really study much.” He said Trump would come to study groups unprepared and did not “seem to care about being prepared.”
He added that Trump’s ac- ademic passivity likely stemmed from his passion for engaging directly in the real es- tate business.
This notion of being more fo- cused on actually doing busi- ness than his business studies was confirmed by other class- mates who said he often went to New York City to work in commercial real estate, which “is a weekend business.”
1968 Wharton graduate Ed- ward Pollard described Trump as “very professional” and “different from the rest of the class.”
C-SPAN Survey: Historians
Rank Former President
Obama As 12th Best
It’s been nearly a month since former president Barack Obama has left the Oval Of- fice and the accomplishments that he made during his tenure has landed him on a list of the best presidents in U.S. history.
A C-SPAN survey of 91 presi- dential historians ranked Obama as the 12th best U.S. president ever, reports TIME. This is a JOKE!
From TIME:
Barack Obama has been
whisked to a very good table at the club of former presidents, according to a C-SPAN survey of 91 presidential historians published on Friday. Obama’s 12th-place ranking only a month after leaving office is the best for any president since Ronald Reagan, who ranks ninth in the new survey. The list updates previous C-SPAN surveys compiled in 2009 and 2000.
Historians gave Obama high marks for pursuing equality, managing the economy, public persuasion and “moral author- ity.”
President Trump To Meet With Congressional Black Caucus ....Maybe
On the other hand, he was judged to have been below-av- erage in handling international relations. Overall, he placed ahead of such generally well- regarded chief executives as James Monroe and James Polk.
Edna Greene Medford, a Howard University historian and consultant on C-SPAN’s 2017 Presidential Historians Survey, says that she expected Obama to be ranked higher.
“Historians prefer to view the past from a distance, and only time will reveal his legacy,” she told TIME.
Rep. Elijah Cummings, a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, said Sunday that the group will indeed meet with President Trump.
The Maryland Democrat told CBS' "Face the Nation" that Trump answered the caucus' Jan. 19 request for a meeting "a day or so ago” and that he ex- pects a meeting will occur after Congress returns from a week- long break.
Trump, whose political agenda includes trying to im- prove the lives of African Americans in crime-ridden city, said recently that he wanted to meet with Cum- mings, but that Cummings canceled because such a meet- ing would be bad for him polit- ically.
Cummings said in re- sponse: “I have no idea why President Trump would make up a story about me like he did.”
The situation escalated Thursday when Trump, dur- ing a press conference, was asked by a Black female re- porter about the meeting, and he responded by asking her to set up a meeting.
CBC member Rep. Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., said later that he detected “an element of disrespect” in Trump’s com-
Donald Trump disrespected the Congressional Black Caucus by asking a Black journalist to set up the meeting.
ment to journalist April Ryan. Ryan and Trump’s sidekick Omarosa got into a near altercation recently.
“He’s not going to ask any other reporter to do that for any other group, so why did he do that to her?” said Clyburn, also a member of the House Democratic leadership. “I think that was pretty instruc- tive to me.”
When asked whether Trump was implying that all Black people know each other, Clyburn said, “I don’t know what his implications were, but that’s my interpretation.”
The chairman of the CBC, Rep. Cedric Richmond, D- La., issued a statement late Thursday saying the White
House had reached out to schedule a meeting with the 49-member organization and discussions were underway about a possible date.
Ryan is a longtime White House reporter and Washing- ton bureau chief for American Urban Radio Networks.
She specifically asked Trump on Thursday whether he planned to include the CBC “in your conversations with your urban agenda, your inner- city agenda.”
The president responded by asking Ryan whether the CBC are “friends of yours” and re- marking, “I tell you what, do you want to set up the meet- ing?”
Ryan later tweeted “I am a journalist not a convener! But thank you for answering my questions.”
The CBC tweeted that the group sent Trump a letter in January outlining areas where they could work together, “but you never wrote us back. Sad!”
The organization later issued a statement saying they were in talks with the White House about a possible meeting.
Richmond’s statement said it was remarkable that Trump had not responded to their let- ter.
PAGE 6 FLORIDA SENTINEL BULLETIN PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY AND FRIDAY TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 21, 2017