WikiCU - User contributions [en]

Talk:Barack Obama

2008-11-01T19:49:10Z

Marie: /* The "Small Consulting Firm" */

I'm not sure an unsubstantiated Bwog comment is substantial enough to add the assault accusation... [[User:Pacman|Pacman]] 21:50, 27 September 2007 (EDT)

==Google ad==
Anyone else notice the ad on this article is for John McCain? I wonder if he monopolized the market on Google Ads for pages with the keywords "Barack Obama"... [[User:Pacman|Pacman]] 12:48, 3 March 2008 (EST)

== Very sad ==

It's sad to think the wiki encyclopedia for Columbia University would make such a negative spin on Obama's association with Columbia. Why not just state facts and give a more balanced view of his life at Columbia than spinning it in such an obvious negative fashion? It sounds like McCain campaign staffers wrote the article on Obama.

And here to think I once had respect for Columbia University. Obama may be on to something: the "bile" does appear to flow freely out Columbia University.

: Dear anonymous commenter,
: I'm not sure how you can claim that an article which contains such abject praise as "Obama's professors and classmates...confirm that he was a brilliant, standout student and that he was an active participant in seminars. Baron said he was one of the top one or two students in his class" could constitute a "negative spin on Obama's association with Columbia". Many of the other features of this article, including snippets of Obama's residential life, were lifted directly from his memoirs. As for the criticisms of Obama's distancing from the school, they are true: he has shown little willingness to talk about his time at the university, which is a source of frustration for students - but mostly because they see the association as positive, and wish he would talk it up.

: Please also keep in mind that this wiki is not an official publication of Columbia nor is it exclusively authored by Columbia students - in fact, you are more than welcome to make your own changes and contributions to the article, provided they are justifiable. It ought not reflect on your opinion of the university in any way. [[User:Pacman|Pacman]] 13:51, 29 October 2008 (EDT)

== The "Small Consulting Firm" ==

I know it may be difficult to find information on Business International since it merged with the Economist Intelligence Unit years back. However, BI had offices in major cities of the world and published newsletters containing top-notch research on doing business around the world. It was the premier publisher in this area of business. Subscriptions were costly, and every multi-national corporation subscribed to these publications. Senator Obama's description is accurate, and the nature of BI's publications could lead a person of Senator Obama's background to feel that he was "selling out." There are many online, erroneous reports about the nature of this company, but if you search you can find something closer to the truth.

Talk:Barack Obama

2008-11-01T19:48:17Z

Marie: /* The "Small Consulting Firm" */

I'm not sure an unsubstantiated Bwog comment is substantial enough to add the assault accusation... [[User:Pacman|Pacman]] 21:50, 27 September 2007 (EDT)

==Google ad==
Anyone else notice the ad on this article is for John McCain? I wonder if he monopolized the market on Google Ads for pages with the keywords "Barack Obama"... [[User:Pacman|Pacman]] 12:48, 3 March 2008 (EST)

== Very sad ==

It's sad to think the wiki encyclopedia for Columbia University would make such a negative spin on Obama's association with Columbia. Why not just state facts and give a more balanced view of his life at Columbia than spinning it in such an obvious negative fashion? It sounds like McCain campaign staffers wrote the article on Obama.

And here to think I once had respect for Columbia University. Obama may be on to something: the "bile" does appear to flow freely out Columbia University.

: Dear anonymous commenter,
: I'm not sure how you can claim that an article which contains such abject praise as "Obama's professors and classmates...confirm that he was a brilliant, standout student and that he was an active participant in seminars. Baron said he was one of the top one or two students in his class" could constitute a "negative spin on Obama's association with Columbia". Many of the other features of this article, including snippets of Obama's residential life, were lifted directly from his memoirs. As for the criticisms of Obama's distancing from the school, they are true: he has shown little willingness to talk about his time at the university, which is a source of frustration for students - but mostly because they see the association as positive, and wish he would talk it up.

: Please also keep in mind that this wiki is not an official publication of Columbia nor is it exclusively authored by Columbia students - in fact, you are more than welcome to make your own changes and contributions to the article, provided they are justifiable. It ought not reflect on your opinion of the university in any way. [[User:Pacman|Pacman]] 13:51, 29 October 2008 (EDT)

== The "Small Consulting Firm" ==

I know it may be difficult to find information on Business International since it merged with the Economist Intelligence Unit years back. However, BI had offices in major cities of the world and published newsletters containing top-notch research on doing business around the world. It was the premier publisher in this area of business. Subscriptions were costly, and every multi-national coporation subscribed to these publications. Senator Obama's description is accurate, and the nature of BI's publications could lead a person of Senator Obama's background to feel that he was "selling out." There are many online, erroneous reports about the nature of this company, but if you search you can find something closer to the truth.

Talk:Barack Obama

2008-10-31T02:44:02Z

Marie: /* The "Small Consulting Firm" */ new section

I'm not sure an unsubstantiated Bwog comment is substantial enough to add the assault accusation... [[User:Pacman|Pacman]] 21:50, 27 September 2007 (EDT)

==Google ad==
Anyone else notice the ad on this article is for John McCain? I wonder if he monopolized the market on Google Ads for pages with the keywords "Barack Obama"... [[User:Pacman|Pacman]] 12:48, 3 March 2008 (EST)

== Very sad ==

It's sad to think the wiki encyclopedia for Columbia University would make such a negative spin on Obama's association with Columbia. Why not just state facts and give a more balanced view of his life at Columbia than spinning it in such an obvious negative fashion? It sounds like McCain campaign staffers wrote the article on Obama.

And here to think I once had respect for Columbia University. Obama may be on to something: the "bile" does appear to flow freely out Columbia University.

: Dear anonymous commenter,
: I'm not sure how you can claim that an article which contains such abject praise as "Obama's professors and classmates...confirm that he was a brilliant, standout student and that he was an active participant in seminars. Baron said he was one of the top one or two students in his class" could constitute a "negative spin on Obama's association with Columbia". Many of the other features of this article, including snippets of Obama's residential life, were lifted directly from his memoirs. As for the criticisms of Obama's distancing from the school, they are true: he has shown little willingness to talk about his time at the university, which is a source of frustration for students - but mostly because they see the association as positive, and wish he would talk it up.

: Please also keep in mind that this wiki is not an official publication of Columbia nor is it exclusively authored by Columbia students - in fact, you are more than welcome to make your own changes and contributions to the article, provided they are justifiable. It ought not reflect on your opinion of the university in any way. [[User:Pacman|Pacman]] 13:51, 29 October 2008 (EDT)

== The "Small Consulting Firm" ==

I know it may be difficult to find information on Business International since it merged with the Economist Intelligence Unit years back. However, BI had offices in major cities of the world and published newsletters containing top-notch research on doing business around the world. It was the premier publisher in this area of business. Subscriptions were costly, and every multi-national coporation subscribed to these publications. Senator Obama's description is accurate, and the nature of BI's publications would lead a person of Senator Obama's background to feel that he was "selling out." There are many online, erroneous reports about the nature of this company, but if you search you can find something closer to the truth.

Barack Obama

2008-10-31T02:00:42Z

Marie: East 94th Steet is in Yorkville, not East Harlem. East Harlem beginds at 96th Street.

{{wp-also}}

[[Image:Obamany.jpg|thumb|right|Obama the Columbia undergrad, visiting [[Central Park]] ]]

'''Barack Obama''' [[Columbia College|CC]] '[[1983|83]] is a US Senator from [[w:Illinois|Illinois]] and the Democratic party candidate for the 2008 presidential election.

Many Columbia students are [[w:The Audacity of Hope|audaciously hoping]] he'll win his primary and the national election. If he does, he will not only be the first partially black president, but the first attendee of [[Columbia College]], and the first graduate of any Columbia school<ref>[[Theodore Roosevelt]] and [[Franklin Delano Roosevelt]] both attended [[Columbia Law School]], but neither graduated, as you only needed to pass the bar after 2 years of school to practice law. One Roosevelt dropped out after passing the bar, the other after being elected to the NY State Assembly. [[Dwight Eisenhower]] never attended Columbia, but rather served as a somewhat absentee President of the University while biding his time to run for the Presidency.</ref>, to occupy the Oval Office. Obama is currently the first Columbia College alumnus to be nominated by a major modern party ticket, and the first CC alum to be a major party nominee since the Federalists nominated [[DeWitt Clinton]] in [[1812]].

Obama, however, tends to forget/ignore his Columbia affiliation, preferring to mention that he attended [[Harvard|Harvard Law School]]. He has repeatedly turned down requests to be the [[Class Day]] speaker in recent years, as well as general requests to appear from the [[College Democrats]]. He did, however, note that Columbia was his alma mater while visiting during the [[ServiceNation Presidential Candidates Forum]], and sent a letter to the attendees of the Class of 1983's 25th reunion gathering.

==Columbia years==

[[Image:Obama tenement.jpg|thumb|right|The East Harlem tenement where Obama lived during most of his time at Columbia]]

[[Image:Obama grandparents.jpg|thumb|right|Obama gets a visit from his grandparents during his Columbia years]]

Obama [[transfer student|transferred]] to CC from [[w:Occidental College|Occidental College]] which (poor place) is even more rarely mentioned by the young senator. At Occidental, Obama had been into partying and drugs. He hoped the move to New York, and Columbia, would put him on a more serious track.

Columbia at that time did not guarantee university housing for all students, so Obama lived off campus. He claims to have spent his first night sleeping in an alley near the corner of 109th and [[Amsterdam Avenue]] and washing with the homeless next to an open fire hydrant. He eventually moved into a walkup on E. 94th St., in [[Yorkville]], where he would "chat with his Puerto Rican neighbors about...the sound of gunfire at night".<ref>http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/01/30/where-obama-lived-in-1980s-new-york/</ref>

When he was on campus, he concentrated on academic work, spending most of his time in [[Butler Library]] "like a monk", and made few friends. He also took up jogging and "stopped getting high". The racist and anti-Semitic graffiti he sometimes encountered on bathroom walls on campus (how times never change!) helped him form his ideas about race and class. He wrote of "the almost mathematical precision with which America’s race and class problems joined; the depth, the ferocity, of resulting tribal wars; the bile that flowed freely not just out on the streets but in the stalls of Columbia’s bathrooms as well".<ref>''Dreams from My Father'', p. ?</ref>

Obama claims to have participated to some extent in anti-apartheid activities with the [[Black Students Organization]], but no one is quite sure.

He majored in [[Political Science Department|PoliSci]], and claims to have concentrated in "International Relations," (now [[International Politics]] - this is a subfield of the PoliSci major and should not be confused with a "concentration," the Columbia term that substitutes for what most schools term a "minor"). Obama's professors and classmates, including former international politics professor [[Michael Baron]] and current MTV president [[Michael Wolf]], confirm that he was a brilliant, standout student and that he was an active participant in seminars. Baron said he was one of the top one or two students in his class. Despite this, Obama continually declines requests to release his Columbia transcript.

Sources first differed on whether he wrote his senior thesis on Soviet nuclear disarmament<ref>http://www.columbiaspectator.com/?q=node/28631</ref> or the North-South debate on trade and the "new international economic order"<ref>http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/04/magazine/04obama-t.html</ref>. Later, it emerged that he had not really written an official thesis at all: students were not required to do so at the time, and what counted as a "thesis" was really a long seminar paper. Obama wrote his for Prof. Baron's American Foreign Policy class. A search has been launched<ref>http://www.bwog.net/articles/obama_s_schoolwork_verily_a_mystery</ref> for a copy of the paper, which was confirmed to have been on the topic of Soviet disarmament. Baron, Obama's de facto "thesis" advisor, is now retired to Florida, and claims to have lost his copy of the paper in a move some time ago.

It has been reported that Obama graduated without honors<ref>http://www.nysun.com/new-york/obamas-years-at-columbia-are-a-mystery/85015/</ref>, but if the policies then were the same as they are today, he would not have been eligible for latin honors, because he spent only two years in the college. Obama hoped to become a community organizer, but could not find work as one, and joined a small consulting firm instead. In his memoir, he portrays this as a big corporate job, and claims it prompted fears he was becoming a sellout.

==Later Columbia coincidences==

In his primary fight to become the Democratic nominee, Obama has faced, among others, [[GS]] alum [[Mike Gravel]]. His Republican opponent would be [[John McCain]], a former [[Class Day]] speaker whose daughter, [[Meghan McCain]], was CC'07. In the general election, he is facing tickets with [[Wayne Allen Root]], also CC'83, the Libertarian Party vice presidential nominee, and independent vice presidential candidate [[Matt Gonzalez]] CC'87.

==References==
<references />

==External links==
*[http://www.college.columbia.edu/cct_archive/jan05/cover.php Columbia College Today profile of Obama]
*[http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/us/politics/30obama.html NYT article on Obama's years at Columbia and subsequent time in New York]

[[Category:Columbia College alumni|Obama, Barack]]
[[Category:Class of 1983|Obama, Barack]]
[[Category:Political science majors|Obama, Barack]]
[[Category:Presidential candidates|Obama, Barack]]