Both women are accomplished and I dare say would credit their education as an important factor in their career success.
A woman caller commented about the educational background of the presidential and vice-presidential candidates and asked, "Shouldn't voters be concerned about the education of the candidates?". In response, Mona Charen called the woman a snob just like so many democratic women who are snobs.
This comment is right in line with the reactive conservative media and the McCain campaign's mode of deflecting issues by using pejorative comments about anyone bringing up an issue. McCain and his supporters never honestly discuss issues, they use grade-school tactics of name calling. How disrespectful! (to quote a recent McCain ad). This is very disrespectful of the American public. We deserve a real discussion of the issues.
I guess this should be no surprise since in 2004 Charen authored Do-Gooders: How Liberals Hurt Those They Claim to Help (and the Rest of Us) and in 2003, Useful Idiots: How Liberals Got It Wrong in the Cold War and Still Blame America First.
Reviewer Daniel L Edelenher had this to say of Charen's book, Do Gooders.
Charen is a capable writer, but she seems really forced in spots here, especially when she's trying to channel Ann Coulter. But Coulter she is not; her attempts at being arch fall flat and she repeatedly writes with trepidation, as if she knows she can't be as funny or quick with a knife to the belly like Coulter can.Bruce C. Thornton, a professor of Classics at American University of Cal State Fresno has written this in regards to the term "useful idiots" used by Charen (Wikipedia):
Lenin called them "useful idiots," those people living in liberal democracies who by giving moral and material support to a totalitarian ideology in effect were braiding the rope that would hang them. Why people who enjoyed freedom and prosperity worked passionately to destroy both is a fascinating question, one still with us today.Reviewer Jeremy Grasso had this to say of the Cheran book, Useful Idiots:
It's rhetorically exciting to denounce all liberals everywhere - and even fun - but it's not in the service of a good argument that could hold up for liberal readers, for instance. The point, it would seem, would be to write a book that can excite neocons, so to speak, while provoking mute reaction in the left wing - because, as it is, this book is very easy to disagree with, and very easy to pick apart. It may be refreshing to read, but it is, fundamentally, a rant. You can't win any arguments with this book; you can only lose them.
Palin Education
Palin spent her first college semester at Hawaii Pacific College, transferring in 1983 to North Idaho College and then to the University of Idaho. She attended Matanuska-Susitna College in Alaska for one term, returning to the University of Idaho to complete her Bachelor of Science degree in communications-journalism, graduating in 1987.
In 1988, she worked as a sports reporter for KTUU-TV in Anchorage, Alaska, and for the Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman as a sports reporter. She also helped in her husband’s commercial fishing family business. Wikipedia
Sarah Palin was enrolled in five colleges in six years. I suppose you could say this gives her a unique perspective on higher education and you could put that in her "experience" column.
McCain Education
John McCain graduated from the United States Naval Academy near the bottom of his class in 1958, his low class rank attributed to indifference both to disciplinary rules and to academic subjects he did not enjoy. Encyclopedia Britannica
McCain also attended the National War College, 1973-74 (US News)
Here are some interesting links I did found about a thesis he wrote during that time:
McCain's Homework
The Code of Conduct and the Vietnam Prisoners of War, a "sanitized" copy of the thesis on the Vietnam war that John McCain wrote while studying at NWC.
The Seeds of McCain's War Views, NY Times
McCain's War, Washington Post
War President McCain, Huffington Post
Biden Education
Joe Biden graduated with a double major in history and political science in 1965, ranked 506th of 688 in his class. He went on to receive his J.D. from Syracuse University College of Law in 1968, where by his own description he again underperformed and ranked 76th of 85 students. He was admitted to the Delaware Bar in 1969. Wikipedia
Obama Education
Barack Obama received a bachelor’s degree from Columbia University (1983) and a law degree from Harvard University (1991), where he was the first African American to serve as president of the Harvard Law Review. Encyclopedia Britannica
Barack Obama studied at Occidental College for two years. He then transferred to Columbia University in New York City, where he majored in political science with a specialization in international relations. Obama graduated with a B.A. from Columbia in 1983. Obama entered Harvard Law School in late 1988 and at the end of his first year was selected as an editor of the Harvard Law Review based on his grades and a writing competition. In his second year he was elected president of the Law Review, a full-time volunteer position functioning as editor-in-chief and supervising the law review's staff of 80 editors. Obama's election in February 1990 as the first black president of the Harvard Law Review was widely reported and followed by several long, detailed profiles. He graduated with a Juris Doctor (J.D.) magna cum laude from Harvard in 1991. Wikipedia
What Barack Obama did in the years between graduating from Columbia University and entering Harvard Law School.
Barack Obama
After four years in New York City, Obama moved to Chicago to work as a community organizer for three years from June 1985 to May 1988 as director of the Developing Communities Project (DCP), a church-based community organization originally comprising eight Catholic parishes in Greater Roseland (Roseland, West Pullman, and Riverdale) on Chicago's far South Side. During his three years as the DCP's director, its staff grew from 1 to 13 and its annual budget grew from $70,000 to $400,000, with accomplishments including helping set up a job training program, a college preparatory tutoring program, and a tenants' rights organization in Altgeld Gardens. Obama also worked as a consultant and instructor for the Gamaliel Foundation, a community organizing institute. In mid-1988, he traveled for the first time to Europe for three weeks then Kenya for five weeks where he met many of his Kenyan relatives for the first time.
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