Presidential Intelligence

Kacey

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Presidential Intelligence

A report published Monday, by the Lovenstein Institute of Scranton, Pennsylvania, detailed its findings of a four-month study of the intelligence quotient of President George W. Bush. Since 1973, the Lovenstein Institute has published its research to the educational community on each new president, which includes the famous "IQ" report among others.

There have been twelve presidents over the past 50 years, from F.D. Roosevelt to G.W. Bush, who were rated based on scholarly achievements:
1. Writings that they produced without aid of staff.
2. Their ability to speak with clarity, and several other psychological factors, which were then scored using the Swanson/Crain System of intelligence ranking.

The study determined the following IQs of each president as accurate to within five percentage points. In order by presidential term:

Franklin Delano Roosevelt [D] 142,
Harry S Truman [D] 132,
Dwight David Eisenhower [R] 122
John Fitzgerald Kennedy [D] 174,
Lyndon Baines Johnson [D] 126,
Richard Milhous Nixon [R] 155,
Gerald R. Ford [R] 121,
James Earle Carter [D] 175,
Ronald Wilson Reagan [R] 105
George Herbert Walker Bush [R] 98,
William Jefferson Clinton [D] 182,
George Walker Bush [R] 91

In order of IQ rating:
182 . . William Jefferson Clinton [D]
175 . . James Earle Carter [D]
174 . . John Fitzgerald Kennedy [D]
155 . . Richard Milhous Nixon [R]
147 . . Franklin Delano Roosevelt [D]
132 . . Harry S Truman [D]
126 . . Lyndon Baines Johnson [D]
122 . . Dwight David Eisenhower [R]
121 . . Gerald R. Ford [R]
105 . . Ronald Wilson Reagan [R]
098 . . George Herbert Walker Bush [R]
091 . . George Walker Bush [R]

The six Republican presidents of the past 50 years had an average IQ of 115.5, with President Nixon having the highest at 155.



President George W. Bush rated the lowest of all the Republicans with an IQ of 91.

The six Democratic presidents of the past 50 years had an average IQ of 156, with President Clinton having the highest IQ, at 182.


President Lyndon B. Johnson was rated the lowest of all the Democrats with an IQ of 126. No president other than Carter [D] has released his actual IQ (176). Note the institute measured him at 175.

Among comments made concerning the specific testing of President G.W. Bush, his low ratings are due to his apparently difficult command of the English language in public statements, his limited use of vocabulary [6,500 words for Bush versus an average of 11,000 words for other
presidents], his lack of scholarly achievements other than a basic MBA, and an absence of any
body of work which could be studied on an intellectual basis.

The complete report documents the methods and procedures used to arrive at these ratings, including depth of sentence structure and voice stress confidence analysis.


"All the Presidents prior to George W. Bush had a least one book under their belt, and most had written several white papers during their education or early careers. Not so with President Bush," Dr. Lovenstein said. "He has no published works or writings, which made it more difficult to arrive at an assessment. We relied more heavily on transcripts of his unscripted public speaking."

The Lovenstein Institute of Scranton, Pennsylvania think tank includes high caliber historians, psychiatrists, sociologists, scientists in human behavior, and psychologists. Among their ranks are Dr. Werner R. Lovenstein, world-renowned sociologist, and Professor Patricia F.Dilliams, a
world-respected psychiatrist For more information on the Lovenstein Institute, go to http://lovenstein.org//

Hm - The smartest president didn't know enough to keep his pants zipped and the dumbest one thinks he can run a war.
 

jdinca

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Wow, it only takes an IQ of 91 to get an MBA? I'm in the wrong damned profession.

W may not be the brightest bulb on the list but when you look at the terms of many of the presidents on the list, it appears that IQ doesn't really correlate with the job they do in office.
 

tellner

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I'd have to question the ranking of Shrubus Maximus. 98? He did make it through a prestigious law school and many difficult and intellectually challenging jobs. He may have been borderline aphasic, but I'm sure he at least hits above the median on raw intelligence. Minimus? I'm surprised his IQ isn't in the comfortable room temperature range.

As for Clinton, well, in the Talmud the Sages tell us that "The Holy One, Blessed be He, endowed Man with a magnificent brain and a versatile male member but only enough blood for one of them at a time." Besides, we know for a fact that Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon and Reagan were all doing the extra-curricular horizontal mambo at one time or another. We're pretty sure that Truman, Carter and Maximus weren't. And I really don't want to speculate too deeply about the Condi/W rumors. The visions of "Kirk/Uhura" love games have me reaching for the grapefruit spoon and sawdust.
 

Laurentkd

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well, my data interp professor told us "there are three types of lies... little white lies, damn lies, and statistics!"

Not knowing the background of this study I of course can't comment on this one in particular, but I just think it is important to be aware that after doing a study you can basically make the results say whatever you want them to say.
 

Ninjamom

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Sorry, but this is one of those bogus Internet stories (I can hear all y'all Democrats sigh in sorrow from here ;) ).

According to Snopes, there is no Lovenstein Institute, in Scranton, PA or otherwise, no such study, and the intent is clearly partisan (although you probably didn't need the Snopes website to figure that one out).

While not a gifted speaker, George W. Bush is probably about a 130-140 IQ, as would be about the range for Bill Clinton.
 
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Kacey

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Sorry, but this is one of those bogus Internet stories (I can hear all y'all Democrats sigh in sorrow from here ;) ).

According to Snopes, there is no Lovenstein Institute, in Scranton, PA or otherwise, no such study, and the intent is clearly partisan (although you probably didn't need the Snopes website to figure that one out).

While not a gifted speaker, George W. Bush is probably about a 130-140 IQ, as would be about the range for Bill Clinton.

Yeah... but it's fun to think about, isn't it?
 

shesulsa

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Actually, the part about Carter being the only one to release his IQ info was true until Clinton revealed his.

Also, when looking at cumulative IQ scores and Dubya, one must remember that there is verbal IQ and performance IQ - the two are averaged revealing a cumulative IQ. If verbal IQ is extremely low but performance is high, the cumulative score will be comparatively low and will, for the most part, not be indicative of a person's true intelligence structure.
 
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