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by Iftheshoefits 4469 days ago
Yes, actually. His parents were a Harvard alumnus and a mother who was both gifted and accomplished in Anthropology (with a wide network) and the people who raised him from age 10, his grandparents, were hardly "middle class" in the one-breadwinner-midwestern-auto-worker sense of the word. They were at minimum on the affluent side of middle-class.

So, Obama's childhood is not even close to being typical. He started with a leg-up that only got better as time went along. About the only true obstacle in his way has been his race--which is decidedly a huge one to have overcome, especially in America, where racism is still deeply embedded in our society in a number of ways, and was much much worse during his formative years. But his economic and family environment put him way, way ahead of even the typical American's.

1 comments

How many thousands of people had a Harvard alumnus for a father and gifted and accomplished woman for a mother? How many of those thousands became president?
Your second question is entirely irrelevant in the context of this discussion. "Become President" is just not a reasonable minimum measure of "success."