“Last election time, if you recall, the American mass media did a shameful job of vetting [the presidential candidates],” Tsurumi said.
As another November approaches, Tsurumi is trying again to air his criticisms of the man he once taught and his actions as president.
“This time it seems to be getting around a bit more widely,” he said. “After three years of dismal record, people seem more inclined to believe that all his failed leadership was apparent during the Harvard Business School years.”
In a July 2 speech to the Foreign Correspondents Club of Japan in Tokyo, Tsurumi repeated the broadside he has launched repeatedly in the past.
“I always remember two groups of students,” Tsurumi said then, according to published reports. “One is the really good students, not only intelligent, but with leadership qualities, courage. The other is the total opposite, unfortunately to which George belonged.”
—Staff writer Simon W. Vozick-Levinson can be reached at vozick@fas.harvard.edu.