Is There a Doctor in the White House? Not if You Need an M.D. – WSJ

Madame First Lady Mrs. Biden Jill kiddo: a bit of advice on what may seem like a small but I think is a not unimportant matter. Any chance you might drop the Dr. before your name? Dr. Jill Biden sounds and feels fraudulent, not to say a touch comic. Your degree is, I believe, an Ed.D., a doctor of education, earned at the University of Delaware through a dissertation with the unpromising title Student Retention at the Community College Level: Meeting Students Needs. A wise man once said that no one should call himself Dr. unless he has delivered a child. Think about it, Dr. Jill, and forthwith drop the doc.

I taught at Northwestern University for 30 years without a doctorate or any advanced degree. I have only a B.A. in absentia from the University of Chicago in absentia because I took my final examination on a pool table at Headquarters Company, Fort Hood, Texas, while serving in the peacetime Army in the late 1950s. I do have an honorary doctorate, though I have to report that the president of the school that awarded it was fired the year after I received it, not, I hope, for allowing my honorary doctorate. During my years as a university teacher I was sometimes addressed, usually on the phone, as Dr. Epstein. On such occasions it was all I could do not to reply, Read two chapters of Henry James and get into bed. I ll be right over.

via www.wsj.com

Oh dear.