In defence of Harvard, whilst at one point over 90% graduated with honors it is now capped, so that only 50% of the class will graduate with any kind of honors. I used to get a significant number of students emailing me when final grades came out moaning that because of their B+ they'd never make the cap for honors (I Head TA'd a few courses).

I do wholeheartedly agree with you: using GPA as a filter is fairly pointless.