Monday, September 07, 2009

President Obama's Scary Back To School Speech



Wow. Such stunning ignorance and paranoia. Afraid to let the President of the United States of America address American school children? Really?

The White House released the text of the address the President will give tomorrow. You can read the entire address here.

I've read the entire speech. Here are some of the frightening, terrifying and clearly socialist highlights.

"Now I’ve given a lot of speeches about education. And I’ve talked a lot about responsibility.

I’ve talked about your teachers’ responsibility for inspiring you, and pushing you to learn.

I’ve talked about your parents’ responsibility for making sure you stay on track, and get your homework done, and don’t spend every waking hour in front of the TV or with that Xbox.

I’ve talked a lot about your government’s responsibility for setting high standards, supporting teachers and principals, and turning around schools that aren’t working where students aren’t getting the opportunities they deserve.

But at the end of the day, we can have the most dedicated teachers, the most supportive parents, and the best schools in the world – and none of it will matter unless all of you fulfill your responsibilities. Unless you show up to those schools; pay attention to those teachers; listen to your parents, grandparents and other adults; and put in the hard work it takes to succeed.

And that’s what I want to focus on today: the responsibility each of you has for your education. I want to start with the responsibility you have to yourself."

Notice all that talk about taking responsibility? Clearly part of the leftist/socialist agenda! We can't have the President of the United States urging parents, teachers and the students themselves to take responsibility for their parts in educating our children! What possible good could come from that?

But wait! There is more of this insidiousness.

"Every single one of you has something you’re good at. Every single one of you has something to offer. And you have a responsibility to yourself to discover what that is. That’s the opportunity an education can provide.

Maybe you could be a good writer – maybe even good enough to write a book or articles in a newspaper – but you might not know it until you write a paper for your English class. Maybe you could be an innovator or an inventor – maybe even good enough to come up with the next iPhone or a new medicine or vaccine – but you might not know it until you do a project for your science class. Maybe you could be a mayor or a Senator or a Supreme Court Justice, but you might not know that until you join student government or the debate team.

And no matter what you want to do with your life – I guarantee that you’ll need an education to do it. You want to be a doctor, or a teacher, or a police officer? You want to be a nurse or an architect, a lawyer or a member of our military? You’re going to need a good education for every single one of those careers. You can’t drop out of school and just drop into a good job. You’ve got to work for it and train for it and learn for it."

No thinking person can possibly deny the socialist agenda embedded in this. Telling children that every single one of them is good at something, has something to offer and can discover it and achieve it if they stay in school, get an education and work hard? How is capitalism supposed to survive if everyone can achieve success? If every one becomes a "have", where will the "have nots" come from? That's just crazy talk?

"Some of you might not have those advantages. Maybe you don’t have adults in your life who give you the support that you need. Maybe someone in your family has lost their job, and there’s not enough money to go around. Maybe you live in a neighborhood where you don’t feel safe, or have friends who are pressuring you to do things you know aren’t right.

But at the end of the day, the circumstances of your life – what you look like, where you come from, how much money you have, what you’ve got going on at home – that’s no excuse for neglecting your homework or having a bad attitude. That’s no excuse for talking back to your teacher, or cutting class, or dropping out of school. That’s no excuse for not trying.

Where you are right now doesn’t have to determine where you’ll end up. No one’s written your destiny for you. Here in America, you write your own destiny. You make your own future."

Again with the browbeating! The heavy-handed message that through personal responsibility, education and hard work you can improve your life and succeed! Who does this guy think he is, talking to our kids like that?

"And even when you’re struggling, even when you’re discouraged, and you feel like other people have given up on you – don’t ever give up on yourself. Because when you give up on yourself, you give up on your country.

The story of America isn’t about people who quit when things got tough. It’s about people who kept going, who tried harder, who loved their country too much to do anything less than their best.

It’s the story of students who sat where you sit 250 years ago, and went on to wage a revolution and found this nation. Students who sat where you sit 75 years ago who overcame a Depression and won a world war; who fought for civil rights and put a man on the moon. Students who sat where you sit 20 years ago who founded Google, Twitter and Facebook and changed the way we communicate with each other.

So today, I want to ask you, what’s your contribution going to be? What problems are you going to solve? What discoveries will you make? What will a president who comes here in twenty or fifty or one hundred years say about what all of you did for this country?"

This sounds suspiciously like that other horrible socialist who challenged the students of a previous generation by saying "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country!" It doesn't get anymore un-American than that!

"But you’ve got to do your part too. So I expect you to get serious this year. I expect you to put your best effort into everything you do. I expect great things from each of you. So don’t let us down – don’t let your family or your country or yourself down. Make us all proud. I know you can do it."

Parents, DON'T LET YOUR KIDS HEAR THIS STUFF! IT'S DANGEROUS AND SCARY!

20 comments:

I Travel for JOOLS said...

They corrected their mistake which was issuing the lesson plan well ahead of the speech. They just should have said the Pres is going to talk to the nation's children about responsibility, blah blah and there was no need for a lesson plan. Teachers are perfectly capable of doing that. That is what we pay them for.

But, they didn't.

Keith Sader said...

ZOMG, you're so right!!! That is every socialist talking point eVAH!!!!!

Xavier Onassis said...

JOOLS - I didn't really have any problem with the SUGGESTED (not required) lesson plan, but I don't have any problem with them removing it, either.

Here is what I think the cause of the hysteria is.

Many conservatives are repeating all of the right wing talking points to their children at home. "Obama is evis". "Obama is a Muslim". "Obama is destroying America". "Obama is not 'our' President!"

I think they are afraid that if their childern are exposed directly to the President of the United States telling them that they all have something they are good at, that they all have something to offer, that they can achieve anything they want in life if they stay in school, if they take personal reponsibility for their goals and education, if they are respectful to their teachers and are willing to work hard, that their children will come home from school saying "I like President Obama. He cares about us and wants us to succeed.".

These parents are trying to instill fear, hatred and mistrust in their children and they don't want their hard work to be undermined by, ya know, actual facts and inspiration from The Leader of the Free World..

Nick said...

Darn those pesky Negroes any way...

Keith Sader said...

I often wonder if it doesn't really get tiring living in fear like some folks seem to want to do all of the time.

I seem to remember growing up under the umbras of MAD(mutual assured destruction) and this level of crazy was reserved for the 6:00 a.m. Sunday religious programs. Now that crazy people have run out of armageddon via polity, is this the only thing they have to do with their time?

Lisa said...

Students should be able to listen to the President's speech

Property koncepts said...

hello ,Many conservatives are repeating all of the right wing talking points to their children at home. "Obama is evis". "Obama is a Muslim". "Obama is destroying America". "Obama is not 'our' President!"



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john bailo said...

I think parents should just let their kids stay up and hear Tony Robbins infomercials if they have to sit through this claptrap. Revolutionary war soldiers sat in the same desks as kids in P.S. 155? What is the point of this speech except to save a drowning Presidency.

Back in my creative writing class we used to have the ultimate put down for someone's story that wasn't good enough to be literature -- we'd say, it would make a great children's story.

Barrack Obama...good enough for school, but not for adults.

Joe said...

linked with credit

I Travel for JOOLS said...

Well, on Drudge this morning there is an article which I shall link that describes what the democrats did when Bush Sr. spoke to school children. They were so outraged they even held congressional hearings to investigate the use of taxpayer money to fund the president's speech. I would note the democrats were in control of congress at that time too, but I guess memories are short now days.

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/When-Bush-spoke-to-students-Democrats-investigated-held-hearings-57694347.html

Keith Sader said...

Eighteen years ago Jools? Eighteen years?! I'm trying to see the relevance here. Quick, name all of the democrats who were in Congress for that speech and this one, now do the same for republicans.

Words fail me about the irrelevance of Drudge's post. What's even better is that he failed to give a reference to the words of the speech itself.

From the 1991 Bush speech Via Volokh: "Let me know how you're doing. Write me a letter. I'm serious about this one. Write me a letter about ways you can help us achieve our goals." - wasn't this type of suggestion in the lesson plan causing the tempest-in-a-teapot?

My how soon the republicans forget too.

Fin said...

Excellent post XO

I Travel for JOOLS said...

Keith - the uproar now is no different than the uproar 18 years ago except for the difference in party of the POTUS and the fact the democrats made a congressional issue out of it back then. So what if it has been 18 years. The point is people who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

I listened to the speech. It was a very good speech.

Keith Sader said...

So what you're saying Jools, is that the republicans didn't learn the lessons the democratic idiocy should have taught them eighteen years ago - I agree completely.

Xavier Onassis said...

As someone on Twitter pointed out, you have to love the irony of parents keeping their kids OUT of school, to prevent them from hearing a message by the president stressing the importance of staying IN school. BRILLIANT!

Mark Smith said...

To be fair, Obama did make some changes, so it's a little disingenuous to pretend that the given speech and suggestions arent altered from the original. While I agree that the knee jerk reactions of alot of parents were unfounded, I won't go so far as to call them idiots or scaredy cats. Here's the rub, take a look at your commentary, read the tone of some of the more liberal comments. Now explain to me how your majority of left leaning commentors, yourself included, are any less snide or condescending as the conservatives you have often complained about? See thats the thing that is starting to change the way I look at the left and right wings. The politics might be a little different, but the tone and arguing points are interchangable. Obama ran on change, supporters of Obama, myself included, echoed that change. Change isnt going to come about through partisan politics, and you will never have bipartisan politics as long as each side is trying to one up the other. I spent a paragraph in todays post, clowning on the hysteria over Obamas school speech, and left it at that. You chose to take it farther. I'm not saying you should or shouldnt have, its not for me to say. When you make a blanket accusation, based on what you assume the parents opposed to, it doesnt really inspire a sense of Change we can believe in. It just sounds like more nanny nanny boo boo name calling. Maybe a good portion of those parents just don't like Obamas politics, but it's a big leap from disliking or distrusting Obama, to "parents are trying to instill fear, hatred and mistrust in their children" So lets review; Change = no change. One side slings shit at the other, the other slings it back. Same ol same ol.

I Travel for JOOLS said...

Keith - agreed

Xavier Onassis said...

m.m. - "To be fair, Obama did make some changes, so it's a little disingenuous to pretend that the given speech and suggestions arent altered from the original."

Some of the verbiage may have changed, but the core messages didn't. Stay in school. Take personal responsibility for your education. Do good things.

That's it.

"I agree that the knee jerk reactions of alot of parents were unfounded, I won't go so far as to call them idiots or scaredy cats."

I will. I'm becoming convinced that they may be right. The very idea of public education itself is an inherently liberal idea. I think I'll post about that later.

"Here's the rub, take a look at your commentary, read the tone of some of the more liberal comments. Now explain to me how your majority of left leaning commentors, yourself included, are any less snide or condescending as the conservatives you have often complained about? See thats the thing that is starting to change the way I look at the left and right wings. The politics might be a little different, but the tone and arguing points are interchangable. Obama ran on change, supporters of Obama, myself included, echoed that change. Change isnt going to come about through partisan politics, and you will never have bipartisan politics as long as each side is trying to one up the other."

Snide and condescending? Me?

Fuck yeah!

In case you haven't been paying attention, that's kinda what I do here. In fact, I'm doing it right now.

I'm also snide and condescending when I talk about religion, cyclists, vegans, capitalists, PETA freaks, Fox News, conspiracy theorists, Apollo 11 deniers, and people who treat pets like they are human children.

About the only time I'm not snide and condescending is when I'm stroking cock over the next, big, over-hyped Super Hero movie!

I never expected the election of Obama to result in the demise of partisan politics. We are talking about a country where not that long ago Representatives and Senators would break into fist fights, beat each other with canes and challenge each other to duels over minor policy differences!

No, I didn't expect rainbows and unicorns.

Eliminating partisan politics was never a goal or an expectation. That would just be silly.

All I wanted was a change in the way we dealt with the rest of the world.

I wanted a president who knew the difference between being a leader and a bully.

I wanted a president understood that you have to talk to people you disagree with if you are going to find any common ground and resolve your differences.

I feel like I got that, so I'm happy.

Mark Smith said...

And you kind of missed my point. I was speaking in bigger terms than just you, or just bloggers, or liberals. Of course your snide, but thats not who I was referring to. I'm talking about both sides of the fence. The change you want is never going to happen, sorry. The change conservatives want, will never occur either. One side cock blocks the other. If one side has a majority advantage, they bully the other. Thats why nothing will ever change. Obama is just Bill Clinton with a better rap and a deeper tan.

Anonymous said...

Good post X.

I went to college to become a teacher. My degree is in education. I decided during my final year that I didn't want to teach after hearing several instructors and teachers tell us things like, "be prepared, the parents are the most difficult thing you will face, they don't want to take responsibility for their kids education and as a result, neither do the kids", and "don't bother giving homework, the kids won't do it and the parents will complain about it."

I think certain parents are scared to hear anything about "personal responsibility". GGGRRR..