I've found all the naughty socialist indoctrination in the advance text of the president's education speech tomorrow, and I've cut it out for you and annotated it, totally out of context. In bold, how an Obama hater -- someone who sincerely believes that Obama is a malevolent force -- might interpret the excerpts.
Obama: "And no matter what grade you're in, some of you are probably wishing it were still summer, and you could've stayed in bed just a little longer this morning."
But the government forces you to go to school, ha ha ha.
But I'm here today because I have something important to discuss with you. I'm here because I want to talk with you about your education and what's expected of all of you in this new school year.
What's expected? The liberal socialist president EXPECTS something from OUR children?
Now I've given a lot of speeches about education. And I've talked a lot about responsibility.
Responsibility is a code word for: redistribute income.
I've talked about your teachers' responsibility for inspiring you, and pushing you to learn.
He's threatening to physically assault children here.
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.
You know, if Obama wasn't so in sway to the teachers unions, he wouldn't be welcome at our schools, where our kids learn the values of capitalism and freedom.
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.
Self-discovery? That's a code word for homosexuality. Or, at least, for choosing a path in life that's different from what your parents want you to do. Obama is encouraging our kids to be individualists and disobey us.
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.
Now he's encouraging our kids to be nerds. And he just endorsed that fascist, Steve Jobs.
You'll need the knowledge and problem-solving skills you learn in science and math to cure diseases like cancer and AIDS, and to develop new energy technologies and protect our environment. You'll need the insights and critical thinking skills you gain in history and social studies to fight poverty and homelessness, crime and discrimination, and make our nation more fair and more free. You'll need the creativity and ingenuity you develop in all your classes to build new companies that will create new jobs and boost our economy.
My head exploded. Cancer AND AIDS? in the same sentence? AIDS is a disease of choice. And it's a code word for sex ed. And it's not appropriate for the president to mention this. "Critical thinking" skills. That's like critical race theory, right? Question authority? Be a post-modernist who doesn't believe in truth? And what's with these goals: Obama is commanding our children to fight liberal pathologies like poverty and homelessness and crime and -- even discrimination -- he wants our kids to learn skills so they can grow up and and discriminate against white men -- and I bet the communists will object to Obama's contention that education ought to be harnessed to economic growth, too.
I get it. I know what that's like. My father left my family when I was two years old, and I was raised by a single mother who struggled at times to pay the bills and wasn't always able to give us things the other kids had. There were times when I missed having a father in my life. There were times when I was lonely and felt like I didn't fit in.
Where were you born, sir?
So I wasn't always as focused as I should have been. I did some things I'm not proud of, and got in more trouble than I should have. And my life could have easily taken a turn for the worse.
But I was fortunate. I got a lot of second chances and had the opportunity to go to college, and law school, and follow my dreams. My wife, our First Lady Michelle Obama, has a similar story. Neither of her parents had gone to college, and they didn't have much. But they worked hard, and she worked hard, so that she could go to the best schools in this country.
Now he's saying that our kids should expect to BE like Obama?
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.
Oh God. He is implying something really pernicious here. He is insinuating that not every child has the same access to the social capital that allows their participation in healthy societies. This is an argument for socialism, plain and simple. He's urging the kids to think of themselves as victims.
That's why today, I'm calling on each of you to set your own goals for your education - and to do everything you can to meet them. Your goal can be something as simple as doing all your homework, paying attention in class, or spending time each day reading a book. Maybe you'll decide to get involved in an extracurricular activity, or volunteer in your community. Maybe you'll decide to stand up for kids who are being teased or bullied because of who they are or how they look, because you believe, like I do, that all kids deserve a safe environment to study and learn. Maybe you'll decide to take better care of yourself so you can be more ready to learn. And along those lines, I hope you'll all wash your hands a lot, and stay home from school when you don't feel well, so we can keep people from getting the flu this fall and winter.
Liberals out there -- you see? You see? What are the president's priorities? He's encouraging rebellion against authority. He's encouraging individual exploration. He's encouraging everyone to become community organizers like himself. Where's the value of hard work? Of discipline? Or doing homework every night?
Don't be afraid to ask questions. Don't be afraid to ask for help when you need it. I do that every day. Asking for help isn't a sign of weakness, it's a sign of strength.
Not when you're a president, it's not.
Because when you give up on yourself, you give up on your country.
Another hidden appeal to ObamaNation. What an abomination.
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.
Shades of Mouthpiece Theater. I'd advise you not to quit your day job, Ambinder, but this is your day job, after all: anticipating and parroting right-wing talking points in a ridiculous effort to balance your liberal inclinations. That's how Serious Journalists operate, truth be damned. So I'll just ask you to go fuck yourself, you unfunny pigface.
Look, Qjake, we all say our share of stupid things in life, but your perseverance in this fashion is becoming a little worrisome. Perhaps you should have a conversation with yourself. Ask yourself whence this obsession arises. Only then will you be able to move on to the next step of determining how to express your thoughts and concerns in a productive manner. Or, at least, in a more entertaining manner.
Uh, it looks like someone has a case of the Mondays.
Ambinder is secretly on *your* side, jackass.
If by "*your* side" you mean "on the side of openly mocking that which wholly demands mockery", I don't think Qjake is on that side.
But overtly on the side of irrational, fearmongering lunatics.
When truth and evidence become partisan values respected only by the left, see how quickly Ambinder abandons both in a grotesque effort to ingratiate himself with the right. As this effort inevitably fails, watch him lurch ever more comically rightwards, desperate to prove that he abhors fact-based journalism as much as they.
Remember, this is the type of swine (in character, if not in physical likeness) who will reflexively "give the government the benefit of some doubt, even having learned lessons about giving the government that benefit."
And these attempts at snark are pathetically weak tea. If you think Ambinder's predictable pablum is funny, well, let's just say you probably still read Gawker.
Why do you spend your holidays in the comments section of someone you so detest, Qjake?
Why are you so complacent in the face of Ambinder's daily miscarriage of journalism? There is no shortage of voices willing to point out what a joke of a journalist Ambinder makes, a chorus which he continues to ignore at his and his industry's peril.
Perhaps you are that elusive lowest common denominator, feasting greedily on pigshit straight from Ambinder's rancid pen. If so, my condolences, in these latter days of journalism as practiced by those of Ambinder's stripe. Your banquet is fast ending.
Marc,
I wonder if the media will report like you how silly the Republicans have been regarding this speech. I have read the entire speech and it is an excellent speech for our students to hear. In fact, my two daughters will read the speech tonight.
Maybe if the Republicans would quit focusing on their hate and focus on the issues Americans are facing maybe we can build a better country for our youth.
Love the comments.
I'd find this funny if it weren't for the disturbingly high probability that this is exactly how wingnuts will interpret this, and their comments will be treated as straight news and not subjected to any critical analysis.
Your definition of an Obama hater reflects the uncritical repetition of rightwing ideology:
Obama hater -- someone who sincerely believes that Obama is a malevolent force
If it were someone who sincerely believed that Obama was a creature from out of space would this faction be getting any air time at all? I don't think so. The fact that you devote time to making a humorous attempt at "decoding" how the fringe of the right wing is going to interpret this completely harmless speech reveals that at some level, you give the fringe credence.
Nice column. Not a masterpiece, but a good chuckle.
Three gold forks.
I'd find this funny if not for the Obama plan discussed here (see the "backstory" part).
Say, did Ambinder tell anyone about that BHO plan before the election? Did Ambinder contact anyone in the BHO campaign and ask them to explain why parents shouldn't be creeped out by such a plan? I'm pretty sure Ambinder didn't do that. Why?
Just...Duh!
It seems to me you're just obscuring the point of all this. Consider for a second that when the lesson plans were exposed, Obama was forced to change them. What place do this have in our classroom:
Extension of the Speech: Teachers can extend learning by having students
Write letters to themselves about what they can do to help the president. These would be collected and redistributed at an appropriate later date by the teacher to make students accountable to their goals.
If this was all so innocent, why change it when exposed to public scrutiny? You can write this off by ridicule, but the people that forced this into the public light have done us all a service. Transparency is good, and forcing Obama to make changes in his lesson plans and almost certainly in this speech is good, too. And to those on the left, don't for a second pretend you wouldn't be going crazy if George W. Bush had tried something like this, screaming about he was going to turn your babies into born-again Christians.
"What place do (sic) this have in our classroom:"
Write letters to themselves about what they can do to help the president. These would be collected and redistributed at an appropriate later date by the teacher to make students accountable to their goals.
Students were asked to perform a similar exercise when George H. W. Bush spoke to students, but -- and here is the catch -- the letters were solicited directly by President Bush to help him "improve government."
In the Obama instance, the letters are written by the students to the students. It is similar to the tried and true classroom exercise of students writing their own biographies as if it was 40 or 50 years into the future, or writing their own obituaries. Making the students accountable for their own goals provides the teacher with a tool to motivate his/her students with goals that have meaning to them. In other words, when a student says, "Why do I need to learn this anyway?" the teacher can demonstrate to the student how this particular topic or exercise is relevant. (If Janey wants to be a baker when she grows up, learning fractions today is important to that process.)
If this was all so innocent, why change it when exposed to public scrutiny? You can write this off by ridicule, but the people that forced this into the public light have done us all a service. Transparency is good, and forcing Obama to make changes in his lesson plans and almost certainly in this speech is good, too. And to those on the left, don't for a second pretend you wouldn't be going crazy if George W. Bush had tried something like this, screaming about he was going to turn your babies into born-again Christians.
There was no public scrutiny, only people like you going bat excrement crazy over a non-existent problem trumped up by your spokespersons -- who, let it be pointed out, could not make any factual assessment of a speech which had not been written yet.
Second, (lest you attempt to suggest the the President didn't release his speech "on schedule") the full text of the speech to which any lesson plan which would have been developed was released a full 23 hours early.
Third, the supposed "lesson plans" were developed not by President Obama (I believe he has more pressing engagements) but by the Department of Education, which like every other government agency provides a wide variety of lesson plans, learning materials, photographs, historical documents to assist student from elementary school through post-graduate studies with tools to enhance their learning.
George W. Bush did "try something like this". He promoted creationism in schools, prayer in schools, school vouchers to have students in distressed public schools attend religious schools instead. He limited debate about the "war of choice," the Iraq war, in schools. He pressed for libraries public, school and private, along with bookstores to collect information on the books checked out by or purchased by patrons when those books conflicted with the tenets of the "Patriot Act." He authorized wiretaps on American citizens -- and not just those who had contact with "foreign nationals". He instituted a "no-fly list" that, riddled with errors, prevents law-abiding Americans -- from infants to the very elderly -- from boarding a plane because the Department of Homeland Insecurity falsely identified them as "terrorist threats" to the nation.
Need I list any more actions by George W. Bush? Finally, let me remind you that the President did nothing in response to a Daily Brief that told him "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US." And on September 11, 2001, the 43rd President of the US was reading "My Pet Goat" to a classroom full of impressionable young schoolchildren.
How the left reacted when George H.W. Bush gave a school speech:
“The Department of Education should not be producing paid political advertising for the president, it should be helping us to produce smarter students,” House Majority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) said. “And the president should be doing more about education than saying, ‘Lights, camera, action.’ ”
Two House committees demanded that the department explain the use of its funds for the speech, an explanation that Deputy Secretary David T. Kearns provided late in the day in a letter to Rep. William D. Ford (D-Mich.), chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee. Education Secretary Lamar Alexander was out of town. [...]
Rep. Patricia Schroeder (D-Colo.), chairwoman of the Select Committee on Children, Youth and Families, said it was outrageous for the White House to “start using precious dollars for campaigns” when “we are struggling for every silly dime we can get” for education programs.
Rep. Martin Frost (D-Tex.) said that if Bush feels obliged to use government funds to hire outside consultants “to make him look good,” then he should fire some of the public relations experts on the White House payroll. “Then the president might be more sympathetic to unemployment benefits,” Frost said, referring to Bush’s threat to veto legislation to extend benefits.
Compare that mild reaction with the hysterical reaction of today's right to the speech, Ms. Psycho. Yup, a few congresscritters took a few pot shots at Bush over a speech because Bush used consultants. That's what happens in Congress. The left was hysterical over Bush in 2000, sure, but it just doesn't add up to tea parties, birthers and death panel fabrications.
As for why the lesson plan was changed, you honestly can't think of another reason besides guilt? Maybe because you don't want to?
Just watch. I'll guarantee at least a few of those end up being the exact talking points right-wingers are using tomorrow and beyond.
The president giving a speech to kids about the importance of education. The Horror. If there was any remaining doubt that these people have completely lost their minds, those doubts have been utterly erased.
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Fox News reported on ongoing parent opposition to the speech this morning:
http://www.gotchamediablog.com/2009/09/psychotic-parents-still-protesting.html
I have no problems with the president's speech. Would have like to have read it sooner though. Sometimes we protest too much though. Perhaps another case of the pot calling the kettle black.
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/When-Bush-spoke-to-students-Democrats-investigated-held-hearings-57694347.html