Conservatives Enraged that the POTUS Wants to Encourage School Children to Try Harder

[iNow]

My despair regarding the US populace only deepens. Here's yet another depressing story regarding the sorry state of American thought:

 

 

 

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/09/04/obama.schools/index.html?iref=mpstoryview

The White House found itself on the defensive Friday over what would ordinarily be considered the most uncontroversial of events: a back-to-school speech to the nation's children.

 

<...>

 

"Thinking about my kids in school having to listen to that just really upsets me," suburban Colorado mother Shanneen Barron told CNN Denver affiliate KMGH. "I'm an American. They are Americans, and I don't feel that's OK."

 

"As the father of four children, I am absolutely appalled that taxpayer dollars are being used to spread President Obama's socialist ideology," Greer said.

 

"The idea that school children across our nation will be forced to watch the president justify his plans ... is not only infuriating, but goes against beliefs of the majority of Americans, while bypassing American parents through an invasive abuse of power."

 

<...>

 

"The goal of the speech and the lesson plans is to challenge students to work hard, stay in school and dramatically reduce the dropout rate," an administration spokesman said. "This isn't a policy speech. It's a speech designed to encourage kids to stay in school."

 

White House officials noted that Obama's speech, which will be available for anyone to view on the Web on Monday, is not unprecedented. President George H.W. Bush delivered a nationally televised speech to students from a Washington D.C., school in the fall of 1991, encouraging them to say no to drugs and work hard.

 

In November 1988, President Ronald Reagan delivered more politically charged remarks that were made available to students nationwide. Among other things, Reagan called taxes "such a penalty on people that there's no incentive for them to prosper ... because they have to give so much to the government."

 

Charles Saylors, president of the national Parent Teacher Association, said the uproar over Obama's speech is "sad."

 

 

I tend to agree, but I'll go one step farther. This is more than "sad," it's batshit crazy, and it needs to stop.

 

 

"I'm an American. They are Americans, and I don't feel that's OK" ... for my president to try to help motivate my child to stay in school and receive a decent education.

 

 

What are your thoughts? Is the President out of line, or are his critics tilting at windmills?

[bascule]

[Mr Skeptic]

What are your thoughts? Is the President out of line, or are his critics tilting at windmills?

 

If Obama is out of line it's because people have been drawing lines in the wrong places.

[The Bear's Key]

Awesome freakin pic :D

[Pangloss]

I haven't got a handle on this one yet. I've seen a couple discussions about it and saw an op/ed piece somewhere (WSJ?), but it seemed to be really trivial, about kids having better things to do (like learning). That struck me as daft because Presidents often speak to children in schools (Bush certainly did). So I don't really understand the objection and I'm looking around for more on it.

 

Here's a link to the New York Times piece on the subject today:

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/04/us/04school.html?bl&ex=1252296000&en=aca08736a6e52505&ei=5087%0A

 

The meat of it:

 

“The thing that concerned me most about it was it seemed like a direct channel from the president of the United States into the classroom, to my child,” said Brett Curtis, an engineer from Pearland, Tex., who said he would keep his three children home.

 

“I don’t want our schools turned over to some socialist movement.”

 

The White House has said the speech will emphasize the importance of education and hard work in school, both to the individual and to the nation. The message is not partisan, nor compulsory, officials said.

 

“This isn’t a policy speech,” said Sandra Abrevaya, a spokeswoman for the Department of Education. “It’s designed to encourage kids to stay in school. The choice on whether to show the speech to students is entirely in the hands of each school. This is absolutely voluntary.”

 

I dunno, maybe the right is even more lost than I thought it was.

[insane_alien]

since when was encouraging people to b better educated a socialist movement?

 

really wtf?

[swansont]

Government mandated and sponsored education is already socialist, but if course that point is lost on these people. They don't actually know what socialism is, they just know it's bad.

 

The thing I think that bothers me most about this is that these people belong to a group that paint themselves as "real Americans" and wave the flag every chance they get. And they want to show disrespect to the president; I have a hard time reconciling that. It doesn't matter who the individual is — you show respect to the office. I had always though that the left had a harder time with that concept (there's a large overlap with military hierarchy in this concept, and liberals don't join the military, right?) Are there instances of liberals pulling their kids out of schools when Bush dropped in to read a book to them?

 

So if these people complain about being called un-American backwards-ass hypocritical country farts, the can kiss my posterior, because they've already sent the message that I don't have to respect their position, or them.

[iNow]

Here's a link to the New York Times piece on the subject today:

From your link:

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/04/us/04school.html

Mr. Obama’s speech was announced weeks ago, but the furor among conservatives reached a fever pitch Wednesday morning as right-wing Web sites and talk show hosts began inveighing against it.

 

Mark Steyn, a Canadian author and political commentator, speaking on the Rush Limbaugh show on Wednesday, accused Mr. Obama of trying to create a cult of personality, comparing him to Saddam Hussein and Kim Jong-il, the North Korean leader.

 

The Republican Party chairman in Florida, Jim Greer, said he “was appalled that taxpayer dollars are being used to spread President Obama’s socialist ideology.”

 

And Chris Stigall, a Kansas City talk show host, said, “I wouldn’t let my next-door neighbor talk to my kid alone; I’m sure as hell not letting Barack Obama talk to him alone.”

[Mokele]

“i don’t want our schools turned over to some socialist movement.”

 

ahahahahahahahahaha!

[Dudde]

Government mandated and sponsored education is already socialist, but if course that point is lost on these people.

 

That's hilarious, that's exactly where my thought went when I saw that sentence.

 

I'm happy at least to have some closure on the matter, I was actually concerned about why the nations' teens and children were so blatantly ignorant about everything - apparently they shouldn't learn, AND they need to be kept out of politics...

 

wth was that whole thing about Mr. Obama and Sudam and Kim Jong-Il?

[iNow]

really wtf?

Welcome to how I feel every day living in the US. The problem I think is that we're all busy reading while they're busy breeding.

 

 

This seems to capture the issue of the ignorance of this, as well as the hypocrisy:

 

 

XQheP7Bp-zc

[bascule]

Wow, Michelle Malkin, as usual, makes me want to stab myself in the eye with a fork.

[Dudde]

Haha that clip was awesome, thanks for posting it. I always hate watching fox news..

[Pangloss]

Having looked at some moderate conservative boards a bit more on this I've found that some of them have objections that are not as ludicrous as the ones being discussed above. Most of the hand-waving is along the lines of "don't turn our kids into socialists!" and it's pretty ridiculous.

 

But there is a kernel of reasonable objection to the indoctrination issue. The issue revolves around the basic underlying assumption in American socio-politics that it's fine for older kids to step into politics, but younger minds need to be left free of ideological influences outside of the home. It's not that they don't get ideological indoctrination from their own parents (they certainly do), but because the parents are essentially operating without an owners manual, we need to support them and be careful not to undermine their authority in the household. This is such a dicey issue that sometimes minor changes in information given to younger children can have a major impact on home discipline, motivation, and educational and societal success.

 

In short, they're saying that the administration may be injecting a specific ideological point of view into the minds of younger kids. It's not something we normally do, and there's a pretty good reason not to do it.

 

Personally, I'm not at all convinced that that's what's happened here. From what I've seen so far this is a message along the lines of "study hard and you'll do well in school!" And the moderate conservatives I've talked to (some of whom have objections to this) have been very careful to point out that they APPROVE of President Obama delivering that message to their children. Their objections come in through specifics that look to me like they might have been poorly/accidentally/ill-advisedly phrased by the administration. Here's an example:

 

"The White House said Wednesday that the president's address is intended to be an inspirational, pro-education message to all students at the beginning of the school year. But critics objected to the language of one of the lesson plans, for students in pre-kindergarten through grade 6, which suggested that students "write letters to themselves about what they can do to help the president." Another assignment for students after hearing the speech was to discuss what "the president wants us to do."

 

Kennedy didn't say "Ask not what the country can do for you, but what you can do for the President", he said "country", and therein lies what may be the heart of the objection for more moderate conservatives. Understand, I'm speaking for others here so I don't know how well I'm representing the argument. But I think it's important to understand that not all Americans who have objections to the Obama administration are raving, illogical, uneducated lunatics (not that anyone suggested such). Like the guy says in the video above, sometimes even the right has a reasonable objection or two.

 

Is that the case here, though? I'm not sure but I'm not really seeing something that begs for such an outburst.

[iNow]

But critics objected to the language of one of the lesson plans, for students in pre-kindergarten through grade 6, which suggested that students "write letters to themselves about what they can do to help the president."

Kennedy didn't say "Ask not what the country can do for you, but what you can do for the President", he said "country", and therein lies what may be the heart of the objection for more moderate conservatives.

 

Which is all well and good, but they are truncating the quote. The quote is not asking the students "what they can do to help their president," but instead it's asking them what they can do "to help their president with the goal of keeping kids in school."

 

 

I'd say that last bit is rather useful in completely deflating this silly argument.

http://www.ed.gov/admins/lead/academic/bts.html

 

 

 

Is that the case here, though? I'm not sure but I'm not really seeing something that begs for such an outburst.

 

Yeah... well... are you really all that surprised after the birther movement, the teabagging, the drill baby drill, the equating Obama with Hitler for trying to provide healthcare to all citizens, and the other nonsense being spouted by these asshats? I'm not.

[Dudde]

I can understand that, it's a very valid point. To be honest, as much as I poke fun at the extreme conservatives, I kind of personally object to the 'what can you do for the president' thing too, I think perhaps we should encourage patriotism to one's country, as opposed to the guy sitting in office.

 

I actually had to find it several times from sources I trust to be accurate to fully believe that's what it said.

 

The quote is not asking the students "what they can do to help their president," but instead it's asking them what they can do "to help their president with the goal of keeping kids in school."

 

This is the conclusion I came to as well, but thought there was a better way of phrasing it, knowing full well this would be blown out of context.

[Moontanman]

The Conservatives are well down the road to batshit crazy, they cannot deal with loosing power to the liberals. They cannot see they pretty much screwed the pooch themselves by all the nutty bullshit they tried to pull when Bush was pres. Socialism is only bad when it helps the poor, it's wonderful when it helps the rich. The Conservative movement thought they were speaking for everyone in the country they forgot that not everyone is a Conservative Christian fundamentalist. Now they are so desperate to show their displeasure they are stepping and fetching like their asses are on fire and their heads are catching....

 

BTW Has anyone else noticed that the spell checker always suggests capitalizing Conservative but not Liberal?

[Pangloss]

Well there's a classic example of quote-parsing if I ever saw one. Thanks for pointing that out.

[D H]

The underlying problem behind this even being a controversy is that our country has become far too polarized. Bush was just evil to liberals from 2000 to 2008. Obama is not just evil to conservatives: he is pure evil. Neither said is rational. Crap like this: "Conservatives Enraged that the POTUS Wants to Encourage School Children to Try Harder" does not help.

 

There is too much rhetorical crap out there.

[ydoaPs]

He's going to HYPNOTIZE them!!!!!!!!!!!

 

http://www.oilforimmigration.org/facts/?page_id=290

[Mokele]

Such sillyness. Why would Obama need to resort to puny verbal tricks to sway the masses, when he can rely on his natural psychic powers. After all, like most US presidents, he is a lizardman from the constellation Draco.

[iNow]

Crap like this: "Conservatives Enraged that the POTUS Wants to Encourage School Children to Try Harder" does not help.

 

There is too much rhetorical crap out there.

Two quick points, DH.

 

1) It made you open the thread, didn't it? It's a good title and it captures the readers interest. I have no desire to create a thread which will not generate any conversation or debate. I think my selected title has helped bring people in and get involvement. You can argue otherwise, but I wanted to clarify my intent when creating the thread, and to share my motivation for choosing the words I did.

 

2) The thread title is remarkably accurate, so what's the problem? Perhaps I could have said "Some conservatives," to be more precise. I agree with that, but I ran out of room since thread titles can only be a certain maximum length.

 

 

Either way, I think we collectively agree that this attack on Obama is yet another baseless waste of time and an embarrassment to our country.

[D H]

1) It made you open the thread, didn't it? It's a good title and it captures the readers interest. I have no desire to create a thread which will not generate any conversation or debate.

So you, like far too much of the media (and that includes both CNN and Fox News), feel you need to resort to yellow journalism? Sad, sad day.

 

2) The thread title is remarkably accurate, so what's the problem? Perhaps I could have said "Some conservatives," to be more precise. I agree with that, but I ran out of room since thread titles can only be a certain maximum length.

The thread title is remarkably inaccurate. You could have tried to understand why some conservatives are against this program. But that would have been too much work and would have against your political bias. They are enraged by the teaching points that the DOE is sending out in advance of the speech, not the speech itself.

 

Either way, I think we collectively agree that this attack on Obama is yet another baseless waste of time and an embarrassment to our country.

You have made a straw man of their arguments and you implied all conservatives think this way (association fallacy). I think what we can collectively agree with is that use of logical fallacies at this site is not a good idea.

[iNow]

Okay. I love the fact how you talk about how partisan we are... And how this thread I created only makes the problem worse, and fails to find a way for people to come together.

 

Then, in the very next post... you attack me using the exact same us/them mentality you criticized me for showing.

 

Having your cake and eating it, too, are ye?

 

 

Listen. You said I strawmanned them. Explain how and where. I shared a story, and shared my reaction to it. Not much else, except where I corrected truncated quotes they are using to magnify the witch-burning mentality, and I called them hypocrites since Reagan and GHWBush did these same things while they were in office (and, in fact, Reagan expressly spoke about taxation to students... which has zero to do with staying in school and is hugely indoctrinating).

 

You said I stated that ALL conservatives feel this way, yet the post you just quoted conceded the exact opposite (you know... where I mentioned that I should have said "some conservatives" and that I agreed with that?).

 

You also accuse me of "yellow journalism" for capturing the issue in an interesting way, and say what a "sad, sad day" it is? It is a thread title, and you should try focusing more on the thread content, since that's where the meat is.

 

 

Seriously, DH... How about you try leading by example and quit being such a partisan yourself? You are being incredibly offensive, and it seems rather personal instead of objective. If you disagree with my points, then explain why without all the extra baggage.

 

Sound good?

[Cap'n Refsmmat]

Who's the one making this personal?

 

Can we stay on topic please?