I blah blah blah blah I blah blah I blah blah blah blah I. Me, me, me, me.
Ed Morrisey: “I think Obama fouled this up from the beginning, making it look much more political than necessary”
I agree with Ed and many others. I’ve read the speech, and it is innocuous. A good speech, actually, and entirely appropriate for all students to listen to. But, as Ed points out, it’s not the speech itself that was giving parents pause.
It was the Arne Duncan/Government-created curriculum that accompanied the speech:
The speech, included in its entirety below, turned out to be entirely innocuous. But by asking teachers to impress upon children the need to “help President Obama,” they made it look blatantly political. They seem to have forgotten that they’re the public servants, and that the people do not live to serve political masters.
Though this analysis of the speech is a bit troubling, though not surprising:
Update: Commenter Faraway counts up references to Obama and to country, and finds 55 self-references and four to the nation.
Update II: I’ve run the speech through a word frequency counter and found the following results:
- 56 iterations of “I”
- 19 iterations of “school”
- 10 iterations of “education”
- 8 iterations of “responsibility”
- 7 iterations of “country”
- 5 iterations each of “parents”, “teachers”
- 3 iterations of “nation”
In other words, Barack Obama referenced himself more than school, education, responsibility, country/nation, parents, and teachers combined. And to think that people accused Obama of self-promotion!
As Michelle Malkin notes, it’s the subtext, silly:
Yes, you missed the point.
It’s not the speech (as I pointed out last week), it’s the subtext.
It’s the radical activism of the White House Teaching Fellows who designed the education guides tied to Obama’s speech.
It’s the overzealousness of public school educators who have turned classrooms into Obama campaign offices.
It’s the influence of the left-wing social justice crusaders of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge on Team Obama.
It’s the Left’s embrace of Obama Chicago pal Bill Ayers’ pedagogical philosophy of “education as the motor-force of revolution.”
It’s the activist tradition of government schools using students as junior lobbyists to pressure legislators for higher education spending, pro-illegal immigration protests, gay marriage, environmental propaganda, and anti-war causes.
This speech was meant to be political. There was this entire political lesson plan built around it being pushed by the whitehouse. They got caught and quietly dropped it. But don’t lie to people, leftards, and try to tell us this wasn’t meant for donk propaganda. Worse, it was part of this sick cult of personality built around obama.
And, I am sure the earlier drafts of this speech were not as devoid of political rhetoric. Obama is in love with his own voice and his ego is stratospheric. I am certain there would have been mention of several of his ideals.
In Morse Code the President will repeatedly blink out “A-l-l-a-h-u-a-c-k-b-a-r”.
So now you know. If you hadn’t stayed in school, grad-gee-ated. and “done been learned” you would know these things.
How about a pallet of Wet Naps for Pat to wipe the Obama semen from his chin…
Somehow this word frequency count was missed:
145 you
I.e., you the children listening to this speech.
Don’t manipulate facts to suit your purpose. It’s unflattering.
Good Morning, I see pat has soiled the thread with his hatred and racism. Good Morning pat, Hows the daughter? How is the big window looking down on town lake? How is the messiah?
Funny, no one bitched when Regan and Bush did the same thing. Maybe we should start giving our President the respect he deserves as President.
Obama and his underlings have been calling people who disagree with his healthcare plan thugs, brownshirts, nazis, etc. And you’re surprised that people don’t want him around their kids? Hahahaha.
Plus, after 8 years of the most despicable behavior by the democrats towards Bush, go fuck yourself.
Had GW given a speech to students it would not have bothered me in the least. I did not like him as a president but I gave him the respect he deserved.
Yet, the left never gave him the respect he deserved so count me unimpressed.
And I can’t tell you how much I loathe this fake obama.
Can you you point me to a link where Reagan and Bush’s Dept. of Education created a curriculum to go along with their speeches?
I’ve been very clear that I have no problem w Obama giving a standard “stay in school and study hard” speech to kids. It’s the indoctrination curriculum that accompanied it that gave me (and most others) pause.
No, a republican would never try to indoctrinate children or preach their policy to them.
Yes they did.
The jackasses called for Congressional hearings on President G. H. W.Bush.
As for respect, it is earned, and the current president is in arrears.
Yes they bitched and complained.
I agree with you Rucker. We used to live in a country where the parents would teach their children to respect their leaders reguardless of thier religion, race, political party, or views. There was a day when everyone stopped to listen when the president spoke. We were taught to stand behind our president even if we didn’t always agree with him because standing behind our president was just as important as standing behind our country. Unfortunately those days are gone. I mean look back at the kennedy days. This man was not as wonderful as everyone thought. He had some pretty disturbing ideas and he had one mistress coming in one door and one going out the other all right under the nose of his wife and children and yet everyone thought he was a god. Pres. Clinton screwed around once, got caught and has never been able to live it down. When I listen to the rants of republicans today it makes worry about where our country is headed.
Fooled around once? You libs really are gullible and naive.
You are obviously not a native Texan, but probably from Mass., NY, or some other liberal shit hole.
Clintoon screwed around once?
Which one are you talking about?
You should pay attention to the rants of the current president, and his czars, if you are truly concerned about the direction our country is headed.
See above, dumbass.
And as to Clinton getting caught once — are you stupid or just a liar? Probably both. You also ignore the fact that Clinton, a president of the United States and a member of the bar, suborned perjury in a witness and committed perjury himself.
I know you donks are scared of facts, but tough luck, toots. Get over it.
Wow…classy. You must be a republican.
I’m a registered democrat and have been my entire life. You lose, cupcake. LOL