Here in America, We Are Still Very Far from 150-Day Battles, But Close to Mid-Term Elections
KCJ’s comment here, on the fawning Songs of Obama sung in a New Jersey classroom, inspired me to write a response that may warrant its own post. Here is the video KCJ is talking about:
This is creepy stuff, and I’d be livid if my kids ever come home singing something like this. Now, where is the evidence that this is the work of the Obama Administration, as opposed to that of one unintelligent Kool-Aid drinking teacher? WSJ blogger James Taranto notes that the teacher in question has since retired, and that there’s no evidence that this was orchestrated from any sort of Central Committee for Popular Enlightenment Und Freudediktat. We are still a long way from 150-day battles here, and anyone in the administration who was so inclined (Van Jones?) still faces such significant obstacles as a mid-term election that will almost certainly cost the governing party dozens of seats in Congress.
(This, on the other hand, is the work of the Obama Administration, and it only amplifies the disgust I’d first expressed here at the herd mentality of our “artistic community,” and the willingness of some in our government to make it a tool of state power. I like the way Iowa Hawk lampooned it here. This will give many of us a sense of unease that will outlast the memory of the overreach itself. It should.)
Still, let’s not overstate cycles that most of us are old enough to recognize as natural and recurring seasons in any democratic system of government. Political parties — and this is especially true of the Democrats, whose tent is much wider at the fringes — are dominated by activists who define “change” in revolutionary terms. Consider the simplistic genius of the very slogan, “Change.” It is ingenious for the same reason that it is so perilous for the politician who rides to victory on it: because it is void for vagueness. It means nothing more than whatever the hearer wants it to mean, up to the moment when the candidate is elected and must govern, and offer specific proposals that often turn out to be different from what voters may have imagined (or been led to imagine).
By now, you may be about to ask for examples. First, I’d cite Obama’s passivity about gay marriage. Obama the President is smart enough to know that the voters aren’t ready for it, but the activists want revolutionary change, even if the result is a series of consequential, long-term setbacks. Consider the administration’s retreat from its early promise to close Gitmo in a year. The Administration made that promise without giving much thought to the question of what are we to do with the terrorists there, terrorists whose plans could not have been disrupted if they had been captured or questioned in ways that conform to our domestic judicial rules of evidence. Yes, some imagined that they would be let go to kill again, but our President has enough sense not to propose that. He also learned that the American people aren’t ready to share their country with terrorists, and the clumsy initial efforts to shut Gitmo down, justified in part on appeasing our “allies,” — often, really the most inflexibly and irrationally anti-American citizens of nominally allied nations — ended up doing significant damage to our most important trans-Atlantic alliance. Now that the war in Iraq seems to be winding down with most key U.S. interests standing a good chance of being secured for at least a while after we leave, some on the far-left are dropping their past pretenses that Afghanistan was “the good war” from which Iraq was a distraction. Now, there is another war that must be lost. There certainly are legitimate debates about how the war there should be fought or can be won, but I don’t expect the far left to take much of a serious interest in those. They no doubt imagined that Obama’s election would mean an accession to their demands for unconditional withdrawal, something Obama can’t give them. That sets us up for the sort of rebellion among the unpatriotic left we haven’t seen since 1968, though probably on a much smaller scale.
For most voters, however, dissatisfaction with the status quo doesn’t translate into enduring support for any particular alternative, and that’s particularly so when the alternative bears a hint of radicalism. Voters are repelled by revolutionaries. Consider: isn’t it possible that dissatisfaction with Iraq in 2006 might have meant dissatisfaction with how the war was being fought, or that it hadn’t been won yet? Certainly most of that dissatisfaction has eased. Iraq is no longer among the most contentious issues in our country, and there is no great popular demand for the kind of calamitous helicopters-on-the-embassy-roof withdrawal that our most craven politicians, many of whom voted to authorize the war, had called for so recently. Nor did dissatisfaction with the economy necessarily equal popular support for the kind of overspending that both Presidents Bush and Obama supported, and which McCain would have. The Great Silent Majority’s imagined idea of “Change” turns out to be unlike the cultish socialist-realist hues of Shepard Fairey’s imagination. The voters’ mandate may have been nothing more than a mandate to manage things back to the halcyon days before 9/11, when the economy also happened to be pretty good. Activists have sharp-edged plans to change the world. Voters have gauzier directions to make the stuff that was good to be good again, and to make the stuff that’s good now better. And during elections, especially mid-term elections, voters tend to punish any sign activism furiously.
I’ll close with the most important point of all — voters think more strategically than we give them credit for, and they tend to display this in their affinity for divided government. Recall, after the 2006 mid-terms, I noted how voters tend to check the president’s party by giving victories to opposition parties:
1958: Republican President (Ike), second mid-term, Dems gain 16 in the Senate, 48 in the House.
1966: Democratic President (LBJ), second mid-term, Republicans gain 3 in the Senate, 47 in the House.
1974: Watergate. Republican President (Ford), sorta-second mid-term, Dems gain 4 in the Senate, 49 in the House.
1978: Democratic President (Carter), first mid-term, Republicans gain 3 in the Senate, 15 in the House.
1986: Republican President (Reagan), second mid-term, Dems gain 8 in the Senate, 5 in the House.
1994: Democratic President (Clinton), first mid-term, Republicans gain 2 in the Senate, 54 in the House.
2002: President’s party actually gains 2 in the Senate, picks up 8 in the House.
Today, we have a likely net switch of 26 House seats and 6 Senate seats. It’s a solid win, more so in the Senate, but not a blowout in light of the historical trends. Dislike of the governing party turns voters out for mid-terms, and governing parties tend to lose seats as a result. [link]
Events like 1994 and 2006 were mostly reactions to an excessive accumulation of power by one party. They were negative mandates, voter-directed terminations. In the broader historical context, they were inevitable reactions. We’re probably going to see the same thing in 2010, because the Democrats’ great accumulation of power isn’t reflected in broad popular support for their ambitious plans. The voters smell radicalism in the government’s excessive spending, its amorphous but too-ambitious health care schemes, and (somewhat unfairly, I think) its obsequious foreign policy. But if the policy in practice isn’t that different from Bush’s, its conciliatory tone certainly hasn’t done us any good with Iran or North Korea, and can’t persuade Europe to behave like an ally (something it ceased to be when it stopped needing us at the end of the Cold War).
Negative mandates tend to be of limited endurance because they’re mostly reactionary in nature. Once the governing party is duly rebuked, the sense of purpose is spent. Once in power, opposition parties typically fail to realize the visions they’ve sold to their voters. The Republicans didn’t close the deal after 1994, because Newt Gingrich was a superficially unappealing figure in the same ways Barack Obama is superficially appealing, and because he cultivated the sort of radical image that gave the voters unease. In this, he certainly had a strong assist from a hostile news media. Obama’s is a case of what I’d describe as vicarious hubris — hubris that’s mostly evident in the swooning of an adoring media, who are still smitten by the Obama of their imaginations in the same way a few of them are still smitten with John Kennedy, with all the erotic and sometimes homoerotic overtones that implies.
With a few obvious exceptions, however, Obama’s own policies have been marked by a cautious cognizance of the backlash to come and a certain calculated willingness to disappoint his base. But triangulation is a very easy thing to get wrong, because it tends to leave everyone disappointed. That can cause disgruntlement even among the supporters of a “stewardship” kind of president, but just imagine the bitterness of the jilted adorers who did not just vote for “Hope,” but who embraced their own imaginations of it.
Political indoctrination songs are marginally worse than anti-free speech schools and districts which denied their children an authentic citizenship lesson through listening to President Obama’s recent address to the nation’s students. In our district some children were put in an alternate classroom during the speech to meet parental demands. Parents can and do keep their children out of lessons in subjects like sex education, so a parent preventing his or her child from listening to the speech was less objectionable than entire schools or districts.
One side of the political spectrum being so dominant in the arts, media, education, and so on — and I’d add even in the church (Christian) — is bad for our democracy. And anyone that says that liberals do not have a significant majority power in each of the first three areas is in denial.
One example: I was watching C-Span coverage of a big, national meeting of public school educators. It was back either just before Iraq War II or just after it began. The panel I saw had some big names from big groups. The audience was about 100 to 200 teachers. — The entire discussion on the war was — from one side of the political specturm – and one idea – and I guess you can easily imagine what the universal position was. Contrast that with what the polled opinion of the general public was at the time — and you have a problem. I think this starts to fit a textbook (semi-pun intended) definition of indoctrination: when the educational system begins to represent less the society of the masses and more the ideas of a smaller contingency of the people in that society.
I was also amazed that these intelligent people couldn’t understand how having such a shared opinion among themselves was oppressive to what they were talking about wanting: a free and open discussion in their classrooms.
One of the big people who talked a lot was answering a question from the crowd about how to get the students to engage more in talking about the war and such topics. She was saying that what she found and heard much from other teachers was that students actually had ideas (based on some knowledge) about the war, but were relucatant to speak out loud about it in class. And teachers need to create conditions in which they felt free to express them.
— It has been too long ago for me to remember the words she said well enough to paint the picture correctly – and that would help you see it — but in general, she was talking about the students feeling bolder to speak their minds, and then she dropped in a side joke about how then they (they teachers) could tell them why the war is bad….and the audience and panel laughed…
….and I thought, “And that is exactly why your students keep their mouthes shut…..Because they know your opinion is the one you are going to thrust on them and when it doesn’t match theirs, what do you expect them to do?”
She wasn’t talking about propagandizing the students. All of those teachers wanted to be good teachers in the Socratic tradition —– but when by and large you find that one side of the political spectrum has a high enough majority in a profession – this is what you get too often for the good of the society.
(I’d also point in this ballpark to the times I’ve heard military people who knew the days of the draft saying they liked the system because it kept the military “honest” and brought in people with different ideas and mindsets, and that was a good thing overall….)
Though I’m not entirely comfortable with the kids singing these songs — especially if they weren’t allowed to opt out (and I assume their parents knew what they were doing) — I’m a bit dismayed at the when and how and from whom this “went viral.â€
This song was done to honor Obama as the first African-American president as part of a celebration of Black History Month, but that context is stripped away when the criticism is brought about this seven months after the fact.
I’m as disturbed by Fox and Friends’ underhanded way of presenting this as I am by the now-retired teacher’s arguably inappropriately displayed exuberance for Obama.
Teachers have never had “free speech” rights to say anything they want, and “authentic” depends on what the lesson says: Having a class or a whole school listening to an address by President Bush is one thing (and I’d like to see if that ever happened)….but putting together with a lesson plan telling the class or school or schools across the nation that his ideas were good — whether we’re talking about Iraq War II, the War on Terror, or even his pre-flipflop North Korea policy – is a different matter. I’m sure you’d agree to that. You’ve overreached some here…I respectfully suggest/conclude.
How many school districts refused (didin’t) run speeches by Bush? Even in the immediate aftermath of 9/11? What would we have heard from his opposing camp if his administration had told school districts throughout the country they should run his speech(es)? What about making the weekly fireside chats mandatory – but only the president’s one – not the opposition’s that comes immediately after?
School districts, particularly high schools in which many can vote and many will be able to vote in a short time, should be promoting a president’s ideas complete with his own video promoting them. I don’t care who is in the White House…
Why? Why would FoxNews withhold it for seven months? Why would’t it jump on it early in Pres. Obama’s term to try to deflate him out of the gate? Whatever the reason, conservatives could respond to your opinion, and I think some have been, but I don’t remember exactly, with indignation that the video wasn’t presented by the rest of the media until now. — Inotherwords, outrage at the perception of motives for delaying it until now is countered with outrage at the perception of motives for trying to bury it from the start to never see the light of day…
Since when does Fox News care what non-viewers say/think about them?
It is not news now. Had it come out in February when the incident actually occurred, it would have been news (whether it would be newsworthy is another matter).
I’m not saying this to make a pro-Obama statement. I didn’t even vote for him. I’m making a larger point that, left or right, I’m deeply disturbed by the new ways in cyberspace in which “news” (i.e., broadcasts purported to be news) are manipulated for partisan rallying. This became news because it went “viral” and how, when, and by whom it went viral was manipulated. Left or right, this is disturbing.
I admit to taking a gratuitous shot at the administration for this Juche-like worship of Obama. It was the overzealous teacher/administrator, not the administration that was guilty of this idolatry. For Christians, it was particularly offensive that the line from “Jesus Loves the Little Children” was borrowed (‘red, and yellow, black and white…’) and Obama’s name substituted for Christ’s.
BTW, I received this today, it is dated SEP 2009 and it is very fresh:
http://asiafoundation.org/resources/pdfs/DPRKContingencyCUSKP0908.pdf
Published by the Center for U.S.-Korea Policy, The Asia Foundation
excerpt:
“This paper will identify the main issues on which the United States and South Korea
would need to coordinate policies in response to possible North Korean instability at each
stage of an unfolding contingency, with a focus on different functional areas of
cooperation. It will highlight immediate priority areas for U.S.-ROK cooperation,
identifying lead agencies and mechanisms for cooperation, and potential points of
conflict in U.S.-ROK efforts to manage instability in North Korea. The assessment will
attempt to provide a long-term framework for understanding U.S.-ROK contingency
planning for North Korea.”
I hope I didn’t seem to be picking on you. I think the NEA scandal supports your point better than the NJ example does, but with all respect, I hate to see the right falling into the same trap the left fell into when Bush was president — the way it’s starting to assume bad motives, inside jobs, and government orchestration behind every excess. This kind of partisan polarization eventually got so out of hand that many lefties actually believed that Bush invaded Iraq for the oil, had advance knowledge of 9/11, and planned to strip them all of their civil liberties, all of which was nonsense. It got us to the point where many (most?) DKos and Democratic Underground readers were rooting for the guys shooting at our troops. It’s not good for America.
It’s harder to be a loyal opposition in some ways than it is to govern. Just look at how much damage the Democrats did to our national unity during wartime. I think it’s key, first, that the opposition credit the President for making good decisions — such as abandoning his promises to the far left to close down Gitmo no matter what, or to go on appeasing North Korea. And it’s right that we criticize — vigorously — excesses like his excessive spending, his disingenuous promises that expanding the medical welfare state won’t bankrupt us, and his emerging drift on Afghanistan. Above all, we mustn’t let disagreement with some of Obama’s policies become loathing of the man, though I’d find Obama a difficult man to loathe personally.
Obama is a dangerous radical. PERIOD. That is not partisan, polemical, or polarization. His roots, religion and policy choices are neither American nor democratic in even the broadest sense of the terms. His black liberation theology roots are deeply marxist and his Czarization of the executive branch strikes at the heart of accountable representative government. Takeovers of the banks, the healthcare industry, CEOs, and attempted takeovers of education should alarm any American that still believes George Washington is the father of our country.
Joshua, I hold you in enormous esteem, but treating Obama as just another democrat is naive, disingenuous, and ultimately unfair to ordinary Americans. He is a radical socialist with an extremist marxist agenda that unfortunately includes the cult of personality and a wholesale capitulation to the enemies of the USA.
Comparisons to the DPRK are of course, hyperbolic, but not irrelevant.
I agree with you on that one, with the important condition being that the President isn’t exploiting or indoctrinating the kids in a partisan way. After hearing the president’s comments quoted afterward, I wondered what the fuss was all about. A cynical mind would respond that the reaction before the speech caused the speechwriters to tone down the politics. To me, however, part of the “loyal opposition” concept means giving the president a rebuttable presumption of good faith. I have really, really had it with the desperation to believe that presidents we did not vote for start wars, allow terrorist attacks to happen, and speak to schoolchildren because of poisonous or pecuniary motives. Nothing about Obama’s speech to the kids seemed nefarious, controversial, or out of bounds with past practice.
Some of the things you guys are saying are just silly. Juche-like worship of Obama? So when the people like a Republican president, it’s all cool, but if its people liking a Democrat, its worshipping? Obama is still pretty unpopular in America, to even say that he could be “indoctrinating” us, is laughable.
Kushibo, What about the NJ video is even half as disturbing as the producer of malicious garbage like Farenheit 9/11 sitting next to a former POTUS at the 2004 DNC Convention? Maybe my delusion of grandeur is to think that among conservatives, self-policing starts here, but if GHW Bush sits next to a birther at RNC ’12, we’ll know The Right has failed as badly as The Left has at putting its extremists at a distance.
I don’t know much about totalitarian music in elementary schools, but I am wondering when someone is going to find or otherwise perform a YouTube rendition of “Footsteps,” the abortive Kim Jong-un anthem!
Obama could put a stop to all of this nonsense if he would just quit with the airs and start acting like a normal man. You know, go cut some brush in the Chicago suburban backyard, call himself a wartime president, put on a flightsuit with a codpiece to land on a Japanese tanker in the Indian Ocean and then personally joystick an unmanned aerial drone to attack a camp in Helmand province, and cap off the normalcy by ordering a few Stealth Bombers to fly over next weekend’s football games during the national anthem. Then we would all feel much more at home, here, in the Homeland with Lee Greenwood! Ahem…please excuse the outburst.
Not that it’s particularly relevant to the current conversation, but I question how having 130,000 troops (plus God knows how many contractors) in Iraq counts as “winding down,” particularly just when things are heating up again re: U.S.-Iran chest-pounding. What happened to reality? Somehow everyone has agreed to agree on this paradox and I’m puzzled.
The reality is that Iraqi soldiers have replaced us on Iraqi streets, casualties are way down, security has improved dramatically, and Iraqis’ quality of life is starting to rebound.
I sense your disappointment, meaning these must all be bad things. Or maybe you imagined that Barack Obama would flee with all due haste and leave Iraq like a carcass torn apart by terrorists and militias, which would have been somehow more just and ethical than giving an elected representative government a chance to take root.
As for US-Iran chest-pounding, I think you’re falling into the trap of drawing moral equivalance between Obama and Ahmedinejad. Funny, the very least I expected from Obama’s election was the end of that particular kind of nonsense.
Joshua, I wouldn’t say I’m disappointed in the least about the significant leveling-off of violence in Iraq, particularly as seen in that very data-rich Brookings report in your second link. That’s an excellent report, by the way, and I’m glad to get it. And my reference to Iran isn’t about either Ahmed. or Barack, or to draw moral equivalency between the two.
(Unfortunately I don’t speak any Persian, don’t read as much as I should about Iran, and am unable to draw any but the most obvious parallels between those two men. Haven’t even read “Flags of Our Fathers” or “Dreams of My Father” or whatever Obama’s memoir is called or any of Ahmed.’s poetry. Don’t have much of a clue as to Gen. James Jones or what his medals are for or his views of Iraq War or if Biden’s scheme for partition is even something he remembers, or if the Kurds still think we’re friends, or what is going on with oil revenues in Kirkuk. I even stopped reading Juan Cole’s blog and watching bloated guests hash out Iraq policy with Jim Lehrer! But I do know that our pre-Chris Hill ambassador to Iraq is glad that China is making oil deals with the Kurds. And that the North Korean leaders seemed to be very scared in March 2003.)
If anything, my last little coda of a thought in previous comment was meant to imply that while having a significant number of troops in Iraq (even a post-drawdown 50,000) could be seen as a means of intimidating Iran, it’s foolish for the commentariat to imply that action against Iran can be taken without any thought to what that means for our troops in Iraq. And 130,000 troops is 130,000 troops. But anyway, you defined what you meant with the “winding down” thing, which is more than most people do when discussing Iraq — if Iraq is discussed at all, so I appreciate it.
BTW, as long as we’re exchanging readings, there’s a great book by John Garver, very data-rich, about China-Iran relations that seems to imply that China will never really put the screws on Tehran. I suppose it’s worth thinking about how pressuring China on Iran will effect our ability to pressure China on North Korean issues. Didn’t catch yet if you commented on the appointment of the new Human Rights envoy on NK.
Now back the present perfidious examples of when music teachers start channeling Carmina Burana…Actually, it is pretty interesting and connects to politics and inculcating ideologies. The best elementary vocal music teachers today alternate between using the Carl Orff method (which had been funded and co-opted by the Nazis) and the Zoltan Kodaly method (co-opted by the Hungarian Communist Party). North Koreans tend to use the Soviet methods of music education, which are informed by the Kodaly system, but overlay them with techniques acquired under Japanese colonial rule. If you’re interested in making a more academic linkage between music education in Democrat-friendly classrooms and the North Korean example, I recommend consulting my article “Song of Youth: North Korean Music from Liberation to War,†North Korean Review Vol. 4, No. 1 (Fall 2008), 93-104.
And I am still on the hunt for the “Footsteps” tune which hailed Kim Jong-un. Who knows? Maybe they took some other anthem about his dad and turned it upside down.
I’m tired and probably need to read through the comments again…but…
It’s my understanding the speech itself was part of a larger packet. I don’t know how tied to the Dept. of Education the packet was – or how tied to the national teacher’s union – pretty much an arm of the Democrat party like NOW and others are….
But, looking at Obama’s administration using its tight support from the NEA and arts community makes it easy to give an educated guess this message to the youth was tied together the same way – the same way ACORN is used and reaches out into local communities in specfic areas.
If having the media, Hollywood and the arts, teacher’s unions and to a lesser extend teaching profession (along with higher education — profs and department admin people), with such a clear majority on one side of the political spectrum doesn’t seem unhealthy to people, I don’t know why it wouldn’t, whatever your own politics are….As I said, I think the same with the military or religious organizations in some respects.
But – we have had this situation for some time…
What is different is that — now these groups have their man in the White House – to an extent a good bit beyond having Clinton in the White House or Carter —
— and they feel good enough and strong enough to blurr the lines — to redraw the lines — into doing stuff like this.
And the disturbing part for me is – Obama is in the lead with this. Did he have his administration specifically tie itself to this video? No. But using groups like ACORN – which is tied to the government unlike Christian conservative groups – and the NEA and so on to do things like “correct the falsehoods being spread” about his policies and to promote his policies — is pushing the envelop of ideological and party politics.
The president speaking directly to the nation’s youth through the schools complete with lesson and unit plans on his policies – in favor or even against them – come to think of it – produced by orgs tied enough to the government is a bad thing. It starts to get into the South Korean KTU territory….
Really? This video might assist us in making a comparison between the cults of personality both in the DPRK and the USA.
And anyone comparing Bush Derangement Syndrome to honest and sincere objections to forcing children to sings hymns to Comrade Obama may as well capitulate to the impending socialist takeover of our (US) government.
This is the letter sent to all principals from Department of Education.
Dear Principal:
In a recent interview with student reporter, Damon Weaver, President Obama announced that on September 8 – the first day of school for many children across America – he will deliver a national address directly to students on the importance of education. The President will challenge students to work hard, set educational goals, and take responsibility for their learning. He will also call for a shared responsibility and commitment on the part of students, parents and educators to ensure that every child in every school receives the best education possible so they can compete in the global economy for good jobs and live rewarding and productive lives as American citizens.
Since taking office, the President has repeatedly focused on education, even as the country faces two wars, the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression and major challenges on issues like energy and health care. The President believes that education is a critical part of building a new foundation for the American economy. Educated people are more active civically and better informed on issues affecting their lives, their families and their futures.
This is the first time an American president has spoken directly to the nation’s school children about persisting and succeeding in school. We encourage you to use this historic moment to help your students get focused and begin the school year strong. I encourage you, your teachers, and students to join me in watching the President deliver this address on Tuesday, September 8, 2009. It will be broadcast live on the White House website http://www.whitehouse.gov at 1:00 p.m. eastern standard time.
In advance of this address, we would like to share the following resources: a menu of classroom activities for students in grades preK-6 and for students in grades 7-12. These are ideas developed by and for teachers to help engage students and stimulate discussion on the importance of education in their lives. We are also staging a student video contest on education. Details of the video contest will be available on our website http://www.ed.gov in the coming weeks.
On behalf of all Americans, I want to thank our educators who do society’s most important work by preparing our children for work and for life. No other task is more critical to our economic future and our social progress. I look forward to working with you in the months and years ahead to continue improving the quality of public education we provide all of our children.
Sincerely,
Arne Duncan
This is the letter our union president sent us.
President Obama to Speak Directly to America’s Students
On Tuesday, September 8, President Barack Obama will deliver a national address directly to the nation’s students on the importance of education. He will challenge students to work hard, set goals, and take responsibility for their learning. The address will be broadcast live over the White House website – http://www.whitehouse.gov – at 1pm eastern time, 10am Arizona time.
An email invitation is being sent from U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan to every school principal in the country asking them to have their school participate in the broadcast. NEA is working with the White House to both promote this event and to create materials that will support student participation. Current discussions include the development of a menu of classroom activities for students; a possible student video contest focusing on the important of education in their lives; and, more.
This will be the first time any U.S. President has undertaken such an ambitious outreach effort to speak directly to America’s young people. This is an unprecedented opportunity for students across America to kick off the school year with a 21st century event that harnesses technology to celebrate learning.
Thank you,
Estevan Carreon
GUEA President
My high school district made the decision not to show the speech live. Teachers could show it the next day, but students could opt out of viewing the speech if they had parental permission.
Much was said about the Democratic reaction to George HW Bush’s 1991 speech to school kids. I am linking two different perspectives on this issue.
http://www.tonysrants.com/national/perspective-dems-slammed-george-h-w-bush-for-address-to-schools/
http://bigsole.blogspot.com/2009/09/in-context-what-was-going-on-with.html
Tim
but putting together with a lesson plan telling the class or school or schools across the nation that his ideas were good — whether we’re talking about Iraq War II, the War on Terror, or even his pre-flipflop North Korea policy – is a different matter. I’m sure you’d agree to that. You’ve overreached some here…I respectfully suggest/conclude.
I respectfully conclude that you’ve misrepresented the content of his speech and proposed lesson plan.
How many school districts refused (didin’t) run speeches by Bush?
Did George W. Bush. ever give an apolitical direct address to the nation’s school children? Oh, sorry, I must have missed that one. In any case, I’m sure that many schools would have refused to show it, and they would have been wrong to do so.
Just look at how much damage the Democrats did to our national unity during wartime.
No links?
So is Schumer, who led the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, also suggesting that the same should apply to Democrats who voted to authorize the war, including Hillary Clinton, Harry Reid, John Kerry, Dianne Feinstein … and Schumer himself?
I didn’t think so, either.
So the strategy is to vote to send soldiers to war, cut the support out from under them in the middle of that war when (to the astonishment of some, apparently) we take casualties and it becomes less popular? Is it statesmanship to declare lost a war that can still be won, or to disregard the humanitarian and security catastrophe that surely would have followed? Does it disturb you that, by Schumer’s admission, the Democrats share in Al Qaeda’s successes? Can we join in hoping that the converse will not be true?
That disingenous and fickle position, along with the entire “lied us into war” meme, has done terrible harm to our national unity, and we may yet see what a monster we’ve made when some of the same people who put the Democrats in the majority turn on President Obama for recogizing that Afghanistan is a must-win, though a win we won’t have unless we do better at showing the Afghan people a vision of a better future.