I have some ideas I'd like to share...My idea to help Obama by having his admin. communicate very clearly in directives to minors, and not embracing the idea of ******* states and non ******* states but of respect and tolerance... Otherwise the divide that we see with town hall meetings, and reactions to ill-communicated speeches will become greater and greater as the months pass by...
At least that is specific. Thanks for sharing your story. I find it difficult to reconcile whether I agreed with that. At least the specificity was there. There wasn't an open-ended "How can you help the President", but rather what do you want him to be... Specificity is important, especially coming from politicians.
ROXRAN, You have struck me, alternately at least, as a smart guy. Do you really think there is a controversy here? Can you acknowledge that a few radio people are just running with the political opportunity of this? That's really all that's happening. The Dept. of Ed. gets to run pretty independently of the president, so at worst, we are talking about a controversy with DOEd. And I'd like to echo what another poster asked: since when in the US is it a bad thing for a kid to want to help the president? I agree the wording could be better (at least in a world cursed by the likes of Glenn Beck and other people with a "deep hatred" of their own brains.)
Thanks B-Bob, I appreciate the kind words. To the meat of the context, No...There is no controversy here but there is a gaffe that adds to the bucket of negative when there shouldn't have been and I have been clear in all my posts not to direct blame to Obama, but to the Dept. of Education, you would think they of all admin.'s would understand the importance of clarity in communication. I don't think there is anything wrong with helping the President, but that should be asked rather than required and we should respect those who differ in our own choice. That is the essence of what we should be about...I think we need to understand that the "deep hatred" is on both sides...I am happy to listen to Beck,...I understand the feelings you have, but it takes a Beck to help take down the other sides' person with "deep hatred"...Kinda like fighting assholes with assholes sort of speak...
ROXRAN, we are mostly on the same page, except for the Beck thing. He's very very bad for this country. Maybe we could all pledge to not give the time of day to those who fan the fires. Who's on your list of left-wing haters? Is someone calling Republicans "assholes" once in their life to a small audience equivalent to telling a national audience that the POTUS has a deep hatred for most of them? I guess we could try to compare and contrast all day. Both are very negative and counter-productive for all of us.
I'm still catching up reading the newer posts, but I can't pass this up. So, if the kids are writing letters to themselves about what they can do to help the president, is your fear that they would be indoctrinating themselves?
The difference is that Beck is blatantly wrong, lying, or misinformed about much of the stuff he brings up.
This may be true. That does not make the original point (that as long as both sides hate each other, nothing real will be accomplished) any less true.
I hate to say it but the paranoid opponents of Obama are winning the PR war. Considering how much coverage this issue has gotten, including even 24 pages on this forum, I would say that they have succeeded in elevating something about as innocuous as it gets into an actual cause.
Republicans win the PR war because their views will always be on the side on of "american values" at least in perception. I was going to start a thread on this. being a gun nut is more in line with the constitution. being on the side of not providing insurance for the poor or letting the insurance industry run wild is more along the lines of capitalism. progressives are always in an up hill battle getting public programs instituted, even if in the long run they are obviously good for the country. like public schools, which it is highly ironic that people who send their kids to these socialist institutions don't want their kids to hear Obama speak.
There's not a lot controversial here. As if there was a doubt. http://www.whitehouse.gov/MediaResources/PreparedSchoolRemarks/
The other irony of this is Obama is fairly conservative on his values on education, he consistently pleads to poor people specifically blacks to take more responsibility for their kids' education
Obama's commitment to people taking more responsibility for the education of their children and being actively involved is one of the things that I like about him. Take this coming from a guy that did not vote for him.
I'm not sure there is an argument about American values here since wouldn't working hard and staying in school be considered an American value? This to me seems more about that they have taken what should be a marginal issue at best and turned into something that is getting a lot of play in the news cycle. Now while much of this play has been to make these people look crazy that said as the opposition the more attention you can get that only helps thngs in the long run.
