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yankee
Joined: Fri, May 23 2008, 12:26 pm EDT
Posts: 18
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 Posted: Wed, Sep 9 2009, 10:39 am EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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| What a great response!!! I'm going to quote it to some hipocrits I know. Thanks for posting it!!! |
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Great Job!
Guest
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| Posted: Wed, Sep 9 2009, 10:49 am EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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| Guest wrote: | | Guest wrote: | Here is my take from someone who disagreed. I do not like politicians speaking in the class room. My view is the same whether it is Regan, Bush or Obama. I do not disagree with the speech content, just the approach.
The President has various mediums to use including television networks. I would much rather have sat down with my kids at night to listen to him speak on the very same topic then to have him speak to kids during school hours. The other issue I do have is the original topic for the paper students were to write and while I think they did a good job revising the topic, it was clear that the original topic would have led to political discussions occurring which is inappropriate in my opinion for the smaller kids.
It is not the Presidents party or politics, but that I think a separation between public schools and politics should exist. |
I couldn’t disagree more. I vote Democrat sometimes, Republican sometimes and Independent on occasion. I believe in voting for the person and the platform, not the party. My point of view has nothing to do with politics or which party the President belongs to or even whether I support this particular President.
My fundamental disagreement is your position suggests that the President is only a politician, not the leader or our country. The elected leader of our country speaking to students is not “politics in the classroom” unless the speech takes partisan political positions (which this one did not) or unless parents or teachers make it political by thrusting their own political biases into a non-political discussion. The idea that President Obama (or any President) is automatically political is ridiculous. That is the kind of partisanship that is destroying our country – the idea that the man himself, by mere virtue of his party, is something to automatically oppose if you belong to another party.
Any person becoming President is a politician to get to that position. And some more than others continue to insert their political party agenda into their job. But almost all, on occasion, are simply acting as our leader. That is the job – they are the leader of our country, not merely the head of a party. When Bush had to initially respond to the 9/11 attacks, a vast majority of people didn’t go around saying not to listen to him because he was a politician. When I was in school and the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded, my school interrupted normal lessons and brought TV’s into the classroom to follow the initial coverage and we all watched President Reagan speak about the tragedy. No one – or virtually no one – made a fuss that Reagan was exploiting the situation to insert politics into the classroom. He was the leader speaking to his nation. Period. The President should be able to do that without everyone who politically opposes him saying they don’t want any communication from him of any kind. And, BTW, what a terrible, terrible message we are sending to our children, regardless of who is President, to suggest that they are merely a political figure and that the office carries no respect. Strongly disagreeing with the President’s positions is American. Disrespecting the office itself as merely a political one is not. Shame on people for reducing this country that way. The far right likes to declare everyone who doesn’t agree with them as traitors and themselves as patriots. But real patriots respect the authority of the position and don’t undermine the fundamental leadership of our country by reducing everything to politics. |
I couldn't agree more with your post. When did we stop being Americans and became Democrats or Republicans? There are times when we put our party politics to the side and join in a common goal...perhaps this is the lesson for today! |
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a mom
Guest
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| Posted: Wed, Sep 9 2009, 11:02 am EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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| I agree with the view that the president should not behave like a politician. He took an oath to work for all of us and protect this country. I am an independent and I found Obama a most non-politician like president I know of. I believe his speech was to motivate the students of this country, given the global competition that lies ahead of all our school kids (think the enormous population of Chinese who value education much more than us). I really like to see my kids value the great education opportunities and environment provided by this country (Obama himself is a prominent success story of this country's educational system). |
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Democrat
Guest
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| Posted: Wed, Sep 9 2009, 12:09 pm EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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"Teachers can build background knowledge about the President of the United States and his speech by reading books about presidents and Barack Obama. Teachers could motivate students by asking the following questions:"
Do we want teachers quoting from "The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream"
? |
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Guest
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| Posted: Wed, Sep 9 2009, 12:49 pm EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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| I don't believe those item list posted on ed.gov is going to affect how the teachers handle this event (how many teachers visited the site to get the list?). And, the list is likely compiled by some low-level staffers. Teachers are not going to be dictated by the list. |
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Guest
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| Posted: Wed, Sep 9 2009, 1:16 pm EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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| Democrat wrote: | "Teachers can build background knowledge about the President of the United States and his speech by reading books about presidents and Barack Obama. Teachers could motivate students by asking the following questions:"
Do we want teachers quoting from "The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream"
? |
That's a stretch. It was some bullet point list of suggestions to help some teachers who want it probably compiled by some junior, and likely non-politically appointed, staffer in the Department of Ed. No one is being ordered to read his books let alone quote from them and as can be seen from the speech there was nothing in it that was particularly political or him personally. |
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Guest
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| Posted: Wed, Sep 9 2009, 1:21 pm EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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| Democrat wrote: | "Teachers can build background knowledge about the President of the United States and his speech by reading books about presidents and Barack Obama. Teachers could motivate students by asking the following questions:"
Do we want teachers quoting from "The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream"
? |
Where do the preparation guidelines suggest that teachers read HIS books?
It suggests reading any books about past presdients or the current one and doesn't specify whose books. A teacher could just as easily pick up any of dozens of books written by other people about him, including those critical of him, let alone the thousands written about past Presidents.
Seriously, some has to be pretty darn set to find an excuse to criticize the speech to be making up weak objections like this. |
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Guest
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| Posted: Thu, Sep 10 2009, 11:40 am EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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| Does anyone know whether there is a plan to show the speech to the Cranbury school students? |
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Guest
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| Posted: Thu, Sep 10 2009, 11:49 am EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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| Guest wrote: | | Does anyone know whether there is a plan to show the speech to the Cranbury school students? |
I called the school to ask and Mr. Haney called me back. He said they had originally planned to air it when it was scheduled for 1pm but they changed it to noon which overlapped with many kids lunchtime. So they left it to the individual teachers to decide if and how they could fit it into their lesson plans or not, as a repeat. But then they also had technical problems with the feed and many who had planned to view it couldn't. Some will still do so at some point and others will not -- a class by class decision. |
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IKnowWhyCensored
Guest
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| Posted: Sat, Sep 12 2009, 2:01 am EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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I know why
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publius
Guest
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| Posted: Sun, Sep 13 2009, 2:09 am EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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Please........get off of your high horse and get back to reality. All the prez did was to tell kids to work hard and stay in school. At least he didn't try to indoctrinate them concerning lower taxes on the rich like St. Ronnie Ray-gun did. Thats part of this reason we're in such a mess in the first place!
Obama worked his way up from virtually nothing.
Unlike the goofy, spoiled, frat-boy whom he replaced. |
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Guest
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| Posted: Sun, Sep 13 2009, 9:37 am EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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| Whether the poster realized it or not, the cartoon was intended ironically -- to poke fun at how ridiculous the conservative criticism was, and not because the artists believed the criticism. |
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Guest
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| Posted: Sun, Sep 13 2009, 12:48 pm EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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| Guest wrote: | | Whether the poster realized it or not, the cartoon was intended ironically -- to poke fun at how ridiculous the conservative criticism was, and not because the artists believed the criticism. |
Yup that's why I posted it |
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Guest
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| Posted: Sun, Sep 13 2009, 1:00 pm EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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In all seriousness, I could see the far left doing the same thing protesting if Bush wanted to hold a speech in the schools the last few years. Even though most likely the speech Obama gave and a theoraical speech by Bush would be very nearly identical in nature.
The left held similar actions of protest against Bush and I remember Rangel, Schumer and others being openly hostile. Now that Obama is in office it is the right side of the spectrum doing these actions and making fools of themselves. The only difference is that people see themselves on one side (being right) and thus view their actions from that perspective. It is honestly people on both sides of the aisle who are causing issues and problems.
Neither side is exempt to think so is a problem in and of itself. And before anyone starts yelling that I am a right wing nut, much to my husbands dismay I voted for Obama, support him today and hated Bush. I don't think it's unpatriotic to view the president as a politican as well as a leader of the country, suddenly becoming president does not make one change his politics or ignore their views or forget how they got to that position, you don't grow up the political food chain and then suddenly stop when you reach the top. In fact, I think a bigger concern is when we forget that our president, senators, governors, etc..are politicans and their parties do want things accomplished in line with their party beliefs, I know that is why I voted for Obama. Bush was a politican and used office to try and get his agenda through- subsitute Soc. Sec and health care they are both agenda items.
I also certainly think it is fair that if I can question Bush and think he had problems, then my husband can do the same for Obama. It's just that I get 4 years of griping now as opposed to me doing it the last 8. |
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Guest
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| Posted: Sun, Sep 13 2009, 4:23 pm EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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That's dumb logic. You're basically saying two wrongs make a right.
And it's not even true. As the previous poster a ways up pointed out, previous Republican presidents were not criticized for giving speeches that were widely covered in classrooms in the past, including Reagan and Bush. I'm sure some group of people did protest them doing so -- someone always disagrees with everything. But it was not widespread or organized. So what you're really saying is that it's okay for you to disagree with him just because he's a Democrat and not because of what he's saying because some whack job fringe on the far left did it to a past president you liked. All that would do is make you a whack job far right person, which I doubt was your intent. |
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Guest
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| Posted: Sun, Sep 13 2009, 5:27 pm EDT Post subject: Re: Presidnet's back-to-school speech -- why did Cranbury censor it? |
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That is not what I am saying, though you would like it to be so your comment has some viability. If you care to read, what I am saying is that both sides need to stop this. I am saying that those who are screaming about the far right should also be looking at the far left and how they treated President Bush. It seems it is fine to criticize either side so long as you agree with the point. However, you clearly are part of the problem I mentioned which is only looking at one side.
I did not say it was okay at all to what you are saying. Don't say basically what you're saying is...because that is your view only to get a response which you got. But, your making assumptions which makes a you know what. You'r telling me I'm far right because I see problems on both sides? This is the attitude that is wrong. I support Obama as I support him 1000000% and though we had McCain and Obama signs in our yard. What I am opposing is people complaining about is the far right doing this and also about the far left screaming about Bush, was he also not a leader (even though I disagreed with almost everything he did). You can't complain about far right tactics now without complaining about far left tactics in the past. That is why I am so angry and fearful that we're going to lose the house and senate next year. We don't learn from seeing our own far left attitude in the face of the far right. |
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