Obama Plans to Indoctrinate Our Children
On September 8, President Obama will give a speech to America’s schoolchildren that will be broadcast on the White House Web site and carried on CSPAN (a.k.a. the Network That No One Watches). The U.S. Department of Education’s Web site describes the upcoming speech thusly:
During this special address, the president will speak directly to the nation's children and youth about persisting and succeeding in school. The president will challenge students to work hard, set educational goals, and take responsibility for their learning.
The horror! Clearly the president is trying to indoctrinate our children into following his socialist, fascist and/or Nazi agenda. If I had children of my own and no brain in my head, I wouldn’t want my kids “brainwashed” by a “president” who was born in a place called “Kenya,” hates white people (even though his own mother was white), is a Muslim terrorist sleeper agent, and is somehow secretly trying to destroy everything that America stands for—whatever that is.
God knows Obama is a terrible role model: a mixed-race man (the media tend to forget about the white half) who worked his way up from the bottom the socioeconomic ladder thanks to his own intelligence and determined effort and the support of his hard-working single mother; a Harvard-educated lawyer who has devoted most of his professional life to public service, and who, at a fairly young age, made history by becoming the first mixed-race president of the United States. Ugh! What a monster!
This time it’s not just the paranoid far-right nutjobs who are up in arms (maybe quite literally) over Obama’s impending “invasion” of America’s classrooms, but mainstream nutjobs as well. Some school districts are refusing to show the speech at all, and some well-known conservative figures are voicing their own doubts about Comrade Obama’s intentions. Here’s a gem from a press release by Republican Party of Florida Chairman Jim Greer:
"As the father of four children, I am absolutely appalled that taxpayer dollars are being used to spread President Obama's socialist ideology. The idea that school children across our nation will be forced to watch the President justify his plans for government-run health care, banks, and automobile companies, increasing taxes on those who create jobs, and racking up more debt than any other President, is not only infuriating, but goes against beliefs of the majority of Americans, while bypassing American parents through an invasive abuse of power.”
Uh, Jim… I didn’t see any mention that Obama plans to “justify” his economic and social policies to schoolkids. Maybe the White House will slip in subliminal messages telling kids to become liberal Democrats when they grow up, or, if they’re children of Republicans, to slash their parents’ throats with dull razors while they’re sleeping. Anything is possible in the alternate reality of the right wing.
Here’s another paranoid tidbit from the reliably kooky Gary Bauer, American Values leader:
Once again, the Obama Administration is using its power in unprecedented ways, this time injecting itself into the nation's classrooms. Tuesday may be a good day to sit in on your child's classes.
“Invading”? “Injecting”? “Indoctrinating”? What’s next on Herr Obama’s evil agenda? Anal probing?
Perhaps people like Greer and Bauer would like to return to the good old days when President George W. Bush didn’t attempt to inspire schoolchildren directly, but instead eloquently asked the all-important question: “Is our children learning?” Clearly Bush was the gooder president.
Judging from America’s abysmal slide into irrationalism and ignorance, it’s not just children who need to be reminded to take responsibility for their learning. It would be nice if certain adults would educate themselves with facts and learn to speak the truth.
Instead, these people seem to have adopted a quote by Stephen Colbert as their motto. Colbert said: “I'm not a fan of facts. You see, the facts can change, but my opinion will never change, no matter what the facts are.”
Only in their case, it's not a joke.
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