Bob Wire Has a Point (It's Under His Cowboy Hat)
President Obama’s On TV! Hide the Children!
You can't make this stuff up. Unless you're Fox News.By Bob Wire, 9-08-09
 |
|
 | |
| The President can inspire our children to achieve greatness. Or at least hold the book right side up. Maybe next time. | |
|
Just when it seems that the conservative crowd can’t possibly make themselves look more foolish and bitter, here comes a firestorm of outrage over President Obama having the audacity to address American schoolchildren on their first day of school.
Why, the nerve of that man! Trying to inspire our children to study hard? Stay in school? Pay attention to their teachers? How dare he! Could it be that conservatives are just mad because it never occurred to them to say these things to their own kids? (“Heston, the Hummer’s in the shop; you’ll have to walk to school.”)
Seriously, the raging paranoia and delusional ranting that spews from the Fox News crowd with their snapping jaws and rolling eyes is not just disturbing, it’s becoming tiresome in its predictability. Did the Fox News think tank fail to broadcast the news that President Obama actually WON the election last fall? It’s been ten months! Why are conservatives still treating the sitting President like he’s a candidate?
Check out this nugget of wisdom from CNN’s website: “Thinking about my kids in school having to listen to that just really upsets me,” suburban Colorado mother Shanneen Barron told CNN Denver affiliate KMGH. “I’m an American. They are Americans, and I don’t feel that’s OK.”
Say what now? Ms. Barron “doesn’t feel that’s OK” for the President of the United States to address her children? Wow. The freely-elected leader of the country she claims to love is going to make an inspirational speech to our schoolchildren, and this raisin-brained housefrau chooses to deny her kids the opportunity to hear it because she fears his “socialist agenda.” Don’t these people realize that this kind of outcry only makes them look batshit crazy to anyone with an iota of common sense?
Can you imagine anyone pulling this kind of moronic, disrespectful shit when JFK addressed the nation? Hell no. He was JFK, the President of the United Freakin’ States of America. He was OUR President, not just the President of the Democrats, or the President of the Catholics, or the President of the East Coast. The nation loved JFK, respected the office, and would have been honored had he decided to speak to our nation’s students.
You know who ruined it for everybody? Nixon, for one. He brought such shame to the office with his own paranoid hugger-mugger and craven thirst for power that after he scuttled away to his cave in San Clemente, people didn’t bother to use the title “President” for the President anymore. It became Ford. And Reagan. And Clinton. And Obama.
The other corrosive agent that’s eating away at the country’s respect for the office is the conservative media, and their oddly smug dismissal of any and everything coming from the new administration. But it doesn’t matter how loud or snotty or shrill the Limbaughs, Becks and Coulters get, or how much attention their latest godhead Sarah Palin brings on herself—the conservative backlash is getting to be so desperately lame that the lunatic fringe will eventually be shoved aside by more reasonable voices who are capable of rational thought and common sense. Probably people who studied and paid attention to their teachers and weren’t afraid of their President.
[Bookmark NewWest.net/BobWire before the black helicopters show up and make you do it.]
Join the Bob Wire Appreciation Society
Stumble It!
Like this story? Get more! Sign up for our free newsletters.
Comments
"The Dispossessed" by Daniel Bell, 1962
try rereading your article and substituting conservative for liberal,,, and bush for clinton,,, beck for olberman,,, yadda yadda.
its all the same
That doesn't change the fact that the behavior of the right wing over yesterday's speech is deplorable and embarrassing for them. I feel sorry for their kids.
Though your point does not refute the thrust of Bob's commentary: That the far right (led by Fox News and Right wing radical politicians that are sadly the current Republican establishment) is leading this current nonsense.
We can argue about whether the Left ever cleaned up its act in/after 1991 (I believe there is good evidence on both sides of the argument), but it should be irrefutable that the Right needs to clean house now.
conservatives barely have a voice anymore since obama has the major networks and 99% of all news outlets in his pocket. you should be thankful for fox news so there is a voice for the other side.
"Paranoia will destroy ya." ~Ray Davies
"It is better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and remove all doubt." ~Mark Twain
The ABC evening news made it the lead story last Thursday, citing a Colorado school district of 5,000 students that received 50 complaints about the upcoming Obama speech. That, ABC judged, was the most important story of the day -- the one percent of parents who gripe. And ABC never even mentioned the propaganda crap spouted all day long by Rush and Beck and Co.
I don't mean to argue that the far right wingnuts should not be covered, but some perspective would be welcome -- and more honest.
As it stands, about 20 percent of the population is shaping the national debate. Just look at health care reform and how the lies of the far right have shifted public sentiment.
but reread my comments,, then explain the hyperjump to both your petty comments and qoutes from davies and twain.
i think my comments were respectful,,, didnt attack anyone.
i think you in particular bob, dont like anyone commenting on the other side.
robert,,, how do you get to the " no point in trying comment" ????
I just don't like having words put in my mouth, as so often happens in the comments.
When you make a statement like "obama has the major networks and 99% of all news outlets in his pocket" without offering anything to back it up, that lets all the air out of your credibility. It's the kind of hyperbolic crap that they spew on hate, uh, I mean, talk radio all day long.
In fact, the House Majority leader at the time, Dick Gephardt (D-Mo.), said "The Department of Education should not be producing paid political advertising for the president, it should be helping us to produce smarter students."
Hey Bob, imagine that, a Democrat who thinks the Department of Education shouldn't be a front operation for the President's PR department. WOW! Democratic "raging paranoia and delusional ranting"
Guess you missed that one.
It's the National Blood Sport passing for political debate these days, a plague on both their houses. Neither party is worthy of the rabid support each side's supporters give them.
Back off and get a new perspective and make them earn your support.
Students in grades pre-K-6, should be encouraged to "write letters to themselves about what they can do to help the president.”
These would be collected and redistributed at an appropriate later date by the teacher to make students accountable to their goals.
Why not just sign them up as Acorn volunteers too?
I can't believe that NewWest ignored the actual argument in favor of their own straw man, because you never see that happen here...ever, really.
Not only did Rep. Ford (D) call for an investigation the liberals in Congress made White House staff come to hill to testify before their committees, but the GAO told them to back off everything was on the up and up.
YOU LIE!
The former presumes that all students are in perfect agreement with the president's policies and THAT is the crux of the matter. DISTINCTIONS MATTER!
Sadly, our local Superintendent has stated that kids will not be "allowed" to see the speech until he checks it out for its appropriateness...whatever that means. [see "Banned Books", etc., etc.]. It MIGHT then be available for viewing by students PROVIDED THEIR PARENTS GIVE SIGNED PERMISSION.
All of this rhetoric does nothing to further the learning of democracy in our children. Whatever happened to Freedom of Speech? And perhaps we should think a bit about Voltaire's quote: "I disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."
What exactly do you teach???
ps - Side wager - wanna bet $100 bucks I can tell you who you voted for?
The one way conversation is exactly what this Superintendent advocated. His way or the highway. No discussion, no "exposure" to controversy, NO dialogue. "Educate" for a nation of sheep.
As for Rush, I think it would be just fine for him to address the students of America...once he's won that office that Barack Obama won.
[Bet a $1000 I can predict who you'll vote for when the next Republican ticket is RUSH/PALIN. [Please, please Lord, let that happen!]
My point, that you miss and possibly cannot comprehend, is that the classrooms of America do not need to be a PR and propaganda front for the powerful, even one you worship. This may not be the position of the NEA or your local teacher's union but morally, philosophically, politically it is the correct position. Especially Obama, Rush and Palin. (Bush, Chaney, Gore, Kerry, Franken, et. al and etc etc etc ad extreme nauseum)
ps- I am registered Libertarian "Free Minds, Free Markets" and will not be caught dead voting for any of the aforementioned, please send me a receipt for $1,100 for the donation to the Libertarian Party in my name for the two bets I won.
Yeah, Dana, we certainly can't have our kids being exposed to that kind of propaganda.
Congratulations on being a Libertarian. Who is your President?
All of this is truly simple, a Presidential Speech is by it's very nature a PR event, warm feelings, great guy, etc etc (your own comment also) In a Democracy, with respect to the minority, the powerful should not be using our children in their political chess machinations (even warm fuzzy wonderful protest changed speeches) I am truly sorry you all can not understand this concept, for me it's foundational; the public square is where National Debates need to be, if the President wants to generate a public affairs message encouraging children (and this President's story is second to none in history) he should do so and send it to every school to use in a time, place and class as they choose. I personally think his message should be put out there, especially to children in difficult situations. But, having said that, he should not be allowed to do his messages in classrooms whenever he says, preempting whatever for his agenda is not compatible with a Democracy that respects the minority but is more in line with one that worships their King or obeys their dictator.
You, I and Beau (and all U.S. Citizens) do not worship a King nor bow to any Dictator and WE should not graze even on the sunniest part of that slippery slope.
My PRESIDENT, as well as yours (assuming you are a citizen of the United States of America), is Barack Obama, your point?
My point is that it is truly sad that what was an exciting event a generation ago is twisted into some kind of nefarious political PR move by small but vocal fringe factions.
My point is that President Obama was elected by your countrymen in a free, democratic election. Of course you don't have to join his Facebook page or put up an Obama poster in your window. But this country has only one leader at a time. He is it. You don't have to drink the Kool-Aid, but you should not paint everyone who voted for Obama with the same broad brush.
Finally, disagreeing with your concept or even finding it specious is not the same as not understanding it.
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”
Bob sucks you in with a catchy title, the attention getter (Speech 101), then beats you about the head and shoulders with his latest rant. Once in awhile Bob does get off a good one. but most of the time it is just another subject Bob wants to rant about in that special Bob way.
As far as President Oboma's school speech goes I'll leave it to the experts of his audience:
"I like that he talked about some of the struggles he went through when he was younger, just like many of us," said Brandon Walker, 17 a junior.
My parents don't have a problem and I don't care either," said sophomore Seth Fowler, 15 "I'm just not interested in politics"
There was no question that sophomore Erin O'Grady, 15 would opt out. As soon as she walked into Pelaez-Perez's room she asked to leave. "I don't think we should be required to watch anything," Erin said. "I didn't talk to my parents about it and don't think they care one wat or the other. I just don't want to have to do something."
Paige Napier, 16, said she iddn't understand why there was so much controversy. "He said pretty much the same things I've heard from counselors, teachers and my parents," the junior said.
There you have it folks the opinions of those who should know. I wouldn't argue with them anymore than I would argu with Bob.
You're one of the best at ignoring real evidence and making stuff up or using policy made up by others while selectively supporting your feelings while ignoring real evidence because you are glued to surface policy's while continually ignoring underlying causes behind those policy's.