September 5, 2009| Comments
My Dear School District:
Well, you certainly played me when I called your office yesterday, didn’t you? It actually didn’t hit me until after we hung up. After 30 minutes on the phone with you, I was no better informed than I had been a half hour earlier when I dialed the phone.
Allow me to remind you how it went. I called to see how you, dear school district, would be handling the President’s address to the nation’s schoolchildren, set for Tuesday, September 8th. You acted as though you weren’t quite sure what I was talking about. I patiently told you about the speech, when it was scheduled, that it was to be a “welcome-back-and-stay-in-school” message to the kids from their leader, and that there was some controversy surrounding it. Yes, I played along, but you knew all that already, didn’t you? You knew full well that this event was being met with such words as “indoctrination,” and “inappropriate” from parents suspicious of the motives behind it.
Nonetheless, as you will recall, I told you that it was not so much the President’s speech that concerned me, but the original “lesson plan” that was distributed to the nation’s schools by the U.S. Department of Education to accompany the speech. Included within this original material, I explained, was an instruction to kids – grades pre-K through 6 – to write letters to themselves about what they might do to help the president. First you had heard of this, apparently (again, just playing along).
Then, suddenly, you had the paperwork in front of you. Remember that? The very Department of Education material we had just been discussing. You scanned it, and, wouldn’t you know, you saw no mention of schoolkids being directed to help the president. I reminded you that it was the original lesson plan to which I was referring, and thus the original intent of this speech. In the wake of parental controversy the content had been revised. You continued to feign innocence. You asked if this original material I quoted appeared on official Department of Education letterhead. Nice touch.
In the midst of this, you implied I was the only person who had called your office, the only individual in our entire community who had inquired about this. Oh, but wait. Yes, there were other calls. Now you remembered. Your office had actually heard from quite a few parents earlier in the day. You then insinuated that perhaps I, and those others, perhaps we are simply confused and not properly informed. You were even rather specific in less than the most complimentary terms, about where we probably got our information.
You seemed surprised to hear that my information actually came from original source material – original source material that still, even after the White House revision that deleted the “help the president” directive, includes suggestions that students study the lives of the Presidents (preferably the current President, the only one referred to by name), that they reflect on what the President wants them to do, and that they ponder why it is important for them to listen to politicians. Well, Barbara Bush once spoke to schoolkids, you added (and, yes, I know, so did her husband and Ronald Reagan), but the difference, I responded, was that her talk did not include a lesson plan designed to help her husband, the president. You conceded I was right. Remember?
The bottom line is that I was simply seeking information, knowing that school officials nationwide have been setting district-wide policies in response, again, not to the speech, necessarily, but to the accompanying, unprecedented lesson plan. Given my fact-finding experience, my district apparently chose to remain vague and confusing: “most of the kids will probably be at lunch anyway….school just started so there is a lot going on….everyone has so much to do.”
When finally I accepted that there was no official policy, no concrete information to be had, I bade you farewell and said I’ll just have to see what happens. You, gratefully I think, followed my lead. But you sounded tired. Sad, even. I don’t know what that meant. It just wasn’t really what I expected.
You may be interested to know that after our conversation, I decided to tune in to left-wing radio and see how the situation was playing there. I was greeted immediately by a raspy rant that now to appease the “trailer trash,” the White House was being forced to release the content of the speech on Monday. As “trailer trash” representative, let me say I’m glad to hear it. Oh and just so you know….that comment was exactly what I expected.
Thanks for your time.
Betsy Siino | Comments
Aftermath of the Great Speech
September 8, 2009 | Comments (0)September 8, 2009 | Comments
I felt kind of nauseous most of the day. All because of the President’s speech today to the schools.
I read the text of the speech yesterday (remember, they had to release the text to appease us wingnuts). It was fine and dandy, just as I expected. Carefully crafted. Expertly designed to answer all the criticisms that arose over the last week when it was announced the President would be addressing the nation’s schoolkids. What kind of barbarian can object to a President, especially this President, urging kids to work hard, be responsible, stay in school, all that exalted stuff? Well, a barbarian like me, I guess.
The speech was fine, but I just couldn’t shake that pesky “original intent” thing – the accompanying lesson plan that, before backlash revision, asked kids to “help the President.” After my call to the school district last Friday got me nowhere, as a parent, I had to make my own decision and do what I thought was right. And my decision was no, I’m not buying.
The kids and I looked at the speech yesterday. Nothing new for them. They’ve heard it all before. At home. Many times. As it should be. Today one school aired it, one didn’t. I politely told the one that did that my youngest would not be participating. Apparently, according to an NBC pundit this morning who shall remain nameless, I am thus too stupid to raise my own kids. This was the same guy, who, on the morning of the 2008 election, proclaimed LBJ to be one of the greatest Presidents in history, so I’m not putting much stock in his assessment.
My reason for resistance was not that I feared indoctrination, and, as my offspring would tell you, I’m not one who believes in wholesale sheltering or isolation. No, it was the principle. I have taught my kids that what matters isn’t what they say, but what they do. The same applies to those around them, as well. This national event, following on the heels of debate about all the President’s czars (one of whom — an avowed communist and so-called “9/11 truther”– stepped down this weekend), set the perfect example.
A pretty speech does not erase the fact that I find this administration’s actions dangerous and diametrically opposed to what I want for my country and my family – and what is outlined in our Constitution. I was nevertheless left feeling tonight like a lone voice in the wilderness, so much so that I have second guessed today’s decisions over and over. Had I to do it again, perhaps I would have chosen a different path. Perhaps not. I don’t know. I guess this is what made me nauseous.
But I found my elixir tonight when I spotted a random quote from Sir Winston Churchill. I was reminded of an image once described to me of those dark days in the 1930s when the British Parliament was scrambling to appease the escalating aggressions of Adolph Hitler, assuming that would keep their island nation safe. But there among them could be heard one lone voice: “This is a terrible mistake.” Indeed I have always found strength in Sir Winston’s courage, not simply in standing strong against the Axis powers during World War II, but standing strong himself in the lead-up to the war, when his belief in what was right and what was dangerous made him one of the most vilified men in Britain.
So I will use Sir Winston’s strength to quiet my own lonely inner conflict. And the words of the brilliant Tammy Bruce, too, who said last week that “you are your child’s moral tutor, not that shady lawyer from Chicago.” As for my second guessing, well, as I told my husband tonight, “I have to get over this. I’ve never been a parent during an attempted socialist-fascist-whatever-this-is takeover of the government before.” Sir Winston knows what I mean.
Betsy Siino | Comments