Across the country, there’s been heated debate over the speech President Obama gave to students across America.     I’ve been told that at the Holman School, they’ll be showing it today, so I decided to give it a screening first before letting my child be subjected to what the right wing media has called an indoctrination to socialism and the new world order.

After watching the entire speech this morning, I have to admit that on this issue I lean towards agreeing with the left on this speech in that it’s a harmless pep talk by the president of the United States.   There’s really no rhetoric or underlying tones that will make my child come home and pressure me into supporting Obamacare, ending the war on terrorism or continue writing blank checks that she will have to pay for when she’s older.

The speech was ok.  The message was ok.   One thing I will say is that Obama is out of touch with children and though he has two of his own, he has probably forgotten how to talk to kids after spending the past three years campaigning to adults.      I think he should have been a bit less stately than he was and maybe it could have even been described as a lecture, but perhaps a lecture on education is what kids need.

So if you’re worried about your child coming home today indoctrinated into some socialist agenda worry not, because other than our kids not understanding the rap star/basketball player reference, everything is going to be OK and they might even WANT to do their first homework assignments of the year.  The rest is up to us.

Whether you love or hate the guy, one example we need to set for our children is that he is the President of the United States and that we should always teach them to respect the position.   The right wing pundits had it all wrong this time, not to imply in any way that I think they ever have it right either.

With that, however, I will conclude with some quotes from prominent Democrats.

1.) “The Department of Education should not be producing paid political advertising for the president, it should be helping us to produce smarter students.”  -- Dick Gephart, 1991

2.) “As the chairman of the committee charged with the authorization and implementation of education programs, I am very much interested in the justification, rationale for giving the White House scarce education funds to produce a media event.”

3.) “[We] cannot endorse a president who spends $26,000 of taxpayers’ money on a staged media event at [a] Junior High School … while cutting school lunch funds for our neediest youngsters.”

Those were all comments made by Democrats after George HW Bush’s similar speech to students back in 1991.    I have to thank my friend Brian in Washington D.C. for pointing this out for me.  I also have to point out that he was a former Bush staffer, so take it for what it is.

What do you think about the Obamacation speech?