What Obama Said…

I want a public option. More importantly, I want a solution so poor and middle class Americans don’t have to go without health care. If there is another way to accomplish that, fine. My mind is open. And that’s what I take away from the president’s fine speech tonight: Keep your minds open and stay focused on what we need to achieve. I can work with that.

In the meantime, a pox on the house of GOP Rep. Joe Wilson, a rude piece of work. He should be censured for calling BHO a liar in the middle of the address. That’s just classless and rude.

After the jump is the text of the president’s speech. If you heard it, read it. If you didn’t hear it, check it out. Then let us know: What do you think?

Why Do Right-Wingers Oppose Obama’s Back-to-School Speech?

I have been bewildered by the so-called controversy over President Obama’s non-political speech for schoolchildren, which will take place later today. Did parents complain when Dubya Bush visited schools? Not that I can recall. Mentioned this to the spouse early this morning: “I don’t get the concern. What’s controversial about this?”

The putative love of my life looked at me as if I were a total dolt. “You know what it is. You just don’t want to admit it,” he said. “It’s the same thing behind those teabag idiots and the town hall screamers. Deep down, they can’t handle the truth that the president is ‘black.’ They’ll fight him even if he proclaims the sky is blue and babies are cute.”

As he said those words, I knew the ball and chain was right. In my gut, I have suspected bigotry, not health care, was really at the heart of the right-wing furor. Of course, that would mean that the hatred within the US’s tainted soul was deeper than even I imagined — and if you know me, you know I think this nation is irreparably poisoned by pigmentationism.

Yes, I am again in fear of my so-called countrymen.

To right-wing McCainiac obstructionists, dittoheads, and those wearing fear of a “black” president on their sleeves, grow the hell up. Most of the nation rejects your bigotry. Get with it! You are behind the times. Past your sell-by date. Dinosaurs. And you should be ashamed. Absolutely, there are legitimate reasons to criticize Obama and plenty of ’em, but I’m not hearing them in the town halls or in the cries of people opposing his speech to school kids. No, what I hear — as does my melanin-free spouse — is hate and fear. And it is disgusting. Shame on you people, you small-minded, nasty, misguided, anti-American, antediluvean relics of a time thankfully gone. The nation finally is growing up a little — why can’t you?

Now, the bigots howl because the president is giving a back-to-school speech. Unbelievable. Look, if you have a problem with a president exhorting students to be responsible, to study, and to ask questions, I feel sorry for your kids, because their parents obviously are stupid racists who put small-mindedness above their own children.

God, I fear for this construct…

Check out the text of the president’s speech, which comes from the White House Web site, and tell me what possibly could be objectionable about it:

Hello, everyone — how’s everybody doing today? I’m here with students at Wakefield High School in Arlington, Virginia. And we’ve got students tuning in from all across America, kindergarten through 12th grade. I’m glad you all could join us today.

I know that for many of you, today is the first day of school. And for those of you in kindergarten, or starting middle or high school, it’s your first day in a new school, so it’s understandable if you’re a little nervous. I imagine there are some seniors out there who are feeling pretty good right now, with just one more year to go. And no matter what grade you’re in, some of you are probably wishing it were still summer, and you could’ve stayed in bed just a little longer this morning.

I know that feeling. When I was young, my family lived in Indonesia for a few years, and my mother didn’t have the money to send me where all the American kids went to school. So she decided to teach me extra lessons herself, Monday through Friday — at 4:30 in the morning.

Now I wasn’t too happy about getting up that early. A lot of times, I’d fall asleep right there at the kitchen table. But whenever I’d complain, my mother would just give me one of those looks and say, “This is no picnic for me either, buster.”

So I know some of you are still adjusting to being back at school. But I’m here today because I have something important to discuss with you. I’m here because I want to talk with you about your education and what’s expected of all of you in this new school year.

Now I’ve given a lot of speeches about education. And I’ve talked a lot about responsibility.

I’ve talked about your teachers’ responsibility for inspiring you, and pushing you to learn.

I’ve talked about your parents’ responsibility for making sure you stay on track, and get your homework done, and don’t spend every waking hour in front of the TV or with that Xbox.

I’ve talked a lot about your government’s responsibility for setting high standards, supporting teachers and principals, and turning around schools that aren’t working where students aren’t getting the opportunities they deserve.

But at the end of the day, we can have the most dedicated teachers, the most supportive parents, and the best schools in the world and none of it will matter unless all of you fulfill your responsibilities. Unless you show up to those schools; pay attention to those teachers; listen to your parents, grandparents and other adults; and put in the hard work it takes to succeed.

And that’s what I want to focus on today: the responsibility each of you has for your education. I want to start with the responsibility you have to yourself.

Every single one of you has something you’re good at. Every single one of you has something to offer. And you have a responsibility to yourself to discover what that is. That’s the opportunity an education can provide.

Maybe you could be a good writer — maybe even good enough to write a book or articles in a newspaper — but you might not know it until you write a paper for your English class. Maybe you could be an innovator or an inventor — maybe even good enough to come up with the next iPhone or a new medicine or vaccine — but you might not know it until you do a project for your science class. Maybe you could be a mayor or a senator or a Supreme Court justice, but you might not know that until you join student government or the debate team.

And no matter what you want to do with your life — I guarantee that you’ll need an education to do it. You want to be a doctor, or a teacher, or a police officer? You want to be a nurse or an architect, a lawyer or a member of our military? You’re going to need a good education for every single one of those careers. You can’t drop out of school and just drop into a good job. You’ve got to work for it and train for it and learn for it.

And this isn’t just important for your own life and your own future. What you make of your education will decide nothing less than the future of this country. What you’re learning in school today will determine whether we as a nation can meet our greatest challenges in the future.

You’ll need the knowledge and problem-solving skills you learn in science and math to cure diseases like cancer and AIDS, and to develop new energy technologies and protect our environment. You’ll need the insights and critical thinking skills you gain in history and social studies to fight poverty and homelessness, crime and discrimination, and make our nation more fair and more free. You’ll need the creativity and ingenuity you develop in all your classes to build new companies that will create new jobs and boost our economy.

We need every single one of you to develop your talents, skills and intellect so you can help solve our most difficult problems. If you don’t do that — if you quit on school — you’re not just quitting on yourself, you’re quitting on your country.

Now I know it’s not always easy to do well in school. I know a lot of you have challenges in your lives right now that can make it hard to focus on your schoolwork.

I get it. I know what that’s like. My father left my family when I was two years old, and I was raised by a single mother who struggled at times to pay the bills and wasn’t always able to give us things the other kids had. There were times when I missed having a father in my life. There were times when I was lonely and felt like I didn’t fit in.

So I wasn’t always as focused as I should have been. I did some things I’m not proud of, and got in more trouble than I should have. And my life could have easily taken a turn for the worse.

But I was fortunate. I got a lot of second chances and had the opportunity to go to college, and law school, and follow my dreams. My wife, our first lady Michelle Obama, has a similar story. Neither of her parents had gone to college, and they didn’t have much. But they worked hard, and she worked hard, so that she could go to the best schools in this country.

Some of you might not have those advantages. Maybe you don’t have adults in your life who give you the support that you need. Maybe someone in your family has lost their job, and there’s not enough money to go around. Maybe you live in a neighborhood where you don’t feel safe, or have friends who are pressuring you to do things you know aren’t right.

But at the end of the day, the circumstances of your life — what you look like, where you come from, how much money you have, what you’ve got going on at home — that’s no excuse for neglecting your homework or having a bad attitude. That’s no excuse for talking back to your teacher, or cutting class, or dropping out of school. That’s no excuse for not trying.

Where you are right now doesn’t have to determine where you’ll end up. No one’s written your destiny for you. Here in America, you write your own destiny. You make your own future.

That’s what young people like you are doing every day, all across America.

Young people like Jazmin Perez, from Roma, Texas. Jazmin didn’t speak English when she first started school. Hardly anyone in her hometown went to college, and neither of her parents had gone either. But she worked hard, earned good grades, got a scholarship to Brown University, and is now in graduate school, studying public health, on her way to being Dr. Jazmin Perez.

I’m thinking about Andoni Schultz, from Los Altos, California, who’s fought brain cancer since he was three. He’s endured all sorts of treatments and surgeries, one of which affected his memory, so it took him much longer — hundreds of extra hours — to do his schoolwork. But he never fell behind, and he’s headed to college this fall.

And then there’s Shantell Steve, from my hometown of Chicago, Illinois. Even when bouncing from foster home to foster home in the toughest neighborhoods, she managed to get a job at a local health center; start a program to keep young people out of gangs; and she’s on track to graduate high school with honors and go on to college.

Jazmin, Andoni and Shantell aren’t any different from any of you. They faced challenges in their lives just like you do. But they refused to give up. They chose to take responsibility for their education and set goals for themselves. And I expect all of you to do the same. That’s why today, I’m calling on each of you to set your own goals for your education — and to do everything you can to meet them. Your goal can be something as simple as doing all your homework, paying attention in class, or spending time each day reading a book. Maybe you’ll decide to get involved in an extracurricular activity, or volunteer in your community. Maybe you’ll decide to stand up for kids who are being teased or bullied because of who they are or how they look, because you believe, like I do, that all kids deserve a safe environment to study and learn. Maybe you’ll decide to take better care of yourself so you can be more ready to learn. And along those lines, I hope you’ll all wash your hands a lot, and stay home from school when you don’t feel well, so we can keep people from getting the flu this fall and winter.

Whatever you resolve to do, I want you to commit to it. I want you to really work at it.

I know that sometimes, you get the sense from TV that you can be rich and successful without any hard work — that your ticket to success is through rapping or basketball or being a reality TV star, when chances are, you’re not going to be any of those things.

But the truth is, being successful is hard. You won’t love every subject you study. You won’t click with every teacher. Not every homework assignment will seem completely relevant to your life right this minute. And you won’t necessarily succeed at everything the first time you try.

That’s OK. Some of the most successful people in the world are the ones who’ve had the most failures. J.K. Rowling’s first Harry Potter book was rejected twelve times before it was finally published. Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team, and he lost hundreds of games and missed thousands of shots during his career. But he once said, “I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.”

These people succeeded because they understand that you can’t let your failures define you — you have to let them teach you. You have to let them show you what to do differently next time. If you get in trouble, that doesn’t mean you’re a troublemaker, it means you need to try harder to behave. If you get a bad grade, that doesn’t mean you’re stupid, it just means you need to spend more time studying.

No one’s born being good at things, you become good at things through hard work. You’re not a varsity athlete the first time you play a new sport. You don’t hit every note the first time you sing a song. You’ve got to practice. It’s the same with your schoolwork. You might have to do a math problem a few times before you get it right, or read something a few times before you understand it, or do a few drafts of a paper before it’s good enough to hand in.

Don’t be afraid to ask questions. Don’t be afraid to ask for help when you need it. I do that every day. Asking for help isn’t a sign of weakness, it’s a sign of strength. It shows you have the courage to admit when you don’t know something, and to learn something new. So find an adult you trust — a parent, grandparent or teacher; a coach or counselor — and ask them to help you stay on track to meet your goals.

And even when you’re struggling, even when you’re discouraged, and you feel like other people have given up on you — don’t ever give up on yourself. Because when you give up on yourself, you give up on your country.

The story of America isn’t about people who quit when things got tough. It’s about people who kept going, who tried harder, who loved their country too much to do anything less than their best. It’s the story of students who sat where you sit 250 years ago, and went on to wage a revolution and found this nation. Students who sat where you sit 75 years ago who overcame a Depression and won a world war; who fought for civil rights and put a man on the moon. Students who sat where you sit 20 years ago who founded Google, Twitter and Facebook and changed the way we communicate with each other.

So today, I want to ask you, what’s your contribution going to be? What problems are you going to solve? What discoveries will you make? What will a president who comes here in twenty or fifty or one hundred years say about what all of you did for this country?

Your families, your teachers, and I are doing everything we can to make sure you have the education you need to answer these questions. I’m working hard to fix up your classrooms and get you the books, equipment and computers you need to learn. But you’ve got to do your part too. So I expect you to get serious this year. I expect you to put your best effort into everything you do. I expect great things from each of you. So don’t let us down — don’t let your family or your country or yourself down. Make us all proud. I know you can do it.

Thank you, God bless you, and God bless America.

Obama nominates Sotomayor to SCOTUS

President Obama on Tuesday nominated federal appellate Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court.

If confirmed, Sotomayor, 54, would be the first Hispanic U.S. Supreme Court justice and the third woman to serve on the high court.

Sotomayor “is an inspiring woman who I believe will make a great justice,” Obama said at a White House announcement.

She “has worked at almost every level of our judicial system, providing her with a depth of experience and a breadth of perspective that will be invaluable as a Supreme Court justice,” he added.

Obama said Sotomayor would bring more experience on the bench than anyone currently serving on the Supreme Court when appointed.

via CNN:  Obama nominates Sotomayor to Supreme Court

Media: Tell the Full Obama Story

Conservative writer Andrew W. Smith, writing in Canada’s Chronicle Herald, reminds us that newspapers are supposed to give us the full story — not only positive highlights.

Will Rogers famously pleaded that all he knew was what he read in the papers. If all a person knew of Barack Obama’s first 100 days as president was what they read of them in this newspaper, it would seem to be a very charmed young presidency.

The Chronicle Herald recently made space for an urgent Associated Press dispatch from Washington informing readers the Obamas had chosen a Portuguese water dog. Not original reporting, of course, but an AP rephrasing of a White House-arranged scoop in the Washington Post online. … And they wonder why folks aren’t buying the papers like they used to.

Smith is spot on about this: Newspapers are dying a vicious death. Last week’s bloodbath at the Baltimore Sun was a harsh reminder to many of us that the journalistic times are a-changing, and it’s happening much faster than many anticipated. Part of the reason behind print media’s decline is that  modern editors  seem to put a premium on connecting stories to the ruling populist paradigm. Intelligent readers are tired of it: celebrities interviewed on issues of state, politicians presented as rock stars, and both being presented as equals on the nightly news, for crying out loud, where images of pop star and pol alike are crafted carefully.

The result: The president doesn’t get the full scrutiny he deserves. Readers and viewers don’t get the whole story — or worse, when they do report a piece, the message is massaged to fit the prevailing zeitgeist or the media outlet’s agenda. That goes against everything J-school teaches: Tell the full story and stick to the facts. Of course, we must acknowledge and accept that space and time are restricted. That being the case, however, it is crucial that the people can trust those who get to judge which facts are most noteworthy. Tragically, modern media outlets have given the people little reason to trust them.

This is dangerous, even for Obama supporters: When important stories are given short shrift, We The People suffer. News consumers need more substance from our media, not less. We need as much meaningful information about as many of the administration’s doings as possible. Without the facts, we cannot know what truly is happening in the halls of power or what the repercussions will be for our future. We don’t get an opportunity to keep the president’s feet to the proverbial fire when he strays off-course or breaks a promise. We instead become a fan club, a sycophantic amen corner, or worse, a tolerated but not respected entity expected to go along with the program or be ostracized.

To that end, the columnist does us a mitzvah by sharing his list of stories about “the most powerful man on Earth [mainstream media] deemed unfit to print.”  Do read it, progressives: We may not be as maligned as right-wingers right now, but like the GOP, we are not the party in power.

I’ll repeat this: We are not in charge. Obama is a pragmatist, not a progressive. Like the GOP, we on the Left have to remain vigilant and adversarial (when necessary) to ensure that our vision is heard by the White House and that the facts see print.

Progressives need to know the bad news — and the good news. Smith, a conservative, notes a few under-reported stories that progressives would hail as positive developments. Knowing the full story allows us to keep progressive ideals a part of the mix: We must have equality in this country. We need universal health care. We have two wars raging that need to end. We have a massive economic crisis. What we need are facts: What are the administration’s plans and what will be their real cost? What is really going on in the Middle East? We don’t need more stories about Bo Obama, not from the serious newsies, even if particular editors decide otherwise.

Obama Vows ‘Independent’ Replacement for Souter

This is Obama’s shot to leave a positive, lasting legacy… and promote equality. Let’s hope he doesn’t screw it up.

Justice David H. Souter formally told the White House on Friday that he will retire from the Supreme Court at the end of the current term in June, a development that stirred intense interest about who his replacement will be and how the change will affect future court rulings on abortion and the balance between personal liberty and national security.

President Obama praised Justice Souter and his record on the court, and said he hoped to have a new justice confirmed by the Senate by the time the court reconvenes in October. But before that happens, a vigorous debate in the Senate is virtually certain as lawmakers and the nominee discuss what kind of America they envision.

Promising to nominate a replacement with “a sharp and independent mind and a record of excellence and integrity,” Mr. Obama, who startled reporters by walking to the lectern for a cameo appearance in the middle of the daily White House press briefing, said that he would look for a candidate for whom the law was not a matter of abstract theory, but a force that affects real people in their daily lives.

via NYT:  Obama Vows ‘Independent’ Replacement for Souter