It was never about the speech

"I’m working hard to fix up your classrooms and get you the books, equipment and computers you need to learn." —President Barack Obama, address to schoolchildren, September 8, 2009

President Obama's speech today and the revised Department of Education "engagement resources" do not change the federal government's ever-increasing control of education, to the detriment of local control by the states and local school boards, and a cultural shift away from individual achievement toward a general dumbing-down to ensure equal outcomes for all.

The nationalization of education began in 1965 with the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) with its funding to states (not families) to educate low-income students. It took a giant step forward in 1979, when President Jimmy Carter signed the law that created the U.S. Department of Education. It took a major leap forward in 2002 when Edward Kennedy's No Child Left Behind Act (a reauthorization of the ESEA) was signed into law by President George W. Bush.

Q: Should it be the federal goverment's role to "fix up your classrooms and get you the books, equipment and computers you need to learn?"

A: See the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

Why Obama is speaking directly to schoolchildren on September 8

The philosophy of the classroom in one generation will be the philosophy of the government in the next generation.

—Abraham Lincoln (attributed)

Diffusion of authority among tens of thousands of school districts is a safeguard against centralized control and abuse of the educational system that must be maintained.

—Dwight D. Eisenhower, New York Herald Tribune, February 9, 1955

President Obama will address the nation's schoolchildren directly in their classrooms on Tuesday. More than just a speech, the event will be broadcast on C-SPAN, streamed from the Internet, and be accompanied by downloadable "classroom engagement resources," with thought-provoking content like this:

As the president speaks, teachers can ask students to write down key ideas or phrases that are important or personally meaningful. Students could use a note‐taking graphic organizer such as a “cluster web;” or, students could record their thoughts on sticky notes. Younger children could draw pictures and write as appropriate. As students listen to the speech, they could think about the following:

• What is the president trying to tell me?


• What is the president asking me to do?


• What new ideas and actions is the president challenging me to think about?

Why does the Left in America insist on ever more centralized control of the schools and oppose charter and homeschools, taking control away from parents and local communities?

When an opponent declares, "I will not come over to your side," I calmly say, "Your child belongs to us already... What are you? You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing else but this new community.

He alone, who owns the youth, gains the future.

—Adolf Hilter

Take away a people's heritage and they are easily persuaded.

Give us the child for eight years and it will be a Bolshevik forever.

—Vladimir Lenin (attributed)

Under federal control of education and soon health care, all that's left for us parents is "breed 'em and feed 'em." The government will take care of the rest, from cradle to grave.