Obama’s speech to school children raised a firestorm of controversy, which didn’t help an administration already embroiled with health care reform, the Van Jones controversy, and tanking poll numbers. However, Obama didn’t budge and went ahead as planned, broadcasting the speech Tuesday to schools across the nation, most likely wanting to clear the agenda for yet another speech, tonight, to a Joint Session of Congress.
In all likelihood, Obama’s people innocently came up with this education speech months ago and probably had no idea parents and school districts would react so vociferously. But politics will always be politics. Obama and his supporters built the Big ‘O’ into this cult of personality, and although the text was thoroughly non-partisan, the fact that he was personally making the speech riled some feathers who felt his overwhelming personality, and the political baggage it drags along, should be kept out of the classroom.
His self-promoted image as the “post-partisan” president has taken some hits lately, and although the speech created outrage, it presented Obama with the perfect opportunity to burnish his bi-partisan credentials and strike back against his critics.
He should have invited Republicans to make the speech with him.
Delaying the speech, already a poorly timed affair considering some public schools haven’t even started yet, would put the onus on the Republican leadership. Extending an invitation to John Boehner or Michael Steele proposing that, he, the President, and the Republican opposition leader sit side by side and deliver an inspirational message could have completely changed the tenor of the issue.
There was no need for him to ask nicely either. Obama simply had to dispatch Robert Gibbs with instructions to say, “This speech was never intended to be political, this speech is about the kids. In good faith, I invite my political opponents to deliver a message that should never have been controversial in the first place.” It would have been a bipartisan gesture on an issue that required little political sacrifice.
It’s not as if Republicans could have refused. After raising objection after objection on a host of issues, a Republican refusal would have given Democrats valuable momentum moving into the health care debate. And if Republicans accepted the proposal, who does the White House think will come off better in comparison: President Obama or some Republican?
I disagree with many Republicans on this dispute because I believe Obama’s message to the kids is important. It’s important because many kids look up to him and, insofar he has the power to positively influence them, it would be irresponsible for him not to. Unfortunately, his administration’s political incompetence meant many school districts blacked out the speech altogether. The message never reached the kids.
President Obama is President Obama; he wanted this job and complaining about how a speech he gave is being viewed politically is disingenuous. Obama had an opportunity to do something, however small, about his floundering agenda, not to mention salvage a laudatory educational idea. And his administration blew it.
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