President's Education Speech Protest Is Pure Politics

There's nothing worse than people who are angry at anything President Barack Obama does and try to say it's one thing when we know it's something else.

The latest nonsensical brouhaha — led by right-wing, ideologically driven zombies — deals with his online speech Tuesday to schools across the country. Conservative talk show hosts, columnists and bloggers are stirring up their rabid followers by labeling the president's speech as an attempt to indoctrinate their children into siding with his brand of "socialism."

Yeah, a basic speech on the importance of staying in school has been turned into a ridiculous fight that is all about politics. You now have school districts fielding calls from irate parents who want to keep their children out of school that day; others are demanding they be removed from the classroom. Officials in my hometown, Houston, are actually providing opt-out forms for parents.

It seems to me that the people acting like children are the parents.

I debated the issue on CNN with Jim Greer, who heads the Republican Party of Florida, and he tried to assert that the real issue is the lesson plan sent out by the U.S. Department of Education, which asks students to write letters to the president to help him do his job. Greer danced all around the topic, but what he didn't have the courage to admit is that he and so many others just want to argue against anything the president does.

At one point, Greer said that parents should have the right to sign off on what their kids hear, even from politicians. Yet when I asked whether he will demand that politicians who speak to children in Florida — whether they be school board members, judges, city councilors, state representatives or senators, members of Congress or governors — notify parents of what they plan to say, he danced again.

This, folks, is truly one of the dumbest debates I ever have witnessed.

Presidents and elected officials visit schools all the time. And when they visit, policy questions often arise. I would hope that when an elected official does visit a school, students would be up on their current events enough to ask him about issues that are in the news. Nothing is more embarrassing to a teacher than to have a visitor and have the students give him a blank stare with nothing to say.

In 1986, when I was a junior at Jack Yates High School in Houston, I recall we had several officials come by on career day. One was an elected judge, and another was a businessman who previously was chairman of the Republican Party of Texas.

I really pressed George hard (I was a student in the Magnet School of Communications program), and we eventually struck up a conversation and stayed in contact over the years. Three years later, when I was a student at Texas A&M University and we were planning to attend the annual convention of the National Association of Black Journalists, we sent more than 30 letters to foundations asking for donations. We got about 30 rejection letters. Finally, we got one letter that had a check in it for $1,000. It was from George Strake and the Strake Foundation. He complimented me on my commitment to a career in journalism and wanted to assist us. That check allowed us to pay for our hotel rooms, and without it, we never would have been able to attend the convention. And for me professionally, nearly every job I've received in the past 20 years has been a result of the relationships I built from that convention.

Now imagine what would have happened if my parents had flown off the handle and demanded that George not speak at our school. What if they had been so incensed with Republican policies that they signed a form pulling me from the classroom? I never would have had a chance to question George and impress him with my knowledge of politics, and no relationship would have existed.

Our kids deserve to hear from elected officials, even if they are discussing policy. These individuals are making decisions that impact the lives of these children, and they will grow up to be voters one day. We have too many people today who don't care about politics. They refuse to vote, don't get involved in the issues of the day, and are apathetic. Now we have to deal with these ideologues and their political fanaticism in our schools.

I didn't object when President George W. Bush spoke to school students — and the same with Presidents George H.W. Bush and Reagan. This is one time when I wish students would turn to their parents and tell them to stuff it and allow them to hear from both political parties.

If there is any indoctrination going on, it's coming from conservative parents who are so close-minded that they prefer to drill their ideology into their children's heads. And yes, I would say the same if liberals were up in arms over a Republican president's speaking to schoolchildren.

Maybe that line from the song by then-rapper Will Smith still applies: "Parents just don't understand."

Roland S. Martin is an award-winning CNN analyst and the author of the forthcoming book "The First: President Barack Obama's Road to the White House as originally reported by Roland S. Martin." Please visit his Web site at www.RolandSMartin.com. To find out more about Roland S. Martin and read his past columns, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

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