Back to, Stay in School

I believe the GOP and their loyal followers - who refuse to send their children to school for fear they might listen to President Obama’s “Stay in School” message - are not only ignorant, lacking mental acuity, but they are part of the problem and the reason this country is in shambles. If you object to his message and his philosophy that perfectly fine, but please, please be prepared to share your own solutions. Otherwise, in the words of elementary school teachers around the country with absent students, "if you do not have anything construct to say, be quiet."

Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty is one of the guilty parties who he stepped up to criticize President Obama for targeting the classroom by saying it “is no place to show a video address from Obama.”

Interesting. Well, Gov. Pawlenty, what do you say to Laura Bush who supports President Obama saying, “There’s a place for the president of the United States to…encourage schoolchildren” and what about those thousands of classrooms who watched the inauguration?

Then there is the Chairman of the GOP, Jim Greer, who says taxpayers should not have to pay for President Obama’s indoctrination of children.

"The idea that school children across our nation will be forced to watch the president justify his plans ... is not only infuriating, but goes against beliefs of the majority of Americans, while bypassing American parents through an invasive abuse of power."

Florida GOP Chairman Jim Greer

Mr. Chairman, what would call it when a president – not saying any names – initiated legislation approving phone tapping, exhausts military personnel and employs other “good old boys" networking privileges? Oh, I forgot, abuse of is only justified in times of "real" war not wars where we are battling for our children's minds. I think if GOP leaders and their loyal followers do not want teachers to show President Obama's speech today, then we should honor their requests. Then, send home letters informing those parents we will download the video (as soon as the White House makes it available) to show at our leisure. That way we keep them guessing and if they are still so worried about "Obama in the classroom" they will remove their children from school so real students can learn.

I could understand why there are people objecting and opposed to President Obama’s speech and politics: they feel left out. This speech is neither for their nor their children's benefit. This speech is not for those “well off” children and parents. This speech is not for those children who come home everyday to two, “speech-objecting” parents. This speech is not for those GOP'ers and their loyal followers who have children that already stay in school, will go on to graduate from high school and will be able to afford or have connections to get into those prestigious colleges or universities of their choice.

No, this speech is for the middle-lower class, minority students. Students who have only one, meaning they are parentally handicapped in a society where children with two have a better chance at success. Students who struggle to learn when their basic human needs are not being met at home. Students (Black and Hispanic) whose dropout rate since 1980 has consistently been double and quadruple (respectively) than that of their white counterparts. Moreover, this dropout rate directly effects graduation and in urban cities – Detroit, Baltimore, New York, LA – the graduation rate is less than 50%.

So, who needed to hear his speech more: struggling minority students in inner cities or white GOP follower's students who know very little of the struggle?

I too start school this week and one of the books for my Education the Social Order class (Capitalizing on Disaster: Taking and breaking Public Schools) talks a little about education. It describes how corporations with strong connections to the conservative rights use disasters like Hurricane Katrina, the Iraq War and gentrification to rebuild and privatize schools. These school are then converted into cash cows for for-profit corporations. Not saying this is the underlying reason the GOP objects to President Obama’s speech, but they are closely connected.

We should be so lucky that President Obama is trying to educate our children because for eight years some people accused President Bush of dumbing down and brainwashing them. I liken the tension over this Super Tuesday, Back to School speech to what my generation would call Hiphop beef. This might be a bit of a stretch, but I think I can make it all connect.

Hiphop would not be Hiphop if emcees never stepped into the cipher and battled. One of the first documented battles was in 1982 between Kool Moe Dee and Busy Bee. Over the next twenty years, battling evolved into "beef." Some classic Hiphop songs where the result of emcees beefing over: where Hiphop really started (The Bridge Wars between KRS-One of Boogie Down Productions and MC Marle Marl of Juice Crew), best skills (Nas vs Jay-Z & LL Cool J vs Canibus), best coast (Tupac Shakur from Cali vs Notoious B.I.G. from NYC) or for entertainment purposes and publicity (Roxanne Shante vs U.T.F.O).

What will remain the most commonly debated topic in Hiphop is relevance. Kool Moe Dee – an old school Hiphop pioneer – and LL Cool J – a fresh, young emcee – battled back and forth on several tracks including hits like How You Like Me Now (Kool Moe Dee ’87) and Mama Said Knock You Out (LL Cool J ’89). More recently, Joe Budden and Raekwon - from Wu Tang Clan - had beef that erupted into Flying Fists, Shaolin Style.
Jay Smooth from WBAI’s Underground Railroad did a great job connecting the dots on his Illdoctrine blog.

I think this is dumb, but it’s a very typically, American kind of dumb that happens all the time and is not unique to Hiphop at all. I mean let’s look at what happened here:
You have Raekwon from the Wu Tang Clan – a crew that used to dominate their field, but now kind of struggles to stay relevant – and we've got him organizing a loud angry confrontation for the benefit of a camera. And it’s a confrontation that’s based on misrepresenting the facts. And it’s a confrontation that ends with an outbreak of pointless violence.
Meanwhile, the biggest story in politics right now is this crew (the Republicans) that used to dominate their field, but is now struggling to stay relevant. And who is now organizing these loud and angry confrontations for the benefit of a camera, based on misrepresenting the facts and sometimes ending in outbreaks of pointless violence.

Jay Smooth

I could not have said it better myself. This “Back to School Confrontation” the GOP is staging is their cover for them trying to stay relevant for fear of losing control. I will leave you with this:

So instead of keeping up this nonsense until real goons get involved (those clutching their bibles and guns) and make it super ugly, we need to set these petty distractions aside and put our eyes back on the prize. Our country and our rapper (and politicians) have real work to do. So let’s all cut the crap and get to work.

Jay Smooth