Obama made the right decision for his kids but the wrong decision for our kids

Reasons to agree:

Obama was asked:
Q: Do you send your kids to public school or private school?
Obama said:
“A: My kids have gone to the University of Chicago Lab School, a private school, because I taught there, and it was five minutes from our house. So it was the best option for our kids. But the fact is that there are some terrific public schools in Chicago that they could be going to (notice latter why he brings this up). The problem is, is that we don’t have good schools, public schools, for all kids. A US senator can get his kid into a terrific public school (if this is true, why did he send his kids to a private school? He says that it was close, but you would think that if he doesn’t support vouchers, that he only wants us to send out kids to public schools, that he would go to the extra effort). That’s not the question (yes it is. The question you were asked is if you send your kids to public or private schools). The question is whether or not ordinary parents, who can’t work the system, are able to get their kids into a decent school, and that’s what I need to fight for and will fight for as president. “2007 YouTube Democratic Primary debate, Charleston SC Jul 23, 2007.

Obama said he wants to help make it so that “parents, who can’t work the system, are able to get their kids into a decent school”, but he doesn’t want them to have the choice he made ol sending them to a private school.
So all the talk about how great our public schools goes out the doors when he makes decisions about his own family.
We aren’t good enough to get vouchers so we can choose were to send out kids… For us, public schools are the best choice, but for him he is going to use a private school.
It goes to show that people are very democratic, when talking about others, but everyone becomes a republican and looks out for their best interest when it comes to their family.
Again Obama made millions of dollars, and always says how the rich need to give more of their share, but he didn’t make any extra donations to uncle Sam himself, so his words are not for him to live by, just others.
But that is the right decision. It shows he loves his kids.
Now he just needs to make the right decision and love our children and give them vouchers so we can make the same decision he made.

Probable interest (or motivation) of those who agree:

1. Republican Party Affiliation (40%)
2. They agree with the argument, outside of any interest or alterior motivation (30%)
   
3. Political laziness & issue crossover (15%)
   
4. The desire to see more competition in Education (20%).
   
5. Hope in the future.
6. Desire for equality, and better schools for minorities.
7. Racism (5%)
8. Dislike for unions (5%).
9. Preference for variety (many different approaches to education)
10. Despare. We have tried everything else, why not try vouchers.

Probable interest (or motivation) of those who disagree:

1. They agree with the argument, outside of any interest or alterior motivation (30%)
   
2. Democratic party groupism (40%)
3. Political laziness & issue crossover.
4. Solidarity with the teachers union.

Obama was wrong to have voted against Roberts

Reasons to agree:

1. People on both sides of the isle, say that he is very respectful, to those with whome he disagrees.


2. During his two year tenure on the D.C. Circuit, Roberts authored 49 opinions, eliciting only two dissents from other judges, and authoring only three dissents of his own. This shows that Roberts works well with others, and builds consensus.


3. Roberts is one of twelve Catholic justices — out of 110 justices total — in the history of the Supreme Court.^[37]


4. His wife is an attorney and a trustee (along with Clarence Thomas) at her alma mater, the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts. He must be pretty cool to have got a smart girl like that to marry him.


5. Roberts graduated graduating with an A.B. in history summa cum laude in three years from Harvard.
   


6. Before attending Harvard Law School, was the managing editor of the Harvard Law Review,^[3] and graduated with his J.D. magna cum laude.^[5] If that was good enough reason for Obama to be president, I guess it is good enough reason for Roberts to be Chief Justice.
   


7. He represented 18 states in United States v. Microsoft. How cool is that?
   


8. All of his maternal great-grandparents were from Czechoslovakia. Roberts understands immigration.
   


9. He was captain of his football team and was a Regional Champion in wrestling. That is pretty cool.

Probable interest (or motivation) of those who agree:

1. Republican Party Affiliation (40%)


2. They agree with the argument, outside of any interest or alterior motivation (30%)
   


3. Political laziness & issue crossover (15%)
   


4. The desire to have more conservative judges on issues like abortion, gay marriage, etc.


5. The desire to strengthen presidential power and weaken legislative power (not encouraging the legislature to vote against people they don't like, instead of "bad" people)
   

Probable interest (or motivation) of those who disagree:

1. They agree with the argument, outside of any interest or alterior motivation (30%)
   


2. Democratic party groupism (40%)


3. Political laziness & issue crossover.


4. The desire to have less conservative judges on issues like abortion, gay marriage, etc.
   


5. The desire to limit presidential power and strengthen legislative power (letting the legislature vote against people they don't like, instead of "bad" people)
   

Obama is right about anti-intellectualism

Reasons to agree:

1. People hate smart kids.


2. Americans are way over-fascinated with calling smart people nerds, and geeks. This is not done so much in other cultures.

Background: “I try to avoid an either/or approach to solving the problems of this country. There are questions of individual responsibility and questions of societal responsibility to be dealt with. The best example is an education. I’m going to insist that we’ve got decent funding, enough teachers, and computers in the classroom, but unless you turn off the television set and get over a certain anti-intellectualism that I think pervades some low-income communities, our children are not going to achieve.” ~ Meet The Press, NBC News Jul 25, 2004

Obama is right about evolution

 Q: If one of your daughters asked you, “Daddy, did God really create the world in 6 days?” What would you say?

A: What I believe is that God created the universe, and that the 6 days in the Bible may not be 6 days as we understand it. My belief is that the story that the Bible tells about God creating this magnificent Earth, that is fundamentally true. Now whether it happened exactly as we might understand it reading the text of the Bible, that I don’t presume to know. But one last point--I do believe in evolution. I don’t think that is incompatible with Christian faith. Just as I don’t think science generally is incompatible with Christian faith. There are those who suggest that if you have a scientific bent of mind, then somehow you should reject religion. And I fundamentally disagree with that. In fact, the more I learn about the world, the more I know about science, the more I’m amazed about the mystery of this planet and this universe. And it strengthens my faith as opposed to weakens it.

Source: 2008 Democratic Compassion Forum at Messiah College Apr 13, 2008

Obama is right on Merit Pay

Reasons to agree:

1. We should reward good behavior and punish bad behavior. 
   


2. 
   “ Teachers are extraordinarily frustrated about how their performance is assessed. And not just their own performance, but the school’s performance generally. So they’re teaching to the tests all the time. What I have said is that we should be able to get buy-in from teachers in terms of how to measure progress. Every teacher I think wants to succeed. And if we give them a pathway to professional development, where we’re creating master teachers, they are helping with apprenticeships for young new teachers, they are involved in a variety of other activities, that are really adding value to the schools, then we should be able to give them more money for it. But we should only do it if the teachers themselves have some buy-in in terms of how they’re measured. They can’t be judged simply on standardized tests that don’t take into account whether children are prepared before they get to school or not.” ~ Barack Obama, 2007 Democratic primary debate on “This Week” Aug 19, 2007
   
   

Background

Q: As president, can you name a hot-button issue where you would be willing to buck the Democratic Party line & say, “You know what? Republicans have a better idea here?”

A: I think that on issues of education, I’ve been very clear about the fact--and sometimes I’ve gotten in trouble with the teachers’ union on this--that we should be experimenting with charter schools. We should be experimenting with different ways of compensating teachers.

Q: You mean merit pay?

A: Well, merit pay, the way it’s been designed, I think, is based on just a single standardized test--I think is a big mistake, because the way we measure performance may be skewed by whether or not the kids are coming into school already 3 years or 4 years behind. But I think that having assessment tools and then saying, “You know what? Teachers who are on career paths to become better teachers, developing themselves professionally--that we should pay excellence more.” I think that’s a good idea.

Source: 2008 Fox News interview: presidential series Apr 27, 2008

Obama is wrong when he says: "We need to fix and improve our public schools, not throw our hands up and walk away from them"

Reasons to agree:

1. Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. We have spent more and more money per student in public schools over the past 30 years, and our performance has only gotten worse.
   

Background: “We’ll make sure that every child in this country gets a world-class education from the day they’re born until the day they graduate from college. What McCain is offering amounts to little more than the same tired rhetoric about vouchers. We need to move beyond the same debate we’ve been having for the past 30 years when we haven’t gotten anything done. We need to fix & improve our public schools, not throw our hands up and walk away from them. We need to uphold the ideal of public education, but we also need reform. That’s why I’ve introduced a comprehensive strategy to recruit an army of new quality teachers to our communities--and to pay them more & give them more support. We’ll invest in early childhood education programs so that our kids don’t begin the race of life behind the starting line and offer a $4,000 tax credit to make college affordable for anyone who wants to go. Because as the NAACP knows better than anyone, the fight for social justice and economic justice begins in the classroom.” McCain-Obama speeches at 99th NAACP Convention Jul 12, 2008

Obama is right to want higher teaching standards

Reasons to agree:

1. Those students in Education departments across the country have had worse ACT, and SAT grades than other college departments. They even have worse grades than Criminal Justice departments (cops). It is sad that cops can know math, geography, history, and science, better than those that we put in charge of teaching our children. We need higher standards for teachers, if we are going to pay them more. I'm not saying every teacher is stupid. If you are a teacher, and you are offended, than you prove my point. You are stupid. The facts are the facts, and if you get mad because of the facts, than you are stupid. I'm from Idaho. I'm not offended when you say bad things about people from Idaho, in general, because I know that you are not talking about me specifically. Of course their are a lot of very smart people who are teachers. I thought about going into teaching. My father, whom I love and respect very much is a teacher. My mother in law is also a very good teacher. Two of my 3 brothers got degrees in teaching. Their is nothing wrong with teachers, with colleges of education, etc, we just need to raise their standards if we want our students to do better. 

"I’ll recruit an army of new teachers, pay them higher salaries and give them more support. In exchange, I’ll ask for higher standards and more accountability." ~ Barack Obama speech at 2008 Democratic National Convention Aug 27, 2008.