more socialist cult-recruiting dangerous people and penguins... WOOT!

Even Nascar is drinking the cyanide-laced red Kool-Aid!


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Four posts in one day. Yeah.

Let's be real: Senator Russell is a hater.

Now, the way I understand Obama's upcoming speech to American students is that it will be a talk "on the importance of [students] taking responsibility for their education, challenging them to set goals and do everything they can to succeed," as is indicated on whitehouse.gov.

And I don't claim to be unbiased. On the contrary, I'm crazy about President Obama. I'm pretty sure I've made that clear.

That said, I think I'm being fair and rational when I say that Oklahoma's Senator Steve Russell's incendiary comments about the speech as an attempt at the Obamian indoctrination of American school children are irresponsibly hyperbolic. I don't mean that I don't I hear what he's saying; I see how a speech to children during school hours could be interpreted in that way. I really do.

But it's spoken like someone who has no idea how education works. Students' brains are not empty vessels into which grown-ups ideas are poured. In my experience, for many students, and especially students of color, Obama's political success is inspiring. Many of my students even think he is cool, if their wearing of his face on their t-shirts and shoes is any indication of such a thing. Many, but not all. And for those who don't consider him an inspiring leader or a cool guy, I'd bet that his speech Tuesday morning will give them an opportunity to practice their critical analysis skills. Afterwards, they can practice argumentation with their Obama-worshiping peers. And if that happens, that's when the learning -- for both the "believers" and "non-believers" -- will take place, not while they're listening to Obama's lecture. They've heard that "School is Cool" thing a million times. Sure, they might find it interesting to be spoken to and not about by our nation's leader, but I assure you: students are not passive receivers of knowledge. It just doesn't work that way.

Russell complained that the planned speech, "gives the appearance of creating a cult of personality." Okay, so he gets some face-time on the TV sets in the classroom as he tries to send positive and encouraging messages to our kids. Again, I really do see what he's getting at. But, again. Come on now. Obama as a concept has been a major force in pop culture for a while now. For various reasons, he has been an impressive draw for young people. Part of it, for sure is the way he's been marketed. Absolutely, he's trendy; I've already admitted my kids think he's cool. But it's fairly insulting to my own intelligence as well as insulting my students' intelligence to suggest that all of us youngens have been hoodwinked by him and his people. Y'know, it's possible that we might genuinely agree that all people who are sick deserve to be able to go to the doctor and receive quality treatment.

And finally, his claim that the speech is "is akin to something you would see in North Korea or under Saddam Hussein's Iraq" is just plain-old outrageously off. He going to speak about the importance reducing the drop-out rate. Last time I checked, we didn't invade Iraq because too many students were staying in school.

"Professional protestors"

From Time's "Church Politics: Why the Pope Is Side-Stepping Notre Dame":

"It is clear that Notre Dame didn't understand what it means to be Catholic when they issued this invitation," said Cardinal Francis George, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). The conservative Cardinal Newman Society organized a petition calling for Notre Dame president Father John Jenkins to disinvite the President. Professional protesters such as Alan Keyes and Randall Terry have descended on the South Bend campus, pushing blood-covered baby dolls in Spongebob strollers and getting themselves arrested. And Cardinal James Francis Stafford, one of the highest-ranking Americans at the Vatican, has declared Obama an unfit honoree because his statements on abortion reflect "an agenda and vision that are aggressive, disruptive and apocalyptic."

Obama on abortion:

"I think that most Americans realize that this is a profoundly difficult issue for the women and families who make these decisions. They don't make them casually. I trust women to make these decisions in conjunction with their doctors and their families and their clergy, and I think that's where most Americans are. Now, when you describe a specific procedure that accounts for less than one percent of abortions that take place, then, naturally, people get concerned, and I think legitimately so... There's a broader issue, though. That is, can we move past some of the debates around things about which we disagree, and can we start talking about things we do agree on? Reducing teen pregnancy, making it less likely for women to find themselves in the situation where they've got to anguish over these decisions. Those are areas where I think we can all start mobilizing and move forward rather than look backward."

Now, remind me, who's the one who's got a point? The bloody-doll-pushing, apocalypse predictors, or the guy who wants to mobilize to reduce teen pregnancy and other issues that cause women to have to choose? I mean, the good thing for pro-choicers like me is that the pro-lifers seem to be making our job pret-ty easy.

I really like it when Obama says, "Let's get to work!" at the end of his speeches,

because working is one of my favorite things to do. Especially on days like today, when I get to work with a bunch of students after school to develop a plan for more effectively advertising and recruiting students into AP Prep and AP classes. One of the most pervasive concerns of the students (and non-students) on our social justice committee is the relative "white-middle-class-ness" of our AP prep and AP classes. In a school where 43% of our student body is made up of students of color, why do our most challenging classes not reflect that, is what we want to know.

good day, weird rule

I was able to take my students to the auditorium, to watch on "the largest screen in Urbana" one of the teachers announced, Obama's swearing-in ceremony. So exciting!

When George Bush's face came onto the screen, they all laughed. He's like, so uncool.

After school, we had a faculty meeting at which we were reminded of the rule in the student handbook against scarves. Students are not allowed to wear scarves or bandannas of any kind anywhere on their bodies. The point was raised by a teacher that the scarves are not necessarily gang symbols, as the rule supposes, but are actually just, um, fashionable. She was like, "Somebody was telling me that this is part of some new 'hipster' (?) thing? Well. Hipster? Not welcome here!" ha.

NOOOOOOO!

Call me sappy, but

this performance of "O Holy Night" by Mariah Carey is beautiful. I really like the lines

Long lay the earth in sin and error pining
Till he appear'd and the soul felt its worth.
A thrill of hope the weary world rejoices
For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn!

Now, the question is, and I'm talking to you, Amy and Kasey, is this song about Jesus or Obama?

There's no such thing as "reverse racism."

I can't handle it. Motherfuckers, it doesn't exist. Yes, there can be prejudice harbored by a person of color and directed towards a white person, but prejudice is different from racism. Racism involves both prejudice and power. It's a systematic privileging of some and disadvantaging of others. I like the way that Beverly Tatum explains it in her first chapter of Why are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? She uses this anecdote:

"I once asked a White teacher what it would mean to her if a student or a parent of color accused her of being racist. She said she would feel as though she had been punched in the stomach or called a "low-life scum." She is not alone in this feeling. The word racist holds a lot of emotional power. For many White people, to be called racist is the ultimate insult. The idea that this term might only be applied to Whites becomes highly problematic for after all, can't people of color be "low-life scum" too?

Then she goes on to discuss the problems that come with throwing around the word racist to mean all sorts of things other than what it is, which is systematic "prejudice plus power."

I know lots of white people -- and not-white people actually, not to say it's White and Other -- who equate racism with "mean," and so are sure that they're not racist. They're good people. But they are racist. If you participate, whether actively or complacently, in a system that advantages some and disadvantages others based on their perceived races, then you're racist. If you actively work against that system, then you're anti-racist. There's no neutral. That doesn't mean that all racists are jerks, but it does mean that we're dealing with a lot more racists than we want to acknowledge.

Like this schumck, responsible for a lot of McCain's campaign ads:

Good advertising men are almost always mischiefmakers at heart, the sort who don't mind a little confrontation and who revel in a bit of controversy. And so Davis is wistful at the missed opportunities of the McCain campaign. "I made a list once, which no one will ever see, of all the reasons that my hands were tied on this campaign," he says. "And I've never had a list this long." One of his biggest struggles, Davis says, was to come up with negative spots against a historic, groundbreaking candidate without stepping on taboos. "One of the big hands that I felt was tied behind my back was [that] so many things — like [Obama's record on] crime — you would logically do were perceived as 'Oh, we can't do that. That was playing the race card,' " he says, adding that the campaign created a whole series of crime attacks against Obama that were never aired. "Reverend Wright? 'Oh, can't do that; they'll say we are playing the race card.' [William] Ayers? For the longest time, 'Oh, can't do that. We're playing the race card.' "

Davis says that concern about race played a major role in the entire aesthetic of McCain's ads. The photographs of Obama that the ads used, for instance, which often showed Obama elongated and smiling, were carefully selected, he recalls. "We chose them with only one thing in mind, and that is to not make them bad pictures because bad pictures would be seen as racist," Davis says. "How many shots in their ads did they use a John McCain [photo] looking decent and smiling?" He says the campaign also agonized over the music in the ads, paying special care not to play drum-heavy tracks that could be seen as an African tribal reference. "We were held to a totally different standard," he says.

Geez, excuse Barack Obama for having dark skin!? God forbid we have to give attention to whether or not we're indulging in the stereotypes that contribute to the socially unjust achievement gap in our public schools, to the disproportionate number of black and Latino men in our prisons, to the despicable degree of correlation between race and income levels in our country. I mean, if Obama could have just been white then Fred Davis, could have chosen from all of the cool drum music that that beautiful "country" of Africa has to offer! It would have been so much more convenient! Give me a fucking break.

It's like he wants to say, "We couldn't even talk about how a black President would let all those black people commit all the crimes they're predisposed to do with impunity! Unfair! We have to act like that's not true, but he's black!"

I do realize that jumping to that conclusion is probably just as problematic as the racial stereotypes that I'm guessing he'd like to trade on. (And I could probably come up with some more problematic assumptions about what's on that lengthy list of his.) That said, I really wish that our racists could own their racism, know that we're not calling them "low-life scum," and move into some productive, action-oriented learning about how people of color are treated by our world and how we can create a world that serves all of us more fairly. Like, immediately I'd like that to happen. I'm not known for patience.

They're milking this presidenial-race stuff for all it's worth; "and I'm reaping all the benefits."

Two articles I found thought-provoking:
Lose the BlackBerry? Yes He Can, Maybe

But before he arrives at the White House, he will probably be forced to sign off. In addition to concerns about e-mail security, he faces the Presidential Records Act, which puts his correspondence in the official record and ultimately up for public review, and the threat of subpoenas. A decision has not been made on whether he could become the first e-mailing president, but aides said that seemed doubtful.

For all the perquisites and power afforded the president, the chief executive of the United States is essentially deprived by law and by culture of some of the very tools that other chief executives depend on to survive and to thrive. Mr. Obama, however, seems intent on pulling the office at least partly into the 21st century on that score; aides said he hopes to have a laptop computer on his desk in the Oval Office, making him the first American president to do so.

At the risk of sounding like some young and naive "digital native," um, what? The president doesn't have a computer in the Oval Office? What in. the. hell. does he do? I mean, if that's the case, then fuck all these technology-laced lesson plans I'm writing for my kids so as to better prepare them for 21st Century careers. They can be President of he United States and not have to type, apparently. Apparently, that's even the rule.

Diana Owen, who leads the American Studies program at Georgetown University, said presidents were not advised to use e-mail because of security risks and fear that messages could be intercepted.

“They could come up with some bulletproof way of protecting his e-mail and digital correspondence, but anything can be hacked,” said Ms. Owen, who has studied how presidents communicate in the Internet era. “The nature of the president’s job is that others can use e-mail for him.”

I'm wondering if maybe he can keep his BlackBerry, just for messages like these that help him maintain his awesomeness:

“How about that?” Mr. Obama replied to a friend’s congratulatory e-mail message on the night of his victory.

and

Mr. Obama used e-mail to stay in constant touch with friends from the lonely confines of the road, often sending messages like “Sox!” when the Chicago White Sox won a game.

and the other article is The Wild Wordsmith of Wasila

I suppose it will be recorded as among political history’s ironies that Palin was brought in to help John McCain. I can’t blame feminists who might draw amusement from the fact that a woman managed to both cripple the male she was supposed to help while gleaning an almost Elvis-sized following for herself. Mac loses, Sarah wins big-time was the gist of headlines.

Again... um, what? Just FYI: Feminism is not about "crippl[ing]" men. Not even a little bit. Honestly, I think it would be more difficult to locate a feminist who supported Sarah Palin's candidacy for VP than it would be to find one who sees Palin as participating rather loudly and proudly in the dominant mysoginist ideology. I'm one, for example.

He continues,

What on earth are our underpaid teachers, laboring in the vineyards of education, supposed to tell students about the following sentence, committed by the serial syntax-killer from Wasilla High and gleaned by my colleague Maureen Dowd for preservation for those who ask, “How was it she talked?”

My concern has been the atrocities there in Darfur and the relevance to me with that issue as we spoke about Africa and some of the countries there that were kind of the people succumbing to the dictators and the corruption of some collapsed governments on the continent, the relevance was Alaska’s investment in Darfur with some of our permanent fund dollars.

And, she concluded, “never, ever did I talk about, well, gee, is it a country or a continent, I just don’t know about this issue.”

It’s admittedly a rare gift to produce a paragraph in which whole clumps of words could be removed without noticeably affecting the sense, if any.

(A cynic might wonder if Wasilla High School’s English and geography departments are draped in black.)

There's nothing more annoying to me -- hyperbole -- than people whose first response when I tell them I'm a high school English teacher is, "Ugh. I hate grammar." Except maybe the not-so-few-and-far-between people who say, "Oh good! We need people teaching kids to speak English, and not Spanish! This is America; they should speak our language!"

One thing that Sarah Palin has in common with my students, btw: Ask about Africa and receive some well-intentioned but problematically under-informed "Let's save those poor people... :(" rhetoric.

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UPDATE: I'm feeling pretty cool because one of my favorite profs just blogged about the no-BlackBerry thing, too. He says:

"George W. Bush gave up the chance to digitize the White House by giving up email when he took the oath of office – something to do with executive privilege, the imperial presidency, and not being able to type and chew gum at the same time."

more [found] Obama stuff

I picked up this extremely mediocre (oxymoron) piece of [found] writing in the hallway outside my classroom a couple of days after the election.

If you're wondering why I'm posting so much, it's because I'm supposed to be grading essays.

But this just in:
Barack. Obama. says. "fuck."

I knew I liked him.

The debates unnerved both candidates. When he was preparing for the Democratic primary debates, Obama was recorded saying, "I don't consider this to be a good format for me, which makes me more cautious. I often find myself trapped by the questions and thinking to myself, 'You know, this is a stupid question, but let me ... answer it.' So when Brian Williams is asking me about what's a personal thing that you've done [that's green], and I say, you know, 'Well, I planted a bunch of trees.' And he says, 'I'm talking about personal.' What I'm thinking in my head is, 'Well, the truth is, Brian, we can't solve global warming because I f---ing changed light bulbs in my house. It's because of something collective'."

I think Obama's trying to be me.

I mean, I had parent-teacher conferences this morning, too.

Still feeling all sappy and excited. (Fired up, you could say.)

Thanks, Cassie (and Cassie-Prof).

White people talking about race? Weird.

During the school day today I had to have private conversations with two different white students who were really worked up, borderline angry, at how "the African Americans" were responding to Obama's election.

"How come if a black person is elected, they can make a big deal about it, but if I made a big deal about a white person being elected, that would be racist?" one of them asked me.

"How come right after they announced his victory, the TV stations only interviewed African-American people? Why can't white people have an opinion?" the other student asked.

In each case, I talked to the student about how it was okay for them to feel frustrated at what feels like a pressure for white people to not talk about race as a way of avoiding the "racist" label. I get that. These kids go to a school with a fairly diverse student population, and they don't want to act like everyone's the same. And they shouldn't. That's not the way anti-racism works. Anti-racism isn't colorblind, and it's not non-confrontational. These kids' ideas were racist, but these are not "bad" kids. Racism and big-jerk-ness are not the same. Their awareness of an oppressive forced silence is legitimate, even if their notions of "reverse racism" are not. And yet their lack of knowledge about the ways that racism works, and their lack of satisfactory vocabulary for describing their hurt feelings, led them to say things that made them, for sure, look like big jerks.

I finished the school day with the hopeful thought that Obama's election may really serve as a catalyst for many more honest, personal, and productive discussions of race and racism like the ones I had with these students.

"This party: Great party or greatest party?"

Attention My-Blog-Readers:
(Who am I kidding? Attention, Mom:)

If you ever want to have the greatest MSNBC/Anderson Cooper-watching party ever, recruit one Kasey Umland to be your party planner. Check it:



In all seriousness, though, oh.my.god. I'd like to avoid some lame attempt at finding some words to explain how it felt to see "Barack Obama elected President" flash on the screen. When I called that student this morning, he said, "How does it feel to have been a little part of making history, Ms. Dahlke?" The kids are screaming O-BA-MA in the hallways during passing periods. I could not get my first hour class to focus on our routine activity for at least ten minutes. They're so excited! I'm so excited!

OK, so since I've committed to not trying to put my joy into words, and since Kasey's blog is now private, and since I thought this post was particularly poignant, I'm excerpting:

SO, why wouldn't my mom vote for Obama? TAXES. My mom thinks he will raise her taxes. I towed the Obama line and told her only those making over 250K will see an increase. I told her that she and dad do NOT make over 250K so their taxes will fall. Her response "Well, we all know they say that now but it won't stay that way." (Is my mom Joe the Plumber?)

Now, it could be the fact that I am in the midst of a presidential movie marathon, but I started thinking about this claim: you can't trust a Democrat to cut taxes. OR WORSE, Democrats WANT to raise taxes. Democrats WANT to spend your money. Frankly, it kind of pisses me off.

I'm angry that somehow we have accepted the label, fiscally liberal. I don't think I stand for being fiscally liberal at all. I WANT a balanced budget. I want less government spending. I WANT lower taxes. And even beyond that I WANT small government, and I am willing to bet I favor these things just as much as any conservative.

That being said, I NEED to live in a world in which regardless of race, gender, religion, sexual orientation, etc. everyone is given a fair chance at happiness. I NEED to live in a country that does not see people living in poverty and allow it to continue. I NEED to live in a society in which mental illness, developmental disabilities, learning disabilities, and/or physical disabilities are not a sentence to a life of nothing more than your basic needs being met (if you are lucky) but rather you are afforded the opportunity to reach your own personal potential.

and I want all of that to be possible without a big government, but until we rid the world of discrimination and find a way to instill a sense in everyone of basic consideration for our neighbors, that isn't going to happen. So, until then, I want a government that is looking to put itself out of business. We talk about this in the nonprofit world. The goal of social service agencies is to be so successful, you are no longer necessary. I am not advocating anarchy, but I am advocating a government that looks for long term sustainable solutions to our greatest problems. That seeks not to minimize their magnitude but to work to address the institutional causes of these problems in a way that little by little makes the need for a government role no longer necessary. This is idealistic and I know that, but I am sick and tired of the notion that because I want to see a better world, I am in some way WANT to spend hard working Americans' money. No one wants that and it is ridiculous to even suggest. The difference between us is not our wants but our needs, and I for one, am willing to put my needs before my wants.

I can't believe how much I really love it that Jill Biden is a teacher.

The title of her dissertation is Student Retention at the Community College: Meeting Students' Needs. Pretty cool.



Gets good at around 14 minutes. Like really, seriously good.

But, I should add, Senator Obama, that it really annoys me when you talk too much about the need to reform our education system in terms of our ability to compete in the global economy. What about my students' personal need and right to experience self-actualization? To develop empathy? To ask critical questions of those in power?

But whoa, whoa, whoa. McCain's proposing the closure of the Department of Education? As in, not necessary anymore? Um, what.

and in spite of feeling so sick I wanted to die...

...when I overheard the following conversation among students yesterday, I got goosebumps.

"Who do you want to be president?"
"Obama, duh."
"God! People who are eighteen are so lucky!"
"I know! I want to vote!"

I mean, I know, Obama's trendy. But, so what if he's trendy? These kids think voting is cool! Shouldn't it be a goal of society's to make things that are good for us cool? As in, lots of people will voluntarily contribute positively to their communities? Yes, please.

too much blog-worthy stuff, hence the lack of blogging

The first two days of school went really well. I. am. excited.

Suffice it to say it does not look like this:


(but it would be funnier if it did)


In other news, the Nas and Talib Kweli show was pretty cool. A whole shitload of people singing along, "Yes we can change the world!" I'm sappy. I know that.

O.K., it's just hit me.

The Democrats have nominated Barack Obama for President. The first African-American man to be nominated by a major party for President of the United States. And he'll speak tomorrow on the 45th anniversary of Dr. King's "I Have a Dream" speech. Whoa. I really can't help but smile. (And after spending a lot of time this week looking over and worrying over the statistics that show that in my school, like in schools nationwide, African-American kids are not achieving at the same levels as their White peers, I needed that.)

goosebumps

"So history reminds us that walls can be torn down. But the task is never easy. True partnership and true progress requires constant work and sustained sacrifice. They require sharing the burdens of development and diplomacy; of progress and peace. They require allies who will listen to each other, learn from each other and, most of all, trust each other. "

This sounds a lot like what we agreed teachers need do with their colleagues if schools are to be effective learning communities when I was at a professional development thing last week.