Posted on 12/01/2012 7:47:03 PM PST by Behind the Blue Wall
Thanks for the thoughtful response. I’m not particularly interested in launching into a defense of Obama’s education policies but if you look into the Race to the Top program, it forces states to adopt new laws and policies that ease the way for charter schools and allow for test scores to play a role in teacher evaluation in order to qualify to compete for funds. He also supported the district in Rhode Island that fired the entire teacher staff when they wouldn’t agree to spend a little extra time improving education. Yes the NEA and the teacher’s unions hate all of this, but they are somewhat muted because they know a Republican President would be even worse for them.
He hasn’t supported vouchers, and I’m sure that there’s plenty that’s he’s done going the other direction, and certainly it’s still within the general framework of an active role for the federal government in education, which a lot of us would like to end. And a lot of it might just be seeing the “writing on the wall” and trying to head off/somewhat co-opt the general movement towards school choice, but his policy is definitely not what the teacher’s unions would most like to see, that much I do know.
Thank you. I appreciate that.
Speaking, as part of the 25% that didn’t vote for Obama, when you have the Daily Show serving as an important show for information, and any other source of entertainment and info. soaked in Liberal juices than it is not too hard to figure out their votes for Obama. Obama is cool, he is metropolitan, he is unique, and preaches with the right set of words. Yet they play video games where you fight against Islamists, Communists and Nazis.
It is a complete disconnect, especially at my workplace. Many of my co-workers have openly vouched for their support for Obama. One even went as far as to say, after the election, that 8 out of 10 Romney voters are either ignorant, selfish or racist. May I also add that this is in the field of retail where job hours are getting cut and fulltime positions have been reduced yet they still voted for Obama?
Possibly it is because the people working over us have not told us the real reasons for these problems: The oncoming catastrophe of Obama/Pelosi/Reidstein’s monster AKA Obamacare. I don’t normally discuss politics in the workplace, but I fear that the stupidity of my co-workers may need some kind of remedy.
However, I’ve read that the group I’m in, young white males, have voted a majority for Romney over Obama. Maybe we haven’t all bought into the usual political talk that these idols for the young are trying to say to us.
I would think of it more as a “carrot and stick” than two-faced. I’m willing to engage in a police, constructive dialogue about the differences in our opinion, but if he wants to ignore all of that in favor of his own closed-minded opinions, then we can be at war, and I have a nuclear weapon, he’s got mortar rounds.
You cleverly covered your bases and if your FIL still acts like a jerk, you have demonstrated that you are willing to take the high road and that he is not, therefore, you can tell him to go pound sand if he persists.
The reason behind your problems with family about politics is one reason my father told me to never discuss politics with others. You can lose a lot of good friends discussing politics or religion...To this day the only way I know Dad was a republican was he couldn’t stand Eleanor Roosevelt and she had a husband that couldn’t shut her up publically. It can cause brother to not talk to brother or sister for decades and isn’t worth voicing your opinion, especially is you know theirs....just let it rest....Hope things get better all around for you and the total family...
It takes a big man to admit the error of a previous decision. I think your letter was cogent and on point. If you father-in-law is intractable i think that says more about him than anyone else. I have found in my own life that I cannot talk politics with liberals precisely because they go nuts and start screaming and then out and out hate me because they don’t know how to disagree without being disagreeable. Mores the shame.
I hope this doesn’t fracture your family but you never know with liberals
FREEEEEDOM!!!!!
I like your version :-)
Or be perceptive enough to test the waters before you jump in. It doesn't take much to listen carefully and figure out what someones world view is, unless they just refuse to talk,.
I have met Republicans who believe whatever the GOP (and Rush) is saying, which turns me off too.
I have met Democrats who are so unreasonable they fly off into a tizzy and start yelling when you challenge their beliefs.
One lib Democrat told me he is highly offended when I say that O is a Marxist (having some fun ) because he is Jewish. He sees Jews as Obama/Marxist??
I know a Democrat at work and we put a side our ideological difference to discuss the current issues and debates as a chess game, meaning who will win on each political confrontation and how and why and what they are doing right and wrong in the fight. And we dont say dumb stuff like "My side will win because it is right"
Other Dems I met are like many here, they talk like everyone will agree with them on each election day, even in 2010.
Occasionally I meet a thoughtful Republican who current on the issues we discuss here and he doesn't live in "We are always winning, the GOP is great" LA-LA land.
But Republicans will never beat Dems unless they understand Dems arguments (which are the weapons in this fight) and the voters that they will need to win over, to beat the Dems. "Everyone agrees with me" is a plan for disaster,
Imagine the tension at their family get-togethers over the next decade. ... oh, yeah ...
Any American supporting Obama is no less stupid.
“Now, on gay marriage, I happen to agree with the Democratic position. I support the right of gay people to get married if they want to,...”
This is but ONE of the many quotes I COULD have posted, but why bother? Dude, you are certainly no conservative. At absolute best, you are a left-leaning rino with a gift for psuedo-intellectualism disguised as wisdom.
You used a whole lot of words why? To impress a man with a PhD who you say ‘disowned’ you? In this country, slavery is abolished and illegal. So how can you DIS own what you cannot legally own?
Nitpicky? Possibly. But I read this entire treatise and there is just no way anyone who thinks like you say you do is anywhere close to being a conservative.
All you have done is not voted for a straight up criminal. That doesn’t make you a saint in my religion, nor does it legitimize illegitimate conservative creds.
Ping to 94
ping!!!
The libs now have a crusade over a guy marrying a guy??? This is how most young people think? Then I am in some kind of hell, purgatory or Twilight Zone.
How about saying instead: “it’s a free country, F you, you intolerant jerk”.
Not if you are unimpressed with psychobabble, which is what this whole ‘email’ thing is. THEY are the ones in the Twilight Zone.
So, bluewall person, do you also believe that gays should serve openly in what’s left of our military?
Were you prolife before your own child was born?
From what I read in your email, it looks to me as if you were trying to convince a hopeless academic of your own liberal creds with a couple of conservative glitches thrown in.
“But most importantly, for the purpose of this conversation, I am driven in my life by a sense of responsibility and purpose to better the world, especially for the poor and disadvantaged, and particularly those of African descent.”
So you are a supporter of ‘social justice’?
Would you vote for hillary if she ran? Inquiring minds want to know.
“Particularly those of African descent”???
Just another black racialist DU-member/Obamavoter trolling Free Republic?
They’re like toadstools these days.
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