Obama’s “I” Talk To School Kids

I haven’t said anything about Obama’s controversial talk to school kids today because of a bad case of one-the-one-hand-on-the-other-handism — on the one hand, I’ve been less bothered by it than most of those who are bothered, but on the other I was more bothered by his invitation to the students to write letters describing how they could help him — him! — in his mighty tasks (an invitation subsequently withdrawn) than were those people who were not bothered.

But the president’s disappointing failure to follow Mickey Kaus’s sage advice put an end to my handy silence. Yesterday Mickey quoted a paragraph from what was then a draft of the upcoming speech on which he gagged, with the gag-inducing phrases in bold:

Your families, your teachers, and I are doing everything we can to make sure you have the education you need to answer these questions. I’m working hard to fix up your classrooms and get you the books, equipment and computers you need to learn. But you’ve got to do your part too. So I expect you to get serious this year. I expect you to put your best effort into everything you do. I expect great things from each of you. So don’t let us down – don’t let your family or your country or yourself down. Make us all proud. I know you can do it. [Gag-phrases boldfaced.]

He then commented, explaining why he gagged:

Those are all the people who are trying to help — families, teachers, and Barack Hussein Obama? He’s “working hard to fix up” classrooms? I hope not! He has two wars and a health care bill to worry about, and a whole lot of other politicians and bureaucrats whose job it is to refurbish up school facilities. Is he Superman? Obama’s willingness to cut out all the other players does suggest an unnattractive solipsism and egotism at best and … a troublesome cult-building instinct well, let’s just leave it at that.

Here’s the thing. It’s not too late to fix this graf! Obama hasn’t actually delivered the speech yet. A little last-minute pencil editing and his critics won’t have a whole lot to work with. Start by replacing every use of the word “I”

Well, now it’s too late. The speech has been delivered, and the offending paragraph appeared in it, word for word. And if I’d been smart enough to write what Mickey Kaus wrote I would have bolded an additional, offensive passage of that paragraph (two paragraphs, but the same text, in the version I quoted) with which the president concluded:

…. So I expect you to get serious this year. I expect you to put your best effort into everything you do.

I expect great things from each of you. So don’t let us down — don’t let your family or your country or yourself down. Make us all proud. I know you can do it.

When Obama says “don’t let us down — don’t let your family or your country or yourself down,” he seems to be identifying “the country” with himself. “L’etat, c’est moi!” Haven’t we heard that somewhere before?

On the other hand, Obama couldn’t possibly have followed Mickey’s advice to replace “every use of the word ‘I.’” If he had, as you can easily see from the passage quoted above, the printed version would have looked like swiss cheese, i.e., like all those documents the government used to release under FOIA with the juicy parts “redacted,” leaving gaps of white space. In the speech’s 43 short paragraphs the word “I” occurs, by my (and my word processor’s) count, 68 times. (Well, 69, but one time the president was quoting Michael Jordan.)

This may have ostensibly been a speech to students, but, like all Obama’s speeches, it was really a speech about the one transcendent subject Obama cares about above all others: I, Obama.