Keep Your Kids Home From School! This is OUTRAGEOUS!

President Obama has clearly crossed a line. I mean, who exactly does he think he is to be encouraging today's youngsters to stay in school, attend class, do their homework, be engaged in the classroom, and do their best? What kind of leadership is that?

As a public service to you and so you can keep your precious children home and avoid having their delicate ears hear these blasphemous words, Little Merry Sunshine is providing the full text of President Obama's brainwashing socialist speech. Now, this comes straight from WhiteHouse.gov and we all know just how reliable that is.

That's right, I'm drinking the Kool-Aid* so you don't have to.

Prepared Remarks of President Barack Obama
Back to School Event

Arlington, Virginia
September 8, 2009

The President: Hello everyone – how’s everybody doing today? I’m here with students at Wakefield High School in Arlington, Virginia. And we’ve got students tuning in from all across America, kindergarten through twelfth grade. I’m glad you all could join us today.

I know that for many of you, today is the first day of school. And for those of you in kindergarten, or starting middle or high school, it’s your first day in a new school, so it’s understandable if you’re a little nervous. I imagine there are some seniors out there who are feeling pretty good right now, with just one more year to go. And no matter what grade you’re in, some of you are probably wishing it were still summer, and you could’ve stayed in bed just a little longer this morning.

I know that feeling. When I was young, my family lived in Indonesia for a few years, and my mother didn’t have the money to send me where all the American kids went to school. So she decided to teach me extra lessons herself, Monday through Friday – at 4:30 in the morning.

Now I wasn’t too happy about getting up that early. A lot of times, I’d fall asleep right there at the kitchen table. But whenever I’d complain, my mother would just give me one of those looks and say, "This is no picnic for me either, buster."

So I know some of you are still adjusting to being back at school. But I’m here today because I have something important to discuss with you. I’m here because I want to talk with you about your education and what’s expected of all of you in this new school year.

Now I’ve given a lot of speeches about education. And I’ve talked a lot about responsibility.

I’ve talked about your teachers’ responsibility for inspiring you, and pushing you to learn.

I’ve talked about your parents’ responsibility for making sure you stay on track, and get your homework done, and don’t spend every waking hour in front of the TV or with that Xbox.

I’ve talked a lot about your government’s responsibility for setting high standards, supporting teachers and principals, and turning around schools that aren’t working where students aren’t getting the opportunities they deserve.

But at the end of the day, we can have the most dedicated teachers, the most supportive parents, and the best schools in the world – and none of it will matter unless all of you fulfill your responsibilities. Unless you show up to those schools; pay attention to those teachers; listen to your parents, grandparents and other adults; and put in the hard work it takes to succeed.

And that’s what I want to focus on today: the responsibility each of you has for your education. I want to start with the responsibility you have to yourself.

Every single one of you has something you’re good at. Every single one of you has something to offer. And you have a responsibility to yourself to discover what that is. That’s the opportunity an education can provide.

Maybe you could be a good writer – maybe even good enough to write a book or articles in a newspaper – but you might not know it until you write a paper for your English class. Maybe you could be an innovator or an inventor – maybe even good enough to come up with the next iPhone or a new medicine or vaccine – but you might not know it until you do a project for your science class. Maybe you could be a mayor or a Senator or a Supreme Court Justice, but you might not know that until you join student government or the debate team.

And no matter what you want to do with your life – I guarantee that you’ll need an education to do it. You want to be a doctor, or a teacher, or a police officer? You want to be a nurse or an architect, a lawyer or a member of our military? You’re going to need a good education for every single one of those careers. You can’t drop out of school and just drop into a good job. You’ve got to work for it and train for it and learn for it.

And this isn’t just important for your own life and your own future. What you make of your education will decide nothing less than the future of this country. What you’re learning in school today will determine whether we as a nation can meet our greatest challenges in the future.

You’ll need the knowledge and problem-solving skills you learn in science and math to cure diseases like cancer and AIDS, and to develop new energy technologies and protect our environment. You’ll need the insights and critical thinking skills you gain in history and social studies to fight poverty and homelessness, crime and discrimination, and make our nation more fair and more free. You’ll need the creativity and ingenuity you develop in all your classes to build new companies that will create new jobs and boost our economy.

We need every single one of you to develop your talents, skills and intellect so you can help solve our most difficult problems. If you don’t do that – if you quit on school – you’re not just quitting on yourself, you’re quitting on your country.

Now I know it’s not always easy to do well in school. I know a lot of you have challenges in your lives right now that can make it hard to focus on your schoolwork.

I get it. I know what that’s like. My father left my family when I was two years old, and I was raised by a single mother who struggled at times to pay the bills and wasn’t always able to give us things the other kids had. There were times when I missed having a father in my life. There were times when I was lonely and felt like I didn’t fit in.

So I wasn’t always as focused as I should have been. I did some things I’m not proud of, and got in more trouble than I should have. And my life could have easily taken a turn for the worse.

But I was fortunate. I got a lot of second chances and had the opportunity to go to college, and law school, and follow my dreams. My wife, our First Lady Michelle Obama, has a similar story. Neither of her parents had gone to college, and they didn’t have much. But they worked hard, and she worked hard, so that she could go to the best schools in this country.

Some of you might not have those advantages. Maybe you don’t have adults in your life who give you the support that you need. Maybe someone in your family has lost their job, and there’s not enough money to go around. Maybe you live in a neighborhood where you don’t feel safe, or have friends who are pressuring you to do things you know aren’t right.

But at the end of the day, the circumstances of your life – what you look like, where you come from, how much money you have, what you’ve got going on at home – that’s no excuse for neglecting your homework or having a bad attitude. That’s no excuse for talking back to your teacher, or cutting class, or dropping out of school. That’s no excuse for not trying.

Where you are right now doesn’t have to determine where you’ll end up. No one’s written your destiny for you. Here in America, you write your own destiny. You make your own future.

That’s what young people like you are doing every day, all across America.

Young people like Jazmin Perez, from Roma, Texas. Jazmin didn’t speak English when she first started school. Hardly anyone in her hometown went to college, and neither of her parents had gone either. But she worked hard, earned good grades, got a scholarship to Brown University, and is now in graduate school, studying public health, on her way to being Dr. Jazmin Perez.

I’m thinking about Andoni Schultz, from Los Altos, California, who’s fought brain cancer since he was three. He’s endured all sorts of treatments and surgeries, one of which affected his memory, so it took him much longer – hundreds of extra hours – to do his schoolwork. But he never fell behind, and he’s headed to college this fall.

And then there’s Shantell Steve, from my hometown of Chicago, Illinois. Even when bouncing from foster home to foster home in the toughest neighborhoods, she managed to get a job at a local health center; start a program to keep young people out of gangs; and she’s on track to graduate high school with honors and go on to college.

Jazmin, Andoni and Shantell aren’t any different from any of you. They faced challenges in their lives just like you do. But they refused to give up. They chose to take responsibility for their education and set goals for themselves. And I expect all of you to do the same.

That’s why today, I’m calling on each of you to set your own goals for your education – and to do everything you can to meet them. Your goal can be something as simple as doing all your homework, paying attention in class, or spending time each day reading a book. Maybe you’ll decide to get involved in an extracurricular activity, or volunteer in your community. Maybe you’ll decide to stand up for kids who are being teased or bullied because of who they are or how they look, because you believe, like I do, that all kids deserve a safe environment to study and learn. Maybe you’ll decide to take better care of yourself so you can be more ready to learn. And along those lines, I hope you’ll all wash your hands a lot, and stay home from school when you don’t feel well, so we can keep people from getting the flu this fall and winter.

Whatever you resolve to do, I want you to commit to it. I want you to really work at it.

I know that sometimes, you get the sense from TV that you can be rich and successful without any hard work -- that your ticket to success is through rapping or basketball or being a reality TV star, when chances are, you’re not going to be any of those things.

But the truth is, being successful is hard. You won’t love every subject you study. You won’t click with every teacher. Not every homework assignment will seem completely relevant to your life right this minute. And you won’t necessarily succeed at everything the first time you try.

That’s OK. Some of the most successful people in the world are the ones who’ve had the most failures. JK Rowling’s first Harry Potter book was rejected twelve times before it was finally published. Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team, and he lost hundreds of games and missed thousands of shots during his career. But he once said, "I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed."

These people succeeded because they understand that you can’t let your failures define you – you have to let them teach you. You have to let them show you what to do differently next time. If you get in trouble, that doesn’t mean you’re a troublemaker, it means you need to try harder to behave. If you get a bad grade, that doesn’t mean you’re stupid, it just means you need to spend more time studying.

No one’s born being good at things, you become good at things through hard work. You’re not a varsity athlete the first time you play a new sport. You don’t hit every note the first time you sing a song. You’ve got to practice. It’s the same with your schoolwork. You might have to do a math problem a few times before you get it right, or read something a few times before you understand it, or do a few drafts of a paper before it’s good enough to hand in.

Don’t be afraid to ask questions. Don’t be afraid to ask for help when you need it. I do that every day. Asking for help isn’t a sign of weakness, it’s a sign of strength. It shows you have the courage to admit when you don’t know something, and to learn something new. So find an adult you trust – a parent, grandparent or teacher; a coach or counselor – and ask them to help you stay on track to meet your goals.

And even when you’re struggling, even when you’re discouraged, and you feel like other people have given up on you – don’t ever give up on yourself. Because when you give up on yourself, you give up on your country.

The story of America isn’t about people who quit when things got tough. It’s about people who kept going, who tried harder, who loved their country too much to do anything less than their best.

It’s the story of students who sat where you sit 250 years ago, and went on to wage a revolution and found this nation. Students who sat where you sit 75 years ago who overcame a Depression and won a world war; who fought for civil rights and put a man on the moon. Students who sat where you sit 20 years ago who founded Google, Twitter and Facebook and changed the way we communicate with each other.

So today, I want to ask you, what’s your contribution going to be? What problems are you going to solve? What discoveries will you make? What will a president who comes here in twenty or fifty or one hundred years say about what all of you did for this country?

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.

Thank you, God bless you, and God bless America.

*If you read the Kool-Aid comment and don't get it, then THAT's why you need to listen to President Obama and stay in school or call up your high school history teacher and tell him or her that they failed you. Then Google it. Seriously people, this faux controversy is just stupid. Our kids need good role models and we finally have a President we can be proud of and our children can respect.

I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream For . . . WAIT! Did That Woman Steal My Ice Cream Money?!

On tonight's news there was a story about two 12-year old girls from the affluent suburb of Deerfield who allegedly had their ice cream money stolen at Baskin Robbins by a mom of three.

It seems that these two 12-year olds set a $20 bill on the counter at Baskin Robbins, while the woman in front of them was still in the process of her own transaction. They then walked away to look at the different flavors of ice cream. The woman finished her transaction, turned to walk away, then realized she forgot her purchase, turned back around, picked up her ice cream and the $20 sitting on the counter and proceeded to sit down with her kids in the store. A little while later, the 12-year olds realized their money had been stolen and called the police. According to Baskin Robbins, the mom is a regular customer in the store.

Why didn't the kids ask the woman, who was still in the store, if she picked up their money by mistake? Or if they were too scared to do it, why not have the manager of the Baskin Robbins do it?

The kids called the police. The police are now investigating. This happened 13 days ago. The police are STILL investigating and it made the ABC7 news today, almost 2 weeks later. The parents of one of the "victims" says they want to prosecute the mom who stole their kids' money. The police are investigating and giving interviews to the media about this.

This is the biggest waste of taxpayer dollars I think I've ever seen and now I want to move to Deerfield. They clearly do not have any problems there with vandalism, gangs, drugs, actual theft, homelessness, etc.

I've seen the video and you will too in a moment. In my opinion, this mom probably didn't realize the money wasn't hers. She was probably distracted since, ya know, she almost walked off without her purchase. According to the Sun-Times, the kids called one of their mothers crying that their money was gone. My question: Did the mom advise calling the cops? If these 12-year old girls were my kids and they called or came home upset about someone stealing their ice cream money, I'd look at them and tell them that was too bad and they've just learned an important life lesson: Do not leave money sitting on the counter and walk away. I would tell them that they should not take out their money until they are about to pay for their purchase. I would tell them I was sorry they'd lost $20, but that was too bad and they would never make that mistake again. Furthermore, I would say that if the $20 was stolen on purpose then the person who took the money must have needed it far more than my kids did. If, on the other hand, I saw the video, I would conclude that it was an honest mistake and encourage my kids to learn from it. What I would not do is call the police and I most certainly would not ever say that I wanted the person who took $20 prosecuted.

I have to believe that it is costing Deerfield taxpayers far more than $20 for their police department to investigate this and for their deputy chief to spend his time doing media interviews. Don't they have any other problems in this town?

How do you feel about this? Would you want your local police to investigate this "crime"?

Stupid Criminal of the Day

I wish I could make this stuff up, but I can't. My favorite line is "The girlfriend said she knew nothing about the drugs or money." Sure because she was immune to the smell of pot. Well, either that or she ratted him out.

Arlington Heights break-in report ends in drug arrest
by Barbara Vitello in the Daily Herald, January 13, 2009

Police arrived at an Arlington Heights residence in the 600 block of Happfield Drive Friday preparing to investigate a home invasion.

They left with 350 grams of suspected cocaine, 827 grams of suspected cannabis and a total of $100,000 in cash, accompanied by a resident, 28-year-old Johnny Beltran, who they charged with possession with intent to deliver. Police have not charged anyone with the home invasion.

The defendant's girlfriend called police to report the crime, said assistant state's attorney Kristin Piper. Upon their arrival, the officers smelled pot and obtained a consent to search the residence, she said, and discovered the drugs and $70,000 in cash.

Officers found an additional $30,000 in cash in the defendant's car. The girlfriend said she knew nothing about the drugs or money, said Piper.

A Cook County judge set bail at $750,000 at Beltran's bond hearing Monday in a Rolling Meadows courtroom. However, because he has another case pending at Chicago's Criminal Courts Building, Beltran will be held without bond. If convicted of the Class X felony, he faces nine to 40 years in prison.

At Least the Racists are Outing Themselves

From today's Chicago Tribune online:

Boo! Who? Supporting Obama? No treats for you

Associated Press
11:44 AM CDT, November 1, 2008

GROSSE POINTE FARMS, Mich. - A Grosse Pointe Farms woman has doled out political tricks by refusing Halloween treats to children whose parents support Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.

Shirley Nagel passed out candy Friday -- but only to those who shared her support for Republican presidential candidate John McCain and running mate Sarah Palin.

Fox 2 News says a sign posted outside Nagel's house, about 12 miles west of Detroit, served notice to all trick-or-treaters. It read: "No handouts for Obama supporters, liars, tricksters or kids of supporters."

Nagel tells WJBK-TV that "Obama's scary." When asked about children who'd been turned away empty-handed and crying, she said: "Oh well. Everybody has a choice."

Fax and phone messages were left Saturday at numbers listed in Nagel's name.

Thanks to Dr. Monkey, here's the video!