The day has arrived. Later today, the President of the United States is planning to address students across the nation today. Chances are we would have paid little to no attention to this address if not for the controversy that has been swirling around. You’d think that the President was trying to create an army of teenagers hell-bent on the destruction of society as we know it. We all know that would come in the form of a video game and not a presidential address. Still, there are those who are truly and deeply disturbed by the thought of this speech, or maybe they’re just disturbed, period. Over the weekend I saw a news teaser with a woman in tears because here children might have to listen to the President. Tears, I swear it.

Once again, many of our elected officials as well as those not-elected have turned this benign speech into an us vs. them issue, conservatives vs. liberals, Democrats vs. Republicans. It’s disgusting!

If I had the opportunity to speak the politicians and the various pundits who’ve weighed in on this issue I’d have one question, “Really?” I mean, come on, it’s a speech that tells kids to stay in school and apply themselves. OMG! Can you imagine what might happen if they actually paid attention. Why, we might wind up with children across the nation who could speak proper English, who could add and subtract well enough to balance a checkbook or even (and this is a stretch) pull their pants up over their derrieres.

The White House, in an attempt to calm the nerves of frantic parents, has released the President’s prepared remarks.  I’ve read them and so should you. It’s scandalous!

“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.”

Seriously, who in their right mind (no pun intended) can argue with that?

In all fairness, we need to recognize that President Obama isn’t the first President to address the nation’s students.  Ronald Reagan did it in 1988 and George H. W. Bush did it in 1991. Guess what? In 1991 people were all up in arms over George Bush’s remarks to students. Thanks to the George Bush Presidential Library & Museum we can read the President’s 1991 remarks. Then too, the message was to stay in school, work hard, say no to drugs, etc., etc., etc.

Let’s be honest, this is much ado about nothing. It’s smoke and mirrors, another distraction. With the jobless rate at 9.7% (and rising), the banks, the automakers, the economy in general, fuel costs, healthcare and let’s not forget two, count ‘em, two wars, should we really give a ‘ats rass’ about this speech?

As a nation, don’t we all have bigger fish to fry?

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