Right Message, Heritage Festival & Bad Behavior

THUMBS UP TO:

Reasoned conservatives, right message

Newt Gingrich, Lamar Alexander, Bill Frist and Laura Bush: Those are some of the conservatives who delivered the correct message this week regarding President Barack Obama’s speech to students on Tuesday.

The president addressed students at Wakefield High School in Alexandria, Va., and the speech was televised nationally to participating schools. And a big thumbs up to Bristol, Va., Public Schools, which showed the televised address to approximately 99 percent of its students.

Of course, the problem was that some school districts – particularly in areas where Obama was not popular in last fall’s election – opted not to carry his speech. The claim was that the president was trying to “indoctrinate” students or deliver his “socialist message.” The huffing and puffing was downright comical. The truth was he gave an excellent speech about self-reliance, responsibility and working hard to earn good grades and reach goals.

The White House chose Wakefield in part because its student body is ethnically and economically diverse; three quarters of the students are minorities and almost half are eligible for reduced or free lunches. Obama has made personal responsibility a theme of his presidency, and has frequently addressed that message to minority communities.

Obama also spoke of how his father left when he was two. And he talked of his mother awakening him at 4:30 a.m. to study when the family lived in Indonesia.

“There were times when I missed having a father in my life,” he said. “There were times when I was lonely and felt like I didn’t fit in.”
But, he said, that was no excuse for not working hard. “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 – none of that is an excuse for neglecting your homework or having a bad attitude,” the president said. “That’s no excuse for talking back to your teacher, or cutting class, or dropping out of school. There is no excuse for not trying.”

We give a big thumbs up to Gingrich, the former speaker of the House of Representatives, who is considered a possible Republican candidate for president in 2012. “It’s a good speech,” Gingrich on Monday. “I recommend it to everybody if you have any doubts. I would love to have every child in America read it, think about it, and learn that they should stay in school and they should study.”
We agree. Obama gave a simple message that resonates with anyone willing to listen.

Heritage festival to keep traditions alive

Don’t miss the Heritage Festival today at the State Street Farmer’s Market in Bristol, Tenn., from 7:30-11 a.m. The event is part of the regular farmer market held each Saturday, but will include demonstrations of quilt-making and an apple butter stir.
Come learn more about our regional heritage, and take home some fresh vegetables in the process. For more information, call (423) 764-1879 or e-mail .

THUMBS DOWN TO:

Trying to use a dog to commit a break-in

This story seems to have the key elements of a country song – drinking and fighting over a woman – but how did a dog get mixed up in all of this?

Two men were arrested by Bristol, Va., police Sept. 1 after police said they tried to break into another man’s house and sic a pit pull dog on him. The two men allegedly believed the man had threatened a woman and were going to his house, after midnight, to have the dog attack him. Thankfully the dog didn’t bite the man, even after being shoved inside the doorway, according to reports. The men fled when they heard police sirens.

Roy Edward Vance, Jr., 44, was arrested about 150 yards behind the house and Christopher Heflin, 29, turned himself in several hours later, around 4 a.m. The incident is part of an ongoing fight over a woman, who told police the man had threatened to burn her home with her children inside. But on Sept. 1 he was at his Old Abingdon Highway home when two men allegedly showed up and tried to sic a dog on him. And he reportedly responded by answering the door with a baseball bat. Makes you want to move into that neighborhood, doesn’t it?

We feel sorry for the dog, Blaze, a 13-month-old pit bull. He broke the stereotype of his breed by refusing to attack. Maybe the others involved in this escapade last week could take a lesson from the dog.