I Believe I Remain Unconvinced: McCain's Dirty Little "C-Words"

Needless to say, I went Republican when seeking out examples of repetition in campaign rhetoric. I listened to and read several of John McCain’s speeches on education, where two words stand out: choice and competition.

The “c-words,” as one of the conservative sites affectionately refers to them, are strategically (and not sparingly) sprinkled throughout any of McCain’s (self-proclaimed) “sweeping” dialogues about education. As I’d mentioned in an earlier blog, McCain uses smokescreen techniques—like generalizations, vague language, and repetition—to distract his audience from the fact that he’s thought little about the issue of education as it’s not one of his priorities.

Repetition is certainly effective filler in an otherwise empty conversation. One of McCain’s most repetitive—and least informative—speeches is one that I will call, “I Believe,” as McCain begins every statement in this three minute speech with those very words. This use of anaphora seems to be linked to McCain’s hope that the American electorate will make the subconscious connection that he believes in America, he believes in education—and not make the rational connection that the goal of his rhetorical strategy is to deflect attention away from his lack of any concrete information.

So, it’s I believe, I believe, I believe…then, McCain simply inserts and repeats his buzzwords: choice, competition, and reward. These buzzwords have become synonymous for McCain’s “stance” (if you can justify calling it that) on education. Surely these words are products of the Republican “think tank”—they’ve been proven to be almost unanimously acceptable; after all, what red-blooded ‘Merican dislikes choice and a little healthy competition? McCain believes that more choice, and therefore “more competition in education can only lead to higher quality, lower costs.”

Does this not smack of the corporate world? It seems that McCain has taken a page from the Bush playbook: to run this country like a CEO runs a company. Confirming my suspicions, McCain comes right out and admits that his goal for education is to keep up with “global competition”—to continue to maintain our lead on the world in IT innovations, to continue to supplement the workforce. Aha! There’s McCain’s real stance. There’s where his bread is buttered. There’s where—just kidding.

The bottom line: I do not believe McCain. Do you?

“It Takes a Village:” Hillary Clinton on Revising No Child Left Behind and Promoting

In her speech, “PARENTS AND CHILDREN: Expanding Pre-K,” given on May 21, 2007, to a crowd of educators, parents, and school children in North Beach, Miami, Hillary Clinton quoted the Head of the Children Defense Fund, Marian Wright Edelman, who once said "if we don't stand for children, we don't stand for much." Talk about preaching to the choir; I’m sure that everyone in the crowd got choked up and the climactic scene from Jerry McGuire began playing in their heads: “You had me from hello. (Sobbing.) You had me from hello.”

Throughout the speech, she continued to posture herself right into alignment with the crowd, saying, “Some people, when I talk about the need to really help prepare children, they sort of say, well that's a nice thing to be for, but kind of soft, I mean it's not really that important, is it? But we know that it is.” Darn straight teachers and kids think that preparing children is important. But she pressed on, laying it on thick!

She began to talk directly with the crowd, saying, “This is a gift, my beautiful, beautiful necklace from two of the pre-k students, Sofia and Savannah and it matches my jacket so I had to wear it and it has my initials, so I'm feeling very dressed up today.” And who do you think little Sofia’s and little Savannah’s parents are going to vote for? That’s right—the lady wearing the potato necklace that their darling daughters made! You go, Hillary.

Forging on, with a strong appeal to ethos, Hillary reads from her resume: “For thirty-five years as a lawyer and an advocate, as a friend lady and a Senator and most importantly as a Mom, I have been strongly in support of providing the tools to parents that would give parents an opportunity to recognize that they are their child's first teachers and that the family is their child's first school; because we have to have a strong partnership between our families and our schools and our society on behalf of our children. I've seen what happens when caring adults come together and make a commitment to insure that each child has a chance to fulfill his or her god-given potential.” In one fell swoop, Hillary establishes her credibility, making sure that we remember that she’s a lawyer, a politician, a Christian, a mother—and that, in her role as a parent, she’s equal with the other “caring adults” in the group.

She cements her role as a compatriot with her audience by doing some parent-talk: “We all know about the 'terrible twos' and we know about the sometimes rebellious fours.” Yes, we do! At this point, we are sure that we are having a real conversation with Hillary, parent to parent. And now that she’s created this happy emotional climate of comraderie and conversation, she gets to the meat of her speech: that No Child Left Behind requires serious revision and that Universal Pre-K needs to be instituted. She expresses her main points in a very conversational tone (so as to not break the pathos that she’s worked so hard to create): “There's a lot of things we need to do to reform and change No Child Left Behind, which is an unfunded mandate on our school.” And later: “The cost of childcare, even if the childcare is frankly not that good, is pretty high these days, isn't it? And think about the savings that families could have if pre-kindergarten was accessible as public kindergarten is.”

So, parent to parent, Hillary’s explaining her stance on public education in a way that few could argue with—especially in a crowd of educators, parents, and students. I love what she says here (note how it relates to my first blog): “We can talk all we want about how public schools are great equalizers and engines of our meritocracy in America,” but as long as we continue down the path we’re going, it’s complete crap. (Loose translation--she didn’t say crap.)

Now, clearly, Hillary’s on a role. She really wants to make certain that she highlights her special interest in Pre-K and Head Start. She breaks out the big guns with a small story (a la her husband, Bill Clinton): “My daughter didn't need it. We sent her to pre-school. We had her in pre-school program because we knew it would be good for her, to have the interaction with other children, to be with other adults besides her father and me. And we had some great experiences from that. We also ran into some challenges. There is a period of time when my daughter would only eat green grapes and Jelly sandwiches. And she took a bunch of green grapes and Jelly sandwiches to pre-school every day to eat during her break. And the state was monitoring the pre-school program and they had a supervisor from the state seeing how the children were treated and at the end of the week, the supervisor said to the head teacher 'I think the program is very good but there is this one child who is really going to be poorly served. She may end up being mal-nourished because everyday she brings the same thing for lunch.' So the head teacher said, well yeah I know, that is the Governor's daughter [laughter] and that is what she is eating this week. Obviously, I thought it was worth doing it for my own child, and I think it is worth doing it for every child.” How democratic is that? The Governor’s daughter goes to the same public pre-school as (theoretically) the garbage collector’s son. Hillary also introduces a lot of “it takes a village” imagery with this small story: Little Chelsea was nurtured by her parents (who cared enough to send her to pre-school), by her teachers, and even by the state supervisor. Everyone comes together to make sure that every child has the best start.

Now that everyone’s completely blissed out, Hillary closes with this statement: “If we think about our responsibility for all our children, we will start making investments that will not only help our children but I believe really help us.” Really smart move: she uses the buzz words responsibility and investments, and she continues to use we and our. Hillary used a lot of strong rhetorical strategies to promote herself and her cause to this audience. She used her role as a mother to create an intimacy that enhanced the pathos of the speech. She reused her role as a mother (in combination with her impressive professional resume) to create ethos. And she used all of these strategies simultaneously to create a logical argument that is punctuated with a really strong short story.

McCain: Generally Unconvincing

According to one of his spokespeople, “Senator McCain generally supports No Child Left Behind.” Generally supports?! Okay, whatever. So, McCain supports (generally) No Child Left Behind (NCLB)—but his spokespeople have also been quoted as saying McCain knows we can save public education if we “have the courage to do more than placate the defenders of the status quo.” Other comments from the McCain camp are equally vague—and often contradictory—and lead to my belief that, generally, McCain cares more about losing the support of the Republican base than he does about overhauling the crises that face American schools as a result of NCLB.

Another wavering example: McCain has commented, “We [and I’m assuming that he’s referring to the federal government] must continue to set standards and hold schools accountable for their performance…We should never shrink from the truth or seek to soften accountability where schools are failing in their most basic responsibility…they have failed students, parents and communities.” McCain has also commented, “I do not favor nationally imposed standards or federal funding strings. State and local education agencies should be responsible for developing & enforcing high academic standards. I don’t believe we should penalize students by taking away limited education dollars according to federal dictates.”

So, clearly, McCain has got no clear stance on education—and, honestly, since education is not a key issue for Republican candidates, it seems as though no one really expects him to. In order to placate the small percentage of the voting population which has a strong interest in education and educational reform, he’s got a couple of vague responses that he figures will suit either crowd; these comments abound with loaded words like standards, truth, accountability, failure, and responsibility. McCain hopes/supposes that his audience will be so taken with these words that they will not really take notice to the fact that he never makes a definitive statement.

This language provides an effective smokescreen—deferring listeners away from the hard facts, distracting them with idealistic, dramatic, patriotic language. The words chosen by McCain misdirect the listener, away from the subject at hand—the failures of No Child Left Behind—and refocus on the general notion of accountability; and, while it sounds nice and idealistic, accountability can be translated, in reference to NCLB, to blame-shifting.

For an observant listener to McCain’s comments on education, the reasons for worry are many, and the scariest one may be: Why has McCain busted out the smokescreen? Is he keeping his real agenda hidden until he officially gets the Republican nomination? Because this would be far preferable to the unsettling thoughts that it’s hidden because a) McCain actually thinks that No Child Left Behind is a good start or b) that he has no ideas for, interest in, or plans about improving the educational system. I find McCain’s use of smokescreen unbecoming and, generally, unconvincing.

American Children--and American Principles--Left Behind

America is the land of opportunity. (Equal opportunity.) It’s a country where anyone—regardless of race, gender, or class—who is willing to work hard enough can achieve his or her dreams: In America, the daughter of a New York City hotdog vendor has the opportunity to become the President of the United States.

It is the fundamental American belief that all men are created equal that underlies this principle of equal opportunity. That persistence, diligence, and good old-fashioned hard work can earn anyone unlimited success and social mobility—this is one of the American ideals that lured immigrants from all over the world to the teeming shores of America. Formed initially to teach English to the children of these immigrants (our forbearers), public schools are responsible for taking American children—however diverse—and preparing them for life as dutiful citizens. Public schools have always been a great equalizer in our melting pot of a country.

Recognizing the fact that public schools are the cornerstone of the American principle of equal opportunity, it becomes clear that any infringement upon (or shirking of responsibilities toward) public schools is a direct infringement upon American principles. Upholding the principles upon which this country was founded is a primary responsibility of the federal government.

Hiding a number of sins behind a carefully-framed, benevolent-sounding name, The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, which President Bush signed into law January 8, 2002, is an affront to the federal government’s responsibility toward public schools. Discriminating against schools is no different than discriminating against people; punishing a failing school is no different, and no more effective, than punishing a failing student; refusing to fund struggling schools is, in essence, refusing students their fundamental right as American citizens to equal opportunity.

In order for all American men and women to continue to be equals—and to continue to have equal opportunities to their right to pursue their own particular versions of happiness—it is essential that America’s public schools be equally attended to by a responsible federal government that’s dedicated to preserving the principles upon which this country was founded.

In the wake of the federal disregard for public education labeled No Child Left Behind, America’s public schools are no longer able to function as this country‘s founders had intended—they are no longer providing equal opportunities to American children. So, how do each of the presidential candidates plan to strengthen neglected public schools (in order that American children and American principles do not continue to be left behind)?