Let’s raise our spirits by watching dad and decent man President Barack Obama address the high school graduating class of 2020 with his usual grace and wisdom:
President Obama hits all the right notes to seniors, offering fatherly assurances that they and their country will be all right while reminding them that righting the country will require their work. President Obama also works in an appropriate critique of the failures of the current political and economic system:
If you’d planned on going away for college, getting dropped off at campus in the fall — that’s no longer a given. If you were planning to work while going to school, finding that first job is going to be tougher. Even families that are relatively well-off are dealing with massive uncertainty. Those who were struggling before — they’re hanging on by a thread.
All of which means that you’re going to have to grow up faster than some generations. This pandemic has shaken up the status quo and laid bare a lot of our country’s deep-seated problems — from massive economic inequality to ongoing racial disparities to a lack of basic health care for people who need it. It’s woken a lot of young people to the fact that the old ways of doing things just don’t work; that it doesn’t matter how much money you make if everyone around you is hungry and sick; and that our society and our democracy only work when we think not just about ourselves, but about each other.
It’s also pulled the curtain back on another hard truth, something that we all have to eventually accept once our childhood comes to an end. And all those adults that you used to think were in charge and knew what they were doing? Turns out that they don’t have all the answers. A lot of them aren’t even asking the right questions. So, if the world’s going to get better, it going to be up to you [President Barack Obama, address to graduating high school seniors, as transcribed by CNN, 2020.05.17].
President Obama calls on our new adults to serve their community fearlessly, with confidence in America’s resilience and in their ability to live by moral values stronger than the selfish impulses they see modeled by some of their elders:
First, don’t be afraid. America’s gone through tough times before — slavery and civil war, famine and disease, the Great Depression and 9/11. And each time we came out stronger, usually because a new generation, young people like you, learned from past mistakes and figured out how to make things better.
Second, do what you think is right. Doing what feels good, what’s convenient, what’s easy — that’s how little kids think. Unfortunately, a lot of so-called grown-ups, including some with fancy titles and important jobs, still think that way — which is why things are so screwed up. I hope that instead, you decide to ground yourself in values that last, like honesty, hard work, responsibility, fairness, generosity, respect for others. You won’t get it right every time, you’ll make mistakes like we all do. But if you listen to the truth that’s inside yourself, even when it’s hard, even when its inconvenient, people will notice. They’ll gravitate towards you. And you’ll be part of the solution instead of part of the problem.
And finally, build a community. No one does big things by themselves. Right now, when people are scared, it’s easy to be cynical and say let me just look out for myself, or my family, or people who look or think or pray like me. But if we’re going to get through these difficult times; if we’re going to create a world where everybody has the opportunity to find a job and afford college; if we’re going to save the environment and defeat future pandemics, then we’re going to have to do it together. So be alive to one another’s struggles. Stand up for one another’s rights. Leave behind all the old ways of thinking that divide us — sexism, racial prejudice, status, greed — and set the world on a different path [President Obama, transcript, 2020.05.17].
President Obama is a decent man, and he offers our young people decent advice. Listen to the President, graduates, and make your country a better place for all of us.
Much of what former President Obama said was valid and noteworthy. I wish he hadn’t inserted gratuitous comments that could be – and are being – interpreted as not-so-veiled criticisms of President Trump and possibly others.
Obama had two other choices: 1) he could have omitted the references entirely; or 2) he could have observed, correctly, that there are leaders who fall short in every generation and of all political/ideological stripes.
The tragedy isn’t that he used a presumably nonpartisan and positive “Graduation 2020” presentation to defame others by implication. The tragedy is that, by doing so, he failed to uphold the standards to which he himself aspires.
Please, Mr. Wyland Really? You said Obama’s words “defame others by implication.” Wow. I can’t imagine someone so out of touch with reality and so demanding that political correctness be shown to a white privileged failure as you seem to be.
The words Obama used were entirely appropriate. These kids may have gotten participation trophies all through school, but instead of it making them as squishy on failure as you, they learned to recognize a slacker when they see one. And they see one in Trump.
Unlike Trump, who repeatedly demeans and defames everyone who doesn’t kiss his rectum, Obama didn’t call out anyone by name, but he wasn’t going to engage in the sort of b.s.-ing to newly minted graduates that you recommend. To do what you suggest in your post would be to demean graduates’ intelligence. That Trump and Trump sycophants take exception to Obama’s polite speech is more a reflection on the fact that even they know our President is incompetent, even though Obama didn’t say it.
“The tragedy….” Really? There are 90,000 dead and many mourning, and YOU think a graduation speech that doesn’t engage in politely genuflecting to a failed President is a “tragedy.” Where IS your sense of proportion?
Isn’t it great to remember and realize that we still have a real President.
Obama/Biden hated the Keystone XL and now Biben says he will kill it if elected. Good news indeed.
“Biden White House would yank Keystone XL permit
The Monday statement is the first from Biden’s campaign about how he would handle the project.” https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/18/biden-white-house-keystone-xl-permit-265041
When Barack Obama says, “And all those adults that you used to think were in charge and knew what they were doing? Turns out that they don’t have all the answers. A lot of them aren’t even asking the right questions,” people logically think first of Trump. That’s not defamation; that’s statement of fact that even Trump supporters recognize deep down. Their leader is a schmuck, and they’re stuck with him.
Barack Obama hit exactly the right tone, offering a clear critique of the fundamental problems our young people face without making it personal. Only the people who so keenly feel the pain of daily defending their indefensible choices take offense at such truth-telling.
You know, Obama could have given that same speech at my graduation in 1969. We had just come through a horrible year of assassinations, the rights and lives of minorities were not secure, and the bodies were piling up at a high rate as Nixon’s secret plan to end the Vietnam War turned out to be just another line of BS we had been hearing from our “leaders.” As graduates, we thought our leaders didn’t have the right answers for our time, and we were right. We were asking the right questions, and our leaders were clueless about what the answers were.
I always thought Nixon would be the worst President of my lifetime. Then along came Trump. Nixon, for all his faults, did some good things, along with the bad. I can’t think of one good thing Trump has done.
I imagine this year’s graduates were sitting in their graduation garb at home, and thinking, like I did at my graduation, “Well, it’s gotta get better than this.”
It is heartening and encouraging to hear a presidential speech like that. Gov. Walz speaks in a similar vein. I think other governors are doing that too.
Hearing truth, encouragement, hope and honest assessment makes a very important positive difference to the listeners. Such talk has been proven repeatedly to change outcomes in a positive way.
I am very grateful for speakers like both Obamas, Gov. Walz and others who strengthen us in times like these.