Oval Office Gulf Disaster Speech: Ask not what your country can do for you, but…

by Karoli on June 15, 2010 · 10 comments

I am a proud member of the JFK generation, who grew up with this as my mantra:

Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country.

Following on my previous post, because I am as human as the next, I am now going to tell you why *I* should have written President Obama’s Oval Office speech.

In a nutshell, because he didn’t ask me to do anything.

If ever there was a golden opportunity to spur words to action, it was this speech. He had the opportunity to lay out the Big Plan, and to say he wouldn’t tolerate inaction. He had an opportunity to climb down into the weeds just a little (he is, after all, in his office) and tell us that if we just found ways to shave our usage, we could save a teeny, tiny bit of the planet.

We are a country dying to be asked to do something. We should have been asked. Collective sacrifice isn’t that bad of a thing, and unless there is some compelling reason (like economic disaster or the like) NOT to ask us to cut back, then he should have asked us.

I want a do-over on that speech. I want him to talk to me like the guy that ran for office and not like a guy who is trying to overcome hysteria about a black guy being in office. This speech felt like a speech for Glenn Beck or FOX News, as if to dare them not to poke holes in what he said.

So from me to the President, because obviously, HE isn’t ME…

President Obama, YOU dared to defy convention and run against the Democratic party machine for the Presidency of the United States. You did it by NOT apologizing for your race or your views. In fact, it was the lack of an apology for your race and a call to this nation to have a reasonable dialogue about it that saved your campaign from ruin.

Stop approaching this like you’re at a disadvantage. YOU have the initiative. Run with it.

While we’re at it, maybe it’s time to shake up the staff a little. I can think of a couple of key changes that might get you back in your groove, and not a moment too soon.

Go back on TV right away. Hijack a press conference or two. Whatever. Call all of us to sacrifice something for the good of the Gulf. And the planet. Because if you don’t, we get to keep thinking that clicking a few petitions and hitting the credit card for a donation is what citizenship is.

Citizenship is, above all, making a personal sacrifice for the betterment of all. It is recognizing a vision and working together to realize it.

Don’t let the Glenn Becks of the world stop you from doing what you know is right. Just do it. And make us do it too.

As a footnote, of course I am doing what I can to shave my own consumption. I just want us all to do it. As a project. As a social experiment in cooperation, even. Because if they could live with rationing in World War II, surely we can set aside differences for the good of all generations to come behind us. Can’t we?

Tagged as: economy, environment, gulf disaster, oil, Politics, shared sacrifice

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stuartoneill

You hit a lot of it. I support the president. I think this could have better. Olbermann saying that the speech may have been written by committee. But Olbermann wants bodies hanging from trees. Can't happen. Could have been far better. But I believe we will get out of this and aggressively….eventually. This guy isn't known for blowing his top. Wish Biden had the open ground in Gulf for the duration. He'll let everyone know exactly who going to the gallows.
http://somebodyhealme.dianalee.net/ Diana Lee

I certainly didn't expect him to get angry tonight, but I did expect more passion and a call to action. Very disappointed. This is not the guy I supported and voted for.
http://somebodyhealme.dianalee.net/ Diana Lee

I certainly didn't expect him to get angry tonight, but I did expect more passion and a call to action. Very disappointed. This is not the guy I supported and voted for.
Guest

@Karoli I just watched your (somewhat nutty and totally strident) attack on @Avivo tonight…and having just read your responses to the comments from your previous entries about how this guy @Shoq is so obnoxious that he has
1. trashed efforts by other engineers to actually point out *why* this pipe thing he is proposing INSTEAD OF adding to the idea he stole:
2. helps destroy the chances that the good idea (lewis's) will be adopted, because @shoq has made so much nasty noise about THE WRONG IDEA.

Your response to those points involve some wacky leap into a screed about how “the Internet is bad because it's only about Narcissism!”.

And then, I come here and see that IN YOUR OWN NARCISSISM you think you should be writing the speech delivered by the President.

Finally, in your strident rant tonight at @Avivao, you cited a RETWEET as the reasons for your hours long rant….

@Avivao is again right. You are wildly projecting….both your Narcissism on the rest of the world, and your (obviously) conflicted position as a corporate lackey (you don't name your corporation) for a corp that (apparently) is doing some questionable things that make you uncomfortable.

So, some advice:
A. Stop screaming at everyone else for your own issues.
B. Learn something about the engineering that is being discussed, and the way it is being discussed, and THEN render your opinion about “poor @Shoq…nobody will listen to him”

I'm an engineer, I work in a corporation, and people who rant like you and this @Shoq character are the biggest liabilities to anyone and anything they represent. @Shoq's appropriation and (mis)representation of Lewis' good idea is one strike against it. You shrieking in support of @Shoq is a second strike.

Nice going.

Wow, just read the “We're done” tweet. Man, you are quite a nasty person.
http://www.drumsnwhistles.com/ Karoli

Glad to have provided your late-night entertainment. Your defense of @avivao is admirable, but unnecessary. Marshal your forces if you must, but this is a discussion that's dead.
http://www.myspace.com/thesemilocals SouthernWreck

Si, se puede. Word – on the “just make us” thing.
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Meryl333

It never ceases to amaze me how people can read the same couple of paragraphs and take away such entirely different things. For one, not every passionate point of view is an attack. It's a passionate point of view. Karoli is, unlike many critics of the President, also a strong, well read and intelligent supporter. When you, Mr. or Ms. or Mrs. Guest have the courage to write something under your real name, maybe there could be a discussion. Instead, you've made a ridiculous personal attack without addressing some of the great things that were said about citizenship and responsibility. How could anyone find something wrong with passionately wishing our President would use his pulpit & latent popularity to get us on board with THAT idea. (my head is shaking).
http://www.maturelandscaping.com Nance

“We are a country dying to be asked to do something.” I think that's an incredibly important statement. Like siblings who sense that the family is about to come undone, we attack each other and decompensate further and further. We almost do better when the the bad news has been delivered and we're told to start packing our toys. Point me, tell me it will help, and I'm on it.