Florida Republican Party chairman Jim Greer, who made waves last week when he sent out a press release attacking President Obama’s stay-in-school message, is now expressing his approval of the pre-released text, ABC News reports. In fact, he’ll even let his own kids watch it — but he stands by his earlier criticism.
“It’s a good speech,” said Greer. “It encourages kids to stay in school and the importance of education and I think that’s what a president should do when they’re gonna talk to students across the country.”
Here’s what Greer first said last week:
“As the father of four children, I am absolutely appalled that taxpayer dollars are being used to spread President Obama’s socialist ideology. The idea that school children across our nation will be forced to watch the President justify his plans for government-run health care, banks, and automobile companies, increasing taxes on those who create jobs, and racking up more debt than any other President, is not only infuriating, but goes against beliefs of the majority of Americans, while bypassing American parents through an invasive abuse of power.”
Greer and other Republicans had attacked lesson-plan materials from the Department of Education that had a suggested activity, asking students to write about how they could “help the President.” It appeared that the intended context of this was in relation to the speech on educational goals — it was in a list of bullet points headed “Extension of the Speech.” Nevertheless, the Department of Education did edit the materials to remove this politically dicey phrase, and it now clearly refers to achieving personal goals.
“This was clearly moving in a direction that would have not been satisfactory to me as a parent, and I know many other parents across this country,” said Greer. “The White House has changed, the Department of Education took it all out, but when they submitted it, when they sent it out, when they created those lesson plans – the objections from me, the statement from me, and the objections from many other parents was warranted and they should’ve thought about it more carefully before they tried it.”
