Obama’s Corps: You Can Choose, I Mean You Are Required
So this is what Barack Obama means when he says “you choose”: “you’ll be required”.
The “America Serves” section of Obama’s “office of the president-elect” web site begins with a citation from his own victory speech:
“When you choose to serve — whether it’s your nation, your community or simply your neighborhood — you are connected to that fundamental American ideal that we want life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness not just for ourselves, but for all Americans. That’s why it’s called the American dream.”
What’s interesting is the next paragraph. It begins as if he’ll just appeal to people to serve in the host of new corps he’s promising:
The Obama Administration will call on Americans to serve in order to meet the nation’s challenges. President-Elect Obama will expand national service programs like AmeriCorps and Peace Corps and will create a new Classroom Corps to help teachers in underserved schools, as well as a new Health Corps, Clean Energy Corps, and Veterans Corps. Obama will call on citizens of all ages to serve America,
but the sentence continues with what he really means by “calling on”:
by developing a plan to require 50 hours of community service in middle school and high school and 100 hours of community service in college every year.
What do you think he really means by “encourage”?
Obama will encourage retiring Americans to serve by improving programs available for individuals over age 55, while at the same time promoting youth programs such as Youth Build and Head Start.
So don’t think you’ll just opt out of serving in one of these corps he’s planning to create. Because you’ll be really encouraged not to.
I thought black people were against slavery.
UPDATE: They’ve changed the wording now – but does it really change the meaning?
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