Change We Can Believe In: Barack & Michelle Obama Choose Ritzy Private Sidwell Friends for Daughters Sasha and Malia

Send my children to public school … are you kidding!

More change you can believe in from the Obama’s. File this one under the category of do as I say, not as I do. Barack & Michelle Obama are sending their daughters Sasha and Malia to Sidwell Friends private school. As Hot Air stated, Michelle Obama believes in a public school education, just not for her children. For a candidate that talked such a good game about change, at every chance and every turn Obama has dome nothing more than any other previous politician. Take a look at the educational changes and reforms that Barack Obama backed during the Presidential campaign. Interestingly enough he will make education a priority for his Administration; however, he will not send his children to it.

The choice of Sidwell Friends for Obama’s daughters actually plays perfectly into the many choices he has made for his Presidential Cabinet as well. Obama has done his best imitation of the Clinton White House so far and as fate would have it the Clinton’s chose the same DC private school for Chelsea. Remarkable.

Sidwell Friends School in northwest Washington,Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2008. Michelle Obama and her daughters Sasha and Malia visited their top choices for schools ‘to make sure we find the right fit.’

Of course the Teachers’ Union President says its okay for Barack and Michelle Obama to send their kinds to a private school. What else would we expect? After all is Barack Obama, The One, the Obamamessiah we are talking about. No one is allowed to criticize his choices, especially when he pandered to the public school teachers union vote this past election.

The AFT endorsed Obama for president in July. On the campaign trail, Obama spoke out against school choice and vouchers for children in households of any income level. Still, when asked if the Obamas should send their children to public school, Weingarden said “none of us” can relate to being in the position of president of the United States.

 
“Look, none of us knows what it’s like to be a president of the United States of America or a president-elect,” she said. “I think Senator Obama and his wife have every right to make a decision that works for their family and their kids, and none of us should criticize it.”

Are Barack and Michelle Obama allowed to send their children to the school of their choice? Of course they are. The Obama’s being of privileged means can afford to send their children to a privileged school that has a tuition rate close to $30,000 per year. However, Obama was the same candidate who was adamantly against school vouchers that would have allowed “We the People” the choice of school to send your children. Hell, Obama does not even support school vouchers in the Washington, DC area.

During the just-concluded campaign, Mr. Obama spoke dismissively of the federally funded voucher program that gives poor D.C. families access to the kind of educational opportunities his family is fortunate to have. The D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program gives low-income families up to $7,500 per child for their children to escape failed public schools and attend private schools. Some 1,900 children receive vouchers, and many more are clamoring to join the program. Democrats, and their allies in public school teachers unions, oppose the vouchers and, with the party soon to control Congress and the White House, supporters of the program are right to worry.

UPDATE I: Choice for Me, But Not for Rhee (The Corner)

During the third presidential debate, Barack Obama and John McCain staged a little contest over who could say the nicest things about DC schools chancellor Michelle Rhee. It was an encouraging discussion because Rhee is a reform-minded Democrat who isn’t afraid to take on teacher unions. She’s also a supporter of DC’s limited school-choice program, which lets about 2,000 low-income kids attend private (mostly Catholic) schools with vouchers. As she said about a year ago: “I would never, as long as I am in this role, do anything to limit another parent’s ability to make a choice for their child. Ever.”

Now we learn that Rhee’s schools aren’t good enough for Obama’s children: The president-elect has chosen to enroll his girls at Sidwell Friends. This is nothing new. The elite opponents of school choice routinely keep their children out of public schools:

UPDATE II: Moving on Up! Obama Girls to Attend Elite Private D.C. School

UPDATE III: Even The Washington Post Snears At Barry School Choice