Why Can't Johnny Count?

The Leftist blogger who hates me, but yet can't seem to post anything that doesn't link back to my site or reference me in some other way, posted something about my "desperation" at counting the number of times President Obama used the word "education" in a speech about education as compared to the number of times he referred to himself.

Well, in a post on his blog, he tried to do the same thing with an education speech by George H. W. Bush as "proof" of the folly of doing it. Here's something in particular that caught my eye from his blog.

Here's an education speech by George H.W. Bush. It's MUCH shorter than Obama's speech:

Number of times Bush said "I": 52 times
Number of times Bush said "Education": ZERO times.

If you check the text of the speech, you find something completely different. Take this line, for example:

Education matters, and what you do today, and what you don't do can change your future.

Hmmm...one use of the word "education" from George H. W. Bush's speech.

Then, there's this line:

It [the National Goals Report] sets forth a challenge: Work harder, learn more, revolutionize American education.

That's two uses of the word "education" and a use of the word "learn" which is connected to education.

Shall we try for another line from Bush's speech? Sure!

I know you've heard about stanines and percentiles, surveys and statistics, but here's what all that fancy talk really means: Education means the difference between a good future and a lousy one.

That's three. Another one?

Reaching those goals is the aim of a strategy that we call America 2000, a crusade for excellence in American education, school by school, community by community.

Four uses of the word "education"? Say it ain't so!

I think you get the picture. In total, I counted 8 uses of the word "education." Furthermore, there are other education-related references, including "homework," "teacher," and "student" to name a few. And in a shorter speech than the one Obama gave.

Maybe it's my "empty head", but I learned in school that 8 was a higher number than 0.

Oh, by the way. I counted only 31 uses of the word "I" in the speech. There were other references, such as "me" and "my", but just going by what the Leftist blogger put forward, I'd say he was wrong about that as well.

So let's check the final scores

Obama's uses of "education" in a longer speech about education: 10 times
Bush's uses of "education" in a shorter speech about education: 8 times

Obama's uses of "I" in the aforementioned speech: 56 times
Bush's uses of "I" in the aforementioned speech: 31 times

Looks like there's a certain Leftist who needs to go back to school.

Class dismissed.