Washington's Farewell Address

 

In 1796, Mr. Washington's "warnings of a parting friend" cautioned Americans about the "wiles of foreign influence." Daily Beast editor-in-chief John Avlon, who explores the history and legacy of the address in his new book, joins "CBS This Morning" to discuss "Washington's Farewell: The Founding Father's Warning to Future Generations."

While Washington focused mainly on domestic issues in the address, he ended with a discussion of foreign affairs. “It is our true policy,” he declared, “to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world,” a statement that would shape American foreign policy for more than a century to come.

In his Farewell Address, Washington took neutrality a step further. “The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is,” he advised, “. . . to have with them as little political connection as possible.” This advice was translated by the presidents who followed Washington into a policy of unilateralism. Under this policy, the United States “went it alone” in its relations with other countries, and did not seek either military or political alliances with foreign powers.

Was Washington more of a 'Realist' or 'Idealist?' 

How did Washington's foreign policy influence the War of 1812 and the Monroe Doctrine?

Realism vs. Idealism: Is Santa Real?

 

If your decision was motivated mainly by realism, • your decision-making process was guided by reason and rationality. • you were motivated by self-interest. • you believed that you were protecting your own needs and security. 

If your decision was motivated mainly by idealism, • your decision-making process was guided by morals and ethics. • you were motivated by the desire to help others. • you believed that you were acting in the best interest of your family and community

A Campfire Conversation

Click here to watch the video.

During a private, three-day camping trip in the Yosemite Valley in 1903, President Theodore Roosevelt and preservationist John Muir shared their views on wilderness use while "talking freely around the campfire." Both men shared a life-long appreciation for the wilderness and its natural inhabitants. But each brought different views on how, why, and to what extent that environment should be protected. Their exchange of those views eventually led to the expansion of Yosemite National Park under the federal government.

In this lesson, students will use online tools – as well as information contained in this episode – to research the backgrounds, experiences, and points of view of both men. They will then share that information in a re-creation of one of the pair's "campfire conversations."

Roosevelt Bio    Muir Bio

1. What was Muir’s point of view on wilderness use? What was Roosevelt’s view?


2. In what ways were their points of view similar? In what ways were they different?


3. For each man, what was the value in hearing the other’s point of view?


4. In what ways was the campfire setting an appropriate one for the conversation?


5. If you were in attendance at that campfire, what would you have liked to say to either man?

Bring the sounds of the virtual-forest into your room while you're doing your homework.

How well do you know your National Parks?

Do you have to travel across the country to see a National Park?

Wealth Inequality

'Diamond Dog'

      During the "Gilded Age," every man was a potential Andrew Carnegie, and Americans who achieved wealth celebrated it as never before.  In New York, the opera, the theatre, and lavish parties consumed the ruling class' leisure hours.  Mrs. Stuyvesant Fish once threw a dinner party to honor her dog who arrived sporting a $15,000 diamond collar.  How much would that be in today's $$$$?

     While the rich wore diamonds, many wore rags. In 1890, 11 million of the nation's 12 million families earned less than $1200 per year; of this group, the average annual income was $380, well below the poverty line. Rural Americans and new immigrants crowded into urban areas. Tenements spread across city landscapes, teeming with crime and filth. Americans had sewing machines, phonographs, skyscrapers, and even electric lights, yet most people labored in the shadow of poverty.  Read more....

Is the Distribution of Wealth more equal today than in the Gilded Age?

What do the 'bean counters' say?

Make a prediction and then check out the reality.

Isle of Hope

On the first day on January,
Eighteen ninety-two,
They opened Ellis Island and they let
The people through.
And the first to cross the treshold
Of that isle of hope and tears,
Was Annie Moore from Ireland
Who was all of fifteen years.

CHORUS:

Isle of hope, isle of tears,
Isle of freedom, isle of fears,
But it's not the isle you left behind.
That isle of hunger, isle of pain,
Isle you'll never see again
But the isle of home is always on your mind.

Like Isle of Hope, The Pogues’ Thousands are Sailing (written by guitarist Phil Chevron) ties the economic emigration of the 80’s in with a prior wave of emigration—in this case, the post-Famine emigration to the United States.

1) Compare and contrast the two songs.

2) What was it like to really experience Ellis Island? 

3) What 'pushed' Immigrants from their homelands?  What Pulled them here? (t-chart)

4) Why do you suppose Ellis Island closed in 1954? 

5) How is immigration today different than a century ago?


How would you do as an immigrant?  Play from Ellis Island to Orchard Street.

How was this experience different than Angel Island in the West?  How and why were the Chinese Excluded?

The Real All Americans

Pennsylvania's Carlisle Indian School, founded by Richard Pratt, may have failed to assimilate Native Americans  in society but the school's football team proved their respectability by challenging — and beating — their counterparts in the Ivy Leagues and Military Academies. Although the school shut its doors in 1918, the winning team established Jim Thorpe and coach Glenn "Pop" Warner as two of the best-known names in American sports. It also introduced plays, including the forward pass, that are standard in the game today.

Hear author Sally Jenkins read from her book: The Real All Americans

Pop Warners playbook included more than just the forward pass. His 'hidden ball play' and other 'trick plays' became legendary in football lore.

Watch these 'Trick Plays' and then design one of your own.

Who knows? If its good enough maybe the Brave can use it Friday night.

How did Football, in many ways, became a substitute for war?

How Do We Remember?

It is a somber day for America.

What do we remember about the events of 9/11?

Why do we create memorials? What is their purpose? How does that purpose influence their design?

A steel fragment from the destroyed World Trade Center in New York City is now part of a new monument at the Crazy Horse Memorial in South Dakota dedicated to the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The memorial also honors the efforts of emergency responders after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and United Airlines Flight 93.

Native American leaders chose Crazy Horse for their own SD mountain carving because to them he was a great and patriotic hero. Crazy Horse's tenacity of purpose, his modest life, his unfailing courage, and his tragic death set him apart and above the others. He is a hero not only because of his skill in battle, but also because of his character and his loyalty to his people. Today, his values and his story serve as an inspiration for people of all races.

"My fellow chiefs and I would like the white man to know that the red man has great heroes, also." -- Henry Standing Bear, 1939

Do you suppose the families of the 7th Calvary felt that way? What would the reaction be if someone wanted to build a monument of Osama Bin Laden in NY City?   Could some people see Bin Laden as a hero? Who? Was Crazy Horse a terrorist?

Little Big Horn Battlefield in Montana memorializes the U.S. Army's 7th Cavalry and the Sioux and Cheyenne in one of the Indians last armed efforts to preserve their way of life. Here on June 25 and 26 of 1876, 263 soldiers, including Lt. Col. George A. Custer and attached personnel of the U.S. Army, died fighting several thousand Lakota, and Cheyenne warriors. Markers at Little Big Horn memorialize each of the fallen 7th Calvary where they fell.

An Indian Memorial wasn't dedicated until June 25th. 2003. It was placed in memory of all the tribes defending their way of life at the Battle.

Do you think someday a monument will be built honoring the terrorists behind the attacks?  Is this a fair comparison?

How have divisive events like 9/11 and Little Big Horn actually brought us closer together as a Country? Is this what the terrorists wanted? Why is it important for us to remember what really happened? What can the past teach us about the present? Can time heal all wounds?

War Games

WarGames follows David Lightman, a high school student who unwittingly hacks into WOPR (War Operations Planned Response), a United States military supercomputer programmed to predict possible outcomes of nuclear war. Lightman gets WOPR to run a nuclear war simulation, originally believing it to be a computer game. The simulation causes a national nuclear missile scare and nearly starts World War III.

The movie illustrates the very real fear of an 'imminent' nuclear attack during the late Cold War and teaches a valuable lesson in the end.

How was High School different in 1983?

How have computers and the internet changed our lives since then?

Would you like to play the game?

Vietnam: The Weight of Memory

The Vietnam War seemed to call everything into question—the value of honor and gallantry; the qualities of cruelty and mercy; the candor of the American government; and what it means to be a patriot. And those who lived through it have never been able to erase its memory, have never stopped arguing about what really happened, why everything went so badly wrong, who was to blame—and whether it was all worth it.

Read More

1) What were our goals in Vietnam in the first place?  Why did we get involved?

2) Why is the Vietnam War still so divisive to many Americans today?

3) What is patriotism? How can a person be patriotic to their country and still hold the government accountable for its actions?

4) What motivated American men and women to serve in the Vietnam War? What would you have done during the Vietnam War? Would you have supported or opposed it? Why?

5) How does America apply the lessons that it learned in the Vietnam War to challenges facing us today?

Rockin' The Suburbs

After World War II, there was a 'Baby Boom' creating the need for more housing. Most people resorted to homes outside the cities like suburbs because there it was cheaper. These places were called "Suburbia". Every community in the suburbs were like it's own little town. They all had schools, churches and parks. The increasing popularity of the suburbs grew as the government gave GI bills to the returning veterans of World War II and the Korean War. They helped them with the mortgage and college.  Improved roads and railway transport became the new way of travel as more and more people commuted.

How was Suburban Family life reinforced on TV?

What did critics think about Suburbia?

Would you want to live here?

TV Values

What cultural values do you suppose television reflected during the 1950s? 

What cultural values does television programming reflect today?

Leave It To Beaver is a show remembered by some as an example of a simpler time in America. A time before today's modern anything-goes mentality and it's culture of crassness. A time when traditional family values ruled the day. It is remembered by others as seemingly taking place in an alternate universe that bore no resemblance to reality evenwhen it was new.

I watched a lot of Leave it to Beaver in my childhood, as it was on every afternoon in re-runs, but it wasn’t until seeing it in adulthood that I appreciated to what extent the show does not merit its reputation as a phony part of a repressive Fifties monoculture. Yes, it depicts a world that probably never existed, and yes, like most of what was on television at the time, it under-represents diversity. There are no homosexuals (although who can be entirely sure about Mr. Rutherford?), few black people, and very limited controversy. Within its contained world, however, Leave it to Beaver promotes honesty and personal responsibility over the values of social status or self-interest. It also overturns (usually, anyway) the assumption that dishonesty is an accepted, and even expected, mode of behavior.

Silver Parachute

We are probably all familiar with the Silver Parachutes from Suzanne Collin's The Hunger Games.

The parachutes bearing meds or food float down, courtesy of Panem sponsors, and they are considered last-minute, unforeseen gifts.

What would your 'Silver Parachute' bring?  Who would sponsor you?

Post War Germany was divided into three sections--the Allied part was controlled by the United States, Great Britain and France, and another part by the Soviet Union. The city of Berlin, although located in the eastern Soviet half, was also divided into four sectors --West Berlin occupied by Allied interests and East Berlin occupied by Soviets. In June 1948, the Soviet Union attempted to control all of Berlin by cutting surface traffic to and from the city of West Berlin. Starving out the population and cutting off their business was their method of gaining control. As part of the Marshall Plan the Truman administration reacted with a continual daily airlift which brought much needed food and supplies into the city of West Berlin. The Berlin Airlift lasted until the end of September of 1949---although on May 12, 1949, the Soviet government yielded and lifted the blockade.

How did the airlift affect West German attitudes toward the United States and 'contain' the spread of Communism?

Imagine you are a child in Postwar West Berlin.  Write a 'Thank You' like the ones in the story to "Uncle Wiggly Wings."

False Flag

 

1) Would we have gone to war even if the Maine had not been sunk?  Why/ why not?

2) Is there a good reason to go to war?  If so what is it?

3) What is a 'False Flag' theory?

4) What other 'False Flag's' in history might have been used to start war?

5) Was the attack on 9/11 a 'False Flag?'  Why or why not?

6) How do conspiracy theories work?  Create your own 'conspiracy theory' and describe it.