If you are reading hate or lack of understanding the meaning of a joke in my post then you are reading your own ideas into what I posted.
I said I loved it.
Surprised no one has asked it yet: Will Obama be in Atlanta for the championship?
Were Grant and Tory busy? o.O
Nevertheless- awesome. Just awesome. Congrats to both teams for being there!
A few of the utes mentioned it. That’s why I didn’t quote anyone in particular and I certainly wasn’t aiming anything at you.
So - while I was having a meltdown over the fact that my son thinks my turkey is always dry (we are going to try a turkey brine this year), my husband came flying into the room, “Jane, Jane, do you know about the Connect A Million Minds initiative? It’s all over the local news! They showed Dean Kamen talking to President Obama!” They were explaining the Time Warner Cable connection. It was a lot of fun listening to my husband be so excited about the STEM opportunities that will made available because of this type of interest and support being generated. This time it wasn’t me doing all the talking, it was him. 
He could give me some coaching in my elevator pitch, I do believe.
I doubt it… but that is just me and I know based on past discussions that a lot of us have different opinions on this (which is a very good thing).
A good elevator pitch would be awesome.
I usually start mine with:
“I am a mentor for a competitive high school robotics team”
That always seems to get their attention, because their response is typically to look at me and say “What??”
Then I get to roll into the pitch about FIRST robotics. A little bit of competition description, a lot of the inspiration angle, a laundry list of benefits for students/community/mentors etc.
This is a great thing for FIRST. I wonder if Obama got his line about NCAA basketball players from Dean Kamen…
I know that the President was asked at least three different times if he would come to the Championships. He did not make any commitment, but he didn’t absolutely decline either. Given the demands on his schedule, I would not have expected anything different this far in advance (e.g. this event was originally scheduled to take place on November 10, but at the last minute it was rescheduled when the President’s plans changed so that he could go to Texas for the memorial service at Fort Hood).
-dave
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Good point Dave. I didn’t realize that the fixed mics were further than the video mics. It’s a shame that they didn’t mike Brian and Steven; you guys did a very good job demonstrating the robot as well. I was bouncing off of the walls to see the proverbial wheels in the President’s head turning when he was “inspecting” the robot.
My favorite part was where he was essentially reading off Dean’s talking points. In fact, other than hyping the Recovery Act (keeping Detroit from becoming a complete wasteland since 2009! 
) his entire speech could’ve been a Dean Speech
It’s clear from the context that pretty much everything the President said regarding the robot was in jest, from “keeping an eye on those robots in case they try anything” to “Where are they aiming right now?” to “This is all stuff you can get at Radio Shack?” As far as laying off the press, however, I give no quarter. We need to spoonfeed talking points to the press to keep them from Rita Skeetering us. Elevator speeches too - everyone should have one.
Concerning IndySam
my comment was aimed at the person who compared radioshack obama to wwe bush.
Please explain how that is “hate on Obama.”
Bush’s WWE quote is something I remember with great joy.
Seconded on the loving it. It shows interest and it got a chuckle out of me.
I don’t read it as “hating on” Obama at all. Honestly if making a joke at something the President said is “hating on him” someone needs to grow some thicker skin and realize that the President is human just like the rest of us and we can laugh at jokes or flubs he makes.
My apologies, i just interpreted the Bush quote another way than you did. I thought the comparison was meant to belittle the president but i was wrong. No hard feelings.
Yeah, I was going to say…as the one who originally compared the two quotes, I didn’t intend to insult/belittle either president 
I just feel like they could both sum up the general idea of FIRST to someone who doesn’t know about it. Almost everyone knows what the WWE is, so comparing FIRST to it helps emphasize the scale of the program. Asking about RadioShack means that we have to refute the statement, so we have the opportunity to show how expensive and complex our robots are (sponsorsssss!)
This could go in the elevator pitch thread, too
Maybe Obama was thinking about VEX?
My bookie tells me that there is better than a 50% chance the president shows up in Atlanta this year. If not this year then 75% next year.
That assumes no unseen emergencies, crisis, summits, or other things that will divert his attention.
The president has three things he wants to accomplish. 1) healthcare, 2) energy, and 3) education. FIRST addresses all three of these but from a tangible policy level it really hits energy and education.
Okay - I do not have a bookie but I’ll take the odds.
You don’t even want to joke about a thing like that. Having a sitting president visit a large public arena full of mysterious-looking hardware would give the Secret Service the screaming fantods. The disruption of the event would be incredible, too. My personal preference would be to have the President appear on video, not in person.
(Of course, if FTC 417 doesn’t win, I won’t have to worry about it at all. )
For those of you at the Houston Championships (2003): Would you be willing to go through that type of security, but tighter, just so the President could be at the Championship?
(For those that weren’t there, every time you took a robot through into the Reliant, it, and any backpacks you carried, were searched for whatever they were looking for. The gates were crowded; I found another one that didn’t have a line but had a security guy. I understand that the Astrodome staff wanted to search incoming toolboxes until they were told that they’d have to do several hundred of them, with several thousand impatient high school students waiting to get in.)
I’m going to do a find and replace, replacing “public arena” with “factory”.
You don’t even want to joke about a thing like that. Having a sitting president visit a large factory full of mysterious-looking hardware would give the Secret Service the screaming fantods. The disruption of the event would be incredible, too. My personal preference would be to have the President appear on video, not in person."
Sounds just as justifiable, right? Except that the President has toured several factories across the United States over the past year:
http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/2008/04/obama_on_factory_tour_friday_m.html
http://thepage.time.com/pool-report-obama-at-the-pennsylvania-glass-factory/
So would it be possible? Yes, I’m sure the Secret Service would find a way (The President has already had people with actual AR-15s outside rallies).
The pre-recorded video would be easier logistically and schedule wise, but wouldn’t have the same impact as the if given in person. A live webcast would, but I think the ideal solution would be to have something funny that’s scripted like when Obama appeared on The Colbert Report during his week of reporting from Iraq for the Armed Forces, ordering Colbert to shave his head for the troops. Something like Obama signing an executive order mandating that Sasha and Malia pick up their toys, and having them build a robot to do it for them would probably be quite funny and resonate with students better than just a canned “stay in school speech”. Or maybe have Obama appear with a veteran from the war with Dean’s robotic arm, thanking the students as future scientists and engineers for creating in the future devices such as Dean’s robotic arm that could make the lives of those who fought for our freedom better.
Actually, Dean could use that advice as well. Students nowadays are living in the Jon Stewart and Stephan Colbert generation. We like our news with comedy and intelligent satire*. If Dean throws some well-crafted humor and satire throughout his speeches, you won’t see too many people sleeping through it anymore.
- Even though many people call them “fake news”, regular watchers of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report on average scored higher than most other news networks in Pew Research studies. Why? Because no one would get the jokes on these shows if they didn’t already have strong background knowledge of the news.