"I have been but little in," said Ninian hastily...

There’s a catch, though. The students can only use images, quotes, documents, and music from the era. They cannot use anything that came afterwards. An image of the White House burning in 1812 would not work for the election of 1808. They cannot use images of Leutze’s famous Washington Crossing the Delaware, a product more reflective of the 1840s than the 1770s. Their assignment is to capture the spirit of the age – not the spirit of our historical memory.  

For each video, the students must do as much research (if not more) than they would for a paper in which they were to describe the issues of each election. The video assignment is, on some level, the same as a traditional paper. They have to take a side in the election and argue their point of view from the evidence. Now, however, they must express their conclusions in a new form. These videos will provide windows into past political worlds. We hope to leverage technology to reach a wider audience, and, perhaps, to spark conversations about American history and electoral politics outside of our classroom.

I hope my contribution will help the boys and girls in Afghanistan, Iraq, maybe Libya and who knows where else, and I thank my lucky stats that General Electric doesn't have to make that sacrifice, so it can preserve ALL their income to create economic growth in our country. Meanwhile, the newspapers say that Jeffrey Imelt, GE chairman and a member of Mr. Obama's Council of Economic Advisors, is cutting back the salaries of 15,000 GE workers to help cover the costs of pensions and benefits and spur our country's economic growth.