Children across the country will put their books in their brand new backpacks and head back to class Tuesday.

President Barack Obama plans to help them kick off a new school year with a special address scheduled for broadcast at noon EDT at schools coast to coast. 

However, schools districts in several states have opted out of showing the video due to parental concerns that Obama's speech, which White House officials say was conceived as nothing more than a back-to-school pep talk for kids, may be too political in nature.

According to an Associated Press article, aside from the fact that the video will be shown during school hours when most parents won't be available to watch it with their children, the controversy primarily centers around the suggested lesson plans that accompany the broadcast.

One lesson plan had children writing letters to themselves listing ways they can help support Obama. 

Parents, it seems, are concerned that Obama will use the speech as an opportunity to get kids to sign on to his political agenda.

Meanwhile, another Obama video -- this one shown at Eagle Bay Elementary School in Farmington, Utah last week -- also drew parents' ire. The offending video, "I Pledge," depicts A-list Hollywood celebrities such as Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore making pledges to support the president and actively take part in making a better America.

Individual pledges in the video run the gamut from smiling more to helping advance stem cell research.

The Salt Lake Tribune said that parents called Eagle Bay Principal Ofelia Wade worried about the "leftist propaganda" depicted in the video.

While I can certainly understand the offended parents' objections to the videos, schools are ultimately institutions of learning where a free exchange of ideas should take place. Exposure to viewpoints that differ from that of their parents is healthy for kids and won't negate the core values their parents have spent years instilling in them.

Though I don't support stem cell research - it's taking a life to save a life, a slippery slope I'm not ready to go down - I would not be afraid of my child hearing from someone who does.  Indeed, I would turn it into a golden opportunity to sit down with my child and explain why I believe what I do.

Theoretically, a parent who has done his or her job right should have more pull in shaping his or her child than a stranger or a toothy actress on a videotape, anyway.

Ironically enough, some of these conservative parents, who are now tearing their hair out over the Obama videos, once requested the country stand behind another American president: George W. Bush. And when Bush made a similar back-to-school address years ago, Democratic parents claimed he intended to indoctrinate their children.

In the end, Americans have always hated having their overly delicate sensibilities stirred. 

But it's time we grow up and take a look at the many horrific things in the world truly worth becoming offended about, from child soldiers dying in Sudan to astronomical medical bills forcing millions of gravely ill people into bankruptcy right here in the good old U.S.A. 

Somehow, a random celebrity telling your fifth-grader to drive a Prius just doesn't seem to make the cut.