This is crazy. We have unionized the teachers and taken over public schools so we can push a progressive message It is our first and most important goal. Everybody knows that God and Christianity does not exist and furthermore have nothing to do with US history. The very thought that ANY insane, conservative, messages like "Don't have sex until you are married so you won't have to kill your baby" should be placed in textbooks is absurd. Same with things like "Do not steal" -- a cornerstone of wealth redistribution; "Do not kill" -- how do you otherwise eliminate the scourge of Christianity; "Do not covet thy neighbor's wife" -- how does one otherwise get a relaxing pleasure in the Oval Office in a high stress job? All of these silly rules that Christians promote will cause the fall of the entire Earth and that is why the FF is here to stop it.
Thomas Jefferson has always been the favorite Founding Father among conservatives. (John Adams has the same role among liberals) The people who wrote and approved these new textbooks are so far to the Right that they don't even like Jefferson anymore. He wasn't Christian enough for these fundamentalist types. It is so strange to me that a tiny minority of very active extremists gets to frame the issues once again for everyone else.
Neocon revisionism is ridiculous. They keep pushing this myth that our founders were "conservative" and for "small government." No, they were not. By the time's standards, they were the most progressive leaders on the face of the earth. What they proposed, by the time's standards, was actually a large government with fairly expansive powers. And nearly all of them were either agnostic or deist. In 1776, there was nothing like it anywhere else on earth. It was only around the time of Reagan and the ascension of Rush Limbaugh's media empire that this myth of our founders started popping up. This thing in Texas just highlights the absurdity of it; they are literally codifying the myths pushed by the right into text books.
I have studied quite a bit of history and you sir are full of shit.
Have you taken a look at what is in (and not in) these new textbooks? It is a bit shocking to anyone who isn't a Christian fundamentalist.
You don't know what you're talking about. The founders were extraordinarily liberal by the 18th century standards. The conservatives of that time were firm monarchists. The founders proposed a republic with fairly expansive powers (by 18th century standards). Most of them were atheists or deists. They were products of the Enlightenment. If the founders existed in today's political reality, they would most certainly fall on the left side of the political spectrum. Republicans of today would seem like the monarchists of yester-century to them.
No, go read their personal letters and papers, you'll see he's right.
To be honest, I haven't. I will look into it. I do know that the crap being spewed above is just that.
Blah, blah, blah. You are no better than Limbaugh.
I have studied the Federalist Papers and many of the literary collections surrounding the time of the formation of our country and government. Constitutional law is an area I am pretty well versed in. What NT is doing above is no better than Limbaugh highlighting one side of the story and ignoring the other. One only has to read the Constitution and you can see which ideals prevailed at the inception of our country. The government has become ever more expansive since, but that was not the desire of a majority of the founding fathers. There is no denying there were several that held the ideals NT speaks of, but to say the major view was for a large government with expansive powers is bullshit.
You're intentionally misrepresenting everything I said. I said that for their time, the founding fathers were the most liberal, progressive leaders on the face on the planet. Of course they were. They were all products of the Enlightenment. For their time, the U.S. government was a large, expansive government.
Sorry but you are just beating your head against the wall with these guys!
Their ideas are set in stone! Either that or they are just trolling for attention!
Don't you think the people of Texas should decide what is in their own schools. Of course you don't as you think that the federal govt should lord over most things in a persons life. This is a good example of difference between the US in the late 1700's and current days.
I personally think that the Texas educators went too far, but I think the state should have the right to say what goes on in their own state.
I do get a kick out of most of the negative articles and comments come from media outlets based in New York. Sure there are people upset in Texas, but there is also some praise as well.Do some googling for Texas newspapers .. or do all you care about is what folks in New York and DC have to say about this?
The founding fathers were revolutionaries ... that is for sure. They espoused separation of state and church, but also each state had major control of it's sovereignty .. a civil war took care of a lot of that - and the ever expanding federal govt has never looked back since then. The founding fathers would shudder to see the most recent DC shenanigans of this health care passage - I am pretty sure of that.
Would be fine if it actually was the "Citizens" of Texas doing it, but what we have is a long term plan by a really Small minority to get in a position where they have control of what the next generation is going to be taught as the "Truth" and a pretty slanted one at that! Since I haven't actually got my hands one these text books, I have to go by what I consider reliable sources! Our definitions of reliable source may vary somewhat!
That is comical. Not sure if you have been in a university classroom at all in the past 30 years. Talk about a slanted education.
Didn't know we were talking about University text books here! I was commenting on K-12 textbooks! Those haven't changed much in the last 70 years, except for the gender neutral nazis and attempt to push creationism lately
Please. K-12 textbooks are revised every couple years. My mother has been teaching in the Florida public school system for 45 years and tells me of the dumbing down of our educational system each and every year.
Well they are about to get a LOT dumber in Texas! I think I'll call it NeoCon revisionism, since they are following the Stalinist pattern of "If you don't Like it, Eliminate it from History"!
Boooo! Hissss!
lamparty
Does this remind anybody besides me of the Communist Revisionism of the Stalin Era! People out of favor suddenly disappeared from history books, ideas and other stuff also got gone!