Jefferson Who?

Are they or have they gone crazy in Texas? I can not believe that they are still so backwards and conservative. I lived there in the early 80's and found them to still be very critical of the North. They used to say, about the Civil War, that there was nothing civil about it! Until I adopted the local accent I would get all kinds of comments and stares. That was 20 years ago...yet they are now re-writing history. ACTUALLY!

Jefferson who? Yes the Texas school board is opting to leave Thomas Jefferson out of their new text books and replacing him with John Calvin.

"The Board removed Thomas Jefferson from the Texas curriculum's world history standards on Enlightenment thinking, “replacing him with religious right icon John Calvin.”

How can this even happen in 2010?

"After three days of turbulent meetings, the Texas Board of Education on Friday approved a social studies curriculum that will put a conservative stamp on history and economics textbooks, stressing the superiority of American capitalism, questioning the Founding Fathers’ commitment to a purely secular government and presenting Republican political philosophies in a more positive light. "

"The board’s far-right faction has spent months now proclaiming the importance of emphasizing America’s exceptionalism in social studies classrooms. But today they voted to remove one of the greatest of America’s Founders, Thomas Jefferson, from a standard about the influence of great political philosophers on political revolutions from 1750 to today. "


“We are adding balance,” said Dr. Don McLeroy, the leader of the conservative faction on the board, after the vote. “History has already been skewed. Academia is skewed too far to the left.”

I actually laughed at this one, BALANCE? How can they even think that they are offering any balance when they are taking pieces and parts out they THEY disagree with and do not like.

Just another example of the conservative movement to make the world into what they want it to be. They don't like history, so let's just change it and make it into what they want it to be with the values they want to reflect.