Posted on 08/31/2010 11:45:55 PM PDT by Rashputin
In 2004, liberal historian Thomas Frank published What’s the Matter with Kansas?, a bestselling book in which the author expresses his utter mystification at how the citizens of Kansas could hold conservative values and vote Republican, when socialist economics and the Democratic Party were so self-evidently superior. While the author looked down his nose at the inscrutable ignorant rubes of Kansas, insultingly treating them like laboratory rats unable to solve the simplest maze, the book and its popularity ended up being more of a commentary on the ideological blindness of the author and his left-leaning readers: try as they might, they just don’t get it. As the book revealed, it’s not that left-wingers disagree with conservative principles; they actually cannot grasp the notion of having any principles whatsoever.
When it comes to the left/right divide over education, the focal point now is not Kansas, but Texas. As discussed in Part I of this essay, Texas plays a pivotal role in determining the content of textbooks used nationwide. And yet, bucking the national trend toward a left-leaning educational system, Texas consistently has pushed the conservative viewpoint at its influential school board meetings — infuriating and, yes, mystifying their liberal detractors. And so the time has come to rephrase the question: What’s the Matter with Texas? Why do Texans insist on being conservative when their self-appointed intellectual superiors have tried every trick in the book — mockery, bullying, media bias, legislation — to change the culture of the Lone Star State?
(Excerpt) Read more at pajamasmedia.com ...
explain the impact of Enlightenment ideas from the writings of John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, Voltaire, Charles de Montesquieu, Jean Jacques Rousseau, Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin, and William Blackstone and Thomas Jefferson on political revolutions from 1750 to the present
I can't understand why someone would have a problem with striking Jefferson from this list - there's a more than obvious difference between him and everyone else. He alone actually participated in the Revolution. Lefties accusing the TSBE of trying to "expunge Jefferson from the record" based on this sentence are merely showing their inner pettiness. Yet the author lets such an idiotic accusation stand, and even goes so far as to agree with it. He has some blind spots which tend to corrupt his entire article.
PS..Interesting article..I may cringe on occasion but thank heavens in Texas we have someone to fight the left wing history and agenda in school.
Save The Children!
I agree.. ;)
This jackass needs to get over himself.
He’s distorting the truth more than his allies on the right, whom he lumps in with the vile scum of the left.
Too often it is assumed that those not in total agreement with what is targeted in battlegrounds like Texas are totally opposed with the goal. Somehow, the people who agree that the left has gone wild in education need to be persuaded that the alternative can work and can develop something far better and far more honest. This is a battle we have to win. Those in the middle who agree the left is way off base but don't agree with some of what is proposed as alternatives are worth studying as a means to develop a better battle plan.
Regards
Time for a new book: “What’s wrong with Thomas Frank?”
The only problem is that is will be a short book. Page one: Thomas Frank is a clueless socialist who needs to get outside his box and meet America. The End.
We’ve lived in Texas for five years and, at one point, thought we were going to retire here and make this our home.
Sadly, the property taxes are crushing. I cannot imagine building our dream home, then loosing 14% of our retirement pension to be allowed to live in the house we built and paid for. We simply won’t be able to afford to grow old here.
Texas has the second highest property taxes in the Union. I love so many things about this state, but they’re doing something wrong in this area.
Meg ole girl....you have been here in Texas long enough to have heard the saying: “carry your a$$ on down the road”... if you don’t like it and are so ignorant as to why property taxes are so high....(hint: no income taxes and schools are paid for through property taxes) bye, bye..
The Libs need not worry. Illegal immigration will solve this problem for them.
Neither would Calvin. In any event, I think that’s why they struck out the term “Enlightenment” in their final document.
They need to just read the 1st amendment not take the Federal supreme dictators edicts on its “official meaning”.
The First amendment clearly says: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances”
Any broadening of this as to include prohibitions upon the powers of the States and/or infringement upon the right of the people to practice their religion by the Federal court is nothing more then an aggressive act to assert dictatorial authority by the same Federal court.
The Texas State Board of Education is 100% right to tell it how it is. If the people don’t read their laws how are they to have any hope of stopping and reversing the aggrieves abuses of our Federal injustice system?
I’m sorry but i can never agree with teaching the Federal courts lawless edicts as “law”. The Court decides the guilt or innocence of particular and spesfic cases. They CANNOT be presumed to have the authority to decide the meaning of the same Constitutional law which defines their own authority!
For the sake of Liberty tell our children to read the actual amercement for themselves with their own eyes! Don’t let some dictators a thousand miles away dictate their own law.
That is no difference then accepting the abuses of the Catholic Church instead of embracing the protestant reformation. If the law was simply a matter of what the Federal courts dictated it was, then there would be no law merely Federal dictators with life time appointments.
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