Texas Governor's Race

Bill White, the Democrat challenging incumbent Texas Governor Rick Perry, has found a sore spot to pick.

It’s almost May, which means that the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) is near to finalizing the laughable social studies curriculum revision for Texas public schools.  Just about everybody has weighed in on this potential debacle, and now Bill White is leveling his guns. Rick Perry, you see, appointed the clown leading this circus.

White was in Austin Saturday speaking to teachers at the Association of Texas Professional Educators convention. Speaking broadly on some of the education challenges facing Texas, White told a packed room what he plans to do to make sure students are better prepared to enter the workforce. He also talked about what he calls a flawed testing system, challenges with the student-to-teacher ratio and how many Texans are being priced out of higher education.

Pointing at the state’s high dropout rate, White said "I'll be active in leadership, in bringing kids back to school. There's many strategies to do it, not just one solution. We need to start early with early childhood educations that work, prepare young people for the classroom. They've proved to be a high return on investment."

The main focus of the talk, however, took aim at recent amendments the State Board of Education made to social studies curriculum standards; amendments written by the overwhelmingly right wing and creationist members of the board.

In a 10-5 vote on March 12, the SBOE gave preliminary approval to the new standards, even though they were opposed by leading experts in the field and by reasonable people everywhere. They are changes dictated by politics and ideology rather than truth or educational interests.

Speaking to this, White said that a line needs to be drawn between what politicians want, and those who make front-line decisions on education. "The amendment process injected politics into our school books and classrooms," White has said, and that was "a step in the wrong direction."

White called on Gov. Rick Perry to urge the SBOE chair to send the amendments back to the original curriculum review teams, a move already laughed off by Perry.

White wants to be sure Texans are well equipped to enter the workforce, something that will be crippled if our educational standards are less than world class. Because Texas is one of the largest purchasers of textbooks nationally, the curriculum changes could resonate across the country. The debate has already garnered national attention with other states already making moves to limit the damage.

White called on Perry today to ask lame duck SBOE chair McLeroy to delay the vote until newly elected board members are in office. This would be a wise and reasonable move, which is exactly why Perry will likely reject it.

Some of the flat-earthers on the board were defeated in recent primary elections, and one has voluntarily decided against seeking reelection. Delaying the vote until a new board is seated would likely cause the amendments to fail. White recognizes this, and likely so does Perry.

"Texas voters have voted against those who are extreme and hyper-political," said White campaign spokesperson Katy Bacon. "If Rick Perry won't show some leadership about the process, he should at least respect Texans who've said they don't want the current, controversial SBOE making decisions about their children's future."

It isn’t just the Democratic challenger who recognizes McLeroy for the nutjob he is.  McLeroy has engaged in such extreme antics that the Texas Senate refused to confirm him in 2009, the second time Perry appointed him, and he was defeated in the spring primary election. 


This isn’t a new windmill for White. Nearly a month ago he called on Perry to ask McLeroy to send amendments back to the original curriculum review teams. Perry responded, saying of the SBOE that he was not going to "try to outsmart them."

Think about that one for a moment…

Since White started making his comments about having the revised standards sent back to expert review teams, the Texas Council for the Social Studies and the Texas Social Studies Supervisors Association have weighed in saying, "state education standards should be balanced and neutral and not reflective of political viewpoints."

The Chair of the SBOE is appointed by the Governor. The 15-member board is elected to represent districts. The Board currently is dominated by Christian, creationist extremists who were elected in part because of the gerrymandering back in 2001.

More importantly though, they were elected because the religious right targeted the SBOE as a priority, knowing that the way to increase their ranks was to be found in the creative revisionism of curriculum standard, such as we see now.

Much of this happened while reasonable Texans were not looking. It was a conspiracy, and we slept through it. We’re awake now and recognize that we have to put all our efforts into reversing the damage. The Governor’s race is important, and so is the 2012 election when the entire 15-member SBOE is up for election. We must stay focused on that.

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McLeroy is out… Mercer isn’t

The primary results are in.

To nobody's surprise, Gov. Goodhair won the Republican gubernatorial contest, handing a surprisingly lopsided defeat to Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson. Considering that Texas managed to survive the current recession in better condition than other states, and our secessionist homeboy and teabag sympathizer painted Kay with the “Washington insider” mud brush, the only surprise was the margin.

The down-ticket Republican races were more interesting; especially the contests for seats on the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE). This is the joke of a State agency about which I have previously rather caustically written.

It wasn't always that way, but since the same election that swept Ann Richards, our last (and one of our best) Democratic Governor out of office and replacing her with The Shrub in 1994, the Texas SBOE has been populated with extremists, fundamentalists, creationists and young-Earth revisionists intent on turning Texas schools into Redneck, Madrases-like temples of indoctrination, and a complete laughing stock within U.S. education circles.

Of particular interest to me was the Place 9 seat, pitting incumbent former SBOE chairperson, Baptist fundamentalist, science denier and history revisionist Don McLeroy, against a more politically moderate, pro-education challenger, Bill Ratliff. Ratliff is the son of former Texas Lt. Governor Bill Ratliff, Sr., and thus had name recognition.

I’ve mentioned McLeroy before.

The vote wasn't a runaway, but Ratliff seems to have pulled a rabbit out of the hat.

The other SBOE primary race I was watching didn’t turn out so well. Place 5 incumbent Ken Mercer beat his closest opponent by a ratio greater than 2 to 1. Mercer is another of the fundamentalists attempting to rewrite curriculum standards to match their creationist revisionism, so this is a shame, but with Ratliff on the board perhaps Mercer’s effect will be diluted.

Because of the efforts of these Texas Taliban to deny science and rewrite history to match their King James inspired visions, the board gained a reputation as “the most dysfunctional agency in Texas government.”

Paul Burka, writing in this month’s Texas Monthly magazine, provides some interesting history of the trials and tribulations of the SBOE, including quotes from retiring board member Cynthia Dunbar’s book, One Nation Under God: a “subtly deceptive tool of perversion

“Rather than address how to improve public schools, [the SBOE] seek to slay dragons—evolution, sex education, whole language, new ways of teaching math, unpatriotic depictions of Texas and American history.”

It seems we’ve always had our troubles with the fundamentalists in this state . William Cowper Brann, an early 20th century journalist from Waco, TX, once observed, “I have nothing against the Baptists. I just believe they were not held under long enough."

Brann died after he was shot in the back by an irate Baptist.

SIDEBAR: McLeroy’s campaign was bankrolled in part by donations from Houston builder Bob Perry, one of the nation’s biggest campaign contributors, and the person who gave huge donations to the campaigns of former Texas Governor and U.S. President George W. Bush, and to current Texas Governor Rick Perry (no relation). Bob Perry is also the builder who tried (unsuccessfully so far), to screw a retired Fort Worth area couple by building a defective home, then reneging on the warranty.

That backfired on him, and now he has to pay. He may not be funding any more campaigns for awhile.
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UPDATE: The xtian press isn't very pleased about McLeroy's loss. Editorials appeared overnight in the Christian Press, and the Baptist Standard.
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Texas Poised to Overtake Tennessee

Please watch the following videos. The first is Texas State Board of Education Chairman, Don McLeroy (whom I have blogged about before) as he attempts to justify the dogged determination of the creationists on the SBOE to inject mythology into Texas science classes. This rant follows on the heels of a guest OpEd piece McLeroy wrote for the Austin American Statesman.



Taking into account that McLeroy is a dentist and is very likely not well schooled in the biological sciences, and taking into account McLeroy’s avowed creationist bent, I find his editorial to be very weak even before we dissect his “facts.” But for the sake of accuracy, let’s dissect those facts.

McLeroy either grossly misunderstands the science he quotes, or is deliberately obfuscating the science. What McLeroy does such a bad job of is understanding punctuated equilibria. This is the theory Stephen Jay Gould referred to in the paper from which McLeroy quotes. The theory states that most species experience negligible change for the largest portion of their history, which is revealed as stasis in the fossil record. But Gould goes on to state that when the kind of phenotypic evolution McLeroy admits does occur, it is geologically localized and occurring in sporadic, branching events.

The fossil record indicates that a species generally survives somewhere around 5-10 million years and that they change very little in that time period. This is Gould’s "stasis." That McLeroy so badly misunderstands. Evolution occurred in spits and spurts separated by millions of years of punctuated equilibria.

McLeroy’s rant is no threat to the theory of evolution, but his actions and those of half of the appointed (by Rick Perry, which is another story altogether) SBOE, added to the fact that the 2nd largest purchaser of textbooks in the country will now demand books supporting myth over science, and you have a situation which could possibly affect even those not in Texas. This is very troublesome.

Now follows a bit of explanation how Texas science books will become the laughing stock of the scientific world, even though the SBOE hired a board of experts to aid in writing the standards. This is biology Professor David Hillis from the University of Texas. Professor Hillis was one of the panel of experts who helped write the initial standards.



So McLeroy’s quote mining can be dismissed, as it becomes painfully apparent that his goal is not teaching our kids science, but propping up his creationist views. If this standard had been in effect when I was in school I could have aced all those science quizzes. The answer to every question would have been “God did it!”

The die may be cast, but the battle is far from over. For much more information and some interesting links, please visit the Texas Citizens for Science website.

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Verbatim

TFN: April 25, 2011, by Jose

Publisher Proposes Creationist Materials

The Texas Education Agency has released proposed supplemental web-based materials for science courses from publishers who want their product in your child’s classroom as early as the 2011-2012 school year.

But there’s a problem with at least one of those publishers that represents a potential leap backward for science education in Texas.

International Databases, Inc., a previously unknown company apparently based in New Mexico, has submitted materials that make no attempt to hide a slant toward creationism and intelligent design, and away from established scientific fact.

Submissions by International Databases and other publishers can be reviewed at the Texas Education Agency website.

Below are a few examples of attacks on evolution and creationist statements in International Databases’ materials found during a preliminary review by TFN and the NCSE (click on each image to enlarge):

Module 1: Origin Nucleotide (slide 19)

Since such materialistic, self organization scenarios now have a history of scientific
insufficiency for explaining the Origin of Life on Earth, the Null hypothesis (default) stands.
This allows for the testing of the legitimate scientific hypothesis……Life on Earth is the
result of intelligent causes.

Module 8: Teacher Resources (Slide 3)

…at the end of the instructional unit on the Origins of Life, students should go home with
the understanding that a new paradigm of explaining life’s origins is emerging from the failed
attempts of naturalistic scenarios. This new way of thinking is predicated upon the
hypothesis that intelligent input is necessary for life’s origins.

Module 7: Null Hypothesis (Slide 7)

This module sets up two competing explanations for the origin of life: “Non-intelligent
Causes” vs. “Intelligent Causes.” The clear intent is to make a case for an intelligent
designer. The slide below tells students that “until advocates of non-intelligent causes
sustain their claim,” students must accept that life on earth is a result of intelligent causes.

Module 7: Scientific Method (Slide 6)

Many scientists have adopted an unproven hypothesis upon which to build their theories
regarding the origin of life and its’ diversification. This ‘foundation’ is called scientific
materialism, naturalism, and so forth… There are other scientists who have adopted the
unproven hypothesis that an intelligence is necessary to explain both the origin, and
diversification of life on Earth. This view follows from the human experience that teaches
order (complexity) results from intelligent action.

We’ll remind you that it was the SBOE that opened the door to a submission like International Databases’.

In 2009, the SBOE approved new science curriculum standards that call into question the established, mainstream science supporting evolution. At the time, TFN and NCSE warned that the new standards would encourage some vendors and groups to submit textbooks and other instructional materials promoting creationist claims and other pseudoscience in Texas science classrooms.

You have the opportunity to weigh in. Contact the SBOE by email atreview.adoption@tea.state.tx.us before the July meeting and tell them to stand up for science and reject creationist materials in public schools.

Will it hold up to a SCOTUS review?

This just in from the Texas Freedom Network:

‘Christian Land Governed by Christian Principles’

Even before the Texas State Board of Education took up its expected debate today over what students will learn about separation about church and state in their social studies classrooms, board member Cynthia Dunbar, R-Richmond, made her position clear. She offered the board’s opening prayer this morning and removed any doubt about what she and other far-right board members want students to learn: America’s laws and government should be based on the Christian Bible.

Stop what you are doing and watch this video now -- you have to see it to believe it.

Laying out in blunt language the “Christian nation” vision of American history that the board’s powerful bloc of social conservatives espouses, Dunbar threw down the gauntlet:

“I believe no one can read the history of our country without realizing that the Good Book and the spirit of the savior have from the beginning been our guiding geniuses.”

“Whether we look to the first charter of Virginia, or the charter of New England…the same objective is present — a Christian land governed by Christian principles.”

“I like to believe we are living today in the spirit of the Christian religion. I like also to believe that as long as we do so, no great harm can come to our country.”

You will recall that Dunbar, in her 2008 book, One Nation Under God, argued that the Founders created “an emphatically Christian government” (page 18 of her book) and that government should be guided by a “biblical litmus test” (page 47). Even more damning, this State Board of Education member wrote that public education is a “subtly deceptive tool of perversion,” tyrannical and unconstitutional.

And today she will help decide what the next generation of Texas students will learn about separation of church and state in their public school classrooms.

You can follow the conclusion to this embarrassing saga on our liveblog at TFNInsider.org. And look for an e-mail later today with the final decision of the board -- and what we can do now to restore sanity and respectability to Texas education.

It's important that all Texans see how bad things have gotten at the state board.
Forward this e-mail to friends and post this clip to your Facebook page.

Texas Freedom Network advances a mainstream agenda of religious freedom and individual liberties to counter the radical right.

Make a donation to support the work of TFN.

Tell a friend to subscribe to TFN News Clips, Alerts or Rapid Response Teams. Subscribers may choose the issue areas that interest them.

If I haven’t made it clear enough in previous blogs, this is the kind of fanatical religionism we are fighting here in Texas, but Texas is just the latest battlefront in this war. Religious fanatics worldwide are and have been intent upon installing their own vision of theocratic rule since the dawn of recorded history. It is a war that will go on regardless of how many battles the rational people fight and win.

Listen to Ms. Dunbar’s words. Over and over you hear, “I believe.” The religionist totalitarians all “believe” they know the answer; know what god wants. Mohammed Atta “believed” he was doing god’s will when he participated in the slaughter of 2,976 innocent lives on September 11, 2001.

The five creationist extremists on the SBOE are of the same mindset as Mohammed Atta; just a different theology.

So will the Texas State Board of Education be the vanguard of some long awaited nationalistic movement to return our country to Sharia biblical law?

Hell no. Not so long as reasonable people speak their mind.

The kind of theocracy building being attempted by the SBOE, with the blessing of Gov. Goodhair, won’t survive SCOTUS review. But the extremists won’t let that stop them. It may take a few years to clean up their mess, but the rule of law will eventually prevail.

Either that or we can just burn our Constitutions right now and be done with it.

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This woman wants your kids

Barbara Cargill is running for State Board of Education place 8 seat. The Texas SBoE writes the curriculum that will be used for future textbook. She is Guv. Goodhair's hand picked successor to that whacky dentist, Don McLeroy.

Doesn't get out much, does she? Bless her pointed little head...

Dear Barbara and her cohorts are the product of decades of slow inflitration into the SBoE by dominionist xian zealots. For more information on the ongoing battle for the minds of Texas school children, read the TFN Timeline of textbook censorship.

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Texas' education standards cause nationwide alarm

There are several news stories and opinion pieces published recently from around the country, indicating a real level of concern over the proposed, soon to become real, schoolbook standards in Texas.

Educators and legislators across the nation are baffled by the glaring inaccuracies proposed, and apparently accepted by the SBOE. The concern is such that one California legislator has proposed a bill that would keep those standards out of California schools.

Others are just laughing, saying Texans are proud of their ignorance.

The Texas State Board of Education is top-heavy with young-earth creationists who would rewrite history and science to fit an ignorant and myopic worldview.

Regardless of how it seems, not all Texans are that ignorant. These idiopathic zealots on the Board deny documented, verifiable evidence and force their own ignorance upon the rest of us.

Still, reasonable Texans seem powerless to stop the malignant devolvement from within, but there could be hope from outside the state. If enough school systems and state boards refused to buy books containing the Texas brand of revisionism, the publishers might be forced to print alternate versions of the same book to suit different markets. That would be costly.

Another possible solution would be for textbook publishers simply to reject the TxSBOE’s standards, simply refusing to print texts meeting the obviously inaccurate standards.

…but I guess we can figure that won’t happen.

So what do we do? As a first step we can all join Just Educate, a grassroots effort being pushed by the Texas Freedom Network with the goal of persuading politicians in Texas the future of our kids is being compromised by the politicized nature of SBOE actions, and to ensure that sound scholarship, not personal agenda, guides Texas public school curriculum.

Reasonable Texans are tired of our state being the laughingstock of the world.

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Why America is no longer exceptional

This is one of the more damning reports I believe I’ve ever read.

“81 percent of seniors from our top fifty-five colleges and universities failed a test of basic U.S. history questions drawn from a national exam designed for high school seniors.  Only 22 percent knew, for example, that the words “government of the people, by the people, for the people” came from Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address.  If most American youngsters don’t learn about their nation’s history in the K-12 years, they are unlikely ever to learn about it.”

From a History News Network article. Read the whole story HERE.

The sad part about this is we don’t seem to ever learn that putting dogmatists in charge of educational content contributes to the decline of understanding and knowledge. Judging from recent ballot victories, this might be just what the majority of Americans want.

The discussion in this report is about history, but social studies and science are also under dogmatist attack. Witness a recent opinion piece in Forbes, another in the Palm Beach Post, and some of the work coming from the Texas SBOE.

I'm sorry. The people who vote Republican want conservative, but that is not what they are getting. The Republican party long ago married itself to the "social" conservatives, and those now make up the vast majority of the biggoted dogmatists who have floated to the top of the right wingnut cesspool.

I'm all in favor of fiscal conservatism, but that goal will remain unachievable so long as these science deniers and historical revisionists remain in power. Their brand of "conservatism" more resembles the dream of the Taliban than that of the Founders of our nation. 

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