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TROY DEMOCRATIC CLUB

 TDC NEWSLETTER  

April 2010

What’s Inside?

COMING EVENTS…………………………………………….…………….…………2

• OCDP STRAW POLL FOR GOVERNOR – APRIL 7

• TDC EXEC. BOARD – APRIL 14

• MDP ENDORSEMENT CONVENTION – APRIL 17

• TDC GENERAL MEETING - APRIL 21

RECAP OF PAST EVENTS……………………………………………..………..…….3

• MEMBERSHIP:

NEWS FROM OTHER DEMOCRATIC AND ALLIED GROUPS……………......................4

• CONGRESSMAN GARY PETERS

• 9TH DISTRICT DEMOCRATIC PARTY

• TIM BURNS: COUNTY COMMISSIONER

• MICHIGAN DEMOCRATIC PARTY

• GILDA JACOBS REPORT

• COFFEE PARTY. APRIL 17TH AT 1 PM

• MICHIGAN EARTH DAY FEST, ROCHESTER, APRIL 23-25

• SENATOR GEORGE MCGOVERN, JUNE 8, TEMPLE BETH EL

EDITORIALS………………………………………………………..……………...7

1. What Kinds of Capital Are Necessary To Build A Society?

2. Book Review: Counterknowledge: How we surrendered to conspiracy theories, quack medicine, bogus science, and fake history.

3. Texas Taliban?

Put together by volunteer labor working at home in our “spare” time

Current Events

TDC Executive Board Meeting: WEDNESDAY APRIL 14 AT 7:00 PM

The Troy Dems Executive Board will meet from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m., Wednesday, April 14, at Vice-Chair Kathy Martin’s house (707 Kimberly, Troy 48098). All Troy Dems members are welcome to attend to help plan the Club’s 2010 activities.

TDC General Meeting: April 21 at 7 pm

Dan Farough is Congressman Gary Peters’ Campaign Manager and has agreed to talk to us on April 21 at the Troy Community Center, Rm 305 at 7:00 p.m. about Representative Peters record in Congress to date, and about the certainty that his seat is deeply coveted by the Republicans who will certainly spend money to take it back. He will also answer questions put forth by the audience.

There will also be discussion of Precinct Delegates

OCDP Straw Poll for Governor:

Who do you want as our next Governor?:

Virg Bernero, Andy Dillon, or Alma Wheeler Smith

On April 7, the OCDP will host its…

….Potluck, Politics, & the FIRST 2010 Election Straw Poll!

Don't miss out -- vote now or in-person April 7th. Bring a dish to pass, meet the candidates and enjoy the company of hundreds of Democrats.

OCDP mailed ballots to over 10,000 volunteers in the 2008 election; this will be a great opportunity to keep the momentum of recent Democratic successes.

Disappointed? Elated? Attend the Potluck and Campaign for YOUR Candidate!

Wednesday, April 7th

6:30 - 9:00 pm

UFCW Local 876 Hall

876 Horace Brown Drive

Madison Heights, MI 48071

$20 if you pay in advance and $30 if you pay at the door

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Michigan Democratic Party

MDP endorsement convention for April 17 at Cobo Center

The Michigan Democratic Party will hold a convention on Saturday, April 17, at Cobo Center in Detroit, to endorse candidates for Michigan Attorney General and Secretary of State. Constituency group caucuses will start at 8 a.m. and Congressional district caucuses at 10 a.m., with the convention following at 1 p.m. and the Jefferson-Jackson Day dinner later the same evening.

MDP members age 16 and older who have been in good standing at least 30 days before the convention will be able to cast endorsement votes. In order to vote at the Endorsement Convention a person (other than precinct delegates, candidates and elected officials) must have been a member of the Michigan Democratic Party by March 19. See http://www.michigandems.com/ for more info

The candidates for Secretary of State are Janice Winfrey and Jocelyn Benson

The candidates for Attorney General are David Leyton and Richard Bernstein

During a February 27 State Central Committee meeting at which the decision was made, MDP Chair Mark Brewer explained that an April endorsement will give candidates for these positions more time to mount their statewide campaigns. They cannot be nominated officially until the August convention, but an earlier endorsement prior to their official nomination will give them a boost vs. their GOP challengers.

Under MDP rules, candidates for Attorney General and Secretary of State arre nominated by the state party, not in a primary election. Endorsements and nominations for Governor and Lieutenant Governor will wait until after the August 3 primary election.

The Troy Democratic Club is offering a carpool to this convention. Please contact Vice-Chair Kathy Martin at KIERAN2@aol.com to sign up

RECAP OF PAST EVENTS:

Membership Committee

Three Reasons For Joining:

1. If you were disappointed in the election results and want to do something about it, then please join the TDC and help us Save Our City.

2. If you have some favorite candidates of your own for local, county, or state level positions, then please join the TDC and help your candidates.

3. If you believe that moderate or progressive policies are the best hope of insuring the future prosperity of our city, state, and nation.

Welcome, New Members Albert Gui and Louise Schilling

Also thanks to Renewing Members: Kati Cafagna, Ken & Bea Smits, Kirsten Neilson Hartig, Carla Meier, Mike Smith, Jerry Bixby, Robert & Barbara Jackson, Gary McGillivray, Subhash Subhedar, George Gregory and Cathy Fucinari.

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If you have any questions on membership, please contact Kimberly McFall at

membership@troydemocrats.org

NEWS FROM OTHER DEMOCRATIC AND ALLIED GROUPS

Congressman Gary Peters

Gary’s district office is in Troy at 560 Kirts Boulevard, #105. Please contact him via that office if you have issues and concerns that he might help you with. Phone: (248) 273-4227 Fax: (248) 273-4704. Our own Kevin Hrit is on the staff at this office.

“I would love to continue the work to help our nation heal from this economic crisis, and as a member of the Financial Services committee, I am in a unique position to help out. As I continue in my efforts, I need and welcome your thoughts on such challenging issues as the economy, health care, and the war in Afghanistan, among others. Again, I am deeply appreciative of your financial support. With your help, I know that we will continue to gather the support necessary to make sure that change can stay in Washington”

9th District Democratic Party:

We are Proud of Congressman Peters' Service. We have been very fortunate to have a congressman who shares our values working for us. Congressman Peters has been fighting to save Michigan jobs and to advance progressive legislation that will protect middle-class Americans.

Less than six months after taking office, Congressman Peters led the successful effort to keep the Orion Township General Motors plant open by persuading GM to build its new small car at the facility.

Congressman Peters introduced the Advanced Vehicle Technology Act, which will provide over $500 million in annual federal funding for vehicle research and development. The bill was supported by a broad, bi-partisan coalition of businesses, labor groups, and environmental organizations, and it passed by the House of Representatives by a wide margin. Once the bill is passed by the Senate, it will provide huge benefits to Oakland County by supporting high-paid jobs in what continues to be the world capital of automotive research.

Congressman Peters cast a courageous and principled vote in favor of the health care reform bill in order to dramatically expand health insurance coverage, curtail the system's out-of-control costs, and reduce the federal budget deficit. As a member of the House Financial Services Committee, Congressman Peters is actively involved in crafting legislation to protect investors and consumers of financial services and to prevent a future recurrence of the banking meltdown that we witnessed a year ago. In pursuit of this goal, Congressman Peters recently led a forum on the topic in Oakland County with congresspeople from around the country.

Join Us on Facebook

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In order to keep up with all of you young hipsters, the 9th District Party is now on Facebook! Please join us: the name of our group is 9th Congressional District Democrats (MI).

Keep in Touch with the 9th District Democratic Party

Our website is http://www.9thdistrictdems.org/. Please feel free to call or e-mail me anytime with any questions, concerns, or suggestions.

Tim Burns: County Commissioner Join Tim on Facebook Get regular real-time updates from County Commissioner Tim Burns by friending him on Facebook. Visit him at www.facebook.com/TimBurns

For more information regarding my work as County Commissioner, please visit my website: www.timothyburns.org. What is a County Commissioner? Oakland County Commissioners are the legislature for county government. County Commissioners oversee a budget of nearly $1 billion dollars and serve as a liaison between Oakland County government and local communities

TIM BURNS COUNTY COMMISSIONER 19TH DISTRICT [Clawson and Troy] www.timothyburns.org

Michigan Democratic Party News:

MDP makes voter lists available to primary election candidates

The Executive Committee of the Michigan Democratic Party has voted to allow Democratic candidates in primary election campaigns to have free access to the party’s Voter Activation Network (VAN). The VAN provides contact info and political party preference data about Michigan voters.

Until now, VAN access was available only for the general election campaign to Democratic candidates who already had won their primary election.

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OCDP Young Democrats:

For more information contact: (248) 584-0510 / youngdemocrats@ocdp.org

Gilda Jacobs Report:

SENATE DEMOCRATS FIGHT FOR FAMILIES AND SCHOOLS IN STATE BUDGET

The Senate last week passed the first department budgets with Senate Democrats voting against them because of the harm they would do to families and schools. The School Aid Budget was passed with a $118 per pupil cut which Senate Democrats objected to. Republicans claim that this cut would not be needed if savings are realized through the retirement plan for school and state employees. But those retirement bills have not been taken up by either the Senate or the House of Representatives. Senate Democrats also voted against the Department of Community Health budget which cuts funding for MI Child mental health services, prevention services for children ages 0-3, and non-Medicaid funding for Community Mental Health Centers. The budgets for Higher Education and Community Colleges also passed on a largely party line vote with Democrats objecting to cuts to these budgets.

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SUPPORT THE COFFEE PARTY!

You have undoubtedly heard of the TEA Party – those anti-tax, anti-government, anti-progress people who heckled politicians’ attempts to have reasoned discussions of the health plan this summer, and undoubtedly helped to defeat Troy’s millage proposal and so help to put us into a dire financial emergency. Well, their opposite number – The COFFEE PARTY – has been organized a few weeks ago and went viral over the entire nation. You can join them on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/coffeeparty?ref=mf.

Who or what are they? They are a spontaneously organized community of people who value the democratic process, want to see our politicians work together to solve problems rather than strive to create roadblocks and belittle their political opponents.

The Coffee Party Pledge says it all:

As a member or supporter of the Coffee Party, I pledge to conduct myself in a way that is civil, honest, and respectful toward people with whom I disagree. I value people from different cultures, I value people with different ideas, and I value and cherish the democratic process.

A Troy group had their first meeting at Panera Bread on March 13, and drew ~50+ people. Their NEXT MEETING for the Metro Detroit area is scheduled for the TROY LIBRARY on April 17 at 1 p.m. Call 248-524-3538 for information.

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Michigan Earth Day Fest, April 23-25, Rochester, MI

Exhibits open, with free admission, at 3rd and Water Streets:

4-7 p.m., Friday, April 23

11 a.m. - 7 p.m., Saturday, April 24

11 a.m. - 5 p.m., Sunday, April 25

The parade will be from 10 to 11 a.m., Saturday, April 24

There will be 200+ green and wellness exhibits, including a kids' corner, entertainment; solar, wind and geothermal energy; electric and hybrid vehicles; home and garden; an art fair, farmers' market and petting farm; healthy living resources; home improvement and energy conservation info. This event is touted as "Michigan's largest Earth Day celebration."

More info is available at www.MIearthday.com

Sen. George McGovern to speak on Tuesday June 8 at free event at Temple Beth El

Sen. George McGovern, the Democratic Party’s 1972 presidential nominee, will speak about his new book, Abraham Lincoln, and do a book signing starting at Temple Beth El, 7400 Telegraph at 14 Mile Road. The talk was originally scheduled for May but had to be postponed until Tuesday, June 8,

Admission is free, but tickets are required. There are FREE tickets for the event. To request tickets from Temple Beth El, call (248) 865-0617, then press 1.

During his distinguished career, McGovern served as the first director of the Food for Peace program and as a professor of history and political science in addition to his service in the U.S. Senate. He was a decorated bomber pilot in World War II. EDITORIALS:

EDITORIAL 1:

WHAT KINDS OF CAPITAL ARE NECESSARY TO BUILD A SOCIETY?

Our country and the world recently had a severe shortage of ready money, of available financial capital, which resulted in the forced liquidation of many large and vital financial institutions. The lack of money resulted in The Great Recession which has devastated Main Street even more than Wall Street. We in Troy can see that impact in the $22 million deficit our City is forecasting over the next five years. And we can see the repercussions of that financial collapse in the refusal of Troy voters to approve a temporary tax to carry the City though the hard times. The City’s jewels which are the basis for Troy’s high quality of life are to be closed as a direct consequence of the sudden shortage of

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financial credit, just as the jewels of Wall Street – Lehman Brothers, AIG, and the rest – have also closed and vanished into history.

But even the financial community needs more than money, more than financial capital. Recent investigations have found that the senior executives of Lehman Bros, for example, were warned beforehand that their financial dealings were both risky and legally suspect, and did not support their reassuring words they were simultaneously saying to their colleagues and clients in the financial community. The whistleblower was fired, the games continued, and the company collapsed. Clearly Lehman Bros (and other firms as well) had violated their colleagues’ trust in their word. Lies were told. People acted as if those lies were true. True harm was done. And those liars will never be trusted again by their fellows on Wall Street.

What this shows is that Financial Capital alone is not sufficient to build a community. Trust is also needed. A community cannot long exist if some members continuously lie to the other members. This is not a radical thought. Social scientists, historians, and other commentators of the social scene all know that trust – aka Social Capital - is essential to any society. Francis Fukuyama, a conservative public policy professor who was a key contributor to the Reagan Doctrine and a founder of neoconservatism, has defined social capital as follows:

”Social capital can be defined simply as a set of informal values or norms shared among members of a group that permits cooperation among them. If members of the group come to expect that others will react reliably and honestly, then they will come to trust one another. Trust is like a lubricant that makes the running of any group or organization more efficient”…”The norms that produce social capital…must substantively include virtues like truth telling, the meeting of obligations, and reciprocity”…”Social capital has benefits that go beyond the economic sphere. It is critical for the creation of a healthy civic society, that is, the realm of groups and associations that fall between the family and the state.” (The Great Disruption, pp16-18, 1999).

Troy is our civic society. We are conspicuously short on financial capital at the moment. How are we doing on social capital?

One way to answer this question is to examine the presence or absence of truthfulness in the campaign documents in the recent City tax election. The tax lost by almost a 2 to 1 vote. One could put forth rational economic reasons for refusing the tax. I am not arguing the outcome but the process. And so the question is whether true or false arguments were put forth by either side in the election. Troy Citizens United (TCU) was the main anti-tax organization, and the Troy Leadership Coalition (TLC) was an important component of the pro-Troy alliance of several groups.

Let us start with the campaign documents put out by Troy Citizens United. These consisted of at least one mailing shortly before the election listing a 29% increase in taxes as a consequence of a yes vote. The TCU website put the following quote from the City Assessor on their 2 Feb 2010 posting: "That would be correct, it would be an operating rate increase of 29%" said Mr. Licari to Councilman Howrylak. That statement is true enough as it stands. What is dishonest is to then conflate an operating rate increase of 29% (1.9 mill increase/6.5 mill city general fund operating millage) with a 29% increase in the property taxes people must pay as the TCU did in large bold letters on the front page of their four page brochure, and as they did on the Feb 6th posting on their website. The city operating millage is only one component of our property taxes, and if one takes this into account, then the overall increase in the total city taxes that would have been paid with the new millage would have been a 3.4% increase. The tax calculation offered by the TCU on their brochure conveniently forgot to include the fact that the taxable value of your home is likely going to decrease over the next five years, and so the average taxpayer would spend less money in future than now even with the new millage. Other anti-tax literature had this same sort of incomplete explanation of the tax. Although

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legal, it is deceptive advertising designed to leave a busy resident with little knowledge of the situation believing that he or she would have to spend 29% more if the tax passed. That would be a false belief.

At the TLC sponsored Open Forum on the tax issue held at Walsh College, the two main complaints made by the two TCU representatives were first, that Troy taxes were going up and up, and secondly, that Troy city spending was out of control. The first statement is demonstrably false, Troy taxes hit a high of 15 mills in 1973 and have been generally falling ever since then, In the past twenty years, Troy taxes were cut 9 (nine) times, in 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1995, 2002, 2006, and 2007.In that same twenty year period, they were raised only once, in 1996. It is not true to say that Troy taxes only go up and up when they actually mostly go down and down!. The second statement is misleading if not false. City spending has been decreasing ever since 2003 with a 13% decrease in employee numbers and other cutbacks detailed by the City Manager in his slide show of 9 Sept 2009. It is not true to say that spending is out of control when it has in fact been cut back even in the benefits area which many TCU people were criticizing.

• I used to wonder why all the detailed information in the City Manager’s presentations seemed to have no effect on the political comments of the TCU. Brendan Nyhan, a UM researcher, reported on the op-ed page of the 25 March NYTimes that ideologues who believed factually wrong information responded to the correct information by arguing so strenuously against the true facts that they strengthened the misperception in their own minds.

• The old saw has been proven true: “Don’t bother me with the facts, my mind is made up”.

I will only deal with two more incorrect statements. One claims that “members of” the Troy Democratic Club and “members of” eight different City Boards and Commissions were against the tax increase. The Troy Democratic Club voted unanimously to support the tax increase. Members of several of the City Boards came before City Council and stated that those organizations had no votes on the matter whatever. The TCU brochure basically lied about the behavior of these nine organizations but avoided legal trouble by putting the weasel words “members of” in front of their lies. Finally, the TCU must be given credit for trashing their supporters as well as their opponents. The TCU brochure and their glossy mailing stated that Mayor Pro Tem Wade Fleming advocated a No vote. That may be true, but Mayor Pro Tem Fleming unambiguously and clearly stated at a recent City Council meeting that he never gave the TCU permission to use his name, and that he immediately called the City Manager as soon as he realized that. [Why the City Manager? He is non-partisan and cannot do anything about campaign irregularities. Why not call the City Attorney? Or the Chair of the Troy Leadership Coalition? Both of these officials could have taken steps to have the TCU renounce the use of his name]. Nonetheless, TCU used his name on a political position without his permission, and this was wrong.

I am not aware of any factually based complaints about errors in the TLC campaign literature, nor has anyone questioned the facts used in the TDC editorials in this Newsletter. If any complaints are made about the latter, I will respond to them.

So the situation is that we had a hard fought ideologically based political battle in which false and/or misleading statements were made. The town is divided, and in this we mirror the country. Our social capital is depleted at the local, state, and national levels.

The lack of trust yields inefficient government. The lack of trust between Democratic and Republican national lawmakers is troubling to every patriot, regardless of their politics, for it points to trouble ahead. The troubles of the 1960s were generational as well as based on civil rights and the Vietnam War and the Pill. It rapidly became ideological and culminated in the assassinations of JFK, MLK, and RFK.. The present seems mildly similar to the 1930s, when the GOP ranted at “that man in the White

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House”, even as moderate Republicans worked in FDR’s cabinet as Secretaries of State and of War, among others. The Republican leadership continued to cooperate with the Democratic leadership on matters of national importance. And there were no threats of violence for voting a different way. By that standard, our lack of social capital has left our country worse off today than then in 1935 but not as bad as it was in 1968..

We are not yet as split as we were in the 1850s when the pro-slavery anti-Union and the anti-slavery pro-Union forces finally stopped speaking to one another and started shooting instead, but that is not a particularly encouraging statement. The presence of the internet and its rapid dissemination of ideological literature from the extremes of both left and right is a new factor not present before. Many people think the slogans and deceptive language are absolutely true and that their opponents are not just wrong but are evil. Evildoers are to be punished, and we have an easy availability of weapons. The last thing this country needs is to re-enact the political assassinations of the 1960s. We cannot go there again, and I hope the Secret Service knows that. Even in Troy, we have to try and heal the split; for as it is written: “If not now, when? If not me, who?”

We can start by trying to restore the lost social capital – the trust – that was depleted in the last election. How? We can start by trying to put a cap on deceptive and/or dishonest political advertising. How? I suggest that the Troy Leadership Coalition and the Troy Citizens United should select three non-partisan people to serve as a rapid-reaction; fact-checking committee who would be tasked with vetting all political advertisements in any form used during all future non-partisan City elections. Ideally, two members should be political reporters from major print publications respected by all for their local knowledge and lack of partisanship, while the third member should be selected for his/her legal knowledge and lack of partisanship and serve as moderator. Their reports on any political ad should be made quickly, ideally before distribution, and be immediately published in their papers or other venues. Any political group issuing a non-factually correct ad should alter the ad before distribution. Failure to do so would allow their opposing group to portray them as falsifiers of the truth and not to be trusted. That might be too huge a political price to pay just to distribute one false ad.

I can think of 100 reasons why this plan might not work. Pessimism is easy. But I remember the tears and pain of the sixties, the loss of alternative futures brought about by armed men with their own truths who did not believe in elections. I am haunted by the memory of the funeral oration that Robert Fitzgerald Kennedy gave for Martin Luther King in Indianapolis on the night he was killed, and of the silent tributes given to RFK only three months later by those who lined the tracks over which his funeral train rolled to Arlington and the burial of an aborted future. That memory is full enough to be the reason that we must try together to rebuild our social capital.

Robert Arking

PS. I am not the only person who has arrived at this conclusion. Peggy Noonan in her 27 March column in the Wall Street Journal wrote much the same thing. Check it out at http://online.wsj.com/article/declarations.html. Perhaps other people on both sides of the barricades might be willing to join us in the middle? We will never know unless we try.

Editorial 2:

BOOK REVIEW:

COUNTERKNOWLEDGE:How we surrendered to conspiracy theories, quack medicine, bogus science, and fake history. By Damian Thompson, Norton, 2008. 139 pp plus 22 pages of Notes, etc. Available at Troy Public Library. (for a year or so at any rate)

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This is a slim volume of six short chapters written by an editorial writer for the British newspaper The Daily Telegraph who also has a Ph.D. in the sociology of religion from the London School of Economics. The thesis of the book is clearly stated in his third paragraph of the first page:

“…counterknowledge: misinformation packaged to look like fact – packaged so effectively, indeed, that the twenty-first century is facing a pandemic of credulous thinking. Ideas that, in their original, raw form, flourished only on the fringes of society are now being taken seriously by educated people in the West, and are circulating with bewildering speed in the developing world”

Specific examples of such counterknowledge are 1) the US government knew in advance about the plan to crash passenger jets into the World Trade Center; 2) a Chinese fleet circumnavigated the globe in 1421, ‘discovering’ America 70 years before Columbus; 3) the structure of a cell is too complex to have evolved through natural selection, and so forth. Each of these statements is factually incorrect. A fact, of course, means “a thing that is known to have occurred, to exist, or to be true.” I should point out that the author only deals with matters of fact, and does not stray into matters of faith as such (although religious mis-interpretations of science, such as creationism, are clearly counted as counterknowledge).

After describing these and other examples in Chapter 1, the author focuses on creationism in Chapter 2, psuedohistory in Chapter 3, and dubious medical remedies in Chapter 4. He then describes the large profits that can be and are being made off of counterknowledge in Chapter 5. Here he describes three specific examples of how counterknowledge is deliberately created, spun, and distributed with the aim of earning large sums of money. The specific examples are 1) a DVD and book package titled The Secret which offers a recipe for achieving material wealth just by thinking about it ; 2) the mini-empire of the London-based nutritionist Patrick Holford whose highly profitable products and services are deeply embedded in British society; and 3) Gavin Medzies’ bogus history book “1421:The Year China Discovered America” . His description of these scams describes how false statements can be constructed and distributed and used to bring in great wealth without triggering any legal repercussions. Caveat emptor is the motto of the day. All three of these examples have been well served by the global and unrestricted reach of the internet. A century ago, such efforts might have remained as localized odd beliefs but would only rarely spread through the society; today they spread with the speed of rumor and the promise of gold. And they are repeated as truth by naïve or credulous or unthinking people.

Given that counterknowledge has been, is, and might well continue to be prevalent in our lives, then how do we live with it and how do we distinguish between knowledge and counterknowledge? Many people can’t tell the difference between credible news by objective reporters and that which they read on somebody’s blog. The author points out that the same internet which carries all the counterknowledge also carries the reports of “ freelance defenders of empirical truth, armed to the teeth with hard data, [who] have mounted devastating ambushes on quacks and frauds who have ventured too far into the public domain.” That is one defense. The better defense is for each individual to be able to logically judge the facts of the matter. This will likely be increasingly ineffective in future since my experience is that all too many university students cannot construct a logical, coherent, and tight argument for or against some argument. Two generations of poor education is taking its toll. Aided of course by proponents of counterknowledge such as those on the Texas School Board (see the following editorial). And of course by politicians who can say with a straight face and a slippery tongue that 29% = 3.4% (as in the first editorial).

Only reason can allow us to distinguish the factually true from the false. And the sleep of reason brings forth monsters.

Robert Arking

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Editorial 3:

TEXAS TALIBAN?

I have been reading for about a decade how the Texas State Board of Education has been trying to rewrite our children’s text books. They seem to be dominated by Right Wing evangelists who are hell bent on changing our children’s history text books to reflect their religious views. Since Texas and California are the largest purchasers of text books, what they say – or object to, gets changed by the publishers. California seems to acquiesce to Texas, so Texas end up calling the shots. But the rest of the country is stuck with what Texas deems ‘proper’. I have seen where civil rights, labor and our religious plurality have been getting short shifted in the constant rewriting of our kid’s history books. Historians and educators should be calling the shots – but they are not. The latest desecration of our history has come to the limelight. So egregious is their changes, that it has finally made national news. They have relegated Thomas Jefferson to a secondary status, including his writings regarding the separation of church & state. They have elevated Jefferson Davis to the level of Abraham Lincoln and portray the civil rights movement as having “unintended consequences”. This is just a few of the subtle and not so subtle changes they are making to a new crop of text books.

How many of you, along with me, have been complaining that kids today just’ don’t seem to understand how our government works – and seems to have a lack of understanding of our own history. Had I the time and ‘where withal’, I’d love to take an American History textbook, or a civics book of say 25 years ago, and compare it with the current crop being used by our kids today. I suspect I would be more shocked then I already feel. Our kids need to be educated – not indoctrinated.

So it begets the question – are our school boards truly looking at these text books? To me, it seems the criteria for insertion in a text book say of American History, is the impact a person or event or movement influenced our history. We need for our children to read about “the good, the bad, & the ugly”. We should neither sanitize our shortcomings nor glorify our past leaders. We had some remarkable men and women over the course of say 300 years that shaped our country and influenced events. As much as it is possible, all their contributions should be noted. I find it very disturbing to see that in Texas at least, history is being distorted on an altar of conservative ideology and Evangelical religious beliefs.

Even a cursory knowledge of historical events reveals how much mankind has lost in knowledge and history. From the Royal Library of Polemics in Alexandria – or how much of our great philosophers and inventers from Aristotle to Galileo – even Nostradamus – works and writings were destroyed both by natural events like earthquakes and volcanoes, but mostly by destruction from political and religious entities who wanted to eliminate opposition to their beliefs. World history and our own, is rift with people so intent on supplanting others knowledge with their own narrow philosophies that who knows what wonders now have been destroyed. What great minds were killed in the holocaust, or the Spanish Inquisition – or dozens of other genocides throughout history? What wonders are we now relearning that perhaps was known centuries ago? What knowledge and wisdom has been lost to the ages?

My understanding is that now, with the ability of electronic custom printing, just because Texas wants to subvert its text books is no reason the rest of the country has to go along. Every school board should be pushing for an honest and balanced approach to the composition of our kid’s text books. Budgets should not be your only concern. Shall we continue the era of enlightenment or return to the Dark Ages?

Mike Smith

Clawson