These guys just defy parody.
In its haste to sort out the state’s social studies curriculum standards this month, the State Board of Education tossed children’s author [Bill] Martin, who died in 2004, from a proposal for the third-grade section. Board member Pat Hardy, R-Weatherford, who made the motion, cited books he had written for adults that contain “very strong critiques of capitalism and the American system.”
Trouble is, the Bill Martin Jr. who wrote the Brown Bear series never wrote anything political, unless you count a book that taught kids how to say the Pledge of Allegiance, his friends said. The book on Marxism was written by Bill Martin, a philosophy professor at DePaul University in Chicago.
Bill Martin Jr.’s name would have been included on a list with author Laura Ingalls Wilder and artist Carmen Lomas Garza as examples of individuals who would be studied for their cultural contributions.
Hardy said she was trusting the research of another board member, Terri Leo, R-Spring, when she made her motion and comments about Martin’s writing. Leo had sent her an e-mail alerting her to Bill Martin Jr.’s listing on the Borders .com Web site as the author of Ethical Marxism. Leo’s note also said she hadn’t read the book.
“She said that that was what he wrote, and I said: ‘ … It’s a good enough reason for me to get rid of someone,’ ” said Hardy, who has complained vehemently about the volume of names being added to the curriculum standards.
Let this be a lesson: Never trust anything the wingnut faction on the SBOE says. It’s a one-way ticket to palookaville.
*sigh* just *sigh*
This really makes my blood boil. There should be a way to impeach SBOE members. This should be immediate grounds for removal of both of them. Who has oversight on the SBOE? I’m assuming that it’s the state legislature? What about the TEA?
I hate to sound like a crank, but I’m e-mailing my state rep and state senator over this today.