Ignorance

For years Texas has had one of the highest rates of teen births in the country — and that rate is rising. At the same time, the state’s education officials have bowed to the demands of the religious right, with more than nine out of 10 school districts teaching abstinence-only-until-marriage instead of medically accurate sex […]

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Race and Social Studies in Texas

It has been increasingly difficult to ignore the racially charged statements that keep coming from far-right members of the State Board of Education and their appointees to panels helping revise social studies curriculum standards for Texas public schools. In fact, their statements are becoming increasingly incendiary, as if they are hoping to provoke a bitter and […]

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‘Stealth’ Candidates and the Religious Right

One of the religious right’s most effective strategies in winning political power has been running “stealth” candidates for office. A Texas Freedom Network Education Fund report in 2006 explored this tactic, quoting a 1986 memo from religious-right leader Pat Robertson to supporters seeking control of the Republican Party in Iowa: “Give the impression you are […]

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Death to the Oligarhy! Or Whatever.

We noted in April that Texas Gov. Rick Perry was “proud” to be a guest on Glenn Beck’s FOX News show. Beck, as we noted then, believes liberals are trying “to remove God from America,” is an admirer of Focus on the Family’s James Dobson, and seems to buy into the “End Times” theology of the […]

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David Barton: Now a ‘Constitutional Expert’?

It’s bad enough that the State Board of Education claims David Barton is an “expert” who is qualified to help guide the revision of social studies curriculum standards for Texas public schools. But now we’re told Barton is a “constitutional expert,” too. Wow. Not bad considering that he earned only a bachelor’s degree in religious […]

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