Texas sets textbook standards for all... or most anyway

The Texas school board took the first step this week to fundamentally change the content of the nation's textbooks. For background, the number of textbooks purchased in Texas make them the state that predominately decides the content. This is not a good thing at all. Unfortunately, the injection of party politics and individual beliefs are forming the social studies, economics and history that our children will be taught.

It is my belief that personal convictions are the responsibility of the parents to teach their children. The purpose of school textbooks is the fundamental transfer of FACTUAL information to students. The interpretation of these facts are the responsibility of the child's parents. The nature of our countries history is NOT the issue at hand. The issue is what components of that history the politicians will ALLOW in the textbooks.

There are good and bad components to the history of our great nation. There are things that we have learned because of the lessons that our predecessors did. If we whitewash that information, we, or our children are bound to make the same mistakes and pay the same price that has already been paid on lessons already learned.

I say to let the facts remain. Remove the political left and right influences. Let the interpretation of the good, bad, right and wrong be the responsibility of the parents. This is yet another way for the government to indoctrinate our children to a particular and prescribed way of thinking. We must act to protect our children from ANY politically motivated changes to our history. We are the country we are because of our history, NOT in spite of it as some would like us to believe.

Don