Are you sitting down? Well, stand up, and clear the area of fragile things before you go below the fold. The theocrats of 666 C Street have struck again: Thomas Jefferson is scratched out of history and the great American leader Ronald Reagan will be getting his column inches in Texas board approved history books.
Oh, and they got those freakin' wetbacks out of the story of the Battle of the Alamo, too …
So I heard there was a stir about state school board in Texas and I figured it was another disaster in the making. They'd put creationism in, a few parents would sue, the state would get handed its ass in court, and then it would all blow over. Nope, they've not got to science yet – they started by first rewriting history, and it would be laugh out loud funny if it weren't trying to inscribe their racism and religious fanaticism on a generation of innocent children.
First things first, that looney liberal Thomas Jefferson had to go. Jefferson (1743-1826) was a noted thinker during The Age of Enlightenment. This time period, so named because the dogmatic circle that bounded human thinking was broken, is dated anywhere from 1637 to 1687, and ending no later than the Napoleanic Wars of the early 1800s.
The obvious alternative for Jefferson was John Calvin (1509-1564), an important Reformation theologian. So, other than being a proponent of dogma circumscribing thought, predating the period in question, and having contributed nothing to the thinking of the era, he was the obvious choice. The stupid, it burns, it burns …
I can understand wanting to write out a Deist founding father – that form of revisionism is a requirement for the would-be theocrats of C street but their decisions regarding the iconic Battle of the Alamo are fraught with peril.
As legend has it (there were no survivors) 189 men fought to the bitter end, surrounded by the Mexican army in their makeshift fortress of the Alamo mission while the constitution of the Republic of Texas and their declaration of independence were authored.
Many will recognized the names Jim Bowie, William Travis, James Bonham and David Crockett – the brave white (and Christian) men who brought civilization to Texas. What you won't find in the new history books are the names Juan Abamillo, Juan A. Badillo, Carlos Espalier, Gregorio Esparza, Antonio Fuentes, and Andrés Nava. These six Tejanos were the only ones among the 189 dead to actually have been born in Texas.
Yes indeed, ten white conservative (aka radical revisionist theocratic crackpots) got the WhiteOut(tm), took out Thomas Jefferson, offending every law & order libertarian type in the state, and then they committed political suicide by erasing from history the Mexican American contribution to Texan independence. The five minority members of the board simply got up and walked out after the crazy got totally intolerable.
I'm going to guess that few black or Hispanic voters are going to tolerate this nonsense. Texas is only 47.7% white and those are not all American Taliban; if word of this gets out the entire election dynamic should change for not just the two Texas State Board Of Education.
This is all part of that Seven Mountains thing - religious conservatives slithering about, injecting their views at weak points in civil discourse and administration. The head of the beast appears to be The Family, residing at 133 C Street, in sight of our nation's capitol.
Who are these denizens of the house on C street? Are they a cult? A theocratic conspiracy against the American way of life? A mafia style crime family? Agents of a foreign power, bent on the destruction of our way of life? A clutch of devil worshiping, home wrecking degenerates?
Having looked at them just a tiny bit, as opposed to the in depth research done by Kossack Trouthfishing, I see signs that the answer to each of those questions is a very definite … possibly.
The IRS is after them. There are other criminal investigations afoot, all public, but I know not the particulars, something to do with Senator Tom Coburn paying off the husband of the woman who was coerced into having an affair by Senator John Ensign? Others have blogged these antics, which I general ignore, but …
When I see the planned slaughter of Ugandan gays I know it's a test case for how to handle my LGBT friends here. And the people behind this are 'prayer walking' Newark, which had it's first homicide free month since 1966 this March? Homicide free is good … except if it's a brewing murderous encore to the Spanish Inquisition.
So, how is Ronald Reagan like Tomás de Torquemada? Hell if I know ... but every gay, lesbian, black, Mexican, Muslim, Buddhist, native American, African immigrant (both black & Arab), college professor, high school science teacher, law abiding civil servant, off the grid hippy, and anyone else I missed who isn't a smiley face Christofascist had best start asking ...