Texas Insider

4:12 pm CST - January 13, 2010

Conservative Groups Rally for Inclusion of American Exceptionalism in State History Curriculum Standards

Americans for Prosperity-Texas

AUSTIN – Americans for Prosperity-Texas will be participating in a rally this Wednesday to encourage State Board of Education members to toughen history curriculum standards and put a renewed emphasis on American Exceptionalism.

“Our nation has a unique place in world history, due to our founders’ hard work to create a country where men and women could live free and equal, where those who are elected to public office are beholden to the people who put them there – not the other way around,” said Peggy Venable, director for Americans for Prosperity-Texas. “If we fail to teach the core principles of what makes America exceptional, then we will fail to keep our nation free for future generations.”

Venable will speak at Wednesday’s rally, which is scheduled to begin at noon at the William B. Travis Building, 1701 N. Congress Ave. She will be joined by Brook Terry, senior policy analyst for the Texas Public Policy Foundation; Connie Sadowski, of the Austin CEO Foundation; Bill Ames, an SBOE history curriculum reviewer; and Jonathan Saenz, of the Free Market Foundation.

Terry said that in U.S. Government and U.S. History curriculum, history is being re-written. “It dismisses free market contributions from the private sector, and it does not give equal space to conservative ideals and the public leaders who govern those ideals,” Terry said.

Saenz recalled the recent effort of a history review panel to remove the teaching of Christmas from social studies classes for sixth grades students and replacing it with the Indian festival Diwali.

“Concerned citizens expressed outrage — as a result, the review panel restored Christmas to the social studies curriculum, for now,” Saenz said. “The education of our children is too important to remain silent.”

Ames, who is involved in reviewing proposed changes to current history curriculum, said that there is a concerted effort by those on the left to exclude a diversity of opinion, which biases history and also precludes the opportunity for students to debate all sides of an issue.

“America’s greatest hope lies in the hands of our children and those who would inspire them with a positive view of their country,” Ames said. “We can act to make that hope and inspiration a reality. Or, we can allow a relatively few extremists to communicate their negative view of America.”

5 Comments

CWJensen
7:42 pm CST
January 13, 2010

JUST make sure the history is reported even if the mistakes we make are included.
Omission does not make or excuse wrongs……………………………………..The most exceptional thing about America is we have learned from our mistakes.

Stephen D. Clark
8:02 pm CST
January 13, 2010

After knocking-down democratically elected governments in Iran, Guatemala and Chile, sponsoring Latin-American terror group, the Contras, and invading Grenada, Panama and Iraq under false pretenses … after always picking fights with pipsqueaks whom we knew in advance we could easily beat, instead of taking-on real challenges like, say, China or Russia with whom we have real rivalry in a stand-up fight … after these and other examples I here neglect, some might say that the United States is exceptional indeed — exceptionally hypocritical, that is. I’ll bet these stories are left out of the history books too.

When the empire of the United States outlives the Roman empire, then maybe we will have proved our exceptionalism. Until then — no.

CWJensen
8:22 pm CST
January 13, 2010

No Stephen ………………YOUR personal interpretation is left to those who wish to comment freely because they live in the United States……….Not China or Russia that certainally do have ways of dealing with those who DO NOT agree with them. Because you have that RIGHT that alone is enough to prove our exceptionalism
The only thing worse than a bigot is a self righteous bigot.

josh
1:31 am CST
January 13, 2010

American Exceptionalism has a couple of meanings these days, one good one not so good.

The older, good one says that America is “exceptional” in that it is unique in terms of it’s political system, culture and origins.

The newer, uglier one refers to the growing notion that America is somehow an exception to the international rules we expect other nations to follow.

I have zero issues with the former and support it wholeheartedly. I have lots and lots of issues with the latter and reject it completely.

CWJensen:

Stephen is factually correct about several things, notably the toppling of a democratically-elected Prime Minister in a CIA-backed coup in 1952 in one of the first of many hamfisted US foreign policy decisions that started from the belief that any enemy of communism was our friend. This led to the Ayatollah Khomeni taking power and to the Iran hostage crisis. These things are not secret and not really open to interpretation, it is in fact what happened and has been acknowledged by everyone involved.

Christian Archer
3:53 pm CST
January 13, 2010

Stephen D. Clark, your distain for the actions of this country are quite evident. With whom do you have the biggest problem? Identify who the enemy is to YOU in this country. I would suggest that you watch the following video and become enlightened as to who the real enemy is in this country and why this nation makes the decisions it does.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VebOTc-7shU

It’s a long video so I’ve watched it in 15-20 minute increments.