New Textbooks?

The October 1, 2010, edition of "The Week" magazine has an interesting and disturbing article about new textbooks.  (Now you know how far behind I am in my reading.)  It appears that conservatives (you know who you are) and liberals are disagreeing about what should go into the new textbooks.  It appears that the conservatives have won the battle in Texas.

The new textbooks, scheduled to arrive in classrooms in 2013, want the texts to establish that the U.S. is a "Christian land governed by Cristian principles."  Thomas Jefferson will be dropped from the list of main founders of the country, and will be listed as a minor figure  because he was the main proponent of the separation of church and state.  Sen. Ted Kennedy and labor leader Cesar Chavez would not be mentioned at all in the new books, but Ronald Reagon would be looked on as a national hero and leader of the "conservative resurgence in the 1980s and 1990s."  Slavery would be described as "'the Atlantic triangular trade' -- a relic of British colonialism that America struggled to cast off."

Is it any wonder liberals are outraged?  I realize that the history books especially have always left a lot to be desired -- where are the women and black heroes and innovators ? -- but now these people are messing with the very beginning of the nation.  Is this what we do in the United States?  I grew up believing we were the best country in the world, everyone who lived here had an equal chance at success, we valued truth and honesty above all.  Now our textbooks will tell our children that evolution is only a theory, and that Thomas Jefferson was not a major player in this country's history.  What will be next?  Will the math books soon say that 2+2 doesn't equal 4?  How shockingly bad is this? More to the point -- how can we as Americans put up with this dishonesty?  And it is dishonest, not just bending the facts a little.  I hope you all are as angry as I am.