Lynne Cheney Possible Appointment To TX “Expert” Social Studies Panel

Capitol Annext blog 5/5/09
Lynne Cheney Under Consideration For Appointment To “Expert” Social Studies Panel
By Vince Leibowitz

Lynne Cheney, wife of former Vice President Dick Cheney, is under consideration as a possible nominee to an expert panel that will guide the revision of social studies curriculum in Texas, Capitol Annex has learned.

Cheney is well-known for crusading against national history and social studies standards in the 1990s, calling the standards–which the National Endowment for the Humanities helped fund while Cheney was its chair–”grim and gloomy.” Cheney also denounced the standards as a monument to political correctness, claimed they gave insufficient attention to Confederate General Robert E. Lee and the Wright brothers and focusing far too much on figures like Harriet Tubman, and worried that they concentrated too much on embarrassing episodes in the nation’s history, such as the Ku Klux Klan and McCarthyism.

According to a source familiar with the deliberations of the unnamed State Board of Education member who is considering Cheney as a potential nominee, it is unknown if Cheney has been formally contacted about serving on the panel.

Postcards blog AAS 5/6/09
House defeats bill that would sunset SBOE

Reversing what it did yesterday, the House defeated this morning a bill that would put the State Board of Education under sunset review.

The bill failed 71-73 today, a day after passing 74-68.

House Public Education Committee Chairman Rob Eissler, R-The Woodlands, and Rep. Brian McCall, R-Plano, voted for the bill on Tuesday but voted against it today. The other three votes that put opponents over the edge came from Republicans John Otto, Jim Pitts and Joe Crabb, all of whom were absent during Tuesday’s vote.
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The sunset review process puts state agencies under periodic examination by lawmakers and legislative staffers, giving them a chance to scrub the agency and make changes. Rep. Patrick Rose, a Dripping Springs Democrat who authored the bill to put the state board under sunset review, said it could save taxpayers money and give lawmakers a chance to look at how the board, for example, chooses textbooks and sets curriculum guidelines.

Capitol Annex blog 4/30/09
David Barton, Minister Who Believes Hurricane Was God’s Punishment For Gays To Guide Revision Of TX Social Studies Curriculum

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The Texas Freedom Network Thursday uncovered and released the names of several of the so-called “experts” appointed to the guidance panel.

The two most controversial appointees are former Republican Party of Texas Vice Chair and founder of the fundamentalist group “WallBuilders,” David Barton and Rev. Peter Marshall of the Massachusetts-based Peter Marshall Ministries. Marshall has previously suggested that the California wildfires and Hurricane Katrina were divine punishments on society for the tolerance of homosexuality.

Far-right SBOE members Ken Mercer (R-San Antonio) and Gail Lowe (R-Lampasas) sponsored Barton’s appointment. SBOE Members Barbara Cargill and Cynthia Dunbar, both far-right extreamists, sponsored Marshall’s appointment.