What Bayh’s Retirement Tells Us About Ourselves

Bayh has always been shall we say a frustrating sort. Never a profile in courage.

This marks perhaps the kindest response from the liberal blogosphere to Evan Bayh’s decision to leave the Senate.  Michael Tomasky’s thoughts from across the pond (The Guardian is published in the United Kingdom) at least gives Bayh the benefit of the doubt as to his future.  Perhaps because there is talk that his hasty exit might open the way to a Republican takeover of his seat on November, the conservative blogs have been somewhat kinder.  John Stossel offers a positive view of the move based on Bayh’s remarks that he could create more jobs in private industry.  This drew a strong response from Matthew Yglesias:

The popularity of this sort of rhetoric among small-government types mostly illustrates how small-brained they are. It should be both obvious and uncontroversial to observe that the policy environment shaped by congress has an impact on the welfare of the American people that far exceeds that of most businesses. This is equally true whether or not you’re skeptical of the value of activist government.

James Fallows follows a similar argument in questioning the timing and suddenness of Bayh’s exit:

If he really cared about his Indiana constituents and their problems through that time, great! But if so, how can he walk away with this kind of careless disregard about whether, in the style of his departure, he is smashing up things that had said were important to him. If, on the other hand, these issues and people never really mattered that much, and public life had been a kind of popularity contest — well, that may be true of a lot of politicians, but they don’t like to reveal it quite this bluntly.

However, even the tone of these arguments seems civil compared to some of the other tongue lashings that have been handed out at Evan Bayh’s expense:

The Pernicious Influence Of Lefty Blogs  |  Ta-Nehisi Coates

To double down, it’s not so much that he’s “centrist,” or “moderate,” it’s that his centrism has no real policy core. I don’t know how you support the Bush tax-cuts and style yourself a deficit hawk. Policy-wise, there’s nothing “leftist” about being against the Iraq War. But politically-speaking, the anti-war folks were caricatured as a bunch of hippies who don’t understand national security.

…

But so often with “centrist” Dems, I feel like I’m just watching people take positions so that they can claim to be moderate/independent because it sounds good.

The Emptiness of Evan Bayh  |  Ross Douthat

America needs politicians who stake out interesting, politically-courageous positions on important policy questions. What it doesn’t need is politicians who occupy the safest possible ground on the great issues of the day, shift slightly left or slightly right depending on the state of public opinion, and then get congratulated by the press for being so independent-minded.

Evan Bayh  |  Matthew Yglesias

Simply put: He’s an immoral person who conducts his affairs in public life with a callous disregard for the impact of his decisions on human welfare. He’s sad he’s not going to be president? He doesn’t like liberal activists? He finds senate life annoying? Well, boo-hoo. We all shed a tear.

Bayh Low  |  Jonathon Chait

This was just a completely unremarkable man who, had he not been the handsome son of a famous politician, would never in a million years have been a Senator.

If you’ve been a regular reader of my work, you know that I’m typically not this heavy on the quotations, and if you’re one to follow the links, then you might notice that I’ve been very particular in my editing of the quotes that I have shared.  All of this is to highlight the point: dialogue on the political landscape has all but come to a standstill.

With the TEA Party movement apparently gaining momentum (or at least media coverage), this isn’t a particularly astute observation.  Yet I think that Bayh’s retirement has opened the door to understanding that this isn’t just a right-wing phenomenon.  The critiques leveled at Bayh’s centrism, whether warranted or not, still indicate a “do-nothingness” on the part of political moderates who have passed over opportunities to try and foster compromise and move government forward.  (Anyone remember Henry Clay from their U.S. history courses?)  The venom spewed in Bayh’s direction, again, whether warranted or not, has exposed the frustration on the left and its willingness to resort to verbal broadsides as well.  Frankly, we’re all failing to rise to the occasion when it comes addressing the issues we face.

I doubt that I can sum it up any better than Daniel Schorr’s commentary for All Things Considered:

That [Bayh’s decision] will have electoral consequences goes without saying. But the sullen mood of America goes beyond shifting party loyalties. Many Americans seem close to rejecting the whole machinery of government that Evan Bayh found wanting. What happens when the people turn their back on their government is a phenomenon that this democracy has yet to experience.

I can only pray that we find a way to reclaim our role as citizens who share this economic and political space that we call the United States of America.

Hijacking History, Part 3: Educating Ideologies

This post is the third in a series of blogs of I’ve written following the actions of the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) at their January meetings to approve revisions to the state’s K-12 social studies curriculum.  Known as TEKS, these standards will determine the learning goals for Texas students for the next decade and will also impact the publication of textbooks that will be used nationwide.  (I cover this more in the previous blogs, Hijacking History and Hijacking History, Part 2.)  This post will cover the final two days of the meeting where elected members of the SBOE went through the proposed curriculum revisions and voted on changes of their own.  Ultimately, the proceedings exhausted the time allotted for discussion and approval of the revisions, postponing the final vote to the May meeting of the SBOE.

The SBOE is composed of 15 members who are elected from districts based on equal population representation.  Elections to the board are conducted on a partisan basis, and the recent meetings demonstrated just how detrimental this can be to the educational process.  Brian Thevenot of the Texas Tribune has provided excellent coverage of these meetings, and his description of the approval process is no exception:

Debates leading up to the board’s consideration of social studies standards often pitted typically conservative “pro-America” dogma against more typically liberal explorations of women and minority leaders. Yet in the nitty-gritty of at-times testy negotiations, a spirit of mostly polite horse-trading predominated, and most members seemed to get most of what they wanted. And though an eight-member majority block dominated by conservatives often controls the board, votes over specific amendments seldom broke so neatly.

Yet at the end of the day, the approved revisions still took what Terrence Stutz of the Dallas Morning News described as a “tilt to [the] right.” This was highlighted by the inclusion of Phyllis Schafly and the Eagle Forum, the National Rifle Association, the Moral Majority, and the Heritage Foundation to a list of people and groups that student must learn.  The amendment passed on a 7-6 vote, but the comments surrounding it prove just as enlightening:

Board member Don McLeroy, R-College Station, offered the amendment requiring coverage of “key organizations and individuals of the conservative resurgence of the 1980s and 1990s.” McLeroy said he offered the proposal because the history standards were already “rife with leftist political periods and events – the populists, the progressives, the New Deal and the Great Society.”

If the current standards are “rife with leftist” ideals, then the approved changes and rhetoric of the board perhaps indicate a marked shift to the right, rather than just a tilt.  Derogatory remarks such as the following one reported following the meetings show not only a preference against multiculturalism, but an outright disregard for the ethnic diversity of our nation:

David Bradley, R-Beaumont Buna, also seemed upset by efforts of fellow board member Mary Helen Berlanga, D-Corpus Christi, to include the names of more Latinos in the standards. “If Ms. Berlanga, whose only criteria is skin color, had the votes, she would name us ‘the Hispanic Education Agency,’” he told one reporter.

The circumstances surrounding these meetings mark an unfortunate turn.  Instead of a focus on providing the best education for students, the curriculum process in the state of Texas has become the battle ground for the alleged “culture wars” that ultra conservative voices have been attempting to proclaim since the rise of the Moral Majority in the 1980’s.  And while I doubt that any protest I raise will ultimately be heard, I’ll close with these words from the SBOE History and Duties page on the Texas Education Agency website (emphasis mine):

As part of its efforts to provide the best possible education to public school students, the Board designates and mandates instruction in the knowledge and skills that are essential to a well-balanced curriculum.

I can only hope that the wisdom on which this board was founded will ultimately prevail.

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Some highlights from the Proceedings of the SBOE on Curriculum Approval:

• A proposal is debated to change the definition of good citizenship for first-graders to include “holding public officials to their word.”
• The deletion of Dolores Huerta, co-founder of the United Farm Workers because she was a socialist.
• A requirement that eight grade students analyze ideas in Jefferson Davis’ inaugural address as president of the Confederacy.
• An attempt to change all mentions of U.S. “imperialism” to “expansionism.”
• Deletion of Margaret Sanger, a leading voice for contraception and relationship counseling, and founder of the organization that ultimately became Planned Parenthood.
• Removal of the words “from racial, ethnic, gender, and religious groups” from the existing standard: “Explain actions taken by people from racial, ethnic, gender, and religious groups to expand economic opportunities and political rights in American society.”

These highlights were gathered from live blog coverage of the meetings on January 14 and 15 provided by the Texas Freedom Network:

Live-Blogging the Social Studies Debate

Live-Blogging the Social Studies Debate II

Live-Blogging the Social Studies Debate III

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• Related link: Hijacking History
• Related link: Hijacking History, Part 2: The Texas Curriculum Hearings

A Call to Action for Justice in Haiti (and beyond)

Now that the metaphorical dust is settling on the disaster that has befallen Haiti, it is the time to begin remembering what we are already forgetting. Distracted by the commentary and wrangling surrounding the State of the Union Address, we’ve lost track of the tragedy of an estimated 150,000 dead (the U.N. confirming 111,481 based on bodies recovered as of January 24). While there is no doubt that we should acknowledge the economic problems here in our country, it would be a failure of nerve and moral courage to shift our focus inward upon ourselves on account of an arbitrary requirement that the President “shall from time to time give to Congress information of the State of the Union.” (Article II, Section 3, U.S. Constitution)

I’ve previously written concerning the real nature of Haiti’s “curse” and Christian responsibility in the wake of this disaster, but it’s time for us to move beyond talk and take action. For everyone who has already become involved, sending recovery kits and making financial contributions, I thank you and commend your actions. However, as Richard Kim points out, our charity simply isn’t good enough:

But it’s also time to stop having a conversation about charity and start having a conversation about justice–about recovery, responsibility and fairness. What the world should be pondering instead is: What is Haiti owed?

Haiti’s vulnerability to natural disasters, its food shortages, poverty, deforestation and lack of infrastructure, are not accidental. To say that it is the poorest nation in the Western hemisphere is to miss the point; Haiti was made poor–by France, the United States, Great Britain, other Western powers and by the IMF and the World Bank.

Our culpability in the repeated failures of the economy and government in Haiti are apparent with only a basic historical knowledge of the country’s two centuries as an independent republic. Oppressive foreign aid programs, including loans that have lined the pockets of corrupt dictators (a fact we conveniently ignored for the sake of “national interest”), continued to keep Haiti politically and economically impoverished. Now it appears that our political leaders and bureaucrats are prepared to repeat the same failed policies in the wake of the earthquake. Kim explains how the International Monetary Fund intends to take a business-as-usual approach to the plight of Haiti:

Now, in its attempts to help Haiti, the IMF is pursuing the same kinds of policies that made Haiti a geography of precariousness even before the quake. To great fanfare, the IMF announced a new $100 million loan to Haiti on Thursday. In one crucial way, the loan is a good thing; Haiti is in dire straits and needs a massive cash infusion. But the new loan was made through the IMF’s extended credit facility, to which Haiti already has $165 million in debt. Debt relief activists tell me that these loans came with conditions, including raising prices for electricity, refusing pay increases to all public employees except those making minimum wage and keeping inflation low. They say that the new loans would impose these same conditions. In other words, in the face of this latest tragedy, the IMF is still using crisis and debt as leverage to compel neoliberal reforms.

Seeing the failure of these policies prior to the full force of nature’s destructive power, it is a sign of poor judgment to think that taking the same direction will have any positive effect on Haiti. Yet, every bit as deplorable is the fact that it’s a sign of complete moral and ethical failure on our part as citizens of the developing world to continue to ignore the real plight of our neighbors as we profit from their misfortune. It is time for each of us become agents of ethics and work to bring about change.

Right now Congresswomen Maxine Waters (D -CA) and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) are circulating a letter that will be presented to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner urging him to use the full leverage of the U.S. government to bring about debt cancellation on the part of the IMF and other international agencies carrying outstanding loans to Haiti. Currently over 50 members of Congress have agreed to sign this letter, but you can help by urging your own representative to sign as well. With the help of the Jubilee USA Network, an outreach of over 75 religious denominations and communities seeking debt relief the underdeveloped nations, you can send an email to your representative urging her/him to join the petition. While you’re at it, you can also visit here to sign a citizens petition that Jubilee USA will present to Secretary Geithner urging him to support debt cancellation for Haiti. The deadline for this is February 2, so please consider responding to this action quickly.

And regardless of deadlines, you can offer your voice in support of H.R. 4405, the Jubilee Act for Responsible Lending and Expanded Debt Cancellation of 2009. Sponsored by Congresswoman Waters, this bill is an effort to build on the earlier success of H.R. 2634, which was filed in the previous congress, and passed the House of Representatives before becoming bogged down in the Senate. (Avelino Maestas offers a more in depth look at these bills at Huffington Post.) H.R. 4405 has been introduced and currently awaits consideration in the House Committee on Financial Services. You can help spur this bill to the floor by writing letters or sending emails to committee chair Congressman Barney Frank (D-MA) and ranking member Congressman Spencer Bachus (R-AL), as well as other members of the committee.

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It’s time to change the way we behave as citizens of the wealthier minority within or world, and as a nation with a history that is checkered at best. I’ve made my case for our responsibility to Haiti based on how that checkered past has harmed Haiti over the years. And while I will be the first to admit that we can’t be held individually responsible for the racism and imperialism of our country’s past, we can become responsible from this moment forward for our country’s just, peaceful, and equitable policies toward our neighbors beyond our borders. I can’t encourage you enough to join with me in making a difference for our nation and our world.

Hijacking History, Part 2: The Texas Curriculum Hearings

In a previous blog, “Hijacking History,” I took on the subject of the Texas state curriculum for K-12 education (known as TEKS) and the implications of the proposed revisions to the curriculum that was to be presented to the State Board of Education (SBOE).  This new curriculum will not only determine what will be taught in Texas’ many public schools, but will also likely determine what is seen in new history textbooks throughout the nation.  (I explain this in more depth in my previous post.)

However, it is not just the revised curriculum that raises concern, but the highly pitched partisan battles that are taking place on the SBOE.  Various media outlets have covered the push by an ideologically conservative segment of the board to include standards that appear to better exemplify political and ideological positions than actual learning goals.  This January meeting was no exception, with the opening day hearings marked by controversy.  Brian Thevenot of the Texas Tribune describes the hearings:

As the State Board of Education grinded through testimony on Wednesday over its controversial social studies standards, much of the debate teetered on two basic fulcrums: teaching vs. indoctrination and patriotism vs. realism.

Scores of speakers, many affiliated with political organizations, ran complex issues of race and religion largely through those two filters for hours.

The importance of the curriculum decisions is evidenced by the sheer numbers of people arriving to testify before the SBOE.  Counts put the total near 130 speakers, far too many to be heard before the scheduled 6 pm adjournment.  Yet instead of extending the time for public comments, the board moved to adjourn for the evening anyway.  The Texas Freedom Network’s live blog reports on the events surrounding the close of the meeting:

6:13 – The board is getting angry comments from people who waited all day to testify. They’re demanding that the board continue hearing testimony. (We sympathize. After all, the board isn’t often asked to listen to their constituents on these issues.) A motion to extend the hearing fails on a tie vote. In the chaos, it’s hard to tell how all of the board members voted. But most of the “no” votes appear to have come from the board’s far-right faction…

6:18 – Now would-be testifiers are shouting in anger. More chaos. The chair, Gail Lowe, has to break a tie on a motion to adjourn the meeting. Could there be a clearer representation of the indifference some board members have for the concerns of their constituents? …

UPDATE: After adjournment, the state board’s five Democrats remained to continue listening to testimony from those who were unable to speak before the hearing ended. Many of the remaining testifiers were Latinos, some of whom had traveled from across the state to the hearing.

This crass indifference to the voices of many unheard witnesses is a testimony to the composition of the Texas SBOE.  Dominated by ultra-conservative ideologues who promote an ethnic insensitivity that is overtly racist, even if not overtly bigoted, a harrowingly nationalistic American exceptionalism that remains blinded to our history of injustice, inequity, and imperialism, and an unabashed Christian exclusivism, it should come as no surprise that they would have no compunction for those unfortunate enough to have been too far back in the witness line to speak before 6:00 pm.  While those members who continued to hear the testimony of the remaining witnesses are a credit to their elected office, the SBOE as a whole clearly turned its back on the democratic ideals its most hardened conservatives purport to defend.

Sadly, this is just another symptom of not only a failure of civility, but an utter lack of respect that appears to dominate our political landscape.  Sadder yet, this was only the first day of the meetings.

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The Texas Freedom Network offered live blog coverage of the events of the January 13 hearings that you can find at the following:

Live-Blogging the Social Studies Hearing

Live-Blogging the Social Studies Hearing II

• Related link: Hijacking History

Haiti and the “Curse”

In the midst of the storm surrounding Pat Robertson and his comments about the “curse” upon Haiti, we might have missed the other imposition of the language of “curse” on that country.  In a statement on Thursday afternoon, French President Nicolas Sarkozy called for an international conference on the question of reconstruction aid for Haiti after associating the plight of country with a more ambiguous curse:

From this catastrophe, which follows so many others, we should make sure that it is a chance to get Haiti once and for all out of the curse it seems to have been stuck with for such a long time.

If not Pat Robertson’s absurd theological stretches, then what exactly is this “curse” that haunts Haiti?  While Sarkozy’s statement almost comes across sounding like an innocuous little raincloud that hovers over this unassuming island republic, the reality is much more devastating.  To better understand the structural problems that have plagued Haiti, a brief history lesson is in order.  This commentary at the Center for International Policy sheds some light on the early history of the republic:

Economic Justice in Haiti Requires Debt Restitution  |  CIP Americas Program

Haiti won its independence from France in 1804, through a bloody 12-year war, becoming the second independent country in the Americas and the only nation in history born of a successful slave revolt. But world powers forced Haiti to pay a second price for entrance into the international community. They refused to recognize Haiti’s independence, while French warships remained off its coasts, threatening to invade and reinstitute slavery.

After 21 years of resisting, Haiti capitulated to France‘s terms: in exchange for diplomatic recognition, Haiti’s government agreed to compensate French plantation owners for their loss of “property,” including the freed slaves; compensation to be paid with a loan from a designated French bank. The debt was ten times Haiti’s total 1825 revenue and twice what the United States paid France in 1803 for the Louisiana Purchase, which contained seventy-four times more land.

The debt was a crushing burden on Haiti’s economy. The government was forced to redirect all economic activity to repay it. A huge percentage of government revenues—80% in some years—went to debt service, at the expense of investment in education, healthcare, and infrastructure. The tax code and other laws channeled private and public enterprise to export crops such as tropical hardwoods and sugar, which brought in foreign currency for the bank but left the mountainsides barren, the soil depleted, and the population hungry.

While this may allow those of us in the United States to savor the irony of Sarkozy’s statement given France’s role in the economic crippling of the fledgling nation, we would be well reminded of our own interference in the affairs of foreign nations; especially those in the Caribbean which have often been considered playthings in our own private “U.S. lake.”  The Haiti Action Committee reminds us of our own complicity in the destruction of the early Haitian economy:

The United States led a worldwide boycott against Haiti and refused to recognize the new nation until 1864, fearing that its freedom would pose a danger to the U.S. system of slavery.

Instead of playing linguistic games that offhandedly attribute Haiti’s woes to some ambiguous “curse,” it’s time for us living in economically powerful nations to own our role in putting the hex on this underdeveloped and economically declining nation.*  While Sarkozy’s intentions, along with the rest of the industrialized world, are no doubt for the good, the time for addressing the real issue is long overdue.  We are quick to be the saviors of the disaster-ridden, rushing in with our recovery and relief money, but we never pause for a moment to consider how our history of plundering underdeveloped nations has exacerbated the present crisis.  And for all of our hurry to be the heroes today, tomorrow we will forget this sad affair, never addressing the ongoing systemic imperialism and economic oppression that will continue to leave Haiti ripe for the next disaster.  After all, it’s just Haiti’s “curse” …

* According to the CIA World Factbook 80% of Haitians live in poverty, with over half of the population in abject poverty.

Hijacking History

I’d like to dedicate this blog post to Bobbie Tetley, my high school AP American History teacher who instilled in me a love of history, and even though I am on the eve of completing graduate school, she remains one of the most challenging, demanding, and respected voices not only of my educational career, but of my life.  Thank you, Mrs. Tetley.  – cwc

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This first came to my attention through an action alert from the United Farm Workers, an organization I’ve become connected to through my denomination’s participation in the National Farm Worker Ministry.  I received an email asking me to “Stop Texas from erasing Cesar Chavez and Hispanics from school books.”  It provided information about an upcoming session of the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) that will be voting on new curriculum standards for social studies for the state of Texas.  UFW asked me to compose an email to Gail Lowe, the chair of the Texas SBOE demanding that they not further marginalize the voices of Latina/os within the history curriculum.

This call to action is one that I’m only too happy to answer.  In case you weren’t aware, as the Texas curriculum goes (which is known as Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills or TEKS), so goes the textbook publishers.  As the textbook publishers go, too often, so goes the nation.  Brian Thevenot offers his insights as to the importance:

Hijacking History  |  Texas Tribune

Following earlier clashes over curricula in other disciplines, the social studies debate will test whether the SBOE can cut through the fog of extremism and find a neutral mainstream. Though its appointees spent countless hours drafting the new standards, the board can toss or overhaul portions at any point, as it did with English standards in 2008 and science standards last year. And so a fifteen-member elected board dominated by social conservatives, few of them educators, will once again decide what will and won’t be taught in Texas public schools. Their influence will be magnified exponentially, as usual, because the content of textbooks in the lucrative Texas market drives what publishers peddle in other states.

Thevenot’s implication is clear: there’s even more at stake than the representation of Latina/os in the history curriculum.

The threat to Chavez’s inclusion in the curriculum is only one of many minority names that may be removed or downgraded to “recommendation” status in the curriculum.  Notable among the list of figures targeted for removal is Thurgood Marshall, the first African-American Supreme Court Justice and lawyer who successfully argued Brown v. Board of Education before that same court.

Lowe to guide education board through hot issues  |  AP

Two experts on a board-appointed advisory panel say Chavez, a civil rights activist who supporters say greatly improved conditions for Hispanic farm workers, and Marshall, who argued the landmark case that resulted in racial desegregation and was the first black U.S. Supreme Court justice, receive too much attention.

Panelist David Barton, an evangelical Republican activist who was appointed by Lowe, said Chavez “lacks the stature, impact and overall contributions of so many others.”

Social Studies “Experts” Don’t Know Much About History  |  Austin Chronicle

In another section on history studies, Peter Marshall downplays Thurgood Marshall as not being a “strong enough [example] in light of the multiplicity of persons who have impacted American history.”

…

“This has all been grossly misconstrued,” replied Peter Marshall in an interview with the Chronicle. “My point … is simply one of comparison. … If you’re trying to adduce examples for these guidelines of famous Ameri­cans that ought to be included in the teaching of American history, to pair those two men is silly. Chavez doesn’t begin to compare in terms of his impact on American history with Ben Franklin.” But he made it clear that his objections are also political. “My own personal guess is that the reason he was included in that is that it reflects the leftist bias of the people who wrote the guidelines last time. I don’t know; I don’t know who wrote them. But I’m suspicious of that. … In comparison with [other figures], Chavez doesn’t warrant much attention. … He’s just not real high on my list.”

In their criticisms, both Barton and Marshall along with fellow expert panelist Daniel Dreisbach argue in favor of focusing more on the “Founding Fathers,” and specifically, their religious convictions.  This turn toward what I can only politely describe as a pernicious blending of American civil religion with a particularly aggressive form of evangelical Christianity presents a threat to our national history of religious tolerance and the growing pluralism of this nation of immigrants.  The opinions of the alleged experts are basically echoed by the current chairperson of the Texas SBOE, Gail Lowe:

Lowe to guide education board through hot issues  |  AP

“This country was founded on Judeo Christian principles and to say otherwise is to deny what is very unique about our country.”

Hijacking History  |  Texas Tribune

The question of American superiority likely will come up again at next week’s SBOE meetings, Lowe said. “The state board members had given them (committee members) clear direction in the spring that we wanted that concept included, so it’s surprising they voted it down,” she said. “We don’t have to tell students what to think, but any educated person should have learned about American exceptionalism.”

These attitudes of American exceptionalism, along with its silent partner Christian exceptionalism, are simply inconsistent with our history.  Advocates of this misconception that the “Founding Fathers” were all Christian conveniently forget that many of them were Deists, a theological proposition that evangelical Christians roundly deny.  I doubt that either of the aforementioned religious leaders on the panel would subscribe to the tenets of deism. (David Barton is the founder of WallBuilders and Peter Marshall is founder of Peter Marshall Ministries.)  Yet beyond the religious realm, we often fail to see that American exceptionalism extends benefits to Americans who are white.  The exclusion of Cesar Chavez and Thurgood Marshall in favor of James Madison or Andrew Jackson is obvious on its face: the replacement of two figures of color by two white figures.  Yet in Oklahoma the racial implications of featuring Andrew Jackson in favor of a person of color should become even clearer, as we cannot forget the man who defied the Supreme Court and unconstitutionally uprooted Native Americans in a forced march across the country to their “reservations.” We have to be reminded that “American exceptionalism” all too easily morphs into “white exceptionalism,” the apathetic and unthinking accomplice of white supremacism.

This curriculum meeting should present as a moment for pause.  Yes, we may soon see a flood of deficient U.S. history textbooks that represent a narrow, rather sectarian point of view.  However, as a barometer of attitudes and currents within our nation, it indicates the presence of religious supremacy, structural racism, ethnic bigotry, and international indifference.  To make matters worse, groups and individuals exhibiting these attitudes are often belligerent, self-confident, and self-righteous; offering an understanding of dialogue that looks more like the evangelism of conversion than the engagement of conversation.  If the Texas SBOE approves these very narrow and ahistorical changes to the social studies curriculum in their meeting tomorrow, it will be a travesty on history.  The fact that so many people continue to hold to these inaccurate and dehumanizing ideals right now is a travesty on humanity.

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As a note of gratitude, I am indebted to the Texas Freedom Network for their extensive coverage of the curriculum changes in their state.  Hats off to them for all of the good work they do on behalf of not only Texans, but the rest of us as well.  I also want to extend my thanks to Brian Thevenot for his article of the same name, whose title I have selfishly co-opted as my own.

Also, if you’d like to send in your comments at the last moment, you can still link here to the United Farm Workers advocacy page and email your comments to SBOE chair, Gail Lowe.

Responding to Britt Hume’s Responders

I’ll be the first to admit that as a person of faith and a leader in a faith community, I’m disturbed by Britt Hume’s comments concerning Tiger Woods on Fox News Sunday.  If you haven’t caught Hume’s comments, you can find the 35 second blurb on Thursday’s news and analysis segment, “Tiger Woods’ Come to Jesus.”  I want to tip my cap to Caitlin’s work at finding such a breadth of responses to this little faux pas, because it revealed to me some problems in our understanding of religion and faith traditions that make not only Hume’s thoughts problematic, but those of some of his defenders as well.  If we put aside the obvious softball pitchers like Bill O’Reilly, there are some intriguing defenders out there, even if their defenses aren’t nearly so intriguing.

Stuart Roy’s comments at The Hill really miss the point on this issue.  He begins with a long apologetic for Christianity based on the statistical “fact” that it’s still the recognized majority religion in the United States.  I feel like I would be repeating myself this week if I went into the problems of the moral tyranny of the majority, so I want to move on to his comments on Christianity vis-à-vis Buddhism:

Secondly, although there is a lot of discussion about this point, Buddhism isn’t a religion in the sense of belief in a higher being from whom to seek forgiveness. Instead, Buddhism says you get this from within. I’m no religious scholar, but that would put Hume’s analysis pretty much on point. In Christianity, you do seek forgiveness and redemption from a higher being, something not offered in Buddhism. You may disagree with whether or not it is necessary — if you aren’t a Christian — but his analysis was correct.

Roy is correct – he’s no religious scholar.  The assumption that forgiveness can only be granted by or through some higher power is the failing point of both Hume’s original slap at Buddhism and Roy’s misguided attempt at a defense.  If he were a religious scholar, he might realize that one of the greatest failures of Christian theology is its tendency to lock forgiveness into the relationship between an individual human being and some higher power.  When a person may somehow feel absolved of failing in their relationship to another human being (or group of them for that matter), there is no reason to seek the forgiveness of the wronged party and to engage in a process of dialogue and reconciliation.  Christianity has plagued the western landscape with this attitude that “Because I’ve made things right with God, I don’t have to worry about making things right with my neighbor.” I’m pretty sure that’s inconsistent with the red-lettered words in Mr. Roy’s unread Bible.  To make matters worse, as Christian doctrine continues to blind some of its most faithful adherents from engaging in just and caring relationships with other human beings, the sayings of the Dalai Lama strike me as highly ethical and relational.  Perhaps it’s time to take a step back and re-evaluate.

My second point of contention is more one of disappointment.  Rabbi Brad Hirschfield’s defense of religion in general as a response to Hume’s comments is well intentioned, but shortsighted.  His attack on the liberal media and blogosphere failed to recognize that some of us self-proclaimed “liberals” are also religious.

Let’s face it, many people fear faith and even more genuinely resent it being discussed in public. While there is no question about the damage which religious faith can do, there should also be no question as to the good things it accomplishes in terms of both creating personal meaning and also motivating humanitarian action. So it should be a wash. Instead though, because Hume suggested Jesus instead of rehab, both he and those who support him are attacked as Jesus Freaks and fanatics. That’s not right.

While there may have been a loud outcry from the non-religious, it wasn’t the only cry.  There are those of us within the religious community, and more specifically the Christian community, who treasure the diversity of our global religious pluralism and respect the voices of our neighbors and peers in the Buddhist faith.  Since Hirschfield seems to share this value with me, I’m having a difficult time understanding why he went out of his way to defend someone like Britt Hume who obviously does not.  He goes on to conclude his article:

I welcome Mr. Hume’s remarks even if I think his analyses of Buddhism is shallow, and his claim that it is only through Jesus that Tiger will find a better life, bordering on ridiculous. So why welcome his comments? Because I know that he meant well and because faith matters to people and it should not be banished from public conversation. Not if we are as committed to openness in the way so many of us claim to be. Now we will find out if we really are.

The sad fact is that there are a lot of people who mean well, but rather thoughtlessly and carelessly bring about more harm than good.  I’ll resist the temptation to expound a list of “well meaning” politicians who have caused egregious harm, including pointless death and destruction.  However, I will not stop short of saying that Hume’s thinking, well being though it may be, is provincial and narrow.  If he were truly interested in offering his support to Tiger Woods, Hume would be extending the invitation to dialogue, rather than wagging his finger and admonishing Woods to come to Jesus.

To make matters worse, Fox News appears to have circled the wagons around one of their own.  Not only do they fail to recognize that “fair and balanced” means you can’t casually cast aside a major world religion in an offhanded remark, but in refusing to acknowledge that Hume’s critics might have a point, they make it quite clear that the discourse is only “fair” when they are allowed to determine what is “balanced.”  While I’ve quietly thought the media circus around Tiger Woods is more scandalous than the “scandal” itself, the failure of discourse that has followed in the aftermath is perhaps the greater scandal we fail to even recognize.

Church, State and the Common Good

If I would’ve started a pool as to what issue would be the first to catch my attention in this new year, my money would not have been riding on church and state.   That is, at least, until I discovered what may seem like a relatively obscure action of taken by the Board of Aldermen from my hometown of Centralia, MO.  In their final meeting of 2009 they discussed three proposed ordinances that would have amended the city code’s non-discrimination protections to include “gender identity” and “sexual orientation,” a change that I welcome and support.  Unfortunately the meeting ended with a failure to pass the proposed changes by a vote of 4-2. However it wasn’t the inaction of the aldermen that concerned me; it was the religious activism on the part of a local pastor.  Here’s an excerpt of coverage from the local newspaper:

One speaker, for example, was Larry Lewis, interim pastor of the Centralia [First] Baptist Church. Suggesting he spoke for “Centralia’s faith community,” he said the ordinances violated the separation of church and state and would, among other things, give the city’s stamp of approval to those lifestyles. “This would be divisive when this community needs healing.”

This prompted me to look into the proposed ordinances for myself, and I was disappointed but not surprised to discover that the language of the bills included very specific exemptions for churches and other religious institutions and organizations.  (I write more about this at my own blog.)  The claim that the bills violated the separation clause was nothing more than political grandstanding designed to provide a supposedly “legal” cover for the public moralizing of an exclusivist religious perspective.  In actuality, this no-holds-barred attempt by so-called Christian interests to codify their own morality proved to be the greater threat to the separation clause.  In instances such as this, the dual meaning of “separation of church and state” is too often forgotten.  The first amendment not only protects religious institutions from encroachment by the state, but protects the state, and by extension its citizens, from the encroachment of religion.

I discovered that I wasn’t alone in this new year’s concern.  As I wrote about the moral tyranny of religion in local politics, Americans United for the Separation of Church and State wondered about similar issues at the national level.  They recently posted a report offering a look at President Obama’s record on this issue after one year.  Their findings aren’t nearly as gleeful as those on the Religious Right might have you believe:

There’s no denying that when Obama took office, many who stand guard on the church-state wall breathed a sigh of relief. The previous eight years had been difficult ones, and there was a sense that things had to get better because they really couldn’t get any worse.

…

But that doesn’t mean everything Obama has done has pleased advocates of church-state separation. Indeed, the Obama record on church and state is mixed. One year later, it’s a good time to step back and assess his record so far.

Lifting up Obama’s decision to open federal funding for stem cell research and inclusion of minority and non-religious voices in his speeches and public functions as highlights, this report goes on to address areas of concern.  Noting the President’s rather ambiguous record regarding appointments to federal judgeships, including the appointment of Justice Sotomayor to the Supreme Court, the report goes on to raise real questions with regard to the administration’s positions concerning faith-based initiatives, school voucher programs, and church/state cases being pursued by the Department of Justice.  While I don’t necessarily share these concerns to the same extent that Americans United might, I do think they make legitimate points about Obama’s record on the separation between religion and politics.

Yet, as important as these collisions between religion and politics are, I’m left with a troubling question: If we are to honor the non/religious pluralism of our contemporary society, how do we effectively work to promote the common good?  And perhaps even more importantly, how do we even determine a common good?  While it should be apparent that I support the liberal (lowercase “L”) ideal of tolerance, I’m not blind to its problems.  Ethicist and scholar David Hollenbach perhaps describes them best:

In public life, all encompassing understandings of the common good must be subordinated to the importance of tolerance.  A live-and-let-live ethos thus leads to what John Dewey once called an “eclipse of the public.”  The good that can be achieved in the shared domain of public life is hidden from view as protection of individual, private well-being becomes the center of normative concern.

(David Hollenbach, The Common God and Christian Ethics, 10)

In an age of religious and nonreligious sectarianism, competing political visions, and outright discord and distrust, how do we seek out a vision for the shared good?  The health care debate that spanned the entirety of 2009 really exemplifies the difficulties we face.  The cries of nationalized health care and “death panels” drowned out the voices of reason for a rational public discussion.  And to make matters worse, this non-debate effectively silenced discussions on other important issues such as the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, apprehension, detainment and trial of suspected terrorists, and the plight of the poor, which extends to far more basic concerns than health care.

It is my hope for 2010 that we as a nation will work to find some means for engaging in national discussions that don’t automatically degenerate into shouting matches and propaganda wars.  Yet looking back at 2009, I’m left to wonder if we can actually summon the ethical wherewithal to make that hope a reality.

When Did 9/11 Become More Powerful Than 11/11?

“The 11^th hour of the 11^th day of the 11^th month…”

Ninety-one years ago today the echoes of the guns of August finally faded into silence.  The parties of what at the time was known as “the war to end all wars” laid down their arms and began negotiating the peace.  World War I had come to a close. (Of course, this didn’t mark an end to fighting – the Ottoman Empire disintegrated into civil war and wouldn’t reemerge as the Republic of Turkey for almost five years.)

Today we observe this date as Veteran’s Day, a national holiday to honor all of those who have lived and died in the service of the U.S. military.  Given our current crisis, this observance is perhaps more important than ever.  I think we may have exceeded Winston’s Churchill’s imagination of military sacrifice when he famously said, “Never has so much been owed by so many to so few.”  The burden of our military engagements in Iraq and Afghanistan teeters dangerously on the less-than-Atlas-sized shoulders of our all-volunteer military.  While this disproportionately small segment of U.S. society* fights our wars, the majority of us continue to rally around the cause of conflict with virtually no ownership.  How many of us have family members in the military?  In combat zones?  What is our personal investment in these conflicts?

I fear that our disregard for the face of this holiday has allowed the deeper meaning of Veterans Day to remain obscured.  Prior to becoming Veterans Day in 1954, this date was celebrated as Armistice Day, marking the cease fire that ended World War I.  Buried within the deep of the Veterans Day tradition, there is not only an honoring of those who have served, but a remembrance of the terrible cost of war.  A concurrent resolution passed by Congress in on June 4, 1926 reminds us of this price and encourages us to observe this date in the totality of its meaning (with thanks to the Veterans Administration, emphasis is mine):

Whereas the 11th of November 1918, marked the cessation of the most destructive, sanguinary, and far reaching war in human annals and the resumption by the people of the United States of peaceful relations with other nations, which we hope may never again be severed, and

Whereas it is fitting that the recurring anniversary of this date should be commemorated with thanksgiving and prayer and exercises designed to perpetuate peace through good will and mutual understanding between nations; and

Whereas the legislatures of twenty-seven of our States have already declared November 11 to be a legal holiday: Therefore be it Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives concurring), that the President of the United States is requested to issue a proclamation calling upon the officials to display the flag of the United States on all Government buildings on November 11 and inviting the people of the United States to observe the day in schools and churches, or other suitable places, with appropriate ceremonies of friendly relations with all other peoples.

To put it simply, Armistice Day was originally conceived as a day to celebrate the end of the fighting and to honor the cause of peace.

I fear we live in an age where much of the power of the original Armistice Day holiday has been lost; a power of which we are in dire need.  We are politically dominated by the symbol of 9/11, a rallying cry to war uninhibited by any understanding of the deeper causes of resentment and hatred for our neo-imperial foreign policy.  For those of us seeking to make a difference in our national life, it’s time to claim the symbol of 11/11: a call for peace grounded in the hope for a more cooperative community of nations, yet tempered in the sober reality of the destructive war whose end it commemorates.

Until we recognize that the cost of our callousness is truly greater than we can afford to bear, we will continue to live in fear instead of hope.  Defining our orientation in terms of the devastating attack of September 11^th only reinforces our national paranoia.  Redefining our direction in terms of an admittedly uneasy armistice and peace could allow us to begin the process of international reconciliation that will truly be required to ensure not only our national security but international security as well.  The time has come for those of who support the cause of peace to reject the fear of 9/11 and claim anew the hope of 11/11.

*Which also happens to be disproportionately overrepresented by African Americans and is rapidly rising in Latino/a representation – See Government Accounting Office Report GAO-05-952)

Related links:

• Section 60 | Xenia Institute

An Open Letter to President Obama

By Clint Collins
Xenia blogger

Dear Mr. President:

By the time this is published, I may be one of the last people remaining on the planet who has yet to commend or eviscerate you for your selection to receive the Nobel Peace Prize.  In spite of that, I hope you will accept my heartfelt congratulations on your receipt of this great honor.  While others choose to question or even denigrate your selection on the grounds that you have yet to demonstrate your commitment to peace through sweeping accomplishments or an extensive span of intentionality and engagement, I consider your multilateral and dialogical approach to statesmanship worthy of both accolade and emulation.  Your enlightened leadership in this respect confers great benefit not only to our national self-interest, but also to the global common good.

I am further appreciative of the manner in which you received this honor.  While the temptation to bask in the glow of international recognition presented itself, you shunned self-aggrandizement in favor of furthering the cause of dialogue, mutuality, and respect.  The announcement on behalf of the Norwegian Nobel Committee clearly disclosed their hope that this award would strengthen your vision of international solidarity, and you have chosen to accept it as a means to further that goal, instead of as an end in itself.  For all of these things, Mr. President, I commend you.

Yet in spite of my admiration for your globally oriented approach to diplomacy and governance, I feel compelled to speak on behalf of those who today cannot share in Alfred Nobel’s vision of “fraternity between nations.”  The absence of any specific reference to the peoples of Iraq and Afghanistan in your acceptance announcement casts a conspicuous and disappointing shadow across an otherwise inspiring response.  Further clouding this moment, the one presidential responsibility you chose to lift up by title was your position as commander of U.S. military forces.  While the irony of this was palpable, to do so in the same breath that you offer only an oblique and implied reference to the ongoing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq was truly in poor form.

Constrained by their status as occupied nations, neither Iraq nor Afghanistan may truly benefit from your vision of multilateralism.  They are at best patron states reliant upon U.S. military presence and subject to U.S. guidance, or at worst occupied territories only one step removed from the status of puppet-states.  In either case, or by any other scenario in between, these nations can never truly be partners in a conversation of equals.  Until they are released from the custody of military occupation, the peoples of Afghanistan and Iraq remain excluded from the possibility and hope for a just peace.

Given your own acknowledgement of the momentum this award offers to the cause of international peace and diplomacy, I urge you to avert any impending inertia by expediently withdrawing our military forces from Iraq and Afghanistan.  If we as a nation are to uphold the values and virtues you have extolled throughout your presidential tenure and during your preceding election campaign, we must act to end this injustice and reinstate these nations to their rightful place as equals at the global table.

I write this with my full support for your timely and necessary global vision, and with my continued prayers that your leadership may be just, moral, and equitable.

Respectfully yours,

Clint Collins

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