A right-wing Indiana state senator gave “shocking instructions to a history teacher” during a legislative hearing last week, Huffington Post reports (story here). Those instructions were “not to criticize Nazism or fascism to his students.”
The teacher, Matt Bockenfeld, said in the hearing that his class was “learning about the rise of fascism and … Nazism” and “I’m just not neutral on the political ideology of fascism.”
Republican Sen. Scott Baldwin (photo, above) responded, “We need to be impartial.” “He also said he wasn’t ‘discrediting’ Nazism,” Huffington Post reported. “Baldwin emphasized that it’s fine to discuss the existence of the ‘isms,’ like fascism and Nazism. But ‘we’ve gone too far when we take a position on those ‘isms,’’ he told Bockenfeld. ‘We need to be the purveyor of reason. We just provide the facts.’”
Well, I’ll discredit it. Senator, you’re a bleeping idiot.
Baldwin not only is incapable of critical thinking, but apparently has never heard of it. There are two parts to critical thinking: Facts + reason. “Reason” isn’t part of getting the facts; it’s what you do with facts after getting them.
This is why you don’t let state legislatures micromanage instruction in schools.
As for partisan politics, is asking Republicans not to do this sort of thing asking too much? Can’t they just disagree with Democrats on ideology and policies without going all-in stupid?
Scott Baldwin is a state Senator in Indiana and you are not. Apparently he is able to use fact and reason enough to get elected. Though like many politicians he has had a foot in mouth moment. We do not know if he regularly irons his uniform for meetings of the Silver Knights.
Baldwin is an idiot. There’s no law against electing idiots to legislatures. In this country, idiots are allowed to vote, so that’s going to happen in places populated by idiots.