WaPo Writer Caught Shading Truth About Texas Textbook Changes

In a scathing indictment, Ann Althouse bitchslaps a Washington Post writer who mischaracterized the changes approved in the Texas high school textbook nontroversy (to use one of dear Chuckie's coinages).

Here's how the Washington Post's Michael Birnbaum characterizes the changes, secure in the knowledge that the sheep who depend on WaPo for news will never second guess him:

The new standards say that the McCarthyism of the 1950s was later vindicated -- something most historians deny -- draw an equivalency between Jefferson Davis's and Abraham Lincoln's inaugural addresses, say that international institutions such as the United Nations imperil American sovereignty, and include a long list of Confederate officials about whom students must learn.

They also removed references to capitalism and replaced them with the term "free-enterprise system."

Here's how Althouse deals with Birnbaum's first fudgy "fact:"

The students are required to "describe how McCarthyism, the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), the arms race, and the space race increased Cold War tensions and how the later release of the Venona Papers confirmed suspicions of communist infiltration in U.S. government..." The word "vindicated" is inflammatory and unfair.

To see how Ann calls out Birnbaum on the rest of his mischaracterizations (some would call them "lies"), read the rest.