An ISP called Toast.net has an interactive Independence Day Quiz — feeling patriotic? Go see how your knowledge of U.S. history and lore stacks up against others. The questions are very good, really.
Remember to fly your flag on the 4th of July!
Independence Day quiz
June 30, 2008
2 Comments | 
1776, Education, History | Tagged: 4th of July, History, Patriotism, Quiz | 
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Posted by Ed Darrell
“Louisiana’s exorcist governor”
June 30, 2008I love the headline: “Anti-science law signed by Louisiana’s exorcist governor.”
Tony Whitson’s quick analysis is good, too.
One might begin to think Louisiana really is cursed. Katrina, Rita, other political troubles — and then they elect the bright, young reformer as governor, and he turns out to be a voodoo history and voodoo science practitioner — heck, maybe he practices just plain old voodoo.
All this comes at a time when it may have saved John McCain from making a mistake that would make George McGovern’s selection of Tom Eagleton look like wisdom of the ages (when news came out that Eagleton had undergone convulsive shock therapy for depression, he was replaced on the ticket by Sargent Shriver, but not after much damage had been done to the credibility and viability of the McGovern campaign — why Nixon thought it necessary to sponsor burglary to defeat this ticket is one of the mysteries of the ages of Shakespearian tragedy come to life in in American politics).
Mind you, I like and respect McGovern, and I found working with Tom Eagleton on the Senate Labor Committee a great joy.
Leave a Comment » | Campaigns, Creationism, Education, Evolution, History, Intelligent Design, Politics, Science, War on Education, War on Science | Tagged: 2008 campaign, Creationism, Education, Evolution, History, Intelligent Design, War on Education | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
India, 100 years ago
June 30, 2008World history and geography teachers take note: This site, Chat and Chai, has an interesting slide show of what appear to be stereoscope and post card photos from India, 100 years ago. The link may be useful for on-line demonstrations — you may be able to use the images in other presentations.
The slides show people in a lot of everyday activities, providing good, visual examples of how people lived then. An instructive comparison: Can your students find photos of Indians carrying out similar activities today? How has India changed, for how much of its population? I suspect you can find cases where Some Indians have leaped into the 21st century, and other examples where the lives of many millions of people have not changed all that much.
Several of the photos remind that they were taken 40 years or more before India won independence from Britain. These may pertain to discussions of empires and imperialism, and other economic issues, too.
One commenter asked the blogger to share the slides, but I don’t see a positive response.
Don’t ask me to explain the music the blogger selected for the slides.
Here is the actual slide show.
Vodpod videos no longer available.
more about “India 100 Years Ago “, posted with vodpod
Leave a Comment » | Education, Geography - Economic, Geography - Physical, Geography - Political, History, History images, World history | Tagged: Education, India, World history | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Legacy of 1968: USS Pueblo still shadows North Korean relations
June 29, 2008It’s clear that U.S. relations with North Korea (the Peoples Republic of Korea, or PRK) still suffer from institutional memories of the USS Pueblo incident. For both sides the Pueblo incident remains a sore point from 1968, a very trying year for the U.S. anyway.
PRK was scheduled to detail its nuclear activities in a report last Thursday when I started pondering this issue — part of the continuing negotiations to close down nuclear weapons production in PRK. PRK hoped to get off the U.S. list of “terrorist nations.“
Al Jazeera featured this story, below, in September 2007. In addition to footage of the Pueblo, still illegally held by PRK, and used as tourist site and propaganda opportunity, the piece explores the effects of the incident on more recent events, the negotiations to de-nuclearize the Korean Peninsula.
And now we know the rest of the story. PRK delivered the report; Bush announced the nation would be taken off the list of supporters of terrorism. (Report below from CBS News)
PRK destroyed the cooling towers to their offensive reactor.
And now we’re right back where we were in 1995. Eight years of Bush’s work pushed us backwards 13 years. Partial compliance by PRK, but the bomb-building project is on hold.
Nuclear non-proliferation mades some strides this last week. Still I can’t help the feeling that January 21, 2009, cannot arrive quickly enough.
Remember the Pueblo veterans. The Pueblo Affair still dogs relations between the U.S. and the PRK, through no fault of the crew of the Pueblo who endured a year of brutal captivity, and then seem to have been forgotten by the nation they served so well.
5 Comments | 1968, History, Korea, Nuclear weapons, Santayana's ghost | Tagged: 1968, History, Korea, Nuclear Proliferation, Politics, USS Pueblo | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Quote of the moment: T. H. Huxley
June 29, 2008June 29, 1895: T.H. Huxley DiesThomas Henry Huxley, a British biologist and firm believer in evolution, dies at age 70. The greatest defender of Darwinism in Britain, he once said,
“The deepest sin against the human mind is to believe things without evidence.”
2 Comments | Dunning Kruger Effect, Famous quotes, History, Quotes, Religion, Science | Tagged: Dunning-Kruger Effect, Quotes, Religion, Science, T. H. Huxley | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
How to start a hoax against a presidential candidate
June 29, 2008Hoax complaints against presidential candidates are old ideas. In 1796, Alexander Hamilton paid newspaper editors to print stories saying Thomas Jefferson was atheist. It was a minor theme in that campaign, but after John Adams’ political fortunes foundered on the Alien and Sedition Acts, among other missteps, Hamilton stepped up the attacks in the election of 1800.
Jefferson’s great biographer, Dumas Malone, estimates that by election day, fully half the American electorate believed Jefferson was atheist. Jefferson made a perfect target for such a charge — staunch advocate of religious freedom, he thought it beneath the dignity of a politician to answer such charges at all, so he did not bother to deny them publicly. Ministers in New England told their congregations they would have to hide their Bibles because, as president, Jefferson would send troops to confiscate them.
In a warning to hoaxers, we might hope, Americans elected Jefferson anyway.
Such nefariousness plagues campaigns today, still. Boone Pickens, who helped fund the Swiftboat Veterans’ calumny against war hero John Kerry, has an offer to pay $1 million to anyone who can show the charges false. In a replay of Holocaust denial cases, Pickens refuses to accept any evidence to pay the award, last week turning away the affidavits of the men who were present at the events.
At the Bathtub, we’ve already sampled a crude and steady attempt to brand Hillary Clinton a Marxist with creative editing of a few of her speeches.
The assaults on Barack Obama are already the stuff of legend. The comic strip, “Doonesbury,” is running a story line with a volunteer for the internet rumor stopping part of the campaign, FighttheSmears.com. The smears are real.
Matthew Most of the Washington Post wrote a lengthy piece in yesterday’s paper, “An attack that came out of the ether,” on the research done by a woman at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey, on the origins of the internet hoax that Barack Obama is a Muslim — a rumor so potent that Georgetown University Prof. Edward Luttwak repeated it in a New York Times op-ed article, without the fact checkers catching it (the Times consulted five scholars of Islam who all agreed the foundation for the claim is incorrect).
Danielle Allen has tracked the rumor back to its sources, in a failed campaign against Obama in Illinois and a candidate who admittedly was looking for mud, and one constant sniper at FreeRepublic.com. It’s impressive sleuthing, and the article would be a good departure for study of how media affect campaigns in a government or civics class.
The “how to” list is really very short:
- Pick an area of a candidate’s life that is not well known. As the Hamilton campaign against Jefferson demonstrates, it’s useful if the candidate does not feature the issue in official biographies, and more useful if the candidate doesn’t respond. Michael Dukakis let several issues slide in his campaign for the presidency, saying that he didn’t think the public would be misled. The public was waiting for a rebuttal.
- It helps if there is a factoid that is accurate in the rumor. Obama’s father was Muslim. Most Americans were receptive to the false claim that in Islam, a child is considered Muslim unless there is a conversion. A part of the rumor claims Obama was never baptized Christian. Of course, no one has asked to see John McCain’s baptismal papers. One wonders whether a rumor about McCain’s not being born inside the U.S. could get similar traction among voters (McCain was born in Panama while his father was serving in the Panama Canal Zone in the Navy; children of U.S. citizens are automatically U.S. citizens regardless where they are born. The issue was litigated during Barry Goldwater’s candidacy in 1964, since Goldwater was born in Arizona before Arizona was a state.)
According to the Post story: [A] search showed that the first mention of the e-mail on the Internet had come more than a year earlier. A participant on the conservative Web site FreeRepublic.com posted a copy of the e-mail on Jan. 8, 2007, and added this line at the end: “Don’t know who the original author is, but this email should be sent out to family and friends.”
Allen discovered that theories about Obama’s religious background had circulated for many years on the Internet. And that the man who takes credit for posting the first article to assert that the Illinois senator was a Muslim is Andy Martin.
Martin, a former political opponent of Obama’s, is the publisher of an Internet newspaper who sends e-mails to his mailing list almost daily. He said in an interview that he first began questioning Obama’s religious background after hearing his famous keynote speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.
- Repeat the claim, as often as possible, to audiences that are inflamed by it. No one would dare make such a claim before an audience of Democratic delegates from the Texas 23rd Senatorial District Democratic Convention, almost 80% of whom were black — at least not at the convention. However, flyers making the charge might show up on windows of cars parked during church services at Christian churches where delegates attend. A speaker at the Republican convention for the same district might not be hooted down. This rumor of Obama’s faith went to right-wing forums known for rumor hospitality, notably Free Republic. In forums at that site, rumors frequently appear to be judged on just how damaging they might be if true, not on their veracity.
- Repeat the claim, even after denials.
The story is well worth reading. It can help educate us to how to avoid being victims of such rumors in the future.
Tip of the old scrub brush to e-mail correspondent MicahBrown.
3 Comments | Accuracy, Barack Obama, Campaigns, Cartoons, Education, Free press, Free speech, History, Hoaxes, Obama 2008, Politics, Technology | Tagged: 2008 campaign, Barack Obama, Campaign Technology, Education, Elections, History, Hoaxes, How to, Media, Politics | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Suzuki: 50 years of science makes a difference
June 27, 2008Dr. David Suzuki is a Canadian scientist who writes popular science chiefly for Canadians. We in the U.S. might do well to pay more attention to him.
Below, his e-mail newsletter/column, with observations about the 50 years of science progress since his graduation from college. FYI.
Dear Friend:
Here’s your weekly Science Matters column by David Suzuki with Faisal Moola.
What a difference 50 years makes
Last month, I attended the 50th anniversary of my college graduation. A week later, I celebrated my grandson’s graduation from high school. I don’t think I was much different from the kids in my grandson’s class when I went away to college in 1954 (give or take a few rings and tattoos). Like them, I was filled with trepidation but also excitement about testing my physical and intellectual abilities beyond high school. But my how the world has changed in 50 years!
I began my last year of college in 1957. On October 4 that year, the Soviet Union electrified the world by successfully launching a satellite, Sputnik 1, into space. Little did we dream that out of the ensuing space race between the U.S.S.R. and the U.S.A. would come 24-hour television news channels, cellphones, and GPS navigation. In 1958, the only trans-Atlantic phone lines were cables laid on the ocean floor, so phone calls to England had to be booked hours or sometimes days in advance. I flew from Toronto to a roommate’s wedding in San Francisco on a propeller plane that made several stops during the 22-hour trip.
In 1958, scientists were still debating about whether genetic material was DNA or protein, we didn’t know how many chromosomes humans have or that the Y chromosome determines sex, and the Green Revolution was yet to come. Polio was still a problem in North America, smallpox killed hundreds of thousands annually, and oral contraceptives, photocopiers, personal computers, colour TV, and DVDs didn’t exist. In 1958, parts of the Amazon, Congo, and New Guinea had not been explored. We were yet to learn of species extinction, depletion of fish in the oceans, the effects of CFCs on the ozone layer, acid rain, global warming, PCBs, and dioxins.
In half a century our lives have been transformed by scientific, medical, and technological advances, as well as a host of environmental problems. No one deliberately set out to undermine the planet’s life-support systems or tear communities apart, but those have been the consequences of our enormous economic and technological “success” over the past five decades. Beset by vast problems of wealth discrepancy, environmental issues, poverty, terror, genocide, and prejudice, we are trying to weave our way into an uncertain future.
I began speaking out on television in 1962 because I was shocked by the lack of understanding of science at a time when science as applied by industry, medicine, and the military was having such a profound impact on our lives. I felt we needed more scientific understanding if we were to make informed decisions about the forces shaping our lives. Today, thanks to computers and the Internet, and television, radio, and print media, we have access to more information than humanity has ever had. To my surprise, this access has not equipped us to make better decisions about such matters as climate change, peak oil, marine depletion, species extinction, and global pollution. That’s largely because we now have access to so much information that we can find support for any prejudice or opinion.
Don’t want to believe in evolution? No problem – you can find support for intelligent design and creationism in magazines, on websites, and in all kinds of books written by people with PhDs. Want to believe aliens came to Earth and abducted people? It’s easy to find theories about how governments have covered up information on extraterrestrial aliens. Think human-induced climate change is junk science? Well, if you choose to read only certain national newspapers and magazines and listen only to certain popular commentators on television or radio, you’ll never have to change your mind. And so it goes. The challenge today is that there is a huge volume of information out there, much of it biased or deliberately distorted. As I think about my grandson, his hopes and dreams and the immense issues my generation has bequeathed him, I realize what he and all young people need most are the tools of skepticism, critical thinking, the ability to assess the credibility of sources, and the humility to realize we all possess beliefs and values that must constantly be reexamined. With those tools, his generation will certainly leave a better world to its children and grandchildren 50 years from now.
Take David Suzuki’s Nature Challenge and learn more at www.davidsuzuki.org.
5 Comments | Education, Environmental protection, History, Science | Tagged: David Suzuki, Education, Environmental protection, History, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Quote of the Moment: John Kennedy, June 26, 1963 (Encore Post)
June 26, 2008
Rare color photograph of President John Kennedy addressing a crowd in the then-divided city of Berlin, June 26, 1963
From the Smithsonian Magazine site:
June 26, 1963: “Ich bin ein Berliner”
In West Berlin, President John F. Kennedy delivers the famous speech in which he declares, “Ich bin ein Berliner.” Meaning literally “I am a citizen of Berlin,” the statement shows U.S. solidarity with democratic West Berlin, surrounded by communist territory.
View a video of President Kennedy’s speech at American Rhetoric, Top 100 Speeches.
Photo of President Kennedy addressing Berlin’s citizens, photographer unidentified; from American Rhetoric site.
[end of encore post]
Kennedy’s entire speech was good. It was well drafted and well delivered, taking advantage of the dramatic setting and the dramatic moment. John Kennedy well understood how to give a speech, too.
Below is most of the speech, nearly five minutes’ worth, from a YouTube file — another indication that schools need to open up their filters to allow at least some of the best YouTube material through:
You may also want to note these posts:
6 Comments | Accuracy, Cold War, Communism, Famous quotes, Freedom - Political, History, History audio sources, History video sources, Quotes, Video and film | Tagged: Berlin Wall, Cold War, Communism, Famous quotes, freedom, History, John F. Kennedy | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Typewriter of the moment: W. H. Auden at Swarthmore
June 25, 2008Poet W. H. Auden taught students at Swarthmore for three years, 1942-1945. Swarthmore’s library started rather early to collect Auden’s manuscripts and other materials, including the typewriter he used there — an Underwood, as you can see, below.
Auden’s typewriter during his Swarthmore years (1942-1945).
The library has a detailed, on-line exhibit of Auden’s work and associations with the college, material useful for student research and in-class presentations related to his work.
Auden’s poetry was contemporary, and it reflected the fears and passions of lovers, and lovers of liberty, in the face of the fascist threat of World War II. Auden died, aged by tobacco, alcohol and barbituates, in 1973, aged 67.
Resources:
- Auden’s biography — it’s pretty interesting — at Poets.org, the Academy of American Poets
- .pdf of the Swarthmore alumni magazine article on Auden at the college
- Auden’s poems, at the site of the W. H. Auden Society
- Auden’s poem, “September 1, 1939”
- “As I Walked Out One Evening”
- W. H. Auden Society
Leave a Comment » | Books, History, Literature, Poetry, Technology, Typewriters, World War II | Tagged: Entertainment, Media, Poetry, September 1 1939, Technology, Typewriters, W. H. Auden, World War II | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Symposium in a book: Rachel Carson’s legacy
June 25, 2008Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn released his hold, Rep. Jason Altmire’s bill moved, and three weeks ago the post office in Springdale, Pennyslvania, was named in Rachel Carson’s honor. On the internet, yahoos still try to blame her deaths from malaria, claiming that her message of stewardship was misplaced, and led to a “ban” on DDT that allows malaria to run wild.
Off the internet, serious scholars still work. SUNY Press published a compilation of lectures at Oregon State Univesrity commemorating the 40th anniversary of Carson’s most famous book, Silent Spring. The new book, Rachel Carson: Legacy and Challenge is edited by Lisa Sideris and Kathleen Dean Moore.
The press release from the University of Indiana is below the fold.
Leave a Comment » | Books, DDT, Environmental protection, Ethics, History, Rachel Carson, Religion, Science | Tagged: Books, DDT, Environmental protection, Ethics, Rachel Carson, Religion, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Torturing children, the Constitution, and a teacher’s duty to protect children
June 23, 2008This is the device Ohio teacher John Freshwater was using to shock students and brand them with crosses: A BD-10A high-frequency generator tester for leak detection, from Electro-Technic Products, Inc.:
BD-10A high frequency generator tester leak detector, from Electro-Technic Products. “BD10ASV OUTPUT: 10,000-50,000 volts at frequency of approx. 1/2 megahertz. Power 230 V, with a momentary ON/OFF switch”
As described at the company’s website:
- Model BD-10A is the standard tester
- Model BD-10AS features a momentary ON/OFF switch
- OUTPUT: 10,000-50,000 volts at frequency of approx. 1/2 megahertz
The company also offers a line of instruments for teaching science — notably absent from that part of the catalog is this shocking device (literally).
Generally, this tester should not produce serious injury, even when misapplied. Standard middle school lab safety rules would suggest that it should never be used to “test” a human for leaks. Such voltages are designed to produce sparks. Sparks do not always behave as one expects, or hopes. High voltages may make cool looking sparks, but the effects of high voltage jolts differ from person to person. It may be harmful.
“We have instructions to warn people that it’s not a toy,” said Cuzelis, who owns Electro-Technic Products in Chicago. “If this device is directed for seconds (on the skin), that’s a clear misuse of the product.”
Cuzelis said he is not aware of anyone seriously hurt with the device and said that his company has never been sued for injuries.
What sort of lab safety rules did Freshwater have for other experiments?
If you discovered your child’s science teacher had this device, designed to produce high-voltage sparks to highlight holes in rubber and plastic liners of tanks, would you be concerned? If you know what should go on in a science class, you’d know there is probably little use for such a device in a classroom. It’s been described as a Tesla coil.
Tesla coils of extremely small voltages can be safe. They should be safe. But one occasionally finds a safety warning, such as this generalized note at Wikipedia:
Even lower power vacuum tube or solid state Tesla Coils can deliver RF currents that are capable of causing temporary internal tissue, nerve, or joint damage through Joule heating. In addition, an RF arc can carbonize flesh, causing a painful and dangerous bone-deep RF burn that may take months to heal. Because of these risks, knowledgeable experimenters avoid contact with streamers from all but the smallest systems. Professionals usually use other means of protection such as a Faraday cage or a chain mail suit to prevent dangerous currents from entering their body.
Freshwater was using a solid state Tesla coil, if I understand the news articles correctly. Knowing that these sparks can cause deep tissue and bone damage in extreme cases, I suspect that I would not allow students to experience shocks as a normal course of a science classroom, especially from an industrial device not designed with multiple safety escapes built in.
Freshwater had been zapping students for years.
Here is a classic photo of what a Tesla coil does, a much larger coil than that used by John Freshwater, and a photo not from any classroom; from Mega Volt:
Tesla coil in action, from Mike Tedesco
There is nothing in the Ohio science standards to suggest regular use of a Tesla coil in contact with students performs any educational function.
I offer this background to suggest that the normal classroom procedures designed to ensure the safety of students were not well enforced in Freshwater’s classrooms, nor was there adequate attention paid to the material that should have been taught in the class.
The teacher, John Freshwater, has been dismissed by his local school board. Freshwater supporters argue that this is a case of religious discrimination, because Freshwater kept a Bible on his desk.
Among the complaints are that he burned crosses onto the arms of students with the high-voltage leak detector shown above. This gives an entirely new and ironic meaning to the phrase “cross to bear.”
Cafe Philos wrote the most succinct summary of the case I have found, “The Firing of John Freshwater.” Discussion at that site has been robust. Paul Sunstone included photos of one of the students’ arms showing injuries from the schocks. He also included links to news stories that will bring you up to date.
Amazingly, this misuse of an electrical device may not be the most controversial point. While you and I may think this physical abuse goes beyond the pale, Freshwater has defenders who claim he was just trying to instill Biblical morality in the kids, as if that would excuse any of these actions. Over at Cafe Philos, I’ve been trying to explain just why it is that Freshwater does not have a First Amendment right to teach religion in his science class. There is another commenter with the handle “Atheist” who acts for all the world like a sock puppet for anti-First Amendment forces, i.e., not exactly defending a rational atheist position.
Below the fold I reproduce one of my answers to questions Atheist posed. More resources at the end.
16 Comments | Academic freedom, Accuracy, America's founding, Bill of Rights, Classroom management, Creationism, Education, Education quality, First Amendment, Free speech, Freedom - Political, History, Intelligent Design, James Madison, Lessons of history, Pedagogy, Politics, Public education, Religion, Religious Freedom, Santayana's ghost, Science, Separation of church and state, Teaching, Thomas Jefferson, U.S. Supreme Court, War on Education, War on Science | Tagged: Creationism, Education, Evolution, First Amendment, Intelligent Design, John Freshwater, Law, Religion, Religious Freedom, Science, State Education Standards, Tesla coil | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Scout Centennial video
June 22, 2008Here’s a video on the 100th anniversary of the Boy Scouts of America, coming in 2010.
Vodpod videos no longer available.
more about “Scout Centennial video“, posted with vodpod
Scouts, Scouters, friends and media should probably bookmark this site, and use it to coordinate events planned for the centennial year.
Among other fun things, there was a contest to pick a logo for the year-long festivities. The logo is below, left.
The winning design came from an Eagle in California
Name: Philip Goolkasian
Hometown: Fresno, Calif.
Scout Rank: Eagle Scout
Council: Troop 223, Sequoia Counci
1 Comment | Boy Scouts of America, History | Tagged: 2010, Boy Scouts, History, Scouting American Centennial | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Louisiana creationists gear up campaign to deceive students
June 20, 2008My earlier post urging readers to contact Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal to urge him to veto the latest creationist eruption the Louisiana Lege gave him, produced an interesting comment. A fellow named Wayne provided links to a presentation by some guy named Perry Marshall, in which Marshall flails vainly against evolution theory. The video is billed as one the Louisiana Coalition for Science “fears.” Wayne wants to know, should we keep children from seeing it?
Marshall apparently isn’t even an engineer, but instead designs ads for internet placement — at least one step removed from the usual joke about engineers as creationists. Of course, that doesn’t help any of his arguments.
Wayne linked to three YouTube presentations, about half of the presentation Marshall made at an unidentified church (there are five segments total, I gather). What you see is bad PowerPoint slides, with audio. Marshall suggests that evolution couldn’t get from the American pronghorn antelope to the African giraffe, but in classic creationist form, he doesn’t address the unique signs of evolution we find in giraffes (neck, vagus nerve, for example) nor in pronghorns (bred for speed to beat the American cheetah, which is now extinct, and thereby hangs a great tale of sleuthing by evolution).
Marshall’s presentation is insulting. To me as a historian, it’s astounding how he can’t accurately list sequences of events well known to history. The science errors he makes are errors any 7th-grade student might make — but he’s passing them off as valid criticism of evolution theory.
Here’s the first YouTube presentation, and below the fold, my response to Wayne.
These presentations are an omen. They are sent to us as a warning for what the Discovery Institute will try to sneak into classrooms if Jindal signs that bill into law — heck, they’ll try anyway, but we don’t have to drill holes in our kids’ heads to make it easier for con men and snake oil salesmen to get their fingers in there.
My response below the fold.
28 Comments | Accuracy, Biology, Charles Darwin, Creationism, Darwin, Education, Education quality, Ethics, Evolution, History, Junk science, Pedagogy, Politics, Public education, Rampant stupidity, Religion, Science, Teaching, Textbooks, Voodoo science, War on Education, War on Science | Tagged: Bobby Jindal, Creationism, Education, Evolution, History, Intelligent Design, Louisiana creation law, Rampant stupidity, Religion, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Handbook of Texas on-line
June 20, 2008Question: Where do you find good Texas history in a hurry?
Answer: The Handbook of Texas.
Question: What about Texas history on-line?
Answer: Same thing, different format:
Tip of the old scrub brush to Will’s Texas Parlor. Crossposted at the Wayback Machine.
2 Comments | 1836, History, History images, Teaching, Technology, Technology in the classroom, Texas, Texas history | Tagged: On-line Sources, Technology, Texas history, Texas State History Association | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Campaign underwater? (and classroom DVD offer)
June 19, 2008
Who are these guys?
Who are these guys in the pool? Can you identify them?
Can they swim?
(Answers below the fold.)
1 Comment | Abraham Lincoln, Campaigns, Elections, Famous quotes, History, History images, History video sources, Politics, Slavery, Technology, Television | Tagged: Campaigns, Illinois, Lincoln Douglas Debates, Midwest floods 2008 | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 
