The religious right puts their magic book forward as self-evident truth in spite of the fact there is next to nothing in the way of independent corroboration for any of it. There is no independent corroboration for any part of the Jesus story what so ever. The Constitution does not mention the words Bible, Jesus or God, and specifically bans religious tests for holding public office. Never the less, the Christian Nationalists continue to claim this country was somehow based on their book. It wasn’t.
Our founding fathers could not have avoided being influenced by Christianity. And, important ideas found in our government such as the separation of powers came from Locke who came up with them based upon his understanding of the Bible. However, the Constitution is not a religious document and there has never been and will never be a "Christian America". Jesus said that his kingdom was not of this world which excludes every nation and government in power.
Yeah, I accept that. I accept that the founding fathers were influenced by christianity. After all, it was the dominant religion in their environment. So, it goes without saying that they were influenced by it.
But - and that is more important - they were aware of that influence and then CHOSE to write the constitution of the new country as a secular document. They CHOSE to write a clause specifying the separation of church and state, they chose to write a clause that there should be no religious tests before anyone can take up an office of the state.
Which means that I'd have no problem if history lessons pointed out the 'christian influence' aspect but only if they then leaned on heavily on the founding fathers' choices in writing the constitution.
Or to put more simply - by all means say 'A' but if you do, you also have to add 'B'.
Right. It should also be pointed out that the founding fathers had the long history of religious wars in Europe to consider when writing the Constitution. Needless to say, they sure didn't want them occurring over on our side of the Atlantic.
You'll probably have seen me recommending a specific book, this one has got a whole (!) section on those religious wars, they're calling it the 'Age of Religious Discord'. That section takes up about 10% of the whole book!
Which is how it should have been done in the first place. At least they're fixing the mess Walters left behind. I have a hazmat endorsement, I can haul it away for them.
Ryan Walters was typical of the religious extremists who draw their conclusions first, then work backward looking for justification. He saw his magic book as the solution to every problem, and that’s where his thinking evidently ended.
I can almost guarantee to you that he has never read the whole book, beginning to end. His mentor, David Barton told him exactly which parts to read and that is what he did. Can’t be polluting his pure Christian thoughts with those nasty bits in Ezekiel and Song of Solomon, can he?
It's a good thing there is no legal definition for a historian, because David Barton may as well be calling himself an astronaut. No university that wanted to hold on to their accreditation would ever hire him to teach history.
Think of a historian like eg a plumber. Or a baker. Basically someone who has learned certain skills, like a baker who knows how to make choux pastry, a (proper!) historian has learned how to interpret sources. And that comes with its own challenges:
Eg if you're looking at times when you've got very few written sources, you need to interpret all kinds of other remnants from that time. That's why areas such as numismatics or heraldry exist. It's where carbon dating and counting tree circles (yes, that's a thing) contribute knowledge.
And if you're looking at a time period when there are lots and lots of written sources, you'll need to find a way to filter them, because you cannot consider them all.
Addendum - AI can (can!) be helpful. I read an article which was considering the role AI can play when looking at genealogy in Scotland. That article suggested that AI can help pointing out that eg places named in a variety of sources are actually the same place, it's just that the spelling varies so widely, not only by the poor writing skills of the people writing the documents but also by people switching from Gaelic to English and back again.
I am generally pretty anti-AI but this article gave me food for thought, so that maybe there is a role for AI.
If you are referring to Ryan Walters, I am unaware of anything he did that might have been helpful to the condition of public education in Oklahoma. But I could say the same about every other state superintendent of education. I suspect we know more about Walters because of his resource wasting efforts. Had he been doing his job properly, he would have been largely unknown outside of OK educational circles. A lot of us here think that was the point. We believe he was angling for higher office of some sort. A Trump appointment.
It’s certainly better than his ‘christopretendisomething’. I actually put his phrase into my search engine (no, not google) and came across a youtube and a tiktok, all authored by one …. yes, you guessed. Our pal from yesterday.
His Christopretensism is just an Urban Dictionary colloquialism. It's not a recognized word or concept. Not in academia, not in political discourse and not even among theologists.
It made no sense. And the more he wrote, the less sense he made.
He clearly had no feel for the room, otherwise, he'd have written a couple of comments and then walked away.
What a twat!
(Due to his 'contributions' being scrubbed, my post about a place called Twatt got deleted, too. It's a lovely little place in the Orkney Islands and yes, they do a roaring trade of souvenirs with their village name printed on them.)
We are moving this week. I didn’t sleep well last night so I’m pretty fuzzy and tired today. You may not see me much for the rest of the week. Have fun.
Don’t forget to wash the true believers thoroughly before you chew on them. You don’t know where they’ve been.
Other than slavery and genocide, I cannot corollate any overlapping themes between the foundation of the United States and the Bible.
The Bible says to submit to the governing authorities because they are put in place by God. The United States was founded as a rebellious act against the governing authorities.
The Old Testament gives the rules for a theocracy or theocratic autocracy. The New Testament is not particularly interested in describing an ideal government at all. The United States government is modeled on a classical Republic.
Our government was founded on principles from the enlightenment. That the new government was compatible with Christianity and Judaism and Islam speaks to the benefits of separation of church and state.
Terrific. Oklahoma is at least TRYING to unfuck all the fucked-up stuff that Ryan Walters tried to put in place. If Mr. Fields can fully follow through on his expressed intentions, one might expect a serious improvement in the quality of education in the Sooner State.
And being that they languish at or near the BOTTOM of education ratings in the United States, THEY NEED IT.
Walters was so hung on his belief system that I doubt he could consider much of anything else. Anyone taking his place would be an improvement, almost by default.
One can only imagine how Republicans in Oklahomastan and other Red states will re-write Trump's sham of a presidency in future history, from the re-tweets of the Obamas as apes to his lies about Jeffrey Epstein.
The United States has proven itself to be the stupidest nation on the planet, electing a malignant narcissist totally unqualified and unfit to hold what once was the most important office in the world. Not any longer. The world deplores Trump and, by association, the United States.
Trump has not only decimated the present, but he has successfully sullied the past and endangered the future. All abetted by the Republican party.
All that work by the child killer undone. Beautiful. And despite Walters' tongue being lodged firmly inside Trump's rectum, he never did get that cabinet position he so lusted after.
Thus it it ever with those who try to align themselves with the Golden Goblin.
That said, I would be curious to know where Walters goes from here. Considering his penchant for shoving Christianity EVERYWHERE and especially in schools and/or government, keeping an eye on him strikes me as a fair idea.
I have little doubt but what he will make big money on the Christian speaking circuits shedding crocodile tears about he was the victim of the godless left. Your donations appreciated.
I expect he will be a thorn in our side for the next 20-25 years as he is only 40. He will hop from one conservative advocacy group to another, show up on Fox, speak at TPUSA, etc., etc.
“ In March 2025, the Freedom Foundation established the Teacher Freedom Alliance, a new national organization to provide educators with professional support services and resources.[15] The group is designed to provide educators with an alternative to teachers unions.[16] On September 25, 2025, Oklahoma Superintendent of Public Instruction Ryan Walters announced he would resign from his position and become the CEO of the Teacher Freedom Alliance.[17]”
He's also fairly young, there are many years ahead where he is likely to try that kind of shenanigans again.
A thought has just occurred to me, it's a question: Do you (=everyone here in this forum) think that anything could dislodge his thinking? Do you (=same) think that there is anything which would convince him that there is merit in secular spaces? Including secular education?
Could Walters change his mind? Anything is possible. PROBABLE? Not so much. He's bought into the con so deeply that I doubt anything could dislodge him from it.
“… the 2026 Oklahoma Standards reflect the education establishment’s studied lack of interest in patriotism, the historic roots of the American republic, or any notable achievements by conservatives or Republicans.”
You don’t teach patriotism, you engender it. You don’t have to lie and hide the truth to do so either. Patriotism is borne from the ideals that the country was built upon, the people who keep guiding faulty humans toward those ideals, and even if we don’t always live up to the ideals, we are always striving for them. So, you can’t teach pride in your country, but you can help people see the good in it so they can have pride.
What Walters actually did was make people less proud of the state and country by demanding conformity by going against the ideals that the country was built on. Any time patriotism is forced on a population, it backfires. The whole Bad Bunny Super Bowl response makes me less patriotic that a vanishing third of the country thinks that patriotism means we have to sing about how awful LGBTQ people are, or how we should be seeking our sexual partners in elementary schools, while pretending g to love Jesus, rather than celebrating the people who live and work and build up the country, even if it was sung in Spanish. One show was a Walters’ special, the other a portrait in patriotism. Despite the vitriol and violence directed at Bad Bunny by our leaders and vocal town assholes, he expressed joy, love and community. That is how you engender patriotism, not lying about history, pretending a villain is the second coming of Jesus, and forgetting that the country is for “We the People.”
"We are presenting a successful model that others can emulate for how to restore public education and eradicate radical woke influences from our schools."
When I hear someone use the word "woke" these days, I automatically think "That person is a complete imbecile".
He did ask why his dad abandoned him. Did Jesus forget the whole reason for his existence and eventual sacrifice for humanity (or at least the Chosen People, anyway).
Yes, this is a victory – good. But how much money was wasted? These people don't seem to give a shit about waste, fraud, and abuse do they? Not if it's their waste, fraud, and abuse.
The religious right puts their magic book forward as self-evident truth in spite of the fact there is next to nothing in the way of independent corroboration for any of it. There is no independent corroboration for any part of the Jesus story what so ever. The Constitution does not mention the words Bible, Jesus or God, and specifically bans religious tests for holding public office. Never the less, the Christian Nationalists continue to claim this country was somehow based on their book. It wasn’t.
And wouldn't it be nice if the standards actually required THAT FACT to be pointed out?
Yes. In fact, why not post it in the public school classrooms.
Yet another lesson why fanatics should never have anything to do with education… public or otherwise.
Our founding fathers could not have avoided being influenced by Christianity. And, important ideas found in our government such as the separation of powers came from Locke who came up with them based upon his understanding of the Bible. However, the Constitution is not a religious document and there has never been and will never be a "Christian America". Jesus said that his kingdom was not of this world which excludes every nation and government in power.
Yeah, I accept that. I accept that the founding fathers were influenced by christianity. After all, it was the dominant religion in their environment. So, it goes without saying that they were influenced by it.
But - and that is more important - they were aware of that influence and then CHOSE to write the constitution of the new country as a secular document. They CHOSE to write a clause specifying the separation of church and state, they chose to write a clause that there should be no religious tests before anyone can take up an office of the state.
Which means that I'd have no problem if history lessons pointed out the 'christian influence' aspect but only if they then leaned on heavily on the founding fathers' choices in writing the constitution.
Or to put more simply - by all means say 'A' but if you do, you also have to add 'B'.
Right. It should also be pointed out that the founding fathers had the long history of religious wars in Europe to consider when writing the Constitution. Needless to say, they sure didn't want them occurring over on our side of the Atlantic.
Absolutely!
You'll probably have seen me recommending a specific book, this one has got a whole (!) section on those religious wars, they're calling it the 'Age of Religious Discord'. That section takes up about 10% of the whole book!
𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐸𝑑𝑢𝑐𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝐷𝑒𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑚𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑟𝑒𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑣𝑒𝑛𝑒𝑑 𝑎 𝑡𝑒𝑎𝑚 𝑜𝑓 𝑒𝑑𝑢𝑐𝑎𝑡𝑜𝑟𝑠 𝑡𝑜 𝑟𝑒𝑒𝑣𝑎𝑙𝑢𝑎𝑡𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑜𝑐𝑖𝑎𝑙 𝑠𝑡𝑢𝑑𝑖𝑒𝑠 𝑠𝑡𝑎𝑛𝑑𝑎𝑟𝑑𝑠.
Which is how it should have been done in the first place. At least they're fixing the mess Walters left behind. I have a hazmat endorsement, I can haul it away for them.
Ryan Walters was typical of the religious extremists who draw their conclusions first, then work backward looking for justification. He saw his magic book as the solution to every problem, and that’s where his thinking evidently ended.
I can almost guarantee to you that he has never read the whole book, beginning to end. His mentor, David Barton told him exactly which parts to read and that is what he did. Can’t be polluting his pure Christian thoughts with those nasty bits in Ezekiel and Song of Solomon, can he?
It's a good thing there is no legal definition for a historian, because David Barton may as well be calling himself an astronaut. No university that wanted to hold on to their accreditation would ever hire him to teach history.
Think of a historian like eg a plumber. Or a baker. Basically someone who has learned certain skills, like a baker who knows how to make choux pastry, a (proper!) historian has learned how to interpret sources. And that comes with its own challenges:
Eg if you're looking at times when you've got very few written sources, you need to interpret all kinds of other remnants from that time. That's why areas such as numismatics or heraldry exist. It's where carbon dating and counting tree circles (yes, that's a thing) contribute knowledge.
And if you're looking at a time period when there are lots and lots of written sources, you'll need to find a way to filter them, because you cannot consider them all.
Addendum - AI can (can!) be helpful. I read an article which was considering the role AI can play when looking at genealogy in Scotland. That article suggested that AI can help pointing out that eg places named in a variety of sources are actually the same place, it's just that the spelling varies so widely, not only by the poor writing skills of the people writing the documents but also by people switching from Gaelic to English and back again.
I am generally pretty anti-AI but this article gave me food for thought, so that maybe there is a role for AI.
"also by people switching from Gaelic to English and back again. "
At least part of the problem is the late development of Scottish Gaelic as a written language.
The socially conscious words of Jesus are anathema to them!
"magic book" ? hahahahahah
Question - did that chap [Walters] achieve anything? I mean anything positive? Or was his tenure just a waste of time, effort and money?
Edited to add the name, it became clear that my comment was ambiguous. Apologies.
If you are referring to Ryan Walters, I am unaware of anything he did that might have been helpful to the condition of public education in Oklahoma. But I could say the same about every other state superintendent of education. I suspect we know more about Walters because of his resource wasting efforts. Had he been doing his job properly, he would have been largely unknown outside of OK educational circles. A lot of us here think that was the point. We believe he was angling for higher office of some sort. A Trump appointment.
You know something? I am looking forward to all those folk scrubbing their CVs and downplaying their role they played in Trumpian times.
We've seen this movie before - there were millions of Nazis on the 25th April and hardly any a fortnight later. 1945.
I hope the same phenomenon can be observed in the year ..... [insert suitable date].
JG? He was here to derail the thread and pick fights so he could martyrbate and pretend to be persecuted for his faith.
I actually meant that Oklahoma chap rather than yesterday's apparition.
Oops.
No need. I wasn't very clear. I've now edited my comment to clarify.
Thank you for the new word, though.
Thanks. Wish I could claim it was one of mine. Honesty forbids. :)
‘Matyrbate’ - that’s a good one.
It’s certainly better than his ‘christopretendisomething’. I actually put his phrase into my search engine (no, not google) and came across a youtube and a tiktok, all authored by one …. yes, you guessed. Our pal from yesterday.
Maybe he managed to get some clicks or views?
His Christopretensism is just an Urban Dictionary colloquialism. It's not a recognized word or concept. Not in academia, not in political discourse and not even among theologists.
It made no sense. And the more he wrote, the less sense he made.
He clearly had no feel for the room, otherwise, he'd have written a couple of comments and then walked away.
What a twat!
(Due to his 'contributions' being scrubbed, my post about a place called Twatt got deleted, too. It's a lovely little place in the Orkney Islands and yes, they do a roaring trade of souvenirs with their village name printed on them.)
We are moving this week. I didn’t sleep well last night so I’m pretty fuzzy and tired today. You may not see me much for the rest of the week. Have fun.
Don’t forget to wash the true believers thoroughly before you chew on them. You don’t know where they’ve been.
Wishing you all the best, hope your move goes well.
Other than slavery and genocide, I cannot corollate any overlapping themes between the foundation of the United States and the Bible.
The Bible says to submit to the governing authorities because they are put in place by God. The United States was founded as a rebellious act against the governing authorities.
The Old Testament gives the rules for a theocracy or theocratic autocracy. The New Testament is not particularly interested in describing an ideal government at all. The United States government is modeled on a classical Republic.
Our government was founded on principles from the enlightenment. That the new government was compatible with Christianity and Judaism and Islam speaks to the benefits of separation of church and state.
Thank goodness saner heads prevailed in Oklahoma.
Never thought I'd write that sentence. ;)
Terrific. Oklahoma is at least TRYING to unfuck all the fucked-up stuff that Ryan Walters tried to put in place. If Mr. Fields can fully follow through on his expressed intentions, one might expect a serious improvement in the quality of education in the Sooner State.
And being that they languish at or near the BOTTOM of education ratings in the United States, THEY NEED IT.
If only Walters had listened to educators in the first place. He couldn't do that, of course, because indoctrination is one hell of a drug.
Walters was so hung on his belief system that I doubt he could consider much of anything else. Anyone taking his place would be an improvement, almost by default.
Walters and yesterday’s troll have a lot in common.
Hemant blocked that one. What an irritant!
That one was particularly obtuse. I feel sorry for anyone who has to have him over for a holiday gathering.
He wouldn't take a telling!
Not just anyone. What if it had been David Barton?
Okay ... ALMOST anyone! 😝
Indoctrination that leads to hallucination.
Good! Knowledge triumphs over superstition. As it should be.
One can only imagine how Republicans in Oklahomastan and other Red states will re-write Trump's sham of a presidency in future history, from the re-tweets of the Obamas as apes to his lies about Jeffrey Epstein.
The United States has proven itself to be the stupidest nation on the planet, electing a malignant narcissist totally unqualified and unfit to hold what once was the most important office in the world. Not any longer. The world deplores Trump and, by association, the United States.
Trump has not only decimated the present, but he has successfully sullied the past and endangered the future. All abetted by the Republican party.
All that work by the child killer undone. Beautiful. And despite Walters' tongue being lodged firmly inside Trump's rectum, he never did get that cabinet position he so lusted after.
Thus it it ever with those who try to align themselves with the Golden Goblin.
That said, I would be curious to know where Walters goes from here. Considering his penchant for shoving Christianity EVERYWHERE and especially in schools and/or government, keeping an eye on him strikes me as a fair idea.
When it happens, rest assured that Hemant will be all over it.
I have little doubt but what he will make big money on the Christian speaking circuits shedding crocodile tears about he was the victim of the godless left. Your donations appreciated.
He will be on the wingnut welfare tour or the NFP grift-tank circuit.
More than likely, and preaching to the choir strikes me as about his speed.
I expect he will be a thorn in our side for the next 20-25 years as he is only 40. He will hop from one conservative advocacy group to another, show up on Fox, speak at TPUSA, etc., etc.
“ In March 2025, the Freedom Foundation established the Teacher Freedom Alliance, a new national organization to provide educators with professional support services and resources.[15] The group is designed to provide educators with an alternative to teachers unions.[16] On September 25, 2025, Oklahoma Superintendent of Public Instruction Ryan Walters announced he would resign from his position and become the CEO of the Teacher Freedom Alliance.[17]”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_Foundation_(Washington)#Teacher_Freedom_Alliance
i bet he goes on late nite tv..hawking his 'magic prayer cloth' @ 19.99, (inbtwn the tupperware,and the "REAL looking " jewelry adds )
Stranger things 'ere now have come to pass!
He's also fairly young, there are many years ahead where he is likely to try that kind of shenanigans again.
A thought has just occurred to me, it's a question: Do you (=everyone here in this forum) think that anything could dislodge his thinking? Do you (=same) think that there is anything which would convince him that there is merit in secular spaces? Including secular education?
Could Walters change his mind? Anything is possible. PROBABLE? Not so much. He's bought into the con so deeply that I doubt anything could dislodge him from it.
Walter’s was an incompetent fanatic, but didn’t have the jack to buy a cabinet spot.
“… the 2026 Oklahoma Standards reflect the education establishment’s studied lack of interest in patriotism, the historic roots of the American republic, or any notable achievements by conservatives or Republicans.”
You don’t teach patriotism, you engender it. You don’t have to lie and hide the truth to do so either. Patriotism is borne from the ideals that the country was built upon, the people who keep guiding faulty humans toward those ideals, and even if we don’t always live up to the ideals, we are always striving for them. So, you can’t teach pride in your country, but you can help people see the good in it so they can have pride.
What Walters actually did was make people less proud of the state and country by demanding conformity by going against the ideals that the country was built on. Any time patriotism is forced on a population, it backfires. The whole Bad Bunny Super Bowl response makes me less patriotic that a vanishing third of the country thinks that patriotism means we have to sing about how awful LGBTQ people are, or how we should be seeking our sexual partners in elementary schools, while pretending g to love Jesus, rather than celebrating the people who live and work and build up the country, even if it was sung in Spanish. One show was a Walters’ special, the other a portrait in patriotism. Despite the vitriol and violence directed at Bad Bunny by our leaders and vocal town assholes, he expressed joy, love and community. That is how you engender patriotism, not lying about history, pretending a villain is the second coming of Jesus, and forgetting that the country is for “We the People.”
Patriotism at the point of a gun or the insistence of an authority figure is something ... but it sure as hell isn't patriotism.
The beatings will continue until patriotism improves?
Or words to that effect...
https://ibb.co/7xY215xF
It's not at all odd – it was performed by 'furriners'.
"We are presenting a successful model that others can emulate for how to restore public education and eradicate radical woke influences from our schools."
When I hear someone use the word "woke" these days, I automatically think "That person is a complete imbecile".
In other OK school news:
https://www.oklahoman.com/story/news/education/2026/02/10/oklahoma-religious-jewish-charter-school-rejected-osbe/88604288007/
I see that they are from outside the state, angering the local Jewish community.
Ah, outside agitators.
What do alligators have to do with Oklaho.... say what? Agitators? Never mind.
Agitator alligators! Ohmygoodness! 😱
At least it's not lions, tigers and bears. 😁
Oh, my! (George Takei voice optional!)
Great stuff Mr. Mehta ….
I’ve got my fingers well and truely crossed for Oklahoma's future in this regard.
… 🦘🦘🦘
Thank you so much for writing about this extremely consequential & positive news in Oklahoma. I’m very happy for Oklahoma’s students!
OT: It would seem as though Jose may have had a dime dropped on him, because ALL BUT ONE of his comments on yesterday's blog are GONE.
"Curiouser and curiouser," quoth Alice.
Not
https://ibb.co/spJSzwF8
Gee, that's too bad.
Really. There might be some tears by me. ;)
We could argue whether we have a picogram of sympathy for him? Or a femtogram?
(Goes to look up the tiniest violin ever produced by mankind....)
If that's your best Malcolm Reynolds impression, I think it needs some work! 😁
Was going to look up the exact quote by him but decided a paraphase was close enough. :D
Collapsed under the weight of all the pudding, perhaps. 😉
What a bloviator he is.
Finally, some good news.
But you always have the good news: Jesus died for your sins.
He was allegedly only gone for 3 days. Jesus took a long weekend.
It was really Friday afternoon to Sunday morning. What is that really? A day and half?
Not even that long. According to Luke, Jesus went to heaven the moment he died. Shit, he even brought one of the two thieves with him.
I wonder if he called his dad/other self a dick for the crucifixion (cruci-fiction?).
He did ask why his dad abandoned him. Did Jesus forget the whole reason for his existence and eventual sacrifice for humanity (or at least the Chosen People, anyway).
I thought he took a quick detour to hell?
The babble tells so many different stories for the same events that it can't be trusted for anything it says.
Jesus gets us? Sure, we all die horribly and rise from the dead.
Having never sinned, it appears he died for naught.
https://nz.pinterest.com/pin/jesus-died-for-your-sins--27584616462012165/
I don’t recall ever having sinned in my life … so therefore the xtian THEISTS' young man died for nothing in relation to me.
… 🦘🦘🦘
True but that doesn't mean that we are immune from caring about what happens in our world.
Yes, this is a victory – good. But how much money was wasted? These people don't seem to give a shit about waste, fraud, and abuse do they? Not if it's their waste, fraud, and abuse.