Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Home School Option

33 Questions


Not every parent can, or wants to home school their children.  Let me suggest that teaching them just one course, based on this book, could very well instill in them a proper skepticism about anything they're taught in the classroom.

Today is the official release date for my new book, 33 Questions About American History You’re Not Supposed to Ask, from Random House/Crown Forum.

These are questions that receive incomplete, misleading, or absolutely false answers in the standard treatment of American history. Most are simply never raised in the first place, since they might give rise to forbidden thoughts that run counter to established opinion.

A few of the questions:

  • Were the American Indians really environmentalists?
  • Is the U.S. government too stingy with foreign aid – or not stingy enough?
  • Was the U.S. Constitution meant to be a "living, breathing" document that changes with the times?
  • What really happened in the Whiskey Rebellion, and why will neither your textbook nor George Washington tell you?
  • What made American wages rise? (Hint: it wasn't unions or the government.)
  • Did the Iroquois Indians influence the United States Constitution?
  • Did school desegregation narrow the black-white achievement gap?
  • Did the Founding Fathers support immigration?
  • What was "the biggest unknown scandal of the Clinton years"?
  • The three constitutional clauses that have caused the most mischief – what are they, and what were they really supposed to mean?
  • Did capitalism cause the Great Depression? If not, what did?
  • Does the Constitution really contain an "elastic clause"?
  • Did the Founding Fathers believe in jury nullification – that juries could refuse to enforce unjust laws?
  • Was George Washington Carver (who supposedly developed 300 products out of the peanut) really one of America’s greatest scientific geniuses, as Henry Ford claimed?

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Aaaargh... let me take a stab at this. Off the top of my head-- and I may be wrong:

* Were the American Indians really environmentalists?

Not per se-- it's a part of the "noble savage" myth.


* Is the U.S. government too stingy with foreign aid – or not stingy enough?

Not stingy enough.

* Was the U.S. Constitution meant to be a "living, breathing" document that changes with the times?

Yes, within the framework set forth in the constitution itself.

* What really happened in the Whiskey Rebellion, and why will neither your textbook nor George Washington tell you?

Hell if I know-- my textbook never mentioned it.

* What made American wages rise? (Hint: it wasn't unions or the government.)

Health care? (My real question is "rise when?"

* Did the Iroquois Indians influence the United States Constitution?

Maybe. There were some ideals in the Iroquois confederacy that may have been reflected in the Constitution.

* Did school desegregation narrow the black-white achievement gap?

Resoundingly no.

* Did the Founding Fathers support immigration?

Yes. They made provisions for it in the constitution.

* What was "the biggest unknown scandal of the Clinton years"?

The Rose Law Firm billing records.

* The three constitutional clauses that have caused the most mischief – what are they, and what were they really supposed to mean?

I don't know what you mean by mischief.

* Did capitalism cause the Great Depression? If not, what did?

No. A variety of factors did, including the "dust bowl" and international banking disruptions.

* Does the Constitution really contain an "elastic clause"?

Huh? I've never even heard of it. I guess that means "no".

* Did the Founding Fathers believe in jury nullification – that juries could refuse to enforce unjust laws?

Yes. Like Rodger, I live in Maryland, the only state that requires that the jury be informed of this right.

* Was George Washington Carver (who supposedly developed 300 products out of the peanut) really one of America’s greatest scientific geniuses, as Henry Ford claimed?

That's a subjective question. I'll say yes, because he invented peanut butter. ;)

Anonymous said...

Wow. Sorry about all those line breaks. Fix it if you can. I didn't mean to take up half the page.

Howard said...

I almost got kicked out of school when I learned AND REPORTED OUT LOUD that the Indians killed buffalo by stampeding entire herds tem off of steep cliffs and then picked through the bones for meat and clothing. When they wanted fruit or nuts from a tree they just cut the dam thing down and then acquired the goodies. I mean we are talking hysterical teacher and vice principal, neither of whom dared call in my parents over it. I was asked to name the book from which I took the data and when I told them I read it in the New York Times they shut up. I actually read about it in some comic book of the time.

Anonymous said...

The Iroquois Indians had no enfluence on the constitution whatsoever. they might have enfluenced a socialist government but not ours.Indians were horrible conservationist compared to most other peoplebut you must understand they were doing what they did to survive. They did not know any better.They got better after the introduction of horses but still in a lot of cases would drive whole herds of buffalo over cliffs.
No the constitution is not a living breathing document subject to change at the whim of some asshole politico. That is why amendments are required and those are very few.

Anonymous said...

For more than 1,000 years, prehistoric men and women of the Great Plains hunted bison by driving them over cliffs. Ulm Pishkun, is possibly the largest buffalo jump in the world, was used as a jump site between 900 and 1500 A.D. Below the cliffs that stretch more than a mile, the soil reveals compacted bison bones nearly 13 feet deep.


http://tinyurl.com/34crhr
They were nomadic for a reason: hunt an aera out move on, oh yeah sanitation? WHAT sanitation?
RAK

Anonymous said...

Nice work there Rockville, indeed. Lemme fix this typo for you:

What was "the biggest unknown scandal of the Clinton years"?

The Rose Law Firm billing records.

I'm pretty sure you meant to say:

"Selling their souls to Satan."

Billll said...

Here's my $.02:
* The three constitutional clauses that have caused the most mischief – what are they, and what were they really supposed to mean?

One would be the commerce clause that allows the feds to regulate commerce between the states. Originally intended to prevent the states from levying tariffs on each others goods, it's been interpreted to allow the feds to regulate everything.

* Did capitalism cause the Great Depression? If not, what did?

Protectionism in the form of the Smoot-Hawley tariff act of 1929 caused countries to erect trade barriers against us in retaliation and sometimes each other. Most other countries recognized the root of the problem and dropped their tariffs. We didn't, and for us the depression ran to 1952.

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