Less than a year to go for Texas State Board of Eductation vote

Ah, Texas State Board of Education member and former chair Don McLeroy has competition when he runs for re-election next year. Tom Ratliff wants to run for the Republican party, and has McLeroy pegged:

“I truly believe he (McLeroy) thinks he knows better” than educators what should be taught and how, Ratliff said. “I am one hundred and eighty degrees from that mentality.”

I would extend that. McLeroy doesn’t just think he knows better than educators: he thinks he knows better than everybody. His now imfamous, “Somebody has to stand up to these experts,” quote was proof of that.

McLeroy, as usual, makes some eyebrow raising quotes:

McLeroy makes no apologies for grafting a political agenda onto education.  “The culture war over science education, the teaching of evolution, is going to be there, no matter what,” he said. “Education is too important not to politicize.”

On the particular matter of evolution, he says:

McLeroy brushes off the controversy over science curriculum. The media, he said, seeks to pigeonhole him and his allies on the board as “religious fanatics.”

“I’m here on a social equity issue,” he said. “As a Christian with strong Christian beliefs … I know all these children are created in God’s image, and we need to help these kids. It’s a moral responsibility.”

I wonder how the media made Mr. McLeroy mention Christianity twice and God once in his answer. What social equity issues McLeroy is interested in remains a mystery.