[guest post by Dana]

Why, yes she did:

A top administrator with the Carroll Independent School District in Southlake advised teachers last week that if they have a book about the Holocaust in their classroom, they should also offer students access to a book from an “opposing” perspective, according to an audio recording obtained by NBC News.

Gina Peddy, the Carroll school district’s executive director of curriculum and instruction, made the comment Friday afternoon during a training session on which books teachers can have in classroom libraries. The training came four days after the Carroll school board, responding to a parent’s complaint, voted to reprimand a fourth grade teacher who had kept an anti-racism book in her classroom.

A Carroll staff member secretly recorded the Friday training and shared the audio with NBC News.

“Just try to remember the concepts of [House Bill] 3979,” Peddy said in the recording, referring to a new Texas law that requires teachers to present multiple perspectives when discussing “widely debated and currently controversial” issues. “And make sure that if you have a book on the Holocaust,” Peddy continued, “that you have one that has an opposing, that has other perspectives.”

“How do you oppose the Holocaust?” one teacher said in response.

“Believe me,” Peddy said. “That’s come up.”

Disagreeing with Peddy’s assessment of the bill and presenting his own opposing perspective was the bill’s author:

State Sen. Bryan Hughes, an East Texas Republican who wrote Senate Bill 3, denied that the law requires teachers to provide opposing views on what he called matters of “good and evil” or to get rid of books that offer only one perspective on the Holocaust.

“That’s not what the bill says,” Hughes said in an interview Wednesday when asked about the Carroll book guidelines. “I’m glad we can have this discussion to help elucidate what the bill says, because that’s not what the bill says.”

[Ed. Pressed for time, but this is part of a larger story that you can read about (and hear the audio of Peddy’s comments) at the above link. ]

UPDATE: Clearly feeling the need for damage control and clarification, the superintendent of Carroll Independent School District issued an apology concerning Gina Peddy’s comments and the bill’s directive:

In a statement shared on the Southlake district’s social media platforms, Ledbetter said the district “[recognizes] there are not two sides of the Holocaust.”

“As the superintendent of schools, I express my sincere apology regarding the online article and news story released today. During the conversations with teachers during last week’s meeting, the comments made were in no way to convey that the Holocaust was anything less than a terrible event in history,” the statement read. “As we continue to work through implementation of [House Bill] 3979, we also understand this bill does not require an opposing viewpoint on historical facts. As a district, we will work to add clarity to our expectations for teachers and once again apologize for any hurt or confusion this has caused.”

–Dana

[guest post by Dana]

This guy will never accept that he lost the 2020 presidential election. In his fevered mind, the only possible way for him to have lost was because the election was rigged. He’ll beat that delusional drum until he feels vindicated. IOW, the rest of his life. And if his manic manipulations to prove fraud end up in taking down the Republican Party due to a significant lack of Republicans showing up at the ballot box, that’s just too bad. Trump posted this yesterday:

If we don’t solve the Presidential Election Fraud of 2020 (which we have thoroughly and conclusively documented), Republicans will not be voting in ‘22 or ‘24. It is the single most important thing for Republicans to do.

So a former Republican president is calling for the sabotage of the Republican Party’s political futures of his party because his massively inflated ego cannot/will not accept that more people wanted Joe Biden and not Donald Trump to become the next president. And MAGA loyalists will be more than willing to follow his lead. But what about the MAGA-leaning politicians? Are they willing to martyr themselves for the sake of his vanity? I don’t think so. It will be interesting to see how those up for re-election try to stay in his good graces as long as necessary, and then cut and run when the time comes. But who’s going to be taken in by such a painfully obvious move toward self-preservation? Too little, too late.

Normally, I wouldn’t care too much about Trump’s continual whining, however, looking to 2024, he quite possibly won’t be as irrelevant as one would hope:

Former President Donald Trump is the clear front-runner for the Republican Party’s 2024 presidential nomination, new polling shows.

Although a small faction of the GOP remains staunchly opposed to Trump, the vast majority of Republicans continue to view him favorably, and a significant majority want him to seek the presidency again. No other potential GOP presidential contender comes close to Trump’s level of support, according to the latest survey results from Morning Consult.

…47 percent of Republicans say they would vote for Trump if the 2024 GOP primary took place now. The closest contender behind Trump is former Vice President Mike Pence, but he garnered the backing of only 13 percent of respondents. Florida’s GOP governor, Ron DeSantis, was a close third, with just 12 percent of Republicans saying they’d vote for him.

After Pence and DeSantis, no other potential Republican candidate polled in the double digits.…Donald Trump Jr., came in fourth, with the backing of 6 percent of GOP voters…Nikki Haley, Florida Senator Marco Rubio, Utah Senator Mitt Romney and Texas Senator Ted Cruz were each backed by 3 percent of Republicans.

With more than two-thirds of respondents saying that they want Trump to run again in 2024, he still matters.

–Dana

CNN:

Trump ally Steve Bannon’s game of chicken with the House committee investigating the January 6 Capitol Hill riot is on the cusp of entering a new and critical phase Thursday as he faces his last chance to reverse course and comply with the panel’s subpoena before lawmakers likely move to seek criminal charges.

Bannon’s lawyer on Wednesday wrote a letter to the panel saying that his client will not provide testimony or documents until the committee reaches an agreement with former President Donald Trump over executive privilege or a court weighs in on the matter. “That is an issue between the committee and President Trump’s counsel and Mr. Bannon is not required to respond at this time,” attorney Robert Costello wrote.

The letter doubled down on previous instances in which the former White House adviser made clear he has no intention of appearing for a deposition Thursday as ordered by the committee and essentially dared lawmakers to sue or hold him in criminal contempt earlier this month in response to the subpoena.

If Bannon is a no-show, the committee is expected to immediately begin seeking a referral for criminal contempt after the subpoena deadline passes — essentially making an example of Bannon’s noncompliance as the House seeks more witnesses, sources familiar with the planning told CNN.

I don’t necessarily hold out a lot of hope for a criminal contempt prosecution.

The problem here is that congressional Democrats and Joe Biden don’t seem to really care about holding Trump accountable and making sure no coup happens in 2024. If they did, they would start making amendments to the Electoral Count Act, and would greatly streamline appellate review of enforcement of subpoenas. They could set an extraordinarily expedited timetable for such challenges, to be heard within weeks, not months or years.

And they could set special rules for challenges to subpoenas in case of impeachment. As to the case of subpoenas for impeachments — and this is a proposal off the top of my head, so if there’s something I have not thought through, please tell me — they could require that any such challenge be heard by the Supreme Court within a week. Or, they could simply deny any access to the federal courts for challenges in the case of impeachment. That would leave the matter squarely for the Chief Justice in his role presiding over the trial.

And they could pass legislation providing for adequate facilities and personnel to enforce subpoenas themselves, by having people arrested for disobedience, just like every trial court judge in the nation.

Instead, they’re futzing around with a radical left Big Spending Agenda and Big Racial Pandering Agenda like everything is normal and will stay that way. Meanwhile, preparations for a 2024 coup are not ending.