Leo Blog: A newspaper's liberal view of 'liberalism'
"Teacher Under Investigation for Alleged Liberalism," a headline on an Associated Press story, ran in the Boston Globe and other papers. No, they aren't weeding out liberals from the schools. As the blog Oh, That Liberal Media! notes, the teacher wasn't in trouble for thinking leftward thoughts but for placing contemptuous comments about President Bush into a school vocabulary quiz.
It happened at Mount Anthony Union High School in Bennington, Vt. English and social studies teacher Bret Chenkin asked students to insert either the word "coherent" or "eschewed" into this sentence: "I wish Bush would be ____ for once during a speech, but there are theories that his everyday diction charms the below-average mind, hence insuring him Republican votes."
Another test item asked the class to insert "balled" or "arrogated" here: "It is frightening the way the extreme right has ____ aspects of the Constitution and warped them for their own agenda." It's surely a shock to learn that extremists may be arrogating aspects, while Bush is in danger of being eschewed, if not balled.
Here's a vocabulary test of our own. Insert either "his ninth" or "a very mysterious" here: To Bret Chenkin of Bennington, "English is ____ language."
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