Knowledge...critical thinking...political indoctrination?

To echo a commendable point you've recently made elsewhere: Who gets to decide?

The political party currently in power? Would you like to see history books written with a Liberal spin? Or a world history written by strict Christian fundamentalists, in which history began 6,000 years ago?

History is dominated by wars. How would you explain the Vietnam War to kids? The ambiguous outcome of the Korean War? Was the invasion of Grenada a grand adventure?

Do you think it's time to indoctrinate kids to love the Iraq War? Should it be described as "mission accomplished" with a footnote?

What's wrong with the statement from the article "Countries are morally ambiguous entities: they are what they are by virtue of their histories."? American history isn't exactly unblemished. How would you give slavery a patriotic spin? The eugenics laws at the turn of the 20th century? Jim Crow laws? Should history books portray McCarthy as a poor misunderstood patriot? Ollie North as a hero instead of felon? Richard Nixon as the victim of a setup?

What a can of worms you'd be opening. Personally I'd rather not see millions of young minds turned to gullible mush by a diet of jingoism that stunts the growth of critical thinking skills. Call me a naive idealist, but I think an education should consist of strict truth, not propaganda. But I guess we differ on that, eh?