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When important information is left out of lessons, he said, students are left with the impression that "the human history of this great, great, country began in 1492."

Hey, call me a liberal, but I find myself agreeing with this guy. We should learn about a people who were constantly at war with one another, who practiced incredibly brutal tortures on one another (opening up a vanquished opponents abdomen, staking his innards to a tree and lighting the forest on fire comes to mind), and who raped and enslaved one another. Let's teach the children about people who as late as 1492 hadn't thought of using the wheel to aid transportation or used a beast of burden.

When we paint an image of a people, peacefully planting flowers, building a totem pole, having the occasional chotaquwa, and smoking a peace pipe, students are left with a false impression.

Owl_Eagle

" WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
DIVERSITY IS STRENGTH"

I know it is hard to believe, but before Indians were running casinos and selling cigarettes tax-free in North America, they were a stone-age people. They had not learned to domesticate animals, they had no written language, they used only stone tools and they had not even yet invented the wheel. They had never seen a horse, a metal knife or a plow before Columbus. They also commonly practiced slavery, genocide and cannibalism against other tribes.

No matter how many times liberals watch "Dances with Wolves" and "Pocahontas," it will not change these facts.