Conservatives Lying Liars -- What A Shock

This post at the Language Log, and its attendant links to a tempest in AZ, brings to mind a reoccurring fuss that arises in my first-year writing classroom every so often.  We'll be talking about immigration, or high school curriculum, or language acquisition -- something, who knows -- but someone will burst out, in fury, exclaiming how "It's not fair!" that they had to study Spanish in high school.

"We had to study Spanish!  Why?  They," usually pausing at this point shooting glares at the Hispanic students in the classroom, "came here, we didn't go to their country.  They should learn English!  Why do we have to learn their language?"

"Actually," I always say, at this point, really tired of making the point, but it has to be made, "you don't have to learn Spanish in high school.  You have to learn some foreign language in high school.  It's just that you," I always pause at this point to stare pointedly at the complaining student, "came from a very small and very poor town.  Is that the case?  One of those little tiny Arkansas high schools that didn't want to consolidate because that way you would lose your football team?  Do I have that right?"

They have shut up by now and are looking sullen.

"Well, when that is the case," I say, "usually such small high schools only have the resources to hire one foreign language teacher.  And when that's the case," I say, "they usually hire a Spanish teacher, because Spanish is most useful for most students in this area.  Don't blame immigrants.  Blame your community, which is poor and broke and refused consolidation."

Sometimes I add a little riff on NCLB, which is taking what funds exist and spending them on idiotic testing, but usually I move on at this point.

But!  Not what this post is about!

Not exactly anyway.

This post is about those links at LL.  Go read those links!  This guy, Tony Hill, writes a letter to his legislator about how these "Mexican" students "told" him they hated white Americans and hated America and were planning to take America back from Americans who stole it from them.  How they tore pages from the textbooks and threw the books at each other and how when he taught those "Mexicans" and black students (love how he inserted blacks in there -- racist bingo!) they didn't want to learn and how if "we" just got the illegal immigrants (cause he could tell by looking at those "Mexicans" they were all illegal, I guess) the class sizes would all go down to nice small classrooms (full of white kids who would read books instead of ripping them up and throwing them) --

Anyway, my point is, apparently the idiots in AZ believed this story Tony Hill fed them.

Conservatives make up lying lies and other conservatives believe them.

No wonder that Jesus thing plays so well in their community.