California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (quick note to those readers who may be time travelers from 1986: yes, that guy from Commando) has vetoed a bill that would require the state's public schools to add climate change to their curriculum and science textbooks. Before anyone spins this as Schwarzenegger being some kind of anti-Earth, anti-science jackass (his multiple Hummers already do that work for you, by the way), you should know that he has very good reasons. Educational mandates, he says, shouldn't come from the government. He's right. This is why we have such things as boards of education, which are supposed to be made up of teachers and experts who decide on public school curricula themselves. The state can bar schools from unconstitutional practices (say, telling kids God created man by performing mouth-to-mouth on a heap of mud 6,000 years ago), but some vote-hungry lawmaker shouldn't be allowed to tell schools what to teach based on what's politically popular at the time. If we allow that kind of behavior, we could very well have high school classes devoted to how much New Coke sucks. (Am I right, time travelers?) More details here.
