I spent today watching videos (because who really does anything productive on New Years Day, and besides, it was way too cold to go outside).

This video made my heart hurt.     In the first section, the late Carl Sagan is shown teaching a 6th grade class science.    You can tell how much Sagan loves what he is teaching and also how much he enjoys helping these kids open their minds, nurturing their curiosity about the world.

The second part is a jarring contrast.   It’s a scene from the documentary “Jesus Camp,” a Pentecostal Christian children’s camp.  The kids, rather than being encouraged to think and wonder and dream, are being indoctrinated in hatred and specifically, hatred toward the government and public education.

These kids are literally being trained as “warriors for Jesus.”   It reminds me so much of al-Quaeda training.

It makes me so sad that so many people in this country would rather have children getting the second type of “education” than the first.