“At least 21 states, including large and powerful California, Texas and Florida, have committees that decide which books can be used in public schools. The scrubbing and sanitizing that are imposed to satisfy the big states have affected all the commercially produced textbooks. That means that even states without adoption laws end up using the same books as the ones written to please California and Texas. Their decisions have been excoriated by spokespeople for both the right and the left. Their fear of offending any politically connected group means the textbooks they approve are often the dumbest and dullest of the bunch.”