ECONOMY — WHILE TEXAS CAN’T AFFORD TO BUY NEW FAR-RIGHT TEXTBOOKS, RICK PERRY STILL RESISTS FEDERAL AID: For the past year, far-right members of the Texas Board of Education have been overhauling the state’s textbook standards. The changes include “pushing for inclusion of more…Confederate glorification,” renaming the Atlantic slave trade the “Atlantic Triangle Trade,” and raising doubt about climate change. However, the Texas Observer now reports that, with the state facing “a budget shortfall of at least $11 billion in 2011,” the “money isn’t going to be there” for the state to buy the new books. The books with the new science standards “would have cost $400 million, and the Legislature is already expecting a bill of $888 million for textbooks already ordered.” To ensure that students can still be exposed to “proof, supposedly, of evolution’s fallibility,” the Board is trying to secure funding for special “supplements for science classes from fifth grade through high school.” Ironically, though, the legislature’s biggest obstacle to securing the revisionist textbooks is right-wing Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R), whose constant compulsion has been to oppose federal funding. At the beginning of June, he refused to let Texas compete for Race to the Top funding for education reform because he falsely claimed the program would weaken the state’s school standards, an allegation refuted by fellow Republican governor Sonny Perdue of Georgia. The Houston Chronicle earlier this week lamented Perry’s stubborn “grandstanding” despite the clear need for education support in the state. Texas now faces a daunting $18 billion shortfall for the next two-year budget cycle, amounting to 20 percent of the total budget, but Perry misguidedly insists he can find enough spending cuts to create balance. He is even blustering about rejecting supplementary Medicaid funding from Congress that would greatly help address the state’s fiscal woes. Last year, he tried to reject the stimulus money that proved key to balancing Texas’ budget, insisting, “We can take care of ourselves,” before the legislature intervened and secured relief.