Smart TV’s vs. Your Privacy

Posted on July 6, 2018July 6, 2018 by Denise Simon

It is all getting quite tiresome.It is a cyber war you are in and you don’t know it.

There is Facebook sharing your data with foreign entities and governments. Then the NSA announced it was deleting 685 million personal records.

Then it was Siri and Alexa. Then we are told that Google is reading your GMail. And Google defends the practice.

Smart TVs are spying on you

If you watch television on an internet-connected TV, it may be watching you back.
Data-slurpers: The New York Times took a close look at the rise of services that track viewers’ watching habits—in particular Samba TV, which has claimed to gather second-by-second information from software on 13.5 million smart TVs in the US, this includes brand like smart TV Samsung, LG and Samba
Been here before: Last year, the Federal Trade Commission fined Vizio for $2.2 million over a similar issue. But that was because Vizio sold its data to third parties without users’ consent. Samba pays TV manufacturers like Sony and Philips to carry its software, but doesn’t sell its data. Instead, Samba uses it to sell targeted ads.
Why it matters: You may rip your TV’s plug out of the wall in horror. Or you may not care (Samba TV has said that 90 percent of users agree to turn the service on). Either way, this kind of thing could be going on in your living room—and the companies behind it aren’t exactly going out of their way to let you know about it.

What is a Smart TV? photo

*** The New York Times was not the most recent reporting of this. In fact several media outlets sounded the alarm back in 2017.

The Federal Trade Commission said Monday that Vizio used 11 million televisions to spy on its customers. The television maker agreed to pay $2.2 million to settle a case with the FTC and the New Jersey attorney general’s office after the agencies accused it of secretly collecting — and selling — data about its customers’ locations, demographics and viewing habits.

With the advent of “smart” appliances, customers and consumer advocates have raised concerns about whether the devices could be sending sensitive information back to their manufacturers. The FTC says the Vizio case shows how a television or other appliance might be telling companies more than their owners are willing to share.

“Before a company pulls up a chair next to you and starts taking careful notes on everything you watch (and then shares it with its partners), it should ask if that’s O.K. with you,” Kevin Moriarty, an attorney with the FTC’s Division of Privacy and Identity Protection, wrote in a blog post. “Vizio wasn’t doing that, and the FTC stepped in.”

As part of the settlement, Vizio neither confirmed nor denied wrongdoing.

“Today, the FTC has made clear that all smart-TV makers should get people’s consent before collecting and sharing television viewing information, and Vizio now is leading the way,” Vizio’s general counsel, Jerry Huang, said of the settlement.

Although some consumers might not recognize the name Vizio, most have probably watched something on a Vizio television. The Irvine, Calif.-based firm, which Chinese firm LeEco recently announced it would buy, is the most popular TV maker in the United States. With 20 percent of the U.S. market, it made about 1 in 5 TVs sold here in 2016. LeEco has broad ambitions in the consumer space, with businesses that also produce a Netflix-style media service, smartphones and even cars.

According to the lawsuit, Vizio was literally watching its watchers — capturing “second-by-second information” about what people viewed on its smart TVs. That included data from cable, broadband, set-top boxes, over-the-air broadcasts, DVDs and streaming devices. Vizio also is accused of linking demographic information to the data and selling the data — including users’ sex, age and income — to companies that do targeted advertising.

[Did you just open a brand new home hub? Read this first.]

Vizio said in its statement that it never paired viewing information with data that identified individual users but used viewing data only in “the ‘aggregate’ to create summary reports measuring viewing audiences or behaviors.”

The U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey ordered Vizio to pay $1.5 million to the FTC and $1 million to the New Jersey attorney general’s office; Vizio won’t have to pay $300,000 of that unless it violates the order in the future.

The part of the settlement paid to the FTC reflects the amount that Vizio probably made from collecting and selling the customer information. Vizio will delete all the data it collected through the feature before March 2016. It must also prominently display its data collection and privacy policies to consumers and create a program to make sure its partners follow those policies.

Justice Alito and Plaintiff Janus Saved Free Speech

Posted on June 27, 2018June 27, 2018 by Denise Simon

Excellent!

There are an estimated 5 million government employees in 24 States. Mark Janus is a Illinois State employee that has been forced to pay $600 per year to the public sector union known as AFSCME. In a 5-4 ruling with the opinion written by Justice Alito, no more forced dues are required even when not a member of a union. Of course, Justice Elena Kagan wrote a dissenting opinion stating that ‘its crusade by the majority is turning the First Amendment into a sword’.

AFSCME President Lee Saunders had argued that strong labor unions are needed because they give “the strength in numbers [workers] need to fight for the freedoms they deserve,” including retirement plans and health care.

The repercussions could affect unions nationwide. Union membership nationwide is less than 11 percent of the American workforce, but about a third of government employees are members. More here.

As a condition of employment, a person is forced to pay up to keep their job while they have no voice in lobby efforts, where money is spent or in collective bargaining.

Supreme Court hears major challenge to government unions ... photo

The Janus case started in the 7th circuit and the union fee case has been going on for an estimated 40 years. Janus was represented by Mark Mix, the president of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.

The basis of the argument is being forced to pay union fees of any sort is coerced political speech. Part of the Alito decision includes:

Compelling individuals to mouth support for views they

find objectionable violates that cardinal constitutional

command, and in most contexts, any such effort would be

universally condemned. Suppose, for example, that the

State of Illinois required all residents to sign a document

expressing support for a particular set of positions on

controversial public issues—say, the platform of one of the

major political parties. No one, we trust, would seriously

argue that the First Amendment permits this.

Perhaps because such compulsion so plainly violates the

Constitution, most of our free speech cases have involved

restrictions on what can be said, rather than laws compel

ling speech. But measures compelling speech are at least

as threatening.

When speech is compelled, however, additional damage

is done. In that situation, individuals are coerced into

betraying their convictions. Forcing free and independent

individuals to endorse ideas they find objectionable is

always demeaning, and for this reason, one of our land

mark free speech cases said that a law commanding “in

voluntary affirmation” of objected-to beliefs would require

“even more immediate and urgent grounds” than a law

demanding silence.

The 82 page opinion is found here. It is compelling reading.

Open Secrets, a site for money in government published this in part:

2018

$13,352,634

80%

19%

That number above represents union money to legislators where 80% went to Democrats and 19% went to Republicans.

Since 1989, public sector unions have contributed $385 million to federal elections, and Democrats have received the vast majority of that money. In the 2016 election those groups pumped $63.8 million into races, 90 percent of which went to Democrats. So far in the 2018 cycle, $13.4 million has gone toward races, with 80 percent benefiting Democrats.

The top 20 politicians to receive money from public sectors since 1989 have been Democrats, including Hillary Clinton, House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Minority Whip Steny Hoyer.

In this election cycle, Democratic senators in hotly contested races have benefited from union support.

In the past 10 years, public sector unions also spent nearly $160 million on lobbying.

Overall, 28 states have passed so-called “right-to-work” laws, which ban requirements for union membership or fees. The states include Wisconsin, Michigan and Indiana, former union strongholds where average hourly wages and union memberships have slipped since the laws passed.

A dip in union membership would likely bring a significant drop in funding for big union political spenders like AFSCME, which has spent $114 million on federal elections since 1989.

Other top spenders that would see their funds potentially slashed include the National Education Association, the Service Employees International Union and the American Federation of Teachers (AFT).

So, Maxine Waters is now Running Silent?

Posted on June 26, 2018June 26, 2018 by Denise Simon

After her last little press conference trying to undo her political rhetoric in a real feeble attempt, seems she is running silent now.

Senator Chuck Schumer came out with a huge critical response to Maxine and rightly so. Then Nancy Pelosi issued a comment as well, although it was much more thin on substance.

But in between all of this two interesting things happened.

Judicial Watch came out with a hand delivered letter to the Chairman and Co-Chairman of the House Office of Congressional Ethics demanding that Waters be investigated and disciplined for her violation of House rules.
Congressman Andy Biggs, R-AZ introduced a measure calling for Waters to apologize and to resign her position.

What we have going on is building chaos that cannot be denied. The Department of Homeland Security issued an internal memo advising agency employees to take all measures for increase individual security and to be prudent in all work and life activities.

Meanwhile, this rhetoric, the protests and confrontations is only growing and far beyond that of government employees.

Check out Chicago as a bar called Replay Lincoln Park has refused to allow or serve customers wearing MAGA hats, stating it wants to keep the establishment classy.

There are some interesting but nasty tactics being used across the country but this tells a bigger story. You see, protestors in DC are virtually stalking administration personnel and surrounding their homes. How about this wanted poster being handed out and taped to walls and elevators?

So meanwhile, check out the plans for example in New Jersey set of June 30.

“On June 30, politicians across the country will hear the outrage of the American people towards these policies,” said Anna Galland, executive director of MoveOn Civic Action, one of the groups organizing the protests.

More than 400,000 people have RSVPed on social media that they plan to attend the events around the country, organizers said.

Other groups participating in the rallies and protests include American Civil Liberties Union, Greenpeace, NARAL Pro-Choice America, National Education Association, YWCA and the Women’s March organization, which held a similar large national march and sister rallies around the country in January.

The Washington, D.C., rally will be held at 11 a.m. at Lafayette Square near the White House. Some New Jersey activists are organizing buses to attend the event.

Then it seems breastfeeding moms have been invited to be a part of the anti-Trump immigration policy.

Due to the Supreme Court decision, 5-4 on the Trump third version of the travel suspension, expect more protests. The Supreme Court decision is here. Of note: “[T]he government has set forth a sufficient national security justification to survive rational basis review. We express no view on the soundness of the policy. We simply hold today that plaintiffs have not demonstrated a likelihood of success on the merits of their constitutional claim,” Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. wrote for the majority.

Roberts also dismissed arguments that the Supreme Court’s Japanese internment rulings had any bearing on the outcome of the lawfulness of the travel ban.

“Whatever rhetorical advantage the dissent may see in doing so, Korematsu has nothing to do with this case,” Roberts wrote. “The forcible relocation of U.S. citizens to concentration camps, solely and explicitly on the basis of race, is objectively unlawful and outside the scope of Presidential authority. But it is wholly inapt to liken that morally repugnant order to a facially neutral policy denying certain foreign nationals the privilege of admission.”

Days of Rage could still be upon the country. So, where is Maxine now? Has she deferred to Corey Booker or The Open Society Institute or Kamala Harris?

7-2 SCOTUS Decision, Jack Phillips Wins

Posted on June 4, 2018June 4, 2018 by Denise Simon

MASTERPIECE CAKESHOP, LTD.,

ET AL. v. COLORADO CIVIL RIGHTS COMMISSION

ET AL.

The high court decision is here.

Justice Ginsberg and Sotomayer were the dissenting opinions.

This is a decision that upholds the freedom of religion and the dedication to practice that religion. Frankly, it was never about the wedding cake, if the truth be told.

The Masterpiece Cakeshop same-sex wedding cake case isn’t ...

photo

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor today of Jack Phillips, the owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood, Colorado, who declined to bake a custom cake to celebrate a same-sex wedding because of his religious beliefs.

Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission is a historic case involving religious liberty, LGBT rights, and the First Amendment.

In the 7-2 ruling, the high court said the Colorado Commission of Civil Rights, which had ruled against Phillips, demonstrated “clear and impermissible hostility” toward the baker and cake artist’s Christian belief that marriage is the union of one man and one woman.

“The Civil Rights Commission’s treatment of his case has some elements of a clear and impermissible hostility toward the sincere religious beliefs that motivated [Phillips’] objection,” wrote Justice Anthony Kennedy in the majority opinion.

As The Daily Signal previously reported, in 2014 Colorado Civil Rights Commissioner Diann Rice compared Phillips’ not making a cake to slavery and the Holocaust. Rice apparently didn’t know that Phillips’ father fought in World War II and was part of a group that helped liberate Buchenwald concentration camp.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor today of Jack Phillips, the owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood, Colorado, who declined to bake a custom cake to celebrate a same-sex wedding because of his religious beliefs.

Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission is a historic case involving religious liberty, LGBT rights, and the First Amendment.

In the 7-2 ruling, the high court said the Colorado Commission of Civil Rights, which had ruled against Phillips, demonstrated “clear and impermissible hostility” toward the baker and cake artist’s Christian belief that marriage is the union of one man and one woman.

“The Civil Rights Commission’s treatment of his case has some elements of a clear and impermissible hostility toward the sincere religious beliefs that motivated [Phillips’] objection,” wrote Justice Anthony Kennedy in the majority opinion.

As The Daily Signal previously reported, in 2014 Colorado Civil Rights Commissioner Diann Rice compared Phillips’ not making a cake to slavery and the Holocaust. Rice apparently didn’t know that Phillips’ father fought in World War II and was part of a group that helped liberate Buchenwald concentration camp.

“For her to compare not making a cake to the Holocaust, knowing what my dad went through, is ludicrous, and personally offensive,” Phillips, 62, told The Daily Signal.

“This is a big win for the religious liberty of all Americans,” says Ryan Anderson, a senior fellow at The Heritage Foundation. “The Court held that the state of Colorado was ‘neither tolerant nor respectful’ of Jack Phillips’s beliefs about marriage. But as the Court also noted ‘religious and philosophical objections to gay marriage are protected views and in some instances protected forms of expression.’”

“Americans should be free to live their lives, including at work, in accordance with their belief that marriage unites husband and wife. Congress and the states should make this crystal clear by passing legislation, such as the First Amendment Defense Act, which explicitly prevents the type of government intolerance that took place in Colorado,” Anderson added.

**

Meet the Lawyer Who’ll Argue at Supreme Court for Christian Baker’s Right to Free Speech

As far back as grade school, Kristen Waggoner’s father taught her to seek God’s purpose for her life.

This paternal counsel, after much prayer, resulted in her knowing her calling at age 13.

But growing up in a small mill town in Washington, she could not have guessed that, little more than 30 years later, she would be a lawyer arguing a widely known case in the nation’s capital before the nation’s highest court.

“My hope is that the court will use this case as an opportunity to say, ‘We’re protecting the liberty of both sides,’” Waggoner says.

The liberal Left continue to push their radical agenda against American values. The good news is there is a solution. Find out more >>

Talk about culminations.

Waggoner will stand Tuesday before the nine justices of the Supreme Court and ask them to protect a Colorado baker’s constitutional right not to be forced by the government to create a custom cake celebrating a same-sex marriage—or any other occasion or sentiment that would violate his traditional Christian faith.

Waggoner, senior counsel at Alliance Defending Freedom, the prominent Christian legal aid organization, represents Jack Phillips. The owner of a family business in Lakewood, Colorado, Phillips became famous for declining to make a cake in July 2012 for two men for a local celebration of their upcoming marriage in Massachusetts.

One way or another, Waggoner has been at Phillips’ side since shortly after he politely turned down the couple’s order of a wedding cake while offering to sell Charlie Craig and David Mullins virtually any other baked good made by his Masterpiece Cakeshop.

The two men left in anger and soon filed a formal complaint, triggering hateful phone calls, death threats, and legal proceedings in Colorado against Phillips.

Those events eventually would intersect with the calling heeded by Waggoner, 45, when she was barely a teenager: defending the rights of religious individuals and institutions in America.

Now, Waggoner finds herself on the verge of making her first arguments before the Supreme Court, on behalf of Phillips, 61, and those she describes as countless other creative professionals committed to living, working, and expressing themselves in line with their faith—or lack of it.

Room for a Different View of Marriage

Phillips and other people of faith are defending their freedom as radical activists and government officials across the country wield nondiscrimination laws on the local and state levels in ways never intended by legislators, Waggoner says:

They’re being used to silence and to punish people who have a different view of marriage. It’s no longer about a government affirming a right and a recognition of same-sex marriage. It’s now about requiring private citizens to affirm that as well—which violates the core convictions of millions of Americans who subscribe to the Abrahamic faiths. It’s not just Christianity, it’s Judaism, Islam.

When the Supreme Court was weighing whether to recognize same-sex marriage in the landmark 2015 case Obergefell v. Hodges, Waggoner reminds, advocates told people of faith that they had nothing to worry about, that their rights would be protected:

I think what’s so alarming is how we’ve gone so quickly from this concept of liberalism to, really, illiberalism. From tolerance to intolerance. … From ‘live and let live’ to … you either affirm my view or you’re branded as a bigot and you lose your business.

How is forcing Phillips to create a cake in violation of his conscience different than forcing an atheist singer to perform at religious service, she suggests, or requiring a Jewish artist to glorify the Holocaust?

Friend-of-the-court briefs in the case, Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, show that “tons of people” who support same-sex marriage also support Phillips’ right to decline an order, she says.

“And that’s the right position, because that’s freedom for everyone, even those we disagree with. So it does an injustice to the case to suggest this is about same-sex marriage. It’s not. It’s about the right to live and to work and to speak consistent with your convictions, and not have the government tell you what to say.”

‘Part of a Bigger Story’

The Daily Signal’s interview with Waggoner occurs in her final week of preparing in Washington, D.C., for her Supreme Court appearance with fellow ADF lawyers defending Phillips. Among them are Jeremy Tedesco, who has logged many hours on the Phillips case, and her co-counsel, Jim Campbell.

Waggoner’s husband Benjamin is also a practicing attorney back home in Scottsdale, Arizona. Historically, his wife is a Seattle Seahawks fan, but these days relies on their three children—ages 9, 15, and 17—to keep her current with the football team’s progress.

In about an hour, she plans to be on a nightly 7:30 session on FaceTime with her third-grader son, a commitment while she is away.

Waggoner grew up as Kristen Kellie Behrends in Longview, Washington, about two hours south of Seattle and an hour north of Portland.

What she treasures most about her upbringing, Waggoner says, is that she was steeped in consistent values at home, church, and school that shaped her worldview without sheltering her.

Her father taught her from Scripture about “being an Esther, being a Deborah, used by God,” she says, and that “joy and fulfillment come from having a purpose that’s bigger than ourselves.”

“It’s not about us, we’re a part of a bigger story that has to do with helping human flourishing. And that just shaped my whole life, even now.”

A Defining Moment

Clint Behrends, a Christian pastor and educator, was principal of the school his elder daughter Kristen attended from first through 12th grade.

Waggoner has two younger brothers and a younger sister, two of them adopted but born brother and sister. Her mother, Lavonne Behrends, “thrived” at being a stay-at-home mom for the most part, but also worked part time in accounting-related jobs.

Once a teacher in public schools, today her father is a licensed minister in the Assemblies of God denomination. He is associate pastor of Cedar Park Church in Bothell, Washington, and superintendent of an affiliated school system.

Young Kristen would go to the principal’s office to visit her father three or four times a day, sometimes because she got into trouble. In these encounters, he urged her to find and develop her talents, and apply them in a way that would honor God.

And one day, Waggoner recalls, she saw clearly that defending ministries and religious freedom should be her path. Although her “rebellious teenage years” were not yet behind her at 13, she never really looked back, Waggoner recalls in an interview with The Daily Signal.

“That’s what I thought God was impressing on me to do, and it matched with my skill set,” she says. “And it worked out.”

Waggoner’s father was the first college graduate in the family, and she became the second.

By choice, her entire education was in Christian schools. She ran cross country and played volleyball and basketball in high school, where she continued to be a good student and graduated as valedictorian in a class of 21.

She won a drama scholarship to go to Northwest University, a school outside Seattle affiliated with the Assemblies of God. She ended up doing debate, winning some tournaments and “best speaker” awards. She also played volleyball. (“That and the law are my two loves.”)

Then it was on to law school at Regent University in Virginia Beach, where she won “best oralist” and the Whittier Moot Court Competition.

What grabbed her about law?

“I think that the pursuit of justice is something that really motivated me, and taking stands on principles,” she says, adding: “But once you start working with clients and you experience being able to help individuals, when most of the time they’re at their low point, it’s very fulfilling.”

‘On the Tough End’

Right after law school, she clerked for Richard Sanders, a member of the Washington state Supreme Court. She first sought a summer job with him two years earlier because he practiced constitutional law, not knowing he was running for a seat on the court.

“The day I called him to follow up on the status of my resume was the day he was elected to the [state] Supreme Court,” she recalls. “He picked up the phone and talked to me for about 45 minutes.”

Nearly two years later, a few weeks out from graduation and planning to clerk for a federal judge in Virginia, she got a call from the law school saying a justice on the Washington Supreme Court had been looking for her for weeks. Sanders was hiring; she interviewed and got a clerkship there.

The law school graduate proved to be “up for the challenge,” Sanders, now back in private practice, recalls, and she worked hard to “get better and better.”

“This is exactly where she should be, and this is what she does best,” the former judge says of Waggoner’s current role. “I think she realizes that she’s on the tough end of those arguments.”

Sanders, knowing his law clerk’s interests, proved instrumental in urging her to look into the law firm where she would stay for 17 years.

Ellis, Li & McKinstry had a good reputation for its work in constitutional law in Seattle, not exactly a conservative bastion. It represented many large churches and religious organizations.

Sanders “consistently encouraged” her to go to work there, Waggoner recalls, rather than at a public interest law firm, to gain broader and deeper experience.

“My very first case was a religious liberty case,” Waggoner recalls, “which I don’t think is coincidental.”

‘A Lot Has Changed’

Ellis, Li & McKinstry also happens to be perhaps the nation’s largest private law firm made up of Christian attorneys, partner Keith Kemper tells The Daily Signal.

Kemper describes Waggoner as a tenacious but gracious advocate whose “incredibly strong work ethic” drives her to study up on the case at hand to learn more than her colleagues or opponents.

“She will be better prepared,” says Kemper, who supervised Waggoner in her early years with the firm. “She will know the material backward and forward.” More here from The Daily Signal.

Have you Met James Fraser? Students may Know him Soon

Posted on April 16, 2018April 16, 2018 by Denise Simon

This fella took over where Howard Zinn left off…beware parents…

James W. Fraser, Professor of History and Education at the Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development at New York University, holds a joint appointment in the departments of Humanities and Social Sciences and Teaching and Learning. Fraser’s teaching and research is motivated by his concern with the challenges facing future Social Studies and History teachers who must find ways of engaging sometimes bored students with American and world history. His most recent book, By the People: A History of the United States is designed to help make US History courses more lively, with a focus on the agency of everyday Americans of many different communities, times, and places. Fraser’s work also reflects his concern with complex debates about the place of religion in public schools, especially in the United States, but also internationally. He has written, taught, and consulted about the state of teacher education in the United States and elsewhere, and also written and spoken about the future of the History of Education as an academic field of study. Fraser is the president of the History of Education Society for 2013-2014. He has served on the Editorial Board of the History of Education Quarterly, and as the NYU liaison to New Design High School, a public high school in New York’s Lower East Side, and to Facing History and Ourselves. He is Director of Undergraduate Studies in the NYU Department of Teaching and Learning, and serves on the committees responsible for the NYU programs in London, England and Accra, Ghana.

From 2008 to 2012, Fraser was the Senior Vice President for Programs at the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation in Princeton, New Jersey, where he coordinated the different Fellowship programs and led the launch of the Foundation’s Fellowships for Teachers. Now back to full-time teaching at NYU, he remains a senior advisor to the Foundation. Fraser was the founding dean of Northeastern University’s School of Education, serving from 1999 to 2004. He was a member and chair of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Education Deans Council, the Boston School Committee Nominating Committee, and other boards. He was also a lecturer in the Program in Religion and Secondary Education at the Harvard University Divinity School from 1997 to 2004. He has taught at Lesley University, the University of Massachusetts, Boston, Boston University, and Public School 76, Manhattan. He is an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ and was pastor of Grace Church in East Boston, Massachusetts, from 1986 to 2006 and is now a member of Judson Memorial Church in Greenwich Village, New York.

*** That church by the way is an activist ‘justice’ church. And that activism is pervasive in Mr. Fraser as he is pushing a new high school advanced class history textbook, full of indoctrination.

*** In part:

The final section of the book, titled “The Angry Election of 2016,” is highly critical of Trump.

“Most thought that Trump was too extreme a candidate to win the nomination, but his extremism, his anti-establishment rhetoric, and, some said, his not-very-hidden racism connected with a significant number of primary voters,” Fraser wrote.

A new AP history textbook that covers the 2016 election is coming under fire for being “blatantly biased” against Trump and his supporters. (Courtesy of Terra Snyder)

Trump voters are described as “mostly older, often rural or suburban, and overwhelmingly white” while the book uses the viewpoint of Clinton voters to describe Trump’s supporters as fearful, backwards, sexist people who supported a mentally ill candidate.

“Clinton’s supporters feared that the election had been determined by people who were afraid of a rapidly developing ethnic diversity of the country, discomfort with their candidate’s gender, and nostalgia for an earlier time in the nation’s history,” the textbook says. “They also worried about the mental stability of the president-elect and the anger that he and his supporters brought to the nation.”

The book also bashes police for its handling of the Ferguson riots.

In a section titled “Black Lives Matter,” Fraser wrote that after the shooting of Michael Brown, Brown’s “parents were kept away at gunpoint.” He paints a negative view of police while glossing over violent tactics carried out by some rioters, critics say.

“The nearly all-white police force was seen as an occupying army in the mostly African American town…the police increased the tensions, defacing memorials set up for Brown and using rubber bullets on demonstrators,” he wrote.

According to his bio, Fraser wrote the book to “help make U.S. History courses more lively, with a focus on the agency of everyday Americans or many different communities, times, and places.” More of the story here.