Arizona’s persecution of its Spanish-speaking populations and everything that has to do with Hispanic Studies has progressed to the point where books are now banned in Tucson schools:

The list of removed books includes the 20-year-old textbook “Rethinking Columbus: The Next 500 Years,” which features an essay by Tucson author Leslie Silko. . . Other banned books include “Pedagogy of the Oppressed” by famed Brazilian educator Paulo Freire and “Occupied America: A History of Chicanos” by Rodolfo Acuña, two books often singled out by Arizona state superintendent of public instruction John Huppenthal, who campaigned in 2010 on the promise to “stop la raza.” Huppenthal, who once lectured state educators that he based his own school principles for children on corporate management schemes of the Fortune 500, compared Mexican-American studies to Hitler Jugend indoctrination last fall.

When you get to the point where you ban Paulo Freire and Rethinking Columbus, there is no hope for you. I always thought that schools were places that promoted learning and reading, that they fostered the culture of appreciating the written word. And now books are banned? And such brilliant books, too?

I say, let’s not stop there. Let’s start burning books that offer the world-view that a Fortune 500-inspired bureaucrat finds incompatible with his limited vision of reality.

Jeez, people. This cannot be happening in a place that wants to call itself civilized.

My gratitude goes to reader PAF who sent in this information.