[Phys-l] internal/external conservative/nonconservative forces !?!?

[John Denker <jsd@av8n.com>]

While I was trying to figure out why bogus derivations of
Bernoulli's principle outnumber correct derivations by a
factor of 100-to-1 or so, I stumbled across this:

  http://www.physicsclassroom.com/class/energy/u5l2a.cfm

It classifies F_grav and F_spring as internal forces and 
classifies a long list of other forces as external forces.

It then goes on to say that the internal forces are «sometimes 
referred to as nonconservative forces» while the others are 
«sometimes referred to as conservative forces».

It makes a big deal about this, with examples and diagrams
and many paragraphs of discussion.  It even says explicitly
«This Concept is BiG».

There are many emphatic questions on the topic at
  http://www.physicsclassroom.com/reviews/energy/energyans1.cfm
so this is certainly not an isolated misprint.

But wait, there's more!  Let's go to:
  http://phys205.physics.tamu.edu/TypeB/TypeB.htm

which is entitled:
> Promoting Excellence in Physics Teaching

and bills itself as supported by:
> Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) Type B Teacher Quality Grant

I mention this because it hotlinks to the aforementioned
physicsclassroom.com and endorses it as
> excellent tutorial site

Also, according to google, classroomphysics.com is the #1
site for stuff related to "Minds On Physics".

======

So, we have a large, prominent, "excellent tutorial site" that
 a) introduces energy using a completely wrong idea of what 
  conservative and nonconservative mean.
 b) tells us that springs are internal not external
 c) tells us that gravitation is internal not external
 d) in an earlier chapter it mentions electrical and
  magnetic forces, but in this chapter it leaves them
  off both lists.  I wonder if that's because they couldn't
  decide whether E&M were conservative or nonconservative.

==============

I could go on, but for now let me leave it is a question: 
Is there any possibility that this is not as bad as it looks?
Is this some new kind of energy (or new kind of conservation)
that they forgot to tell me about until now?