Keeping America

Over this last week we saw both Martin Luther King Day, and the birthday of Benjamin Franklin. These two important figures helped shape America as we know it today, and I think it’s good to remember them and what they did for us. I’m sure many read reminded themselves of the famous “I have a dream” speech as part of that.

It’s sad to me that the things they helped create, are being squandered by later generations. More and more we find speech that distorts the truth. We find speech that, while is reported to celebrate our “diversity,” only serves to deepen the divide between people in our culture. There are various groups within American that seem more concerned with being celebrated for where they, or their ancestors, came from than they do about where they are now. (I will not give links to such sites that might support them.) They seem to forget why they, or their ancestors, came to America in the first place. Many want us to forget that, whether our ancestors came from Europe, South America, Africa, or the Middle East, we are all still Americans.

Benjamin Franklyn valued personal liberty. He valued it so much that he once said, “Those who give up liberty for the sake of safety deserve neither.” And yet since the tragedy of 9/11, we find our government taking away our liberties and telling us it’s all in the name of creating a safer America.

Civil liberty isn’t and addendum that we’ll “get around too when we can.” It’s a fundamental part of our constitution. If we aren’t vigilant about keeping them, we will cease to have an America at all.

Good News on the Anti-Nuclear Waste Front

Here’s some good news for the folks out in the western deserts of Utah. You, people like me and the Goshute Indians. Cedar Mountain, the proposed site for all a trainload of hot nuclear waste material, has been declared as wilderness, and is now protected from certain kinds of building. That means you can’t build railroad lines through it, and PFS (the evil people who want to dump this stuff on us) wanted to use rail.

PFS hasn’t given up the fight just yet, but this is surely a large amount of rain on their nuclear waste dumping parade. This quote from the KSL article is interesting:

But cooperation among lawmakers does not kill the project completely. A longer-term solution could come from a bill sponsored by Nevada Senator Harry Reid, who proposes keeping nuclear waste at or near the place where it's generated.

That’s the most sensible thing I’ve heard coming out of D.C. in a long time. Let the people who make the garbage deal with it.

People see what they want

It looks like the whole “evolution vs. creationism” battle has hit the federal courts. If this article is true to what’s going on, the whole thing is absolutely silly. Bizarre may be a better word.

First off, it looks like Cobb County, Georgia schools put a sticker on their biology books saying, "This textbook contains material on evolution. Evolution is a theory, not a fact, regarding the origin of living things. This material should be approached with an open mind, studied carefully and critically considered." Why they felt the need to put this sticker on these books is anyone’s guess. The school board calls the stickers "a reasonable and evenhanded guide to science instruction" that encourages students to be critical thinkers. The stickers seem unnecessary to me, but okay.

Most modern biology texts I’ve ever read (including my latest one) present it as a core theme in modern biology (which it is), explain it’s core process, natural selection, and then show how certain elements of biology seem to coincide with it. They don’t bowl you over and say, “God doesn’t exist and evolution is the only true gospel of creation.” In fact, I’ve never seen a biology textbook that mentions God at all, let alone tries to prove or disprove his existence. They just teach biology as we understand it today; or at least at the time of publication.

Apparently some folks disagree. Some parents, as well as the ACLU (surprise surprise) have sued, claiming the stickers violate the constitutional separation of church and state. U.S. District Judge Clarence Cooper ruled that the sticker "conveys an impermissible message of endorsement and tells some citizens that they are political outsiders while telling others they are political insiders."

Huh? Endorsing critical thinking violates the first amendment? Since when? What is this statement endorsing if not careful study and thought? And just who are the political outsiders, here? People who can’t think for themselves? The judge is doing nothing but concocting a condition that doesn’t actually exist. Judge Cooper must think that critical thinking, and forming your own opinions, is dangerous. I wonder what he thinks about bloggers?

This quote from the article is brilliant:

"If it's unconstitutional to tell students to study evolution with an open mind, then what's not unconstitutional?" said John West, a senior fellow with the Discovery Institute, a Seattle-based think tank that supports intelligent design, the belief that the universe is so complex it must have been created by a higher power. "The judge is basically trying to make it unconstitutional for anyone to have a divergent view, and we think that has a chilling effect on free speech."

It seems to me that these parents, the judge, and the ACLU, are simply saying “What’s constitutional is what agrees with my position, and anything that disagrees with it is unconstitutional.” Oh, yeah. Way to protect our civil liberties, there. Not!

“Opponents of the sticker campaign see it as a backdoor attempt to introduce the biblical story of creation into the public schools…”

What? Where in this sticker’s message does it mention the Bible? Where does it mention religion? Give me a break, people! You’re seeing ghosts where there are none!

"The anti-evolution forces have been searching for a new strategy that would accomplish the same end," said Kenneth Miller, a professor of biology at Brown University and co-author of the science book that was stickered. "That purpose is, if not to get evolution out of the schools altogether, then at least undermine it as much as possible in the minds of students."

Huh? Since when is thinking critically about something an attempt to undermine biology? What wrong with simply saying that evolution isn’t a proven fact and going on to teach it anyway, along with all the other stuff we do know (more or less) for sure? Heck, we don’t know how prions function but we still teach how we “think” they might and no one bats an eye.  Why is evolution so sacred that we can’t allow students to weigh the evidence and think for themselves? That’s not undermining science, that’s the fundamental nature of science! Question everything and refine our understanding!

But silliness isn’t confined to only one side of the argument. Get this:
In 2004, Georgia's school superintendent proposed a statewide science curriculum that dropped the word "evolution" in favor of "changes over time." That plan was soon scrapped amid protests from teachers.

You think? How stupid is that? Call a spade a spade, a duck a duck, and the theory of evolution the theory of evolution. Don’t back away from it! Teach it! Question it! Show all its holes as well as its wonders! Then let students decide for themselves.  They’re going to make up their own minds, anyway, no matter what you do.

UPDATE:12/16 One of our readers. The Sanity Inspector, left a link with some more background information. I followed that link back to one of his own blogs. It turns out he was at the initial hearing. I reccomend reading it. Very interesting stuff. Thanks SI!

Tookie Not a Victim

I don’t think I’ve ever been driven so nuts as by the people who are all over mourning the death of Tookie Williams. All kinds of “evidence” is crawling out of the woodworks to say that he wasn’t a co-founder of the Crips gang. What’s next? He didn’t murder all those people in cold blood after all?

Give me a freaking break.  

This dirtbag was convicted over twenty years ago on several counts of murder. In some cases, it looks like it was more of an execution. I don’t give a crap what he may or may not have done in the intervening twenty years between his conviction, sentencing, and finally his execution. The state gave him twenty years that he never granted to his victims.

If you want to debate the validity of the death sentence, go ahead and do it. If you want to hoist a cold-blooded murdering oxygen-thief up on a flag-pole and get me to salute him as a martyr, forget it.