The headlines on Web reports of the Kansas State Board of Education’s Tuesday approval of evolution-friendly science standards reflected outsiders’ perceptions (and misperceptions) of this long-running issue in Kansas. Some examples:
– "Evolution returns to Kansas" (National Center for Science Education)
– "Kansas schools dump ‘intelligent design’" (Globe and Mail, Toronto, Canada)
– "Darwin back on Kansas’ A list" (Los Angeles Times)
– "Conservatives lose latest Darwin battle in Kansas" (Reuters)
– "Kansas board supports evolution" (Wall Street Journal)
– "Evolution of science standards continues in Kansas" (CNN)
– "God, Darwin clash again in Kansas" (Times of India and Irish Times)
– "Darwin admitted back into Kansas schools" (DailyIndia.com)
– "Evolution comes to Kansas" (Cosmos, Australia)
– "God vs. evolution in Kansas . . . Again" (New York Times blog)
That last site, by the way, includes hundreds of blogger comments that add up to a dispiriting picture of what the world thinks of Kansas. (Samples: "Why do we still allow such moronic throwbacks to vote in national elections?" "Is their goal a state populated with Wal-Mart greeters?" "These are the people that brought us BTK, ‘In Cold Blood,’ Dorothy and Toto, the world’s largest ball of twine and wheat. Lots and lots of wheat. Need I say more?" "Kansas has schools?")
Whatever the state board does next, the damage is done.
Posted by Rhonda Holman
Not only was prewar intelligence wrong about Iraq, postwar planning, such as it was, also badly missed the mark. Military PowerPoint slides from August 2002, obtained by the National Security Archive, predicted that the United States would have as few as 5,000 troops in Iraq by December 2006, the New York Times reported. Instead, we have about 132,000 troops there and will be surging 21,500 more. And instead of the stable, pro-American democracy that was predicted, our mission now is to prevent total chaos.
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
Some of the top bloggers in the country took part in a panel discussion on the impact of political blogs Tuesday night at the Robert J. Dole Institute of Politics in Lawrence. Participants included Joan McCarter, contributing editor at www.dailykos.com; Erick Erickson, managing editor at www.RedState.com; and Scott Johnson, co-founder of the Power Line blog. They said that blogs will play an increasing role in swaying and informing the public, but Erickson warned that candidates need to be prepared for the downsides of campaign blogs, the University Daily Kansan reported. “Blogs are more likely to harm you than help you, but they are a necessary tool,” he said.
Tell that to Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards. Both of the bloggers his campaign hired have now quit, following the uproar over some of their past blog comments. Melissa McEwan left the campaign Tuesday night, the day after blogger Amanda Marcotte bailed.
Here is Washington Post media critic Howard Kurtz’s take on candidates hiring bloggers: “My sense is that candidates want the hipness infusion and netroots support that bloggers offer but would like to finesse being associated with online fire-breathers — in other words, they want it both ways.”
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
An article in the New York Times shows how creationists are pursuing a Trojan Horse strategy against science: Marcus Ross, a young geoscientist pursuing his doctorate at the University of Rhode Island, wrote a dissertation about dinosaurs who lived in the Cretaceous era, about 65 million years ago.
His advisers called the paper “impeccable,” but there’s a problem: Ross is a young earth creationist who believes the Earth is at most 10,000 years old, based on his reading of Scripture.
Not a hint of that in the paper, of course. Ross has also appeared on a DVD defending intelligent design and young earth “theories.” Ross defends his dual outlook, saying his biblical literalism is another “paradigm” that he uses.
But how is that intellectually honest? As one scientist blogger noted, “most professionals will not place their name on a paper where the conclusions are so antithetical to their own viewpoint.”
Ross earned his degree — fine. But the obvious danger is in creationists pursuing mainstream credentials to lend a veneer of respectability to bogus science.
Posted by Randy Scholfield
The bill to declare English the state’s official language left the House Military, Veterans and Homeland Security Committee with bipartisan support this week, raising the chances that it or something like it will pass the full Legislature this session. With the teeth of an earlier version pulled regarding official government documents, the latest bill seems even more like pointless anti-immigration pandering. Yet Committee Chairman Don Myers (in photo), R-Derby, declared, “This is a pro-immigration bill because it encourages those who aren’t proficient in our common language to get this way. We’re not taking away their first language.”
But does anybody living in Kansas really need legislative encouragement to learn English?
When Rep. Mario Goico, R-Wichita, spoke of what learning English had done in his life since he left Cuba as a child, Rep. Bill Light, R-Rolla, responded: “I appreciate what Rep. Goico said, but I just ask the question, did he need a state law to do that?”
Posted by Rhonda Holman
The following satirical headlines come from the Web site borowitzreport.com:
U.S. SENDS SURGE OF HOMICIDAL ASTRONAUTS TO IRAQ; Armed With Pepper Spray, Mallets, Tubing
ASTRONAUTS, HUBBLE TELESCOPE IN STEAMY LOVE TRIANGLE; NASA Announces Zero Tolerance Policy on Docking
BIDEN RETURNS TO CAMPAIGN TRAIL WITH DUCT TAPE OVER MOUTH; New Strategy to Keep Candidate on Message
BREAKDANCING CASTRO SILENCES RUMORS; Busts a Move on Three-minute Video
Posted by Rhonda Holman
