Intelligence Failure

Not only did President Bush give Mr. Moustache a ride to the UN before leaving for the hard work of beating back brush at the ranch in Crawford, he also dropped this little bomb (via the AP):

President Bush said Monday he believes schools should discuss "intelligent design" alongside evolution when teaching students about the creation of life. During a round-table interview with reporters from five Texas newspapers, Bush declined to go into detail on his personal views of the origin of life. But he said students should learn about both theories, Knight Ridder Newspapers reported. "I think that part of education is to expose people to different schools of thought," Bush said. "You're asking me whether or not people ought to be exposed to different ideas, the answer is yes." The theory of intelligent design says life on earth is too complex to have developed through evolution, implying that a higher power must have had a hand in creation. Christian conservatives — a substantial part of Bush's voting base — have been pushing for the teaching of intelligent design in public schools. Scientists have rejected the theory as an attempt to force religion into science education.

Bill O'Really had this to say in support of the President in his talking points memo from last night:

Whatever your belief, it (intelligent design) should be respected. But the National Academy of Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science both reject intelligent design and don't want it mentioned in science classes. That, in my opinion, is fascism. There is no reason the students cannot be told that more than a few people, including some scientists, believe the creation of the world, no matter how it occurred, involved a higher power. What on earth is wrong with that? It would be wrong to teach Genesis (search) in a science class. That's for a theology course. But it is equally wrong to ignore the fact that evolution is not a universal belief. Just state the facts, whether it be science or any other subject. Now President Bush told the reporters that he favored an exposition of intelligent design so, "people can understand what the debate is about". It seems logical to me. But a Knight-Ridder reporter named Ron Hutchinson spun it this way. "Bush essentially endorsed efforts by Christian conservatives to give intelligent design equal standing with the theory of evolution in the nation's schools." Well, I didn't hear anything about equal standing for the president. Of course, the reporter spun the story that way to make it seem like Mr. Bush is a fanatic under the spell of religious zealots. That's what some in the press do all day long. This isn't a complicated matter. Public schools have an obligation to present all subjects in perspective. Again, "Talking Points" isn't advocating Adam and Eve in the science lab. But if you're going to discuss the biological procedure of abortion, for example, you have a responsibility to tell students that half the country feels it's morally wrong. Right? The same thing with evolution. Of course it's accepted science. It should be taught as such. But there's no downside to mentioning that many people of faith believe a creator was involved in the process.

John Cole, a libertarian minded conservative blogger who I have a bit of respect for, thinks this is all laughable in his post The Coalition of the Stupid:

To have the leader of the country, the leader of the party, and the person who proclaims that he wants to be known as the ‘education president’ to state, even casually, that he thinks intelligent design should be taught alongside evolution is lunacy of the first order. First, the facts: 1.) Intelligent design is not a theory. There is no theoretical basis to it. It is not scientific theory, and it is not just bad scientific theory, it is simply not theory. It is ascientific. It is a flight of fancy. It is a call to discard mountains of evidence, throw up ones hands, and state: “This is all too confusing and complex, and science is hard, so some ‘intelligent designer’ must be behind all this.” 2.) Intelligent design is creationism. It may not be quite as audaciously stupid as the nonsense peddled by the ‘young earth’ crowd, but it is creationism. Just who do you think this ‘intelligent designer’ is? [...] 3.) Teaching ‘intelligent design’ as science, or as a viable theory, or whatever you want to call it other than bullshit, is to assault science. Criticism of evolutionary theory is always welcome, but attempting to replace evolutionary theory with fanciful tales is to assault not only the senses, but to attack the very manner science itself is conducted. 4.) People don’t want ‘intelligent design’ taught because it is a viable scientific theory, they want it taught because it is tailored to fit their pre-existing religious beliefs. The introduction of ‘intelligent design’ into the class room will be seen as a blow to the ‘evil secularists.’ It will be just another step in ‘taking back the culture.’

All of this leads more and more into opening the door to sectarian education in our public schools--here's an example from a story earlier this week in the NYTimes:

When the school board in Odessa, the West Texas oil town, voted unanimously in April to add an elective Bible study course to the 2006 high school curriculum, some parents dropped to their knees in prayerful thanks that God would be returned to the classroom, while others assailed it as an effort to instill religious training in the public schools. Hundreds of miles away, leaders of the National Council on Bible Curriculum in Public Schools notched another victory. A religious advocacy group based in Greensboro, N.C., the council has been pressing a 12-year campaign to get school boards across the country to accept its Bible curriculum. [...] But a growing chorus of critics says the course, taught by local teachers trained by the council, conceals a religious agenda. The critics say it ignores evolution in favor of creationism and gives credence to dubious assertions that the Constitution is based on the Scriptures, and that "documented research through NASA" backs the biblical account of the sun standing still. In the latest salvo, the Texas Freedom Network, an advocacy group for religious freedom, has called a news conference for Monday to release a study that finds the national council's course to be "an error-riddled Bible curriculum that attempts to persuade students and teachers to adopt views that are held primarily within conservative Protestant circles." [...] In one teaching unit, students are told, "Throughout most of the last 2,000 years, the majority of men living in the Western world have accepted the statements of the Scriptures as genuine." The words are taken from the Web site of Grant R. Jeffrey Ministries' Prophecy on Line. [...] Some of the claims made in the national council's curriculum are laughable, said Mark A. Chancey, professor of religious studies at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, who spent seven weeks studying the syllabus for the freedom network. Mr. Chancey said he found it "riddled with errors" of facts, dates, definitions and incorrect spellings. It cites supposed NASA findings to suggest that the earth stopped twice in its orbit, in support of the literal truth of the biblical text that the sun stood still in Joshua and II Kings. "When the type of urban legend that normally circulates by e-mail ends up in a textbook, that's a problem," Mr. Chancey said. Tracey Kiesling, the national council's national teacher trainer, said the course offered "scientific documentation" on the flood and cites as a scientific authority Carl Baugh, described by Mrs. Kiesling as "an internationally known creation scientist who founded the Creation Evidence Museum in Glen Rose, Tex."