Posted on 12/06/2004 6:03:55 AM PST by Tumbleweed_Connection
It’s amusing how the liberal politicians and media are wracking their brains in an endless quest to figure out why their man lost and President Bush won re-election. A popular focus of their post-election depression study has been the evangelical Christian vote, a topic addressed by Mort Kondracke, the left side of “The Beltway Boys”, in his column “Democrats Need to ‘Get Religion’.” In the article, Kondracke suggests that Democrats must attempt to “understand” the evangelical Christian faith in order to succeed politically. He offers the typical liberal tongue-lashing at the conservative positions on pro-life and marriage protection.
I used to consider Kondracke (a former senior editor of the left-wing New Republic) a moderately reasonable liberal who was able to carry on a polite dialogue with the saner half of “The Beltway Boys”, Fred Barnes. But all my respect for Kondracke went down the tubes when he referred to the conservative Christians who want to “ban evolution from schoolbooks” as “kooks”.
Kondracke and his liberal friends would be the first to preach that they believe it’s unconstitutional to teach “religion” in public schools. But whether out of ignorance or denial, these secularists do not admit that the so-called “theory” of evolution (far from even a genuine scientific theory, much less the fact they teach it to be) was the product of atheists attempting to discredit Christianity and spread their secular humanist agenda—yes, secular humanism is a RELIGION (a belief).
No scientist, Christian or secular, denies that microevolution (changes within species) takes place. It’s the Darwinian “theory” of macroevolution (organisms changing into more complex life forms) that is, at best, a guess. There is no possibility that macroevolution can pass the tests of the scientific method. Using steps of the scientific method, Dr. Carl Baugh’s website, creationevidence.org, found these problems with macroevolution:
Experimentation—The processes would exceed the lifetime of any human experimenter (Dobzhansky).
Reproduction—impossible to reproduce in the laboratory (Dobzhansky)
The problem with most public school textbooks is that they’re years out of date. By today’s standards, science in Charles Darwin’s day was primitive. Modern research in microbiology and especially DNA has revealed the phenomenal complexity of even the tiniest single-celled organism. The idea that life forms such as this could just “accidentally” emerge from some “primeval soup” now sounds totally preposterous, thanks to modern scientific research. In his book, How Life Began, biologist L. R. Croft declares, “Today we now have the key with which to escape from the despair of Darwinism. It lies in the science of molecular biology” (p. 156).
What’s more, many of the so-called “missing links” in the ape to man evolutionary chain have proven to be nothing more than hoaxes, and many probably were included in some of the textbooks you read in grade or high school:
Piltdown Man—“a hoax based on a human skull cap and an orangutan’s jaw”.
Nebraska Man—a single tooth found; rest of the skeleton found later—that of a peccary.
Lucy—similar to a pygmy chimp—“inner ear, skulls and bones” not even close to becoming Homo Sapiens.
Secular educators have used deceptive theories of atheistic and agnostic scientists to promote their anti-God agenda. The theory of evolution wasn’t the only lie they’ve used to discredit Christianity. I think most of us were taught in school that medieval Christians believed the earth was flat. However, in 1997, J. Burton Russell, of the University of California-Santa Barbara, told the American Scientific Affiliation Conference at Westmont College that “with extraordinary few exceptions no educated person in the history of Western Civilization from the third century B. C. onward believed that the earth was flat.”
Russell’s research found that both an antireligious Frenchman (so what’s new?) and that gifted American storyteller, Washington Irving, concocted the idea (although Russell had “not been able to establish a connection” between the two) that medievals believed the earth was flat. With the purpose of, according to Russell, “to defend Darwinism. . . The flat-earth lie was ammunition against the creationists.” Paraphrasing the secularists’ argument, Russell wrote that they pointed to Christians as stupid—“These people who deny evolution today are exactly the same sort of people as those idiots who for at least a thousand years denied that the earth was round.” It’ll be a 90 degree day in January here in the Frozen Tundra before National Geographic ever produces a documentary on Russell’s study.
And what about Mort Kondracke, who referred to anyone who doesn’t want to teach evolution as a “kook”? Remember, this is the guy who relies upon Ron Reagan’s deceptive form of science and believes that embryonic stem cell research would have spared his wife from Parkinson’s disease. Throughout the Democrats’ last national convention, from Hillary Clinton to Ron Reagan, all the talk was about “stem cells”, never differentiating between adult stem cells (which are currently used successfully in scientific research) and embryonic stem cells (which no scientist has ever claimed would promise a cure for any disease). The left routinely uses science as a tool to deceptively promote its agenda.
And will the Democrats ever understand why Bush won, and specifically, why we conservative Christians voted as we did? Will they ever be able to comprehend our faith?
Not unless they realize that true Christian faith is no psychological philosophy or simple head knowledge. Until, like our President, they accept Christ as their personal savior and experience the new birth, they’ll never “get” our religion. “Kooks” we may be, but at least we’re better safe than sorry.
The democrats could win if they dropped socialism and embraced the Constitution.
This country was founded not on entitlement, but liberty. The freedom to succeed or fail on the basis of one's own merits without interference.
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" Mort Kondracke, the left side of “The Beltway Boys”, in his column “Democrats Need to ‘Get Religion’.” In the article, Kondracke suggests that Democrats must attempt to “understand” the evangelical Christian faith in order to succeed politically"
Wherein lies the problem. They don't WANT TO "understand" that would violate they're twisted way of thinking.
She really is a kook and quite wrong.
There's zero evidence for macroevoluition - one species changing into another - from either the fossile record or laboratory experiments.
Evolution says life resulted from undirected chance over time. This is not so; in this context, evolution is godless naturalism pretending to be science.
These people love humanity but hate mankind.
I was my understanding that Darwin was a Christian and he attributed his theory of evoloution as "God's plan" that man has misunderstood.
I am not smart or informed enough to prove or disprove evolution principals. That is not why I vote the way I do.
As a Bush supporter, I simply did not want the likes of
P-Ditty and/or Talk-Shitty, or Eminim or Michael-Moore or Whoppie-Goldberg or arrogant Jon Stewart getting anywhere the seat of power in Washington DC.
To me, these types of people would corrupt society to the point of anarchy, and I do not want to see my kids and grandkids being forced to protect themselves against hordes of secular revolutionaries.
Connecting the dots from Mort Kondracke and what he thinks to a scientific field of evolution to claim people of faith are not kooks.
Mort is still just befuddled that Kerry lost.
He knows why, Kerry was a terrible candidate, he just can't admit it.
I am going to have to go with Mort on this one.
(Background, I am an atheist, and I am a formally trained scientist, although in physics as opposed to biology)
I support evolution. I am very confident it is pretty much correct. However, a big part of the scientific method is in accepting that what you think may be wrong, and entertaining other ideas and exploring them fairly. That is the battle within the narrow discipline of evolution. I think it is happening, although not quite perfectly...people on both sides have some pretty entrenched positions. I think both sides are betraying scepticism.
That said, I don't think that is what this about. Cutting edge differences are handled in journals and conferences. But the political and public debate is about high school texts. In that area, I tend to support some of the 'creationist' positions. For religious reasons or not, if parents want to emphasize any uncertainty, or make sure some idea is put forward to their children, I don't mind at all and think it is appropriate. Personally, I would rather get the government out of schooling entirely, but that is another thread.
Most 'creationists' here probably support most of what I said here, except about agreeing with Mort. Mort didn't say that people who want to mention intelligent design (ID), or emphasize any uncertainty in evolutionary theory are kooks. He said people who want to BAN evolution from text books are kooks. I agree with him. The Proponents of ID I have met are asking for consideration and mention, not the banning of ideas they disagree with. That would make them guilty of what they accuse the other side of. I haven't come across the argument that evolution should be banned from texts, but if it is, I would be comfortable considering them extreme, or to use Mort's less than PC term 'kooks'
Kook.
The author of this article and people who believe as she does are "kooks." Is she just ignorant or does she lie to make her point? Does she not know that Darwin who came up with the theory of Evolution was a Christian? Duh so much for him being an atheists, ey?
Does the author know what a theory is? What other theory is there to explain the variety of life forms and how they developed and dont tell me that six days of creation did it all. That was a metaphor used to explain to nomads 6000 years ago how the world was created. Its certainly not a scientific theory. It is not literally true. That said there doenst need to be any dispute between religion and science on this. The creation story follows pretty closely to how scientists believe the order of creation. It just didnt happen in six literal current earth days. Current man and dinosaurs were not created at the same time. Its doubtful that Neanderthal Man was created at the same time as today's man. If they were then current day man did an excellent job of hiding his bones.
She's lucky Darwin is dead. If he were still alive, he could sue her for libel.
I have always thought that there is no such thing as an true atheist.
It takes more faith to believe in nothing than to believe in a supreme being.
I make that statement based on the fact that a very large percent of people who inhabit this planet believe in some type of deity.
There must be some inherent drive in the human soul that seeks to fulfill that need.
Not being a protagonist, just curious
Aw geez ><
Going on these anti-evolution jihads does make us look bad. Not kooks, but it does make people who aren't in church scratch their heads.
If they did that, they wouldn't be democrats. But that's just fine with me.
You are right on the mark.
If you'd like to have a conversation about it, I am more than willing. But this thread is not the place. :-) Drop me a FReepmail if you'd like.
Wrong.
Darwinian evolution (i.e., Darwinism, evolution through natural selection, descent with modification) does not speak to the origins of life. Nor does Darwinian evolution posit change as a result of "undirected chance over time." Quite the opposite. It posits speciation as a result of genetic change which is directed by natural selection. Natural selection is the process by which the natural genetic variables in organisms result in differential reproductive success as a result of these inheritable characteristics.
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