Posted on 12/01/2005 10:55:04 AM PST by curiosity
Edited on 12/01/2005 11:11:54 AM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
The storm-tossed and rudderless Republican Party should particularly ponder the vote last week in Dover, Pa., where all eight members of the school board seeking re-election were defeated. This expressed the community's wholesome exasperation with the board's campaign to insinuate religion, in the guise of "intelligent design'' theory, into high school biology classes, beginning with a required proclamation that evolution "is not a fact.''
(Excerpt) Read more at townhall.com ...
Not me.
And friend, not even you:
"Before I formed thee in the belly, I knew thee..."
-- Jeremiah 1:5
Yes, I agree that school choice is ultimately the answer. However, until such time as it comes to pass, what is currently being taught with my tax dollars is still my concern.
But, they matter in this story because George Will is saying creationism will hurt the Republicans. Well, since most Americans support the Republican position, that really makes no sense.
What percentage of those that 'oppose evolution' do you think are Republicans? I think a large percentage are Democrats who won't be changing their vote because of this. In fact, I can't imagine any Democrat changing their vote because the GOP endorses ID/Creationism.
We can start by noting that educated ID advocates like Behe and Denton accept common descent as a fact.
That's a significant point of agreement.
When push comes to shove, you can bet that the combined efforts of medical doctors, the pharmaceutical industry, government agencies and, yes, the same NEA that opposed phonics instruction in the 1980s will succeed in painting those who believe in "intelligent design" as anti-science, anti-education and anti-children. Kooks, in other words.
Why make such controversies political? What is to be gained? We don't generally give political agencies a voice in deciding how our offspring are to be instructed in matters of faith. We would be irate if the state or federal government told parents they must put their children in religious schools from the age of five to eighteen years.
Yet the public is generally accepting of submitting young people to state-supported, mandatory anti-religious instruction in government schools, whose standards have sunk to the lowest common denominator of the communities in which they exist. In other words, no standards at all.
Concerned citizens who sincerely want to improve education, not just impose different values than the status quo, need to recognize that the cards are stacked against them, no matter what reforms they propose for the public schools. The only way their courses and methods of instruction will ever be implemented for longer than one school board election is outside the public schools.
Advocates of intelligent design, creationism, millennialism, zoroastrianism and all other fringe philosophies needn't expend their money and effort trying to change public schools, because it isn't going to happen.
Instead, they -- and others of like mind -- should set up their own private schools, thumbing their noses at the education bureaucrats who sink further into irrelevance with each passing year.
A largely meaningless distinction. I am presented with an unknown substance. In order to determine what it is, I subject it to a number of chemical assays and observe the results. Are my observations of the results evidence, or not?
Instead, they -- and others of like mind -- should set up their own private schools, thumbing their noses at the education bureaucrats who sink further into irrelevance with each passing year.
I agree. And though it would probably never happen, it should be possible for parents to get teachers fired and teachers should be able to hold students back from graduating to the next grade if they don't pass, regardless of what parents say.
IMHO, this paradoxical requirement cannot happen in publicly funded grade and high school monopolies.
I'm pretty sure it will hurt republicans with the undecideds in the middle -- and they're the ones who decide most elections. Why do I think the undecideds will turn away from republicans? Because they're people who don't think about politics most of the time. That's why they're undecided. But they want to think of themselves as intelligent people. Like Hollywood actors, who desperately want to be thought of as more than just pretty meat. So they mindlessly go with what they imagine to the "intelligent" party. It's a style thing.
The dems, somehow, have convinced the undecideds that they're the intellectual party. When the MSM gets finished with this creationism/ID business, the republicans will be toast with the undecideds. Which means we won't be winning any more national elections.
Your inability to imagine is not a hinderence to science. Take a look at what others can imagine.
You are politically clueless. You take your phobias and project them into politics pretending to know what you are talking about. ID/creationism has never appeared on any issue list anywhere when people are asked why they voted as they did.
In short you're a political charlatan.
Regards,
John
I'm pretty sure it will hurt republicans with the undecideds in the middle -- and they're the ones who decide most elections. Why do I think the undecideds will turn away from republicans? Because they're people who don't think about politics most of the time. That's why they're undecided. But they want to think of themselves as intelligent people. Like Hollywood actors, who desperately want to be thought of as more than just pretty meat. So they mindlessly go with what they imagine to the "intelligent" party. It's a style thing.
I'm glad you said it. I've been searching for the words for awhile.
I have just one point to add. I think there are intelligent independents who would never vote Democrat who might choose not to vote at all because of the Republicans taking this position.
How do you explain the recent Dover School board election?
For some strange reason, the shill for George Stepinitoplis, fancies himself the authority of all things conservative. He might as well admit he has struck out.
How do you explain the preponderance of technophiles here at FR suppporting federal intervention in local school board issues when the voters have just demonstrated that they don't need the statists to issue edicts from Mount Washington DC's judiciary?
Agreed. But independents aren't quite the same as undecideds. Very often, an independent has firm opinions about the issues. The undecideds never do, and they vote emotionally, making their decision at the last possible moment. They'll do whatever makes them feel good about themselves. And if the MSM keeps telling them the republicans are idiots, they'll vote dem.
A slim plurality of voters turned against several school board members portrayed as charlatans by a never ending supply of agitprop by a media with a bone to pick with religion. That's life in federalist America.
It appears to me that the 'local' voters, including many parents I assume, voted to throw out, IIRC, eight school board members who supported the 'ID' policy. And a "a slim plurality of voters", is what very often what decides elections, as well as congressional votes.
See my post #197.
You have evidence of your assertions, I'd be happy to look at it. As it stands no however, I don't think you have anything except high hopes that conservatives suufer so your particular agenda advances. But you could prove me wrong.
I saw you post, it was good for a laugh. But only once.
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