Double standard: Judge Jones and the Texas board of education
There are now efforts in the Texas state legislature to do the following:
(1) -- remove the Texas board of education's powers to approve textbooks and state standards for education, and give those powers to appointed officials, e.g., the Texas Commissioner of Education.
(2) -- deny Don McLeroy the state senate's confirmation of his current position of board chairman.
The best source of information on these efforts is the blog of the Texas Freedom Network. I have posted a lot of comments on that blog.
The Darwinists just wanted the Texas board of education to rubber stamp the standards-drafting committees' proposed new state science standards without making any changes. If Judge John E. Jones III, who has no scientific background (he has a bachelor's degree in political science and a law degree), could rule on the scientific merits of intelligent design after hearing testimony from experts, then why can’t the Texas BOE — which has some members with science degrees and/or science teaching experience — also make decisions about questions requiring scientific knowledge? And the Darwinists don't even consider the Texas board of education qualified to make decisions on issues that do not require any expertise, e.g., the issue of whether to retain the "strengths and weaknesses" language in the state science standards.
(1) -- remove the Texas board of education's powers to approve textbooks and state standards for education, and give those powers to appointed officials, e.g., the Texas Commissioner of Education.
(2) -- deny Don McLeroy the state senate's confirmation of his current position of board chairman.
The best source of information on these efforts is the blog of the Texas Freedom Network. I have posted a lot of comments on that blog.
The Darwinists just wanted the Texas board of education to rubber stamp the standards-drafting committees' proposed new state science standards without making any changes. If Judge John E. Jones III, who has no scientific background (he has a bachelor's degree in political science and a law degree), could rule on the scientific merits of intelligent design after hearing testimony from experts, then why can’t the Texas BOE — which has some members with science degrees and/or science teaching experience — also make decisions about questions requiring scientific knowledge? And the Darwinists don't even consider the Texas board of education qualified to make decisions on issues that do not require any expertise, e.g., the issue of whether to retain the "strengths and weaknesses" language in the state science standards.
Labels: Texas controversy (new #2)
posted by Larry Fafarman | 4/23/2009 02:57:00 PM
4 Comments:
A lot of this depends upon politics. It seems that the Republican margin in the Texas House of Representatives was cut from 79-71 to only 76-74 in the 2008 election. But Republicans still enjoy a sizable 19-12 majority in the Texas Senate, down only slightly from 20-11.
Democrats in general are much more favorable to the archaic Darwin-is-the-sacred-faith line than are Republicans, although there are a significant number of Republican Darwin-addicts. Texas also has a Republican governor.
So it would probably be hard for the old-fashioned Darwin-liners to prevail in the legislature, given the substantial support among Republicans for academic freedom and for questioning obsolete and easy-to-question Darwinist doctrines in the public schools.
It's too bad so many Democratic politicians are still cluelessly wedded to ancient Darwinist dogma, a situation which is especially obvious here in San Francisco. But any political party or other group which remains entranced by Darwinism seems to be likely to suffer in the long run, as Darwinism continues to decline and to disintegrate. Liberal Democrats aren't very liberal at all when they remain stupidly bound to Darwinist pseudoscience.
Jim Sherwood said,
>>>>>>So it would probably be hard for the old-fashioned Darwin-liners to prevail in the legislature <<<<<<
Chairman McLeroy needs at least two-thirds of the state senate, or 21 votes, for confirmation, so even if he gets every one of the 19 Republican senators' votes, he would need at least two votes from the 12 Democrats.
McLeroy is very probably in trouble if he needs a two-thirds majority for confirmation. I wasn't aware of that.
That's too bad. I don't agree with his creationist views; but he deserves great credit for standing up for freedom and for the rights of the people, against arbitrary and autocratic "experts."
At least it's likely that the Darwin-dogma crowd will have trouble in their efforts to curtail the BOE's powers.
McLeroy was appointed back in 2007 for this job. And no doubt if there was a vote, he would have been under political heat from militant Darwinists back then as he is now.
It's not only what you do in a position of authority (how much bowing down to special interests) but also who you are and how strong your convictions are in public.
Yes, McLeroy confirmation is in trouble, but there is still hope he gets back in. There is no doubt, Dems are threatening other Dems not to defect otherwise they will face consequences from their own party and special interest groups who might not support them for re-election.
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