From MSNBC.com:

Turned off science
Students may be the real victims of the evolution wars
By Sandra Lilley
News planning editor
NBC News
Updated: 1:49 p.m. ET June 3, 2005

The battle over teaching evolution is raging in communities across the country, but the headlines rarely focus on the “quiet” impact of this controversy.

Science is becoming a political “hot potato” for some students - transforming what should be a dynamic, fascinating topic into a total turn-off. And some students are choosing silence over losing a prom date.

“Children are very much worried about their place in the world. Some students only ask me about evolution privately, after class,” said Wes McCoy, PhD, who teaches Genetics, Biology and Astronomy at North Cobb High School in Kennessaw, Ga.

McCoy, who has won the Georgia “Outstanding Biology Teacher” award, is active in his Presbyterian church and also serves on the National Executive Board of the Presbyterian Association on Science, Technology and the Christian faith, is saddened by what he has seen in his classroom.

“Students face consequences if they choose to accept evolution in a family or a church or a community that patently rejects evolution … It might affect whether you get a date to the prom, or whether you get that summer job or not,” McCoy said. “You may even anger close family members. Conversations about evolution can make family reunions very tense.”

I could write volumes about the intolerance exhibited all around, by those both religious and anti-religious.

It would be unconvincing to those who are extremist, those who choose to call moderates “mushy” and “not holding deep beliefs”.

Moderates DO have true, deeply held beliefs, however they do not feel the need to declare a holy war upon any who dissent, and “holy war” in this context includes the hyperbole of the anti-religious-left just as much as the dogma of the religious-right, for both sides use similarly emotionally charged, destructive rhetoric.

I will leave it at this:

We have sown the seeds of our own destruction.

The old saw should be changed to: “Go East young man, to Asia.”

I leave it to you to form your own conclusions, to do your own math.

The inexorable march will prove whose solution is correct; however history has shown what results from a turn to dogmatism of any type, religious or secular.

The thesis posited here, “Liberalism is not a death wish“, highlights exactly the issues we should be discussing, and the solutions we should be debating.

I disagree with the thrust of the paper extensively quoted, because upon first reading it seems to put far too much trust in the benevolence of government.

That is the irony today, conservatives in the United States, who once mistrusted government to an almost pathological extent, now advocate laws, restrictions, and regulations that place an immense amount of responsibility upon government that if abused, which is a probability rather than a possibility in light of past behaviors shown by governments throughout history in a host of infamous egregious acts, could create the most repressive system yet known in the tragic narrative of civilization.

“Conservatism” in the United States in this respect is coming to resemble the far-right brand of “conservatism” in Europe, which would be much to the horror of those US conservatives if they but realized it.

I need to consider further the full implications before writing more on this topic, but I still strongly believe what Benjamin Franklin said two centuries ago holds true even today:

They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.

The consequences of the McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance Law are coming home to roost, notably in potential Federal Election Commission regulations on weblogs that write in support of candidates.

Our Constitution is founded upon the principle that “all men are created equal” and that any political speech should not be regulated or restricted by the government.

It is undeniable, however, that those with a great deal of money to call upon have a distorting influence upon both elections and in setting the agenda not only for discussion in the media, but in the end what is discussed and voted upon in Congress.

The fundamental dilemma: How do we protect the right of freedom of speech while avoiding a dictatorship of wealth?

In other words, how do we not suffer the fate described in a different context in the last lines of the George Orwell book Animal Farm:

I can only hope we find answers that do us credit, for the solutions we impose will affect our nation, and our heirs, for good or for ill, for a long time.

The direct use of force is such a poor solution to any problem, it is generally employed only by small children and large nations.
   -David Friedman

Under democracy one party always devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party is unfit to rule - and both commonly succeed, and are right.
   -H. L. Mencken