Not long ago, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal received praise for a speech after the Republican defeat warning fellow Republicans that, if they want to win again, “We’ve got to stop being the stupid party.” He seems to have forgotten that particular reform in comments this week supporting the teaching of both creationism and intelligent design in public schools as part of teaching “the best science.”
Jindal has joined other GOP leaders in treating creationism as a science. He insisted: “Bottom line, at the end of the day, we want our kids to be exposed to the best facts. Let’s teach them about the big bang theory, let’s teach them about evolution – I’ve got no problem if a school board, a local school board, says we want to teach our kids about creationism, that people, some people, have these beliefs as well, let’s teach them about ‘intelligent design.’”
He asked “What are we scared of?” Well, Governor, we are afraid that in the midst of widespread failing schools and dropping science scores, we will be now teaching religion as science.
Source: Salon
Karen,
“I’d want to know more before making a judgement on Jindal. Kids are taught things in school that are “unscientific” all the time.”
What more do you need to know? Are you in favor of creationism/intelligent design being taught in science classes in public schools in Louisiana? What are the “unscientific” things that are taught in public schools “all the time?”
Loch Ness Monster seen as real dinosaur in biology books taught in Louisiana school
The startling claim about Nessie’s authenticity is reportedly made to bolster creationism within the textbook. The Loch Ness Monster is described as a type of dinosaur, and if dinosaurs and man co-exist, then presumably there would be holes in the scientific argument for evolution.
By Erik Ortiz
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Tuesday, June 26, 2012
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/loch-ness-monster-real-dinosaur-biology-books-taught-louisiana-school-article-1.1102340
Excerpt:
The Scottish legend of the Loch Ness Monster is suggested as truth in a biology book that a private Christian school in Louisiana is using in its curriculum.
But that’s only part of the outrage from critics: Students who are eligible for taxpayer-funded vouchers will be allowed to attend Eternity Christian Academy in Westlake for the 2012-13 school year, according to reports.
The startling claim about Nessie’s authenticity is made to bolster creationism within the textbook, the Scotsman newspaper reported Monday. The Loch Ness Monster is described as a type of dinosaur, and if dinosaurs and man co-exist, then presumably there would be holes in the scientific argument for evolution.
The textbook, produced by Accelerated Christian Education, features a passage about the Loch Ness Monster in the Biology 1099 edition, Scotland’s The Herald reported.
“Are dinosaurs alive today? Scientists are becoming more convinced of their existence,” the textbook reads, according to the newspaper.
“Have you heard of the ‘Loch Ness Monster’ in Scotland? ‘Nessie’ for short has been recorded on sonar from a small submarine, described by eyewitnesses, and photographed by others. Nessie appears to be a plesiosaur.”
Bruce Wilson, who blogs about religion and right-wing politics, estimates 200,000 students who receive publicly-funded vouchers are learning from such a curriculum. Louisiana’s voucher program will allow poor and middle-class children to attend private schools.
“I don’t believe they should be publicly funded, I don’t believe the schools who use these texts should be publicly funded,” Wilson told The Herald.
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Here’s an excerpt from a post I wrote last December:
Louisiana School Voucher Program Ruled Unconstitutional in State Court
http://jonathanturley.org/2012/12/02/louisiana-school-voucher-program-ruled-unconstitutional-in-state-court/
Excerpt:
In August, I wrote a post about Louisiana’s new school voucher program (Stateside Louisiana: School Vouchers and the Privatization of Public Education) that would use tax dollars earmarked for public education to pay for students’ tuitions to private and religious schools. Last week, State District Judge Tim Kelley “declared the diversion of funds from the Minimum Foundation Program (MFP) — the formula under which per pupil public education funds are calculated – to private entities was unconstitutional.” The voucher program is funded by a block-grant program that “Judge Kelley ruled is restricted by the constitution to funding only public schools.”
“Nowhere was it mandated that funds from [the block-grant program]…be provided for an alternative education beyond what the Louisiana education system was set up for,” he [Judge Kelley] wrote. The state can legally fund vouchers, but the funding “must come from some other portion of the general budget,” Judge Kelley said.
The judge, however, did not issue an immediate injunction to stop the voucher program. “The 5,000 students currently receiving vouchers will be able to continue attending their private schools pending an appeal, state officials said.”
Governor Bobby Jindal, a champion of the voucher program, called the ruling “wrong-headed” and “a travesty for parents across Louisiana who want nothing more than for their children to have an equal opportunity at receiving a great education.” He promised to appeal the judge’s ruling. John White, the state superintendent of education, said, “We are optimistic this decision will be reversed.”
I’d want to know more before making a judgement on Jindal. Kids are taught things in school that are “unscientific” all the time. They’re probably taught a lot of opinion as though its fact, too.
I’m guessing everyone is missing the irony of this story. The writer is implying that Gov. Bobby Jindal (is stupid) while supporting the belief that a pineapple and a porcupine share a common ancestor. And that all life and living things are the result of some explosion x-billion years ago.
(revision)
BarkinDog wrote ” If Bobby Jindal thinks the EArth is Flat then he can go to the Louisiana Tech folks and get a handle on it.”
Another beautiful piece of irony you unwittingly stumbled upon. Realize that when the words of Isaiah were written, at that very time the greatest scientific minds of our wonderful earth thought the earth was carried on the back of a huge turtle. Another point in time when our “science” thought it knew the truth while the truth was written in the Bible. Those who thought the earth was flat had to ignore what is written in scriptures.
It appears you only added to a huge collection of strawman arguments that are observed in this blog.
I’m guessing everyone is missing the irony of this story. The writer is implying that Gov. Bobby Jindal while supporting the belief that a pineapple and a porcupine share a common ancestor. And that all life and living things are the result of some explosion x-billion years ago.
Well guess what. THAT belief, is ……. STUPID. No, things don’t spontaneously generate out of nothing (no mater how many x-billion years) and a pineapple is NOT related to a porcupine.
Creation is simply the observation that things are, well, CREATED. We have observable evidence that life isn’t the result of something poofing into existence. Life is extremely complex, even down to a “simple” cell. Evolutionism (the adult fairytale) has yet to demonstrate how incredible complexities could have “evolved” over x-billion years.
The age of the earth is another one we can chuckle at. The alleged age of the earth has increased exponentially only in the past few decades. I think of an analogy of the neighbor telling us how old his grandfather is. One day he says is grandfather is 76 years old. A year later in a conversation, he says his grandfather is 89 years old. Then he announces yet another year later his grandfather is 97 years old! By now you think your neighbor is either (A) a wingnut, or (B) has absolutely no idea how old his grandfather is. Yet this is what we are witnessing in regards to the age of the earth. It changes exponentially every decade, proving the prior age is wrong, and the credibility SHOULD be into question, but our “brilliant” minds that subscribe to the evolutionism fairytale just accept it without reason or evidence.
I often wonder at what time in history did modern science become so crippled. Crack open some textbooks that are used in the classroom today and you might read about fossils that date the strata layer. Later on in the same chapter, you will run across a sentence that implies the strata is used to date the fossils. (!) Now back at some point in history, that would be a glistening example of CIRCULAR LOGIC or CIRCULAR REASONING. But such is taught as “science”.
At the very least, students should be allowed to QUESTION evolutionism. They should be allowed to look at the mountains and mountains of evidence contrary to evolutionism. But evolutionism has become a politically protected sacred cow and no one should dare question it, because it’s “science”. Never mind it is simply a belief not supported by science, but it is called “science”. Well, I have a belief too. We are created and we have a Creator. But certain beliefs are forbidden in the classroom.
Sometimes it is amusing, but more often it is shameful, and embarrassing, that so many have accepted evolutionism as “science” and have allowed the cause of science to become crippled and stupid. Furthermore, these same people have the gall, the audacity, to call others who have recognized creation as something CREATED, stupid.
Of course he does….
“[Jindal] asked ‘What are we scared of?'”
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And why are we afraid to teach the “Stork Theory” of human birth, I ask?
Do you think there is any chance he was getting at teaching then as science rather than faith means they will be eliminated as viable hypotheses?
Nah, I guess not.
Oh, well.
his new book “how to suck up to your base” should be out by the summer.
RepubliCon Party. Con men at work. This funny looking Jindal schmuck is too much for even Louisiana.
But we must not overlook the notion that religion can be a science. Think of Christian Scientists. The Church of Scientology. Take Earth Science for example. Some folks believe things about the Earth that have scientific basis. Like the Earth is Flat. Or the Earth is Round. Scientists can disagree on such things. Scientists tell us that there are drugs that will cure cancer. People take the drugs. The same people pray every night that the cancer will be cured. Bingo. Tumor goes away. Now some will say that the drug was responsible and others will give credit to the Lord. Who is right? It is all a matter of science as to who is right. If prayer works five times out of six then there is a scientific basis for prayer. If Bobby Jindal thinks the EArth is Flat then he can go to the Louisiana Tech folks and get a handle on it. On the 8th Day God created Dog. There is scientific basis to support this. Darwin was just as much a fraud as Freud. There is no scientific basis for the notion of Darwinianism. People get dumber in Louisiana every day. We cant blame that on science. It is the Lord’s will. Us dogs want them to get dumber in Louisiana every day. The Will of Dog matters. Be kind to Bobby.
Religion is a science designed to fool the senses so people do stupid things. Religious people rationalize why wanting Jesus and lazerus being dead was a good thing like any military army or legal system enforcing the death penalty. Religious people make people think God hates gays, zoosexuals or naked people. Religious people keep that tradition. Those that do not are the Christians.
Teaching about what a person thinks is creation does not teach a person anything about the one who created everything that is. It should simply be accepted that God created whatever and leave it at that not trying to make a science out of it. That is just plain stupid.
I get it… ‘Jerome’… Jindal is confirming what the majority of people already think. The ‘Rethuglican’ party is the ‘stupid’ party……. a perfect party, for a stupid segment of the people!!!!!
But stupid doesn’t recognize stupid. Here’s another creation story that should be taught. I like it.
http://www.firstpeople.us/FP-Html-Legends/TheCreationStory-Iroquois.html
In the beginning, the world was not as we know it now. It was a water world inhabited only by animals and creatures of the air who could survive without land.
Up above, the Sky World was quite different. Human-type beings lived there with infinite types of plants and animals to enjoy.
In the Sky World, there was a Tree of Life that was very special to the people of the Sky World. They knew that it grew at the entrance to the world below and forbade anyone to tamper with the Tree. One woman who was soon to give birth was curious about the Tree and convinced her brother to uproot the Tree.
Beneath the Tree was a great hole. The woman peered from the edge into the hole and suddenly fell off the edge. As she was falling she grasped at the edge and clutched in her hand some of the earth from the Sky World. As she fell, the birds of the world below were disturbed and alerted to her distress. The birds responded and gathered a great many of their kind to break her fall and cradle her to the back of a great sea turtle. The creatures of the water believed that she needed land to live on, so they set about to collect some for her. They dove to the great depths of the world’s oceans to gather earth to make her a place to live. Many of the animals tried to gather the earth from the ocean floor, only the muskrat was successful. With only a small bit of earth brought onto turtle’s back from his small paws, Turtle Island began to grow.
The Sky Woman soon gave birth to a daughter on Turtle Island. The daughter grew fast. There were no man-beings on Turtle Island, but a being known as the West Wind married the daughter of Sky Woman.
Soon the daughter of Sky Woman gave birth to Twins. One was born the natural way, and he was called the Right-Handed Twin. The other was born in a way that caused the death of the mother. He was called the Left-Handed Twin. When their mother died, their grandmother, Sky Woman, placed the fistful of earth that she grasped from the edge of the Sky World, and placed it on her daughter’s grave. The earth carried special seeds from the Sky World that were nourished by the earth over her daughter. So from the body of her daughter came the Sacred Tobacco, Strawberry and Sweetgrass. We call these Kionhekwa. The Life Givers.
The Right and Left-Handed Twins were endowed with special creative powers. The Right-Handed Twin created gentle hills, beautiful smelling flowers, quiet brooks, butterflies and numerous creatures, plants and earth formations. His brother the Left-Handed Twin made snakes, thorns on rose bushes, thunder and lightning and other more disturbing attributes of today’s world. Together, they created man and his many attributes. The Right-Handed Twin believed in diplomacy and conflict resolution. The Left-Handed Twin believed in conflict as resolution. They were very different, but all that they created is an integral part of this Earth’s Creation.
Their Grandmother, Sky Woman, now came to the end of her life. When she died, the Twins fought over her body and pulled it apart, throwing her head into the sky. As part of the Sky World, there her head remained to shine upon the world as Grandmother Moon. The Twins could not live together without fighting. They agreed to dwell in different realms of the earth. The Right-Handed Twin continued to live in the daylight and the Left-Handed Twin became a dweller of the night. Both of them continue their special duties to their Mother the Earth.
Remember, Jindal had ironically stated he doesn’t want the Republican party to be the “stupid” party.
Reblogged this on Jesus Christ Party Politics.
You can’t fix stupid…
What part of civics class did he skip in grade school. Was it the part about the supreme court striking down unconstitutional laws?
Yep, Stupid is as stupid does. And that’s all I have to say about that.
He wouldn’t be so quick to say that if it was the Hindu creation myth that was going to be taught.
Stupid is as stupid does. What an idiot.