I tell ya, there's nothing like dissention in the opponents' ranks.

More trouble for Republicans.

The Right really has no one. Tancredo is looking better and better every day! But he and Brownback, they're going nowhere.

Both Romney and Rudy are effectively the "moderates," as both are further distancing themselves from the Right. They can't peel off any moderate Dems, because of the war.

Thompson has already been declared non-Reagan-like. So he's out.

McCain no one really likes. But, by lack of consensus anywhere else, he just might be able to wrap this up.

I am now going to hold my breath until the Press starts writing a "Republicans In Disarray" narrative. Ready? Go!

Our obligation is to define the liberty of all, not to mandate our own moral code. -- SCOTUS that was...

See? We're fair-minded people. When the other guy has a point, we acknowledge it. When he doesn't weasel, we pat him on the back. Kind of people we are, right?

Woah. A statement that could have come from my (progressive, Democratic, ordained minister) mother. Authentically startling.

One can only assume that he's about to be denounced by the usual suspects for his failure to properly adhere to Christianist know-nothingism.

I must say this is pretty surprising, and with a very un-Mitt like level of candor. This is a clear endorsement of theistic macroevolution (species evolving from other species), which is the evil of evils for the creationist right.

That's essentially the Catholic doctrinal view of evolution: evolution is pretty much right on, though God started it and gives it a little nudge from time to time. Quite frankly, I don't know why that view is so objectionable to many conservative Christians.

At least Romney demonstrates that it IS possible to be intelligent and religious at the same time!

How sad is it that we're congratulating a former governor and presidential candidate for having the cajones to admit to his belief in one of the basic tenets of modern biology?

I say, let's encourage the Religious Right to find and run their own candidate!

Let's keep exposing those who do not walk in lock-step with the Fundies!

Splitting the GOP is the best possible outcome for '08.

At the very least, the Fundies won't show up to vote for these "heathens"!!!

PEACE

Check it out -- Rudy's gone off the deep end today, too!

At an appearance at Houston Baptist University, Mr. Giuliani said that he favors abortion rights, certain restrictions on gun ownership and gay rights — he is for civil unions, he said, although not for marriage between people of the same sex.

I think the Catholic view is a little more nuanced than that, but regardless, it's good that they don't get worked up about it.

I'm sure Romney polled on evolution and found that even within the far right, it's not their biggest issue. You have to be pretty far out there to really care about it. It's never going to be as much of a litmus test issue as abortion.

It's time for a new sig: 

"Thank God George Bush is our president." -Rudy Giuliani

Holy Scripture and Nature are both emanations from the Divine word; the former dictated by the Holy Spirit, the latter, the Executrix of God's commands. Natural effects which we experience by our senses, or which we infer from adequate demonstration, are not to be revoked because of certain passages of Scripture, which may be turned and twisted into a thousand different meanings.

Galileo

While comparative religion is a perfectly legitimate subject, and indeed origins of life is a topic suitable for it, I would be amazed if it was practical to have comparative religion in more than a handful of K-12 public schools. To do so would not be just to bring in the evangelicals, but self-appointed representatives from almost every religious group.

For example, while I honestly forget if it was junior or senior high, Jewish parents successfully pressured my school system to ban discussion of The Merchant of Venice as anti-semitic. Catholic parents weighed in on contraception and abortion in our new-at-the-time "hygiene" classes, which had a few topics that might be called sex education.

Indeed, I'm sure someone could find material that would bring out the Episcopalians for suggesting that one might use an improper fork, and, some extreme transgression could bring out Unitarian Jihad.

--
[signed] Brother Cattle Prod of Enlightenment

It is important to understand that "intelligent design" isn't about either, it is a deliberate misnomer designed to disguise its creationist nature. The actual concept of ID is that the dna used by living cells is so complex that it cannot have evolved randomly, and thus it can only have been provided by a higher power via supernatural means WHICH CANNOT BE UNDERSTOOD BY SCIENCE! Yet they have the gall to call it "scientific". yeesh.

For those who read dr. dawkins recent book "The God Delusion" he makes the point that all the known facts of evolution could be explained by a nose cone full of bacteria and viruses. the reason scientists don't advocate that explanation is that we a) haven't found said nose cone b) we would have to explain how the life forms that provided the nose cone evolved, and c) it is still quite possible that we'll complete our understanding of evolution inside a closed system of our biosphere. But even is we do have to allow some outside elements (there is a perfectly scientific alternate evolutionary concept called Panspermia which was the basis for 2001 A Space Odyssey that postulates some bacteria and viruses came to earth on meterorites from other worlds; scientists plan to test for this at the lunar base) the result won't be creationism/ID but simply a revision of evolutionary science.

Thanks for that name! I'd heard of his work, but never got the chance to study it, now I can! here's the wiki link .

Is the shiny hair a result of evolution?

One more reason for evangelicals to mistrust Mormonism.
I know some evangelicals who have rejected all talk of evolution. The earth is 6000 years old. Gaps in the fossil record is proof. Fossils are put there by God to fool us. Jesus is coming soon, so we don't need to conserve our natural reosurces. Man is not the most destructive species to the planet. There is no possibility that evolution is part of God's plan. There is no talking to them about this. They may listen politely but their minds are made up. If it's not in the BIble, it's not true. Another common theme with creationists is that belief in the theory of evolution is equivalent to a religion. The difference I see between science and religion is that religion claims to have all of the answers and science is always looking for more answers and is willing to admit mistakes when they are found.
We try to find other things to talk about to keep the conversation pleasant. Personally, I think they are nuts and they think I'm going to Hell for not believing that there is nothing new to be learned.

Um, I'm not really that up on Mormon theology, but...

Doesn't Mormonism posit that God was once a physical human being?

If so, how could He have directed the evolution of humanity? The evolution of broccoli and ferrets, I can understand, but how does a human being "use[d] the process of evolution to create the human body"?

I'd guess this would all be answered in Mormon Sunday school, but if so, it's not yet a theory that's part of the public conversation in the way that evolution, intelligent design and literal seven-day Biblical creation are.

Yeah, well, mormons believe a whole bunch of fucked up shit.

Actually--speaking as an ex-Mormon who knows the church's doctrines--the LDS church has studiously avoided having a standard position on evolution. Its leaders have officially neither endorsed nor decried it--and indeed never talk about it at all. The Mormon church tries to walk a tightrope act between asserting the literal truth of the Bible and embracing (or pretending to embrace) modern science and knowledge. Taking a definite stance on evolution one way or the other would throw a monkey wrench in this strategy, so the church leaders do their best to just ignore it and, on the rare occasion when they may be forced into giving an answer about it, just hand-wave it aside by saying that there are aspects of God's plan we don't understand.

(That being said, though, a sizeable proportion of Mormons (though I'm not sure it's an actual majority) do actively disbelieve in evolution.)