A Virginia Liberal

“We believe objectivity will lead not only to good origins science, but also to constitutional neutrality in this subjective, historical science that unavoidably impacts religion. We promote the scientific evidence of intelligent design because proper consideration of that evidence is necessary to achieve not only scientific objectivity but also constitutional neutrality.” Intelligentdesignnetwork.org
There is a lot of double-talk here, but some things are still gotten across. It’s safe to say that the things the site puts in boldface are the things it really wants to get across. Looking at what they really want to get across, we get objectivity, scientific evidence, objectivity, and neutrality. More than anything else, this sends the message that they value fairness and equality. Though this is also belied in many places on the site, the url itself pretty well debunks that-www.intelligentdesignnetwork.org. Further to the contrary, the fact that no facet of the site or any link on the site makes any attempt to educate about Evolution, other than what’s wrong with it.
The last thing emphasized above was ‘scientific evidence’. Intelligent Design itself, interestingly, has no evidence. There is NO evidence supporting Intelligent Design-there is rhetoric, and there are problems with evolution, but there is no evidence. Let’s reiterate-evidence? None.

This site, though obviously not as objective as it claims on the top of the first page, is not the official site for Intelligent Design-though no other site is, either. Intelligent Design either has theorists who are uneducated in the ways of the internet, or is deliberately making sure no one site can claim centrality. Under this concept, if any site makes a claim, or many claims, that are disproved, they cannot be called claims of the Intelligent Design general community and thus no site can be a liability.
The most relevant response from Google for ‘Intelligent Design’ was www.intelligentdesignnetwork.com. ‘Intelligent Design official’s first result on the first page was a ‘blog’ which talked about students in Dover angry about Intelligent Design and the third ‘hit’ was Playstation magazine. Other searches brought similar results.
For all intents and purposes, intelligentdesignnetwork.org is Intelligent Design’s main site. It outlines the movement’s ideas and serves as a central site-it links to the Kansas science standard, proposed further revisions to Kansas and other science standards, and a place to give one’s opinion on Kansas science standards, real and proposed. So far as I can find, no other site links there-meaning everyone browsing a site biased towards Intelligent Design is asked to give feedback to those who actually make the education decisions. And only people browsing that site. The only other place to vote on this topic is at the Kansas science standard’s website itself-which could be browsed by people on either side of the debate.
To recap what can be learned from Intelligent Design on the internet; Intelligent Design claims objectivity and neutrality but does not try to maintain this illusion. Intelligent Design makes it difficult to be certain of what its claims are without purchasing a copy of one of their books. Finally, it appears to try to tip the scales in a voting process to determine what is taught to over a hundred million children. Intelligent Design’s argument is not, in summary, best served by their online representation.

In my last post, I talked about how Bush cut a lot of programs that benefited the poor and only the poor in order to pay for his tax cut. But do you know what else he cut?
Social Security. I don’t think Bush is smart enough to plan things more than six months or so ahead. (See the Iraq War.) But if he was he couldn’t have done this better.
Step 1: Give tax cuts to the rich, the only people in my party who weren’t just lied to. Fund this by cutting programs that keep the poor and the elderly alive. Step 2: Make a problem that will, at worst, require SS to be cut by 1/4 out to be a huge problem via the process of lying, like in step 1. Propose obviously stupid plan that has nothing to do with so-called problem everyone is now worried about and is even critisized by Alan Greenspan. Important part-Plan favors wealthy and wouldn’t do anyone else any good. Lie and lie and lie to cover up anything that happens.
Bush is one lucky bastard. How this plan could have any support at all among non-stupid people?
Seriously. The program is ‘flat broke’ bushspeak for ‘decades from now a small dip will occur’ because he cut it so heavily. Does Bush really think he can influence any part of the American economy of 2075? It’s out of your control, asshole.