In case you were wondering...

In case you were wondering who is trying to influence Allegheny County Council on the "In God We Trust" matter, here are letters from Liberty Counsel and the Freedom From Religion Foundation that made their way to that body. Personally, I believe that most politicians already have their mind made up one way or another on this issue and use letters like this to cover their asses. In fact, these letters were sent to a constituent--and reader of this blog--who emailed and called his/her counselor today. That counselor took the Liberty Counsel position.

However, while counselors may have their own beliefs on this topic, one thing that sways them more than any lobbying group (well, when there's no $ involved anyway) is voters inundating them with calls and email. So keep it up!

A Message To My Good Friends At The FFRF.

Remember this blogpost?

I wrote about a guy named Joe Sohmer who, despite being entrusted by the good people of Altoona to teach their teenagers science, nevertheless undermines the validity of radiocarbon dating and, of course, evolution in his science classes whole "hold(ing) the Bible as the source of truth."

He's quoted:

"I'm entitled to my beliefs as much as the evolutionist is."

On the one hand, this is completely true.  He is entitled to his beliefs as much as anyone else is.  On the other, that does not, however, make them to be anywhere near true.

Well, the article that triggered my blog post also seems to have piqued the interest of our good friends at the Freedom From Religion Foundation.

Unfortunately, while their overall point (that the teaching of creationism as science is unconstitutional) is completely correct, what they're using to frame their argument is simply a mess - so much that it could undermine their overall (and, let me reiterate, correct) point.

Take a look at the start of the FFRF's press release:

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is responding to an alarming trend in Pennsylvania's science education, by sending a memo to every Pennsylvania public school district superintendent (nearly 500 of them) on July 25.

The memo follows the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette's investigative journalism, recently uncovering that 20% of the state's public high school teachers teach creationism in their science classrooms.

And from the memo:

A recent story in the Pittsburgh-Post Gazette (sic) surveyed 106 science teachers regarding the teaching of evolution in Pennsylvania public schools. This article revealed shocking statistics about the state of science education in public schools. A third of the science teachers surveyed identified themselves as believers in creationism or intelligent design. Of that number, teachers who identify themselves as creationists -- nearly 20% of those surveyed-- "spend at least an hour of classroom time on creationism in a way suggesting it to be a valid scientific alternative" to evolution.

I gotta point out the BIG errors in that paragraph.  I hate to, but I just gotta.  In order to do that, I have to start at the P-G (and please note, FFRF, where the dash goes) article.  Looks like the FFRF's memo writers mixed two separate bits of information.  The first is from the P-G questionaire:

The Post-Gazette questionnaire this spring drew 106 responses from science teachers. It asked them to choose one or more answers to a question of what they believe in: evolution, creationism, intelligent design or not sure/other.

Ninety percent chose evolution; 19 percent said they believe in creationism, not defined in the questionnaire; 13 percent said they believe in intelligent design; and another 5 percent answered "not sure/other." Teachers were allowed to list more than one option, so the numbers don't total 100 percent.

But the quotation is from another survey altogether:

The Penn State survey said the teachers identifying themselves as creationists spend at least an hour of classroom time on creationism in a way suggesting it to be a valid scientific alternative. "Between 17 and 21 percent [of teachers in the survey] introduce creationism into the classroom," he said.

And the Penn State survey wasn't a Pennsylvania survey at all:

Mr. Berkman and Eric Plutzer, a Penn State professor of political science and sociology, based their book on a national survey of more than 900 science teachers, which found 13 percent advocating that Earth was 10,000 years old or younger, as opposed to Earth's scientifically determined age of 4.54 billion years. [Emphasis added.]

The "20%" comes from the P-G survey while the quotation comes from the Penn State survey.  And the two data points refer to two separate ideas.  The P-G was asking about the teachers' beliefs while the Penn State survey is about what the teachers do.  Two separate issues.  Two separate surveys.  Apples, oranges.

Now it's quite possible that the reality of the situation is in complete agreement with what the FFRF says it is - but it's just not possible to establish that from what they present as facts.  And that's the mess.

And then there's this part from the FFRF's memo:

A third of the science teachers surveyed identified themselves as believers in creationism or intelligent design.

This isn't clearly true either (it might be BUT it might not be, and that's the point). Take a look at how the P-G describes their survey:

The Post-Gazette questionnaire this spring drew 106 responses from science teachers. It asked them to choose one or more answers to a question of what they believe in: evolution, creationism, intelligent design or not sure/other.

Ninety percent chose evolution; 19 percent said they believe in creationism, not defined in the questionnaire; 13 percent said they believe in intelligent design; and another 5 percent answered "not sure/other." Teachers were allowed to list more than one option, so the numbers don't total 100 percent. [Emphasis added.]

But note that since teachers could choose more than one option, you only get "a third" (or something very close to it) if none of the 13% who believe in intelligent design also designated themselves as creationists.  If they completely overlap, then the number's just 19% and the real number could be anywhere in between.

And need I point out that these look like they were surveys and not scientific polls?  How many surveys were sent out?  Relying on self-selected questionnaire returns to establish solid data is, well, questionable.  At best.

FFRF: I am one of your biggest fans.  I confidently and optimistically expect success in your lawsuits calling for the removal of the unconstitutional Ten Commandment monuments from two Pittsburgh area public schools.  But if you're going to issue press releases and memos to School Superintendents you have to do better than this.  You have to write something clearer than this.

You want respect from a School Superintendent?  Get all your facts straight, present your entire position clearly and don't don't DON'T misspell the name of one of your sources (as I alluded to above, it's the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, not the Pittsburgh-Post Gazette).

Other than that, you're completely correct - teaching creationism (or Intelligent Design) as science in a public school is unconstitutional.  Just do your homework better next time.

Kentucky Gets It Right

While perusing World Net Daily (aka birther-central) this morning, I saw this.  The headline reads:

ATHEISTS WIN TEN COMMANDMENTS BATTLE

WND writer Drew Zahn writes:

A Kentucky school district is yanking down multiple displays of the Ten Commandments after an atheist organization sent the county a letter warning the plaques were unconstitutional.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation, or FFRF, a Wisconsin-based organization of “freethinkers” – explained on the group’s website as atheists, agnostics and skeptics devoted to spreading nontheism – told Kentucky’s Breathitt County School District it had received complaints about the displays.

Earlier this week, the district agreed to take down the displays, which had reportedly hung on area high school, middle school and several elementary schools’ walls for years.

Here's the letter the FFRF sent to the Breathitt County School District.

WND embeds this coverage of the story from WYMT-TV and in that story there's a telling quotation from a local resident who disagrees with the School Board's decision to take down the Commandments.  Mary Lou Campbell says:

Makes me angry. Because my grandchildren, I want them to have the Christian upbringing.

And so she wants the Ten Commandments to remain hanging in the public schools.

To its credit, the Kentucky Board of Education released this statement:

The display of religious materials, such as a painting of a religious figure or a copy of the Ten Commandments, in a public school violates the U.S. Constitution's prohibition on the establishment or endorsement of religion by a public agency. A school or district that displays copies of the Ten Commandments without the inclusion of other historical documents and not as part of a historical/comparative display is in violation of the U.S. Constitution. See the U.S. Supreme Court's holding on this issue in Stone v. Graham, 449 U.S. 39, 101 S.Ct. 192 (1980). The Kentucky Department of Education's focus in Breathitt County is on student achievement and college and career readiness and using its resources to support those efforts.

The 2012 Kentucky School Laws says that:

No preference shall ever be given by law to any religious sect, society or denomination; nor to any particular creed, mode of worship or system of ecclesiastical polity; nor shall any person be compelled to attend any place of worship, to contribute to the erection or maintenance of any such place, or to the salary or support of any minister of religion; nor shall any man be compelled to send his child to any school to which he may be conscientiously opposed; and the civil rights, privileges or capacities of no person shall be taken away, or in anywise diminished or enlarged, on account of his belief or disbelief of any religious tenet, dogma or teaching. No human authority shall, in any case whatever, control or interfere with the rights of conscience.

And in discussing the unconstitutionality of displaying the Ten Commandments on school property, it reads:

Since the pre-eminent purpose for posting the Ten Commandments on schoolroom walls is plainly religious in nature, this section has no secular legislative purpose and is therefore unconstitutional as violative of the establishment clause of the First Amendment of the United States Constitution; it does not matter that the posted copies are financed by voluntary private contributions, for the mere posting of the copies under the auspices of the Legislature provides the official support of the state government that the establishment clause prohibits.

Each is correct.  And as a result the unconstitutional displays have been removed - all within a couple of weeks  It's been about 8 months since the FFRF sent letters to two local school districts about theirequally unconstitutional Ten Commandment monuments.  As of right now, those two monuments have yet to be removed.

If Kentucky can get it so right so quickly, why can't New Kensington or Connellsville?