Senate set to bust creation backer as board of ed leader

Perhaps they should make Expelled II and focus on the removal of government officials from their positions. This is upsetting to me he would be labeled an extremist and wacko. And please keep in mind I do not believe the earth is only 6,000 years old (I am an Old Earth Creationist) and I do believe aspects of evolution have a part to play so this is not me defending my own views- this is me defending him from unfair labels.

Second, segments of the article confuse me, mainly this:

At a confirmation hearing last month, McLeroy said he had no regrets about his leadership and emphasized he has not pushed his religious viewpoints into public education policies.

McLeroy recently fought for new science curriculum standards that require students to analyze and evaluate various scientific theories.

“There’s nothing religious about those standards,” he told senators. “Our children will critically examine the scientific explanations for cells or the origin of life. I think that by being honest with our kids, we will get really good scientists.”

Compared to:

Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, D-El Paso, has been a strong critic of McLeroy.

“He has used his position to push extreme beliefs on 4.7 million school children. He has rejected solid science in favor of ideology,” Shapleigh said. “He has ignored input from experts on what works best for reading.”

I'm interested in knowing the specifics of his actions and exactly what all he attempted to do that they had issues with. The article was vague and did not mention how his views interfered with his position.

But most of all, I'm concerned with him being labeled an extremist. I personally don't understand how someone could believe the earth is only 6,000 years old but at the same time, I would not label them extremists for it. That seems to be a popular catch phrase these days. I understand Turkey is going through something similar in regards to the evolution vs. creation controversy and the Turkish Muslims who advocate creationism are also receiving such labels over there.

If he is pressing his personal views into his job I can understand the issue but I would like more information on his activities. I would also like to understand what makes him worthy of the label 'extremist.'

reply to post by xxpigxx


Name a single morphological trait that is shared by all apes that is not also shared by humans. Name a single morphological trait that is shared by all apes and humans, which is not also shared by all monkeys.

Tails, by the way, don't count - because humans possess the coccyx, and we know it's a vestigial tail because it's not only visibly present in the human embryo, but some children are occasionally born with fully formed tails.

Even if you don't believe in Evolution - humans are still mammals, still primates, still apes, and still monkeys. We know this through phylogeny/taxonomy as well as by tracing retro-viral markers... among other lines of evidence. Diagnostically, physically, you are an ape, and you are a monkey. Deal with it.

[edit on 26-5-2009 by Lasheic]

reply to post by AshleyD


Don McLeroy has not been shy with his personal religious beliefs regarding Evolution and his support for Intelligent Design. In fact, here's a transcript from a presentation he made in 2005 to a church regarding this very topic:

Don McLeroy on Intelligent Design and Evolution

and for those of you who would like to listen to the actual audio of this transcript, here you go:

McLeroy audio file

A few key snippets straight from the mouth of McLeroy:

Now I would like to talk a little bit about the big tent. Why is intelligent design the big tent? It’s because we’re all lined up against the fact that naturalism, that nature is all there is. Whether you’re a progressive creationist, recent creationist, young earth, old earth, it’s all in the tent of intelligent design. And intelligent design here at Grace Bible Church actually is a smaller, uh, tent than you would have in the intelligent design movement as a whole. Because we are all Biblical literalists, we all believe the Bible to be inerrant, and it’s good to remember, though, that the entire intelligent design movement as a whole is a bigger tent. So because it’s a bigger tent, just don’t waste our time arguing with each other about some of the, all of the side issues. And that’s one thing that I really enjoyed about our group is that we’ve put that all in the big tent, we’re all working together.

I’d like to make one final observation just from my experience and the Texas State Board of Education. Is, we weren’t about to convince any scientists, but we couldn’t convince fellow board members that these books should have evidence. And the more I look back on it, I believe if we would have challenged the naturalistic assumptions that nature is all there is with our fellow board members and challenged these people that were talking about it a little bit that brought up testimony, possibly we would have gotten a few more votes because a lot of these dear friends of mine on the State Board of Education are good, strong Christians that are active in Young Life and other activities.

Emphasis mine. The fact remains that McLeroy has blatantly abused his position on the Texas Board of Education by adamantly undermining the curriculum of science classes specifically regarding the teaching of evolution. He can try to justify his stance any way he desires, but that doesn't erase his not-so-hidden-agenda to have his religious views guide his actions on the board.

[edit on 5/26/2009 by maria_stardust]