Jesse Alexander Helms, Jr.

           Tyrannosaurus Senataurus Rex

Time was invented by the Gods so that everything does not happen at once.

Mother Jones had this to say about how several states are handling the problems related to the Great Recession:

State governments are grappling with massive budget deficits, overburdened social programs, and of mountains of deferred spending. But never mind all that. For some conservative lawmakers, it's the perfect time to legislate the promotion of creationism in the classroom. In the first three months of 2011, nine creationism-related bills have been introduced in seven states—that's more than in any year in recent memory:

Those states include Texas, Florida, Kentucky, Tennessee, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Missouri. What a motley crew of legislators in charge of these states, indeed!

Now neo-rationalists of course would tell you that dinosaurs died out over 60 million years ago.  And these stubborn intellectual bastards are not giving our Christian scientists an even break.

I mean it is like these secular atheists just climb up into their ivory towers and pull up the rope ladder that got them there!!

TEXAS

Two weeks ago Bill Zedler, state rep for District 96 in Arlington, tossed into the legislative heap House Bill 2454, which would prohibit "discrimination by public institutions of higher education against faculty members and students based on their conduct of research relating to intelligent design."

MJ: I thought people doing work on the science of evolution typically don't weigh in on what caused the beginning of life.

BZ: I wonder why?

MJ: They say they don't know the answer.

BZ: If somebody does decide to weigh in, why should they be discriminated against?

MJ: Because they don't have the scientific evidence to substantiate their views.

BZ: The debate ought to be: "How did it happen?" But we're not gonna allow that one to be brought up! I don't think they oughta be thrown off campus if they come up with it http://blogs.dallasobserver.com/unfairpark/2011/03/state_rep_bill_zedlers_propose.php

NEW MEXICO

"Section 5. Students may be evaluated based upon their understanding of course materials, but no student in any public school or institution of higher education shall be penalized in any way because he or she may subscribe to a particular position on any views regarding biological or chemical evolution...."

Compare this to this sentence from the proposed NM bill: " C. Public school teachers may hold students accountable for knowing and understanding material taught in accordance with adopted standards and curricula about biological evolution or chemical evolution, but they may not penalize a student in any way because that student subscribes to a particular position on biological evolution or chemical evolution...."

http://www.nmsr.org/leg2009.htm

TENNESSEE

(a) The general assembly finds that: (1) An important purpose of science education is to inform students about scientific evidence and to help students develop critical thinking skills necessary to becoming intelligent, productive, and scientifically informed citizens; (2) The teaching of some scientific subjects, including, but not limited to, biological evolution, the chemical origins of life, global warming, and human cloning, can cause controversy; and (3) Some teachers may be unsure of the expectations concerning how they should present information on such subjects…

 (c) The state board of education, public elementary and secondary school governing authorities, directors of schools, school system administrators, and public elementary and secondary school principals and administrators shall endeavor to assist teachers to find effective ways to present the science curriculum as it addresses scientific controversies. Toward this end, teachers shall be permitted to help students understand, analyze, critique, and review in an objective manner the scientific strengths and scientific weaknesses of existing scientific theories covered in the course being taught.

(d) Neither the state board of education, nor any public elementary or secondary school governing authority, director of schools, school system administrator, or any public elementary or secondary school principal or administrator shall prohibit any teacher in a public school system of this state from helping students understand, analyze, critique, and review in an objective manner the scientific strengths and scientific weaknesses of existing scientific theories covered in the course being taught.

I thought it prudent to end this discussion with the proposed legislation currently introduced in Tennessee.  Why Tennessee?

 Who would dominate American culture--the modernists or the traditionalists? Journalists were looking for a showdown, and they found one in a Dayton, Tennessee courtroom in the summer of 1925. There a jury was to decide the fate of John Scopes, a high school biology teacher charged with illegally teaching the theory of evolution. The guilt or innocence of John Scopes, and even the constitutionality of Tennessee's anti-evolution statute, mattered little. The meaning of the trial emerged through its interpretation as a conflict of social and intellectual values.  

 William Jennings Bryan, three-time Democratic candidate for President and a populist, led a Fundamentalist crusade to banish Darwin's theory of evolution from American classrooms. Bryan's motivation for mounting the crusade is unclear. It is possible that Bryan, who cared deeply about equality, worried that Darwin's theories were being used by supporters of a growing eugenics movement that was advocating sterilization of "inferior stock." More likely, the Great Commoner came to his cause both out a concern that the teaching of evolution would undermine traditional values he had long supported and because he had a compelling desire to remain in the public spotlight--a spotlight he had occupied since his famous "Cross of Gold" speech at the 1896 Democratic Convention. Bryan, in the words of columnist H. L. Mencken, who covered the Scopes Trial, transformed himself into a "sort of Fundamentalist Pope." By 1925, Bryan and his followers had succeeded in getting legislation introduced in fifteen states to ban the teaching of evolution. In February, Tennessee enacted a bill introduced by John Butler making it unlawful "to teach any theory that denies the story of divine creation as taught by the Bible and to teach instead that man was descended from a lower order of animals."  

http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/scopes/evolut.htm

How much do you have to pay to get out of doing all these things twice?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B84RpcmF50I

Well these proposed laws do not ban the teaching of evolution, the supporters would say. All of these cretin-like state legislators are introducing this type of legislation under the cover of seeking Civil Rights and Equal Protection for ignoramuses.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BO7WQpBD0A

The Bible does not list the names of every creature on the Ark. It does say that one set of every kind of air-breathing animal was on board (Genesis 6:19-20, 7:15-16). So, dinosaurs must have been included.

There is evidence that dinosaurs lived after the Flood. For instance, Job saw “behemoth” after the Flood. (Other evidences will be discussed later.)

The Ark was a very large ship designed especially by God for its important purpose. It was so large and complex that it took Noah 120 years to build. Noah used this time to warn people about the Flood and convince them to turn to God and be saved with his family http://www.christiananswers.net/dinosaurs/j-ark1.html

Well I do not think it necessary to go all the way back to Job to discover the truth of things for chrissakes.

What about Tyrannosaurus Senataurus Rex?  I mean a lot of folks believe that Jesse Helms was the last living dinosaur and since Jesse was part of recent history…well ipse dixit and res ipsa loquitur to say the least.

There is a point to my ramblings and it has to do with the current SAT’s:

The biologist Theodosius Dobszhansky once said, “Nothing in biology makes any sense except in the light of evolution.” Now, old Theodosius never had to take the SAT II Biology test, but if he had, he probably would have been quite pleased about the many questions the SAT II asks about evolution and the diversity of species. About 15 percent of the questions in the core of the SAT II Biology E/M test evolution or diversity in some way, and the E and M sections cover ecology and molecular biology, respectively, in the context of evolution.

http://www.sparknotes.com/testprep/books/sat2/biology/chapter8.rhtml

My question is this:

Under the provisions of this new anti-evolution legislation, would it not be discriminatory to deny a student placement at some university because he/she as a fundamentalist might have FAILED TO ANSWER FIFTEEN PERCENT OF THE QUESTIONS PRESENTED IN SAT II due to their religious beliefs?

And what about other questions on these tests that relate to global warming or slave owning Founding Fathers or the underlying causes of the Civil War?

What if a student is denied entrance into Harvard Law School because he received a C+ in some biology class due to his religious beliefs; thereby dropping his over-all GPA to a 3.4?

The peasants are revolting and are now more revolting than ever!