Dover Creationist Trial not so Intelligently Designed
BBSNews Editorial 2005-11-06 -- The "Dover Panda Trial" reached an end on Friday after six weeks and twenty-one days of testimony. According to the NY Times, a lawyer for a religious based law group called the Thomas More Law Center shopped around for years looking for a school system gullible enough to be drawn into a high-risk and potentially very expensive litigation by trying to "wedge" something called "intelligent design" into a local school systems science curriculum.
They finally found one after years of searching in Dover, Pennsylvania.
What was needed was a school board with a sufficiently fundamentalist religious makeup to force the issue, and who would be willing to insert religion into science class. Judge John E. Jones III at least twice questioned school board witnesses on his own, even demanding to see immediately a copy of an earlier sworn deposition from one board member who was having trouble squaring current under oath testimony with an earlier sworn deposition.
It turns out that those with a creationist bent appeared to be less than truthful in trying to convince themselves and others that "intelligent design" was not religion.
The York Daily Record in Pennsylvania has written extensive series coverage of the Panda Trial that took place in a Harrisburg federal court. From the start of the trial on September 26th, 2005 the case entitled Kitzmiller, et al. v. Dover School District, et al., US District Court, Middle District of Pennsylvania has been covered by several journalists at YDR.
The most entertaining and insightful reporting has come from Mike Argento. The editors at YDR are to be commended for giving Argento his head in the coverage of the trial. When former Dover Area School Board member Bill Buckingham got on the stand Mike Argento presented to YDR readers a first hand look at how duplicitous testimony can become when trying to disguise religious leanings when formulating public policy. After a particular grueling bit of testimony that had Mr. Buckingham sweating, Argento had a unique take on the proceeding.
From a Mike Argento column:
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"Buckingham said he never read about his adventures on the school board in the newspapers and never
talked to anyone about them. He also said he never mentioned creationism at school board meetings
or in the press or anywhere, for that matter.
So at the time the board was talking about creationism, Buckingham granted an interview to a Fox 43 news reporter. I guess he forgot about that new-fangled invention, videotape. On the tape, which you can see at http://www.ydr.com/mmedia/multi/528, Buckingham, wearing the same lapel pin he wore in court Thursday, said he wanted to balance evolution in the classroom with something else, "such as creationism." Oops. He said that the reporter "ambushed" him and that he was "like a deer in the headlights of a car" and that the newspapers were all reporting that he and the board were talking about creationism and that he thought to himself, "Don't say creationism." Double oops. It was like he had a Homer Simpson moment. He was thinking "Don't say creationism. Don't say creationism. Don't say creationism." And then he opens his yap and says "creationism." D'oh!" |
The judge hopes to render a decision about the creationism trial about the Dover school board late this year or in January. It is almost always folly to predict an outcome in a court case but in this one, it's hard to imagine any other outcome than the school board being found to be trying to introduce creationism into science classes. And what's worse, at least for the people who are trying to put religion into science classes in at least thirty states around the country, this trial showed just how biased in favor of fundamentalist religion the "intelligent design" crowd actually is.
And on Tuesday, Dover area voters will decide if the makeup of the local school board will remain entirely composed of religious bias or whether there will be new members more concerned about providing children with a factual education as compared to religious dogma dressed in a lab coat and labeled "intelligent design."
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