Juicio Brennan

In the continuing saga of military equipment issues, the army has reached an all new low. Army officials have banned the use of privately bought armor. You probably remember all the fund drives and protests for more body armor that have occurred over the past few years. I know many organizations here in Cincinnati, including churches, have held events to raise money to send proper equipment to their loved ones overseas.

The army, however, does not want its troops to wear armor that might be “substandard” to the issued armor. Well, this would not be a problem if our government actually equipped our soldiers instead of building “bridges to nowhere” that cost hundreds, yes hundreds, of millions of dollars. But I guess they think it is better for our soldiers to wear no armor rather than armor that still helps but is not as good as the equipment the government could buy them but is not willing to buy.

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Last Tuesday, the Ohio Board of Education voted 11-4 to remove science standards and lesson plans that encourage students to seek evidence for and against evolution. The critics of the material believed it was an open door to teach intelligent design, a fancy word for Christian creationism. Marth Wise, a critic of the material, stated “It is deeply unfair to the children of this state to mislead them about science.”

It is good to see that our school administrators are willing to see intelligent design advocates’ true motives to push faith and Christianity. This seems to be greatly due to the U.S. District Judge Jones’ ruling against intelligent design/creationism in Dover, Pennsylvania, schools. He described Dover’s policy as “breathtaking inanity” and stated that the six-week trial illustrated that intelligent design “is a religious view, a mere re-labeling of creationism, and not a scientific theory.”

Jones stated:

(The Dover policy) singles out the theory of evolution for special treatment, misrepresents its status in the scientific community, causes students to doubt its validity without scientific justification, presents students with a religious alternative masquerading as a scientific theory, directs them to consult a creationist text as though it were a science resource and instructs students to forgo scientific inquiry in the public school classroom and instead to seek out religious instruction elsewhere.

I am glad that our board is standing up for the educational standards of our science classes. Now, if only they would stand up to this.
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Last Thursday at the U.N. Climate Change Conference, the U.S. delegation staged a dramatic walkout in order to ‘scuttle’ the negotiations. They stated it was in response to Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin’s Wednesday remark, “To the reticent nations, including the United States, I say there is such a thing as global conscience, and now is the time to listen to it.”

Most other delegations said the American actions had less to do with Martin’s comments and more to do with the fact that for two weeks they have only been trying to prevent other countries from making progress rather than adding anything helpful. What’s worse, the U.S. delegation has not been regularly attending the meetings and so to show up at one just to leave it is even more embarrassing for us as a country.

Our delegation even resorted to bullying tactics. President Bill Clinton was scheduled to speak on Friday night and he did, but not without the U.S. threatening the United Nations. From NYMetro:

Bush-administration officials privately threatened organizers of the U.N. Climate Change Conference, telling them that any chance there might’ve been for the United States to sign on to the Kyoto global-warming protocol would be scuttled if they allowed Bill Clinton to speak at the gathering today in Montreal, according to a source involved with the negotiations who spoke to New York Magazine on condition of anonymity.

Clinton did end up speaking and called the Bush administration “flat wrong”.

This morning, more than 150 nations agreed to launch formal talks on mandatory greenhouse gas reductions after the Kyoto 2012 deadline passes. The United States was not among them.

On a lighter note, the National Environmental Trust distributed whoopee cushions with Bush’s face printed on the front by the words “Emissions Accomplished.”

Jennifer Morgan of the World Wildlife Fund: “This shows just how willing the U.S. administration is to walk away from a healthy planet and its responsibilities to its own people.”

President Clinton: “I think it’s crazy for us to play games with our children’s future. We know what’s happening to the climate, we have a highly predictable set of consequences if we continue to pour greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, and we know we have an alternative that will lead us to greater prosperity.”

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