Mark,
Mutations a random event , but evolution not?
Correct, natural selection that acts upon the mutations is not random.
Mmmmm... but natural selection itself is "random" to mutation; i.e. there's no purpose behind the selecting environment. We argue that many times to say that "evolution is not purposeful. It doesn't ever necessarily say that organisms become 'better', only more fit for the current, changing environment."
Also, natural selection is not the only principle going on. There are [genetic code? proteins?] that are kept because there is no selection pressure on the code. Furthermore, there are changes that 'piggyback'
I know I'm speaking very roughly, 'cause I'm still not too knowledgeable about it. I think these are vaild points, and I think they allow one to make the argument that "evolutionary processes" are (virtually) random. There's no a priori reason that any organism survived--they all survived only because they were able to survive in the random (as regarded to the organism itself) environment that they were born into.
What do you think?