Creationists are Killing Me

I've been doing some evolution/creation reading because I'm teaching some students in a group home school at our church/village. Some of these creationists are killing me.I just read a debate at http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/debate-age-of-earth.html. In it the creationist presents an argument based on sediments on the bottom of the ocean. He says:

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The amount of sediment in the ocean is about twice the mass of the continents above sea level, it could have been produced in 30 million years. 4.5 billion years would have produced 150 times as much sediment at the present rate.

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Can someone tell me why, in a debate, one side would attempt to present evidence that, if accurate, would shoot down both sides of the debate? This creationist wants an age for the earth of less than 50,000 years, yet here he's presenting evidence for a minimum age of 30 million!!!Later, after the evolutionist side said that short period comets don't fit the young earthers position, either, the young earther in the debate says:

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The average lifetime of a short period comet has been calculated as about 500 years. If all comets were created as they are, this figure is obviously low. Adjusting it by a factor of 40 would lead to the presence of short-period comets up to 20,000 years after creation.

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Well, isn't that nice. It doesn't fit his "theory," he agrees, but if we multiply the figures by 40, then it would be okay! Wow, I guess that settles that. I'm 41. That would make me a lot older than my 8-year-old son, but if we adjusted his age by a factor of 6, then he'd be older than me. Since this is a lot smaller adjustment than the creationist has to make in that debate, can I therefore reasonably conclude that my son is older than I am?Add to that the embarrassing behavior of a creationist who posted an advertisement for Creation Ex Nihilo magazine on another thread, for what reason I cannot imagine.When I had to convince my friends and brothers in the church with me that we needed to drop young earth creationism, the behavior of creationists and the form of arguments they use were the best evidence I had. One of my friends once said, "The reasons I believe in evolution aren't the greatest. I believe because Shammah (that's me) has done the research for me, and I don't want to be found agreeing with those people who defend a young earth."

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It doesn't shoot down both sides.

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In my own defense, I did say "if accurate." What I meant was that if the argument was valid and really proved what it said it did--a thirty million year old earth--it would disagree with both sides. I agree that it doesn't.I read a great description of the way the geologic column can be seen complete from the coasts of America and Europe, where very old layers exist, to the midAtlantic ridge, where only the newest layers can be seen, because the ocean has been slowly expanding over that time. That's probably an awful description I just gave, but it seemed to apply even to the sediment argument. We're not expecting 4 1/2 billion years in the Atlantic, anyway, because it's not that old.

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My subjective take, though, is that most creationists are more anti-evolution than pro-creation, and will do great harm to themselves in an effort to wound the bad guys-- kinda like suicide bombing really.

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That, I think, is the only possible explanation. The suicide bombing analogy is interesting. I'm actually wondering if any YEC's want to offer some alternative explanation, because it doesn't seem to me there is one.