New Tennessee Monkey Law!

Haslam didn't ignore it. He was well aware of it, having received thousands of protests from scientists, students and other concerned citizens. Instead, he chose to allow it to become law without his signature. He claimed he didn't think the bill was necessary. In essence, he wanted to go down on record as being against it, but he didn't want to actually do anything that would slow it down.In the final analysis, there probably wasn't anything he could have done about it. Vetos in Tennessee can be overridden by a simply majority, and this piece of crap passed both houses by a wide majority, so it was going to become law regardless of anything Haslam did. But hey, at least he said he didn't like it.

It's not exactly a Monkey Law. That's really the press having a bit of fun with an anti science type law coming out of the state that hosted the Monkey Trial. But it's certainly in the same spirit as other anti science legislation.

The text of the law can be found here. It says, among other things: and and There is no scientific controversy about evolution. There is no scientific controversy about human cloning. There is no scientific controvery about "the chemical origins of human life," although it is as of now an unanswered question. The combination of right wing hot button issues together with calls for teaching the scientific strengths and weaknesses of existing scientific theories is not a coincidence. Futher, given that there is nothing in any laws now that prevents any science teacher from discussing actual scientific controversy and strengths and weaknesses of scientific theories, the only rational conclusion is that this is nothing more than another thinly veiled attempt to pander to religious conservatives and other religious people who, by virtue of years of creationist lies and publicity, believe that there is actually some scientific controversy in these areas.Further, I am not the least bit mollified by the language claiming that the statute because there are so many illinformed and dishonest cdesign proponentists who argue that ID and creationism are not religious beliefs, and there are so many parents who buy that bullshit that there will be calls to have them included as part of the curriculum.

No, we need to stop electing pandering idiots who couldn't care less about genuine public policy concerns that might not matter to their base and start electing intelligent people who are willing to listen to facts when presented to them and able to balance problems and arrive at workable solutions. There's no particular reason to think that scientists and engineers are any better at that than lawyers and political science folk. But the lawyers and political science folk do need to listen to the scientists and engineers when they are talking about things that they are educated in.

AE has this queer notion that we shouldn't worry about Constitutional violations unless they occur in the state where we live.

AE also seems to think that an accurate description of his position constitutes a strawman.

Perhaps instead of name-calling and misusing labels, you could explain why you think I was making a strawman argument or being a troll, or tell us what lies you think I'm telling.Probably not, but hey, I'm willing to give you an opening.

You do realize that this is a debate forum, right? And in a debate, when you make a claim, others are expected to question and challenge that claim.If you can't support your claim, it's okay to say so, rather than simply dodging and ignoring questions.

It passed, the gutless governor didn't veto it, but didn't sign it either. Thus, he stands firmly astride the fence.