It may be our next trouble spot. They have a creationist majority on the school board, and they’re saying stuff like this:

Despite the Pennsylvania case, some school board members want both intelligent design and evolution taught in Polk schools. They say they have received numerous e-mails and phone calls in support of intelligent design.

“My tendency would be to have both sides shared with students since neither side can be proven,” Tim Harris said.

Tim Harris, you’re a moron. You need to recognize this fact soon, so that your self-confident ignorance doesn’t lead your school district into a catastrophic law suit that will make you a poster boy for the taxation and education problems that will ensue. Look at Alan Bonsell. That could be you.

“Those who are unaware of history are doomed to repeat it” is really true here. I say this as a friend and fan of public schools—thinking that you are serving a pious community by trying to sneak religion into your schools is a formula for disaster.

Sensible residents of Polk County: I have a suggestion. You should get together and buy each board member a copy of Humes’ Monkey Girl, and tell them to read it…and that they’ll be tested on it. If your school board members are functional illiterates, make them watch the PBS documentary on Judgment Day. The clear message of the trial is how the hubris of certain school board members led the whole district into folly and financial ruin. Another message is that the people they think are their friends, the fellows of the Discovery Institute, will abandon them at the first hint of trouble, and that those who stay you might wish had left, since in the case of the Dover trial it was Behe and Minnich who helped kill the case.

And to people everywhere: if you can, run for your local school board. These small groups of people have tremendous influence on American education, and yet you will find the most remarkably stupid people seated on them, people who campaign on a platform of destroying public education. You will receive no glory and no fame and the power you exercise will not be appreciated by the students it benefits, but we need hundreds of thousands of smart people to take those seats and steer education in a rational direction. If you don’t, there are a million Tim Harrises waiting in line to run it into the ground.

Matt Dowling has organized the YouTube recordings of Dembski’s lecture at the University of Oklahoma: parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. The man can drone on.

He’s a little late, but Afarensis finally saw Judgement Day. Verdict: he likes it! I knew he would. He also points out the key factor that demolished the creationist case:

This, in a nutshell, is why ID lost at Dover. The contrast between the experiments embodied in that stack of papers and books vs the lack of any interest in performing experimental checks on their own ideas on the part of ID advocates spelled their doom.

I think there were several factors that played a role: the obvious dishonesty of Bonsell and Buckingham, and the analysis that showed Of Pandas and People to be a descendant text of creationist literature were pretty darned important. But yes, the Discovery Institute’s clear avoidance of actually doing any science was damning.

This failing will be repaired in time for the next trial by the recent hiring of eminent scientist Michael Medved.