Monkey Business Has No Place In School Science

A nutty professor has crawled out of the 19th century again with the audacity to suggest creationist belief should be taught in the 21st century school science lab. What a load of old monkeys. The Darwin caricature (opposite) may be offensive to some today but not to the Victorians. For some die-hards, the creation versus evolution debate just hasn't moved on.

Leading the foray into this hairy old chestnut is the Rev Professor Michael Reiss, director of education at the Royal Society, who is neither a physicist nor a chemist. 

Hiding behind the mantle of the auspicious Society, Reiss is well-known for his creationist views in science teaching and for dumbing down science in schools for Blair's government, as outlined in this 2006 Guardian interview.

Reiss, a practising priest, is professor of science education and head of the school of mathematics, science and technology at the Institute of Education. The Rev Reiss should heed this little ditty:

There was a young man from Trinity

Who took the square root of infinity

But the number of digits

Gave him the fidgets 

So he dropped maths

And took up divinity

There is a place for creationism in schools. It's in Bible Studies and Religious Education.

It's bad enough having to put up with our children being indoctrinated and manipulated by creationist evangelists in Blair's Academies run by his creationist pals and obscure establishment orders. 

But trying to sneak in this belief, masquerading as science and placing it on the school science curriculum would create a dangerous precedent.

It would take a blunt and eloquent Professor Richard Dawkins to give the best put down for this crazy idea, as he did in a recent TV series. 

To suggests that creationist belief is a science and as such it should be taught alongside Darwin's evolutionary science, is a nonsense.

Darwin's personal angst to reconcile his Christian belief and emerging hard scientific evidence is worth a discussion as part of his evolutionary theory. The famous US Stopes 'Monkey Trial' of 1925 is a useful part of a socio-political discussion. 

Creationist pundits like Reiss are welcome to dwell on the subject but not force their beliefs on innocent and susceptible children and not in a school science lesson. 

Einstein posed immaculate questions about God and the Universe but as a mathematician and theoretical physicist.

Medical advancements in the field of genetics could not have happened without the scientific groundwork of Darwin. Do we really want to take such a retrograde step?

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Why The Media Is So Mad At McPalin

The media is getting mad. Their Chosen One's star is starting to fade and they don't like it one bit. With a crafty bit of footwork, Obama sidelined Clinton but McCain saw a gap in the market and along came Wonder Woman. 

The media darling is now trailing in the polls but it wasn't supposed to turn out like this.

The pitbull with lipstick is wowing TV audiences and McCain, the Vietnam war hero, brings nothing but admiration.

McCain's strategy of attacking media bias is starting to pay off, with the media now accusing the McCain camp of manipulating them. That's rich. Obama has been manipulating the media for years. But now the boot's on the other foot. 

Obama's manipulation didn't make the media mad though, because journalists and commentators were willing accomplices to try to get Obama elected. It's the thought that McCain could be manipulating them that has the media seeing red.

Political journalists, including the Orange Party have seen it all coming for a while and now it's happening can be forgiven for just a slight wry smile.

Voters are seeing through Obama as Chicago's Mr Cellophane. Charles Krauthammer, writing in Real Clear Politics, describes Obama's 'Altitude Sickness' as a fading celebrity. 

"The Democrats are in a panic. In a presidential race that is impossible to lose, they are behind. Obama devotees are frantically giving advice. Tom Friedman tells him to "start slamming down some phones." Camille Paglia suggests, "be boring!"

Howard Kurtz, in the Washington Post, is surprisingly blunt for a Democrat. The mainstream media, Kurtz says, are mad.

"The more interesting question is whether Obama is starting to come apart at the seams ... Over the last couple of days, several generally apolitical people have told me that they think Obama has been melting down ever since Palin's nomination was announced. Hysteria does appear to be sweeping the Obama camp, with over the top attacks on both Palin and McCain. One wonders whether their internal polling numbers are really, really bad."

The attack on Palin has been unprecedented in US presidential elections. The truth is that Palin has been the object of the most vicious and concerted smear campaign in modern American history.

Democratic lawyers, reporters, bloggers and assorted Obamaphiles have descended on Alaska for something, anything, to bring down Palin.

One fascinating line of attack was the soon discredited line that Palin hadn't been vetted by Republicans and that turned into another own goal. 

Obama has neatly side-stepped the vetting process for the Democrats. If he had been properly vetted he would not have stood a chance for nomination - there are just too many skeletons lurking in the cupboard.

US political commentators, not in the pay or the pockets of either camps,  are picking up on all this and asking the question now asked by voters. If Palin and indeed McCain are fair or unfair game. Why not Obama? 

The fact is that they've been sat on. The lawsuit over Obama's eligibility to stand for president has been highlighted by the Orange Party  here and picked up by some. But that's as far as it goes, for the moment. 

More importantly, Obama's links to the Annenberg Foundation and Weather Underground bomber, William Ayes, got an airing in McCain US TV ads, before the lawsuits arrived and pressure was put on to pull the ads. 

Melanie Philips, writing in the Spectator, is one of the few to give a detailed account of Obama's time as a Chicago 'community organiser'.

Meanwhile over at Power Line:

"One star fades, another is born. The very next morning McCain picks Sarah Palin and a new celebrity is launched. And in the celebrity game, novelty is trump." 

The media is seizing on anything to try to discredit McCain and Palin and rightfully challenging false or questionable claims by the McCain campaign. 

But claims and falsehoods by the Obama campaign aren't what the press is "getting mad" about and reporters have no intention of reporting them.

It's not too hard to diagnose why "the media are getting mad." Power Line  sums up with their usual astute vitriol: 

"They're getting mad because their candidate is losing. They've spent years building him up and covering for his mistakes and shortcomings, and he is such a stiff that he can't coast across the finish line. I'd be mad too, I guess, but I think I'd have the decency not to take it out on Sarah Palin."

It's all in the timing. The Obama machine managed to keep up the momentum for four years. For McCain and Palin their job is easier. They only have to remain airborne for a few more weeks. 

In the US elections, it's only the finish that counts. And the voters just want a strong commander-in-chief and a trusted hand on the economy.

JB Williams, in  The New Media Journal, is in no doubt that Obama is getting too easy a ride: 

"It means that if the press avoids asking those questions, they are derelict in their primary purpose of keeping the public informed. Their only task during an election cycle is to help the American people know as much as possible about those who seek to run their nation. If they won’t ask the questions, then they aren’t doing their job."

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Brown's Fuel Bills Plan-Wrap Up Warm

After last week's housing help that never was, today we had another damp squib on fuel bills from a wet and weak government. The advice? Wrap up warm this winter.

Lag the loft, put in a new boiler and spend thousands on double glazing. No word of even a small cash rebate. No word of a windfall tax on the greedy energy companies, not today or anyday it seems. 

This bunch of trivial measures shows just how out of touch is the government. 

As the big energy companies are allowed to trouser our cash and sail off into the off-shore sunset the measures announced today are a drop in the ocean. 

Energy efficiency and help for the needy cost next to nothing when you put them alongside the obscene profits to be made from the recent huge hike in gas and electricity prices.

And how are people expected to pay for the insulation, new boiler and double glazing? It's bad enough just trying to make ends meet and pay the bills.

Sure, there'll be some help for some of the poorer but any government of whatever party could and should be doing that. 

Struggling to feed the kids? Worried about paying the bills ? Fit an energy saving light bulb and everything will be alright.

Environment secretary, Hilary Benn, floundered - badly - on the BBC's Today programme. 

Announcing the £910m package to help people struggling with energy bills, Brown said this was a "better way" than bringing in the one-off cash rebates paid for by a windfall tax.

These are clearly people out of touch with reality. 

The trade unions, those with true Labour values and not cosying up to their New Labour pals, are expected to step up their demand for a windfall tax on the energy companies. 

Tony Woodley, of Unite, described the planned insulation package as "crackpot" and urged immediate cash help for people struggling with soaring energy bills.

The Conservatives said Brown had actually cut the budget for energy efficiency grants for people on benefit last year and was simply restoring the budget.

LibDem, Vincent Cable, said the money involved was "a tiny fraction" of the amount energy companies had raised as a result of being given free carbon trading permits by the government.

Time and again at the TUC, the true Labour union leaders, tried to speak up for people worried sick about rising bills. That is set to be repeated at the Labour Party conference.

The Conservatives have offered an olive branch to the unions and have already started talks about how they can work together in a new government. They're doing the same with the SNP. 

It now seems the true Labour Party, the SNP, the Conservatives and the LibDems, not in Clegg's fan club, are speaking with one voice on so many issues which affect people's lives.  And that's the voice of the voters.

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McCain's Manna From Heaven From Brown BBC

Tie in Brown's ill-timed and badly thought out backing for Obama and the BBC's dodgy and biased "world poll" coming out at the same time, and McCain must be thinking he's the Chosen One - they were manna from heaven.

Both were picked up by the US media and posted by the Orange Party yesterday. Both are being derided in the US to highlight the naive bias of a UK prime minister and the BBC. And both are being told to keep their noses out of the US elections.

With friends like Brown and his track record, who needs enemies. The BBC 'World Poll', simply reinforces Obama's exotic background. Both will do Obama no favours. 

Brown gave unprecedented backing to one of the US presidential candidates in his article for the Parliamentary Monitor, which he must have signed off. Nowhere in the article does he mention McCain.

The BBC World Service/GlobeScan poll, reported here by ABC News, claims to show people around the world want Obama as president. 

But pollster GlobeScan only questioned 22,000 people by telephone and face-to-face in countries ranging from Australia to India and across Africa, Europe and South America for the BBC poll. 

Hardly a statistically valid 'poll' and a point not lost on bloggers tracking the bias of BBC/GlobeScan polls around the world.

Democrats and Republicans want to move on, but not before the McCain-Palin campaign has milked it here, claiming Obama had nicked their policies. 

Brown and the BBC have rattled the Republican's cage. Drudge is lurking in the background and he is proving to be McCain's secret weapon.

As the US election enters its closing stages, Brown and the BBC should know better. They are trying to play with the big boys. Engaging in silly little schoolboy antics shows them up as fools. 

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Brown And BBC World Poll Back Obama

In an unprecedented breach of protocol, Brown has backed US presidential candidate Obama, as the release of a BBC/GlobeScan poll, claims to show people across the world chose the Chosen One as president.

The support by Brown and the BBC poll, reported by ABC News, come at the same time as polls in the US show McCain is gaining ground by the day.

The support of a UK prime minister for a US presidential candidate, so close to the US election date, is an unprecedented breach of protocol and nowhere in the article does he mention the Republican candidate, John McCain.

His comments have already drawn sharp criticism from shadow foreign secretary, William Hague.

Writing in the Parliamentary House Magazine, Parliamentary Monitor, Brown said:

"And in the electrifying US presidential campaign, it is the Democrats who are generating the ideas to help people through more difficult times. To help prevent people from losing their home, Barack Obama has proposed a Foreclosure Prevention Fund to increase emergency pre-foreclosure counselling, and help families facing repossession."

However, support by Brown doesn't auger well for Obama. Brown is often ridiculed for his 'Jonah' effect, where he brings back luck to anything he is involved with or supports. 

And the poll for Brown's BBC may provide a bonus for McCain, where Obama's exotic background is proving more of a hindrance than a help in his campaign.

Pollster GlobeScan questioned more than 22,000 people in countries ranging from Australia to India and across Africa, Europe and South America for the BBC poll.

ABC News reports that: "The margin in favour of Senator Obama ranged from 9 per cent in India to 82 per cent in Kenya, while an average of 49 per cent across the 22 countries preferred Senator Obama compared with 12 per cent preferring Senator McCain. Some four in 10 did not take a view."

In  the US, the RCP Average puts McCain on 48.3% and Obama on 45.6% a gain for McCain of 2.7. 

Brown's support for Obama and the BBC poll have been highlighted in the US by Drudge, who is well-known for exposing the Monica Lewinski affair and revealing Prince Harry in Afghanistan. 

His latest news items, which show up media bias against McCain and Palin, have been picked up by the US Main stream media. 

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Tory TLC To The TUC

A letter from a senior Conservative to the TUC, shines a revealing spotlight on the current political mess at Westminster and how it could be played out in the future. It's another nail in Brown and New Labour's coffin, as we watch events unfold on a split screen. 

In Brighton, union leaders at the TUC, using language unheard of just a few years ago, expressed genuine frustration and anger at the government. 

In Birmingham, a cardboard cabinet of empty suits swanned around in shallow selfish arrogance, in a thinly disguised publicity stunt.

Shadow chancellor George Osborne, has written an open letter to the TUC calling on trade union members to "forget" the Labour Party, accusing the government of betraying workers.

"So if you care about better jobs and better incomes, and if you care about treating public sector professionals with respect – forget about the Labour Party. It has forgotten about you."

The move comes as chancellor Darling, addresses TUC delegates, which will hardly set conference alight. 

Events at the TUC mirror those which are happening in the Labour Party and among some Labour MPs. After years of cosying up to New Labour, many have had enough. 

The Conservatives are tapping into that real battle between those with true Labour values and the New Labour elite.

Brown and his New Labour ministers are living in a fantasy world. With the exception of postie turned health secretary, Alan Johnson, not one cabinet member has any experience of the real world. 

Raising the spectre of the bad old days of the unions is both naive and unhelpful. 

The Conservatives are showing a way forward. Throwing a reassuring olive branch to the trade unions, is a welcome first step. They are doing the same with the SNP in Scotland.

This is not so much about party politics. This is facing up to the reality of the situation. 

A cabinet reshuffle, another re-launch by Brown, a more Blairite leadership challenge, will achieve nothing. It's the end of the New Labour Project and true Labour is trying to regroup. The government doesn't stand a chance at a general election. All the political players know that. 

The Conservatives, for so long happy to sit on the sidelines and watch New Labour disintegrate, now know it will all end sooner rather than later.

Only those with a selfish, vested interest in propping up New Labour, will try to help them to cling onto power.

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Mac And Mae Rock Rot Sets In

Bush has done a Brown and bailed out Freddie and Fannie. This is not about economics, this is about greed. Here, ours had the solid-sounding name of Northern Rock. But the names disguise the festering financial fiasco beneath all of them. 

The banks should never have been allowed to get in the mess in the first place.

Taxpayers are propping up Northern Rock to the tune of ten of billions of pounds. The US always does things bigger. Fannie May and Freddie Mac have liabilities running into hundreds of billions of dollars.

The sub-prime mortgage model started in the US and, like many things, the government was happy to import it, warts and all.

What has happened is the result of a flawed borrowing model, only concerned with making a fast buck.

Out went the traditional checks, where borrowing depended on solid factors like income and how much cash the lenders actually had in the bank. In came the model which simply assessed risk, lent accordingly and bundled off the more risky bond debts to be sold on. 

Fine, if money's freely available. But not when the Middle and Far East banks, which held the bond debt, took a look and decided to withdraw their investment.

Here the treasury, Bank of England and Financial Services Authority sat back, let it all happen and blamed each other when it all went pear-shaped. In the US the same questions will be asked and the future is unclear and uncertain. 

Economic analysists are quick to call it all the result of a mythical "credit crunch", when it's nothing of the sort. It's a deliberately created debt culture. 

On both sides of the Atlantic, people were lulled into a false sense of security and allowed to borrow up to the hilt and beyond. 

Mortgages became loans and were started on fixed, short-term, cheaper rates for just a couple of years, to hook in the customers. The repercussions are repossessions. And spiralling debt.

The Wall Street Journal notes how Fannie and Freddie expanded their exposure to the more risky loans, despite executives warning of the consequences two years ago. 

The two companies "shunned the riskiest type of mortgages, only to embrace those mortgages late in the game in an effort to regain market share from Wall Street rivals."

The winners from this cheap credit for all, were the lenders, who made fat profits. And the losers? Everyone else.

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Voters Start To See Through Obama

Evidence Obama is turning into Chicago's Mr Cellophane, comes in the latest Gallup daily tracking poll, which shows the highest support for McCain, in that poll, since May. 

The poll, of registered voters, shows McCain has overtaken Obama leading 48% to 45%. The RCP average puts Obama on 45.7% and McCain on 46.7%.

Both Democrats and Rebublicans needed their conventions to put a bounce in the polls. Political commentators are putting the lead down to a better showing for the McCain campaign.

The closing weeks of the race for the White House, sees candidates out on the stump and in set-piece TV debates. 

But it will be in the media positioning, the viral internet campaigning and TV ads that will decide whether voters will see right through Him.

Commenting on the McCain media strategy, observed here on a number of occasions, Washington journalist, Peter Brown, in The Wall Street Journal, believes the public's perceived view of media bias will help the McCain campaign: 

"Among the more significant things that we learned at the Republican convention last week is that John McCain and Sarah Palin have decided that running against the news media will help them beat Democrats Barack Obama and Joe Biden. And, they are betting that although their frontal assault on the press might not go down so well in the Hamptons and in Hollywood, which are Democratic strongholds anyway, it will play in Peoria."

McCain needs to hit the magic 50% before reality overcomes media bias and the momentum kicks in. Today's polls show he is edging closer to that target.

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