Mixed messages from Louisiana

While the ICR might contemplate moving to Louisiana after their reverses in Texas, they might be a bit confused by the messages from within the state.

Now I like Louisiana, called the Sportsman's Paradise when I lived there. Both of my kids were born in Louisiana, just outside Shreveport.I made some great friends there. But in all honesty i was very disappointed in the school system when I lived there and recently was further disappointed when Bobby Jindal signed off on a disastrous piece of legislation, the poorly named Louisiana Science Education Act -- which did nothing more but open the door for non-science to be introduced and made it hard for anyone to complain about it. But what do you expect when your best friends are the Discovery institute and the Louisiana Family Forum! I do see a lawsuit in their future.

Well let move ahead from the 2008 signing of the bill and see what the Louisiana Legislature has been up to. Well since they are facing one of the worst ecological disasters in history and one that will reverberate for years in Louisiana's economy, what does the Legislature do -- they unanimously pass a resolution asking for folks to pray for divine intervention. I am sure the ICR will love to hear that message. Just as I am sure State Sen. Robert Adley will claim a victory for God when BP gets its act together and finally deals with the problem and the massive clean-up.

The message the ICR might not like so much comes in the form of an editorial in the Shreveport Times from a couple of days ago. It is directed at the hypocrisy of Gov. Bobby Jindal and US Senator David Vitter are calling for the best and brightest science and engineering minds to help deal with the oil disaster after spending their entire career pandering to the large anti-science constituencies within the State of Louisiana. Isn't it ironic?

Charles Kincade takes no prisoners with his editorial and ends with this:

"Our dismal education system has and will continue to have obvious effects on our economic viability. But more freighting is the inescapable conclusion that unless the anti-science policies of Jindal, Vitter, et al are corrected, and soon, future generations will be unable to function in the modern world."

I wish I could argue with him, but he is one of the few voices talking sense. Louisiana will become dependent on other states for technology and innovation, especially since they still rank near the bottom of the list of States for education (47th of 50). Their educational woes haven't changed since I lived there and unless the people of Louisiana make a change, it's not likely to get better.