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For Immediate Release                                                 March 12,2009        

Republican Party of Texas’ Executive Committee (SREC) has voted overwhelmingly for inclusion of “Strengths and Weaknesses” language.
 Party Supports the Platform and the People

AUSTIN, TEXAS – Texans for Better Science Education (TBSE) has learned that the Texas State Republican Executive Committee (SREC), consisting of two representatives from each of Texas 31 state Senatorial Districts, has voted near-unanimously to encourage all GOP members of the State Board of Education (SBOE) to include “strengths and weaknesses” language in the final adoption of the science standards for public schools.  According to those attending, there was only one dissenting vote.  The resolution reads in part:

RESOLVED, The Republican Party of Texas, consistent with the 2008 State Republican Platform, opposes abandonment of the longstanding “strengths and weaknesses” science standard and calls upon the Republican members of the State Board of Education to support the retention of the “strengths and weaknesses” standard in the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS).

This action was taken after three GOP members of the SBOE (Miller, Craig, and Hardy), voted with a block of five Democrats to strip the strengths and weaknesses language from the TEKS standard—a change championed not by most of their constituents, but rather, by extremist members of the ACLU, a Berkeley California based signer of the Humanist Manifesto III, and assorted militant Darwinists.  One SBOE member has even reported overt intimidation from Darwinists.  These groups insist that there are no weaknesses of evolution—that it should be taught as established fact to Texas children.  (The full resolution is located at www.strengthsandweaknesses.org.)

Well known scientific weaknesses of neo-Darwinian evolution include:

·         The spontaneous origin of life from non-living chemicals--no favored explanation or hypothesis exists, even among die-hard evolutionists

·         The origin of information contained in the DNA molecules

·         The Cambrian Explosion of life and other abrupt appearances of life forms in the fossil record

·         Irreducibly complex (IC) features of life

·         The near-absence of transitional forms or features and a corresponding abundance of data showing stability of life forms (stasis) in the fossil record

Dr. Ide Trotter adds, "…the Darwinian activist attack on current Texas standards actually undermines a fundamental principle of science.  Science is, and science teaching should be, grounded in investigation and not indoctrination." 

For more information, see http://www.strengthsandweaknesses.org.

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Press only:  Ide Trotter (214-543-3613)  press@strengthsandweaknesses.org
 Teach more evolution, not less—strengths and weaknesses—and let the fittest theories survive.

More information may be found at
 http://www.strengthsandweaknesses.org/PressKit.htm and other pages on the TBSE website.

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Press only:  press@strengthsandweaknesses.org

Teach more evolution, not less—strengths and weaknesses—and let the fittest theories survive.