After about the millionth time reading how Cheney, Addison, and co. believe the constitution grants the president absolute power over the military and foreign relations, I had to go back to re-read the constitution. This Cheney version is just not how I remember it from high school civics class mumble-mumble years ago.

Sure enough, the constitution I found on line bears no resemblance to their fictional document. (Google pointed me here http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.overview.html - I'm sure there are many other options).

Rather than quote at length from the section on congress's powers and the president's powers I'll point out some highlights. I urge you to read it in context.

Congress has the power to:

To define and punish ... offenses against the law of nations (clearly the US is not considered the sole definer of international law)

To declare war ... and make rules concerning captures on land and water; (Congress has the explicit power to take charge of POWs)

To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces; (can't get much plainer than that!)

The president:

The President shall be commander in chief of the Army and Navy of the United States ... (I read this as: he will be the top general and be in control of all tactical planning subject to the restrictions above)

He shall have power, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to make treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; (no power to make or break treaties without Senate concurrence)

And last but not least, I consider breaching of the oath of office (I ... will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States) by attempting to circumvent the constitution to be treasonous and grounds for impeachment. The attacks on the constitution of the United States by the administration of President Bush necessitate calling for his impeachment.

I'm aghast that people can be having serious discussions about whether or not we should attack Iran when our military is stretched to (and some say, beyond) its limits in Iraq. It's common wisdom that the relatively paltry 25,000 troop surge has to end in the spring because we don't have the troops to continue beyond that. So when CheneyBush says we have to attack Iran I have to ask, "You and what army?"

A problem with arguing with anti-evolutionists is that there are a large number of quite different beliefs under one big umbrella. I think a successful way to debate them is to divide and conquer. First, figure out what kind of anti-evolutionist you are arguing against. At one extreme are the queasies, those who feel a little queasy at pulling god out of the equation entirely. I don't necessarily disagree with the queasies, there are points that we don't, and will probably never, understand via science. Even if science eventually could figure out all the "hows", science is not equipped to deal with the "whys". At some point, maybe some god in his majesty spoke his holy name, smote with his mighty war-hammer, or waved his noodly appendage, and made things happen along the path we know through science. I don't have any problem with that.

The problem with the queasies is that they can be swayed by "holes in the theory of evolution." OF COURSE THERE ARE HOLES! We don't even know all that's knowable yet!

But the other extreme is scary. The other extreme believes that any thought must start from certain premises defined their particular reading of the bible as literal truth. Science is incompatible with this set of beliefs. Science starts with observation of reality and follows it where it may lead.

But here's where the divide and conquer strategy comes in. Each truly anti-science anti-evolutionist depends on his OWN peculiar reading of the bible. There are young-earthers, there are old-earthers, there are all sorts of levels of science that these people are willing to throw out to make their peculiar beliefs balance out. Some have to eliminate virtually all of modern science from carbon dating to cosmology. If you figure out how much science they are trying to throw out, you should be able to either embarrass them in public or get them squabbling amongst themselves.

As long as we're in the position of defending darwinism, we'll be on a turf that is too sophisticated for the average american who'll throw up his hands and say, "It's all too complicated for me, I'll go with whatever my pastor says". But if we can force anti-science types to defend the depth of absurdity that they truly believe, I think we can protect our science education.

Just ask 'em. "So what exactly do you believe? Was Noah's ark literally true? Does carbon dating work? How old is the earth?"

BTW, this rhetorical strategy occurred to me at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History last February. I had just finished marveling at the wonder of evolution from the exhibits there when we reached an exhibit explicitly referring to the evolution of mankind. Sure enough, there was a smug little bastard there scoffing at how anyone could believe such lies. We argued a bit - perhaps more than a bit, I embarrassed my 10 year old daughter - my bottom line being, "teach science in school, not religion". He kept "pointing out holes in current theory" from some rote crap that wasn't even internally consistent, but he was absolutely deaf to my (ahem) brilliant arguments. After my daughter led me gently away I played it over and over in my head and concluded that I'd spent the whole time on the defensive, and didn't even know what level of wack-dom this guy represented. For all I know he believed that 2 of every animal was literally on Noah's ark and then I could have just laughed in his face as I walked off.