Evolution is a nice theory. Natural selection is apparently a natural fact. They are not the same. Extinction trumps all as for changing life on earth. We lose species, not gain them. Culling does not produce novel forms.

We most certainly have gained species (not to mention much greater taxonomic levels). We did not have tigers in the Cambrian Period. Neither did we have pigeons, people, or pterodactyls. For that matter, the entire Paleozoic Eon (which began with the Cambrian) lacked flowering plants, and the Precambrian (everything before the Paleozoic) pretty much lacked everything multicellular before 700 million years or so ago.

Don't take my word for it, go check it out: find a geologic map of, well anywhere, and go find the fossils that *should* not be in the sedimentary rocks in that area, given the ages shown. Thomas Huxley, when asked what would disprove evolution, said, "fossil rabbits in the Precambrian." Go find them! For that matter, go overturn the ages given, which are supported by thousands of radiometric analyses. Science awaits your new observations!

I'm not even being snarky here (except for the fact that I don't expect you to do any of this). But this is, actually, how science is done.

But it was known, from the beginning of paleontology and stratigraphy, in the late 18th/early 19th centuries, that life had changed drastically over Earth's history, and that its history did not jibe with Genesis. "Evolution" was a term in the air years before Darwin. He was just the first to break the code.

You've got 200 years of work to overturn. Get cracking.

How about we bring out the Bible in class, in Texas public schools, and examine Genesis 1 and 2 for internal logic and how they don't fit with geological, astronomical, and biological reality? For instance, how the two chapters differ in the order of life created, and (yes, even if you make "every day equal a billion years," or whatever) are both are falsified by the fossil record?

Oh, but you know the howl of rage that would rise if we started doing that! Mustn't insult the Fundies graven image, you know.

Also: what Yminale said, here:

Texas decision makes pro-evolution pro-science text books more expensive.

Economies of scale make textbooks published in many states cheaper. This is going to be bad, any way you look at it.

I am proud of everything I have done for the commodity and equity divisions of A.I.G.-F.P. I was in no way involved in -- or responsible for -- the credit default swap transactions that have hamstrung A.I.G. Nor were more than a handful of the 400 current employees of A.I.G.-F.P. Most of those responsible have left the company and have conspicuously escaped the public outrage.

All this time, we've been hearing how it was AIG Financial Products that were responsible for the CDS malarky that now threatens the world economy. Now DeSantis tells us, "Hey, it was just tiny, tiny minority, and they're all gone now?" So, gosh, I guess there's no one else to blame, then, and we better just pony up the wealthfare without questions.

But the fact that major portions of the economy are given over to "financial products," as opposed to actual production of goods and services, is a large part of how we got into this mess. Kevin Phillips refers to this process as financialization of the economy, and describes this, in Wealth and Democracy (and probably the more recent Bad Money, which I haven't read), as one of the main ways that rich world powers have, historically, become poorer second-tier players. So I have limited patience for hearing about the proud work of the Financial Products Division.

What the hell does free will have to do with free markets? I've been in social-democratic countries in Europe, and, somehow, despite the fact that they had, say, universal health coverage, I still retained my free will and freedom to speak. Are you saying you're defined by the products you buy?

Besides, for the last few decades, everything in our country has been micromanaged by our capitalist supermen. The result? The near-collapse of the world economy.

Matt Taibbi has a detailed article in Rolling Stone that lays out the (even) larger-scale financial shennanigans, how we got here, and how much we are on the hook (if that's even knowable). It's pretty shocking. (Link at sig.) Towards the end, he makes exactly the same point about how much the Fed is beyond control or accountability.

He sums the story up thus:

In essence, Paulson and his cronies turned the federal government into one gigantic, half-opaque holding company, one whose balance sheet includes the world's most appallingly large and risky hedge fund, a controlling stake in a dying insurance giant, huge investments in a group of teetering megabanks, and shares here and there in various auto-finance companies, student loans, and other failing businesses. Like AIG, this new federal holding company is a firm that has no mechanism for auditing itself and is run by leaders who have very little grasp of the daily operations of its disparate subsidiary operations.

...on the linear spectrum of capitalism to socialism, where exactly are we now? Is there a dictionary word that even describes what we are now?

Bring back Glass-Steagall, or something just like it. There needs to be a firewall again between banking and, well, gambling.