Alonzo and vjack have already blogged in more detail about this, so, as there’s really nothing to add to them in a serious way…
… I have, naturally, to invoke Monty Python. 
Now, some people — even non-creationists (a.k.a. people who don’t ignore evidence just because it contradicts a book written by Bronze Age desert nomads who could only imagine supernatural explanations for anything they didn’t know, and who thought the world was just a few generations old) are saying that people will be electing a president, not a biologist, so the candidates’ stance on evolution doesn’t really matter.
In other words, they’re free to believe in something really absurd, ignoring all the evidence to the contrary, but “otherwise, they’re perfectly all right”.
Remember the classic mattress sketch?
Groom: Er yes. We’d like to buy a bed…a double bed…about fifty pounds?
Verity: Oh no, I’m afraid not, sir. Our cheapest bed is eight hundred pounds, sir.
Groom: Eight hundred pounds!
Lambert: Or, er, perhaps I should have explained. Mr Verity does tend to exaggerate, so every figure he gives you will be ten times too high. Otherwise he’s perfectly all right, perfectly ha, ha, ha.
and, later,
Verity: Lambert! Will you show these twenty good people the, er, dog kennels, please?
Lambert: Mm? Certainly.
Groom: Dog kennel? No, no, no, mattresses, mattresses!
Verity: Oh no, no you have to say dog kennel to Mr Lambert because if you say mattress he puts a bag over his head. I should have explained. Apart from that he’s really all right.
See what I mean? It’s not “really all right”. In at least one thing, they’re showing that they’re either a) completely nuts, or b) cowardly pandering to those who are. They’re unwilling to think critically, to consider the available evidence, and to ask the experts on the subject… or they’re dishonest, cowardly, and devoid of any integrity.
And you want those guys to run your country?
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I am tempted to agree. But on the otherhand, people do often act differently with religion than with anything else in their compartmentalized brain. A lot of great scientists were religious..and I assume you wouldn’t say they didn’t think critically. I realize being religious=/=being a creationist, but both follow from the simply idea of ignoring logic and making bad decisions based on it.
Now I’d much rather have an evolutionist and an atheist as president, but I do know it is fair to say someone other than that would do a horrible job…
Thanks for the link. The subject of candidates pandering to Christian voters has always been a difficult one for me. I wish they wouldn’t do it, and it does make me think less of them. Still, I understand that I live in a country where they probably have to do it if they want to be viable candidates (especially but certainly not exclusively on the Republican side).
I, as a Christian, wish they would not pander to us also!
That said, do you still insist on calling things that reflect the color red’s wave-lengths “red”? Certainly they are all things but red and calling them red, in total disregard of the evidence, is absurd.
The point of that last statement. We all think we “know” things we cannot know or, at a minimum, cannot scientifically prove.
Only two groups in this area of discussion can know: agnostics and deists.
- agnostics know they don’t know
- deists, who have had an experience, know what they experienced. If we completely disregard all of these experiences we should also diregard all experience of scientific studies.
aethiesm is the only believe structure that can only be based on intellect.
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Atheism is not a belief structure. It is the lack of a belief in any god.
“deists, who have had an experience, know what they experienced. If we completely disregard all of these experiences we should also diregard all experience of scientific studies.”
The “experiences” of scientists are events that are testable, repeatable, and can be experienced by ANYONE who is testing or repeating the experiments. That’s a little different than someone saying they felt a warm glow while they were praying.
If you experienced a warm glow while you were praying, I can’t argue that you didn’t perceive that, but don’t expect me to take my word for it. If I tell you that DNA is the molecule that includes the genetic instructions for the development and growth of an organism, I don’t expect you to believe me either! Do the experiments yourself.