Evolved?
In his latest column for openDemocracy, Dave Belden writes how In the US now, it is just about possible to go from cradle to grave in fundamentalist institutions ... A smart young woman interning in my office was off to study biology at a Christian college, where you can get a four-year biology degree minus evolution: a pretzel baked by a magician.
And so to Texas, where, the New York Times reports, A biology professor who insists that his students accept the tenets of human evolution has found himself the subject of scrutiny by the US Justice Department.
The fundamentalist finger points at one Professor Michael Dini, associate professor of biology at Texas Tech University.
The finger belongs to the Liberty Legal Institute, a collection of Christian lawyers who claim that Dini, like so many others, has discriminated against students on the grounds of religion.
The Professors mistake was to demand that, when answering the question of how the human species originated, students seeking a letter of recommendation for postgraduate studies truthfully and forthrightly affirm a scientific answer.
At least one of the students, 22-year-old Micah Spradling, was outraged.
On his personal website, Dini had written, The central, unifying principle of biology is the theory of evolution. How can someone who does not accept the most important theory in biology expect to properly practice in a field that is so heavily based on biology?
Oops!
The Liberty Legal Institute jumped on Spradlings case, filing an official complaint. Spradling said that there was no way he would have enrolled for Dinis classes had he known his position on creationism.
That would be denying my faith as a Christian, he said. Theyve taken prayer out of schools and the Ten Commandments out of courtrooms, so I thought I had an opportunity to make a difference.
That difference includes an investigation of Dini by the Department of Justices civil rights division.
Dini, for the record, is described as a devout Catholic. He insists that all he wanted to do was ensure that people who I recommend to a medical school or a professional school or a graduate school in the biomedical sciences are scientists.
No such luck. Heres one of his other students, 20-year-old Lindsay Otoski: Just because someone believes in creationism doesnt mean he shouldnt give them a recommendation. Its not fair.
The next step, says the Legal Liberty Institute, is to file a lawsuit against the university.
Holy cola!
And so on to Derby, England, where an Islamic cola has hit the UK markets.
Under the catch line Liberate your taste, the cola, produced by the Derby-based Qibla Company, hopes to rival market-giants Coca-Cola and Pepsi. In fact, according to Qibla spokesman Abdul Hameed Ebrahim, the taste is somewhere in between Coke and Pepsi.
Wow!
Qibla is the Arabic word for the direction of Mecca. Mecca is a rival Islamic cola. So is Zamzam, which is also a holy spring in Mecca. It gets confusing.
The Qibla co.s posters are something else. Pictures of 1.5 litre bottles sit next to images of Palestinian deaths. One poster tells the punter its Time to make a choice!. A bottle of Qibla Cola eclipses another bottle adorned with the stars and stripes.
The founder Zahida Perveen had the idea from the growing sentiment against global brands and resentment against them in the Muslim world, explains Ebrahim. The company will donate 10% of its profits to Islamic charities. The whole basis for the company is ethical, Ebrahim says. The company is promoting an anti-injustice approach, an anti-exploitation approach.
The drink will be marketed to Muslim communities in Britains major cities.
The BBC says that Mecca Cola sells about two million 1.5 litre bottles every month in Britain. It has just launched in Paris and is also being exported to Germany, Belgium, Italy and Spain.
(Source: BBC Online)
Liberal harvest
From coke to smack, and the poppy fields of Afghanistan.
The United Nations drugs agency reported this week that the newly liberated country remains the worlds largest producer of opium.
In 2002, despite a comprehensive ban on drug production and trade by President Hamid Karzai, Afghanistan produced almost three quarters of the worlds opium.
The solution? According to Antonio Maria Costa, Director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, nothing short of democratic structures, the rule of law, and political, social and economic development.
Hold on, isnt that also the plan for a post-liberated Iraq?
China ops.
Just as the Year of the Goat is centred on a strong and clear motivation for peace, harmony ad tranquillity during challenging times, we are equally intent on our mission to safeguard America and its people.
Who is we? Would you believe, the CIA?
Its true. The US Central Intelligence Agency has launched a drive for new Chinese-American recruits. Why work for a company when you can serve the nation? the CIA asks in large adverts spread across newspapers and magazines read by Americas Chinese community. They are accompanied with a large Happy New Year printed in Chinese characters.
Stealing an inspiring slogan of the Diarys, the advert asks readers to stay true to our global focus.
The Agency hopes to appeal to The extraordinary citizen who wants more than a job and, of course, who wants to take a lie detector test and spy on China.
In fact, the CIA could not do a better job of announcing the focus for their future spy operations. According to CIA spokesman Mark Mansfield, the ads are an opportunity to reach some Chinese-Americans who otherwise might not consider a career in the CIA ... Were certainly looking for more people with area expertise, cultural knowledge and language skills.
China analysts (spies) are promised that they will contribute to a process reaching right to the top of national policy decisions.
So now we know where the Bush administration gets its ideas from.
Trouser stakes
Finally, to Kenya.
In the western town of Eldoret, women took to the streets in protest this week. They are demanding government protection from a gang of young men who are attacking women in trousers, and stripping them naked.
Twenty-three men, all members of the Mungiki religious sect, were charged with assault. Their aim (as in, their reason for stripping women of their trousers) is to uphold the traditional values of the Kikuyu ethnic group, which include female circumcision. One member broke his leg after falling in a ditch when he failed to catch a fleeing female trouser-wearer.
Rumours were spreading around Eldoret on Friday that Vice President Michael Wamalwa had ordered women to stop wearing trousers. Wamalwa denies his involvement.
One of the victims was Rachel Muzone Nganga. I felt so bad, I felt so humiliated, she told the BBC Focus on Africa programme.
Still, it wont stop her wearing trousers. Its my right, she said, affirmatively.
Quotes of the week
There is no point in testing Europeans on food while they are being tested on Iraq.
A classic from an unnamed senior White House official quoted in the New York Times. It refers to the US decision to postpone filing a case against the EU for its ban on genetically modified food. The story appeared in the IHT under the inside-page sub-headline Bush ready for war, but not on crops.
Show weakness now and no one will ever believe us when we try to show strength in the future.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair, insisting that the United States and Britain will not back down in their confrontation with Iraq.
"The fixation on a smoking gun is fascinating to me. You all ... have been watching 'L.A. Law' or something too much."
US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, chastising reporters for expecting too much from Secretary Powell's presentation.
One of the most bitter defeats I have known.
German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, responding to his loss in state elections.
We were against military action and we remain against it now.
Schröder again, insisting his governments policy towards war with Iraq has not changed.
Mr Schröder is personally responsible for the breakdown of European solidarity.
Friedbert Pflueger, a Christian Democratic Union parliamentarian.
We have the right to have something to be proud of.
President Saparmurad Niyazov of Turkmenistan, explaining to his cabinet why he is going to start handing out free Mercedes cars to top officials (like members of the cabinet).
Figures of the week
3,000
The reported number of precision bombs and missiles that are likely to be employed in the first two days of an attack on Iraq.
$500 billion
The proposed annual US defence budget by the end of the decade
Contact the Diary Editor: Dominic.Hilton@openDemocracy.net
