virginia power (or not?)

Can anyone in the awareness of things tell me

1. why VA still has a separate Lt. Govenor race from the Governor one
2. if the Lt. Gov has any power at all other than "if the Governor should be unable to perform his duties..." (like the Vice Pres has Senate tie-breaking powers in the Federal Gov)
   
3. (in speculation) why VA would vote so overwhelmingly for Kaine (D) and still vote for Bolling (R) for Lt.
   
   I mean, I respect that people aren't just "voting the party line", but I can't quite figure out why...

And yesterday continued its support for a statement I made yesterday morning: I've never seen a bond referendum fail in Loudoun since I moved here.

Kansas repeats itself while Dover Repeats Kansas...

Bad News: Kansas State BOE has voted to include "Intelligent Design" in the curriculum.  This time, this one actually has the support of the DI (Dover didn't) and is the fight the DI would have preferred to have had Dover not gone first.

Good News: Dover repeated Kansas's 2000 vote after 1999's removal of Evolution from the Kansas education standards -- all eight members of the Dover school board have been voted out.  Granted, they were sitting in a trial the last 5 weeks rather than campaigning, but it goes to show that you reap what you sow.  The trial is costing the county tons of money (even with the Thomas More center working pro bono) and has made the small town a laughing stock in the nation.  Religious ferver notwithstanding, the people of that town didn't expect to vote themselves into social martyrdom 4 years ago.

Interestingly, given that the town is rather overwhelmingly Republican, the CARES campaigners that ran against the current board on a Democratic slate are actually mostly Republicans.  Also, CARES doesn't intend to remove ID entirely, but will move it to the creation stories section of an elective comparative religion class (where it belongs, though I doubt they'll teach the fact that ID really makes for bad theology even more so than bad science...).  Interestingly enough #2, voter turnout in Dover was only 35%, which for a decision of that magnitude is really rather pathetic (though better than the county Dover is in, where it only reached 20%).

Indifferent News: It does make an appeal of the case (given the high probability of a win for the plaintiffs) less likely, meaning Kansas rather than Dover will be the case to go to federal courts and finally nail ID as a form of religion that shouldn't be "taught" (again, what's there to teach?) in public schools.  The new school board will take over on December 5th; the judgement may not be rendered until the end of the year.  What isn't known is whether or not the new school board will withdraw the case prior to judgement.  Unlikely, but possible, and if they do so, its sets no precedent (even if it wouldn't be totally applicable given the different districts) for the inevitable Kansas case.

Update: oh, and the Kansas standards actually both redefine "science" to remove skepticism (having the effect of therefore removing any teaching of recognizing pseudoscience when its presented), and actually includes requiring the teaching of a flat out lie: the basic Darwinian theory that all life had a common origin and that natural chemical processes created the building blocks of life have been challenged in recent years by fossil evidence and molecular biology.  This is absolutely false in every letter -- had some fossil evidence or molecular evidence discredited common descent (common descent is something even the majority of ID supporters say they "believe" is true) those scientists would be on the gravy train for life and more famous than Darwin himself.  Every fossil, every aspect of genetics and DNA and organic chemistry continues to support common descent.

Teaching children lies in public schools is not something we as a country should pay for, or tolerate.

"they say we lack vision; we don't see that..."

Consider this vision statement: "The issue of government has always been whether individual men and women will have to serve some system of government of economics -- or whether a system of government and economics exists to serve individual men and women."

The words are Franklin D. Roosevelt's from his 1932 speech to the Commonwealth Club of San Francisco, FDR's boldest statement of purpose before he was elected. Roosevelt's point was that while powerful groups often claim to oppose a strong government role in the nation's economic life, they almost always seek government's protection for their own interests. Government's task, Roosevelt argued, was to intervene "not to hamper individualism but to protect it" by helping the less powerful confront economic difficulties and abuses of the system by the powerful.

Whatever message Democrats come up with, they will continue to lose ground and be untrue to what's best in their tradition if they fail to stand up for this affirmative government role in enhancing both individual liberty and self-sufficiency.

-- E.J.Dionne Jr, "Vision Check for the Democrats"