The Schwarz Report

Dr. Fred Schwarz Volume 44, Number 2 Dr. David Noebel February 2004 Our 51st Year! Lady in Pink by John Perazzo Inside If Howard Dean is increasingly the voice of Democrats in America today, activist Jodie Evans is the face of the Democrats’ future. A radical activist and Democratic fund- raiser, she mirrors the Party’s core on its three most important issues: hating President The Unraveling of Scientific Bush, denouncing the war and engineering the L.A. Times’ last-minute sexual harassment Materialism accusations against Arnold Schwarzenegger during the California recall election. by Phillip E. Johnson, Page 3 Evans rose to prominence via her role in Code Pink for Peace, a self-described “grassroots peace and social justice movement” formed just one year ago to organize Mr. Johnson explains that when one separates the public protests against America’s impending war in Iraq. Though its leaders benignly philosophy of Darwinism from the science of present themselves to the public as ordinary, concerned women who would simply rather Darwinism, the proud tower collapses. “wage peace” than go to war, this group was in fact founded by four experienced activ- ists and hardcore communists – Jodie Evans, Medea Benjamin, Diane Wilson, and a radical Wiccan activist calling herself Starhawk. Code Pink works closely with United For Peace and Justice, whose leader Leslie Cagan is a longtime devotee of Fidel Castro and the Socialist Party USA. Another Code Pink ally is Medea Benjamin’s group Global Exchange, which has Communist Party/Democrat Party strong ties to the communist Workers World Party. Imbued with a deep hatred for the by Lowell Ponte, Page 6 United States and capitalism in general, Benjamin is a pro-Castro activist who lived in Mr. Ponte suggests that the Communist Party Cuba (and was married to a Cuban) and was a principal organizer of the 1999 Seattle USA is moving right as the Democrat Party is riots in which some 50,000 protesters wreaked havoc and tried to shut down the World moving left. When will they converge? Read the Trade Organization meetings. speculation. Throughout the 1990s, in fact, many of the Marxists currently working for Code Pink were busy organizing anti-free trade protests – some of them violent – and filing numerous high-profile lawsuits that forced American corporations to spend enormous sums of money to defend themselves. When we examine the backgrounds of Code Pink’s major players, we find that they have very little in common with “average, every- day, concerned” American women or activists just interested in peace. Jodie Evans, for instance, sits on the board of directors of the Rain Forest Action The Schwarz Report Bookshelf Network (RAN), a coalition of anti-capitalist, anti-corporate environmentalist groups. To see a complete list of books recommended by RAN’s co-founder Michael Roselle also founded the Earth Liberation Front, which the the Christian Anti-Communism Crusade, please FBI ranks alongside the Animal Liberation Front as the foremost domestic terrorism check out our website at www.schwarzreport.org. threats in the United States. According to the FBI, during the past seven years those two This site also has back issues of The Schwarz groups have been responsible for more than 600 criminal acts and $43 million in dam- Report as well as other great resources. ages. And in 1985, Code Pink spokeswoman Sand Brim, who was then the executive director of Medical Aid, flew an American neurosurgeon to San Salvador to operate on the combat-wounded hand of Marxist Revolutionary Party Commander Nidia Diaz, And do not participate in whose group had recently murdered four American Marines and nine civilians. (MASH the unfruitful deeds of dark- star and celebrity “antiwar” activist Mike Farrell assisted in the general’s surgery.) ness, but instead expose Code Pink now consists of more than 90 chapters in numerous American cities and them. Ephesians 5:11 such far-flung nations as Costa Rica, Norway, and India. Mocking the Bush Administration’s color-coded security alerts, the “Code Pink Alert” warns that this ad- Dwell on the past and you’ll lose an eye; forget the past and you’ll lose both eyes.” Old Russian Proverb THE SCHWARZ REPORT / FEBUARY 2004 ministration poses “extreme danger to all the values of nurtur- tinue to resist the occupation in their own way.” ing, caring, and compassion that women and loving men have Similarly, Evans and her cohorts had blamed America held.” Professing their commitment to “wage peace,” Code for all of Iraq’s ills during the pre-war months of late 2002. At Pink members see no justification for war under any circum- that time, she claimed, “a child with cancer cannot get pain stances – where the U.S. is concerned. relief or medication because of sanctions. Childhood diarrhea In addition to scorning America’s military action in Iraq, has again become a major killer. Five hundred thousand chil- Code Pink members also condemn the racism, sexism, pov- dren have already died from inadequate health care, water erty, corporate corruption, and environmental degradation they and food supplies due to sanctions.” Yet they uttered nary a claim are rampant in the U.S. In this respect, Code Pink is word about the reason why those sanctions had been put in like other prominent “peace” movements in our country – place: Saddam’s refusal to honor the very pledges he had portraying America as a moral cesspool and an imperialist made following the first Gulf War in 1991. Nor did they bother aggressor, while remaining mute about whatever barbarities to mention that while Iraq’s overall population struggled occur anywhere else on earth. Not even the pre-war atroci- through the era of sanctions, Saddam and his inner circle lived ties of Saddam Hussein drew a scintilla of condemnation from like royalty, illegally diverting countless billions of “oil-for- Code Pink. food” dollars into their own pockets. Proclaiming that “women have been the guardians of life Criticizing the cost of the current war, Code Pink laments . . . because the men have busied themselves making war,” that “in the United States of America, many of our elders . . . Code Pink calls on “women around the world to rise up and now must choose whether to buy their prescription drugs, or oppose the war in Iraq. We call on mothers, grandmothers, food. Our children’s education is eroded. The air they breathe sisters and daughters . . . and every ordinary outraged woman and the water they drink are polluted. Vast numbers of women willing to be outrageous for peace.” During one Code Pink and children live in poverty.” The threat of distant terrorists, demonstration in Washington, D.C., participants marched up claims Code Pink, is insignificant when compared to the “real the steps of the Capitol, unfurled their slogan-bearing ban- threats” we face every day: “the illness or ordinary accident ners, and stripped down to the dove-adorned bras and pant- that could plunge us into poverty, the violence on our own ies they wore beneath their clothes. “We’re putting our bod- streets, the corporate corruption that can result in the loss of ies on the line,” they shouted. “You Congresspeople better our jobs, our pensions, our security.” get some spine. We say ‘Stand back, don’t attack – innocent “We choose pink,” they say, “the color of roses, the children in Iraq!’” Another popular chant was, “We don’t beauty that like bread is food for life; the color of the dawn of want your oil war. Peace is what we’re calling for!” a new era when cooperation and negotiation prevail over Every day for four months, Code Pink also staged all- force.” Such women obstinately refuse to acknowledge that day antiwar vigils at the White House. Moreover, it initiated a they are free to wax poetic in this manner only because others campaign that involved presenting pink slips (women’s linge- before them won their security by fighting the very real en- rie) to President Bush and other pro-war officials – a meta- emies that sought to destroy our civilization. Moreover, they phor for pink slips of the paper variety, which are given to despise the very society for which those men gave their lives. employees whose jobs are being terminated. These unique In addition to her Code Pink duties, Jodie Evans also sits tactics have brought Code Pink’s members considerable na- on the advisory board of the International Occupation Watch tional news coverage and many talk show invitations. (IOW) center in Iraq, which Code Pink helped establish. The Earlier this year Jodie Evans led a delegation of fifteen organizers of Occupation Watch — Medea Benjamin and Code Pink women to Baghdad, where they met with Iraqi Leslie Cagan — explicitly declared their purpose in setting up women for the purpose of “creat[ing] the understanding that headquarters in Baghdad was to thin U.S. forces by getting the people of Iraq are no different than you and me.” “We soldiers to declare themselves conscientious objectors. understand,” said Evans, “the love of a mother in Iraq for her IOW also monitors American abuses during the recon- children, and the driving desire of that child for life . . . We who struction of Iraq. Implying that America’s true motivation for cherish children will not consent to their murder. Nor do we attacking Iraq was to seize its oil fields, IOW proudly asserts consent to the murder of their mothers, grandmothers, fathers, its intent to “advocate for the Iraqis’ right to control their own grandfathers, or to the deaths of our own sons and daughters in resources, especially oil.” No mention is made of the fact a war for oil.” She said nothing about the fathers, grandfathers, that, for decades, Iraq’s oil was controlled, not by Iraqis, but mothers and children murdered, tortured or raped by Saddam by Saddam Hussein for his own aggrandizement. IOW fur- Hussein’s regime, nor its 12-year refusal to abide by the terms ther purports to be “a watchdog regarding the military occu- of the UN’s many resolutions. While in Baghdad, Evans and pation and U.S.-appointed government, including possible her companions repeatedly and publicly painted America as an violations of human rights, freedom of speech, and freedom unprovoked aggressor, and Iraqis as noble defenders of their of assembly.” Again, no mention is made of the fact that these invaded homeland. “Children continue to die of hunger,” they are American concepts that had not seen the light of day in reported, “and electricity is unreliable. However, Iraqis con- Iraq since the moment Saddam first rose to power. 2 THE SCHWARZ REPORT / FEBRUARY 2004

Clearly, Code Pink is but another in a long line of “peace” women to come forward and tell the L.A. Times their allega- groups whose main goal is to blame the United States for tions against Arnold Schwarzenegger. Moreover, she helped every conceivable international crisis. If peace were indeed organize picketing sessions in front of Schwarzenegger’s cam- Code Pink’s chief concern, surely it would be able to find paign headquarters. Yet her purported concern for the pro- something to say about wars elsewhere in the world. If “nur- tection of women is wholly subordinate to her partisan politi- turing, caring, and compassion” were in fact what Evans and cal affiliations. For instance, she had nothing to say about her ilk cared about, surely they would utter at least a few Gray Davis’ well-documented episodes of violent and ob- words about human rights abuses in some nation other than scene behavior toward female staffers. Nor, for that matter, the United States. Instead they trace all of humanity’s afflic- did Evans impugn the ill-advised remarks of her friend Bob tions to the doorstep of America. Mulholland, the California Democratic Party spokesman, who As a far leftist, Evans has found a comfortable political told ABC News that “Schwarzenegger is going to find out, home in the Democratic Party. Indeed she was a key that unlike a Hollywood movie set, the bullets coming at him fundraiser for her longtime friend and political ally, former in this campaign are going to be real bullets and he is going to California governor Gray Davis. Evans’ ex-husband, Westside have to respond to them.” financier Max Palevsky, actually appointed Davis to his first In short, Evans’ posturing as a champion of human de- political job as the fundraiser for Tom Bradley’s 1973 Los cency is nothing more than a political battering ram selectively Angeles mayoral campaign. Shortly thereafter, Evans and aimed only at those with whom she disagrees. Similarly, her Davis worked closely together during the latter’s stint as chief posturing as a woman deeply devoted to “peace” is but a of staff to then-governor Jerry Brown. mask for her real agenda: the blanket condemnation not only In the weeks preceding the recent California governor’s of our nation’s foreign policy, but its very way of life. recall election, Evans was instrumental in convincing several —FrontPageMagazine.com, December 8, 2003 The Unraveling of Scientific tion, then winning the debate should have been no problem for Lewontion and Sagan, even with a fundamentalist jury. Materialism The statement “We breed a great variety of dogs,” which rests on direct observation, is much easier to prove than the state- by Phillip E. Johnson ment that the earth goes around the sun, which requires so- In a retrospective essay on Carl Sagan in the January 9, phisticated reasoning. Not even the strictest biblical literalists 1997 New York Review of Books, Harvard Genetics Pro- deny the bred varieties of dogs, the variation of finch beaks, fessor Richard Lewontin tells how he first met Sagan at a and similar instances within types. The more controversial public debate in Arkansas in 1964. The two young scientists claims of large-scale evolution are what arouse skepticism. had been coaxed by senior colleagues to go to Little Rock to Scientists may think they have good reasons for believing that debate the affirmative side of the question: “RESOLVED, living organisms evolved naturally from nonliving chemicals, that the theory of evolution is as proved as is the fact that the or that complex organs evolved by the accumulation of earth goes around the sun.” Their main opponent was a biol- micromutations through natural selection, but having reasons ogy professor from a fundamentalist college, with a Ph.D. is not the same as having proof. I have seen people, previ- from the University of Texas in Zoology. Lewontin reports no ously inclined to believe whatever “science says,” become details from the debate, except to say that “despite our abso- skeptical when they realize that the scientists actually do seem lutely compelling arguments, the audience unaccountably voted to think that variations in finch beaks or peppered moths, or for the opposition.” the mere existence of fossils, proves all the vast claims of Of course, Lewontin and Sagan attributed the vote to “evolution.” It is as though the scientists, so confident in their the audience’s prejudice in favor of creationism. The resolu- answers, simply do not understand the question. tion was framed in such a way, however, that the affirmative Carl Sagan described the theory of evolution in his final side should have lost even if the jury had been composed of book as the doctrine that “human beings (and all the other spe- Ivy League philosophy professors. How could the theory of cies) have slowly evolved by natural processes from a succes- evolution even conceivably be “proved” to the same degree sion of more ancient beings with no divine intervention needed as “the fact that the earth goes around the sun”? The latter is along the way.” It is the alleged absence of divine intervention an observable feature of present-day reality, whereas the throughout the history of life—that explains why a great many former deals primarily with non-repeatable events of the very people, only some of whom are biblical fundamentalists, think distant past. The appropriate comparison would be between that Darwinian evolution (beyond the micro level) is basically the theory of evolution and the accepted theory of the origin materialistic philosophy disguised as scientific fact. Sagan him- of the solar system. self worried about opinion polls showing that only about 10 If “evolution” referred only to currently observable phe- percent of Americans believe in a strictly materialistic evolu- nomena like domestic animal breeding or finch-beak varia- tionary process, and, as Lewontin’s anecdote concedes, some 3 THE SCHWARZ REPORT / FEBRUARY 2004 of the doubters have advanced degrees in the relevant sci- judge the reliability of scientific claims outside their fields of ences. Dissent as wide-spread as that must rest on some- specialty, and have to take the word of recognized authorities thing less easily remedied than mere ignorance of facts. on faith. “Who am I to believe about quantum physics if not Lewontin eventually parted company with Sagan over Steven Weinberg, or about the solar system if not Carl Sagan? how to explain why the theory of evolution seems so obvi- What worries me is that they may believe what Dawkins and ously true to mainstream scientists and so doubtful to much of Wilson tell them about evolution.” the public. Sagan attributed the persistence of unbelief to One major living scientific popularizer whom Lewontin ignorance and hucksterism and set out to cure the problem does not trash is his Harvard colleague and political ally Stephen with popular books, magazine articles, and television pro- Jay Gould. Just to fill out the picture, however, it seems that grams promoting the virtues of mainstream science over its admirers of Dawkins have as low an opinion of Gould as fringe rivals. Lewontin, a Marxist whose philosophical so- Lewontin has of Dawkins or Wilson. According to a 1994 phistication exceeds that of Sagan by several orders of mag- essay in the New York Review of Books by John Maynard nitude, came to see the issue as essentially one of basic intel- Smith, the dean of British neo-Darwinists, “the evolutionary lectual commitment rather than factual knowledge. biologists with whom I have discussed his [Gould’s] work The reason for opposition to scientific accounts of our tend to see him as a man whose ideas are so confused as to origins, according to Lewontin, is not that people are ignorant be hardly worth bothering with, but as one who should not be of facts, but that they have not learned to think from the right publicly criticized because he is at least on our side against the starting point. In his words, “The primary problem is not to creationists. All this would not matter, were it not that he is provide the public with the knowledge of how far it is to the giving non-biologists a largely false picture of the state of evo- nearest star and what genes are made of….Rather, the prob- lutionary theory.” Lewontin fears that non-biologists will fail lem is to get them to reject irrational and supernatural expla- to recognize that Dawkins is peddling pseudoscience; nations of the world, the demons that exist only in their imagi- Maynard Smith fears exactly the same of Gould. nations, and to accept a social and intellectual apparatus; Sci- If eminent experts say that evolution according to Gould ence, as the only begetter of truth.” What the public needs to is too confused to be worth bothering about, and others equally learn is that, like it or not, “We exist as material beings in a eminent say that evolution according to Dawkins rests on un- material world, all of whose phenomena are the consequences substantiated assertions and counterfactual claims, the public of material relations among material entities.” In a word, the can hardly be blamed for suspecting that grand-scale evolu- public needs to accept materialism, which means that they tion may rest on something less impressive than rock-solid, must put God (whom Lewontin calls the “Supreme Extrater- unimpeachable fact. Lewontin confirms this suspicion by ex- restrial”) in the trash can of history where such myths belong. plaining why “we” (i.e., the kind of people who read the New Although Lewontin wants the public to accept science York Review) reject out of hand the view of those who think as the only source of truth, he freely admits that mainstream they see the hand of the Creator in the material world: science itself is not free of the hokum that Sagan so often “We take the side of science in spite of the patent absur- found in fringe science. As examples he cites three influential dity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many scientists who are particularly successful at writing for the of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the public: E. O. Wilson, Richard Dawkins, and Lewis Thomas, tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just- “each of whom has put unsubstantiated assertions or so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commit- counterfactual claims at the very center of the stories they ment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions have retailed in the market. Wilson’s Sociobiology and On of science somehow compel us to accept a material explana- Human Nature rest on the surface of a quaking marsh of tion of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are unsupported claims about the genetic determination of every- forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an thing from altruism to xenophobia. Dawkins’ vulgarizations apparatus of investigation and a set concepts that produce ma- of Darwinism speak of nothing in evolution but an inexorable terial explanations, no matter how counterintuitive, no matter ascendancy of genes that are selectively superior, while the how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is entire body of technical advance in experimental and theo- absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine foot in the door. The retical evolutionary genetics of the last fifty years has moved eminent Kant scholar Lewis Beck used to say that anyone who in the direction of emphasizing nonselective forces in evolu- could believe in God could believe in anything. To appeal to an tion. Thomas, in various essays, propagandized for the suc- omnipotent deity is to allow that at any moment the regularities cess of modern scientific medicine in eliminating death from of nature may be ruptured, that miracles may happen.” disease, while the unchallenged statistical compilations on That paragraph is the most insightful statement of what is mortality show that in Europe and North America infectious at issue in the creation/evolution controversy that I have ever diseases…had ceased to be major causes of mortality by the read from a senior figure in the scientific establishment. It early decades of the twentieth century.” explains neatly how the theory of evolution can seem so cer- Lewontin laments that even scientists frequently cannot tain to scientific insiders, and so shaky to the outsiders. For 4 THE SCHWARZ REPORT / FEBRUARY 2004 scientific materialists the materialism comes first; the sci- fine science as the search for materialistic explanations will ence comes thereafter. We might more accurately term them find it useful to assume that such explanations always exist. “materialists employing science.” And if materialism is true, To suppose that a philosophical preference can validate a then some materialistic theory of evolution has to be true sim- cherished scientific theory is to define “science” as a way of ply as a matter of logical deduction, regardless of the evi- supporting prejudice. Yet that is exactly what the Darwinists dence. That theory will necessarily be at least roughly like seem to be doing, when their evidence is evaluated by critics neo-Darwinism, in that it will have to involve some combina- who are willing to question materialism. tion of random changes and law-like processes capable of One of those critics, bearing impeccable scientific cre- producing complicated organisms that (in Dawkins’ words) dentials, is Michael Behe, who argues that complex molecu- “give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose.” lar systems (such as bacterial and protozoan flagella, immune The prior commitment explains why evolutionary scien- systems, blood clotting, and cellular transport) are “irreduc- tists are not disturbed when they learn that the fossil record ibly complex.” This means that the systems incorporate ele- does not provide examples of gradual macroevolutionary trans- ments that interact with each other in such complex ways that formation, despite decades of determined effort by paleon- it is impossible to describe detailed, testable Darwinian mecha- tologists to confirm neo-Darwinian presuppositions. That is nisms for their evolution. (My review of Behe’s Darwin’s also why biological chemists like Stanley Miller continue in Black Box appeared in FT, October 1996.) Never mind for confidence even when geochemists tell them that the early now whether you think that Behe’s argument can prevail over earth did not have the oxygen-free atmosphere essential for sustained opposition from the materialists. The primary dis- producing the chemicals required by the theory of the origin pute is not over who is going to win, but about whether the of life in prebiotic soup. They reason that there had to be argument can even get started. If we know a priori that ma- some source (comets?) capable of providing the needed mol- terialism is true, then contrary evidence properly belongs un- ecules, because otherwise life would not have evolved. When der the rug, where it has always duly been swept. evidence showed that the period available on the early earth For Lewontin the public’s determined resistance to scien- for the evolution of life was extremely brief in comparison to tific materialism constitutes “a deep problem in democratic self- the time previously posited for chemical evolution scenarios, governance.” Quoting Jesus’ words from the Gospel of John, he Carl Sagan calmly concluded that the chemical evolution of thinks that “the truth that makes us free” is not an accumulation of life must be easier than we had supposed, because it hap- knowledge, but a metaphysical understanding (i.e., materialism) pened so rapidly on the early earth. that sets us free from belief in supernatural entities like God. How That is also why neo-Darwinists like Richard Dawkins are is the scientific elite to persuade or bamboozle the public to ac- not troubled by the Cambrian Explosion, where all the inverte- cept the crucial starting point? Lewontin turns for guidance to the brate animal groups appear suddenly and without identifiable most prestigious of all opponents of democracy, Plato. In his ancestors. Whatever the fossil record may suggest, those Cam- dialogue the Gorgias, Plato reports a debate between the ratio- brian animals had to evolve by accepted neo-Darwinian means, nalist Socrates and three sophists or teachers of rhetoric. The which is to say by material processes requiring no intelligent debaters all agree that the public is incompetent to make rea- guidance or supernatural input. Materialist philosophy demands soned decisions on justice and public policy. The question in no less. That is also why Niles Eldredge, surveying the ab- dispute is whether the effective decision should be made by ex- sence of evidence for macroevolutionary transformations in the perts (Socrates) or by the manipulators of words (the sophists). rich marine invertebrate fossil record, can observe that “evolu- In familiar contemporary terms, the question might be tion always seems to happen somewhere else,” and then de- stated as whether a court should appoint a panel of impartial scribe himself on the very next page as a “knee-jerk neo-Dar- authorities to decide whether the defendant’s product caused winist.” Finally, that is why Darwinists do not take critics of the plaintiff’s cancer, or whether the jury should be swayed materialist evolution seriously, but speculate instead about “hid- by rival trial lawyers each touting their own experts. Much den agendas” and resort immediately to ridicule. In their minds, turns on whether we believe that the authorities are truly im- to question materialism is to question reality. All these specific partial, or whether they have interests of their own. When the points are illustrations of what it means to say that “we” have an National Academy of Sciences appoints a committee to ad- a priori commitment to materialism. vise the public on evolution, it consists of persons picked in The scientific leadership cannot afford to disclose that part for their scientific outlook, which is to say their a priori commitment frankly to the public. Imagine what chance the acceptance of materialism. Members of such a panel know a affirmative side would have if the question for public debate lot of facts in their specific areas of research and have a lot to were rephrased candidly as “RESOLVED, that everyone lose if the “fact of evolution” is exposed as a philosophical should adopt an a priori commitment to materialism.” Every- assumption. Should skeptics accept such persons as impar- one would see what many now sense dimly: that a method- tial fact-finders? Lewontin himself knows too much about ological premise useful for limited purposes has been expanded cognitive elites to say anything so naïve, and so in the end he to form a metaphysical absolute. Of course people who de- gives up and concludes that “we” do not know how to get the 5 THE SCHWARZ REPORT / FEBRUARY 2004 NOVEMBER 2003 public to the right starting point. theory has to be protected from critical scrutiny. Lewontin is brilliantly insightful, but too crankily honest Gould’s essay is a tissue of half-truths aimed at putting to be as good a manipulator as his Harvard colleague Stephen the religious people to sleep, or luring them into a “dialogue” Jay Gould. Gould displays both his talent and his unscrupu- on terms set by the materialists. Thus Gould graciously al- lousness in an essay in the March 1997 issue of Natural His- lows religion to participate in discussions of morality or the tory, entitled “Nonoverlapping Magisteria” and subtitled “Sci- meaning of life, because science does not claim authority over ence and religion are not in conflict, for their teachings occupy such questions of value, and because “Religion is too impor- distinctly different domains.” With a subtitle like that, you can tant to too many people for any dismissal or denigration of the be sure that Gould is out to reassure the public that evolution comfort still sought by many folks from theology.” Gould leads to no alarming conclusions. True to form, Gould insists insists, however, that all such discussion must cede to science that the only dissenters from evolution are “Protestant funda- the power to determine the facts, and one of the facts is an mentalists who believe that every word of the Bible must be evolutionary process that is every bit as materialistic and pur- literally true.” Gould also insists that evolution (he never de- poseless for Gould as it is for Lewontin or Dawkins. If reli- fines the word) is “both true and entirely compatible with gion wants to accept a dialogue on those terms, that’s fine Christian belief.” Gould is familiar with nonliteralist opposi- with Gould—but don’t let those religious people think they tion to evolutionary naturalism, but he blandly denies that any get to make an independent judgment about the evidence that such phenomenon exists. He even quotes a letter written to supposedly supports the “facts.” And if the religious people the New York Times in answer to an op-ed essay by Michael are gullible enough to accept materialism as one of the facts, Behe, without revealing the context. You can do things like they won’t be capable of causing much trouble. that when you know that the media won’t call you to account. The debate about creation and evolution is not dead- The centerpiece of Gould’s essay is an analysis of the locked. Propagandists like Gould try to give the impression complete text of Pope John Paul’s statement of October 22, that nothing has changed, but essays like Lewontin’s and 1996 to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences endorsing evolu- books like Behe’s demonstrate that honest thinkers on both tion as “more than a hypothesis.” He fails to quote the Pope’s sides are near agreement on a redefinition of the conflict. Bib- crucial qualification that “theories of evolution which, in ac- lical literalism is not the issue. The issue is whether material- cordance with the philosophies inspiring them, consider the ism and rationality are the same thing. Darwinism is based on spirit as emerging from the forces Resourceof living matter, or as a an a prioriNotes commitment to materialism, not on a philosophi- mere epiphenomenon of this matter, are incompatible with the cally neutral assessment of the evidence. Separate the phi- truth about man.” Of course, a theory based on materialism losophy from the science, and the proud tower collapses. assumes by definition that there is no “spirit” active in this When the public understands this clearly, Lewontin’s Dar- world that is independent of matter. Gould knows this per- winism will start to move out of the science curriculum and fectly well, and he also knows, just as Richard Lewontin does, into the department of intellectual history, where it can gather that the evidence doesn’t support the claims for the creative dust on the shelf next to Lewontin’s Marxism. power of natural selection made by writers such as Richard —First Things, November 1997 Dawkins. That is why the philosophy that really supports the Communist Party/ World messenger bag ($23.99), a Political Affairs Maga- zine coffee mug ($15.99), or a shirt with the image of a pro- Democratic Party testor carrying a sign that reads “Bush Out 2004.” That’s right, the Communist Party USA has gone capital- by Lowell Ponte ist. It now exploits its brand name, built by years of anti-com- Looking for a perfect holiday gift for that lefty on your munist attacks, and now it is turning its brand into a cash cow. list? Try shopping at the Communist Party USA online. 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As Carl Bernstein the capitalist company making and marketing this merchan- of Woodward & Bernstein Nixon-slayer fame recounted in dise for them, CafePress.com (which can offer the same prod- his book Loyalties: A Son’s Memoir, his parents were among ucts with anybody’s logo on them, including yours). the thousands and thousands of secret Communist Party mem- “But we decided to produce our own products,” said bers knowingly brought in by Franklin Delano Roosevelt to Slattery. “What we’d been selling, it turned out, had not been re-make our government along what today are called “pro- made with union labor. We expect to have our own product gressive” lines. line back on sale very soon.” Attempts have been made to re-Americanize the Demo- I decided not to ask whether the CPUSA was going to cratic Party. Heartland politicians from President Harry Truman track down the sweat shops where what had already been to President Bill Clinton have tried, at least in rhetoric, to move sold was made, and to return all CPUSA profits from this their party back towards American mainstream centrism. Bill merchandise to the exploited workers. Neither did I ask Clinton has been part of the Democratic Leadership Council, a what using unionized labor would do to the price of their small movement of “New Democrats” trying to bring their Left- commie products, or how that higher price might reduce sales ward-drifting party back to sanity before it falls entirely off the and profit, or how they would react if these union workers extreme Left edge of the political spectrum. went on strike demanding ownership of the means of produc- But like werewolves drawn by the full moon, or like tion and 100 percent of the pie. salmon drawn to swim upstream to breed and die, Leftist The former Harvard University economist John Kenneth Democrats continue to be under the gravitational influence of Galbraith put forth a theory of “convergence,” arguing that the Marxist voodoo in their blood that keeps pulling them the United States and Soviet Union were becoming more like ever farther Leftward. This has produced disastrous political one another and were destined eventually to merge. Today, defeats that can be invoked by the single names of crushed of course, the Soviet Union is kaput and in the United States Leftist candidates – McGovern, Carter, Dukakis. voters have shifted internal power from the long-dominant And now the siren song of the lunatic Left is seducing Leftist party to America’s political party of the Right. Democrats again. Former Vermont Governor Howard Dean But “convergence” apparently is still happening on the cries out “Go Left, Young Persons, Go Left!” and the children gauche side of American politics. The Communist Party USA of Hamlin put one left foot in front of another as they march in is moving right, and not just in its embrace of capitalist mer- lockstep under his banner. Dean’s appeal is emotional – an chandising. unwavering snarl of hatred against President Bush and tradi- America’s Leftist media is reluctant to point this out, but tional American values. since 1984 the Communist Party USA has essentially ceased Last August Dean went so far as to accuse his rival Left- to function as a political party. ist candidates for President of being “too far to the right.” Beginning that year, it had such fear that a division among The first Governor to sign “same-sex unions” into law, and Leftist voters would re-elect Republican Ronald Reagan that the loudest voice criticizing America for deposing mass mur- the CPUSA simply told its members to vote for the Demo- dering megalomaniac Saddam Hussein, Dean’s name will soon cratic Party candidate. It has done so ever since, acting not join the roll of ultra-Leftist Democrat losers. like its own political party but as a special interest group aux- In this convergence between a right-moving Communist iliary of the Democratic Party. Party USA and a left-moving Democratic Party, the once- Indeed, with months to go before the Democrats pick dreaded CPUSA has become retro kitsch, the stuff of nostal- their 2004 slate, the Communist Party by October 2003 had gia and Andy Warhol art imitators. already directed its members, sight unseen, to support the One of the resident Lefties at Fox News Channel, Alan Democratic ticket as the only way to beat incumbent Repub- Colmes, now unashamedly makes his shockingly honest self- lican President George W. Bush. And why not, with the description the title of his new book: Red, White and Liberal. Democratic Party each year embracing more and more ele- Communism failed as a political movement in the United ments of an anti-capitalist Marxist agenda? States for a host of reasons, including a working class so pros- As David Horowitz has observed, the once-ideologically- perous that today roughly one-third of blue collar union mem- mighty CPUSA that used to dominate “progressive” politics bers vote Republican. (This is why the Democratic Party has is today “only a constituent part of the whole” Leftist mecha- always opposed letting workers decide how their mandatory nism for seizing power and confiscating private property in union dues may be used in politics, dues that traditionally have America. The same could be said for the Democratic Party. gone almost entirely to help Democratic candidates.) Notice that the Democratic Party has done nothing to re- The major reason the Communist Party USA has sup- ject, repudiate or distance itself from this support by its fellow ported wide-open immigration is that Marxist revolution re- Leftist comrades in the Communist Party. Is this because its quires a dissatisfied proletariat. In prosperous capitalist 7 THE SCHWARZ REPORT / FEBRUARY 2004 America this can be gotten only by importing a proletariat spots on their lists for $1.5 to $2 million.” from poorer nations. The Democratic Party in the U.S. scouts for potential The alternative class that sparked Marxist revolution in candidates with enough wealth to pay for their own campaigns unindustrialized Czarist Russia was the lumpenproletariat, made – and perhaps a bit more. As the old joke goes, does the up of the scum of society – e.g., status-seeking intellectuals. It name Pavlov ring a bell? Does the name of near-billionaire is now chic – indeed, de rigeur – to be fashionably Marxist on Democratic Senator from New Jersey Jon Corzine ring a cash the faculty of the typical American college or university cam- register? pus. At the least, it is a career enhancement, a plus for pro- We may not yet have the best government money can motion rather than a firing offense. buy, but in this regard the Democratic Party has led the way in But it’s clear from speaking for a few minutes with these selling our government to the highest bidders, foreign and elitist airheads that if Hitler instead of Stalin had won World domestic. Call it “U.S. Capitol Capitalism” or “Donkey Kong.” War II, they today would just as eagerly be embracing the swas- But perhaps the Democratic and Communist parties in tikas, style and rhetoric of national socialism instead of the ham- our nation will ultimately converge only in the growing similar- mer and sickle and red rhetoric of international socialism. ity of their ideas and not merge into a single party as they Capitalists have become the fastest growing class in effectively operate today. Communist China, the world’s most populous Marxist na- Geologists enjoy explaining how at present rates of tec- tion. Late last year capitalists there were pounding on the tonic continental plate drift, in 50 million years the forces that door seeking membership in the Communist Party. Why? cause California earthquakes will have turned Los Angeles Because as the Wall Street Journal observed, the CP is the into an island just off the coast of San Francisco. biggest old boy network in the land. Last November, after At the present rates of Rightward drift by the CPUSA decades of shutting them out, the Chinese Communist Party and relentless Leftward movement by the Democratic Party, Congress voted to allow “advanced element” (its apt code sometime before the 2012 national election the Democratic word for capitalist) citizens to apply for party membership. Party will actually be to the Left of the Communist Party USA. In Russia the Communist Party has welcomed capitalists By then the Democratic Party will have shrunk to third not only as members but also as its political candidates for party status and be generally viewed as a ship of fools, a barge office. The December 2 Moscow Times reported that “The of grafters, geezers and losers sailing into history’s sunset as did Communists, who have always positioned themselves as the the Whigs, Mugwumps and Know-Nothings before them. workers’ party fighting the evils of capitalism, have filled about The Communist Party will be much richer from the sell- a quarter of their party list [of candidates] with businessmen, ing of its products and will have more members than it does some of them millionaires.” today. But most of its member-customers will be brain-dead What’s in this for the capitalists? A possible seat in the pseudo-intellectuals and artists at rural state universities and national legislature, the Duma, and the potential power that junior colleges who impress one another by flashing CPUSA goes with such a position. Survival requires power in a ruth- membership cards and logo-emblazoned underwear. less Russian political culture that has never experienced the The CPUSA will have succeeded at last, but in the same Western Enlightenment, as Russian President Vladimir Putin way that the 19th Century socialist communes of Amana and just demonstrated. Oneida did – not as cities on a hill that attracted widespread What’s in this for the Communists, whose leaders have imitation, but as joint stock companies that became famous taken heat from the ideological faithful for embracing capital- for selling products that capitalist consumers wanted to buy. ists? These businesspeople are “capable managers,” Party The CPUSA could become the next Victoria’s Secret, and leader Gennady Zyuganov told the Moscow Times, who can Marx & Engels could become the next Ben & Jerry’s. contribute to Russia’s development. He adds, according to And heartland America, healthier and more prosperous Times reporter Francesca Mereu, that the Communist Party than ever before, by 2012 will be celebrating our newly-elected of Russia “no longer opposes private property.” first Hispanic President, 35-year-old George P. Bush, son of Ah, if only we could say the same for the Democratic Jeb. We will have forgotten that anachronistic Leftist Demo- Party in the United States! And if only they would permit crats and Communists even exist….at least outside the hot- America to adopt the same economically-liberating 13 per- house zoo enclosures called universities. And the future will cent flat tax that became law in 2001 in Russia! (The Bush be bright. Administration put such a flat tax in place in Iraq and should And come what may, Santa Claus – along with his politi- propose the same here.) cally incorrect fur, leather, tobacco pipe, overweight, moral “A businessman on a party list means money,” said judgmentalism, and exploited reindeer and elves – will con- Nikolai Petrov, an analyst with the Carnegie Moscow Cen- tinue to wear red. ter, to Mereu. She reports learning that “parties can sell good —FrontPageMagazine.com, December 16, 2003 Founded in 1953, the Christian Anti-Communism Crusade, under the leadership of Dr. Fred C. Schwarz, has been publishing a monthly newsletter since 1960. The Schwarz Report is edited by Dr. David A. Noebel and Dr. Michael Bauman with the assistance of Dr. Ronald H. Nash. The Crusade’s address is PO Box 129, Manitou Springs, CO 80829. Our telephone number is (719) 685-9043. All correspondence and tax-deductible gifts (the Crusade is a 501(c)3 tax-exempt organization) may be sent to this address. Permission to reproduce materials from this Report is granted provided our name and address are given. Check out our updated website at www.schwarzreport.org. 8