Tom Delay, Evolution and Columbine

Paul Krugman writes about Tom DeLay:

Going back to those tea parties, Mr. DeLay, a fierce opponent of the theory of evolution — he famously suggested that the teaching of evolution led to the Columbine school massacre — also foreshadowed the denunciations of evolution that have emerged at some of the parties.

These are the kinds of the things Krugman writes that are so frustrating. He’s a brilliant economist but too often drives off the reservation into dishonesty.
After reading Krugman’s account, are you led to believe that Tom DeLay said in a clear declarative sentence that Columbine was the result of the teaching of evolution? That he repeatedly said it and would say it again today if asked?
I really wonder how many people understand that saying something that’s factually correct isn’t good enough. An accurate fact can be presented in a dishonest way. I think if I said this to many political pundits, their heads would explode.
If I were to ask you what’s the sum of one plus one, and you said that it’s less than 20 trillion, that answer is factually accurate but dishonest. A certain linguist in the Boston area has made his career on such statements.
The person who engages in dishonesty hurts themselves in two ways. First, they’re being dishonest. Secondly, since they believe they’re presenting facts, they immune themselves over criticism of context.
Facts can imply something that isn’t true. They can be taken out of context. They can imply a false symmetry. Facts by themselves aren’t enough.
Krugman has an unusual fixation with Delay and blaming Columbine on the teaching of evolution. He’s mentioned this several times.
Enough of Krugman’s take. Here’s the full story. One week after the Columbine massacre, Addison L. Dawson wrote a letter to the editor to the San Angelo Standard-Times which mocked the idea that guns were to blame:

For the life of me, I can’t understand what could have gone wrong in Littleton, Colorado. If the parents would have only kept their children away from the guns, we wouldn’t have had such a tragedy. Yeah, it must have been the guns.
It couldn’t have been because over half our children are being raised in broken homes.
It couldn’t have been because our children get to spend on average 30 seconds in meaningful conversation with their parents each day. After all, we give our children quality time.
It couldn’t have been because we treat our children as pets and our pets as children.
It couldn’t have been because we place our children in daycare centers where they learn their socialization skills amongst their peers under the law of the jungle while 16 year old employees who have no vested interest in the children look on and make sure that no blood is spilled.
It couldn’t have been because we allow our children to watch on average 7 hours of television a day filled with the glorification of sex and violence that isn’t fit for adult consumption.
It couldn’t have been because we allow our children to enter into virtual worlds in which to win the game, one must kill as many opponents as possible in the most sadistic way possible.
It couldn’t have been because we have sterilized and contracepted our families down to sizes so small that the children we do have are so spoiled with the material that they come to equate the receiving of the material with love.
It couldn’t have been because our children who have historically been seen as a blessing from God are now being viewed as either a mistake created when contraception fails or inconveniences that parents try to raise in their spare time.
It couldn’t have been because our nation is the world leader in developing a “culture of death” in which 20 to 30 million babies have been killed by abortion.
It couldn’t have been because we give 2 year prison sentences to a teenagers that kill their own newborns.
It couldn’t have been because our school systems teach the children that they are nothing but glorified apes that have evolutionized out of some primordial soup of mud by teaching evolution as fact and by handing out condoms as if they were candy.
It couldn’t have been because we teach our children that there are no laws of morality that transcend us, that everything is relative, and that actions don’t have consequences. What the heck, the President gets away with it
.
Nah, it must have been the guns.

The letter was later read by Paul Harvey on the radio and then by Tom Delay in Congress on June 16, 1999 during a debate on gun control. (You can see the in the Congressional Record on page H4366.) The words are often credited to DeLay and not Dawson, though DeLay’s reading of it certainly implies an endorsement.
After DeLay spoke, Barney Frank lambasted the letter by saying it was blaming the teaching of evolution for the shooting. That’s where Krugman got his line.
First, let’s say a few things about the letter. It’s fatuous and not terribly intelligent. However, by reading it during a debate about control, DeLay was clearly doing the same things that Krugman is doing—mocking the idea of blaming Columbine on one issue.
The listing of cultural problems makes the point clear. In fact, Dawson is being facetious about it which underscores that he’s tossing out many other suggestions. He’s not saying it’s evolution but the sum total of problems in the culture, where the debate in Congress was focusing on guns.
Do you think if DeLay were asked, yes or no, was Columbine due to Darwin, he would say yes? Re-read what Krugman wrote. The only “famously” part is due to Krugman mentioning it time and time again.
If you believe that Tom DeLay blamed Columbine on the teaching of evolution, well…you have your evidence. If you want to write that, go right ahead. But you shouldn’t be such a cheap date. Here’s the key point: I would never write it and neither would many other people because it’s dishonest and not up to professional standards. An editor should not have allowed it to pass. I should hope the Times feels that same way.

Posted by on April 13th, 2009 at 1:13 pm


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