Iowa: Choosing Our President & Our Religion

Separation of church and state?  No establishment of religious beliefs by the government?  Not in Iowa!

Teacher: I was fired, said Bible isn't literal
The community college instructor says the school sided with students offended by his explanation of Adam and Eve.

By MEGAN HAWKINS
REGISTER STAFF WRITER

September 22, 2007

A community college instructor in Red Oak claims he was fired after he told his students that the biblical story of Adam and Eve should not be literally interpreted.

Steve Bitterman, 60, said officials at Southwestern Community College sided with a handful of students who threatened legal action over his remarks in a western civilization class Tuesday. He said he was fired Thursday.

And this is the "make or break" state for presidential candidates?  (More below)

I really hope this story isn't true - but in the land of wingnuts, I'm betting on some clever "oh, we're just being 'religion-neutral' by not allowing anyone to teach anything that contradicts the fundamentalists" argument to surface soon.  

"I'm just a little bit shocked myself that a college in good standing would back up students who insist that people who have been through college and have a master's degree, a couple actually, have to teach that there were such things as talking snakes or lose their job," Bitterman said.

I do sincerely hope that this starts a movement to permanently move Iowa from first to last in the order of Presidential primaries.  We have got to stop this lunacy.