To the editor:

The fight over teaching creationism – sorry, intelligent design – in our schools is over, and the people who are convinced that they have a direct line to God and therefore the right to dictate how or what we must all believe and think have won.

Something has always confused me about the supporters of creationism. Where in God’s communications to them does he tell them that it is acceptable to destroy the glories of the world that they say were created for us by him?

When did he tell them that it was permissible to let the waste from their feedlots or pesticide applications wash into the streams and rivers from which others drink?

Where does he tell them to go forth and dump enough hydrocarbons into the air to alter the world’s climate and catastrophically change our weather patterns?

And where do our leaders stand on these issues? Apparently, God told President Bush, Sen. Brownback, Congressman Ryun and all the other right-thinking people in government that fouling of our drinking water and laying waste to the land is our preordained right and global warming is a left-wing conspiracy.

God seems to have also told Pat Robertson and other fanatics that hurricanes Katrina and Rita were retributions against blacks, gays and the citizens of New Orleans for their godless behavior.

Why is it that Mr. Robertson and his compatriots don’t see these events as retribution from God; punishing us for the desecration of what they say he created?

David Bishop,

Lawrence