The Florida Senate Judiciary Committee just passed a bill by a vote of 6-4 that would protect teachers who include creationism in their lesson plans from being reprimanded by school officials. The bill is a direct response to the State Board of Education decision in January to make teaching evolution mandatory. This is some scary stuff.

Lawmakers going out of their way to ensure that religion can be infused into science lesson plans only serves to highlight how important it is for scientists to get more involved in the political process. The bill falls short of directly placing creationism into classrooms, but it paves the way for bad science teachers to inject their personal religious views into their lessons. This is an embarrassment for the state and the country.