That is the gap between the Republican and Democratic Party as it stands right now, and evolution acceptance is a good bellwether for who stands on what side.

If you go with ideology you can dismiss scientifically established facts on the grounds that they clash with your religion.

When Senator Broun, who sits on the Congressional House Science committee, said, “God's word is true. I've come to understand that. All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the big bang theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell,” he demonstrated exactly why the Republican Party is a threat not simply to the US economy, but to the world as a whole.

What he essentially said was that he is willing to dismiss evidence from every single field of scientific endeavour if that evidence contradicts his religious beliefs. If the facts don’t fit his ideology, he is willing to dismiss the facts and cling to his ideology.

We as a world cannot get a decent deal on climate change from the Americans, because they elect this kind of ignorant fool and put him on science committees.

Tod Akin was just the tip of the idiot iceberg when it comes to the Republican Party his pseudo-scientific views on “legitimate rape” were born of the exact same mechanism and cavalier attitude to matters of fact as Representative Broun’s view on evolution.

And that has serious consequences for the rest of the world that the rest of us will have to deal with in the coming years.

We have to act because Bobby McDumbass in America will not only vote for this kind of stupidity, but act belligerent towards Americans who don’t.

Scientific fact is not something you get to debate like it is politics; it is the reality politicians have to deal with. When politicians are perfectly willing to ignore that reality because they don’t like it? Then they are clearly incompetent to do their jobs.

How can somebody who thinks hurricanes are a punishment from god for abortions, or that they can be moved by sufficiently convincing prayers, be trusted with decent policy when it comes to tracking hurricanes? They can't. The Republican Party's wish-list includes budget cuts for hurricane tracking.

Scientifically established fact is the most reliable form of fact we know of, and politicians who cannot deal with it aren't making policy based on reality. They are fundamentally incompetent.

And the Republicans as a political party are defined by that incompetence. You know the funny thing with sex education? It has been the subject of a whole lot of study, and what study has found is that in places where abstinence only education is taught, teen pregnancies and STD rates rise.

That has had zero effect on the Republican stance on sex education – because the Republican Party doesn’t deal with the world as it is, it deals with the world as it thinks it should be. 

And the rest of us are going to have to learn to deal with that, and the way that shapes our politics. We need to avoid following America's lead on politics, because right now? With this being half their politics? It isn't really leading to anywhere we want to go.