The anti-evolutionists are at it again and this time, they think they have come up with a winning strategy. Rather than teach alternative theories (creationism or intelligent design, for example), they are now pushing for new laws that would force schools to teach "the scientific strengths and weaknesses of Darwinian theory."

Bills to do just that are in various stages of development — one may say they are evolving — in Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, and South Carolina.

Science" is a campaign issue in 2008. That is because the presumptive Democratic nominee, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, has made reversing what he calls the "anti-science" stance of the Bush administration a cornerstone of his campaign.

Inevitably, discussion of "science" and "anti-science" leads to whether federal funds should be used to encourage embryonic stem cell (ESC) research. The Bush administration opposes this, but Obama supports it. Ironically, so does his presumptive opponent, Sen. John McCain, who only eight years ago was firmly on the Bush side of the debate but was helped to see the light by Nancy Reagan and some "very smart people," as he once told a television interviewer.

To be sure, the issues involved are complex. The two main questions are:

ITEM: Conservative rabbis debate whether to issue a halachic ruling requiring that workers be paid a living wage.

ITEM: Kashrut authorities insist there is no connection between the Torah’s insistence on how animals are to be treated and how they are to be slaughtered for food.

With John McCain and Barack Obama both enmeshed in their own "pastorgate" problems, it is, perhaps, time to explore some of the issues being raised.

In McCain’s case, the presumptive GOP nominee accepted the endorsement of the Rev. John Hagee, an outspoken evangelical pastor whose past criticisms of Catholicism for its anti-Semitic history is, to say the least, controversial. Hagee this week apologized for the comments that caused the most offense (namely, that Pope Pius XII did little to help save Jews, which, on a simplistic level, is true, even if Catholics do not like hearing it).

Next week, Jews all over the world will celebrate the 60th anniversary of the rebirth of the Jewish state.

Not all Jews, however, will join the celebration. On the far right and the far left of the Jewish spectrum, from the very religious to the very secular, some will mourn and others will simply ignore the day.

Others will pay lip service to the event, but their hearts will not be in it. If they are religious — including some who live in Israel and who put the greatest pressure on the state to enable and sustain their unique lifestyles — they will offer no special prayers. If they are secular, they will display no public symbols of pride and celebration.