I'm not an Arkansas resident, but I wanted to bring to your attention a false statement in the article on HB2548 published on 04/02.

Seth Blomeley wrote that Jonathan Wells had called Neandertal Man and Homo erectus "fraudulent", and that Holt therefore included these items in his bill. In point of fact, Wells does not call these fossil specimens fraudulent within the book, "Icons of Evolution", which Holt noted as a source. Holt took his statement on Neandertal Man as an exact quote from the Jack Chick cartoon tract, "Big Daddy?". While I have not yet located an exact source for the claim concerning Homo erectus, it appears that Jonathan Wells did not mention Homo erectus within "Icons of Evolution".

The provenance of each item in Holt's bill needs to be treated separately. It is all too easy to confuse the source of one item for the source of another. Even though I oppose HB2548 and the general agenda of Jonathan Wells, I felt it necessary to point out, in the interest of accuracy, that in this particular instance Jonathan Wells did not do what he was accused of.

Please refer to my web page at http://inia.cls.org/~ae/ar_hb2548.htm for details on where each item in HB2548 may have come from.

Wesley R. Elsberry