From the awesome Pharyngula blog by PZ Myers At this point, it's safe to say the National Park Service is stonewalling. There is a book called The Grand Canyon: A Different View,
written from a young earth creationist perspective, which the NPS has
approved for sale in its bookstores. It is a truly appalling piece of
crap; I wrote about in in July of 2004, and you can read excerpts from it online.
One might argue that the appearance of the book is simply due to a lack
of discrimination by the Park Service, which just shovels the gimcracks
and gewgaws into their stores to make money, but apparently they try to exercise some due consideration in product placement.
Records released to PEER show that during 2003, Grand
Canyon officials rejected 22 books and other products for bookstore
placement while approving only one new sale item — the creationist book.
The book is clearly in violation of the standards the Park Service sets for itself; this excellent letter from Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility cites the explicit directive from the director of the agency that lays out the criteria.
Historical and Scientific Research. Superintendents, historians, scientists,
and interpretive staff are responsible for ensuring that park interpretive and
educational programs and media are accurate and reflect current
scholarship…Questions often arise round the presentation of geological,
biological, and evolutionary processes. The interpretive and educational treatment
used to explain the natural processes and history of the Earth must be based on
the best scientific evidence available, as found in scholarly sources that have
stood the test of scientific peer review and criticism.
This is a no-brainer. The book should not have been approved in the
first place. It should be removed from their catalog immediately. The
Park Service should approve and implement training for their staff
(which should hardly be necessary; they shouldn't hire idiots in the
first place) to make sure that they are presenting accurate geological
information to the public.
"No comment" is not good enough. This disgraceful controversy has
been stewing long enough that the continued inaction of the Park
Service administration constitutes an implied endorsement of
anti-scientific nonsense.
1:41:12 PM 
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