Are black holes racist? Science literacy in the US of A

A county commissioner meeting in Dallas County, Texas, erupts into uproar and accusations of racism after

Commissioner Kenneth Mayfield, who is white, said it seemed that central collections "has become a black hole" because paperwork reportedly has become lost in the office.

I kid you not. Read the article at the Dallas Daily News.

Speaking of scientific literacy, or the lack thereof, Razib at Gene Expression has an interesting set of posts exploring the results of a new survey of scientific literacy in the US population that allows for a detailed demographic breakdown, and comparison to other countries:

• The 18-24 year old demographic is, on some subjects, significantly more scientifically literate than the over 65 demographic, and the US isn't that terribly illiterate compared to other countries. Actually in some other tests of scientific literacy the US does really quite well. This seems like good news to me.
  
• However, church goers and those who identify themselves as Protestant or Catholic have lower than average levels of science literacy. This is hardly unexpected: members of more hard-line versions of Christianity also do worse in IQ tests and SAT tests. But living in the south, lower socio-economic status, or failing to graduate high school also have strong correlations with scientific illiteracy, and all of these things are linked.