College presidents, Intel CEO challenged on Darwinism and the teaching of science at a media roundtable

This story expresses some of my frustration with the way the press deals with the evolution debate. Here's a quote from the article:

In a wide-ranging and sometimes heated dinner discussion among media representatives, Intel chief executive Craig Barrett and the presidents of eight
major research universities, nearly everyone agreed that science in the United
States is losing ground to foreign competitors. Many in attendance at the
Science Coalition's yearly media roundtable, held at The Penn Club in Manhattan on Monday, cited fast-charging China and India as important new players, and bemoaned a lack of funding for basic research at home. And several attendees blasted the nation's K-12 science education as woefully inadequate.

"It stinks," Barrett said. He and several university presidents, however, dismissed suggestions that efforts to push evolution out of high school classrooms or to label it unproven may be linked to science's declining fortunes. And a question asking whether the presidents would affirm their support of the scientific theory produced evident discomfort.

National Public Radio correspondent Ira Flatow told the group it was "the elephant in the room," but University of Kentucky president Lee T. Todd Jr. said the evolution question was a "red herring," a sentiment Barrett echoed.

Note that Flatlow thought this was the most important issue in corporate America today. As if Intel's fortunes fell and rose with whether or note we teach evolution. I could see math, physics, biology, even the biological evidence for evolution, but not evolution itself.

This article does attempt to be unbiased, but the following quote gives it away:

Eugenie Scott, of the pro- evolution National Center for Science Education, said in a phone interview that university presidents, like many politicians, often step gingerly in an area that crystallizes tension between religion and science.

Innocent enough, but it didn't happen in the conference. The reported had to go get this quote to balance the other comments made at the conference.