Is my story unique?

Not at all. This is why I am so disappointed by "Intelligent Design" books that are no different really in substance than their creationist precursors. Of course, it's not really possible to control who publishes what and under what label, but like I said, it seems to me that it is the creationists riding the coattails of ID.

However, we should keep in mind that not everything is designed, and that some designs may change their function over time.

and

My post wasn't an attempt to justify an argument for all designs being "good" (we're at a far too early stage in the investigation to say anything about this), but was a note of caution to those pointing at anything bad in nature and attributing it to the designer.

Well put, Krauze, on both points. I think we're on the same page.

Cheers.

"I don't think the ID movement would be where it is even now if it was not for the general creation movement," says Ken Ham, president of AiG. "They're riding on the coattails of the creation movement."

I, for one, gave up solidly on "the creationist movement" dispite religious motivation to accept that view. I simply found that the works produced did not even withstand a light cross-check by a non-scientist. Creation Science and Scientific Creationism are determined to be robust with reguards to Biblical interpretation, and willing to be less robust with reguards to science. The ID movement, is determined to be robust with reguards to science, allowing Biblical interpretation the same freedom that Biblical interpretation is permitted with reguards to evolution. (Let us not forget that thiestic evolution is an attempt to unify NDE evolution with Biblical interpretation.)

Though it is true that my first studies into this debate involved the creationist literature, I fully and completely abandoned that literature prior to discovering good ID literature.

Is my story unique?

My point may not have come across very well in my post, so let me reiterate. I don't think there's any logical problem with a designer making things that harm other designs. As I said, we humans do it all the time. However, we should keep in mind that not everything is designed, and that some designs may change their function over time. My post wasn't an attempt to justify an argument for all designs being "good" (we're at a far too early stage in the investigation to say anything about this), but was a note of caution to those pointing at anything bad in nature and attributing it to the designer.

"They're riding on the coattails of the creation movement."

For me, ID is a way to let go of the creationist coattails, not to ride them. I found YEC to be intellectually unsatisfying. Unfortunately many "ID" arguments aren't much better, but I attribute that to creationists riding the coattails of ID, not the other way around.

The function/purpose of a tsunami is to give unbelievers a way to attribute evil to God.

I am not sure the attempt to minimize "bad" design by pointing out that not all bacteria use it to inject toxins is particularly compelling. Further, although the secretory system may be a degenerate system from the flagellum, that is only one example in a long list of biological systems that harm other biological systems, and that could thus be viewed as "bad" or "evil" designs. I think the stronger position by far is to simply identify design where we see it (I think you take this approach generally, but you seemed to be gingerly sidestepping it a bit in your post). I personally have no problem with the idea that a designer would create designs that are physically harmful.