Subscribe to Common Dreams News Updates
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
Bush Again Breaks Wall Between Church, State
Is there anything more that the administration can do to ignore the spirit of the U.S. Constitution before President Bush leaves office?
The New York Times has revealed that a 2007 memorandum by the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel claims that even federal programs subject to nondiscrimination laws can hand out taxpayer money to groups that discriminate in hiring staffers. The memo says the administration can bypass laws that bar giving taxpayer money to religious groups that hire only staff members who share their faith.
It specifically applies to a $1.5 million grant to World Vision, which is headquartered in Federal Way, for salaries for staff members on a program that helps at-risk youths avoid joining gangs.
The organization limits its hires to Christians, but the DOJ memo said that's not a problem because exceptions to the nondiscrimination rule are permissible when obeying the law would impose a "substantial burden" on people's ability to freely follow their religion.
Requiring World Vision to hire nonChristians as a condition of the grant would create such a burden, according to the DOJ memo.
It seems no president has done so much to break down the wall of separation between church and state than Bush has.
A couple of weeks after he took office in 2001, Bush dropped into the White House press room to hold an impromptu news conference -- his first as president. Every question but one was focused on his campaign's proposed tax cut. But I asked the president why he did not respect the historic wall of separation of church and state.
"I do," he replied.
"No, sir," I said. "If you did, you would not create a religious office in the White House." I was later called by Ari Fleischer, the White House press secretary, who asked me why I had "blindsided" the president with my church-state question. I told him I thought it was a "legitimate" question for the new president.
I grant you that there have been other presidents who have clouded the question, such as President Nixon, who held prayer gatherings on Sundays at the White House with invited ministers.
But none of this touched on the intrinsic question of separation of church and state.
The Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives was established by Bush in the White House, paving the way for church groups to win grants for social causes such as anti-drug programs and shelters for the homeless.
The president asked Congress to make it "legal" for religious groups to be given taxpayer money even when they discriminate against hiring people of other faiths. When Congress balked, Bush issued an executive order making the changes he wanted on his own.
Religion and politics seem to intersect frequently these days.
In remarks worthy of the Founding Fathers, retired Gen. Colin Power broke with his own party to support the presidential candidacy of Barack Obama -- and addressed a taunt against the Democratic candidate that he is a Muslim. Obama is a Christian.
But, Powell asked rhetorically on NBC TV's "Meet the Press" last Sunday, what if Obama were Muslim.
"He's always been a Christian," Powell said. "But the really right answer is, what if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country?
"The answer's no, that's not America," Powell said. "Is there something wrong with some 7-year-old Muslim-American kid believing that he or she could be president?"
Powell went on to tell the story of a young American of Arab heritage who joined the Army as soon as he came of age and was killed in Iraq.
This country was founded by people who sought freedom to practice their own religion. To each his own. Democracy is a better alternative to theocracy and we know that tolerance of race and creed is the essence of what America is all about.
- Posted in
29 Comments so far
Show AllAnyone see the video Stephen Colbert did with Helen Thomas for his show? It was wonderful :-)
.
Helen Thomas is wonderful.
.
Have to agree I love that lady! :)
Dear, dear Helen:
I hope you live forever!
JaneM
While so many journalists were compliant and fawning over bush and his debacle, one stood out and asked the questions - stood up for the constitution and our democracy. That was Helen Thomas. I imagine it was hard for Bush to look Helen Thomas in the eye. She has integrity and decency - things he and his cabal have no concept of.
Helen, I think it's safe to say that Bush & Co. will find other ways to subvert the constitution between now and next January!!! );
I had a dream the other night (I'm not an Obama nor a McCain supporter) that McCain was holding a newspaper, grinning broadly: "McCAIN DEFEATS OBAMA!" was the headline (good grief! I have had premonition dreams before, but dumb stuff, like Christian J. LeBlanc winning his first emmy... this dream won't happen).
My real daydream is that neither Obama or McCain wins!! (;
Maybe it's a Truman/Dewey premonition - dreams can be crazy! My take is Cindy had it printed up for him so he could put it up on the wall in his room in the old-age home. Maybe Siouxrose can interpret, but I'm not sure that's her bailiwick.
I'm sure the headline is already written and ready to be printed out...like that online ad of McCain winning the debate when he publicly was still saying he wouldn't go to the debate.
Sioux Rose
Hi WC DEVINS: Since you summoned my voice from the ethers (LOL) I'll give it a shot. Dreams break into several categories. Jane Roberts, channeling The Seth Material (extremely evocative stuff) said dreams were where we could "try on potential realities," the way shoppers try on garments. Sometimes dreams ARE event forecasters, and sometimes the subconscious mind just weaves symbols. I took a class in dream interpretation taught by Dr. Paul Brenner in California many moons ago, and he told us to do our OWN stream of consciousness relative to an intense dream and see where our own connections lead.
Giving $ to these religious groups to take over what had been more secular social services is another quid pro quo that means members of that group will vote for thems that giveth the mulah. It's an old recipe, not quite occult, that works wonders.
Hey Rose, great to hear from you! I wish I had some dreams you could work on but all I get is that recurring one where it's Math Final Exam Day and I haven't attended class in three months!
Funny, I have the same dream, at least once a year, but mine's based on actual events as a college freshman. It was an 8AM class that I just never managed to make. Come exam time, well, I think I squeaked by with a D, but it still haunts me. I'm thinking of retaking it, 30 years later, just so I can unburden my conscience.
rebelnow, I realize we're way off topic but WTF. It is said that a similar dream is one of the most common, so we're not unique but rather run-of-the-mill. I think they say it means you are worried about losing control of stuff in your life, but I could be wrong so don't take your psychoanalysis from me. I actually lived similar realities in my college career, which was longer than normal because of it. My dream is so vivid that often when I wake up I start getting dressed for class...
Americans must simply get it through their heads that the only difference between Islamic and Christian fundamentalists is that each believes the other wears funny clothes. Authoritarian power is the secret pleasure of each in equal amounts. It ultimately comes down to desperate clinging to extreme patriarchy, hence the violence that each has proven to be capable of in the past eight years.
"...is that each believes the other wears funny clothes."
I have never seen this so pithily put - thanks billiam!
The good news is that Obama wants to INCREASE funding to and EXPAND Bush's "Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives."
You know, to help the poor people and the children and stuff...
Why can't it just be "The Office of Community Initiatives?" Why does it have to be "faith-based?"
The Great Satan has turned Christianity into a Terrorist Organization.
Not sure about this, but remember that Obama thinks Bush's faith-based iniatives for handing out our money to religious groups is a fine and dandy thing. And that he wants to expand it.
----------------------------
"To know, and not to do, is not to know"
Yes, I heard of that one too. However, I don't think Obama will be able to even push for it given the total drain on the Treasury Bush has put against Obama. Obama might consider extending Bush's faith based crap in his second term but I seriously doubt he'll get to it for the next 4 years. He doesn't sound as pushy as Bush on religious matters. Correct me on that though if Obama is hell bent on it. Usually in Democratic administrations, the religious rightwing won't bother the White House at least judging from the Kennedy, Johnson, Carter, and Clinton admins throughout my life time. Well, I can't say much about Kennedy and LBJ since I was a kid back then before I could get around to understanding politics.
I wonder.....what do you think my chances would be for getting grant money from Bush/McPain/Obomba, say for youth/drug counseling, intervention, or whatever if my organization were Atheist, and only hired Atheists?
Wait...I'll answer that question myself. Zero chance.
That wall between church and state is made of Lego bricks. It's phony. We just had a slew of "debates" where the candidates were all fawning over their "faith" the "creator" and such....does anyone think that an Atheist could be elected president in this faith-based (Xtian) nation? No way!
Or how about getting grant money for a Neo-Pagan organization intended to provide relief to the poor? Or maybe a Hindu organization? I think it would receive similar rejection.
All fundamentalists, no matter whether they are Christian, Jewish or Muslim or purple people eaters are Terrorists. There is not a nickel's worth of difference between the lot of them.
Powell and Thomas nailed it when they pointed out that it doesn't matter if Obama is Muslim or Christian. Just let him do his job. Most of the Republicans and their corporate cronies along with the bad turncoat Dems of the party have already finished raping and plundering the country's finances. Obama's job at this point is undoing the damage and I hope to God that his life and those of his family members are safe. I don't think President Obama will go out of his way to force church and state together at this point. He would need more money to do so and at this point there is no money left.
"Tolerance of race and creed is the essence of what America is all about"?????
In Bushworld??? Helen, you have to be kidding. :)
Given the Cheney-Bush term, the last one, officially anyway, is pretty much at end, and evidently most people who plan to vote have been ignoring Obama's foreign policy team, which, as he said, will make up the FP bunch of his presidential administration, I think it's quite a waste of time to focus on what Bush has now done about again mixing state and religion; like duh, that old boring stuff. Whatever he establishes for laws or breakdowns thereof can be addressed as soon as the next president takes over; unless, of course, the Cheney or Cheney-Bush team decide to commit a false flag attack to establish martial law and use this to curb a change of presidential administration, which is [possible].
Assuming they're not going to commit such a false flag (hmmm?), I believe people should focus a LOT more on Obama's FP team, for they will be a far greater threat than religious groups hiring only people of the same religious faiths. The latter won't cause major genocides and extremely criminal wars against peace, but the former, his FP team, and them working for the Western "Establishment" (W.E.) "elites", is a whole other and far darker matter; they are the ones who drive these extreme crimes to be committed and for due courses of justice to be obstructed, when not completely avoided, instead.
How safe that assumption is is another matter and only the next (roughly) two and half months will tell us how accurate this is. But these supreme international crimes are definitely far more important than religious bla bla bla happening in the U.S. After all, it's not the religious bodies in the U.S. that command; they're only used for propaganda purposes, as well as for the W.E. to try to minimize public opposition to the most extreme crimes, although there may likely be little opposition from these religious groups anyway (to the most extreme crimes of the U.S. govt and the W.E.).
I don't give a damn who the f*ck religious employers hire; I care about the supreme international crimes being stopped, reparations being provided, reconstruction of countries destroyed by the U.S. and its W.E., and NATO, etcetera, and so on!
Once Obama's elected and then takes over office in January, the U.S. needs to have a massive or strong and nationwide movement to pressure his administration to stop obeying and serving the W.E.; and to do this, people will need to well or very much understand what the f*ck is going on with his so-called foreign policy team of criminals, gangsters, terrorists, ....
Maybe I'm overlooking some factor that could possibly cause me to have a different view from the immediately above, but until people can provide truly convincing and verifiable information that'd cause my view to change, it ain't f*cking changing one itty bitty f*cking bit! And if I'm right on this, then what I'm seeing is yet more "American" callousness, carelessness (negligence), narcissism, and so on; and that could be a criminal sort of negligence, one rendering people focusing on side issues, instead of the most important ones, quite [complicit] in the supreme international crimes that'll continue to be committed and ... escalated.
Ever hear of PRIORITIZING the issues to be addressed; working on the most important before the less important?! Stop getting it all wrong; get it right for a change! Otherwise, mickey mouse seems to be waiting for you at disneyfiendland.
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2008/10/28-5#comment-1066525
For the past 8 years, the morality of the Christian right has been on display. With their control of the federal government through their subsidiary, the Republican party, we have seen warmongering resulting in over a million civilian deaths and countless injuries and families left homeless, war crimes, blatant war profiteering by cronies, torture, summary execution, widespread fraud and greed in the financial services sector, neglect of the poor, subservience to the rich, silencing of scientists, environmental neglect resulting in climate change and other abuses.
Our 8 year experiment in quasi-theocracy (and, not coincidentally, idiocracy) has yielded results that should banish fundamentalists to the margins of society to do penance and forever debase whatever credibility was once erroneously accorded them.
Alex
"This country was founded by people who sought freedom to practice their own religion."
Actually it was founded by people who fled religious persecution in order to practise it on their neighbours.
Well put!
oops, I can edit a comment, but not remove it.
The social divide, religous and secular, serves the moneyed elites first and foremost, by preventing the people from uniting to finally drive the elites out of Washington.