Bush's faith-based changes scrutinized ...without Congress OK

[Nambe]

San Francisco Chronicle

President Bush has gone "under the radar" and around the Congress to spread his faith-based initiative throughout the federal government, according to a new study released Monday.

The study, compiled by researchers at the Rockefeller Institute of Government in Albany, N.Y., is one of the first comprehensive looks at the Bush administration's efforts to redirect government grants to churches and other faith-based groups. ..

For example, grants given to faith-based groups by the Departments of Health and Human Services increased 41 percent in fiscal year 2003.

The report also cites newly revised Department of Labor rules that exempt religious organizations from provisions of the Civil Rights Act that forbid discrimination in employment based on religion.

It also notes changes in federal regulations that now allow churches to use federal funds to renovate buildings that are used for both social services and religious worship. ..

Ride Don’t Drive * * It’s Global Cool

[CarolynEC]

1. And bear in mind...

... every dollar a religious group doesn't have to spend on construction or maintenance is a dollar it can use for proselytizing, no matter how odius its message.

This claim that federal money is not beingused to promote a religious message is just plain not true.

[Eloriel]

4. Uh, I'm not terribly comfortable with your comment

Of course, I have no idea how things work in the Bush administration (and rightly ought to suspect the worst), but what you've written is often used against liberal 501(c)(3)'s and it's just not true:

every dollar a religious group doesn't have to spend on construction or maintenance is a dollar it can use for proselytizing (or whatever their mission involves).

The reason it's not true -- at least under NORMAL circumstances -- is that when 501(c)(3) organizations apply for federal grant money, or even private foundation grants, they have to do it with a particular program outlined in depth in their applications,a nd they are required to use the money granted for exactly the purposes outlined. And there's considerable accountability for showing that that's what they've done.

Now, sometimes they can use the money for ongoing operations, IOW their normal "mission," but a lot of times the money can only go for a specific and well-detailed often new program. So the idea that the money is "fungible" just really isn't the case. When, for example, Planned Parenthood gets money from whatever source for either its ongoing operations or some special program they've developed and would like to fund, there is NO WAY they can shift any funds from their normal operations or the new program money to their political activities -- which is precisely what the rightwing claims they do or can do and why they should be "cut off" from any and all taxpayer money. In this case it can't happen because of very, VERY stringent IRS rules which you KNOW the rightwing would be all over them about and close them the heck down in a NY minute if they violated.

Now, will faith-based operations proseletyze along with whatever programs they're delivering under these initiatives? Many probably will, some won't. So your point about that remains viable, IMO. I just had to speak up about the language you used and the fact that the identical argument is wrongly used by rightwing idiots against leftwing organizations they would dearly love to destroy.

[amber dog democrat]

2. This faith based social engineering is dangerous.

I see it as the first step towards instituting a theocratical dictatorship.
It needs to stop. Another reason the Chimp and his right wing junta
must go.

I am seeing the beginnings of what may develop into a version of the Handmaid's Tale.

[tom_paine]

3. Absolutely. Note is was NOT done in the way Free Societies

implement such changes, but by the Totalitarian "Imperial Fiat" which bypasses the now-defunct mechanisms of Free America.