Obama hates the first Amendment, just like Dubya

[Baby Lee]

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/O/OBAMA_FAITH?SITE=WIMIL&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

CHICAGO (AP) -- Reaching out to evangelical voters, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama is announcing plans to expand President Bush's program steering federal social service dollars to religious groups and - in a move sure to cause controversy - support some ability to hire and fire based on faith.

[memyselfI]

http://img155.imageshack.us/img155/7631/obamaisgodcd2.jpg

[HonestChieffan]

Yea groups like Rev Wright? Goddamn America!!!

[HonestChieffan]

Farrakhan is probably thrilled.

Wonder if Muslim groups qualify?

[little jacob]

i'm sure there will be outrage over this merge of church and state obama is promoting just like last time around...

[dirk digler]

Obama was unveiling his approach to getting religious charities more involved in government anti-poverty programs during a tour and remarks Tuesday in Zanesville, Ohio, at Eastside Community Ministry, which provides food, clothes, youth ministry and other services.

"The challenges we face today ... are simply too big for government to solve alone," Obama was to say, according to a prepared text of his remarks obtained by The Associated Press. "We need all hands on deck."

David Kuo, a conservative Christian who was deputy director of Bush's Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives until 2003 and later became a critic of Bush's commitment to the cause, said Obama's position on hiring has the potential to be a major "Sister Souljah moment" for his campaign.

"This is a massive deal," said Kuo, who is not an Obama adviser or supporter but was contacted by the campaign to review the new plan.

Kuo called Obama's approach smart, impressive and well thought-out but took a wait-and-see attitude about whether it would deliver.

"When it comes to promises to help the poor, promises are easy," said Kuo, who wrote a 2006 book describing his frustration at what he called Bush's lackluster enthusiasm for the program. "The question is commitment."

Obama proposes to elevate the program to a "moral center" of his administration, by renaming it the Council for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, and changing training from occasional huge conferences to empowering larger religious charities to mentor smaller ones in their communities.

Saying social service spending has been shortchanged under Bush, he also proposes a $500 million per year program to provide summer learning for 1 million poor children to help close achievement gaps with white and wealthier students. A campaign fact sheet said he would pay for it by better managing surplus federal properties, reducing growth in the federal travel budget and streamlining the federal procurement process.

Like Bush, Obama was arguing that religious organizations can and should play a bigger role in serving the poor and meeting other social needs. But while Bush argued that the strength of religious charities lies primarily in shared religious identity between workers and recipients, Obama was to tout the benefits of their "bottom-up" approach.

"Because they're so close to the people, they're well-placed to offer help," he was to say.

He also planned to talk bluntly about the genesis of his Christian faith in his work as a community organizer in Chicago, and its importance to him now.
"In time, I came to see faith as being both a personal commitment to Christ and a commitment to my community; that while I could sit in church and pray all I want, I wouldn't be fulfilling God's will unless I went out and did the Lord's work," he was to say.

[HonestChieffan]

Bush plan....libs scream Bad Bad
Obo copies plan...plan good, very good.

Ask a hack who will benefit from plan to review plan. Excellent!

[trndobrd]

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/O/OBAMA_FAITH?SITE=WIMIL&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

CHICAGO (AP) -- Reaching out to evangelical voters, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama is announcing plans to expand President Bush's program steering federal social service dollars to religious groups and - in a move sure to cause controversy - support some ability to hire and fire based on faith.


This is nothing new. Obama has been solidly committed to government support of faith based organizations. As Obama is reaching out to evangelical voters, he should explain his record on the faith based issue. For instance, he got $100,000 federal dollars earmarked for a youth center at Father Michael Pfleger's Catholic Church.

[memyselfI]

This is nothing new. Obama has been solidly committed to government support of faith based organizations. As Obama is reaching out to evangelical voters, he should explain his record on the faith based issue. For instance, he got $100,000 federal dollars earmarked for a youth center at Father Michael Pfleger's Catholic Church.

LMAO

[Baby Lee]

This is nothing new. Obama has been solidly committed to government support of faith based organizations. As Obama is reaching out to evangelical voters, he should explain his record on the faith based issue. For instance, he got $100,000 federal dollars earmarked for a youth center at Father Michael Pfleger's Catholic Church.

Well, he was going to get those dollars, then Hillary exclaimed "I'm WHITE!! That's MY money!!!!"

[Amnorix]

Bush plan....libs scream Bad Bad
Obo copies plan...plan good, very good.

Ask a hack who will benefit from plan to review plan. Excellent!

FWIW, I'm screaming "bad bad" either way

[HonestChieffan]

FWIW, I'm screaming "bad bad" either way

I agree its a screwed up mess when we have this sort of crap taking tax money.

[Adept Havelock]

Well, he was going to get those dollars, then Hillary exclaimed "I'm WHITE!! That's MY money!!!!"

LMAO Pretty much.

FWIW, I'm screaming "bad bad" either way

Yep. Bad idea.

According to the speech, it looks like he's planning on leaving the prohibitions on using Fed. Funds to proselytize, and the Title VII standards in place.


Remarks of Senator Barack Obama
(As prepared for delivery)
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
Zanesville, Ohio You know, faith based groups like East Side Community Ministry carry a particular meaning for me. Because in a way, they're what led me into public service. It was a Catholic group called The Campaign for Human Development that helped fund the work I did many years ago in Chicago to help lift up neighborhoods that were devastated by the closure of a local steel plant. Now, I didn't grow up in a particularly religious household. But my experience in Chicago showed me how faith and values could be an anchor in my life. And in time, I came to see my faith as being both a personal commitment to Christ and a commitment to my community; that while I could sit in church and pray all I want, I wouldn't be fulfilling God's will unless I went out and did the Lord's work. There are millions of Americans who share a similar view of their faith, who feel they have an obligation to help others. And they're making a difference in communities all across this country - through initiatives like Ready4Work, which is helping ensure that ex-offenders don't return to a life of crime; or Catholic Charities, which is feeding the hungry and making sure we don't have homeless veterans sleeping on the streets of Chicago; or the good work that's being done by a coalition of religious groups to rebuild New Orleans. You see, while these groups are often made up of folks who've come together around a common faith, they're usually working to help people of all faiths or of no faith at all. And they're particularly well-placed to offer help. As I've said many times, I believe that change comes not from the top-down, but from the bottom-up, and few are closer to the people than our churches, synagogues, temples, and mosques. That's why Washington needs to draw on them. The fact is, the challenges we face today - from saving our planet to ending poverty - are simply too big for government to solve alone. We need all hands on deck. I'm not saying that faith-based groups are an alternative to government or secular nonprofits. And I'm not saying that they're somehow better at lifting people up. What I'm saying is that we all have to work together - Christian and Jew, Hindu and Muslim; believer and non-believer alike - to meet the challenges of the 21st century. Now, I know there are some who bristle at the notion that faith has a place in the public square. But the fact is, leaders in both parties have recognized the value of a partnership between the White House and faith-based groups. President Clinton signed legislation that opened the door for faith-based groups to play a role in a number of areas, including helping people move from welfare to work. Al Gore proposed a partnership between Washington and faith-based groups to provide more support for the least of these. And President Bush came into office with a promise to "rally the armies of compassion," establishing a new Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives. But what we saw instead was that the Office never fulfilled its promise. Support for social services to the poor and the needy have been consistently underfunded. Rather than promoting the cause of all faith-based organizations, former officials in the Office have described how it was used to promote partisan interests. As a result, the smaller congregations and community groups that were supposed to be empowered ended up getting short-changed. Well, I still believe it's a good idea to have a partnership between the White House and grassroots groups, both faith-based and secular. But it has to be a real partnership - not a photo-op. That's what it will be when I'm President. I'll establish a new Council for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. The new name will reflect a new commitment. This Council will not just be another name on the White House organization chart - it will be a critical part of my administration. Now, make no mistake, as someone who used to teach constitutional law, I believe deeply in the separation of church and state, but I don't believe this partnership will endanger that idea - so long as we follow a few basic principles. First, if you get a federal grant, you can't use that grant money to proselytize to the people you help and you can't discriminate against them - or against the people you hire - on the basis of their religion. Second, federal dollars that go directly to churches, temples, and mosques can only be used on secular programs. And we'll also ensure that taxpayer dollars only go to those programs that actually work. With these principles as a guide, my Council for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships will strengthen faith-based groups by making sure they know the opportunities open to them to build on their good works. Too often, faith-based groups - especially smaller congregations and those that aren't well connected - don't know how to apply for federal dollars, or how to navigate a government website to see what grants are available, or how to comply with federal laws and regulations. We rely too much on conferences in Washington, instead of getting technical assistance to the people who need it on the ground. What this means is that what's stopping many faith-based groups from helping struggling families is simply a lack of knowledge about how the system works. Well, that will change when I'm President. I will empower the nonprofit religious and community groups that do understand how this process works to train the thousands of groups that don't. We'll "train the trainers" by giving larger faith-based partners like Catholic Charities and Lutheran Services and secular nonprofits like Public/Private Ventures the support they need to help other groups build and run effective programs. Every house of worship that wants to run an effective program and that's willing to abide by our constitution - from the largest mega-churches and synagogues to the smallest store-front churches and mosques - can and will have access to the information and support they need to run that program. This Council will also help target our efforts to meet key challenges like education. All across America, too many children simply can't read or perform math at their grade-level, a problem that grows worse for low-income students during the summer months and afterschool hours. Nonprofits like Children's Defense Fund are working to solve this problem. They hold summer and afterschool Freedom Schools in communities across this country, and many of their classes are held in churches. There's a lot of evidence that these kinds of partnerships work. Take Youth Education for Tomorrow, an innovative program that's being run by churches, faith-based schools, and others in Philadelphia. To help narrow the summer learning gap, the YET program hires qualified teachers who help students with reading using proven learning techniques. They hold classes four days a week after school and during the summer. And they monitor progress closely. The results have been outstanding. Children who attended a YET center for at least six months improved nearly 2 years in reading ability. And the average high school student gained a full grade in reading level after just three months. That's the kind of real progress that can be made when we empower faith-based organizations. And that's why as President, I'll expand summer programs like this to serve one million students. This won't just help our children learn, it will help keep them off the streets during the summer so they don't turn to crime. And my Council for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships will also have a broader role - it will help set our national agenda. Because if we are going to do something about the injustice of millions of children living in extreme poverty, we need interfaith coalitions like the Let Justice Roll campaign standing up for the powerless. If we're going to end genocide and stop the scourge of HIV/AIDS, we need people of faith on Capitol Hill talking about how these challenges don't just represent a security crisis or a humanitarian crisis, but a moral crisis as well. We know that faith and values can be a source of strength in our own lives. That's what it's been to me. And that's what it is to so many Americans. But it can also be something more. It can be the foundation of a new project of American renewal. And that's the kind of effort I intend to lead as President of the United States.

:shrug:

[Sully]

LMAO Pretty much.



Yep. Bad idea.

According to the speech, it looks like he's planning on leaving the prohibitions on using Fed. Funds to proselytize, and the Title VII standards in place.

First, if you get a federal grant, you can't use that grant money to proselytize to the people you help and you can't discriminate against them - or against the people you hire - on the basis of their religion. Second, federal dollars that go directly to churches, temples, and mosques can only be used on secular programs.

:shrug:

Thanks.
I was pretty flabbergasted, but wanted more info before going off.

[oldandslow]

FWIW, I'm screaming "bad bad" either way

What he said.

[noa]

BL, I remember your concern a couple months ago that Obama's bipartisan rhetoric wouldn't match his actions. That he was just claiming to draw on ideas from both sides of the aisle while in reality, he would be a straight party liberal.

Now that he is walking the walk, are you on his case about it? Or is this more about the general idea that liberals demonized Bush for this move and now Obama is doing the same thing?
Just curious.

[Baby Lee]

BL, I remember your concern a couple months ago that Obama's bipartisan rhetoric wouldn't match his actions. That he was just claiming to draw on ideas from both sides of the aisle while in reality, he would be a straight party liberal.

Now that he is walking the walk, are you on his case about it? Or is this more about the general idea that liberals demonized Bush for this move and now Obama is doing the same thing?
Just curious.
1. The thread title was part schedenfraude, part attention grabbing
2. That said, I do think it's an important issue for those on all sides to be aware of, so I'm grabbing attention because I think attention is merited, not just to rile folks up.
3. Overall, I support faith based initiative supports, but I do have two critiques. First, the authorization to hire and fire within these ostensibly secular faith based programs based on faith concerns is a big jump, perhaps too big. And second, to simply cite Clinton's and Gore's [proposed] measures for background legitimacy, then to pound Bush's measures on ephemeral DNC Talking Point 'hollow and underfunded' tropes is VERY offputting.

[Adept Havelock]

Thanks.
I was pretty flabbergasted, but wanted more info before going off.

No trouble at all. It looks like the AP changed the article title as well, realizing that it didn't reflect the program. It's now something like "Obama to expand Bush's faith based programs ".

[Direckshun]

FWIW, I'm screaming "bad bad" either way
Not possible.

If you're supporting Barack Obama for President, then you're supporting every aspect of his candidacy.

[Direckshun]

For the record, this is from the horse's mouth:

Now, make no mistake, as someone who used to teach constitutional law, I believe deeply in the separation of church and state, but I don't believe this partnership will endanger that idea - so long as we follow a few basic principles. First, if you get a federal grant, you can't use that grant money to proselytize to the people you help and you can't discriminate against them - or against the people you hire - on the basis of their religion. Second, federal dollars that go directly to churches, temples, and mosques can only be used on secular programs. And we'll also ensure that taxpayer dollars only go to those programs that actually work. . .

You see, while these groups are often made up of folks who've come together around a common faith, they're usually working to help people of all faiths or of no faith at all. And they're particularly well-placed to offer help. As I've said many times, I believe that change comes not from the top-down, but from the bottom-up, and few are closer to the people than our churches, synagogues, temples, and mosques.

[HonestChieffan]

For the record, this is from the horse's mouth:

Now, make no mistake, as someone who used to teach constitutional law, I believe deeply in the separation of church and state, but I don't believe this partnership will endanger that idea - so long as we follow a few basic principles. First, if you get a federal grant, you can't use that grant money to proselytize to the people you help and you can't discriminate against them - or against the people you hire - on the basis of their religion. Second, federal dollars that go directly to churches, temples, and mosques can only be used on secular programs. And we'll also ensure that taxpayer dollars only go to those programs that actually work. . .

You see, while these groups are often made up of folks who've come together around a common faith, they're usually working to help people of all faiths or of no faith at all. And they're particularly well-placed to offer help. As I've said many times, I believe that change comes not from the top-down, but from the bottom-up, and few are closer to the people than our churches, synagogues, temples, and mosques.


Yea...and ACORN didnt use federal tax money to falsify voter registration in inner cities...right.

[Hydrae]

I absolutely agree that support from local churches and the like would work much, much better than doing it from a federal perspective. But in that case we should remove the feds from the process and let people help those in need by contributing directly to those local support groups. I do not feel there is any reason why my federal tax dollars should be distributed to other individuals.

[Adept Havelock]

For the record, this is from the horse's mouth:

Now, make no mistake, as someone who used to teach constitutional law, I believe deeply in the separation of church and state, but I don't believe this partnership will endanger that idea - so long as we follow a few basic principles. First, if you get a federal grant, you can't use that grant money to proselytize to the people you help and you can't discriminate against them - or against the people you hire - on the basis of their religion. Second, federal dollars that go directly to churches, temples, and mosques can only be used on secular programs. And we'll also ensure that taxpayer dollars only go to those programs that actually work. . .

You see, while these groups are often made up of folks who've come together around a common faith, they're usually working to help people of all faiths or of no faith at all. And they're particularly well-placed to offer help. As I've said many times, I believe that change comes not from the top-down, but from the bottom-up, and few are closer to the people than our churches, synagogues, temples, and mosques.

Yep. The prohibition on using money to spread the word of the Flying Spaghetti Monster and the Title VII provisions are going to remain intact.

I still dislike the idea, but I suppose it could be worse. At least my tax dollars aren't going to directly subsidize the spreading of what is IMO, organized superstitions.

[tiptap]

I absolutely agree that support from local churches and the like would work much, much better than doing it from a federal perspective. But in that case we should remove the feds from the process and let people help those in need by contributing directly to those local support groups. I do not feel there is any reason why my federal tax dollars should be distributed to other individuals.

In studies both those that were offered to privately give and those who were taxed and felt those funds went to programs that helped the underprevledged were emotionally satisfied. THE DIFFERENCE WAS THAT MORE MONEY, CORRECTLY REFLECTING NEED, CAME FROM TAXES. And the burden was more equitably distributed. If the society decides democratically that it is a concern than the choice of funding WILL look coercive to many who would otherwise have slipped on meeting those needs.

[tiptap]

I would prefer that we didn't have faith based "outlets" but as long as there is good oversight of the controls that seek to limit the religious bias in the public work than I will bite my tongue and hope that we see good results from people who are committed to uplifting the downtrodden.

[Hydrae]

In studies both those that were offered to privately give and those who were taxed and felt those funds went to programs that helped the underprevledged were emotionally satisfied. THE DIFFERENCE WAS THAT MORE MONEY, CORRECTLY REFLECTING NEED, CAME FROM TAXES. And the burden was more equitably distributed. If the society decides democratically that it is a concern than the choice of funding WILL look coercive to many who would otherwise have slipped on meeting those needs.

Just curious, is that more dollars per dollar "donated" (for this purpose we will consider tax dollars as donations) or is just a larger pool and thus more money? I find it hard to believe that a large bureaucracy would be more efficient than a smaller, local organization.

[patteeu]

In studies both those that were offered to privately give and those who were taxed and felt those funds went to programs that helped the underprevledged were emotionally satisfied. THE DIFFERENCE WAS THAT MORE MONEY, CORRECTLY REFLECTING NEED, CAME FROM TAXES. And the burden was more equitably distributed. If the society decides democratically that it is a concern than the choice of funding WILL look coercive to many who would otherwise have slipped on meeting those needs.

Even if this is true, it's not the end of the story. Anyone who looks at relative school performance would know that more money, correctly reflecting need doesn't mean that results follow. The proper measure of merit is not how much money was raised/spent, it's whether or not results are obtained.