Are Faith Based Initiatives a Form Of Illegal Campaign Contributions?

[me b zola]

Up until now we have focused our collective concern over faith based initiatives on how the concept defies the Constitution, merging church & State, giving tax dollars to tax-exempt entities to provide services that are the government's responsibility.

Recently, though, it has occurred to me that given the way that this administration has a knack for floating government money to serve themselves, their cronies, and their causes, will these same institutions/groups that receive federal faith based initiative grants in turn use part of the money to in turn campaign for the reichwingers?

Here is a link to their website:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/government/fbci/

How do I find out who has received grants under this program? I would greatly appreciate input. Thanks.

[givemebackmycountry]

1. Bill Maher said last night...

Not one nickle has gone to a group that is Jewish or Muslim.
Just Christian.

That sounds illegal to me....

[me b zola]

2. On every level, it seems like a sham

On the WH website, it has a link defending itself from the charge of being unconstitutional. What a joke!

Only funneling $$ to "christian" organizations. HMM. Sounds like a ringer to me.

[kevinmc]

3. Yes they are, but..................

We as a group have to figure out how we can get some of that sweet moolah from the Government with Faith Based grants.

Here is one example:

Abstinence Grants 50 new grants were awarded, totaling more than $31 million, for abstinence-only education programs through HHS' Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA).

[marcologico]

4. The last election showed that there's a pretty blatant quid pro quo:

Dollars flow to "faith-based organizations" receptive to the GOP message, who in turn help get out the vote by preaching the Gospel of George.

[LdyGuique]

5. Did some research

I dug as far as I could without writing emails -- but this is what I've found out so far:

1. A comprehensive report, The Expanding Administrative Presidency: George W. Bush and the Faith Based Initiative, a Project of the Rockerfeller Institute of Government, supported by the PEW Chairitable Trusts, was released last August. It lists all of the individual Departmental appropriations.

While supporters hail these moves as a way of ending the exclusion of certain religious groups from public programs and widening the choice of providers, critics question whether efforts to remove barriers facing faith-based organizations have also weakened longstanding walls banning religious groups from mixing spiritual activities with their secular services.

Among the report's findings:
o In the absence of new legislative authority, the President has aggressively advanced the Faith-Based Initiative through executive orders, rule changes, managerial realignment in federal agencies, and other innovative uses of the prerogatives of his office.
o Among those innovations is the creation of a high-profile special office in the White House, the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, connected to minioffices in ten government agencies, each with a carefully selected director and staff, empowered
to articulate, advance and oversee coordinated efforts to win more financial support for faithbased social services. These ten agencies include: the departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Education, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Justice, Labor, and
Veterans Affairs, as well as the Agency for International Development and the Small Business Administration. A similar office has also been created within the Corporation for National and Community Service. In addition, the Initiative has been promoted in a myriad of other
government offices overseeing programs ranging from homeownership and business development to energy conservation.
o With assistance from the White House Office, these federal agencies have proposed or finalized a host of new regulations that together mark a major shift in the constitutional separation of church and state. Examples of these regulatory changes include:
• The federal government now allows federally-funded faith-based groups to consider religion when employing staff.
• The Department of Justice now permits religious organizations to convert government-forfeited property to religious purposes after five years, replacing the previous policy prohibiting such conversions.
• The federal government now allows federally-funded faith-based groups to build and renovate structures used for both social services and religious worship.
• The Veterans Administration no longer requires faith-based social service providers to certify that they exert “no religious influence.”
• The Department of Labor now allows students to use federal job-training vouchers to receive religious training leading to employment at a church, synagogue, or other faith-based organization.

The Roundtable report also details the extensive administrative changes which have been made to advance the administration's Faith-Based Initiative. These include an overhaul of internal procedures within federal agencies, with many programs simplifying the length and complexity of their grant applications to encourage expanded participation by smaller faith-based service providers. Many agencies have also published informational guides, developed web sites, and
held grant application training workshops which are specifically aimed at such organizations.

Some uncertainty remains as to the full extent of federal funding for faith-based social services.

The substantial majority of federal support for such purposes is in contracts or grants awarded by state and local governments rather than in Washington, and few public programs record whether or not contractors are faith-based. The Roundtable report cites White House estimates that indicate a significant increase in the availability of federal funding to faith-based social service providers.

For instance, during Fiscal Year 2003, the Departments of Health and Human Services (HHS), and Housing and Urban Development (HUD) reported that grants to faith-based groups increased 41 percent and 16 percent, respectively. Overall, the Bush Administration claims that
five federal agencies provided competitive non-formula grants of $1.17 billion to such organizations – a total of eight percent of the $14.5 billion awarded.

The report looks beyond a focus on the rhetoric of President Bush's personal beliefs on the role of religious organizations in publicly-funded programs, and shows how this view has been pervasively and methodically implemented in the workings of the federal government. The common perception is that President Bush's Faith-Based Initiative has been stalled by a reluctant Congress. But as this report illustrates, the Bush Administration has made concerted use of its
executive powers and has moved aggressively through new regulation, funding, political appointees and active public outreach efforts to expand the federal government's partnerships with faith-based social service providers in ways that don't require Congressional approval.

2. During January, 2005, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) a Jewish organization went to Washington DC and manually researched all grants given for faith-based initiatives. They've not made any of their findings public, yet, nor given out a comprehensive list of grantees.
http://www.mediatransparency.org/faithbased_watch.htm

3. Associated Press (AP) has done a comprehensive list but it's only available to News Organizations who subscribe to their service, and that data is only used to support articles (such as:
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=380053
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6781314

I've not been able to find a public list of organizations who have received grants, and I searched GPOAccess intensively.

[me b zola]

8. Thanks for all of the research

Your efforts have given me some ideas.

[kevinmc]

9. Good Job..........

:loveya:

[independentchristian]

6. Yes

Bush has given millions of dollars to Moonie front groups with the faith-based initiatives scam, and then those groups turn around and donate money to his campaign and the campaigns of other Moonies in office.

[NVMojo]

7. I have been saying this since Bush started this crap. Funny how

most recipients of "faith based initiatives" can be churches ... and other conservatives who hated bleeding heart liberal causes for welfare, etc....

[Al-CIAda]

10. A Conservative Christian Republican asks: Are "Paid For" Christians Hypocr

A Conservative Christian Republican asks: Are "Paid For" Christians Hypocrites in how they Vote?
by Karl W. B. Schwarz
(Friday 12 November 2004)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Are Your Tax Dollars Funding Pat Robertson?
Taking a closer look at Operation Blessing International
“Lynn cited televangelist, Pat Robertson's comments on the 700 Club that an angry God had allowed the 9/11 terrorist attacks to succeed in retribution against a corrupt American society.What surprised many commentators at the time was that much of the criticism of the Bush initiative was coming from the religious right itself, including Pat Robertson. Early this year, Robertson denounced the Bush proposal, warning that the program is a "Pandora's Box" that could make legitimate religious charities dependent on government and that the government would end up financing "cults that brainwash" prospective adherents. He went on to tell his 700 Club television audience that the groups getting such funding "will begin to be nurtured, if I can use that term, on federal money, and then they can't get off of it." He added, "It'll be like a narcotic; they can't then free themselves later on."All the more surprising then, that among the very first organizations to be funded by the Bush administration's new program is Operation Blessing International, a Virginia Beach charity created by Robertson. This group is to receive $500,000 in the first wave of grants to be distributed under the faith-based initiative. The award to Operation Blessing is one of 25 announced on October 3rd by Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy G. Thompson. Aside from the irony involved in Robertson's own organization applying for and then accepting such "addictive" government funding, one needs to take a closer look at the finances of Operation Blessing International.”
------------
Now, imagine what you just read. Pat Robertson comes out condemning Bush and the 9-11 attacks as being “on a sinful nation” and then turns around, applies for the federal money he defines as “addictive”, accepts it, and then advises Christians to go out and vote for Bush on the abortion and gay marriage issues. I wonder if it has occurred to Pat to condemn the rampant corruption, greed, killing, empire building, deceit, fiscal irresponsibility, Corporatization of our government and fascism that has taken hold of our government and our nation?

As far as I am concerned, Pat Robertson’s counsel was bought and paid for, subject to impeachment on that issue alone, and I did not listen to him at all. I was paying attention to matters that are undermining this nation from within and without and none of them have anything whatsoever to do with abortion or gay marriage. They have to do with evil, corruption, greed, and fascism, and this nation acting in a manner that is most Un-Godly all the way up to George W. Bush.
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Would Jesus lie to the world to justify an attack on another nation, the killing of now over 100,000 Iraqis? No, certainly not, but that is what George W. Bush did and then lied to get the Christian vote. In fact, when all of the federal grants to faith based initiatives are known, bribed the Christian Right vote is not stretching it at all.
Would Jesus lie to the world to justify an attack on Afghanistan to take over the Taliban / Bridas Corporation pipeline and hold that deed, that greed, that killing up high as if some “honorable act?” No, certainly not, but that is what George W. Bush did and then lied to get the Christian vote.
----
Just to make sure he got the Christian vote, the federal money flowed to the same ministers that then voiced loudly to Christians all across America – vote for George W. Bush. Maybe they just do not know anything about business, how government works, how businesses work, what evil and greed looks like. While wrapping up this story, I came across an article about Fraud in the name of God and one person was claiming that the total overhead of Pat Robertson’s Operation Blessing International was only 1.4% of the money that came in, so 98.6% of it was going to help the needy. However, upon closer inspection it was over 30% and that organization feeds the money to other faith based programs that have their own overhead and cost of doing business.

Long well detailed, con't-

http://usa.mediamonitors.net/content/view/full/11295

[me b zola]

11. As always, you bring great info to the plate

eom