Saturday - March 05, 2005

Religion And Politics

A few days ago one of our readers advocated the taxing of churches and removal of all their tax exempt status.

I countered by saying that as soon as you tax churches then they have a Constitutional right to free political speech.  (remember “no taxation without representation?") Churches do not have that right to political endorsements now because long ago the framers knew what they were doing.  Yes, occasionally you will see politicians in churches giving sermons or whatever but technically they can not stump for themselves (although we know Jesse Jackson and the other race baiters, to include most Democrats do this.)

Well, as luck would have it I found some pieces that focus on this subject.

The first one deals with a bill proposed by North Carolina Republican Rep. Walter Jones called “the Houses of Worship Free Speech Restoration Act of 2005” would allow leaders of churches to endorse candidates.

You see, now, I have a problem with this.  Churches are a very strong force to be reckoned with in the US and if this passes what’s to prevent a rich powerhouse like the Catholic Church to back an individual who would then favor only those issues relevant to Catholicism like abortion, marriage, contraception?

In time we’d have ourselves a theocracy because so few other churches could match the strength of the Catholic Church. 

Now don’t go off half-cocked thinking I am against Catholics.  I just used them as an example.  I could have easily chosen Baptists or Mormons.

Furthermore, think about this:  if the bill passes, what’s to prohibit BOTH parties from ALL OF A SUDDEN finding “one church” they prefer and through that “church” channel BILLIONS of dollars TAX FREE?  What’s to prohibit anyone from leaving monstrous donations with no accountability?

“But”, you say, “Congress can make sure that does not happen by limiting those donations.”

If you, in fact, actually thought that, then think about it for a minute.  How effective was McCain-Feingold?  Look what the FEC is trying to do now--re-write the bill in order to stifle bloggers from being able to mention any candidate nor have any link on their site that endorses a candidate as that would be considered a “contribution” to that person’s campaign.  Read more here.

Every time our fuckwadded Congress-critters write a law they put huge loopholes in them in order to guarantee themselves jobs by having to re-write those laws or close the loopholes with other loopholes further guaranteeing them semi-permanent employment.  You need go no further than the latest immigration bill passed by the House and mentioned here. It’s so full of loopholes the entire country of Mexico could walk right through.

You think this would be any different?  And why mess with it at all?  Why change anything?  Long ago it was decided the best way to keep our country from having a “state religion” was this tax exempt/no politics feature.

So, you see, passing this law is WRONG for our country and would start on us on the slippery slope of a “state religion.”

For more insight, here’s an article against the legislation and here’s one that has different ideas.

Posted by Ranting Right Wing Howler     on 03/05/2005 at 07:49 AM   
Filed Under: • Politics • Religion •  
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