"Helping" Those in Need Indeed!

June 1st Bush issued an executive order: Responsibilities of the Department of Commerce and Veterans Affairs and the Small Business Administration with respect to Faith-Based and Community Initiatives. I doubt that too many people noticed. I know I didn't hear about it. This is a good time to sneak by with unpopular or controversial actions because we are all concentrating on Iraq and 9/11. [I hate to even put those two subjects together like that for fear I will somehow contribute to the completely erroneous notion that there is a connection between the two.] Bush sneaks around a lot. One way or another he gets what he wants. It is so irritating.

In his executive order, Bush states his intention to strengthen the capacity of faith-based organizations to better meet America's social and community needs. That sounds like a noble goal. However, as is becoming the norm, what sounds good is usually anything but good if George Bush has anything to do with it.

Bush's order provides for centers for faith-based initiatives within three agencies: Commerce, Veterans Affairs, and Small Business Administration. There will be a director and staff in each center. The purpose of these centers will be to coordinate agency efforts to eliminate regulatory, contracting, and other obstacles to the participation of faith-based organizations in federal, state, and local social services. Each agency will designate an employee to serve as liaison with the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives (OFBCI).

Bush said Tuesday that the doctrine of separation of church and state should not prevent religious groups from competing for government money to help the needy. When the Senate failed to act on Bush's signature "faith-based initiative" in 2002, the White House did not give up. Slowly but surely, through executive orders and changes in agency regulations, the administration carried out the initiative anyway. In a Christian Science Monitor article in February of 2003, it was reported that there were seven government departments with faith-based offices at that time. These offices enable religious groups to access literally billions of taxpayer dollars in grant money.

Not all Americans are pleased with this approach to helping the needy. Jano Cabrera, a DNC spokesperson, was quoted this week in USA Today: "Bush's support for faith-based initiatives rings hollow. With his right hand, Bush is providing minimal support to faith-based groups, but with his left, he's planning to cut the social safety net wholecloth if he wins in November." Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, a Washington religious liberty watchdog group, said other social programs are receiving less funding as a result of the increase in spending for faith-based programs. "What the White House never tells you are the stories of all the people whose benefits and programs have been cut off so that money can be diverted to these religious operations," Lynn said. "There is still much more smoke and mirrors than it is a substantive program to aid the poor."

The White House calls the president's faith-based initiative "a fresh start and bold new approach to government's role in helping those in need." Well, many of Bush's policies are bold, new approaches, most of which we could have done without. Leave No Child Behind, school vouchers, and our great unilateral foreign policy come to mind. Bobby Scott, distinguished Congressman from Virginia's Third Congressional District, published a statement regarding Bush's executive orders on faith-based initiatives in December 2002, in which he stated that many faith-based organizations have sponsored federally funded programs for decades. Every year Catholic Charities and Lutheran and Jewish Family Service organizations receive hundreds of millions of dollars in public funds. And according to Scott's statement, faith-based organizations sponsor HUD grants in nearly every community in the nation. These groups compete for funds on merit and run federally funded programs subject to the same rules and regulations as any other sponsor. Any program can be funded without new legislation or executive order IF the sponsoring organization agrees not to discriminate in hiring with federal money. Bush is determined that organizations be allowed to receive federal funds and discriminate in employment with federal funds solely based on religion. In Scott's words, "You can put lipstick on a pig but you cannot pass it off as a beauty queen. Likewise, you cannot use poll tested semantics and euphemisms and pass this off as anything other than ugly discrimination."

Jim Towey, director of the White House OFBCI, said that the president feels strongly that this initiative is about the poor, not about process. It surely is about the poor. No argument there.

In my humble opinion, the whole idea on faith-based initiatives is a thinly disguised program to destroy our federal services to our citizens who need assistance. And it also funnels money to questionable organizations which blatantly practice discrimination. This is wrong. Period.

PS I have typed in "faith-based initiatives" or variations thereof 15 times in this post. I tried to make an abbreviation, but it came out FBI!