Been wondering about the uproar about this. He's been saying this stuff for quite some time. Whole chapter in the book on it.

Agreed! (cross-post)

As much as I am for a firm separation of church and state, there are social programs provided by these religious organizations that cross all religious boundaries. A good example is the Jewish Community Center which receives funding from the NYS Department of Aging to subsidize adult day care progams etc - something I take full advantage of for my mom. My mom is Catholic and has a Muslim last name, so sufficed to say there is no discrimination on whom they provide the services to. So long as they are not permitted to proselytize, I am all for funding to religious and community organizations to do the real social services work that the gov't either can't do effectively or has no interest in trying.

Good post, rec'd!

Thanks for getting it straight before people begin to lose their minds - again. Remember, the MSM is intent on showing Obama in the worst possible way or at least they are masterful at misinterpreting him. The AP article, which flat-out stated that Obama was continuing Bush's agenda was not only misleading, but was like casting chum into the liberal waters to bring out all the sharks so they could have an Obama feeding frenzy.

This post, hopefully, calms down the shark attack and lets us once again realize that Obama is not a two-dimensional politician, but a complex individual with a much larger, and highly considered, position on government and life in general.

This is what happens when you get too many sites and networks trying to break a story with misleading headlines, which get skimmed by people with ever shortening attention spans. If one just reads the headlines on Huffingtonpost and others, you'd think he'd wholly just adopted Bush's program. But when you read the story you get the full picture of him wanting to basically retool the program.

Can I make an analogy here that I think fits? It's about good ideas and bad ones.

Bush is completely doctrinaire and his entire administration has been partisan to the point of illegality. His people put an end to Head Start- one of the most successful programs ever. But it was a Democratic idea and they weren't having it.

If Obama rejects good ideas just because of where they came from, how is he any different than Bush, really? If this shit works - then it doesn't matter whose idea it was.

Thanks for pumping some rationality into this issue, jsfox. You do a great service to us all with it.

And to respond to TTGZ,

you're right in everything you said. These are not new positions of his. Imagine if the Supreme Court had not made those decisions. Obama's positions would never have been repeated during the GE. He's not flip-flopping, and he's not pandering. He's simply staying true to his own ideologies concerning those issues. I also agree that Arianna Huffington needs to get a freakin' grip.

Amusing that this topic is relegated to the shit pile here, and does not appear, yet, where most visitors go first.

Ya know, I thought he cozied up to Wright to get some cred in the hood. But we know now he IS a holy roller. And anyone rationalizing this position of his (all you here, for instance) should stop pretending at being liberal; you besmirch the word worse than any republican could.

Fine. Let them continue to delude themselves, and help others, BUT NOT WITH TAX DOLLARS! See?

Is that right? Disgraceful. They should be cut off immediately. I hope I live long enough to see an atheist in office who will call religion what it is and use our tax dollars to help others, without even a thought given to fairy tales or redemption, or forgiveness, or mercy or any crap the deluded try to pass off as reasons to give. The only reason to give is that's what humans can do that other species can't, and there is no end of need. That's it. End of story.

"liberal moral outrage over Obama's supposed pandering to the religious right"

The term "liberal" is often interpreted differently. I think the Faith Based Initiative will be seen far more favorably my people associated with mainline
(liberal/moderate) churches (not Evangelicals or religious right).

Many on the religious right are focused on two or three issues: abortion, homosexuals, and prayer in school.

The mainline churches usually allow ordination of women and some allow ordination of homosexuals. There has been considerable heated debates in some mainline churches over positions on homosexuality. Most do not believe in abortion, but do not usually focus on it. The focus is on feeding the poor and helping other needy people.

The main concern I have is the administrative overhead for ensuring the rules are followed.

By lonely I meant participation here is very limited, compared to other topics.

As you can see, I have little respect for religion, and wish we could accelerate our progress toward reason, which, as an incurable optimist, I believe we have been approaching VERY slowly, since we emerged from the jungle. This is hardly knee jerk. People SHOULD be shocked at Obama's latest pronouncements. Christians have plenty of money to keep their organizations going. That's where most "charity" money comes from. The people who need help do not need to be proselytized or "saved". They just need what a civil government can give best - a leg up, or sustainment for the disabled, or protection from the scavengers, all without strings attached. And the government will not pat itself on the back for being kind, and will not expect a special place next to god when the time comes.

I'm pretty enthusiastic about most of Obama's proposals, but this is one that I don't like.

While I'm Christian and believe that the church has an appropriate role in social activism, having a program of "faith-based initiatives" under the direction of the White House worries me. Though he says proselytizing and discrimination based on religion will be prohibited, I think the potential for abuse will be unmanageable.

I suppose I'll need a lot more assurances that the separation will be manageable before I'll be comfortable with this.

Non religious organizations handle the difference between their political activism and their non-political, tax exempt activism, by setting up independent groups and bookkeeping, carefully separating the incoming money flow to avoid "tainting" the tax exempt money with the other money. That works. But, when an organization like the League of Women Voters, for example, does this the whole organization reaps the benefits of the "good works", the tax exempt activities, improving their standing in the community for all of their activities.

When the "Church of the Divine", or whatever, does this, they too reap the benefits in standing in the community, which aids them in recruiting new members. This is one way the government money would be supporting that churches recruiting of members. Of course the more obvious way is that the church is already doing the charity work, without government help, but using funds they could otherwise use for their TV station, for example. There really is no way to totally insulate one set of church activities from the other. And, that makes this type program a violation of the Bill of Rights.

I'm not going to picket anyone over this, but I do think we need to acknowledge this as yet one more erosion of the Bill of Rights.

Chill out folks. You want to know Obama's views on religion in politics? He gave a speech in 2006 on this very subject.

Video here:
http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid463869411/bctid416343938

Transcript Here:
http://obama.senate.gov/speech/060628-call_to_renewal/index.php

Because when we ignore the debate about what it means to be a good Christian or Muslim or Jew; when we discuss religion only in the negative sense of where or how it should not be practiced, rather than in the positive sense of what it tells us about our obligations towards one another; when we shy away from religious venues and religious broadcasts because we assume that we will be unwelcome - others will fill the vacuum, those with the most insular views of faith, or those who cynically use religion to justify partisan ends. In other words, if we don't reach out to evangelical Christians and other religious Americans and tell them what we stand for, then the Jerry Falwells and Pat Robertsons and Alan Keyeses will continue to hold sway. More fundamentally, the discomfort of some progressives with any hint of religion has often prevented us from effectively addressing issues in moral terms. Some of the problem here is rhetorical - if we scrub language of all religious content, we forfeit the imagery and terminology through which millions of Americans understand both their personal morality and social justice. Imagine Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address without reference to "the judgments of the Lord." Or King's I Have a Dream speech without references to "all of God's children." Their summoning of a higher truth helped inspire what had seemed impossible, and move the nation to embrace a common destiny. Our failure as progressives to tap into the moral underpinnings of the nation is not just rhetorical, though. Our fear of getting "preachy" may also lead us to discount the role that values and culture play in some of our most urgent social problems. After all, the problems of poverty and racism, the uninsured and the unemployed, are not simply technical problems in search of the perfect ten point plan. They are rooted in both societal indifference and individual callousness - in the imperfections of man.