Sunday, June 10, 2012 5:46:57 AM
Terry Jones, Quran-Burning Pastor, Hangs Barack Obama Effigy Outside Florida Church
Posted: 06/08/2012 4:07 pm Updated: 06/08/2012 9:27 pm
The Dove World Outreach Center in Gainesville, Fla., has hanged an effigy of President Barack Obama [ http://www.thesmokinggun.com/buster/obama-hung-in-effigy-678923 ] from a gallows on its front lawn, a move DWOC pastor Terry Jones said was in response to Obama's recent endorsement of same-sex marriage [ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/09/obama-gay-marriage_n_1503245.html ], as well as his stance on abortion and what Jones called his "appeasing of radical Islam."
According to the Broward-Palm Beach New Times, the U.S. Secret Service is currently investigating Jones [ http://blogs.browardpalmbeach.com/pulp/2012/06/terry_jones_hangs_obama.php ] in response to the display.
"The Secret Service is aware of this incident and will conduct appropriate follow-up," Secret Service spokesman Brian Leary told the paper's "The Pulp" blog [id.].
The effigy is suspended from a makeshift gallows with a noose of yellow rope, has a doll in its right hand and a rainbow-colored gay pride flag in its left.
In a telephone interview with The Huffington Post, Jones said the flag was meant to call attention to Obama's stance on same-sex marriage and that the baby doll is there because the president is "favorable toward abortion."
Jones also said that radical Islam is "the most dangerous threat to life and national security in America."
There is also an Uncle Sam dummy standing at the base of the gallows outside the DWOC. Jones told HuffPost that the Obama effigy had originally been positioned to be hanging Uncle Sam when the display went up two weeks ago, but that the church changed the display on Wednesday.
The words “Obama is Killing America” are printed on a trailer nearby.
The DWOC came under intense scrutiny in 2011 after Jones burned a copy of the Quran [ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/26/pastor-terry-jones-defend_n_696390.html ], a move which sparked three days of violent rioting in Afghanistan [ http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/04/quran-burning-protests-continue-afghanistan ] that resulted in the deaths of at least 21 people, including seven U.N. workers.
In addition to its higher profile controversial moves, the Dove World Outreach Center has also been criticized for its internal rules, which The Smoking Gun has called "cult-like [ http://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/bizarre/koran-burner-creepier-you-think ]."
In the church's Academy Rulebook [ http://www.thesmokinggun.com/file/dove-church-rulebook?page=0 ], written by Jone's wife and published in 2007, prospective ministers are directed to cut off most contact with family members.
This is not the first time that an effigy of the country's first black president has been hanged.
In March 2010, a teacher at a failing Rhode Island school hanged an effigy of Obama in his classroom [ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/18/obama-hung-in-effigy-at-r_n_504746.html ]. That same month, another dummy was found hanging on Main Street [ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/03/obama-effigy-feds-probe-h_n_409922.html?1339182386 ] in the Georgia hometown of President Jimmy Carter.
In 2009, a Kentucky grand jury refused to indict two men who hanged an Obama effigy [ http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2009/01/27/60852/if-they-had-hung-joe-biden-we.html ] on the campus of the University of Kentucky. The men had been charged with burglary and disorderly conduct, the latter count associated with hanging the effigy. The lawyer for the two men said that the disorderly conduct charge violated his clients' rights under the First Amendment.
Copyright © 2012 TheHuffingtonPost.com, Inc.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/08/obama-effigy-hanged-outside-church_n_1581272.html [with comments]
===
Barton: 'It Makes Perfect Sense' that People are on Welfare Because they are not Reading the Bible
06/06/2012
http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/barton-it-makes-perfect-sense-people-are-welfare-because-they-are-not-reading-bible [with audio embedded]
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David Barton’s New Thesis: People Who Are on Welfare Don’t Read the Bible
By: Hrafnkell HaraldssonJune 7, 2012
David Barton seems to have discovered the scientific principle of testing your theories. He has actually developed a thesis and he says he could go a lot of places with it, of which I have no doubt since he regularly goes places he has no business going.
Here, see what you think about Barton’s new thesis [ ]:
Wouldn't it be interesting to do a study between those that are on welfare and see how much and how often they read the Bible. You know, if Booker T. Washington is right that Christianity and reading the Bible increases your desires and therefore your ability for hard work; if we take that as an axiom, does that mean that the people who are getting government assistance spend nearly no time in the Bible, therefore have no desire, and therefore no ability for hard work? I could go a lot of places with this. I would love to see this proven out in some kind of sociological study, but it makes perfect sense.
This is a startling thesis. For one thing, it is startling that Barton made it at all rather than simply announcing it is true like he usually does when a stray thought strikes him.
But let’s look at that last comment: “it makes perfect sense.”
He says something that has not been proven – what they call a false premise – and that gets him in immediate trouble: “if Booker T. Washington is right that Christianity and reading the Bible increases your desires and therefore your ability for hard work…”
He hasn’t established that this is true but he is already running ahead of himself and using the assumption that it is true as the basis for a further study, that people who read their Bibles and practice Christianity are less likely to be on welfare. Proving that people on welfare don’t read their Bibles isn’t going to prove Booker T. Washington’s thesis that Christianity and the Bible make you work harder. Those are two entirely different theses.
As it happens, Oxford University published a study [ http://socrel.oxfordjournals.org/content/71/1/25.full ] in 2010 that examines “beliefs about God's influence in everyday life across levels of socioeconomic status (SES) and whether that association is contingent upon religious involvement (i.e., frequency of praying, attendance, reading religious texts, and subjective religiosity).”
That study concluded that “The findings challenge the view that SES is uniformly associated with lower levels of beliefs about God's engagement and causal relevance. “ In fact, the author of the study looks at “the hypothesis that SES is associated negatively with beliefs about divine involvement and control. That is, individuals with lower levels of SES should tend to report the highest levels of belief in divine involvement and control.”
The problem for Barton is that this study at least shows “individuals with high SES tend to report the lowest levels of belief in divine control.” In other words, in simplistic Bartonian terms it’s the people who are well off who don’t read their Bible.
And not to suggest Barton is being racist or misogynist in his assertion but this study concludes that “women and African-Americans tend to report significantly higher levels of divine control compared with men and Whites.” A disproportionate number of Blacks are on welfare but they tend to be more religious than Whites – isn’t that a problem for Barton as well? Or is he suggesting that God is punishing them because they’re black? Or is it all somehow liberalism’s fault, that liberals are somehow undermining God’s plan?
The study’s author also writes that though his study calls “into question the core tenets of the deprivation–compensation view”, that “In some respects, my findings are inconsistent with central tenets of deprivation theory, which holds that the socioeconomically disadvantaged tend to use religion to cope with the adversities of their lives. There is little doubt that, overall, low SES individuals are more likely to belief in divine involvement and control.”
He also observes that,
Compared with high SES groups, low SES individuals tend to profess higher levels of divine involvement and control even when both groups share similarly low levels of religious involvement. These patterns concur with the claim that low SES groups tend to hold more orthodox beliefs than high SES individuals—regardless of their actual participation in religious activities (Van Roy et al. 1973 [ http://socrel.oxfordjournals.org/content/71/1/25.full#ref-58 ]). That is, high SES individuals are said to “practice” their religion via engagement in religious activities, while low SES practitioners are more likely to “believe” in their religion (Demerath 1961; Fukuyama 1961 [ http://socrel.oxfordjournals.org/content/71/1/25.full#ref-17 ], Gaede 1977; Stark 1972 [ http://socrel.oxfordjournals.org/content/71/1/25.full#ref-52 ]). These ideas imply that even when low SES individuals exhibit lower levels of religious involvement they will often retain a higher level of “cognitive religiosity.” By extension, it is plausible that low SES individuals will maintain high levels of belief in divine control and involvement apart from other aspects of the religious role.
In other words, some sociological work in this area has already been done and it doesn’t agree with Barton’s thesis that
lack of Christianity + lack of Bible reading = welfare recipient
It is good to come up with theses and to test them – this is the scientific process after all and we don’t want to discourage Barton from actually thinking, but he tends to come up with them and fall in love with them and to sell them without ever really examining them.
He is as poor a student as he is a scholar: he doesn’t do his homework. You can’t just go to the bathroom and have a thought when you sit down on the toilet and rush it to print. It’s just a whole lot more complicated than Barton wants it to be (a frequent problem of his where history is concerned).
For example, the study also concludes,
Irrespective of social standing, religious activities help to develop, sustain, and reinforce religious-based explanations that all participants—well-educated or not, rich or poor—use to comprehend the world and their place in it.
What Barton needs to do is first prove that Christians work harder than non-Christians, and having done so, then prove that welfare recipients are less likely to be Christians and/or read their Bibles (and we’ve already seen the evidence is against him here). There is plenty of evidence in the way of polls and studies that Barton could already look at without launching yet another study, but he hasn’t even bothered to do this.
It’s pretty clear Barton hasn’t examined all the angles, not that he ever does. It’s more fun to come up with theories that prove the Bible and Christianity are good for you and then sell them neatly packaged in provocative terms like he does here. I have to give Mr. Barton an “F”.
© 2012 PoliticusUSA
http://www.politicususa.com/david-bartons-thesis-people-welfare-read-bible.html [with comments]
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Is Your Religion Your Financial Destiny?
By DAVID LEONHARDT
Published: May 11, 2011
The economic differences among the country’s various religions are strikingly large, much larger than the differences among states and even larger than those among racial groups.
The most affluent of the major religions — including secularism — is Reform Judaism. Sixty-seven percent of Reform Jewish households made more than $75,000 a year at the time the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life collected the data, compared with only 31 percent of the population as a whole. Hindus were second, at 65 percent, and Conservative Jews were third, at 57 percent.
On the other end are Pentecostals, Jehovah’s Witnesses and Baptists. In each case, 20 percent or fewer of followers made at least $75,000. Remarkably, the share of Baptist households making $40,000 or less is roughly the same as the share of Reform Jews making $100,000 or more. Overall, Protestants, who together are the country’s largest religious group, are poorer than average and poorer than Catholics. That stands in contrast to the long history, made famous by Max Weber, of Protestant nations generally being richer than Catholic nations.
Many factors are behind the discrepancies among religions, but one stands out. The relationship between education and income is so strong that you can almost draw a line through the points on this graph. Social science rarely produces results this clean.
What about the modest outliers — like Unitarians, Buddhists and Orthodox Christians, all of whom are less affluent than they are educated (and are below the imaginary line)? One possible explanation is that some religions are more likely to produce, or to attract, people who voluntarily choose lower-paying jobs, like teaching.
Another potential explanation is discrimination. Scott Keeter of Pew notes that researchers have used more sophisticated versions of this sort of analysis to look for patterns of marketplace discrimination. And a few of the religions that make less than their education would suggest have largely nonwhite followings, including Buddhism and Hinduism. Pew also created a category of traditionally black Protestant congregations, and it was somewhat poorer than could be explained by education levels. These patterns don’t prove discrimination, but they raise questions.
Some of the income differences probably stem from culture. Some faiths place great importance on formal education. But the differences are also self-reinforcing. People who make more money can send their children to better schools, exacerbating the many advantages they have over poorer children. Round and round, the cycle goes. It won’t solve itself.
© 2011 The New York Times Company
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/15/magazine/is-your-religion-your-financial-destiny.html
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Bible Reduces Welfare!?
According to David Barton, a super Christian conservative, if one reads the Bible more, then they will be less reliant upon welfare. According to actual statistics, though, that is hardly the case.
Sources:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/07/david-barton-people-are-on-welfare-because-they-dont-read-bible_n_1578084.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/15/magazine/is-your-religion-your-financial-destiny.html [just above]
http://www.wallbuilders.com/abtbiodb.asp
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_7IDZPKRfQ
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Not Afraid to Talk About Race
By CHARLES M. BLOW
June 7, 2012, 12:24 am
Hey, I heard that: “Oh, no, the black columnist is writing about race, again.”
Yes, I am. Deal with it. The moment we allow ourselves to be browbeaten out of having important discussions about issues that persist, we cease to command the requisite conviction to wield the pen — or to peck on a keyboard, but you get my drift.
Varying political views among racial and ethnic groups are real.
They have always informed our politics, and no doubt they will continue to do so. The idea, naively held by many, that the election of the first black president would nullify racial grievances, bridge racial differences and erase racial animosities has quickly faded. We find ourselves once again trying to wrestle with the meaning and importance of race in our politics.
In fact, one could argue that examinations of racial attitudes in politics have become more fraught as racial motives, political objectives and accusations and denials of racism and reverse-racism serve as a kind of subterfuge hiding resentments and prejudices.
Either racial attitudes are naked, blatant and visible, this thinking goes, or they’re nonexistent, manufactured by race baiters and hucksters as devices of division. The middle ground, sprinkled with land mines made up of racial labels, is now a place where fair-minded people dare not tread.
That’s a shame.
But it’s not going to stop me. Strap on your lead boots and let’s go for a stroll.
A Pew Research Center American values survey [ http://www.people-press.org/2012/06/04/partisan-polarization-surges-in-bush-obama-years/ ] released this week offers fascinating insights into how racially divergent values and the changing racial compositions of political parties influence our politics.
Let’s look at the racial makeup of the two major parties: from 2000 to 2012 the percentage of Republicans who are white has remained relatively steady, about 87 percent. On the other hand, the percentage of Democrats who are white has dropped nine percentage points, from 64 percent in 2000 to 55 percent in 2012. If current trends persist, in a few years the Democratic Party will be a majority minority party. But the largest drop in the white percentage has been among Independents: they were 79 percent white in 2000, but they are only 67 percent white now.
The racial diversity among Democrats and the lack of it among Republicans means that the two bases bring differing sets of concerns to the national debate.
For instance, blacks and Hispanics are far more likely to believe that poverty is a result of circumstances beyond a person’s control than a result of lack of effort.
Blacks and Hispanics also look far more favorably on the role of government, particularly as it relates to guarding against poverty and evening a playing field that they feel is tilted. Seventy-eight percent of both blacks and Hispanics believed that government should guarantee everyone enough to eat and a place to sleep, while only 52 percent of whites agreed with that idea.
This is not to say that minorities who favor a stronger government want more government handouts. There was very little difference in the percentage of blacks, Hispanics and whites who believed that poor people have become too dependent on government assistance programs (it’s pretty high for all three groups, at 70, 69 and 72 percent, respectively).
They seem to want a chance, not a check.
To wit, 62 percent of blacks and 59 percent of Hispanics say that we should make every possible effort to improve the position of blacks and other minorities, even if it means giving them preferential treatment. Not surprisingly, only 22 percent of whites agreed with this idea. Only 12 percent of Republicans — almost all of whom are white — agreed. This percentage has been decreasing since 2007, while the percentage of white Democrats who agree has been increasing.
Now what does that mean for the presidential race?
A staggering 90 percent of Romney supporters are white. Only 4 percent are Hispanic, less than 1 percent are black and another 4 percent are another race.
Of Obama’s supporters, 57 percent are white, 23 percent are black, 12 percent are Hispanic and 7 percent are another race.
And what of the all-important swing voters (those who are undecided, who lean toward a candidate, or who say that they could change their mind)? Nearly three out of four are white. The rest are roughly 8 percent each blacks, Hispanics and another race.
That might explain why the Pew poll found that the swing voters lean more toward Obama voters on issues like civil liberties and the role of labor unions, but are closer to Romney voters on the role of social safety nets, immigration and minority-preference programs.
Put another way, Romney voters and swing voters — who are both overwhelming white — agree on the more racially charged issues.
Pointing out these correlations is not only valid, it is instructive and helpful. In large part this election will be about the role of government in our lives, and different racial and ethnic groups view that particular issue very differently.
The economy always looms large, but for those who feel left behind by the economy even when it’s roaring, but especially when it sputters, social safety nets and governmental activism can also have tremendous weight.
The trick will be to have a conversation about the direction of the country that takes that into account but lifts the language to a level where common goals can be seen from differing racial vantage points — to show a way to be merciful to those struggling while providing a path to financial independence and social equality. Contrary to what many Americans think, most people do in fact want a hand up and not a handout.
© 2012 The New York Times Company
http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/07/not-afraid-to-talk-about-race/ [with comments]
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How Racist Are We? Ask Google
Doug Mills/The New York Times
Graphic
Racially Charged Web Searches and Voting
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/06/10/sunday-review/racially-charged-web-searches-and-voting.html [do take a look]
By SETH STEPHENS-DAVIDOWITZ
June 9, 2012, 5:46 pm
Barack Obama won 52.9 percent of the popular vote in 2008 and 365 electoral votes, 95 more than he needed. Many naturally concluded [ http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122637373937516543.html ] that prejudice was not a major factor against a black presidential candidate in modern America. My research, a comparison of Americans’ Google searches and their voting patterns, found otherwise. If my results are correct, racial animus cost Mr. Obama many more votes than we may have realized.
Quantifying the effects of racial prejudice on voting is notoriously problematic. Few [ http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/06/gallup_race_not_big_factor_for.html ] people admit bias in surveys [ http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/06/gallup_race_not_big_factor_for.html ]. So I used a new tool [ http://www.google.com/insights/search/ ], Google Insights, which tells researchers how often words are searched in different parts of the United States.
Can we really quantify racial prejudice in different parts of the country based solely on how often certain words are used on Google? Not perfectly, but remarkably well. Google, aggregating information from billions of searches, has an uncanny ability to reveal meaningful social patterns. “God” is Googled more often in the Bible Belt, “Lakers” in Los Angeles.
The conditions under which people use Google — online, most likely alone, not participating in an official survey — are ideal for capturing what they are really thinking and feeling. You may have typed things into Google that you would hesitate to admit in polite company. I certainly have. The majority of Americans have as well: we Google the word “porn” more often than the word “weather.”
And many Americans use Google to find racially charged material. I performed the somewhat unpleasant task of ranking states and media markets in the United States based on the proportion of their Google searches that included the word “nigger(s).” This word was included in roughly the same number of Google searches as terms like “Lakers,” “Daily Show,” “migraine” and “economist.”
A huge proportion of the searches I looked at were for jokes about African-Americans. (I did not include searches that included the word “nigga” because these searches were mostly for rap lyrics.) I used data from 2004 to 2007 because I wanted a measure not directly influenced by feelings toward Mr. Obama. From 2008 onward, “Obama” is a prevalent term in racially charged searches.
The state with the highest racially charged search rate in the country was West Virginia. Other areas with high percentages included western Pennsylvania, eastern Ohio, upstate New York and southern Mississippi.
Once I figured out which parts of the country had the highest racially charged search rates, I could test whether Mr. Obama underperformed in these areas. I predicted how many votes Mr. Obama should have received based on how many votes John Kerry received in 2004 plus the average gain achieved by other [ http://www.realclearpolitics.com/news/ap/politics/2008/Nov/05/democrats_expand_house_edge_with_historic_gains.html ] 2008 Democratic Congressional candidates. The results were striking: The higher the racially charged search rate in an area, the worse Mr. Obama did.
Consider two media markets, Denver and Wheeling (which is a market evenly split between Ohio and West Virginia). Mr. Kerry received roughly 50 percent of the votes in both markets. Based on the large gains for Democrats in 2008, Mr. Obama should have received about 57 percent of votes in both Denver and Wheeling. Denver and Wheeling, though, exhibit different racial attitudes. Denver had the fourth lowest racially charged search rate in the country. Mr. Obama won 57 percent of the vote there, just as predicted. Wheeling had the seventh highest racially charged search rate in the country. Mr. Obama won less than 48 percent of the Wheeling vote.
Add up the totals throughout the country, and racial animus cost Mr. Obama three to five percentage points of the popular vote. In other words, racial prejudice gave John McCain the equivalent of a home-state advantage nationally.
Yes, Mr. Obama also gained some votes because of his race. But in the general election this effect was comparatively minor. The vast majority of voters for whom Mr. Obama’s race was a positive were liberal, habitual voters who would have voted for any Democratic presidential candidate. Increased support and turnout from African-Americans added only about one percentage point to Mr. Obama’s totals.
If my findings are correct, race could very well prove decisive against Mr. Obama in 2012. Most modern presidential elections are close. Losing even two percentage points lowers the probability of a candidate’s winning the popular vote by a third. And prejudice could cost Mr. Obama crucial states like Ohio, Florida and even Pennsylvania.
There is the possibility, of course, that racial prejudice will play a smaller role in 2012 than it did in 2008, now that the country is familiar with a black president. Some recent events, though, suggest otherwise. I mentioned earlier that the rate of racially charged searches in West Virginia was No. 1 in the country and that the state showed a strong aversion to Mr. Obama in 2008. It recently held its Democratic presidential primary, in which Mr. Obama was challenged by a convicted felon. The felon, who is white, won 41 percent of the vote.
In 2008, Mr. Obama rode an unusually strong tail wind [ http://www.gallup.com/poll/113947/democrats-2008-advantage-party-largest.aspx ]. The economy was collapsing [ http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/17/world/americas/17iht-mccain.4.16251777.html ]. The Iraq war was unpopular. Republicans [ http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/05/01/poll-bush-most-unpopular-in-modern-history/ ] took most of the blame. He was able to overcome the major obstacle of continuing racial prejudice in the United States. In 2012, the tail wind is gone; the obstacle likely remains.
Seth Stephens-Davidowitz is a doctoral candidate in economics at Harvard. The most up-to-date version of the research paper on which this article draws is available here [ http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~sstephen/papers/RacialAnimusAndVotingSethStephensDavidowitz.pdf ].
© 2012 The New York Times Company
http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/09/how-racist-are-we-ask-google/ [with comments]
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Caiden Cowger Program, Conservative Teen Radio Show, Pulled From Spreaker
Posted: 06/08/2012 4:35 pm Updated: 06/09/2012 10:05 am
The 14-year-old West Virginia-based radio host who declared on a recent show that President Obama "is making kids gay" has been deemed "offensive," and taken off the air, by a second internet media outlet.
On Friday, Spreaker, a free audio platform that hosts radio shows, pulled the Caiden Cowger Program [ http://www.spreaker.com/show/caidencowgerprogram ], replacing the page with a note that now reads "Spreaker has deleted this show due to offensive contents."
Cowger hosts a twice-weekly show. Last month, he declared on a show that being homosexual was a "perverted belief, it's immoral and not natural." As the Huffington Post previously noted [ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/06/caiden-cowger-teen-radio-host-gay-obama_n_1574524.html?ref=gay-voices ], Cowger mentioned that he was previously friends with some kids who later came out of the closet. "They were not homosexuals [then]...they just decided all of a sudden, 'I think I'm going to be gay,'" Then he concluded, "I'm going to tell you this, guys: President Obama...Vice President Biden...is making kids gay!"
According to website Zimbio [ http://www.zimbio.com/Gay+and+Lesbian+Rights/articles/8LOFWJG_7c_/Woman+took+gay+son+case+NY+Supreme+Court+wants ], Youtube deemed the video, titled, "Obama is making kids gay" hate speech and removed it from the site. But on Cowger's website [ http://www.caidencowgerprogram.com/ ], he claimed his YouTube account was hacked and then closed and Cowger has since launched a new YouTube channel [ http://www.youtube.com/user/CaidenCowgerShow ].
Rhonda Mangus, the mother of bullied gay teen Michael Mangus, led the charge [ http://www.zimbio.com/Gay+and+Lesbian+Rights/articles/8LOFWJG_7c_/Woman+took+gay+son+case+NY+Supreme+Court+wants ] to remove Cowger's program from Spreaker. Under the Terms of Service on Spreaker's website, the site says user submissions to the site must not be "unlawful, defamatory, libellous, slanderous, threatening, pornographic, obscene, vulgar, harassing, harmful, hateful, abusive, racially or ethnically offensive or is otherwise inappropriate."
Copyright © 2012 TheHuffingtonPost.com, Inc.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/08/caiden-cowger-program-pulled-spreaker_n_1582108.html [with comments]
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Atlanta megachurch leader punched and choked daughter, police say
Atlanta megachurch pastor Creflo Dollar faces misdemeanor chargers after a scuffle with his 15-year-old daughter.
(Fayette County Sheriff's Office / June 9, 2012)
By Laura J. Nelson
June 9, 2012, 6:32 p.m.
Atlanta megachurch leader Creflo Dollar [ http://www.creflodollarministries.org/About/CrefloDollar.aspx ] choked and punched his 15-year-old daughter, then spanked her with a shoe, during an argument over whether she could go to a party, according to a police report.
Dollar told deputies he tried to restrain his daughter when she became disrespectful. When she began hitting back, the report said, he wrestled her to the floor and spanked her.
Dollar, 50, is one of the most prominent African American preachers in Atlanta, a well-known exponent of the prosperity gospel, which teaches followers that God will bless the faithful with material rewards.
His church, World Changers Church International [ http://www.worldchangers.org/ ], has nearly 30,000 members. The church has 10 satellite churches in half a dozen states.
“As a father I love my children and I always have their best interest at heart at all times, and I would never use my hand to ever cause bodily harm to my children,” Dollar said in a statement. "The facts in this case will be handled privately to further protect my children. My family thanks you for your prayers and continued support."
Dollar’s wife, Taffi, said she saw her daughter lying on the floor, but did not see a fight.
The church leader faces misdemeanor charges of simple battery and cruelty to children. He has been released from jail and his lawyer told the Associated Press he was expected to preach Sunday.
At 1 a.m. Friday, Dollar’s 15-year-old daughter called 911. She told a Fayette County sheriff’s deputy that she and her father argued about whether she could go to a party the following night. She left the room with her 19-year-old sister.
When Dollar followed her and asked her why she was crying, she responded, “I do not want to talk right now,” according to the report.
"He charged her, and put his hands around her throat and began to choke her," the report reads. "...He then slammed her to the ground and began to punch her and took his shoe off and started whooping her with it."
Deputies noted a scratch on the right side of her neck.
Dollar said his daughter could not attend the party because of bad grades. Then he said she became very disrespectful when he asked her why she was upset, according to the report. He tried to restrain her. They wrestled. He spanked her. Then, Dollar told deputies, she began to calm down. He sent her to her room.
The 19-year-old daughter initially gave two statements, a verbal one that corroborated her sister's story, and a written one that corroborated her father’s story.
When asked about the discrepancy by deputies, she said her parents were with her when she composed the written statement. When separated from her family, she wrote a second statement that matched her verbal statement, deputies said.
laura.nelson@latimes.com
Copyright © 2012, Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-megachurch-leader-20120609,0,5626910.story [with comments]
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Creflo Dollar's Wife, Taffi Dollar, Home at Time of Alleged Assault
Megachurch Minister Expected to Preach Sunday Amid Charges of Abusing 15-Year-Old Daughter
By Nicola Menzie , Christian Post Reporter
June 9, 2012 12:26 pm
On the heels of Atlanta-area megachurch minister Creflo Dollar releasing a statement about his arrest for allegedly assaulting his teenage daughter, supporters of his World Changers International Church have been speculating as to the whereabouts and role of Taffi Dollar at the time of the alleged attack and subsequent arrest.
According to reports on his arrest, the Dollars' 15-year-old daughter, who has not been identified, got into an argument with her father about attending a party. Authorities, called to the home Friday about 1 a.m. on domestic violence claims, say the popular minister "slightly hurt" the girl in a fight at their Atlanta home, leaving the girl with "superficial injuries."
Investigator Rowan revealed that the Dollars' 19-year-old daughter, identified in reports as Alexandria Dollar, corroborated her sister's story, and claimed in the incident report that she saw her father "put both hands around her sister's neck and (choke) her for about five seconds." Alexandria Dollar then claimed she witnessed Pastor Dollar take her sister by the shoulders and slap her in the face, and throw to the grown [sic - ground] when she tried to break free.
Some in the Christian community, saddened by the news, have been wondering where the girls' mother, Taffi Dollar, was at the time of the incident.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution cites the incident report filed by authorities as showing that Taffi Dollar was in the home, but not in the kitchen, where the alleged incident took place. Once alerted to the incident, Taffi Dollar entered the kitchen and brought the altercation to an end.
A copy of the arresting deputy's report published online reveals that Taffi Dollar told the officer that "the only thing she saw was her daughter, the juvenile victim in [sic] the floor and did not see the altercation between her husband and daughter."
Taffi Dollar, described as a "a world-renowned author, teacher, and conference speaker" on World Changers Church International's website, says that her primary purpose and calling is "supporting her husband in ministry, and raising godly children." She has also said she has a "heart for restoring women and family relationships."
Supporters have expressed sympathy for the Dollars and were encouraging prayer for the family.
"Praying for Taffi Dollar..... I know her heart is hurting, but God is the mender of broken hearts!" tweeted ?@mitta76.
Twitter user @indiamiller1 wrote: "It takes a lot of prayer & meditation when raising teens!!! I know! Praying for Creflo/Taffi Dollar."
Dollar, who shares five children with his wife, faces misdemeanor charges of simple battery and cruelty to children.
The minister was released from jail on $5,000 bond early Friday morning and released a statement through his attorney, Nikki Bonner:
"As a father I love my children and I always have their best interest at heart at all times, and I would never use my hand to ever cause bodily harm to my children. The facts in this case will be handled privately to further protect my children. My family thanks you for your prayers and continued support."
Although Dollar was not expected to make further comments on the case, Bonner told The Associated Press that the minister was still scheduled to preach from the pulpit Sunday -- a decision at least one critic found troubling.
Anthea Butler, a Professor of Religious Studies and Graduate chair at the University of Pennsylvania, told the ACJ [sic - AJC] that Dollar should perhaps taking time off to deal with the case.
"It's very interesting when the preacher gets arrested for battery," said Butler. "We have to wait and see what the circumstances are surrounding the charges."
Butler added, "Here we see someone who espouses Christian virtues being arrested for battery. Perhaps that's a real signal that they need to step down from the ministry for a while. How do you get up in the pulpit and preach on Sunday?"
Dollar, whose local World Changers International Church is home to more than 30,000 members and his New York City branch home to 6,000 others, reportedly preached in a 2006 sermon about child abuse.
"We're responsible for not abusing our children but for disciplining them," he reportedly said. "There's a place for it, and it should only be administered with temperance. You don't go lose your temper on your child, that's abuse. But you don't throw the baby out with the bath water either."
©2012 The Christian Post
http://global.christianpost.com/news/creflo-dollars-wife-taffi-dollar-home-at-time-of-alleged-assault-76371/ [with comments]
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and see http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=4553593
Posted: 06/08/2012 4:07 pm Updated: 06/08/2012 9:27 pm
The Dove World Outreach Center in Gainesville, Fla., has hanged an effigy of President Barack Obama [ http://www.thesmokinggun.com/buster/obama-hung-in-effigy-678923 ] from a gallows on its front lawn, a move DWOC pastor Terry Jones said was in response to Obama's recent endorsement of same-sex marriage [ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/09/obama-gay-marriage_n_1503245.html ], as well as his stance on abortion and what Jones called his "appeasing of radical Islam."
According to the Broward-Palm Beach New Times, the U.S. Secret Service is currently investigating Jones [ http://blogs.browardpalmbeach.com/pulp/2012/06/terry_jones_hangs_obama.php ] in response to the display.
"The Secret Service is aware of this incident and will conduct appropriate follow-up," Secret Service spokesman Brian Leary told the paper's "The Pulp" blog [id.].
The effigy is suspended from a makeshift gallows with a noose of yellow rope, has a doll in its right hand and a rainbow-colored gay pride flag in its left.
In a telephone interview with The Huffington Post, Jones said the flag was meant to call attention to Obama's stance on same-sex marriage and that the baby doll is there because the president is "favorable toward abortion."
Jones also said that radical Islam is "the most dangerous threat to life and national security in America."
There is also an Uncle Sam dummy standing at the base of the gallows outside the DWOC. Jones told HuffPost that the Obama effigy had originally been positioned to be hanging Uncle Sam when the display went up two weeks ago, but that the church changed the display on Wednesday.
The words “Obama is Killing America” are printed on a trailer nearby.
The DWOC came under intense scrutiny in 2011 after Jones burned a copy of the Quran [ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/26/pastor-terry-jones-defend_n_696390.html ], a move which sparked three days of violent rioting in Afghanistan [ http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/04/quran-burning-protests-continue-afghanistan ] that resulted in the deaths of at least 21 people, including seven U.N. workers.
In addition to its higher profile controversial moves, the Dove World Outreach Center has also been criticized for its internal rules, which The Smoking Gun has called "cult-like [ http://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/bizarre/koran-burner-creepier-you-think ]."
In the church's Academy Rulebook [ http://www.thesmokinggun.com/file/dove-church-rulebook?page=0 ], written by Jone's wife and published in 2007, prospective ministers are directed to cut off most contact with family members.
This is not the first time that an effigy of the country's first black president has been hanged.
In March 2010, a teacher at a failing Rhode Island school hanged an effigy of Obama in his classroom [ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/18/obama-hung-in-effigy-at-r_n_504746.html ]. That same month, another dummy was found hanging on Main Street [ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/03/obama-effigy-feds-probe-h_n_409922.html?1339182386 ] in the Georgia hometown of President Jimmy Carter.
In 2009, a Kentucky grand jury refused to indict two men who hanged an Obama effigy [ http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2009/01/27/60852/if-they-had-hung-joe-biden-we.html ] on the campus of the University of Kentucky. The men had been charged with burglary and disorderly conduct, the latter count associated with hanging the effigy. The lawyer for the two men said that the disorderly conduct charge violated his clients' rights under the First Amendment.
Copyright © 2012 TheHuffingtonPost.com, Inc.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/08/obama-effigy-hanged-outside-church_n_1581272.html [with comments]
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Barton: 'It Makes Perfect Sense' that People are on Welfare Because they are not Reading the Bible
06/06/2012
http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/barton-it-makes-perfect-sense-people-are-welfare-because-they-are-not-reading-bible [with audio embedded]
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David Barton’s New Thesis: People Who Are on Welfare Don’t Read the Bible
By: Hrafnkell HaraldssonJune 7, 2012
David Barton seems to have discovered the scientific principle of testing your theories. He has actually developed a thesis and he says he could go a lot of places with it, of which I have no doubt since he regularly goes places he has no business going.
Here, see what you think about Barton’s new thesis [ ]:
Wouldn't it be interesting to do a study between those that are on welfare and see how much and how often they read the Bible. You know, if Booker T. Washington is right that Christianity and reading the Bible increases your desires and therefore your ability for hard work; if we take that as an axiom, does that mean that the people who are getting government assistance spend nearly no time in the Bible, therefore have no desire, and therefore no ability for hard work? I could go a lot of places with this. I would love to see this proven out in some kind of sociological study, but it makes perfect sense.
This is a startling thesis. For one thing, it is startling that Barton made it at all rather than simply announcing it is true like he usually does when a stray thought strikes him.
But let’s look at that last comment: “it makes perfect sense.”
He says something that has not been proven – what they call a false premise – and that gets him in immediate trouble: “if Booker T. Washington is right that Christianity and reading the Bible increases your desires and therefore your ability for hard work…”
He hasn’t established that this is true but he is already running ahead of himself and using the assumption that it is true as the basis for a further study, that people who read their Bibles and practice Christianity are less likely to be on welfare. Proving that people on welfare don’t read their Bibles isn’t going to prove Booker T. Washington’s thesis that Christianity and the Bible make you work harder. Those are two entirely different theses.
As it happens, Oxford University published a study [ http://socrel.oxfordjournals.org/content/71/1/25.full ] in 2010 that examines “beliefs about God's influence in everyday life across levels of socioeconomic status (SES) and whether that association is contingent upon religious involvement (i.e., frequency of praying, attendance, reading religious texts, and subjective religiosity).”
That study concluded that “The findings challenge the view that SES is uniformly associated with lower levels of beliefs about God's engagement and causal relevance. “ In fact, the author of the study looks at “the hypothesis that SES is associated negatively with beliefs about divine involvement and control. That is, individuals with lower levels of SES should tend to report the highest levels of belief in divine involvement and control.”
The problem for Barton is that this study at least shows “individuals with high SES tend to report the lowest levels of belief in divine control.” In other words, in simplistic Bartonian terms it’s the people who are well off who don’t read their Bible.
And not to suggest Barton is being racist or misogynist in his assertion but this study concludes that “women and African-Americans tend to report significantly higher levels of divine control compared with men and Whites.” A disproportionate number of Blacks are on welfare but they tend to be more religious than Whites – isn’t that a problem for Barton as well? Or is he suggesting that God is punishing them because they’re black? Or is it all somehow liberalism’s fault, that liberals are somehow undermining God’s plan?
The study’s author also writes that though his study calls “into question the core tenets of the deprivation–compensation view”, that “In some respects, my findings are inconsistent with central tenets of deprivation theory, which holds that the socioeconomically disadvantaged tend to use religion to cope with the adversities of their lives. There is little doubt that, overall, low SES individuals are more likely to belief in divine involvement and control.”
He also observes that,
Compared with high SES groups, low SES individuals tend to profess higher levels of divine involvement and control even when both groups share similarly low levels of religious involvement. These patterns concur with the claim that low SES groups tend to hold more orthodox beliefs than high SES individuals—regardless of their actual participation in religious activities (Van Roy et al. 1973 [ http://socrel.oxfordjournals.org/content/71/1/25.full#ref-58 ]). That is, high SES individuals are said to “practice” their religion via engagement in religious activities, while low SES practitioners are more likely to “believe” in their religion (Demerath 1961; Fukuyama 1961 [ http://socrel.oxfordjournals.org/content/71/1/25.full#ref-17 ], Gaede 1977; Stark 1972 [ http://socrel.oxfordjournals.org/content/71/1/25.full#ref-52 ]). These ideas imply that even when low SES individuals exhibit lower levels of religious involvement they will often retain a higher level of “cognitive religiosity.” By extension, it is plausible that low SES individuals will maintain high levels of belief in divine control and involvement apart from other aspects of the religious role.
In other words, some sociological work in this area has already been done and it doesn’t agree with Barton’s thesis that
lack of Christianity + lack of Bible reading = welfare recipient
It is good to come up with theses and to test them – this is the scientific process after all and we don’t want to discourage Barton from actually thinking, but he tends to come up with them and fall in love with them and to sell them without ever really examining them.
He is as poor a student as he is a scholar: he doesn’t do his homework. You can’t just go to the bathroom and have a thought when you sit down on the toilet and rush it to print. It’s just a whole lot more complicated than Barton wants it to be (a frequent problem of his where history is concerned).
For example, the study also concludes,
Irrespective of social standing, religious activities help to develop, sustain, and reinforce religious-based explanations that all participants—well-educated or not, rich or poor—use to comprehend the world and their place in it.
What Barton needs to do is first prove that Christians work harder than non-Christians, and having done so, then prove that welfare recipients are less likely to be Christians and/or read their Bibles (and we’ve already seen the evidence is against him here). There is plenty of evidence in the way of polls and studies that Barton could already look at without launching yet another study, but he hasn’t even bothered to do this.
It’s pretty clear Barton hasn’t examined all the angles, not that he ever does. It’s more fun to come up with theories that prove the Bible and Christianity are good for you and then sell them neatly packaged in provocative terms like he does here. I have to give Mr. Barton an “F”.
© 2012 PoliticusUSA
http://www.politicususa.com/david-bartons-thesis-people-welfare-read-bible.html [with comments]
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Is Your Religion Your Financial Destiny?
By DAVID LEONHARDT
Published: May 11, 2011
The economic differences among the country’s various religions are strikingly large, much larger than the differences among states and even larger than those among racial groups.
The most affluent of the major religions — including secularism — is Reform Judaism. Sixty-seven percent of Reform Jewish households made more than $75,000 a year at the time the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life collected the data, compared with only 31 percent of the population as a whole. Hindus were second, at 65 percent, and Conservative Jews were third, at 57 percent.
On the other end are Pentecostals, Jehovah’s Witnesses and Baptists. In each case, 20 percent or fewer of followers made at least $75,000. Remarkably, the share of Baptist households making $40,000 or less is roughly the same as the share of Reform Jews making $100,000 or more. Overall, Protestants, who together are the country’s largest religious group, are poorer than average and poorer than Catholics. That stands in contrast to the long history, made famous by Max Weber, of Protestant nations generally being richer than Catholic nations.
Many factors are behind the discrepancies among religions, but one stands out. The relationship between education and income is so strong that you can almost draw a line through the points on this graph. Social science rarely produces results this clean.
What about the modest outliers — like Unitarians, Buddhists and Orthodox Christians, all of whom are less affluent than they are educated (and are below the imaginary line)? One possible explanation is that some religions are more likely to produce, or to attract, people who voluntarily choose lower-paying jobs, like teaching.
Another potential explanation is discrimination. Scott Keeter of Pew notes that researchers have used more sophisticated versions of this sort of analysis to look for patterns of marketplace discrimination. And a few of the religions that make less than their education would suggest have largely nonwhite followings, including Buddhism and Hinduism. Pew also created a category of traditionally black Protestant congregations, and it was somewhat poorer than could be explained by education levels. These patterns don’t prove discrimination, but they raise questions.
Some of the income differences probably stem from culture. Some faiths place great importance on formal education. But the differences are also self-reinforcing. People who make more money can send their children to better schools, exacerbating the many advantages they have over poorer children. Round and round, the cycle goes. It won’t solve itself.
© 2011 The New York Times Company
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/15/magazine/is-your-religion-your-financial-destiny.html
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Bible Reduces Welfare!?
Published on Jun 7, 2012 by DixonRants
According to David Barton, a super Christian conservative, if one reads the Bible more, then they will be less reliant upon welfare. According to actual statistics, though, that is hardly the case.
Sources:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/07/david-barton-people-are-on-welfare-because-they-dont-read-bible_n_1578084.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/15/magazine/is-your-religion-your-financial-destiny.html [just above]
http://www.wallbuilders.com/abtbiodb.asp
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_7IDZPKRfQ
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Not Afraid to Talk About Race
By CHARLES M. BLOW
June 7, 2012, 12:24 am
Hey, I heard that: “Oh, no, the black columnist is writing about race, again.”
Yes, I am. Deal with it. The moment we allow ourselves to be browbeaten out of having important discussions about issues that persist, we cease to command the requisite conviction to wield the pen — or to peck on a keyboard, but you get my drift.
Varying political views among racial and ethnic groups are real.
They have always informed our politics, and no doubt they will continue to do so. The idea, naively held by many, that the election of the first black president would nullify racial grievances, bridge racial differences and erase racial animosities has quickly faded. We find ourselves once again trying to wrestle with the meaning and importance of race in our politics.
In fact, one could argue that examinations of racial attitudes in politics have become more fraught as racial motives, political objectives and accusations and denials of racism and reverse-racism serve as a kind of subterfuge hiding resentments and prejudices.
Either racial attitudes are naked, blatant and visible, this thinking goes, or they’re nonexistent, manufactured by race baiters and hucksters as devices of division. The middle ground, sprinkled with land mines made up of racial labels, is now a place where fair-minded people dare not tread.
That’s a shame.
But it’s not going to stop me. Strap on your lead boots and let’s go for a stroll.
A Pew Research Center American values survey [ http://www.people-press.org/2012/06/04/partisan-polarization-surges-in-bush-obama-years/ ] released this week offers fascinating insights into how racially divergent values and the changing racial compositions of political parties influence our politics.
Let’s look at the racial makeup of the two major parties: from 2000 to 2012 the percentage of Republicans who are white has remained relatively steady, about 87 percent. On the other hand, the percentage of Democrats who are white has dropped nine percentage points, from 64 percent in 2000 to 55 percent in 2012. If current trends persist, in a few years the Democratic Party will be a majority minority party. But the largest drop in the white percentage has been among Independents: they were 79 percent white in 2000, but they are only 67 percent white now.
The racial diversity among Democrats and the lack of it among Republicans means that the two bases bring differing sets of concerns to the national debate.
For instance, blacks and Hispanics are far more likely to believe that poverty is a result of circumstances beyond a person’s control than a result of lack of effort.
Blacks and Hispanics also look far more favorably on the role of government, particularly as it relates to guarding against poverty and evening a playing field that they feel is tilted. Seventy-eight percent of both blacks and Hispanics believed that government should guarantee everyone enough to eat and a place to sleep, while only 52 percent of whites agreed with that idea.
This is not to say that minorities who favor a stronger government want more government handouts. There was very little difference in the percentage of blacks, Hispanics and whites who believed that poor people have become too dependent on government assistance programs (it’s pretty high for all three groups, at 70, 69 and 72 percent, respectively).
They seem to want a chance, not a check.
To wit, 62 percent of blacks and 59 percent of Hispanics say that we should make every possible effort to improve the position of blacks and other minorities, even if it means giving them preferential treatment. Not surprisingly, only 22 percent of whites agreed with this idea. Only 12 percent of Republicans — almost all of whom are white — agreed. This percentage has been decreasing since 2007, while the percentage of white Democrats who agree has been increasing.
Now what does that mean for the presidential race?
A staggering 90 percent of Romney supporters are white. Only 4 percent are Hispanic, less than 1 percent are black and another 4 percent are another race.
Of Obama’s supporters, 57 percent are white, 23 percent are black, 12 percent are Hispanic and 7 percent are another race.
And what of the all-important swing voters (those who are undecided, who lean toward a candidate, or who say that they could change their mind)? Nearly three out of four are white. The rest are roughly 8 percent each blacks, Hispanics and another race.
That might explain why the Pew poll found that the swing voters lean more toward Obama voters on issues like civil liberties and the role of labor unions, but are closer to Romney voters on the role of social safety nets, immigration and minority-preference programs.
Put another way, Romney voters and swing voters — who are both overwhelming white — agree on the more racially charged issues.
Pointing out these correlations is not only valid, it is instructive and helpful. In large part this election will be about the role of government in our lives, and different racial and ethnic groups view that particular issue very differently.
The economy always looms large, but for those who feel left behind by the economy even when it’s roaring, but especially when it sputters, social safety nets and governmental activism can also have tremendous weight.
The trick will be to have a conversation about the direction of the country that takes that into account but lifts the language to a level where common goals can be seen from differing racial vantage points — to show a way to be merciful to those struggling while providing a path to financial independence and social equality. Contrary to what many Americans think, most people do in fact want a hand up and not a handout.
© 2012 The New York Times Company
http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/07/not-afraid-to-talk-about-race/ [with comments]
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How Racist Are We? Ask Google
Doug Mills/The New York Times
Graphic
Racially Charged Web Searches and Voting
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/06/10/sunday-review/racially-charged-web-searches-and-voting.html [do take a look]
By SETH STEPHENS-DAVIDOWITZ
June 9, 2012, 5:46 pm
Barack Obama won 52.9 percent of the popular vote in 2008 and 365 electoral votes, 95 more than he needed. Many naturally concluded [ http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122637373937516543.html ] that prejudice was not a major factor against a black presidential candidate in modern America. My research, a comparison of Americans’ Google searches and their voting patterns, found otherwise. If my results are correct, racial animus cost Mr. Obama many more votes than we may have realized.
Quantifying the effects of racial prejudice on voting is notoriously problematic. Few [ http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/06/gallup_race_not_big_factor_for.html ] people admit bias in surveys [ http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/06/gallup_race_not_big_factor_for.html ]. So I used a new tool [ http://www.google.com/insights/search/ ], Google Insights, which tells researchers how often words are searched in different parts of the United States.
Can we really quantify racial prejudice in different parts of the country based solely on how often certain words are used on Google? Not perfectly, but remarkably well. Google, aggregating information from billions of searches, has an uncanny ability to reveal meaningful social patterns. “God” is Googled more often in the Bible Belt, “Lakers” in Los Angeles.
The conditions under which people use Google — online, most likely alone, not participating in an official survey — are ideal for capturing what they are really thinking and feeling. You may have typed things into Google that you would hesitate to admit in polite company. I certainly have. The majority of Americans have as well: we Google the word “porn” more often than the word “weather.”
And many Americans use Google to find racially charged material. I performed the somewhat unpleasant task of ranking states and media markets in the United States based on the proportion of their Google searches that included the word “nigger(s).” This word was included in roughly the same number of Google searches as terms like “Lakers,” “Daily Show,” “migraine” and “economist.”
A huge proportion of the searches I looked at were for jokes about African-Americans. (I did not include searches that included the word “nigga” because these searches were mostly for rap lyrics.) I used data from 2004 to 2007 because I wanted a measure not directly influenced by feelings toward Mr. Obama. From 2008 onward, “Obama” is a prevalent term in racially charged searches.
The state with the highest racially charged search rate in the country was West Virginia. Other areas with high percentages included western Pennsylvania, eastern Ohio, upstate New York and southern Mississippi.
Once I figured out which parts of the country had the highest racially charged search rates, I could test whether Mr. Obama underperformed in these areas. I predicted how many votes Mr. Obama should have received based on how many votes John Kerry received in 2004 plus the average gain achieved by other [ http://www.realclearpolitics.com/news/ap/politics/2008/Nov/05/democrats_expand_house_edge_with_historic_gains.html ] 2008 Democratic Congressional candidates. The results were striking: The higher the racially charged search rate in an area, the worse Mr. Obama did.
Consider two media markets, Denver and Wheeling (which is a market evenly split between Ohio and West Virginia). Mr. Kerry received roughly 50 percent of the votes in both markets. Based on the large gains for Democrats in 2008, Mr. Obama should have received about 57 percent of votes in both Denver and Wheeling. Denver and Wheeling, though, exhibit different racial attitudes. Denver had the fourth lowest racially charged search rate in the country. Mr. Obama won 57 percent of the vote there, just as predicted. Wheeling had the seventh highest racially charged search rate in the country. Mr. Obama won less than 48 percent of the Wheeling vote.
Add up the totals throughout the country, and racial animus cost Mr. Obama three to five percentage points of the popular vote. In other words, racial prejudice gave John McCain the equivalent of a home-state advantage nationally.
Yes, Mr. Obama also gained some votes because of his race. But in the general election this effect was comparatively minor. The vast majority of voters for whom Mr. Obama’s race was a positive were liberal, habitual voters who would have voted for any Democratic presidential candidate. Increased support and turnout from African-Americans added only about one percentage point to Mr. Obama’s totals.
If my findings are correct, race could very well prove decisive against Mr. Obama in 2012. Most modern presidential elections are close. Losing even two percentage points lowers the probability of a candidate’s winning the popular vote by a third. And prejudice could cost Mr. Obama crucial states like Ohio, Florida and even Pennsylvania.
There is the possibility, of course, that racial prejudice will play a smaller role in 2012 than it did in 2008, now that the country is familiar with a black president. Some recent events, though, suggest otherwise. I mentioned earlier that the rate of racially charged searches in West Virginia was No. 1 in the country and that the state showed a strong aversion to Mr. Obama in 2008. It recently held its Democratic presidential primary, in which Mr. Obama was challenged by a convicted felon. The felon, who is white, won 41 percent of the vote.
In 2008, Mr. Obama rode an unusually strong tail wind [ http://www.gallup.com/poll/113947/democrats-2008-advantage-party-largest.aspx ]. The economy was collapsing [ http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/17/world/americas/17iht-mccain.4.16251777.html ]. The Iraq war was unpopular. Republicans [ http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/05/01/poll-bush-most-unpopular-in-modern-history/ ] took most of the blame. He was able to overcome the major obstacle of continuing racial prejudice in the United States. In 2012, the tail wind is gone; the obstacle likely remains.
Seth Stephens-Davidowitz is a doctoral candidate in economics at Harvard. The most up-to-date version of the research paper on which this article draws is available here [ http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~sstephen/papers/RacialAnimusAndVotingSethStephensDavidowitz.pdf ].
© 2012 The New York Times Company
http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/09/how-racist-are-we-ask-google/ [with comments]
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Caiden Cowger Program, Conservative Teen Radio Show, Pulled From Spreaker
Posted: 06/08/2012 4:35 pm Updated: 06/09/2012 10:05 am
The 14-year-old West Virginia-based radio host who declared on a recent show that President Obama "is making kids gay" has been deemed "offensive," and taken off the air, by a second internet media outlet.
On Friday, Spreaker, a free audio platform that hosts radio shows, pulled the Caiden Cowger Program [ http://www.spreaker.com/show/caidencowgerprogram ], replacing the page with a note that now reads "Spreaker has deleted this show due to offensive contents."
Cowger hosts a twice-weekly show. Last month, he declared on a show that being homosexual was a "perverted belief, it's immoral and not natural." As the Huffington Post previously noted [ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/06/caiden-cowger-teen-radio-host-gay-obama_n_1574524.html?ref=gay-voices ], Cowger mentioned that he was previously friends with some kids who later came out of the closet. "They were not homosexuals [then]...they just decided all of a sudden, 'I think I'm going to be gay,'" Then he concluded, "I'm going to tell you this, guys: President Obama...Vice President Biden...is making kids gay!"
According to website Zimbio [ http://www.zimbio.com/Gay+and+Lesbian+Rights/articles/8LOFWJG_7c_/Woman+took+gay+son+case+NY+Supreme+Court+wants ], Youtube deemed the video, titled, "Obama is making kids gay" hate speech and removed it from the site. But on Cowger's website [ http://www.caidencowgerprogram.com/ ], he claimed his YouTube account was hacked and then closed and Cowger has since launched a new YouTube channel [ http://www.youtube.com/user/CaidenCowgerShow ].
Rhonda Mangus, the mother of bullied gay teen Michael Mangus, led the charge [ http://www.zimbio.com/Gay+and+Lesbian+Rights/articles/8LOFWJG_7c_/Woman+took+gay+son+case+NY+Supreme+Court+wants ] to remove Cowger's program from Spreaker. Under the Terms of Service on Spreaker's website, the site says user submissions to the site must not be "unlawful, defamatory, libellous, slanderous, threatening, pornographic, obscene, vulgar, harassing, harmful, hateful, abusive, racially or ethnically offensive or is otherwise inappropriate."
Copyright © 2012 TheHuffingtonPost.com, Inc.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/08/caiden-cowger-program-pulled-spreaker_n_1582108.html [with comments]
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Atlanta megachurch leader punched and choked daughter, police say
Atlanta megachurch pastor Creflo Dollar faces misdemeanor chargers after a scuffle with his 15-year-old daughter.
(Fayette County Sheriff's Office / June 9, 2012)
By Laura J. Nelson
June 9, 2012, 6:32 p.m.
Atlanta megachurch leader Creflo Dollar [ http://www.creflodollarministries.org/About/CrefloDollar.aspx ] choked and punched his 15-year-old daughter, then spanked her with a shoe, during an argument over whether she could go to a party, according to a police report.
Dollar told deputies he tried to restrain his daughter when she became disrespectful. When she began hitting back, the report said, he wrestled her to the floor and spanked her.
Dollar, 50, is one of the most prominent African American preachers in Atlanta, a well-known exponent of the prosperity gospel, which teaches followers that God will bless the faithful with material rewards.
His church, World Changers Church International [ http://www.worldchangers.org/ ], has nearly 30,000 members. The church has 10 satellite churches in half a dozen states.
“As a father I love my children and I always have their best interest at heart at all times, and I would never use my hand to ever cause bodily harm to my children,” Dollar said in a statement. "The facts in this case will be handled privately to further protect my children. My family thanks you for your prayers and continued support."
Dollar’s wife, Taffi, said she saw her daughter lying on the floor, but did not see a fight.
The church leader faces misdemeanor charges of simple battery and cruelty to children. He has been released from jail and his lawyer told the Associated Press he was expected to preach Sunday.
At 1 a.m. Friday, Dollar’s 15-year-old daughter called 911. She told a Fayette County sheriff’s deputy that she and her father argued about whether she could go to a party the following night. She left the room with her 19-year-old sister.
When Dollar followed her and asked her why she was crying, she responded, “I do not want to talk right now,” according to the report.
"He charged her, and put his hands around her throat and began to choke her," the report reads. "...He then slammed her to the ground and began to punch her and took his shoe off and started whooping her with it."
Deputies noted a scratch on the right side of her neck.
Dollar said his daughter could not attend the party because of bad grades. Then he said she became very disrespectful when he asked her why she was upset, according to the report. He tried to restrain her. They wrestled. He spanked her. Then, Dollar told deputies, she began to calm down. He sent her to her room.
The 19-year-old daughter initially gave two statements, a verbal one that corroborated her sister's story, and a written one that corroborated her father’s story.
When asked about the discrepancy by deputies, she said her parents were with her when she composed the written statement. When separated from her family, she wrote a second statement that matched her verbal statement, deputies said.
laura.nelson@latimes.com
Copyright © 2012, Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-megachurch-leader-20120609,0,5626910.story [with comments]
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Creflo Dollar's Wife, Taffi Dollar, Home at Time of Alleged Assault
Megachurch Minister Expected to Preach Sunday Amid Charges of Abusing 15-Year-Old Daughter
By Nicola Menzie , Christian Post Reporter
June 9, 2012 12:26 pm
On the heels of Atlanta-area megachurch minister Creflo Dollar releasing a statement about his arrest for allegedly assaulting his teenage daughter, supporters of his World Changers International Church have been speculating as to the whereabouts and role of Taffi Dollar at the time of the alleged attack and subsequent arrest.
According to reports on his arrest, the Dollars' 15-year-old daughter, who has not been identified, got into an argument with her father about attending a party. Authorities, called to the home Friday about 1 a.m. on domestic violence claims, say the popular minister "slightly hurt" the girl in a fight at their Atlanta home, leaving the girl with "superficial injuries."
Investigator Rowan revealed that the Dollars' 19-year-old daughter, identified in reports as Alexandria Dollar, corroborated her sister's story, and claimed in the incident report that she saw her father "put both hands around her sister's neck and (choke) her for about five seconds." Alexandria Dollar then claimed she witnessed Pastor Dollar take her sister by the shoulders and slap her in the face, and throw to the grown [sic - ground] when she tried to break free.
Some in the Christian community, saddened by the news, have been wondering where the girls' mother, Taffi Dollar, was at the time of the incident.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution cites the incident report filed by authorities as showing that Taffi Dollar was in the home, but not in the kitchen, where the alleged incident took place. Once alerted to the incident, Taffi Dollar entered the kitchen and brought the altercation to an end.
A copy of the arresting deputy's report published online reveals that Taffi Dollar told the officer that "the only thing she saw was her daughter, the juvenile victim in [sic] the floor and did not see the altercation between her husband and daughter."
Taffi Dollar, described as a "a world-renowned author, teacher, and conference speaker" on World Changers Church International's website, says that her primary purpose and calling is "supporting her husband in ministry, and raising godly children." She has also said she has a "heart for restoring women and family relationships."
Supporters have expressed sympathy for the Dollars and were encouraging prayer for the family.
"Praying for Taffi Dollar..... I know her heart is hurting, but God is the mender of broken hearts!" tweeted ?@mitta76.
Twitter user @indiamiller1 wrote: "It takes a lot of prayer & meditation when raising teens!!! I know! Praying for Creflo/Taffi Dollar."
Dollar, who shares five children with his wife, faces misdemeanor charges of simple battery and cruelty to children.
The minister was released from jail on $5,000 bond early Friday morning and released a statement through his attorney, Nikki Bonner:
"As a father I love my children and I always have their best interest at heart at all times, and I would never use my hand to ever cause bodily harm to my children. The facts in this case will be handled privately to further protect my children. My family thanks you for your prayers and continued support."
Although Dollar was not expected to make further comments on the case, Bonner told The Associated Press that the minister was still scheduled to preach from the pulpit Sunday -- a decision at least one critic found troubling.
Anthea Butler, a Professor of Religious Studies and Graduate chair at the University of Pennsylvania, told the ACJ [sic - AJC] that Dollar should perhaps taking time off to deal with the case.
"It's very interesting when the preacher gets arrested for battery," said Butler. "We have to wait and see what the circumstances are surrounding the charges."
Butler added, "Here we see someone who espouses Christian virtues being arrested for battery. Perhaps that's a real signal that they need to step down from the ministry for a while. How do you get up in the pulpit and preach on Sunday?"
Dollar, whose local World Changers International Church is home to more than 30,000 members and his New York City branch home to 6,000 others, reportedly preached in a 2006 sermon about child abuse.
"We're responsible for not abusing our children but for disciplining them," he reportedly said. "There's a place for it, and it should only be administered with temperance. You don't go lose your temper on your child, that's abuse. But you don't throw the baby out with the bath water either."
©2012 The Christian Post
http://global.christianpost.com/news/creflo-dollars-wife-taffi-dollar-home-at-time-of-alleged-assault-76371/ [with comments]
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