Sunday, December 21, 2014

More Liberal Bigotry


Liberals are bigots. It's a symptom of their ideology - an inevitable consequence of their political agenda. Bigotry is as fundamental to liberalism as swimming is to fish. You cannot be a liberal without being a bigot. Liberals, for example, see every black face as a victim. They don't believe blacks are able to take care of themselves so they must be subsidized with tax payer dollars. Liberals stereotypically believe every black person is the same – they think the same, they struggle the same, and they are all equally victims of whites. Never mind Dr. King's dream that men should be judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin, if a black man wants a job, or to go to college, or to start a business, liberals automatically think he needs special consideration because he's black. The color of his skin is the first criterion liberals consider. It's called, “affirmative action.” To liberals, blacks are “disadvantaged” as though being black is like being handicapped.

Because they are bigots in their very core, liberals are blind to they own bigotry. It's kind of like that stinky person who can't smell his own body odor. If a conservative should disagree with a black person about anything, then liberals assume the conservative is only disagreeing with the person because he's black. They just can't understand the concept of judging a person (even a black person) by his actions or words. Likewise, if conservatives talk about “welfare reform,” liberals accuse them of racism because the liberals think most people on welfare are black. And heaven forbid if a black person dares to believe he's not a victim and works hard to improve himself because then that person is accused of trying to “act white” and labeled an “Uncle Tom.”

I moved to Kentucky in the summer of 1970, when I was only 4 years old. Even though I was a more than a decade removed from Segregation, I remember some of the racial tensions that still lingered in the South. Being white myself, I can't say I can entirely empathize with the struggles blacks faced in the 50's but I can at least say I'm sympathetic to it. I can imagine, at least a little, the smoldering defiance Rosa Parks must have felt when she refused to give up her seat to a white man and move to the back of the bus.

Certainly there was racism then. For the record, I'm against racism but I'm still for liberty. If a person wants to be racist, I think it's his right to be a racist. However, the real problem wasn't necessarily the racist attitudes that were prevalent at the time but rather it was the segregation laws that put teeth in racism. For example, it would be sad if a black man wouldn't marry a white woman for fear they might be shunned by a racist society. It's a far worse thing, though, to make laws against interracial marriage. It was the laws allowing segregation that truly made blacks the victims of racists.

Democrats back then were all for institutional racism. For example, it was Democrat governor, George Wallace, who stood blocking the steps to a segregated school in Alabama and said, segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever.” Since then, Democrats may have officially denounced segregation, but they are still not able to divorce themselves from the racism inherent in the liberal wing of the Democrat party.

So where am I going with all this? I mention this now because here in my own beloved state of Kentucky, liberal Democrats have abused the power of their office to impose their racism on another class of people – Bible believing Christians. Just recently, our Democrat Secretary of State, Bob Stewart, advised Ark Encounter, LLC, the group building the Noah's ark themed attraction in KY, that the state has changed its mind on the group's application for a tax incentive KY makes available to tourist attractions. The Ark Encounter will not be receiving the incentive after all.

When I first wrote about the Ark Encounter project 4 years ago, it had already been approved to receive a special tax incentive the state of KY makes available to lure tourist attractions here. It's not really a subsidy, per se. Instead, new tourist attractions can receive a partial rebate of the amount of sales tax they generate for the state. In other words, for every sales tax dollar the state receives from Ark Encounter visitors, they would give a few cents back to the park. So it doesn't cost the state any money – the state is making money from the park. What's more, it's only paying the incentive out of funds received by people visiting the park! No money is being taken from property taxes, income taxes, etc.

Some other attractions in KY that have received this same incentive are the Newport Aquarium and the Kentucky Speedway.

When the park originally applied for the incentive, it was clear this was a for-profit endeavor but was still overtly religious in nature. From the get go, folks like Barry Lynn objected to a religious organization receiving “tax payer funding” but the incentives were approved notwithstanding. With that approval in hand, the group raised the necessary funds, purchased the land, got the permits, and began building. Now, the state has changed its mind and told the group they will not receive the incentive after all. They claim to object on the grounds that AiG intends to use the park to proselytize (AiG has always been very clear about this) and that workers are required to sign a faith statement – which is a federal right for religious organizations. So the objections sound rather shallow since very little has changed about the park's stated goals since the state approved the original application.

I'm not sure how much the group relied on this incentive to make its decision on where to build but I know it was at least a factor. Its location is only a few miles away from OH and IN so the group had other options on where it could build and still be reasonably close to the Creation Museum. It's a rather dirty trick to lure the business in with the incentive and then take it away after it's too late to change its mind.

But besides that, what annoys me the most about all this is how the state is hurting Christians with its racist policies. We saw the same thing when the Boston Mayor wanted to ban Chick-fil-A because its president supported traditional marriage or the confiscatory fines levied against Hobby Lobby because they did not want to pay for employees' abortion inducing drug prescriptions. Time after time, the government treats religious people and businesses as second class citizens. Sec. Stewart said in his letter that the Ark Encounter, “will generate jobs and visitor spending that will be welcomed in the local economy.” I'm sure it will and he is happy to accept it; he just won't offer the same incentive KY has given to non-religious attractions. It's sort of like the bus driver who didn't mind receiving a fare from Rosa Parks but still didn't want her to sit in the white people's section.

If this were a black owned business, Democrats would be falling all over themselves to give away subsidies because they believe blacks can't run a business without help from white liberals. But this is a Christian owned business and they treat Christians differently. They can't see how refusing to give a religious business the same incentive available to anyone else is discrimination.

I'll say it again. Liberals are bigots.

2 comments:

  1. As I understand it, the state of Kentucky authorizes tax rebates to for-profit enterprises that are subject to anti-discrimination laws (including laws prohibiting discrimination in hiring on the basis of religious belief). Purely religious enterprises are free to discriminate based on belief, but are not eligible to receive tax rebates. Ken Ham is trying to have it both ways -- claiming the exemption from anti-discrimination laws authorized for non-profit religious organizations, and claiming the tax rebates authorized for for-profit firms obliged to hire regardless of religious profession.

    I actually agree with you about Chik-Fil-A and Hobby Lobby (but then, regarding the latter, I think that requiring health insurance to pay for contraception is roughly on a par with requiring car insurance to pay for oil changes -- insurance is for unexpected, emergency expenses, not routine, expected ones). But if you're going to give investors special favors, it does seem rather reasonable to expect them to follow the [expletive deleted] laws of the state they're accepting favors from!

    I have some doubts about the long-term profitability (and hence ability to pay off investors) of a big barn full of plastic animals (the original Creation Museum has apparently been experiencing declining attendance every year since its opening), but that's another question.

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  2. Steven J,

    You said, “As I understand it, the state of Kentucky authorizes tax rebates to for-profit enterprises that are subject to anti-discrimination laws (including laws prohibiting discrimination in hiring on the basis of religious belief). Purely religious enterprises are free to discriminate based on belief, but are not eligible to receive tax rebates.”

    That is the position the state is taking but I fail to see how it justifies their bigotry. Both federal and state laws allow religious organizations to establish faith-based hiring preferences. Why then does the state refuse the incentive whenever a religious organization exercises that right?

    But did you read the letter from Sec. Stewart that I linked in my post? He begins by arguing a similar position to what you've stated but then digresses into a detailed explanation of how he believes the Ark Encounter will be evangelical in nature. He's very clear that the ultimate reason he is rejecting the application is that he will not make the tax incentive available to “fund religious indoctrination or otherwise be used to advance religion.” He even cites the supposed “Separation of Church and State provisions of the Constitution” though I've never seen such a “provision” anywhere in the document.

    This seems to me to be a clear case of one organization being treated differently than other organizations solely because of its beliefs. If the Ark Encounter wanted to sell beer and souvenirs, then welcome aboard; since it wants to present the gospel, then please move to the back of the bus.

    By the way, I have visited the Creation Museum 3 or 4 times. The last time was about 2 years ago. I know that actual attendance the first five years completely dwarfed all projections. I'm not sure whether attendance to the museum has declined but the last time I was there, it was packed. At lunch time, the museum's staff were on megaphones asking guests who had finished eating in the cafeteria to clear away quickly to make room for others to sit down. I don't remember having a similar problem at the natural history museum at the Union Terminal in Cincinnati any time that I visited there.

    The Ark Encounter is a for-profit endeavor. If it fails, it took the same risk any other business takes. But I've noticed the same gloom and doom predictions about attendance that I heard about the Creation Museum before it opened. The dire predictions only sound like nay-sayers hoping the Encounter fails.

    Thanks for your comments. God bless!!

    RKBentley

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