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Obama’s not tithing
Posted By katie allison granju
Via Instapundit, I ran across this rundown of Barack Obama’s tax returns, with some commentary:
What is surprising, given the recent controversy over Obama’s membership in the Trinity United Church of Christ, is how little the Obamas apparently gave to charity — well short of the biblical 10% tithe for all seven years. In two of the years, the Obamas gave far less than 1% of their income to charity; in three of the years, they gave around 1% of their income to charity. Only in the last two years have they given substantially more as their income skyrocketed — 4.7% in 2005 and 6.1% in 2006. (Of course, it is possible that the Obamas may have made gifts to other worthy causes that were not deductible for federal income tax purposes.)
I haven’t given enough to chairity in recent years either. I’ve vowed to do better in ‘08.
How about you? How much do you give each year?
Mar 25th, 2008
Two things:
1 - the charity numbers only reflect 501c3 charities. You could give a million bucks to the old lady next door to pay off her medical bills and not a cent would show up on your tax return.
2 - really, a “tithe” is after tax, not pre-tax. And the numbers change greatly if you calculate it correctly (eg he actually “tithed” 10% in ‘06 vs 6% - assuming my math is correct).
Actually, a tithe is pre-tax. A literal “tithe” is 10% of income given to sustain a faith community, and is a biblically based concept. It’s purpose is to “level the playing field,” so that all members are equally invested financially (percentage-wise). And the Obama camp already issued a statement to the effect that “they gave what they could,” implying that the 1% did indeed represent their entire charitable contribution. And 1% of a $200,000 income is a VERY poor example of generosity. I made a fraction of their income and managed to donate more than they did every year from 2000 - 2005, and not by a percentage but the literal amount. You could forego a Starbucks a day and do better than they did. It’s a clear indication of something amiss in the social conscience area, in my opinion.
For the record, we tithed 10% of my income to my church. We attended on Sundays, and gave in the collection plate. What we failed to do was count it as a tax deduction.
By the way, try not to be so judgmental.
Oh please. It’s just more of the same. I guess you guys have noted that the GOP/Jim Adkisson hate machine shifted up into full gear last week. I hope Dave Axelrod will nail their skins to the wall with a big dose of their own medicine. Can you say Keating 5? Can you say, “Hi. I’m John McCain. I don’t really belive in all that evangelical/fundamentalist bullshit, and the DNC has the film footage to prove it.” And while we are at it, explain just exactly how getting beat up in a POW camp qualifies you to be President of the United States. If we follow that argument Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is qualified to be President of the United States.
Trouble is. I like John McCain. He would no doubt be a good President. It just breaks my heart that he has all of these evil and mean-spirited people around him and encouraging him to “go dirty” to win. A man a great as him deserves better.
Truth is. I have been watching John. He looks old and tired, and when this election started I had no idea that he was 72. I seriously thought he was about 62—I really did. I am beginning to think he wants to be President about as much as Fred Thompson wanted to be President. Translated: “I don’t really want this but my wife does.”
The more I write about this, the more sad it is making me, so I am just going to quit this message. Barack Obama and John McCain are both GREAT AMERICANS. We could do a HELL OF A LOT WORSE.
Wow -
That was a whole lot of dirt to sling in a single comment, but I’ll ignore the more scurrilous piles and dig in to a couple others:
1) “explain just exactly how getting beat up in a POW camp qualifies you to be President of the United States”
I’ll do just that. The problem with liberals is that this seems to sum up the entirety of their knowledge of what happened to John McCain as a POW. They read the Obama talking points and parrot them endlessly without examining the utter ignorance that even repeating them belies.
John McCain didn’t just “get beat up,” he was systematically tortured over a period of years in an attempt to learn our country’s secrets and give them an excuse to inflict further harm on his fellow POWs. During that time, he gave up not a single one of them despite having been given every reason that he should. For a population who gets hysterical at the slightest discomfort or inconvenience, that alone should earn him a great deal of respect. But even that’s not the point.
John McCain was given the opportunity for an early release by his captors - a release from the sheer physical pain and psychological torment. *And he turned it down* I will repeat: TURNED IT DOWN. Why? In order to deny the enemy even the slightest propaganda victory and show solidarity with his men, he VOLUNTEERED to continue taking the cruelest abuse his captors could dish out. Wow. That’s a “man’s man” any way you want to cut it.
That’s character. Character that every man and woman in this country should honor and respect, and certainly the type of character that we should look for in the person who holds the most powerful office in the world.
Let’s compare that to the “character” of his opponent, shall we? The one who threw his own grandmother - you know, the only relative he had who actually cared enough about him to raise him while his actual parents abandoned him to pursue their own agendas - under the bus in a feeble attempt to save his political hide. His own grandmother? Really? Yes…really. Is it possible to be any more shallow and downright ungrateful? Only if she were still alive to feel the sting of such an unthinkable betrayal…
We could go on and on with the examples of the number of people who were responsible for his rise to the Democratic nomination who have been systematically used, abused and thrown away as soon as they became political liabilities. To protect his family from harm? To serve his country? None of the above. To serve his narrow self-interest? Absolutely.
2) As far as going dirty, that’s a complete fabrication. All that McCain has done is to call Obama out on some of his more outrageous lies (”I’ve always said I believed the surge would work,” etc.), his enormous ego (his own presidential seal, taking the American flag off his plane to replace with his own emblem, etc.) and the manner in which the media fawn over him like puppy dogs (e.g., Chris “I get a tingle up my leg” Matthews, etc.). [It's gotten so bad that even the media have begun questioning themselves on how over-the-top they've been promoting his candidacy and wondering if they shouldn't ratchet it back a few notches.] The truth may hurt, but telling it doesn’t make it a dirty campaign tactic.
Dirty was what Obama did to Hillary Clinton by ridiculing her throughout the primaries for her political positions and then, as soon as she was out of the race, adopting every single one of them and acting as if he had held them all along - even airbrushing his website several times in an attempt to rewrite history. (Too bad for that the Google cache caught him every time). And when Hillary’s supporters complained, he told them to “get over it and fall in line.” Should I go on with the other sleazy tactics he’s used?
If you’re a Democrat and don’t feel covered in slime by the tactics he used to obtain the nomination, then you have no right even using the word “dirty” in the context of this campaign because you don’t understand the meaning of the word.
As far as tithing, it’s well known that conservatives as a whole given much to charity than liberals do:
http://philanthropy.com/free/articles/v19/i04/04001101.htm
Am I shocked to find that Obama was a relative piker in the charity department or didn’t “tithe” to his church? Not at all. Not because he’s liberal: but because I don’t believe that he ever really cared or supported it on anything more than the most superficial level.
He became a member out of political expediency and sat idly while listening to the volumes of hate coming from the pulpit because it served his political ambitions to be there. The pastor wields great influence in Obama’s home district, so joining that church was just what he had to do to get elected: nothing more.
He is an empty suit who is exceedingly smart at one thing and one thing only: advancing the needs and desires of one Barack Obama. Those who looking to him as some sort of political Messiah are bound to be disappointed, because the only one he’s interested in saving is himself.