Ted Haggard is reduced in his circumstances. He and his family are living in a tiny one-bedroom apartment while he attends classes full time at the University of Phoenix, and he's also helping out in a halfway house for the homeless. It's as if he's taken a vow of poverty and is living the ideal Christian life of charity and giving. Oh, what a good man!
To help him in his good works, he has sent out a letter asking people to give — he sends an address to a Christian charity that he promises will send 90% of the money to the Haggard family and use only 10% for administrative costs. For once, he's pushing a charity that doesn't skim off the cream because he is the recipient of the charity. He also doesn't mention that he isn't exactly destitute:
However, he doesn't mention that when he left the church, New Life Church leaders agreed to pay his salary through 2007 - estimated at about $138,000 annually.
In addition, as Colorado Confidential reported earlier this month, El Paso County Assessor property records show that the Haggard's still own their 5-bedroom, 3-bath home in Colorado Springs. Sitting on 5.1 acres, its current market value is listed at $715,051.
Once a grifter, always a grifter, I guess.
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Darn it, I can't find my lighter.
Wait a second, that's not what I meant. Get those images out of your mind. He's bound to be insured.
The sheep have to be shorn periodically or their wool gets long and uncomfortable and matted. It's a service. Really.
What a good man. It's too bad there really isn't a God; I bet that the Jebus who walked at night because he had no shoes would stick his (bare) foot up the ass of someone like Haggard.
PZ neglected to mention this part of the Colorado Confidential story linked above:
Now he can get a real job instead of ripping people off. I almost hear the violins playing in the background...
I'm going to send my donation to Ben Stein's blog, instead. He's going to need it for the forthcoming Death Match with the Giant Squid of Inquiry Suppression, which should be way more fun than watching ordinary everyday Republican pedophiles and whoremongers slather themselves with Susan B Anthony coins.
Come on. Give Ted a break. Drugs and male prostitutes don't grow on trees. Well some drugs do. But going back into the closet can't be cheap.
#6-
aw, beat me to it!
greeks sometimes say,
'poor man, help me lest i become like you.'
I would expect that the 10% administrative cost is his tithe to Jebus, (i.e. a kick back to some higher up turds who need more blow or some such.) God doesn't allow you to defraud the flock and keep it all for yourself. 90% will have to do.
That's chutzpah.
I saw the videos of SOB in both the Jesus Camp video and when he spoke to Richard Dawkins.
First he'll deny me rights because I'm gay, but when he gets caught sucking dick/getting sucked he goes all religious and then pious.
Fuck him, fuck his family and his church.
A zebra cannot change his stripes, only the camoufloge covering them.
But the sadest part of all of this is there are people who will send him money.
When I was college a high school friend of mine I hadn't heard from in a couple of years sent me a form letter asking I send money so she could go "spread the gospel" in China. The ringer was there was, if I recall correctly, a $100 minimum donation due to the high cost of processing donations. What? The? Hell? How much it cost to desposit a check?
@Marcus #2,
And you think he doesn't fantazise about some anal-foot action from Jebus. I'm sure Faggard's deepest desire is to go back in time so he can be an apostal.
@Tony #11,
You go! My sentiments almost exactly. I hope his kids at least learn something from this.
Notice how the Christian wackjobs have this sudden affinity for the "methinks you doth protest too much" argument whenever an evolution supporter gets confrontational? Could this have anything to do with the Ted Haggard experience?
The situation is even stupider than you think. There's some really good discussion of it on Dan Savage's blog here and here.
Turns out the "charity" isn't properly registered. And it is run by one guy, who is a registered sex offender in CA. He's not registered in CO even though he is supposed to be.
So why is it that these idiot religious people want to give their money to sex offenders and a gay drug user/john?
I just don't understand. I'm a lesbian, but I do so many fewer of the things the religious hate than these two, why do they hate me and not them?
You can read Haggard's letter here.
Look at what the sanctimonious git is offering his benefactors:
After someone posts here long enough, does that person get promoted by PZ Myers into a state in which that person doesn't have to wait between making comments? and why do i get an error when i try adding links into my comments?
Anyway, Tedd haggard has been pretty fun news? How is Kent Hovind doing? I haven't heard from him lately on this blog. I can't wait for the next comic.
Having consensual sex with a 17 year old girl should never be a crime, or an event of any consequence whatsoever for that matter... unless you're exceptionally old and disgusting, in which case, you should be given a medal in a nationally televised ceremony. I wonder if Huberty has any actual sexual transgressions in his past that earned him sex offender status; if not, the label is undeserved, and I am perfectly content to depise him for his efforts to bilk the public on behalf a vile scumbag like Ted Haggard.
"Having consensual sex with a 17 year old girl should never be a crime, or an event of any consequence whatsoever for that matter... unless you're exceptionally old and disgusting, in which case, you should be given a medal in a nationally televised ceremony."
The article in Savage's blog refers to her as his "ward", in which case even consensual sex is a violation of his relationship with her.
It appears he was 38 years old at the time of the incident, which may not meet your definition of "old" but sure makes his predatory behavior disgusting.
I have no objection to giving him a medal, so long as I get to decide where to pin it on him. Permanently.
re Ton #11:I suspect you really don't want to.He's a bad VD risk.
My wife points out that "attending classes full time at the University of Phoenix" sounds more impressive if you don't know that the University of Phoenix is a dubiously-accredited, mostly-online university with a 16% graduation rate and a record of financial fraud.
Basically it's like saying you're attending DeVry's shadier cousin.
Why do I get the feeling that Ted is saying: "...no, no. The money was just resting in my account."
Art imitates life!
When you're a registered non-profit organization, this is considered fundraising. But when you're a defrocked minister seeking handouts for your own family because of your hypocrisy, it's simple panhandling.
Why in the name of the dear-lord-baby-jesus would people give this chump money?!
For those who didn't get #23;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXvkD7kpu8I
Attending the University of Phoenix? The Mormon-run online "university"?
Is there nothing about these people that isn't utterly cheesy?
#22-
I think there's some sort of rule that famous right-wing evangelicals can _only_ go to unaccredited or dubiously accredited universities. Give it enough time and he'll be billing himself as Dr. Ted Haggard.
I would like to give thanks for Brother Haggard's unrelenting efforts to discredit the woo-woo movement in the United States of America. I mean, for the head of of one of the biggest congregations of superstitious suckers to be revealed as a gay tweaker? It's better than anything we atheists could have dreamed up.
-jcr
KayI, I did not know that she was has legal ward, so I'm with you on that. I read the case background, and also learned that he was married and had three children. Now, had he been sent off to Germany all by himself for many months, I might have a twinge of sympathy for him if he sought some extramarital sexual gratification (with someone who was not under his legal stewardship), but by that same document, it would also appear that his entire family accompanied him to Germany. Aim high, indeed.Most disturbing of all, however, was the ancillary charge that he "dishonorably fondled his genitals" at a public swimming pool. Had it been an honorable fondling, it would have been understandable, but a dishonorable fondling... words fail me.
Wow that's really touching that he could give up all the money and power and live a simple life of Christian charity, as Jesus would have ... Send him money fast so he doesn't have to live like a god damn poor person anymore!
... his legal ward... (#30)
Can't the guy get an honest job? Selling Used Cars? I did that for six weeks. Second worst job I ever had (the worst was selling Cutco Knives - crappy job, good knives). The first thing I learned was that the customer lies more than the salesman. You the used car buyer tells me less than what you are willing to make in monthly payments. Me the salesman has to dance around the numbers to find out what you really want. Now that you have found the vehicle you actually want, you're pissed off at me for steering you to the reality of what it costs. You finally get the car you want but are unhappy at how much you must pay (everyone else tells you about the great deal they put on over the salesman). I do this dance five to ten times a day. You do it once every couple of years. Who is going to be the better negotiator? Ya think?
A former small church pastor taught me some of the techniques of car sales. He essentially taught me that used car sales was better, because people actually got something for their money.
I couldn't handle it any more, I quit after six weeks (but I made good money).
Note: He was on hell of a salesman!
What, has Ted never heard of student loans?