Thou Shalt Not Steal?

Maybe someone could organize a covert op to put signs that said Family Planning Center on all these payday locations and they would have them closed down in a matter of hours.

This data is surely no surprise to anyone who has been a social activist anywhere in the U.S. interior. Beyond all the equivocation and mincing of words, three points are especially relevant:

(1)-The data provides yet another demonstration of the very real extent to which -- apart from a few relatively civilized regions in the Northeast -- the United States is a genuine Christian theocracy: the states where legalized usury is most commonplace are also either states in which fundamentalist Christians openly (and often forcefully) control the political and socioeconomic systems (e.g., Tennessee and Utah), or states in which the fundamentalists achieve much the same sort of theocratic despotism by hiding behind dogmas of ???political correctness??? that suppress effective criticism of religious tyranny (e.g., Washington and Ohio).

(2)-The data provides yet another demonstration of the core values of fundamentalist Christianity -- specifically the extent to which it has rejected the gentle principles of the Sermon on the Mount (???Blessed are the poor??????). In place of the Beatitudes, fundamentalists have adopted with vengeful relish the incipiently fascist savagery of Genesis (???Be masters over all???); its accompanying encouragement of wife-beating and misogynism in general (???Your husband???will lord it over you???); the oft-repeated, seldom-contradicted biblical prejudice that wealth is proof of divine reward and poverty is evidence of god???s wrath -- all this capped by the genocidal mandates of Revelation (all nonbelievers to be ???thrown into the burning lake of fire???). Not coincidentally, these dogmas are also the dogmas of capitalism: the boss as autocrat -- with severe punishment for disobedient workers and death by torture for capitalism???s enemies.

(3)-Lastly, the data proves beyond equivocation -- as nothing else I have ever seen -- the Christian fundamentalist tolerance and even encouragement of the most viciously tyrannosauric, brazenly Enronesque forms of capitalism. In which context we should never forget how in the Bible-belt South, the Ku Klux Klan -- that most characteristically American death squad so often employed against labor organizers and Civil Rights activists -- was colloquially known as ???the Saturday Night Men???s Bible Study Class.???

This data is surely no surprise to anyone who has been a social activist anywhere in the U.S. interior. Beyond the minced words and equivocation, three points emerge as especially relevant:

(1)-The data provides yet another demonstration of the very real extent to which -- apart from a few relatively civilized regions in the Northeast -- the United States is a genuine Christian theocracy: the states where legalized usury is most commonplace are also either states in which fundamentalist Christians openly (and often forcefully) control the political and socioeconomic systems (e.g., Tennessee and Utah), or states in which the fundamentalists achieve much the same sort of theocratic despotism by hiding behind dogmas of ???political correctness??? that suppress effective criticism of religious tyranny (e.g., Washington and Ohio).

(2)-The data provides yet another demonstration of the core values of fundamentalist Christianity -- specifically the extent to which it has rejected the gentle principles of the Sermon on the Mount (???Blessed are the poor??????). In place of the Beatitudes, fundamentalists have adopted with vengeful relish the incipiently fascist savagery of Genesis (???Be masters over all???); its accompanying encouragement of wife-beating and misogynism in general (???Your husband???will lord it over you???); the oft-repeated, seldom-contradicted biblical prejudice that wealth is proof of divine reward and poverty is evidence of god???s wrath -- all this capped by the genocidal mandates of Revelation (all nonbelievers to be ???thrown into the burning lake of fire???). Not coincidentally, these dogmas are also the dogmas of capitalism: the boss as autocrat -- with severe punishment for disobedient workers and death by torture for capitalism???s enemies.

(3)-Lastly, the data proves beyond equivocation -- as nothing else I have ever seen -- the Christian fundamentalist tolerance and even encouragement of the most viciously tyrannosauric, brazenly Enronesque forms of capitalism. In which context we should never forget how in the Bible-belt South, the Ku Klux Klan -- that most characteristically American death squad so often employed against labor organizers and Civil Rights activists -- was colloquially known as ???the Saturday Night Men???s Bible Study Class.???

And Jesus cast the money lenders from the temple and they all ended up in Alabama, Mississippi, Utah and nevada where they have been screwing people ever since. Thank You Jesus! Can I get a Amen, brother?

Consider this slant for the Christian. There are more money-lenders in Christian states because they need to pay their tithing. That the lenders proliferate in Christian populations just goes to show you how holy they are to observe the tithing principle. We heathens wouldn't know a sinlge thing about giving up something to the Lord. We wouldn't think of going into debt to praise God.

In my experience, the best way to tell how much of a crook someone is by the size of the cross hanging around their neck.