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Norm's avatar

Do you mean Exodus literally or figuratively paid to be in that room? Do you know how much? How could Exodus afford to be at the same tier as TBN? Where did the money come from and where are donors sending their money now?

If not literal money, what policies or laws did Exodus hope the Bush Jr Administration would advocate for in exchange for Exodus’s support.

We’ve all done terrible things in our self-hating days, so I do sympathize — although posing with a war criminal is next level stuff. 😉

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Randy Scobey's avatar

I think with most meet and greets with really high profile people, you pay. Exodus paid for us to go to this ball and for the meet and greet. I honestly don't remember how much but I am sure it was a lot. At the time we were hoping for them to support anti gay marriage laws and not support ENDA. Again, not proud I was every a part of it. As far as posing with a war criminal*, I wanted to give the full context of why that photo happened (systemic anti lgbtq+ bigotry).

*I did eventually come to believe much the same about Rove.

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Norm's avatar

(Sorry for the delay -- I couldn't login or reply yesterday).

I'm not sure how religious non-profits like Exodus or TBN can make political donations and still keep their tax exempt status, but I'm sure there are workarounds.

I was just poking fun. I can't think of a more extreme political figure than Rove in the 2000s. If there was one photo to prove that you were once anti-LGBTQ in the 2000s, the photo op with Rove is pretty much it.

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Randy Scobey's avatar

The login may have been messed up because I applied my custom domain to the Substack and it took a while to process on their servers and of course the web. Hope it is all worked out now. I thought your funny comment was funny, I just confused myself for a second. As for non-profits, yes there are workarounds but we never donated to a political compaigns but definitely funded campaigns that were obviously political issues. Also, this was the Christian Inaugural ball so the money went through another non-profit who hosted it (I think).

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Jeremy Pope's avatar

I couldn’t agree more. Don’t get blinded by the shiny lights and easy scapegoats - look at reality. What we are doing is not working. Hearts and minds. Hearts and minds.

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Randy Scobey's avatar

Thanks and you are right. Scapegoating is SO easy to do nowadays but it is barely scratching the surface of the true "heart" of the issues.

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