Money for Nothing

Professional environmentalists and professional evangelists; how do they make their money and what do we get in return? Have they delivered for Mother Nature? Have they arrested population growth that added 33 million consumers to America in the 1990s alone? Growth that put one third of plants and animals at risk and is most probably responsible for half the loss of four million acres of farmland a year?

“If I was going to sucker people, it would have something to do with a religious cause! They just can't wait to give you their money--for NOTHING!!”
Chris Clugston

Yeah, what was that hit song by Dire Straits in the mid-80s? "Money for nothing".

Fast bucks thru preaching

Clugston’s got it right. Religion is the quickest passport to riches.  I knew a guy in Vancouver----a friend, "Charlie Conrod”-----who had an interesting proposition for me.  He said that we could make a lot of money by giving bible-punchers from the Mid-west a religious service. He was referring to those who holidayed on the Oregon Coast and felt restive and guilty for not getting their weekly hit of fire and brimstone.  The idea came to him while he was in Oregon and noticed all the licence plates from the Bible Belt, and overheard the accents.  Being a Phd in Economics (from Harvard no less) Charlie did a proper business plan, and figured that if we could master the generic Christian pitch, but customize it for particular sects by minor alterations, we could go on the road and be rolling in dough. It would be Reverend Murray and Conrod's "Mobile Deliverance"----our Winnibego (christened “Jesus never takes a vacation”) could fan out to various campgrounds and meet the deep spiritual need of people to part with their money.

Jesus Christ, Tits and Ass

 Charlie, too, felt a deep spiritual need----to relieve them of their money.  He grew up in Salt Lake City, and was able to witness, first hand, what happens to a society that is governed by people who think that the Flintstones was a docu-drama and that you could retroactively "save" dead relatives.  His resentment was palpable----as was mine for the hypocrisy of millionaire ‘holier-than-thous’ like Jimmy Swaggart who worshipped the Holy Trinity of Jesus Christ, “Tits and Ass.”

The Big Tent

Charlie felt comfortable in making his bold proposal to me after learning that I had sent money to one Reverend Schambach in Tyler, Texas in order to make him believe that I was a true believer.  After being reduced to helpless laughter every time I came upon his radio rants on KIRO radio (a Christian radio station that Vancouverites could pick up from Bellingham, Washington), I was determined to buy the audio tapes he recorded live under “The Big Tent” which he took across America during his travelling crusade. It had become an addiction. Just as some people could not begin the day without their morning coffee, I couldn’t get through the day without my Shambach fix. I could not risk of leaving town, and falling out of radio range of his sermons . Seriously, when I played them in my car there were many occasions where I laughed so hard I almost drove off the road. This guy was better than Bill Cosby.

Hitler's speaking techniques

Reverend Schambach had mastered Hitler's technique: Start your speech off slowly, speaking very softly, and then gradually build up your delivery to a fever pitch at the end where you are raving and screaming into the mike, with shouts of “Sieg Hiel”--- or in this case---"Hallejuha!", and "Amen" coming from the congregation. His one-liners were superb, for example, "God is not Burger-King, He is not here to serve you---YOU are here to serve HIM!!!"  The killer for me were the emphatic interjections of his poor African-American followers who would interject with comments like, "Yes, sir!", "That's right!", and "Praise the Lord!".  I think you can guess that for me, next to "One Who Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest", "Elmer Gantry" was the funniest movie I ever saw.  Burt Lancaster showed us how it can be done---maybe Schambach copied him---who knows.

Religion and Environmentalism

Alas, once Schambach thought he had me on the hook, his solicitations for more "love money" became more frequent and more pointed.  When I continued to ignore them, he finally cut me off, but not before warning me that my failure to help his crusade would not go down well with the Almighty.  Kind of sounds like the e-letters I used to get from the Executive Director of the Sierra Club. Like I said, religion, the evangelism of hope without evidence, is the quickest passport to riches.

Just ask Christine MacDonald, former Washington staff member with Conservation International:

“Leading the nation’s fight to save endangered critters and preserve the world’s rainforests may seem like the kind of job that would make up in personal satisfaction what it lacked in remuneration. But the leaders at the country’s top environmental groups do surprisingly well, earning annual compensation that puts them in the top one percent of Americans.....Not only do these raconteurs of mass extinction earn some of the highest salaries of the non-profit world, the presidents and CEOs of today’s most prominent conservation groups speak the gospel of environmental sustainability but live like carbon junkies, burning many more times the greenhouse gases responsible for global warming than the average American. They have grown accustomed to celebrity lifestyles and lavish working vacations to places most people won’t see in a lifetime...but their fondness for gas-guzzling private jets and electricity-hogging multiple homes leaves these so-called conservationists vulnerable to the same accusations of hypocrisy that have dogged former Vice-President Al Gore and Hollywood’s ‘green glitterati.’” (Green Inc., Christine MacDonald, pp. 19-21)

Eden unspared

And what benefits have these green fat cats conferred? Have they delivered for Mother Nature? Have they arrested population growth that added 33 million consumers to America in the 1990s alone? Growth that put one third of plants and animals at risk and is most probably responsible for half the loss of four million acres of farmland a year? Growth that has cost North Americans two acres of wildland for each acres “saved” by their much ballyhooed efforts? Have they succeeded in hammering out a deal to significantly reduce GHG emissions? We express outrage when bailed out banksters and failed CEOs continue to claim large compensation packages but it seems that our highly paid Green Crusaders can continue to be lavishly rewarded for losing the war to save the environment.

Consider what these green executives made way back in 2006 and ask yourself, do televangelists do much worse?

Comparing incomes: Professional Evangelists and Professional Environmentalists

James Maddy, past President, National Park Foundation, $833,290
Steven Sanderson, president and CEO, Wildlife Conservation Society $825,170
John Adams, past president, National Resources Defence Council, /$757,914
Fred Krupp, president, Environmental Defense Fund, /$468,615
Richard Erdmann, executive vice-president, The Conservation Fund, $461,576
Peter Seligmann, chairman, Conservation International, $391,398
John Flicker, president, National Audubon Society $390,716
Carter Roberts, World Wildlife Fund USA, president, $347,190
Russell Mittermeier, president, Conservation International, $381,759
(original source: “Where the Money Is”, Time, November 26, 2007)

The list goes. At the bottom of the heap was poor old Carl Pope, who as executive director of the Sierra Club, made only $239,508 that year. But considering his part in weakening the resistance against mass immigration, he should have paying American citizens that amount in compensation, gleaned from the proceeds of making licence plates in a federal institution.

And then there is our very own David Suzuki. Don’t get me started....

Tim Murray
June 19, 2012