WHY DO RIGHT-WINGERS HATE CATHOLICISM?

First Jim Hoft at Gateway Pundit declared war on Pope Francis:




And then, shockingly, it was Fox News! Well, actually, that's not much of a shock -- sure, Fox has spent years accusing President Obama of anti-Catholic bias, but Fox has also attacked the pope. In December, there was a piece at FoxNews.com titled "Pope Francis Is the Catholic Church's Obama -- God Help Us," which caused its author, Adam Shaw, to lose his job as a Catholic News Service film and videogame reviewer. This time, Fox is taking no chances -- the hit piece on the pope is written by Fox executive VP John Moody (about whom more later):

Pope Francis should stick to doctrine, stay away from economic 'redistribution'

... On Friday ... Francis chose a meeting with – of all people -- officials of the United Nations to endorse what he called "the legitimate redistribution of economic benefits by the state, as well as indispensable cooperation between the private sector and civil society."

By appearing to sanction what amounts to forced redistribution, Francis grievously exceeded his authority and became what amounts to a robe-wearing politician.

Yes, Pope Francis may think he's the expert on what "his authority" consists of as pontiff, but John Moody of Fox News is the real expert on that!

He also exposed his Church, one of the wealthiest institutions in the world, to inevitable charges of hypocrisy. And he put himself in a position of having to back up his frothy talk with ruinous action.

Let's see: for starters, perhaps the Catholic Church and its affiliated non-profit organizations should start voluntarily paying income and real estate tax in the United States, from which it has traditionally been exempt.

There is no doubt that the addition of tax revenue from the Church would be considerable, if hard to estimate. The 17,000-plus parishes may not all measure up to architectural wonders like St. Patrick's in New York or the newer Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles. But few Catholic churches have absolutely no value. What would 39.5% of all that be?

How could Francis, or his subordinates in the United States object to voluntarily turning over part of their vast revenue?

Wow -- a call to tax the Catholic Church. So I guess the entire right wing is going to turn on Fox now, and publish attacks like this 2012 NewsBusters post:

Left-Wing Wacko Roseanne Barr: Tax the Catholic Church

On Friday, far-left actress Roseanne Barr went on an anti-Catholic rant on Twitter, as she seemingly gave her take on the controversy over ObamaCare's abortifacient/contraception mandate.... She even called for the taxation of the Catholic Church....

This isn't the first time that the Hollywood denizen has used this line. In November 2008, shortly after California voters passed Proposition 8, Barr not only singled out Catholics, but also Mormons and Jews. As NewsBusters' managing editor Ken Shepherd outlined:

Mormon and Catholic churches and Jewish synagogues should be forced to register with the IRS as political action committees because they have 'crossed the line between church and state' and 'hate our country' and want nothing less than the 'complete overthrow of the us [sic] government.'

So bellows leftist comedian Roseanne Barr in a November 6 blog post....

John Moody also seems to think the pope "crossed the line" and should pay taxes. Surely he and Fox will be pariahs on the right soon.

No? You don't think so?

Moody continues:

Further, Francis might consider selling off the artworks stored at the Vatican museum and in churches throughout the world, and the thousands upon thousands of ancient books and manuscripts in its library. The Pieta, for instance, should fetch a pretty penny, especially if the buyer is, say, a backer of Al Qaeda who can afford to smash it to pieces as soon as it is acquired.

Let me stop right there and point out that if a commentator for any non-conservative news outlet in America snarkily proposed the purchase of religious art owned by the Catholic Church by an Al Qaeda supporter so that supporter could destroy it, Fox News would begin a loud, relentless, five-segments-a-night campaign of denunciation that would not end until the commentator lost his or her job. Fox would go full Benghazi on this -- and the rest of the media would take the crusade seriously. Ask Martin Bashir.

Now, as for John Moody: You may remember this highlight of his career. Recall that his concern at Fox was supposed to be straight news, not opinion.

As The Washington Post reported on July 11, [2004, Robert] Greenwald's film [Outfoxed] features "a handful of memos from a top FOX executive that appear to suggest tilting the news."

Tilting the news like this:

The movie focuses on daily editorial notes to the Fox News staff from Senior Vice President for News John Moody, who wrote in March about the 9/11 commission hearings: "This is not 'what did he know and when did he know it' stuff. Do not turn this into Watergate."

In an April memo on Iraq coverage, Moody wrote: "Do not fall into the easy trap of mourning the loss of US lives and asking out loud why are we there?" Two days earlier, during U.S. military operations in Fallujah, Moody said: "It won't be long before some people start to decry the use of 'excessive force.' We won't be among that group."

And in a May 2003 note on President Bush's judicial nominees, Moody wrote that some were "being held up because of their POSSIBLE, not demonstrated, views on one issue -- abortion. This should be a trademark issue for FNC today and in the days to come."

And:

Moody on George W. Bush:

"His political courage and tactical cunning ar[e] [wo]rth noting in our reporting through the day"

In 2008, when there were reports of a violent attack on a John McCain supporter named Ashley Todd (which turned out to be a hoax perpetrated by the apparent victim), Moody wrote a memo in which he essentially said that this was bad for Obama because, y'know, they all look alike:

... Ashley Todd, a 20-year-old white volunteer for John McCain's presidential campaign, says she was mugged at an ATM machine in Pittsburgh (my hometown) by a big black man. She further says he threw her down, then disfigured her by carving the letter "B" into her face with a sharp implement when he saw that she supported McCain, not Barack Obama.

Part of the appeal of, and the unspoken tension behind, Senator Obama's campaign is his transformational status as the first African-American to win a major party's presidential nomination.

... If Ms. Todd's allegations are proven accurate, some voters may revisit their support for Senator Obama, not because they are racists ..., but because they suddenly feel they do not know enough about the Democratic nominee....

Bashing the pope? It's OK if you're a Republican. Unabashedly slanting the news? It's OK if you're Fox.