{"id":186504,"date":"2014-01-03T20:45:00","date_gmt":"2014-01-04T01:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2014\/01\/03\/you-have-to-be-fing-terrified-to-fing-threaten-the-fing-pope\/"},"modified":"2014-01-03T20:45:00","modified_gmt":"2014-01-04T01:45:00","slug":"you-have-to-be-fing-terrified-to-fing-threaten-the-fing-pope","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2014\/01\/03\/you-have-to-be-fing-terrified-to-fing-threaten-the-fing-pope\/","title":{"rendered":"You Have to be F%$#ing Terrified to F%$#ing Threaten the F%$#ing Pope"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It appears that Pope Francis has spooked the 1%, because <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalmemo.com\/rich-catholic-republicans-threaten-pope-francis-because-he-frightens-them\/\">they are threatening the Pope and the Church<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><span style=\"color: blue;\">If anyone wonders whether Pope Francis has irritated wealthy conservatives with his courage and idealism, the latest outburst from Kenneth Langone left little doubt. Sounding both aggressive and whiny, the billionaire investor warned that he and his overprivileged friends might withhold their millions from church and charity unless the pontiff stops preaching against the excesses and cruelty of unleashed capitalism.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: blue;\"><br \/><\/span><span style=\"color: blue;\">According to Langone, such criticism from the Holy See could ultimately hurt the sensitive feelings of the rich so badly that they become \u201cincapable of feeling compassion for the poor.\u201d He also said rich donors are already losing their enthusiasm for the restoration of St. Patrick\u2019s Cathedral in Manhattan \u2013 a very specific threat that he mentioned directly to Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: blue;\"><br \/><\/span><span style=\"color: blue;\">Langone is not only a leading fundraiser for church projects but a generous donor to hospitals, universities, and cancer charities (often for programs and buildings named after him, in the style of today\u2019s self-promoting philanthropists). Among the super-rich, he has many friends and associates who may share his excitable temperament.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: blue;\"><br \/><\/span><span style=\"color: blue;\">While his ultimatum seems senseless \u2013 would a person of true faith stiff the church and the poor? \u2013 it may well be sincere. And Langone spends freely to promote his political and economic views, in the company of the Koch brothers and other Republican plutocrats.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: blue;\"><br \/><\/span><span style=\"color: blue;\">Still, a Pope brave enough to face down the Mafia over his financial reform of the murky Vatican Bank shouldn\u2019t be much fazed by the likes of Langone.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Langone, a co-founder of Home Depot, is also known for Dick Grasso&#8217;s obscene golden handshake when he left his chairmanship of the NYSE.<\/p>\n<p>I have an affection for this guy; he certainly has the right enemies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It appears that Pope Francis has spooked the 1%, because they are threatening the Pope and the Church: If anyone wonders whether Pope Francis has irritated wealthy conservatives with his courage and idealism, the latest outburst from Kenneth Langone left little doubt. Sounding both aggressive and whiny, the billionaire investor warned that he and his &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[973,1090,1004,1021],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-186504","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economy","category-ethics","category-finance","category-religion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186504"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=186504"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186504\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=186504"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=186504"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=186504"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}