Posts By: Scott Schaeffer

Trump’s bankruptcies prove why the wealthy should pay higher taxes

During Thursday’s Fox News Republican Presidential Candidate Debate, Chris Wallace asked Donald Trump about his most recent bankruptcy in which the banks to which Trump’s company was indebted lost over one billion dollars. Trump responded that the banks were evil in an attempt to convince us that the bankruptcy was no big deal. He may… Read more »

7 Bible Quotes of Social Justice as a Purpose of God’s Law

… [This article is an excerpt from the book, “Rescuing Religion from Republican Reason”] Republicans and Evangelicals have found common ground in their opposition to social justice. Naturally, justice for the poor flies in the face of what the Republicans have been doing since the 1870s – representing the wealthy oppressors of the poor. The… Read more »

14 Bible verses proving that God’s laws are for the well-being of others

What does the purpose of God’s laws have to do with politics? Well, politicians, especially of the Republican variety, often have principles that they say are more important than the well-being of people. For example, if we promote a healthcare solution, they argue that, even if it works, it’s evil, because it doesn’t preserve the… Read more »

Republican Tax Lie #4: “Reducing investment taxes is beneficial”

[The following excerpt is from my book, “Rescuing Religion from Republican Reason.”] Capital Gains Taxes I’ve heard some Christian Republicans say it’s morally wrong to tax capital gains, as if it doesn’t count as income. This is nonsense. Let’s say you buy a restaurant for a million dollars. You own it for five years and… Read more »

Republican Tax Lie #3: “Democrats spend more.”

… [The following excerpt is  from my book, “Rescuing Religion from Republican Reason.”] (I’ll admit that this is more of a budget lie than a tax lie, but it’s what follows next in the taxation chapter of the book, so I included it here.) The Republicans love to accuse Democrats of engaging in out-of-control spending…. Read more »

Republican Tax Lie: “Tax cuts don’t add to the debt”

… [The following excerpt is from my book, “Rescuing Religion from Republican Reason.”]   Do Tax Cuts Always Pay for Themselves? One of the great deceptions promoted by Republican Christians is that tax cuts always pay for themselves. So anytime Republicans propose a tax cut (which is all of the time, regardless of whether we… Read more »

Republican Tax Lie: “Low tax countries fare best”

… [The following excerpt is from my book, “Rescuing Religion from Republican Reason.”] Do Taxes Hurt the Economy? Should you have an opportunity to counter conservative arguments with what I’ve shared thus far, it’s likely that, at some point in the conversation, your opponent will abandon the “what’s right” argument and switch to the “what… Read more »

How God REQUIRED national wealth redistribution rather than making sharing with the poor optional

… [The following excerpt is from my book, “Rescuing Religion from Republican Reason.”] Biblical Taxation – Was it Optional? When I share these passages with Tea Party Christians, they all tend to give me the same response. They say God’s tithes and taxes were optional, that it was up to the individuals to give out… Read more »

Why the Republican-Christian “Charity-only” poverty solution is both evil and ineffective

… [The following excerpt is  from my book, “Rescuing Religion from Republican Reason.”] … The Charity Argument How do Republican Christians avoid sounding like the devil while opposing a taxation system that redistributes wealth to the needy? They promote charity as the sole solution. In other words, they believe that if mandatory wealth redistribution were… Read more »

The Biblical Case for Progressive Taxation

… [The following excerpt is  from my book, “Rescuing Religion from Republican Reason.”]   Does a Secular Government Have the Right to force Wealth Redistribution? Since we Christians tend to bury our heads in the New Testament and neglect the Old Testament, we ignore God’s design for the nation of Israel and build our entire… Read more »