Pentagon Funds Aid Polygamist Sect - Page 2

stekim · #11 (**permalink**) 04-14-2008, 12:36 PM

And this wasn't really even "waste". I assume the government got what it contracted for. It's just that some of the profits were used by a cult. That's not good, but it's not waste, either. And being "a senior official in the FLDS religious sect" is not against the law.

KidCann117 · #12 (**permalink**) 04-15-2008, 08:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by f0ca1

Really? Link?

great avatar, btw.

okay here it is
from
http://www.rickross.com/reference/po...polygamy5.html

Quote:

Hildale -- Welfare is often how polygamist communities like Hildale in Utah and Colorado City in Arizona substantially support themselves. Polygamists often use food stamps to feed their families. Former polygamist Benjamin Bisline said, "If it wasn't for government subsidies, these people couldn't survive. There are people here with 15 wives on welfare.'' Bisline still lives in a polygamist town.

The twin polygamist communities of Hildale and Colorado City on the Utah-Arizona border totaled 5,274 in 1998. And everything within these towns is overshadowed by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (FLDS), the largest polygamist group in North America.

Girls marry in their teens. Church leaders dictate these marriages, often wedding teenage girls to middle-aged men who already have wives. Nearly all the property in these towns is controlled by the FLDS through a trust called "United Effort Plan," which was run by a board of seven men in 1998.

Joe Knudson, a polygamist living near Colorado City claimed welfare dependency amongst polygamists is caused by religious prejudice, which has forced isolation from economic opportunities. He said, "They've created a ghetto here and shoved [us] into it and shoved a few crumbs our way to make [us] feel better...[and] forced us into an area where we have no other choice."

The "Woodruff Manifesto" of 1890 (issued by LDS President Wilford Woodruff), announced an end to polygamy. And in 1896 the subsequent passage of a law in Utah prohibited its practice. That law was a condition required for statehood. Ironically though, it seems that now the same governments that forbid the practice have become its greatest enablers.

Colorado City and Hildale were on a list of the top ten towns with a population over 2,000 in the Intermountain West for reliance upon Medicaid (health care for the poor) in 1998. And in that same year the same towns draw from the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) program (food for low-income mothers) could only be equaled by Western Indian reservations and impoverished inner cities. 33% of Hildale and Colorado City residents were using food stamps in 1998. To put this into perspective, respectively Arizona's average was 6.7% and Utah's 4.7% during that same period.

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