Church of Scientology kisses up in DC
"We're just another religion now, and deserve the same rights." I guess if we're going to respect religions that issue fatwas against authors, we have to respect religions that issue fatwas against Suppressive Persons. If the FTC hadn't sent their shock troops after Dianetics, we'd have just another pop psych quack group instead of folks claiming constitutional protection, which, I hate to admit, they are as deserving of as anyone else. In the case of Germany's problem with the Co$, it's well to remember that these are the people who think that the thing to do with a real religion is to throw money at it, and their experience has been that the Co$ was a criminal conspiracy rather than a religion, because at the time, they acted that way. Now that they're free of L. Ron's personality disorders, there's at least the possibility of reform, though as long as somebody is making big money, the possibility of abuse will still be there (see allegations that Isaac Hayes didn't really resign from South Park, but that he "was resigned" by his Scientology handler.)
As for lobbying for longer copyright to ElRon's pulp fiction, Nicholas Wise needs to go skiing with the ghost of Sonny Bono.
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