Exclusive Brethren

[KUNG FU]

This is the press release for an upcoming book. I noticed a few interesting points in the release. I'm not selling this book, I'm just the editor of a journal and received this. Haven't read the book, but I thought this would be interesting for some

[FONT=Verdana, Helvetica, Arial]Behind the Exclusive Brethren
Michael Bachelard
Behind the Exclusive Brethren reveals:
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• [FONT=Verdana, Helvetica, Arial]Prior to the 2004 Federal election, a Brethren member registered a business called Willmac Enterprises Pty Ltd. Within three months, this single-directed undefined company had $370,461 in profits to spend on electoral advertising to support John Howard and castigate the Greens. This was the fifth-largest spend of any third-party donor in the campaign. The company was closed about a year after the election.
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• [FONT=Verdana, Helvetica, Arial]In 1995, when the Brethren were providing distance education to a small number of its students, they applied to the Keating government for federal funding under the ERI scheme. They were awarded what was known as category-12 status. Aboriginal schools and special schools for those with autism, or the hearing impaired, are usually the beneficiaries of category-12 funding.
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• [FONT=Verdana, Helvetica, Arial]Under the Howard government’s scheme, the sect’s six school networks, with an estimated secondary-school student population in 2007 of less than 2000 students, will receive almost $50 million in taxpayer recurrent funding in the next four year school-funding round. Upon coming to office, the Rudd government decided to retain all aspects of the funding system for its first four years.
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• [FONT=Verdana, Helvetica, Arial]The Reverend John Dean Drayton, former head of the Uniting Church, tried on four occasions to arrange meetings with then Prime Minister John Howard. Drayson tried both as president of his church nationally, and also as the representative of the National Council of Churches, which represents four million Christians. He was unable to get an appointment with John Howard. Yet when Bruce Hales, current Exclusive Brethren world leader, representing 15,000 Brethren in Australia wanted to meet with Howard, he promptly made space in his diary for him.[/FONT]

Seeing as that last thread has now descended into a discussion on uranium, I thought I'd start a new thread. Mods feel free to merge if you feel it is appropriate.