almsgiving XV

By Diogenes ( articles ) | Sep 08, 2004

Suppose you're the president of a Pittsburgh Catholic university with 9,600 students. Before assuming your current position, you directed the Creighton Center for Health Policy and Ethics and were acting president of Creighton University. You have $500 in your pocket and are inspired to give it away. To whom, or what, do you direct your alms?

(a) to the National Catholic Bioethics Center

(b) to another spiritual or corporal work of mercy

(c) to John Kerry for President, Inc.

If you're Charles J. Dougherty, president of Duquesne University, your answer is (c).

Interestingly, it looks like somebody-- perhaps Dr. Dougherty, perhaps a Kerry campaign staff member-- wanted to make it difficult for this donation to come to light. The federal election record states that the Charles J. Dougherty who made the donation is 'not employed'; yet the Charles J. Dougherty who is president of Duquesne has the exact same address (according to a publicly available university document) as the ostensibly unemployed Kerry donor of the same name.

(Kudos to the sharp OTR reader who asked whether the donor Charles J. Dougherty might be the university president's son. According to an article in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the president does not have a son by that name.)