Texas patient confirmed as first Ebola case diagnosed in US - Yahoo News

Texas patient confirmed as first Ebola case diagnosed in US - Yahoo News














JohnButts@JBMedia - Reports:
A Texas man just back from West Africa has been confirmed as having the first case of Ebola to be diagnosed in the U.S.

Authorities with the Centers for Disease Control revealed the finding Tuesday, a day after the unidentified patient arrived at a Dallas hospital with suspicious symptoms.

Officials at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas put the man into “strict isolation” and sent a specimen to the CDC in Atlanta for testing.

The CDC said preliminary results show the man has the deadly disease which has been linked to more than 3,000 recent deaths in Africa. According to the World Health Organization, there have been more than 6,500 cases confirmed in Africa, with Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone among the hardest hit.

Dr. Christopher Perkins with the Dallas County health department told reporters that the Texas man didn’t start showing symptoms until he arrived home.

“We know at this time this person was not symptomatic during travel but became symptomatic once arriving here and being home for several days,” said Perkins, according the Dallas Morning News. “So that decreases the threat that might be to the general population.”

Four American aid workers have contracted Ebola in West Africa and been evacuated to the U.S. for treatment since late July. Three of them were released after making full recoveries. A fourth patient arrived in Atlanta on Sept. 9, but a spokesperson with Emory University Hospital said privacy laws prevented the release of an updated condition. On Sunday, a U.S. doctor who had been volunteering in an Ebola clinic in Sierra Leone was brought to the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland as safety precaution after he was exposed to the disease.

In past years Ebola has killed up to 90 percent of those it has infected, but the death rate in the current outbreak is closer to 60 percent due to early treatment.

Ferguson Unrest Resumes After Michael Brown Memorial Burns Down - Yahoo News

Ferguson Unrest Resumes After Michael Brown Memorial Burns Down - Yahoo News















JohnButts@JBMedia - Reports:

Several weeks after the turbulence that followed the August 9 shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., a new round of unrest is being reported. As NBC News and others are noting, the catalyst for the renascent protests appears to be the burning down of a Michael Brown memorial in Ferguson:

Related Stories

1. The street memorial for Michael Brown burned down overnight The Week (RSS)
2. In Missouri, Michael Brown memorial preserved, protected Reuters
3. After fire at slain teen's memorial, protests erupt in Missouri Reuters
4. Correction: Police Shooting-Missouri-Timeline Associated Press
5. Ferguson council to meet for first time since Michael Brown shooting Reuters

Local news affiliate KSDK reported that there was a break-in Tuesday at Beauty Town, a West Florissant cosmetics supply store. There were also reports of gun shots fired near the apartment complex where Brown lived and allegedly outside of Beauty Town. Roughly 200 protesters eventually converged on the scene, according to KDSK.

It's unclear if the memorial was intentionally burned down or if, as some suggest, the fire resulted from the many candles at the memorial.

Nevertheless, on Tuesday evening and into Wednesday morning, there were numerous accounts of protests in Ferguson, light clashes between police and a crowd of a few hundred demonstrators including some reports of rock-throwing, damage to police vehicles, and seven arrests.

 
The Post Dispatch added: Police officials, including Missouri Highway Patrol Capt. Ronald S. Johnson, St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar and St. Louis Police Chief Sam Dotson, went to the scene. The crowd eventually dwindled to about 50 to 75 shortly before midnight. A line of about a dozen police faced the remaining protesters.

Police reported eschewed riot gear and were said to have worn body cameras. Numerous Twitter accounts posted the photo below, allegedly of a police officer wearing a bracelet in tribute to Darren Wilson — the police officer who shot Michael Brown.

 

If authentic, this could augur badly for restoring calm in Ferguson.

Vladimir Putin Threatens World War 3, Says Russia Could Invade Europe Within Two Days

Vladimir Putin Threatens World War 3, Says Russia Could Invade Europe Within Two Days












JohnButts@JBMedia - Reports:
Vladimir Putin allegedly threatened World War 3 during talks about Ukraine, claiming that Russia could potentially invade and take over the capitals of many European countries within two days.

In a related report by The Inquisitr, both Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton claim Putin wants to restore Russia to the glory of an empire that spreads across the globe, and even made comparison to Nazi Germany. Hillary does not believe Putin and Hitler can be directly compared, or claim that Putin starting World War 3, but she did make a comparison to how the Nazis used the German minorities in Poland and Czechoslovakia as an excuse to invade. Some say the situation prior to World War 2 is similar to today since “protecting” Russian speaking citizens of Ukraine are used as the justification for intervention in Ukraine.

The rhetoric related to the Ukraine war has been stepping up to a dangerous level in recent weeks. First, Russia’s nuclear weapons were test fired as a demonstration of Russian military might, and then Vladimir Putin promised to rebuild Russia’s nuclear arsenal. In response to recent advances by Russia within Ukrainian territory, Ukraine also threatened to restart its nuclear weapons program.

An influential German newspaper called Sueddeutsche Zeitung is reporting that Vladimir Putin allegedly had a private meeting with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso. During the course of their discussion, Putin essentially threatened World War 3.

“If I wanted, in two days I could have Russian troops not only in Kiev, but also in Riga, Vilnius, Tallinn, Warsaw and Bucharest.”

ADVERTISEMENTAn influential German newspaper called Sueddeutsche Zeitung is reporting that Vladimir Putin allegedly had a private meeting with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso. During the course of their discussion, Putin essentially threatened World War 3. “If I wanted, in two days I could have Russian troops not only in Kiev, but also in Riga, Vilnius, Tallinn, Warsaw and Bucharest.”

This threat by Putin matches a similar statement allegedly said earlier in the month, in which Russia’s leader proclaimed their military force of 20,000 men camped outside Ukraine’s border could take the capital city Kiev within two weeks. In this case, that threat was expanded to include countries like Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Poland and Romania.

It’s possible that Putin was indirectly responding to a speech given by U.S. President Barack Obama earlier in the month, who also mentioned some of those NATO members.

“An attack on one is an attack on all. So if, in such a moment, you ever ask again, ‘who will come to help,’ you’ll know the answer – the NATO alliance, including the armed forces of the United States of America,” Obama said. “We’ll be here for Estonia. We will be here for Latvia. We will be here for Lithuania.”

If this alleged conversation between Putin, Poroshenko, and Barroso did take place, it would be the first time Putin has directly threatened members of the European Union and NATO. If Russia were to actually ever act on this threat, it really would mean World War 3 would start since Article V of NATO’s Washington Treaty declares that “an attack on one is an attack on all,” which is what President Obama was referring to in his speech. While both the United States and England have rejected calls to send lethal aid into Ukraine, both countries would be obligated by NATO treaties to respond with military force if Russia’s actions were to ever match Putin’s rhetoric. According to the NATO website, “Article 5 has been invoked once – in response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States.”

Read more at  http://www.inquisitr.com/1484957/vladimir-putin-threatens-world-war-3-says-russia-could-invade-europe-within-two-days/#gcHtXXEj8H4YtZmB.99

John McCain Votes To Preserve A Supreme Court Case He Called The 'Worst Decision Ever' | ThinkProgress

John McCain Votes To Preserve A Supreme Court Case He Called The 'Worst Decision Ever' | ThinkProgress

JohnButts@JBMedia - Reports:
A proposed constitutional amendment to overturn the Supreme Court’s controversial 2010 Citizens United ruling and give lawmakers greater ability to prevent large donors from corrupting government failed in the United States Senate on Thursday on a party-line vote. Among the 42 Republicans voting no was Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), who in the past had been a campaign finance reform advocate.

Citizens United decision found, for the first time, that the First Amendment’s free speech protections guaranteed corporations and unions the right to spend unlimited sums of money on political advertisements. McCain denounced the ruling as the Supreme Court’s “worst decision ever.”

In 2012, McCain promised that “there will be huge scandals… because there’s too much money washing around, too much of it… we don’t know who, who contributed it, and there is too much corruption associated with that kind of money.” He blasted the Supreme Court’s view that corporations are people and denounced the Roberts Court for demonstrating “a combination of arrogance, naivete, and stupidity, the likes of which I have never seen.”

The amendment, proposed by Sen. Tom Udall (D-NM) would have given Congress and the states the authority to “regulate and set reasonable limits on the raising and spending of money by candidates and others to influence elections,” as long as doing to did not abridge the freedom of the press, and would have allowed them to “distinguish between natural persons and corporations or other artificial entities created by law, including by prohibiting such entities from spending money to influence elections.” Like all constitutional amendments, it would have required a two-thirds vote in the House and Senate and ratification by three-fourths of the states’ legislatures.

But McCain cast the deciding vote against the DISCLOSE Act in 2010, which would have required disclosure of the major funders of political ads. He has refused to back similar legislation to require transparency for outside political spending in every Congress since.

Update: Brian Rogers, communications director for Sen. McCain, told ThinkProgress: “Senator McCain is proud of his long record of fighting special interests in both parties to reform our broken campaign finance system, and doesn’t need to vote for a partisan, hypocritical, election-year stunt in order to prove it. At a time when the Senate has not passed a single appropriations bill, the Defense Authorization Act has not been brought to the floor, and during turbulent times for America’s national security, it is unfortunate that Majority Leader Reid has decided to spend the Senate’s short time in session on a bill everyone knows cannot pass the House and was introduced for purely political purposes.”

Denzel Washington Recalls Experiences with Discrimination and N-Word Insults

Denzel Washington Recalls Experiences with Discrimination and N-Word Insults

 

JohnButts@JBMedia - Reports:
Denzel Washington’s experience shooting his new movie The Equalizer in Boston revived memories of racial discrimination he encountered more than 30 years ago.

Washington was at the Toronto Film Festival press conference Sunday for Equalizer, which premieres at Roy Thomson Hall. For most of the time, he, director Antoine Fuqua and actors Chloe Grace Moretz and Marton Scokas talked about acting methods and the uneasiness of the first day of shooting. But a question about filming the movie in Boston and a comment Washington made about his wife’s upcoming one-woman show led to unexpected revelations.

Washington recalled how about three decades ago he was in Boston with wife Pauletta Learson Washington, who was performing in a play, and some people in his hotel thought he was a pimp, and she was a prostitute. Security was called, and a fight broke out.

“I didn’t know how to fight, but I knew how to win,” Washington told the assembled media.

He also recalled how he walked to his wife’s show one night and was called the N-word.

“‘Hey n—, n—, n—, n—, hey boy.’ I was like, ‘Damn.’ That was the taste I had about Boston,” he said.

Then he recounted how the first time he was called the N-word was when he was in Florida on a balcony around the age of nine. He was called the pejorative word by a group of kids and then went into the house and asked his mother why.

“And she said, ‘Oh, that’s just somebody worried about you taking their place.’ It was like crabs in the bottom of the barrel. And in Southwest Boston, they were all right there,” he said, referring to homes in poor areas that are packed next to each other. “They are at the bottom. So it was like, ‘We’re better than you.’ Yeah, so I came in (to Boston) with all those kinds of memories.”

Hawks owner Bruce Levenson to sell team after revealing he wrote racist email - Yahoo Sports

Hawks owner Bruce Levenson to sell team after revealing he wrote racist email - Yahoo Sports

JohnButts@JBMedia - Reports:
Atlanta Hawks owner Bruce Levenson will sell the franchise after the revelation of a 2012 email he wrote stereotyping African-American fans.

Related Stories

• Following bigoted comments from 2012, Atlanta Hawks owner agrees to sell team NBC Sports
• Hawks owner will sell share due to racist comments SB Nation
• Hawks' owner Levenson to sell interest in team The Associated Press
• Steve Koonin's statement in regards to Bruce Levenson SB Nation
• Bruce Levenson email was to Danny Ferry SB Nation

NBA commissioner Adam Silver and Levenson made the announcement Sunday morning with joint statements. Silver discussed the issue with some owners late last week, but many other owners and team officials did not know of it until Sunday's announcement, league sources told Yahoo Sports.

The announcement comes a little more than four months after the release of an audio tape in which former Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling made racial comments to his reported girlfriend. Silver banished Sterling from the NBA and forced him to sell the team. Sterling's wife Shelly closed the sale of the franchise to former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer for $2 billion last month.

Levenson apologized for the August 2012 email, which was sent to Hawks general manager Danny Ferry and stereotyped the differences between black and white fans in Atlanta.

“Over the past several years, I’ve spent a lot of time grappling with low attendance at our games and the need for the Hawks to attract more season ticket holders and corporate sponsors," Levenson said in the statement. "Over that time, I’ve talked with team executives about the need for the Hawks to build a more diverse fan base that includes more suburban whites, and I shared my thoughts on why our efforts to bridge Atlanta’s racial sports divide seemed to be failing.

"In trying to address those issues, I wrote an email two years ago that was inappropriate and offensive. I trivialized our fans by making clichéd assumptions about their interests (i.e. hip hop vs. country, white vs. black cheerleaders, etc.) and by stereotyping their perceptions of one another (i.e. that white fans might be afraid of our black fans). By focusing on race, I also sent the unintentional and hurtful message that our white fans are more valuable than our black fans.

"If you're angry about what I wrote, you should be. I'm angry at myself, too. It was inflammatory nonsense. We all may have subtle biases and preconceptions when it comes to race, but my role as a leader is to challenge them, not to validate or accommodate those who might hold them."

Silver said Levenson notified the NBA of the email in July, and the league followed with its own investigation. Nevertheless, a high-ranking league official with direct knowledge of the probe disputed that Levenson simply self-reported the email to the NBA.

"Prior to the completion of the investigation, Mr. Levenson notified me [Saturday] evening that he had decided to sell his controlling interest in the Atlanta Hawks," Silver said. "As Mr. Levenson acknowledged, the views he expressed are entirely unacceptable and are in stark contrast to the core principles of the National Basketball Association." Hawks CEO Steve Koonin will oversee team operations while the franchise works through the sale process.

The Chasm Between Blacks And Whites Who Think The Justice System Is Biased Is Getting Even Wider | ThinkProgress

The Chasm Between Blacks And Whites Who Think The Justice System Is Biased Is Getting Even Wider | ThinkProgress

 

JohnButts@JBMedia - Reports:
Last summer after a jury found George Zimmerman not guilty for the shooting of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin, a poll of Americans revealed something remarkable. While about two-third of African Americans continued to believe the criminal justice system is biased against blacks, just 25 percent of whites did, signifying the greatest chasm between whites’ and blacks’ perceptions of bias since Gallup began polling in the early 1990s. That gap also translated into views about the verdict. Eighty-five percent of blacks viewed the verdict acquitting Zimmerman for murder as wrong, while 54 percent of whites said the verdict was correct.

These disparate perceptions of racism in the criminal justice system can play as much of a role in the racial tensions exposed by the shooting of Michael Brown as disproportion itself, according to a new report by the Sentencing Project. It means that whites are more likely to attribute disparate outcomes such as long sentences or high arrest rates solely to individuals’ own mistakes rather than to racism in the system. And it may be an explanation for why whites are more supportive of punitive policies like Three Strikes laws and the death penalty, even though blacks are significantly more likely to be the victims of crimes:

CREDIT: The Sentencing Project

CREDIT: The Sentencing Project

With momentum for reform after the shooting of Michael Brown, the Sentencing Project’s report compiles and interprets two decades of data on racial perceptions of the criminal justice system that “have bolstered harsh and biased criminal justice policies. ” In addition to noting disparate perceptions of justice between blacks ans whites, the report also highlights significant data that whites over-estimate the amount, severity, and nature of crimes committed by minorities. While some minority groups do make up a disproportionate percentage of both crime victims and arrestees, whites tend to think African Americans have committed a proportion of crime 20-30 percent higher than reflected in crime statistics. And a number of studies have exhibited the implicit bias that breeds assumptions African Americans are more likely to be dangerous, and are more likely to have a gun. “Even afte accounting for differing crime rates and other measures of disorder, researchers have found that the ‘percentage [of] young black men is one of the best predictors of the perceived severity of neighborhood crime’,” the report explains.

“Together, these studies reveal that even white Americans who denounce racism still hold unconscious and unintentional racial biases, associating people of color with criminality,” the report explains. “By demonstrating that race distorts perceptions of risk, this research sheds light on the circumstances leading to the deaths of unarmed men and women including Amadou Diallo, Sean Bell, Oscar Grant, Trayvon Martin, Renisha McBride, and Michael Brown.”

Minivan Cop Shooting Mom 'Thought About Trayvon Martin' When Officers Fired - Yahoo

Minivan Cop Shooting Mom 'Thought About Trayvon Martin' When Officers Fired - Yahoo

 

JohnButts@JBMedia - Reports:
Oriana Farrell was terrified. The single mother of five recalled an October 2013 traffic stop, when officers wrestled her out of her minivan along a New Mexico highway, and then shot at the vehicle as she tried to flee with her children inside. Video from a police dashboard camera captured the seemingly-routine traffic stop devolving into a tense incident.

“I started thinking about children who have been shot, families who have been shot,” she said in her first television interview that appeared today on “Good Morning America.”

“I started thinking about Trayvon Martin.”

WATCH: Police Investigate Aggressive Action Taken Against Resisting Mother

Mom in New Mexico Car Chase Calls Cop 'Terrifying Individual'


The ordeal began when a police officer pulled Farrell over, alleging she was speeding. Farrell says when the officer walked away from the car without giving her a ticket she drove off, assuming she wasn’t getting one.

“I started pulling out slowly, like we do from any traffic stop,” she said.

That’s when the officer chased her down, trying to pull Farrell out of the vehicle as her children screamed.

For Farrell, confusion gave way to fear when the officer tried to arrest her. Her son Zeke – thinking his mother was in danger – got out of the car.

“He had his hands on her, and that wasn’t really OK with me,” Zeke said.

Moments later, backup arrived. As a shaken Farrell sped away, officer Elias Montoya fired three shots, unaware of who was in the car.

The appellate court has ordered Farrell's charges to be dismissed, but the case may not be over. The District Attorney can still refile, and the officer who fired his gun, Montoya, has appealed the decision to fire him.

No one was hurt, but Farrell says there’s a lesson to be learned. “Even if I was speeding, that doesn’t require being shot at any point,” she said. “Even if he thought I drove off, that didn’t deserve us being shot at.”

Police: Death of teen whose body burned was random - Yahoo News

Police: Death of teen whose body burned was random - Yahoo News

 

JohnButts@JBMedia - Reports:
A 15-year-old Indianapolis girl whose burned body was found over the weekend was likely abducted and killed by someone she didn't know, police and family members said Tuesday.

Dominique Allen's death was a homicide resulting from asphyxiation, Marion County Chief Deputy Coroner Alfarena Ballew ruled Tuesday. A man walking his dog found Allen's body in his backyard on the city's near northwest side Sunday, police said.

One of Allen's sisters, Shenika Poindexter, issued a stern warning to whoever was responsible during a news conference Tuesday at the site where Allen's body was found. A small makeshift wooden cross was placed next to scorch marks in the grass, and decorated with flowers and stuffed animals.

"I don't know why you had to do this. Whatever you do, wherever you go, justice is going to be served, in this life or the next. I don't care, they will hunt you until you die. ... She did not deserve this, she did not deserve this, she was 15 years old," Poindexter said between tears.

Poindexter said her sister wasn't the type to talk to strangers or get in a car with someone she didn't know.
The victim had been staying with another sister, Mareeka Allen, and was last seen on the sister's porch about 4 a.m. Sunday.

Mareeka Allen said the crime was a "careless random act," and a detective investigating the case agreed.

"At this time, we believe it was random," Indianapolis Metro Police Detective Marcus Kennedy said, adding that Dominique Allen was dead before her body was burned.

Detectives are combing registered sex offenders for possible leads and checking for reported runaways in case there are other victims. Police discovered the teen's purse and shoes Tuesday about a block from where her body was found.

Kennedy distributed a photograph of Dominique Allen taken the last night she was alive. In it, she's smiling and wearing the sandals that were discovered Tuesday.

Her sisters said Allen, who attended Ben Davis Ninth Grade Center, wanted to be a model and to attend Spelman College in Atlanta.

Deputy Mayor Olgen Williams, who lives a few blocks away from where the girl's body was found, comforted the family at the news conference.

"Pretty young lady, she had a future, and this evil person, or persons, destroyed her life," Williams said in an interview afterward.

Wayne Township school officials brought in counselors at the girl's school to help students and staff cope with Allen's death.

Ted Cruz's Dad: "The Average Black Does Not" Understand The Minimum Wage Is Bad

Ted Cruz's Dad: "The Average Black Does Not" Understand The Minimum Wage Is Bad

JohnButts@JBMedia - Reports:
The father of Republican Texas Sen. Ted Cruz said black people “need to be educated” about Democrats, so that they will vote Republican. Cruz, who made the comments at the Western Williamson Republican Club August meeting, added “the average black does not” understand that the minimum wage is bad.

The Aug. 21 meeting advertised that Cruz would “speak passionately on what can be done to return our nation to the principles that made America exceptional.” During the speech, Cruz spoke at length about a recent conversation he said he had with a black pastor in Bakersfield, California.

“I said, as a matter of fact, ‘Did you know that Civil Rights legislation was passed by Republicans? It was passed by a Republican Senate under the threat of a filibuster by the Democrats,’” Cruz said. “‘Oh, I didn’t know that.’ And then I said, ‘Did you know that every member of the Ku Klux Klan were Democrats from the South?’ ‘Oh I didn’t know that.’ You know, they need to be educated.”

Cruz cited a book Please Stop Helping Us by Jason Riley, a member of the Wall Street Journal editorial board.

“I am going to try to encourage everybody I can to buy a book written by a black journalist. His name is Jason Riley. He wrote a book called Please Stop Helping Us, talking about how all the handouts to blacks have kept blacks in the poorhouse. And I’ll tell you what, I am going to make it my task to buy 15 to 20 copies of that book and hand it out to some black leaders to read.”

“Jason Riley said in an interview, Did you know before we had minimum wage laws black unemployment and white unemployment were the same? If we increase the minimum wage, black unemployment will skyrocket. See, he understands it, but the average black does not.”

The elder Cruz added “every ethnic group” wants “the ability to succeed,” saying Democrats “sell this guaranteed utopia” that is “guaranteed mediocrity.”

“What we need to sell is the American dream,” Cruz said.

Feds Punish Business For Engaging In ‘Citizenship-Discrimination’ - Yahoo News

Feds Punish Business For Engaging In ‘Citizenship-Discrimination’ - Yahoo News

 

JohnButts@JBMedia - Reports:
A Texas catering business will pay the United States $26,400 for engaging in “citizenship-discrimination,” as part of a settlement with the Justice Department announced Tuesday.

Culinaire International unlawfully discriminated against employees based on their citizenship status, the Justice Department claimed, because it required non-citizen employees to provide extra proof of their right to work in the United States.

Culinaire has agreed to pay the United States $20,460 in civil penalties, receive training in anti-discrimination rules of the Immigration and Nationality Act, revise its work eligibility verification process, and create a $40,000 back pay fund for “potential economic victims.”

“Employers cannot discriminate against workers by requiring them to produce more documents than necessary in the employment eligibility verification and reverification processes,” Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights division, Molly Moran, said in a statement.

A lawful permanent resident’s card expires, but their right to work is permanent, and in this case Culinaire was requiring employees to present a renewed permanent resident card to be verified as work-eligible. The Justice Department claimed this violated a provision in the INA that prohibits employers from requiring extra documentation from non-citizen employees.

The Justice Department and Culinaire International did not immediately respond to request for comment.

Billionaire threatens charity donations if Pope continues support for the poor - Las Vegas Democrat | Examiner.com

Billionaire threatens charity donations if Pope continues support for the poor - Las Vegas Democrat | Examiner.com

 

JohnButts@JBMedia - Reports:
Billionaire Ken Langone, the founder of Home Depot issued a warning to Pope Francis during an interview with CNBC which was published this past Monday. In the interview he said that wealthy people such as himself are feeling ostracized by the Pope’s messages in support of the poor, and might stop giving to charity if the Pope continues to make statements criticizing capitalism and income inequality.

Mr. Langone described the Pope's comments about a "culture of prosperity" as "exclusionary" statements that may make some of the rich "incapable of feeling compassion for the poor."

The billionaire, who’s a major donor to the Republican Party, is currently working with Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the Archbishop of New York, to raise $180 million for the restoration of St. Patrick's Cathedral. Langone said that he told the Archbishop about a wealthy donor who could give millions of dollars to the Cathedral project but was worried about the Pope's "exclusionary" remarks.

"I've told the cardinal, 'Your Eminence, this is one more hurdle I hope we don't have to deal with. You want to be careful about generalities. Rich people in one country don't act the same as rich people in another country,'" said Langone.

CNBC also spoke to Cardinal Timothy Dolan, who said he told Langone the unnamed donor's concerns seemed based on "a misunderstanding of the Holy Father's message."

"The pope loves poor people. He also loves rich people. So I said, ‘Ken, thanks for bringing it to my attention. We've gotta correct, to make sure this gentleman understands the Holy Father's message properly.' And then I think he's gonna say, 'Oh, OK. If that's the case, count me in for St. Patrick's Cathedral,’” Dolan said.

During a speech in Brazil this past July, Pope Francis appealed "to those in possession of greater resources," saying that they should "never tire of working for a more just world, marked by greater solidarity. No one can remain insensitive to the inequalities that persist in the world."

A number of people, from Republican Sen. John McCain to conservative radio commentator Rush Limbaugh, have weighed in on Francis' statements, with the latter calling it "pure Marxism."

Dolan calls the Marxist label "hyperbole," telling CNBC that the pope thinks "money in itself is morally neutral. Money, our wealth, is a gift from God. And the morality comes in the way we use it.

"If it becomes a god, if it becomes an idol, Pope Francis is saying, then it's wrong. Because there is only one God. If we use it for our own selves and our families, for a secure and a safe present and future, if we use it to reinvest in the community, to help others, and if we share with the poor, then it's morally good," Dolan said.