The media seized upon the idiotic remarks and subsequent spin by Christian Broadcasting Network's 700 Club founder, Pat Robertson, in which he basically endorsed yet another coup attempt by the U.S. upon the Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez.  His careless remarks have re-opened a blood-stained, 55-gallon-sized oil barrel of worms.  Call it a "Pandora's Barrel" of failed U.S. foreign policy decisions dreamt up and propagated by right-wing neocons and then blindly supported by right-wing socially conservative nutbags, like Pat Robertson:

"You know, I don’t know about this doctrine of assassination, but if he [Chavez] thinks we’re trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it,” Robertson told his audience. “It’s a whole lot cheaper than starting a war. We have the ability to take him out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability."

With Christian Fundies like him, who needs Islamic Fundies to terrorize the world?  I think when the American public can go berserk over Janet Jackson's floppy tit for months, you'd think the FCC would investigate Robertson's call to kill the leader of another country.

The Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United, said Robertson’s call for violence should be condemned by American officials.  “It is deplorable for a Christian preacher to go before his vast audience and urge the American government to murder a foreign leader,” Lynn said. “His bloodthirsty commentary is over the top, even by Pat’s rather elastic standard. “This is just the kind of religious fanaticism that the world does not need more of,” Lynn continued. “President Bush should immediately disavow Robertson and his extremist rhetoric.”

But, no.  As a matter of fact, the Bush Administration practically defended Robertson, saying, "they were remarks made by a private citizen."  Really, now?  Just how private or public a person is Pat Robertson?  According to intelligence reports by the Interhemispheric Resource Center, I would conclude that Pat Robertson has been polluting media, religion, domestic politics and U.S. foreign policy for decades:

• CBN's flagship program, "The 700 Club," was started by Pat Robertson on radio in 1961 and on TV in 1963.  By 1975 the ministry had gone international, airing the "The 700 Club" in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Japan, the West Indies, Europe, and Nigeria.  By the mid-1980s it had an estimated 28.7 million regular U.S. viewers.
  
  
• Robertson, according to investigative reporter Sara Diamond, used his tax-exempt broadcast license to hold a fundraising telethon in the United States for the Guatemalan military and the Nicaraguan contras.  On "The 700 Club," Robertson has interviewed Adolfo Calero and Steadman Fagoth, contra leaders; Efrain Rios Montt, then-president of Guatemala known for massive human rights abuses; Jeremias Chitunda, an Angolan guerrilla leader; Ray Cline, former CIA deputy director of intelligence; several Israeli cabinet members, and even President Reagan in an exclusive interview.
  
  
• Robertson's campaign for the presidency brought many rightwing Christians into the political process and made pentecostal Christianity a policy force to be reckoned with. However, his run for public office also brought Robertson some controversy and embarrassing moments, such as when he was forced to admit that his son was conceived out of wedlock. He filed libel suits in response to allegations that he used the influence of his father, a U.S. senator, to avoid combat duty in Korea.  [ sound familiar? - JfZ ]
  
  
• The U.S. operation of CBN was considered one of the top private funders of the contras. As of 1987 Robertson reported that Operation Blessing had sent more than $3 million in aid to the Nicaraguan refugees. CBN gave the $3 million to the contra's Houston-based Nicaraguan Patriotic Association, according to Juan Sacasas, Vice President of the group and representative of the FDN contra force. Robertson denies any connection with Sacasas. However, there is little question that the Operation Blessing donations reached the contra forces. Robertson was so popular among them that one group named itself the Pat Robertson Brigade.

Believe me, this is just the tip of the frackin' iceberg concerning Pat Robertson.  The man has his dirty fingers in more pies around the globe than the average CIA section chief.  Read his profile compiled at Interhemispheric Resource Center and then realize that it is not even current, by any means.  It does not include Robertson ties to the deposed and exiled Liberian dictator Charles Taylor and Robertson's 8-million-dollar gold mining investments, his jingoist anti-Islamic foments, or the recent Chavez flap.

And, don't even get me started on the two decades of political and religious pollution caused by Robertson's Christian Coalition political action group!  Nowadays, however, it's fairly apparent that Robertson's brilliant business and scheming mind is a cart whose wheels have now flown off.  As much as I dislike people like Pat Robertson (and Jerry Falwell), it's just sad -- but perhaps comforting to some -- that this man is clearly sliding down the slippery slope of atrophied brain dementia in an exponential way.


[Headphones] :: Democrusader - JfZ