Barack Obama recently chatted with TV preacher Pat Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network and had some advice for the religious right.
For my friends on the right, I think it would be helpful to remember the critical role that the separation of church and state has played in preserving not only our democracy but also our religious practice. Folks tend to forget that during our founding, it wasn’t the atheists or the civil libertarians who were the most effective champions of the First Amendment…. It was the forbearers of Evangelicals who were the most adamant about not mingling government with religious, because they didn’t want state-sponsored religion hindering their ability to practice their faith as they understood it.
Whatever we once were, we’re no longer just a Christian nation; we are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of non-believers. We should acknowledge this and realize that when we’re formulating policies from the state house to the Senate floor to the White House, we’ve got to work to translate our reasoning into values that are accessible to every one of our citizens, not just members of our own faith community.
Good stuff. I’ve long believed Democratic leaders have done too little to emphasize their First Amendment, and Obama’s comments to CBN helped frame the issue in a helpful way — everyone should support the separation of church and state, especially the devout.
Of course, TV preacher Pat Robertson, who still controls CBN, didn’t see it that way.
One Trackback To “TV preacher Robertson targets Obama“
Robertson’s viewers send him their SS checks while he wants to privatize Social Security and wants to make Bush’s tax cuts permanent. The marks will fall for anything “culture war” while these preachers live the mansion and a yacht lifestyle. Props to Obama
1st
2nd
look who the preacher is the White Supremacist and secret Grand Dragon of the KKK. He who uses his pulpit to preach hatred IntoreaNCE AND iGNORANCE AND WHEN THAT FAILS JUST OUT AND OUT LIE.
Rich Old White Men Wearing Expensive Suits
Rich old white men
wearing expensive suits
pontificating
on the evils
of liberals and gays
and single parent families
preaching about
the coming final battle
good versus evil
as if they wished
they could make it happen
a prerequisite
for the second coming of Jesus
in spite of all the people
who would be killed in the destruction
Rich old white men
wearing expensive suits
strut across the stage
yelling and waving their Bibles
putting the fear of God
in those who feel the need
to fear something
taking people’s money
to pad their lavish lifestyles
and to promote
their own brand of poison
they fund schools and missions
that obliterate and subvert
the true mission of their Savior
that every man woman and child
should be loved and honored
as if each one
was the Creator in person
Rich old white men
wearing expensive suits
never stood in a food line
slept on a sidewalk
filed for unemployment
they never wore a uniform
feared death in battle
lost a limb or a loved one
to a roadside bomb
or a sniper’s bullet
though their dollars
have often purchased
land mines and sniper’s bullets
they never picked cotton
cabbages or fruit
never swung a hammer for a living
never sweated to make a mortgage payment
or worried about health care
But they will take
an old woman’s last dollar
let her think she’s saved
and tell her Jesus loves her
until she loses her home
Rich old white men
wearing expensive suits
are destroying my country
club people over the head
with their Bibles
use Old Testament Law
for a New Testament religion
that bombs medical clinics
and shoots doctors
invades hospices
trampling family’s grief
there is no New World
to which we can escape them
seek refuge from persecution
like the Pilgrims of old
freedom of religion
freedom from religion
freedom of thought
freedom to live however we damn well please
Rich old white men
wearing expensive suits
we can only wait for them to die
Guess I’m going to piss in the punchbowl here. Am I supposed to be pleased with Obama saying we’re no longer a Christian nation, but now also a Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist and non believing one? Hello. We never were a Christian nation but a secular one. Am I the only one who finds his commitment to secularism insufficient?
Robertson isn’t REALLY a preacher-he’s a money-grubbing conman with an innate need for power and money.
He is without ethics and principles. A sociopath.
Was anyone else surprised to see a CBN “reporter” on Meet The Press last Sunday? I couldn’t believe it.
I have a VISION……
Pat Robertson is old and will die very very soon.
lilybelle @ 6:
[Deleted. Personal attack-Sitemonitor]
The insane man better not target Obama or any American
in any way he referenced an elected president in Venezuela.
And what the hell is his book all about.
The New World Order (Paperback)
by Pat Robertson
http://www.amazon.com/New-Worl.....0849933943
quote from the book The New World Order:
“As a brief personal note, my father, A. Willis Robertson, succeeded his fellow Virginian, Carter Glass, in the United States Senate in 1946. Glass had chaired the House Banking and Currency Committee, and my father went on to chair its counterpart in the Senate, where he had the hearty support of the banking community. As I write this I am looking at a lovely sterling SILVER tray given him by the American Bankers Association at their annual meeting in San Francisco, October 25, 1966. My father was also a colleague in the . (Robertson, The New World Order, p.126)
Carter Glass ..puppet of the Rockefellers.
And yes. Prescott Bush—grandfather of President Bush was involved in financing Hitler’s rise to power.
lilybelle @ 6:
Yeah lilybelle. He certainly missed out on props for the agnostics and atheiests.
And really, what you said…
Jason @ 10:
Thanks for setting me straight. I’ll try inanity “Pat Robertson is old and will die very very soon,” instead.
Jason @ 9:
Didn’t you hear!? He made a deal with the devil for another 50 years, and all the devil wants is for him to keep doing what he doing.
Good goin’ Obama. That’s what you get for going on a crazy man’s show. You had sense enough not to go on Fox but because you want everyone to think you’re a big Christian you go on CBN.
I’ve got news for you, a lotta uninformed people still think you are a Muslim and they don’t necessarily watch CBN so don’t waste your time.
“Was anyone else surprised to see a CBN “reporter” on Meet The Press last Sunday?”
At this point, I’m surprised every time I turn on “Meet the Press” and the show doesn’t open with Tim Russert sitting in Dick Cheney’s lap fondly running his hand over the VP’s bald head and cooing in his ear. Other than that, nothing surprises me about the show anymore.
There’s a larger group of voting public than the religious right. Get out there and vote… don’t let them steal another election!
Stop the presses! Pat Robertson is incredible dumbfuck!
Lilybelle, IMO Obama was using “nation” in the sense of “group of people” rather than in the sense of “large governmental unit.”
miss_kitty @ 7:
But he has such a nice smile.
charles @ 14:
Or maybe he’ll just become Dick Cheney’s succubus.
Obama, like virtually every other public figure is wrong about a very critical detail (perhaps he does this to appease the behemoth voting block that Evangelicals represent). He states it was the “Forebears to the Evangelicals” who were most adamant about erecting barriers between church and state. In fact, it was the Deists. For those unaware, a great many of the founding fathers including nearly all of “the biggies” were Deists.
The wikipedia entry is not ready to conclude this, but it offers enough clues for the curious to look further:
In America, Enlightenment philosophy (which itself was heavily inspired by Deist ideals) played a major role in creating the principle of separation of church and state, expressed in the religious freedom clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution. Founding Fathers who were especially noted for being influenced by such philosophy include Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams,Cornelius Harnett, Gouverneur Morris, Hugh Williamson, James Wilson,[31] and James Madison.[32] Although these men were members of traditional Christian denominations (Hugh Williamson was a Presbyterian and the rest were Episcopalians), their political speeches show distinct Deistic influence. Other notable Founding Fathers may have been more directly Deist. These include Ethan Allen[33] and Thomas Paine (who published The Age of Reason, a treatise that helped to popularize Deism throughout America and Europe). Elihu Palmer (1764-1806) wrote the “Bible” of American Deism in his Principles of Nature (1801) and attempted to organize Deism by forming the “Deistical Society of New York.”
Currently (as of 2007) there is an ongoing controversy in the United States over whether or not America was founded as a “Christian nation” based on Judeo-Christian ideals. This has spawned a subsidiary controversy over whether the Founding Fathers were Christians or Deists or something in between.[34] Particularly heated is the debate over the beliefs of Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington, for some of whom the evidence is mixed.[35] However, Benjamin Franklin wrote in his autobiography, “Some books against Deism fell into my hands; they were said to be the substance of sermons preached at Boyle’s lectures. It happened that they wrought an effect on me quite contrary to what was intended by them; for the arguments of the Deists, which were quoted to be refuted, appeared to me much stronger than the refutations; in short, I soon became a thorough Deist. My arguments perverted some others, particularly Collins and Ralph; but each of them having afterwards wrong’d me greatly without the least compunction, and recollecting Keith’s conduct towards me (who was another freethinker) and my own towards Vernon and Miss Read, which at times gave me great trouble, I began to suspect that this doctrine, tho’ it might be true, was not very useful.”[36]
[Deleted. Off topic]
I agree about the “no longer” part but Obama’s overall message was still a good one. It’s the CBN folk who seem to be emphasizing the “no longer” part more so than Obama.
It’s difficult to express how disappointed I am that Barak Obama would appear on CBN. Why is Obaba shoring up the credibility of a hate-mongering, racist, anti-semetic, homophobic kook like Robertson by appearing on his network? For Christ’s sake, Robertson endorses assinations.
This action, on the part of Obama, makes me lose all respect for him. I was going to vote for him, but he’s just proved his judgment is very, very bad.
Can someone please tell what day it was when GOD said only the gop can believe in him?Well lord knows they need him more than the rest of us.Thye may own this war but my lord they don’t own.
miss_kitty @ 7:
I’m reminded of Christopher Hitchens’s best line about Jerry Falwell: “If you gave Falwell an enema, you could bury him in a matchbox.”
The same could be said of Robertson upon his death.
If we had true seperation of Church & State Robertson would be arrested for threatening the lives of foreign leaders.
jr @ 1:
Storm troopers are passing out checks now?
Back in the begining of American history witches had freedom of speech too…
Gurgle, gurgle gaaaccckkkk!
[Deleted. Your parody trolling became tedious a long time ago]
LP@19:
Are you saying Pat has a perty mouth? ;)
Over at Wonkette, there is a blurb that Pat’s phony college, Regent University is in deep financial trouble–when you click to the original article, it spells out in detail the finances of his college.
What parent in their right mind would want to send their kid to his school?
Robertson is repugnant and he lives a very luxurious lifestyle because he has bilked millions from the poor and the gullible. I wouldn’t give him a dime.
Barak’s looking more presidential every day.
According to the dictionary a deist believes that God exists and created the world but thereafter assumed no control over it.
Perhaps deism was the precursor to Intelligent Design? Well, at least the founding fathers were not bible thumpers who thought that the earth was created in 7 days 6,000 years ago. And this was before Darwin.
As a recovered Catholic, all religions are suspect to me. But to those who believe, whatever floats your boat. Put me in the agnostic column. And keep church and state separate.
Obama, like all candidates, is just pandering to various factions. It’s the American Way!
Left Behind Advocate1 @ 30:
LOL. You’ve done a nice job, LBA1, of parodying the idiotic Christian Right. You play the idiot role very well. Don’t lose that sense of humor.
28 ysbaddaden Says:
I meant are Gestapo handing out checks now.
Wasn’t that the name of Pinnochio’s dad?
If the fairness doctrine comes back we crack down on CBN first.
Blue Rose @ 34:
30
so, please, tell us what Christ taught us about this sort of thing….
your post tells of a so called preacher who is doing the very thing Christ warned us about- people who use His name to further their own interests.
ysbaddaden @ 38:
__________________________________________________________________________
Actually, the Founding Father’s Deism was a combination of Etiological, Cosmological, and Telelogical arguments. These were based on logic and the logical order of things as opposed to science per se. Argument From Design was not Queer Eye for Straight Guys getting into a slap fight, but the source of William Paley’s telelogical clockmaker arguement used ad nauseum.
Robertson’s cbn-the crappy butthole network is the danger we should be afraid of. they only spew hate not compassion. they should really read the bible they quote from. i believe it says, paraphrase, it is easier for a camel to go thru the eye of a needle, than a rich man to enter heaven. robertson is so weighted on his way to hell.
Well said, Obama. (And you, too, #26!)
Okay, this isn’t related, but you have to see how this little neo-con is supporting the war and talking about ’sacrifice’ like his fat little ass even knows the concept! It’s sickening. Let’s give this clown a C&L awakwning!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0b_W9H4_08o
pat robertson secretly wants to debrief Hillary.
I have a relative who watches CBN/TBN all the time. I hear the most incredible things coming from these “Christian” preachers. I’m sure my tax dollars are paying for some of this crap thanks to BushCo because hardly an hour of the day goes by without one and all praising the Preznit. Hardly a day goes by without hearing the story of how when Bush was asked about a philosopher he admired he named Jesus.
That’s as far as it goes. They never question the war, poverty, lack of health insurance, the demise of the middle class, autism rates, nothing but the one quoted story above proves, PROVES, that Bush is a great Christian. No one ever asks, “How come Mr. Preznit and Christian never attends church?”
I applaud Obama bringing even one moment of sanity to this audience. On CBN/TBN Democrats are always bad, GOPers are always good, and Bush is pretty close to being God’s other son.
Kevin Foster @ 24:
If you go through and read up, Obama didn’t have an interview on TV on Robertson’s network, but simply replied to a few questions sent via e-mail by Brody, the political corespondent for the CBN. I was a bit disturbed at first, but then I went and read “The brody file”, which is the new blog kept by Mr. Brody on the CBN website. Upon looking at all of the entries I was surprised, and quite happy to discover that Mr.Brody is a very different type of evangelical than Mr. Robertson.
Brody’s blogs don’t contain the right wing bias one would expect from the CBN, but instead they present facts and speculations in a manner that actually is “fair and balanced” and let readers respond to what they’ve read.
Take a look at it if you will - it’s one of those diamonds in the ruff in terms of fair political reporting (coming from a very very unlikely source.)