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FEMA DIRECTING DONATIONS TO PAT ROBERTSON |
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by PrisonPlanet.com
September 2 2005 FEMA is directing Katrina donations to none other than the Rev. Pat Robertson. Millions of Americans and people around the world have rushed to donate money to the victims of Hurricane Katrina, which is shaping up to be one of the worst U.S. disasters in history, if not the worst. FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, is the lead federal agency in the rescue & recovery operation at work in New Orleans and the Mississippi gulf coast. FEMA has released to the media and on its Web site a list of suggested charities to help the storm’s hundreds of thousands of victims. The Red Cross is first on the list. The Rev. Pat Robertson’s “Operation Blessing” is next on the list. “It’s an outrage,” said privacy watchdog Bill Scannell, who alerted Sploid to the FEMA / Robertson scam. “Operation f**cking Blessing? And it’s right underneath the Red Cross link!” FEMA also supports sending money to B'nai B'rith International. CNN.com wrote:
Robertson: U.S. should assassinate Venezuela's Chavez Tuesday, August 23, 2005; Posted: 5:27 p.m. EDT (21:27 GMT) (CNN) -- Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson has called for the United States to assassinate Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, calling him "a terrific danger" bent on exporting Communism and Islamic extremism across the Americas. "If he thinks we're trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it," Robertson told viewers on his "The 700 Club" show Monday. "It's a whole lot cheaper than starting a war." Watch video of Robertson's comments Venezuelan Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel accused Robertson of making terrorist statements and demanded that the United States take action, according to The Associated Press. "The ball is in the U.S. court after this criminal statement by a citizen of that country," AP quoted Rangel as saying. "It's huge hypocrisy to maintain this discourse against terrorism and at the same time, in the heart of that country, there are entirely terrorist statements like those." Another Chavez supporter in the Venezuelan parliament, Desire Santos Amaral said "This man cannot be a true Christian. He's a fascist." (Full story) State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said that Robertson is a private citizen and that his views do not reflect U.S. policy. "We do not share his view and his comments are inappropriate," he said. "And as we've said before, any allegations that we are planning to take hostile action against the Venezuelan government are completely baseless and without fact." Robertson, a contender for the Republican presidential nomination in 1988, called Chavez "a dangerous enemy to our south, controlling a huge pool of oil, that could hurt us badly." "We have the ability to take him out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability," Robertson said. "We don't need another $200 billion war to get rid of one strong-arm dictator. It's a whole lot easier to have some of the covert operatives do the job and then get it over with." Robertson accused Chavez, a left-wing populist with close ties to Cuban President Fidel Castro, of trying to make Venezuela "a launching pad for Communist infiltration and Muslim extremism all over the continent." "This is in our sphere of influence, so we can't let this happen," he said. While Chavez has sought closer links with Cuba -- and was in Cuba when Robertson made his statement Monday -- Chavez was elected democratically. Robertson did not explain how Venezuela was to be used by Muslim extremists. The U.S. State Department Web site says 98 percent of the population are Roman Catholic or protestant. Chavez has said he believes the United States is trying to assassinate him, vowing that Venezuela, which accounts for more than 10 percent of U.S. oil imports, would shut off the flow of oil if that happens. The United States has denied such allegations in the past. Executive orders issued by presidents Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan banned political assassinations. Robertson's controversial history Robertson's comments Monday were the latest in a string of controversial remarks in recent years by the religious broadcaster and founder of the Christian Coalition. Last October, during the heat of the presidential race, Robertson told CNN that during a meeting with President Bush before the invasion of Iraq, the president told him he did not believe there would be casualties. The White House strongly denied the claim. In May, during an ABC interview, Robertson ignited a firestorm with his response to a question about whether activist judges were more of a threat to America than terrorists. "If they look over the course of 100 years, I think the gradual erosion of the consensus that's held our country together is probably more serious than a few bearded terrorists who fly into buildings," he said. Defending his remarks in a letter to Sen. Frank Lautenberg, Robertson insisted he was not being cavalier about the 9/11 attacks. But he also refused to apologize, saying Supreme Court rulings on abortion, religious expression in the public square, pornography and same-sex marriage "are all of themselves graver dangers in the decades to come than the terrorists which our great nation has defeated in Afghanistan and Iraq." In October 2003, Robertson, criticizing the State Department during an interview on "The 700 Club," said "maybe we need a very small nuke thrown off on Foggy Bottom to shake things up," referring to the nickname for the department's headquarters in Washington. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher called the remark "despicable." In July 2003, Robertson asked his audience to pray for three justices to retire from the Supreme Court so they could be replaced with more conservative jurists. "One justice is 83 years old, another has cancer and another has a heart condition," he said. Robertson insisted he was only calling for prayers for the justices to retire and was not asking his followers to pray for their demise. In November 2002, Robertson charged that the Muslim holy book, the Quran, incites followers to kill people of other faiths and disputed Bush's characterization of Islam as a religion of peace. "It's clear from the teachings of the Quran and also from the history of Islam that it's anything but peaceful," Robertson said in a subsequent interview with CNN. "Of course there are peace-loving Muslims. But at the same time, at the core of this religion ... is jihad, and it is to subject the unbelievers either to forced conversion or death. That's what it teaches." Copyright 2005 CNN. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Associated Press contributed to this report. |
