“And I would also presume that Robertson has done good toward Chavez in warning him in some way that he, Chavez, will answer to Creator God at the judgment for his cruel schemes.”

Cruel schemes…like providing his country’s poor with health care, literacy programs, and subsidies for food and home construction? Chavez might not be 100% democratic, but he was elected and re-elected fairly, he tolerates a large organized opposition, and he continues to have the strong support of the majority of Venezuelans. Venezuela is a major oil exporting country, and yet 80% of the population live in severe poverty – whatever Chavez’ flaws, he is actually trying to do something about that. Bush’s hostility only strengthens Chavez and his government, angers Latin Americans who resent US attempts to tell them what to do and who to support, and drives Chavez to have closer ties to the real oppressive dictator Fidel Castro.

This is my first post here. As a long time lurker, I’ve often craved some Swanky goodness; the chuckles made many a day a little brighter. But this is the first time he’s frightened me. I often forget these crazy f*cks are dangerous. At least he had the decency to remind me. I need some comfort food.

Hey “mmm…” I liked your name. Are you a friend of Evan Dando, then?

Friend of Evan? In spirit, hopefully. Just a fan of the candy and the band.

I’m sorry, but it is the right of American might to pillage poor countries for their resources. This Venezuela obsession is freaking me out. Somehow Fidel friggin Castro has been around for 1.2 billion years and we haven’t needed to assassinate him yet for our security yet Chavez needs a bullet in his brain? Thanks, Freeper logic, how many more debacles can you put us in?

awesome Evan Dando related song that hearts Brad R.

the cherry clan could whup the lemonheads any day of the week.

I think Swank needs to check the article again. I believe Robertson was doing more than just warning Chavez. I believe he was calling for him to be assassinated.

And don’t fool yourself, Iceman. Even though I don’t believe we should assassinate Chavez, he’s definitely a bad dude (although I don’t know if he’s bad enough to save the president.)

And I would also presume that Robertson has done good toward Chavez in warning him in some way that he, Chavez, will answer to Creator God at the judgment for his cruel schemes.

“in some way ..” – I like to imagine that way as Pat standing in the middle of a desert highway, shaking his fist as Hugo flies away with the girl in the portable airplane he had stashed, screaming “This battle is yours, my old nemesis, but the war goes on … you’ll answer to Creator God at the JUDGEMENT for your cruel schemes!”

As for the Lemonheads – the sooner you people accept Beck as the new messiah, the better off we’ll all be.

“If that is reality, then I personally thank Robertson for warning the nation.”

And what if it is just Robertson’s chin music? What then, Pastor Swank?

Ted Kennedy and Nancy Pelosi say whatever they want to say. John McCain and Hillary Clinton give forth. Cindy Sheehan is media covered 24 / 7. So that makes it the equal playing field in America.

Well… yes, but you don’t hear them calling for the murder of foriegn heads of state, do you?

The CIA factbook entry on Venezuela kinda puts to shame Crazy Pat’s arguements about Chavez. The economy (after a crippling oil strike) has rebounded some, and GDP grew at a rate four times that of the US of A.
Plus, the country is 96% Catholic- which means an influx in the growth of radical Islamist groups isn’t likely.

And also= the Venesuelans are pissed, quite understandably I might add.

It looks like Pat may have screwed the pooch on this one (God willing).

Don’t forget Pastor Swank, when you presume, you make a PRES out of U and ME.

Cool! I’m going to be co-president with the good Pastor!

And I, like a dumbass, cannot spell country names to save my life. :sigh:

“Friend of Evan Dando”? Is that some new code phrase for “gay”?

On CNN.com they mention that Robertson said something about Venezuela seeking to undermine the US with Muslim Extremism. They had this line in there that was hilarious:

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.

Good on ya’, CNN!

Yoseferoo, left you a little seed comment at the editors in the “ain’t got nothing” thread.

You namby pamby lirulz make me sick!!

“Oh, it wouldn’t be right to wack Hugo. Hugo’s a man of the people, he helps the poor and the disadvantaged. President Chavez was democratically elected.”

Well, boo frickin’ hoo! He;s a threat to AMERICA. He has threatened AMERICA. He’s got oil, his skin color is darker than Gwenyth Paltrow’s, and from the pictures i’Ve seen it looks like hes’ got WMD in his pants!!!!!111 I say go in a take him out!!! After 2 or 3 days of carpet bombing well be sitting pretty on a fountain of black gold, texas tea.

Does Swank think that’s a flattering phot of himself? He looks like he’s about to lunge for the photographer’s throat.

He also looks like the sort of “pastor” of whom it is said he (ahem) “likes working with young men.”

Um, that’s “photo,” not “phot.”

Ha, ha, ha. Is anyone else struck by the resemblance in his new picture of his Swankitude to Charles Nelson Reilly?

Ha, ha, ha. Is anyone else struck by the resemblance in his new picture of his Swankitude to Charles Nelson Reilly?

Dude, every day I pray for a photo montage. But Swank is Brad’s bitch.

It looks like Pat may have screwed the pooch on this one (God willing).

Paging Senator Santorum, Paging Senator Santorum…

Good pastor gives impression that he could not tell Venezuela from Aruba, but he relies on the judgment of his good Christian collegue.

However, Swank feels qualified to address the ethics of assasination: how to reconsile it with the Christian love that has to be extended to to the enemies. Simplicity itself! It suffices to (a) pray that the victim will convert and recant his errant ways, (b) give him a warning, to improve his chances to convert and recant.

I think that heretics were indeed offered such chance by Inquisition tribunals. Burning at a stake was undertaken as the only way to save the recalcitrant soul, and was offered with most prayerful consideration.

Torquemada was a compassionate conservative of his day.

Robertson believes that Chavez is a “terrific danger” to America, according to the AP. If that is reality, then I personally thank Robertson for warning the nation.This says it all, doesn’t it? Chavez wasn’t on Swank’s radar until this moment, but now that Pat Robertson’s mentioned him, Chavez is clearly seen to be a threat to the order established by Creator God and his global armies holy. If Pat wants him assassinated, then Pat must have a darn good reason for saying so! After all, he’s a fellow Christian, and the old bogus “separation of church and state” harangue makes no American freedom sense. So let all pastors fall in line and warn of the threat posed by this man who won’t share his oil and thus is the new evil-dictator-of-the-week. Not tolerating the idea of killing Chavez now = betraying God’s plan for America.Grant, btw, starts out saying how all the usual liberal suspects–Hillary, Ted Kennedy, er, John McCain, and Cindy Sheehan–are “media covered 24/7,” so this is a freedom of speech issue. And so when he says that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez should be assassinated, so be it. It may sound extreme to some. Yet again many remarks from Kennedy, Pelosi, McCain, Clinton and Sheehan sound extreme. However, the news feeds give them wide spread. And so the freedoms continue. Same with Robertson.Yes, all the above-named are well known for calling for covert assassination ops, and where is the liberal media whenever they do? It’s simply not fair. Let Robertson have a turn.

Dude, every day I pray for a photo montage. But Swank is Brad’s bitch.

You mean like a sort of separated-at-birth spot, such as I recently did for Malkin and a certain Betazoid? (Yes, I’m a whore.)

I heard Chavez was smuggling sleeper cells of activist judges into the US. When need to assinate him before his judges have a chance to start inventing rights that don’t exist.

I would assume then that Robertson has already prayed for Chavez, particularly for the latter’s conversion to the Light of God.

As far as I know, Chavez is a practicing Catholic, i.e. he was converted to the Light of God when but a mere infant. Of course, Swank most likely doesn’t think that Catholics are actually Christians, especially that one in Rome who wears the funny hats and the dress.

Well, Basharov, as I said before, Pat Robertson seems to think that Chavez is a violent Muslim extremist. So you can see how the Swanksta would be confused.

After hearing that Pat Robertson had called for Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s assassination, my first thought was, “Who in their right mind is wingnutty enough to justify this?”
Happily, Pastor Swank stepped right up to the plate:

Brad-dude!-unless I’m reading that section wrong, you just called Swanky sane! Sadly, NO! ‘Course. neither is Pat. It’s funny-right now on CNN’s website, there’s a story about how the Bushies are having to denounce Pat’s wacky suggestion. If he hadn’t floated this idea, the administration probably could have bumped-off Chavez, but now if anything bad happens to him, they’ll be the prime suspects. Priceless-ol’ 700 Club has actually wound up protecting Hugo Chavez!

Maybe we could send exploding Coca Cola cans or something.

You know, the guy on the downtown streetcorner who wears the golf pants and no shirt has a sign that says, among other things, that Bill Gates is a space alien who wants to eat our brains. If that is reality, then I personally thank him for warning the nation (and should give him some change so he can buy some “good” beer, which is one of the other things the sign says).

Isn’t it a crime to threaten the president?

that sentiment is only for U.S. of Americans then?

Why does Pat Robertson hate (South) America?

Three little observations:

1. The oil fields in venzuela have already been nationalized. This happened sometime around 1973. And no, don’t worry mate. The oil companies are doing dandy with Chavez since the ineptitude of the revolutinary bureaucracy has reverted the oil business to pre-nationalization days, and oil companies now import even more crude than refined products than ever. Of course, now we are importing refined products, even gasoline, from neighboring countries, and even the US. Sweet deal!

2. Second. When you say that assassinating Chavez only would only benefit him, well, I thing Chavez may have a different opinion.

3. And finally, why has this become some religious controversy? It is an economic one! What Pat Robertson said was that it would be cheaper than waging war, which seem inevitable if he remains in power.

And finally, why has this become some religious controversy? It is an economic one! What Pat Robertson said was that it would be cheaper than waging war, which seem inevitable if he remains in power.

Listen Pinochet, you are going to wind up with your ass back in the dock if you keep going off story with that “vascular dementia” thing that you claimed back in 2002.

I mean, yeah, you sound demented, but you did it way too lucidly to keep you out of jail.

You have to remember that Marie Jon’ (who has been around the block a couple of times, and definitely knows where the fire hydrant is, and also knows that she has big brown eyes and is very aware of it, but syntax forbids stretching this bracket much further) converted from “cafeteria catholicism” to “seventh day adventism”. So maybe she knows something that Chavez doesn’t.

Pastor Swank should be very careful when helping out like this to leave a path for the probable backpedalling. There’s a decent chance that enough stink will be made by the Christian-hating PC Liberal Media that Robertson will be forced to “apologize” and “retract” or more likely “clarify” his remarks later this week, with some lame sheepish explanation that his words were “taken out of context”, and of course he was only speaking “metaphorically” of the Sniper’s Bullet of Baby Jesus swooping over and rescuing the poor soul of Mr. Chavez, fine man that he his.

Hate to see ol’ Paster Swank left out there twisting in the wind, holding that stinky defending-assassination bag without having his own mealy-mouthed non-retraction ready to whip out.

See, what’d I say?
“I didn’t say ‘assassination.’ I said our special forces should ‘take him out.’ And ‘take him out’ can be a number of things, including kidnapping; there are a number of ways to take out a dictator from power besides killing him. I was misinterpreted by the AP [Associated Press], but that happens all the time,” Robertson said on “The 700 Club” program.

Misinterpreted? Yeah, they thought he was speaking American English, when he was really speaking in Robertson English. In Robertson English, everything means what he means it to mean when he says it means what he says it means. See? It’s so obvious.

Oh, and then there’s that little detail about Chavez being the democratically-elected President of a sovereign nation. We really can’t legally go and ‘take him out’, unless Robertson was implying that we take him out for dinner, or to a ball game. But his clarification seems to indicate otherwise.

Nevermind, he was simply lying when he said he didn’t say it:

“[I]f he thinks we’re trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it.”

Unless, by ‘do it’, he meant ‘go and exercise at the gym in order to work out our frustrations – like in a Nike commercial’.

So I wonder if Swank’s head is going to explode now that Robertson says that he didn’t say what he said about assassinating Chavez.

Unless, by ‘do it’, he meant ‘go and exercise at the gym in order to work out our frustrations – like in a Nike commercial’.

Nah. He actually meant that we should all get laid, a sentiment with which I can heartily agree-mainly because the very thought gives the Virgin Ben cold sweats and uncontrollable shivers. And projectile vomiting. So I hope Pat clarifies this while he appears on a panel with VBen. And that VBen is standing directly behind Pat.

Six years ago, Robertson said the U.S. could send agents to kill Osama bin Laden, North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il and Saddam Hussein.

“Isn’t it better to do something like that … to take out Saddam Hussein, rather than to spend billions of dollars on a war that harms innocent civilians and destroys the infrastructure of a country?”

Evangelical analysts question how much influence Robertson retains.

A 2004 poll for PBS’s “Religion & Ethics Newsweekly” and U.S. News & World Report found that only half of white evangelicals viewed Robertson favorably, compared with 75 percent for Focus on the Family leader James Dobson.

Of course, Robertson’s adopted standard wingnut protocol when they utter something so stupid that even the MSM starts calling them out on it-he’s lying and denying ever having said it at all. It seems the concept of audio/video tape is lost on these morons. Of course, a significant portion of their followers watch nothing but the christian stations and Fox news, so if Fox doesn’t push the story, the denial strategy can work. Robertson now claims that he said we should “take out” Chavez, and that “take out” doesn’t necessarily mean assassinate-it could refer to something innocuous like kidnapping (!). But, for the sake of accuracy, let’s go to the videotape:

“If he [Hugo Ch?vez] thinks we’re trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it. It’s a whole lot cheaper than starting a war. And I don’t think any oil shipments will stop.”
— Pat Robertson

Busted!