Pat Pat Pat: enough already, for Jahweh's sake, with this Wrath Of God shtick! It's sooooooo played, dude! 
Anytime something happens that you think gives you the slighest opening to score some points for your ultra-right agenda, you drag God into it: He Planned This to prove I was right, yet again. Or: He Will Punish You, because this is wrong.
Talk about giving religion a bad name. You're no instrument of God. You're just a self-righteous tool of your own fevered imagination.
Translation: Pat Robertson says Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's stroke is punishment from God for "dividing the Holy Land," by pulling Israeli settlers out of Gaza.
But there's got to be some give in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Gaza pull-out - opposed by some Israeli hardliners, and apparently Pat Robertson - while understandably controversial, was nonetheless utterly necessary to move the ball forward in the overtime grudge match that must end.
I'm sure I could find some scripture about give and take and meeting of the minds, but scripture quoters have no place in politics or policy. This is part of what makes the Islamo-fascists so repugnant, isn't it? Yes, they're actually killing innocents and trying to destroy Western civilization, as opposed to merely mouthing off like Rev. Pat. But beware the pronouncer of political views and positions - ANY views and positions at all - who says he's got a pipeline to the Big Guy. Or that his Holy Book told him what's the right public policy. Have your religious beliefs. Fine. But make your political and policy arguments without them. Not so hard, really, and you'll reach more people.
True, the "anti-Zionist" hatemongers such as Iran's new president and the Palestinian terrorists of Hamas, who want to see Israel expunged from the map, are admittedly even more vile than Robertson. But friends like him, neither the U.S. nor Israel needs.
As this WaPo article on Robertson's latest blunder notes, he's been on a roll lately.
Pat Robertson, an avowed Republican, is a pox on the Republican Party. In hell, where he's surely headed, I hope he's right next to Michael Moore. They deserve each other.
TECHNORATI TAGS: PAT ROBERTSON, GOD, ARIEL SHARON, GAZA, REPUBLICAN PARTY, MICHAEL MOORE, FLAMES OF HELL
Posted by Matt Rosenberg at January 6, 2006 07:50 PM
Contacted by the Associated Press for a comment, God reportedly said, "Do I know this Robertson guy?"
Posted by: Terry Parkhurst at January 6, 2006 10:49 PM"I'm sure I could find some scripture about give and take and meeting of the minds, but scripture quoters have no place in politics or policy."
Oh I don't know. For those of us of a religious persuasion, scripture informs our ethics, and all of us, whether religious or not, make decisions about politics and policy based in part on ethical considerations.
On the other hand, religious folks need to understand that saying, "Thus saith the LORD," isn't going to be a convincing argument for non-religious types. If they want to make a policy pitch to people who don't share their worldview, they're going to have to do it on other grounds.
But while we're on the subject of Robertson's comments, I wasn't aware that God considered "dividing the holy land" to be grounds for punishment since, you know, he did it himself after Solomon's death.
Posted by: Nathan Azinger at January 8, 2006 09:27 AM