The Christian with Four Aces

April 2, 2008 6:55 AM

The Christian with Four Aces. Bill Sizemore writes about the infamous televangelist Pat Robertson.
posted by chunking express (52 comments total)

I could have worked for Robertson (indirectly) once, back when CBN Asia was hiring a web/video guy in the Philippines around 2000. Sent in my resume and everything. Yeah, he was a ubiquitous 'touch-the-screen-to-pray-with-me' televangelist and I would be helping to prop up a culture of heterodoxical pop-Christian pseudofaith, but the pay was good. For the Philippines, anyway. Fortunately I never followed through with that application because I instead opted to join a newfangled local internet startup.

A month before the dotcom crash.
posted by brownpau at 7:05 AM on April 2, 2008

Something like 20% of my posts in the past year have consisted of me saying "hey, thanks so much for posting a link to Virginia Quarterly Review since I can't very well go pimping my own site on MeFi." So...uh...that.

Don't mind me, I'm just MeFi dead weight.
posted by waldo at 7:16 AM on April 2, 2008 [3 favorites]

“Her hair stood straight up on her head, she screamed ‘JESUS!’ and was delivered,” Robertson wrote.

Fancy that, the exact same thing happens to me whenever I get an electric shock.
posted by PenDevil at 7:25 AM on April 2, 2008 [2 favorites]

Good article. Learned a lot of dirt about Robertson and the Bush admin that I never knew before. Now I understand why the admins lawyers have been so contentious. None of it surprises me.

waldo, VQR looks like a generous magazine, if I didn't already have too many to read I'd probably subscribe. Might still one day.
posted by stbalbach at 7:37 AM on April 2, 2008

To quote Bill Bryson: "JESUS is the answer! The question is, what do you say when you hit your thumb with a hammer?"
posted by jontyjago at 7:40 AM on April 2, 2008

VQR looks like a generous magazine

Well, we're a university publication—we can give lots of stuff away online. Which works well for me, since I like to give everything away. :) I wish I could say hey, here's a special MeFite subscription rate, but our online subscription system, she is bad. Some day.
posted by waldo at 7:48 AM on April 2, 2008 [1 favorite]

From this we learn: God loves money, hates Modigliani, and is totally into political assasinations.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 8:00 AM on April 2, 2008

Yeah, I want to know what happened to that Modigliani he threw out. Blasphemy!
posted by teg at 8:04 AM on April 2, 2008

I coulda sworn Pat Robertson died last year .... I guess that was Falwell. Thanks for the correction.
posted by mrgrimm at 8:04 AM on April 2, 2008

"You guys are as crooked as a snake," he sputtered. "I'll have you all in depositions for the rest of your life."

As someone who supposedly is a messenger of the word of god, it's good to see that he has the whole 'turn the other cheek' thing perfected.
posted by quin at 8:06 AM on April 2, 2008 [1 favorite]

In the meantime, however, Robertson told viewers he had acquired some cargo planes and implied that they were being used to ferry doctors and medicine into Zaire’s teeming refugee camps.... What Robertson didn’t tell viewers was what I learned from two pilots who flew the planes: The airstrip was actually built so the planes could bring in equipment to dredge diamonds from a remote jungle riverbed for the African Development Company, a for-profit owned by Robertson and registered in Bermuda, where there is no corporate income tax and business regulations are lax. The three planes, two of which were registered to Operation Blessing, were used almost exclusively for a mine deep in the jungle, the pilots told me. Only one or two of more than forty flights were charitable. Chief pilot Robert Hinkle, a former Peace Corps volunteer, said he became so embarrassed by what he considered the duplicity of the operation that he had Operation Blessing’s name removed from the planes’ tail fins. His account was backed up by notes he kept during most of the flights. On one day that Robertson was a passenger, the notes read, “Prayed for diamonds.”

Pat, for your sake, I hope you're going where you think you're going when you die.
posted by middleclasstool at 8:15 AM on April 2, 2008 [1 favorite]

A completely fascinating article. I was especially thrilled to learn that Regents is a 4th-tier school and that 60% of their grads don't pass the bar— why, exactly, do so many of them work for the Bush administration, if not for their Robertson-tinged beliefs?
posted by shakespeherian at 8:17 AM on April 2, 2008 [1 favorite]

The scary part for me is the infiltration of all levels of government by Robertson's Regent graduates (among others). How long will it take (if ever) to weed all these nutcases out?

I remember when Robertson was running for president, claiming to be a Korean combat vet and McCloskey (who once ran for president against Richard Nixon) said, no, I was in the same unit as you and you bragged to us how your father got you out--the last we ever saw of you while we went in and one out of three of us died in battle. Robertson sued for liable, so McCloskey found a bunch of the other men in the unit to verify his statements. This was right before a number of primaries in the South where apparently they look down on this sort of thing.
posted by eye of newt at 8:20 AM on April 2, 2008

I was a one-year-old living in Virginia Beach when Pat Robertson came to town. I grew up within eyesight of CBN. And after 25 years in DC, I now live again within shouting distance of his operation.

I've met the man, I've watched his operation grow, and I've followed his machinations probably more closely than most- simply because he was a long-standing "neighbor" of mine.

I can say this without hesitation: Pat Robertson is certifiably, and unarguably, bat-shit insane.
posted by Benny Andajetz at 8:21 AM on April 2, 2008

Pat Robertson is certifiably, and unarguably, bat-shit insane.

I thought that was sort of the take-away from the article. As Straub says, 'Every fiber of his existence believes totally in his message.'
posted by shakespeherian at 8:25 AM on April 2, 2008

What's not clear to me is whether it's better or worse if he truly believes what he's saying. I've often wondered the same thing about President Bush. I think it would be easier to accept the notion that they know they're full of it, but I fear that's not the case.
posted by waldo at 8:35 AM on April 2, 2008

waldo: I've wondered exactly the same thing.
posted by shakespeherian at 8:41 AM on April 2, 2008

I look at this article and think "this is what journalism is". This type of writing (rich, contextual, well researched, thoughtful, inquisitive and probing) is soooooooooooo rare. I wish I could print out the article and force Katie Couric to eat it. Her journalism IQ would jump 50 points...until she digested it.
posted by zerobyproxy at 8:47 AM on April 2, 2008

The scary part for me is the infiltration of all levels of government by Robertson's Regent graduates (among others).

U.S. Attorneys' Firing Scandal Puts Spotlight on Christian Law School

"Regent University School of Law, founded by televangelist Pat Robertson to provide 'Christian leadership to change the world,' has worked hard in its two-decade history to upgrade its reputation, fighting past years when a majority of its graduates couldn't pass the bar exam and leading up to recent victories over Ivy League teams in national law student competitions.

But even in its darker days, Regent has had no better friend than the Bush administration. Graduates of the law school have been among the most influential of the more than 150 Regent University alumni hired to federal government positions since President Bush took office in 2001, according to a university website."

The New Establishment

"To the Bush haters of America, the young Monica Goodling is a footnote of this wretched era, one of the many Washington types that they'll be happy to get rid of come January 2009: Venal Vice President, Ex-Lobbyists Turned Regulators and, in Goodling's case, Young Evangelicals in High Places.

...Goodling is part of a new generation of evangelicals ushered in by Falwell, who insisted that Christians get involved in politics. They are graduates of the exploding number of evangelical colleges, which no longer aim to create a parallel subculture but instead to train 'Christian leaders to change the world,' as the Regent mission statement reads.

It used to be that being 33 and in charge of 93 U.S. attorneys would mean you'd been top of your class at Harvard or Yale or clerked at the Supreme Court. Now, Christian schools are joining that mix. Regent has had 150 of its graduates working in the White House; the school estimates that one-sixth of its alumni are in government work. Call them the Goodlings: scrubbed young ideologues, ready to serve their nation, the right's version of the Peace Corps generation."

posted by ericb at 8:54 AM on April 2, 2008

Can a program be developed for the Obama administration that will search all resumes of government employees to find those that contain the words "Regent" or "Liberty" and automatically send termination letters to those employees? Cause that would save a lot of time.
posted by ND¢ at 8:59 AM on April 2, 2008 [3 favorites]

If the Hell that Robertson preaches about exists, he has surely earned himself a place in it.
posted by Pope Guilty at 9:11 AM on April 2, 2008 [1 favorite]

quin: As someone who supposedly is a messenger of the word of god, it's good to see that he has the whole 'turn the other cheek' thing perfected.

not to defend Robertson, but, uh, NOBODY has that perfected. that's the whole freaking POINT. duh.
posted by quonsar at 9:12 AM on April 2, 2008

not to defend Robertson, but, uh, NOBODY has that perfected. that's the whole freaking POINT. duh.

There's a difference between "not perfected" and "not attempted".
posted by Pope Guilty at 9:23 AM on April 2, 2008 [4 favorites]

correct but irrelevant. quin didn't say 'not attempted'.
posted by quonsar at 9:24 AM on April 2, 2008

I look at this article and think "this is what journalism is"

I look at this article and think "wow, that's really long". Which is not to say it's not good journalism; the parts I read were amazing. How much audience is there for it though?
posted by Nelson at 9:26 AM on April 2, 2008

I look at this article and think "wow, that's really long". Which is not to say it's not good journalism; the parts I read were amazing. How much audience is there for it though?

We're a literary magazine. We exist to publish really long articles covering otherwise-ignored topics in great detail, something that's been abandoned by most media outlets. If you want to know about Chiquita running drugs and guns for terrorists, Blairo Maggi's destruction of the Amazon rainforest for the sake of growing soy, how Ramadi improved so fast, the epidemic of AIDS in Jamaica or Ezra Pound's disastrous attempt to serve as a foreign correspondent for a Richmond newspaper, we're the publication for you.

On the other hand, if you want something delivered in 800 words or less, might I suggest Reader's Digest? Or, if you're looking for something closer to 20, Fark. ;)
posted by waldo at 9:37 AM on April 2, 2008 [16 favorites]

correct but irrelevant. quin didn't say 'not attempted'.

It would have been accurate, however, which is what my point was.

At any rate, Robertson's not in the position to turn cheeks; it's the one against whom the wrong is committed who turns the other cheek, and Robertson has consistently place himself on the other side of that equation.
posted by Pope Guilty at 9:38 AM on April 2, 2008 [1 favorite]

Hah! waldo! I loved the poetry rejection statistics you posted a while ago.
posted by taliaferro at 9:40 AM on April 2, 2008

The Daily Show was where I first heard about Regent University.
posted by WalterMitty at 9:41 AM on April 2, 2008 [2 favorites]

"wow, that's really long" .. How much audience is there for it though?

I've found a good way to read essays is in "best of" collections. That way, like a book, you know it will take 8 to 10 hours to read and you prepare for it, set aside the time for it. The Best American Essays yearly anthology is excellent.
posted by stbalbach at 9:43 AM on April 2, 2008

It's rather interesting from a psychological perspective and scary from a human perspective to see the machinations of Robertson's (and Bakker's) decision making process. Everything linked with ambition, career, money, etc is all "God told me to".
posted by Burhanistan at 9:53 AM on April 2, 2008

Thank you, waldo.

Robertson is so much less of a hypocrite than I could ever have imagined, and so nightmarishly much more of a direct embodiment of an essential American spirit.

I wish I knew how to feel about that.
posted by jamjam at 10:17 AM on April 2, 2008

quonsar : quin didn't say 'not attempted'.

True enough, and you are certainly correct, I should have phrased that better. My point was that Robertson has always seemed to be one of those people who has made himself rich by speaking for god, and yet, when given opportunity to follow those very same teachings, he fails to do so and gets petulant and litigious. Two things Jesus was not particularly well known for.
posted by quin at 10:23 AM on April 2, 2008

Hey, waldo is here! I had no idea. I got a heads-up about this article in my email, but I wanted to wait until the issue came out to read it, so I could play a game called TRUE READER: Nearsighted Paper-Sniffing Person from the Past.
posted by Powerful Religious Baby at 10:24 AM on April 2, 2008

“You can be just as holy when you are financially comfortable as you can be when you are poor,” Robertson has written. “Poverty is a curse, not a blessing.”

Man, it's been a while, but I could have sworn I've read something about this. It had to do with camels, and the eyes of needles - I'm a little hazy on the story. Apparently Robertson is too...
posted by FatherDagon at 10:44 AM on April 2, 2008 [4 favorites]

It used to be that being 33 and in charge of 93 U.S. attorneys would mean you'd been top of your class at Harvard or Yale or clerked at the Supreme Court. Now, Christian schools are joining that mix.

IOW : It used to be elite meant, at the very least, somewhat vetted and somewhat competent. But we have dispensed with that last hurdle and can now throughly destroy every last vestige of a functioning government once and for all.
posted by tkchrist at 11:54 AM on April 2, 2008

The title of this post had me wondering just how much I could stand to read of this guy chatting up Robertson.
posted by pernoctalian at 12:00 PM on April 2, 2008

Robertson's Fisher-Price play church has been spreading this so-called "Health and Wealth" Gospel for years now. (My apologies for linking to quite possibly the world's worst Wikipedia article.) Pure, materialistic nonsense.

RevLegPressaTon at 18:36 on April 1, said: "Poverty is a curse, not a blessing."

Thanks for your comment. Welcome to last2000yearsofchristiantheology.blogspot.com, Mr. Robertson. Per our 'blog policy, RTFA, please. And here's what was going on in the thread before you got here.
posted by resurrexit at 12:26 PM on April 2, 2008

Seriously good article. I never connected the rise of the Christian Right with the fall of Carter/Rise of Reagan (who now is revered by some people?), probably because I wasn't a year old when old Ronnie was sworn in.

Let's see:

Delusions/hallucinations (auditory or visual)

Paranoia

Loss of coherence in speech (speaking in tongues)

It's not quite DSM, and I didn't study much clinical psych, but that sounds a bit like schizophrenia. Which, if I recall correctly, has often been historically attributed to prophetic and religious figures ex post facto.

"As someone who supposedly is a messenger of the word of god, it's good to see that he has the whole 'turn the other cheek' thing perfected."

From experience (within my own family, even), a Christian is allowed to say or do anything they like so long as they punctuate it by announcing they will pray for you. And no, they don't have to sound sincere when they say it.

I want ex post facto on my business cards.

posted by Eideteker at 12:45 PM on April 2, 2008

I've said so on MeFi before, but I like to think that taxing religious institutions would do a world of good (or at least a nation).

I'd love to discuss this topic (or rather hear from other, more informed people) but don't want to derail the thread.
posted by Eideteker at 12:49 PM on April 2, 2008

Let's see:

# Delusions/hallucinations (auditory or visual)
# Paranoia
# Loss of coherence in speech (speaking in tongues)

I think you might be taking the hallucinations and tongues thing too much at face value. When they say "God told me to buy this FM transmitter", I interpret that as: he had a thought pop in his head to do something...happens all the time to us all. But when one has convinced himself that he is holy, then of course it's easy to start to couch everything in terms of "God told me". The speaking in tongues thing is just falling victim to suggestion from others, and a bit of wishful phoniness.

So, I wouldn't say schizo, just willful and near complete delusional.
posted by Burhanistan at 12:55 PM on April 2, 2008

That is one of the things that is so dangerous about religion. You can always just say "God told me to." And if you convince yourself enough then part of you can believe that God really is telling you to. You can do whatever you want. You are constrained my no bounds of ethics or common sense, because you can always just say to yourself "God told me to." Whereas you or I, when confronted with a desire or a choice, have to look at how it would affect others, whether it would be in our own best interest, whether it would be in the best interest of those we care about, and whether it would be "right" or "moral", Pat Robertson and George Bush don't. They just do it. They want to use a charity to mine for diamonds? Fine. God told them to. They want to invade another country that hasn't done shit to us? Fine. God told them to. It is like the person with no savings and tens of thousands in credit card debt going out and buying a $500 pair of shoes or piece of electronics. They can't justify it rationally. They just wanted it. This is not how adults act. This is how children act. I want something, therefore I will take it. I want to do something, therefore I will do it. The clarity and simpleness of such a way of life must be incredible. I can see why it is an attractive option.

It works in arguments too. They can just say "God told me" or "It is in the bible" and that's it. Argument over. How do you argue with that? You can't.

"I believe x"
"Oh really? Cause x is wrong based on [insert fact-based reasons here]."
"Yeah but x is in the bible."
"Oh so despite all those reasons, you still believe x because God told you to?"
"Yes."
"Well if I told you that Thor told me x was bad would that change your mind?"
"No."
"But you expect me to put credence in the fact that you believe x because God told you to?"
"Yes."
"Could you please get the fuck out of here? The adults are talking."

Real life is confusing and requires effort and thought and self-reflection and all that is hard. It is much easier to just shut down and say "God told me to." I think that is the allure of this type of religious thought.

I am not saying that all religion is bad or that it has no place in society, just no place in government, education or rational decision-making. You want to go sing songs and listen to an old guy talk for an hour on Sunday then be my guest. Do whatever you want. Believe whatever you want. Just don't expect to be able to say "God told me to" as a justification for any action or position that you care to take. Also the old dude and his organization has to pay taxes. Sorry.
posted by ND¢ at 1:28 PM on April 2, 2008 [6 favorites]

Also the old dude and his organization has to pay taxes. Sorry.

No apologies needed for his case. Ideally, he should pay back taxes for the last 30 years. It's only fair that he should help pay for the wars that he has served as cheerleader for.
posted by Burhanistan at 1:46 PM on April 2, 2008

I'm am wholeheartedly on the "tax the mega-church corporations" bandwagon, but FWIW, Pat Robertson takes no salary.

His son, on the other hand, makes about 300 grand a year.
posted by Benny Andajetz at 1:58 PM on April 2, 2008

He may not draw a salary specifically from CBN, but "Robertson's extensive business interests have earned him a net worth estimated between $200 million and $1 billion."
posted by ND¢ at 2:09 PM on April 2, 2008

ND¢: Speaking as an Episcopalian (or whatever I am), I've have many a rant with religious friends about idiots who 'pull the God card.' My conservative evangelical father hates it too.
posted by shakespeherian at 2:12 PM on April 2, 2008

When I was a young 'un, The 700 Club came on right after Sesame Street (or some similar children's program). When that happened, I would run shrieking from the room in search of my babysitter, shrieking, "Help! Turn it off!"

Instinct?
posted by the littlest brussels sprout at 2:31 PM on April 2, 2008 [1 favorite]

“We even discussed how Jesus’ radiance might be too bright for the cameras and how we would have to make adjustments for that problem. Can you imagine telling Jesus, ‘Hey, Lord, please tone down your luminosity; we’re having a problem with contrast. You’re causing the picture to flare.’”

I tried (and failed) to imagine attending a work-related meeting where this sort of thing is earnestly discussed. The mind boggles.
posted by The Card Cheat at 4:41 PM on April 2, 2008

When I was a young 'un, The 700 Club came on right after Sesame Street (or some similar children's program). When that happened, I would run shrieking from the room in search of my babysitter, shrieking, "Help! Turn it off!"

Instinct?

Kids know the darnedest things.
posted by WalterMitty at 5:46 PM on April 2, 2008

In related news regarding Regent University School of Law graduate Monica Goodling (of U.S. Attorney firing infamy):

DOJ investigates whether Goodling forced out gay attorney.

"NPR reports that the Justice Department Inspector General is investigating whether Monica Goodling, a key administration figure in the U.S. Attorney scandal, dismissed a career DOJ attorney 'because of rumors that she is a lesbian':

"Justice Department e-mails obtained by NPR show that Gonzales’s senior counsel Monica Goodling had a particular interest in Hagen’s duties. A few months before Hagen was let go, according to one e-mail, Goodling removed part of Hagen’s job portfolio — the part dealing with child exploitation and abuse."

DOJ officials 'said they came away with the impression that the Attorney General’s office decided not to renew Leslie Hagen’s contract because of the talk about her sexual orientation,' despite her receiving strong performance reviews."

posted by ericb at 8:20 PM on April 2, 2008

Pope Guilty: It would have been accurate, however, which is what my point was.

I would point out that there is no way for you to determine its accuracy. You cannot know whether Robertson has never attempted cheek turning, or has made the attempt but failed. You have not been present to his life, much of which was lived before your birth, and you have not been present to his thought processes. Your assertion is baseless and unprovable. Fact and opinion are not equivalent. My opinion is Robertson is a jerk, by the way. But I'm in no position to pretend I know, or can judge, the facts of his spiritual condition. Nor are you.
posted by quonsar at 8:06 AM on April 3, 2008

We just need to put Pat and Hugo Chavez on an island. Get rid of both idiots.
posted by TheSpot at 7:07 PM on April 3, 2008