Eve John McCain thought Texas megachurch pastor John Hagee was a lunatic. But that’s not stopping Newt Gingrich from cozying up the man who blamed The Gays for Hurricane Katrina: The 2012 presidential hopeful will be Hagee’s guest at his Cornerstone Church in San Antonio in a couple weeks.
McCain accepted Hagee’s endorsement during his 2008 presidential run only to renounce it once everybody pointed out the man is a crackpot; “crazy and unacceptable” is how McCain went on to describe him. Even Catholic League President Bill Donohue dubbed the man an “inveterate bigot”; they’ve since made up, and Donohue says the pair are “are on friendly terms today.”
But none of that has made Hagee off-limits for Newt! Mother Jones relays:
“Every so often [Hagee] pops up like a Whac-A-Mole and then goes away again,” says Chris Korzen, executive director of Catholics United, who was part of the anti-Hagee choir three years ago. “Why does someone like Newt Gingrich feel like he has to have a public association with this person? Clearly it’s about politics.”
[…] The pastor’s history of incendiary comments meshes with his unique brand of Christian Zionism. He’s warned, for instance, that the anti-Christ would be, gay, part Jewish, and president of the European Union. In his book, Jerusalem Countdown, he writes, “[M]ost readers will be shocked by the clear record of history linking Adolf Hitler and the Roman Catholic Church in a conspiracy to exterminate the Jews.” (He has since apologized, acknowledging that there were “thousands of righteous Catholics…who risked their lives to save Jews from the Holocaust.”)
Hagee and his supporters—like Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Abraham Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League—contend that his most inflammatory remarks have been taken out of context. He’s stated that his remarks on Katrina weren’t meant to imply cause and effect. (He said the hurricane was “the judgment of God against the city of New Orleans,” which “had a level of sin that was offensive to God.” He then pointed out that “there was to be a homosexual parade there on the Monday that the Katrina came.”) Hagee has also emphasized that his hawkish foreign policy and end-times theology are mutually exclusive, because “humans are utterly powerless to change God’s timetable.”
So why is Newt buddying up? Because becoming BFFs with Hagee shows the religious right that, despite his own extramarital sins, he has the bigoted bona fides to deserve their vote. And what happens when you pair up two infamous persons with questionable ethics? Their powers combine, and become an unavoidable force of ill will. [Mother Jones]
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Joe
I used to live in San Antonio where Hagee reigns supreme. This repulsive, fat, toad of a man has always spewed garbage. Now his up-and-coming equally disturbing son is being groomed to take over when Dad retires. The son, I think, has a bit of swish in him. You’ve heard it here first; I won’t be surprised if Hagee Jr is caught in a public park in San Antonio offering a blow job to an undercover police officer.
robert in NYC
I’m waiting for this moron to declare the Japanese earthquake and aftermath are the fault of gays. Truly amazing and not coincidental that the bulk of these lunatics are GOP supporters.
Paul Harris
While I hate to “feed the fundies” I have no problem calmly going up to the likes of Hagee and Gingrich and saying, “Gee I thought your body was supposed to be the Temple of God. Who are you to call anyone a sinner?”
What gets me is that so many tax-exempt religious organizations are able to funnel money to anti-gay causes.
Paul Harris
Author, “Diary From the Dome, Reflections on Fear and Privilege During Katrina”
robert in NYC
Paul, the ironic thing is, its perfectly legal for them to funnel money to anti-gay causes, witness Prop. 8 in California where the Mormom sect donated more than $22 million, among others. Here in NYS, the RC diocese of NYC donated over $500,000 to stop marriage equality in our state. The law I believe only prohibits religious leaders endorsing specific candidates but they get around it by alluding to what the candidates stand for but not by name. To me its religion directly meddling in the political process and they get away with it at every election. The problem is, no politician worth his or her salt is going to address it let alone take them on. It amazes me that there isn’t a national movement to go after them. If I had my way, I’d revoke their tax-exempt status and force these parasites to pay their fair share of taxes. Its even more ironic that their exemption is passed along in tax dollars on the those who don’t support them let alone believe, gay tax dollars notwithstanding. If we had such a movement, I believe they’d think twice before opposing civil marriage equality. Hit them in their coffers where it really hurts.
robert in NYC
Paul, the ironic thing is, its perfectly legal for them to funnel money to anti-gay causes, witness Prop. 8 in California where the Mormom sect donated more than $22 million, among others. Here in NYS, the RC diocese of NYC donated over $500,000 to stop marriage equality in our state. The law I believe only prohibits religious leaders endorsing specific candidates but they get around it by alluding to what the candidates stand for but not by name. To me its religion directly meddling in the political process and they get away with it at every election. The problem is, no politician worth his or her salt is going to address it let alone take them on. It amazes me that there isn’t a national movement to go after them. If I had my way, I’d revoke their tax-exempt status and force these parasites to pay their fair share of taxes. Its even more ironic that their exemption is passed along in tax dollars on those who don’t support them let alone believe, gay tax dollars notwithstanding. If we had such a movement, I believe they’d think twice before opposing civil marriage equality. Hit them in their coffers where it really hurts.
robert in NYC
Paul, the $500,000 donated by the NYC RC archdiocese went to Maine and helped succeed in overturning marriage equality there. I’m not sure what it donated to antigay causes in NYS though.