An Unholy Alliance: Rudy Giuliani and Pat Robertson

Rudy Giuliani, the self-described pro-choice, pro-gay rights presidential candidate, aggressively sought and won the endorsement of Pat Robertson, a televangelist with a decades-long record of extremism and offensive attacks on women, feminists, gay people, liberals, and non-Christians.

But what appears to be a political odd couple may in fact be the perfect marriage of expedience and hypocrisy in pursuit of political power and influence.

Giuliani, seeking to shore up his support among conservative evangelical voters, seems to be simply counting votes without counting the cost of granting credibility to a figure who doesn't deserve it. He's been headed down this road for a while. In pursuit of social conservative voters, Giuliani has already backpedaled from previously held pro-equality positions. And he has dramatically weakened his "pro-choice" position by pledging to give us more Supreme Court justices in the mold of Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, and Alito -- justices who would almost certainly move to make reproductive rights (and maybe gay rights) a thing of the past.

The pledge to turn our highest Court over to the far right hasn't been enough to win other Religious Right figures like James Dobson and Tony Perkins, who said at their recent "Values Voter Summit" that they could not and would not vote for Giuliani. But polls show that Giuliani does have significant support among white evangelicals -- and with Robertson's help he might build his support among voters who see the Court's new far-right justices as the best legacy of the Bush presidency.

Anyone who has watched Robertson's drive for political power and influence cannot be all that surprised by the endorsement. He seems to have made a calculation that Giuliani is the most likely candidate in a weak GOP field to beat Hillary Clinton or any other Democratic nominee in a year where early signs show strength for Democrats in the presidential race. And he wants to preserve his own influence by backing a winner.

After years of telling the world that God would bring his wrath down on our nation for providing reproductive choice to women and granting rights and freedoms to gay and lesbian Americans, after years of demanding that his followers go to the ballot box and base their votes on those issues, Robertson may have some explaining to do with his devoted followers.

At a press conference announcing his endorsement, Robertson mentioned the courts as uppermost in the minds of social conservatives, but he himself cited the need to protect Americans from the "bloodlust of Islamic terrorists" and the need to tackle government waste and deficits as the most important issues facing the country.

But it hasn't been government waste that has filled Robertson's coffers and fueled his backers over the years. It's been Robertson's divisive and destructive mixing of religion in politics, claiming to speak on behalf of God and threatening divine retribution on those who disagree with his political agenda, particularly on the issues of abortion and gay rights.

In the current political climate it may be too much to hope for an election year focused on the nation's ideals, and what we need to do to build the kind of country that reflects them. Unfortunately, it seems likely that today's alliance between Giuliani and Robertson foreshadows more campaigning that shamelessly exploits our fears and prejudices rather than building on our hopes and dreams.

Comments

[ms.understood]

And what's with all this cross-dressing? He has done this more often than any other political candidate of any party, but yet, the homophobic and anit-woman jack*ss Pat Robertson is endorsing him. The two of them is just too sick on so many levels!

[seawolf77]

The devil still has his demons. These 2 creeps are straight out of Angel Heart. Let them both rot in hell and if America elects him, let her go to hell as well.

[The Collinbrandt]

So, this means Rudy wants to "blow up the world in order to bring Jesus back". Why are Democrats so stupid that they don't run on the "don't" "blow up the world and bring Jesus back" philosophy which is the philosophy of 40% of the Republican Party. All Democrats have to do to win every election is declare that they will not "blow up the world to bring back Jesus" which is, the underlying theme of the Republican party.

[DasBoot]

Robertson's move proves that the whole "values" spiel has been a front all along. These guys are authoritarians, and they want a strong leader they can obey, be it Jesus (or what they image Jesus was like) or Rudy.

One would think that with two megacreeps like Guiliani and Robertson at the helm of the (likely) Republican campaign, a Democratic victory in '08 is a shoe in.

I still see a worst case scenario though: Democratic infighting during the primary leads to a damaged candidate Hillary, who fails to mobilize enough of the disenchanted anti-war movement. The Reps on the other hand vote on what motivates them most, namely fear: fear of Hillary and fear of (fill in unnamed Other). Undecided voters in the middle are turned off by the mudslinging, blaming "the system," rather than the real culprits: Governor Bush and the Republican party.

As a result, the Republicans pull off a narrow victory, of course with the help of some mysterious voting "irregularities" in key states.

Am I being too pessimistic here?

[RickO]

I wonder what Guiliani promised Robertson in return. Perhaps he will create a new cabinet post and annoint Robertson as Secretary of the Department of Vice and Virtue.

[gettysburg]

Rudy Guliani is a gutless,lying, hypocritical piece of human garbage. God, I hope the Repubs are dumb enough to nominate him. If Clinton or Obama can't make this an Alf Landon or George McGovern rerun, they should exiled from the country.

[NoFactsJustTruth]

I'm not sure you could point to a MORE glaring example of their FEAR and desperation to beat Hillary, then that these opposite ends of the supposed afterlife spectrum, would join together in this unholy matrimony of cross-dressing hypocrisy.



Unbelievable,...and I thought the writers were on strike.

~

[HurryUp1212009]

One Neo-Nazi endorsed by the original Neo-Nazi. Here's the proof that Robertson is a Neo-Nazi; you'd think this quote came from Hitler, but it came from Robertson:

"It is interesting, that termites don't build things, and the great builders of our nation almost to a man have been Christians, because Christians have the desire to build something. He is motivated by love of man and God, so he builds. The people who have come into [our] institutions are primarily termites. They are into destroying institutions that have been built by Christians, whether it is universities, governments, our own traditions, that we have.... The termites are in charge now, and that is not the way it ought to be, and the time has arrived for a godly fumigation."
--New York Magazine, August 18, 1986

[HurryUp1212009]

One Neo-Nazi endorsed by the original Neo-Nazi; and I can prove Robertson is a Neo-Nazi, below.

[Doofus]

If Giuliani is indeed as popular in the polls
(among Repo & Indepo voters), maybe Robertson
as his VP would add some weird balance.

You ought to be able to imagine smirky Pat
urging his vast tv audience to support a
thrice-married cross-dressing Catholic
from NYC (Not that there's anything
wrong with that!).

The sinner repents! Yes, that could work!

[WHATEVER7]

Guiliani just handed us Democrats an early Christmas gift. If Hillary, Barack, Edwards et. al. can't run with this one, we're hopeless.