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Operation Save America To Harass Muslims Across The Nation

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on September 10, 2010 - 11:15am

A few weeks back, we noted that Operation Save America had begun protesting mosques and screaming at worshipers that "Islam is a lie" and that "Jesus hates Muslims," forcing Muslim leaders in Connecticut to actually seek police protection from their harassment.

Today, the group announced that it intends to take its harassment to "mosques across the nation":

We, Operation Save America, are headed to Ground Zero in New York City, to begin our nationwide outreach to Muslims in America. We offer to our Muslim friends enslaved in the tyrannical bondage of Islam, the true source of liberty -- Jesus Christ!

First in New York City, then to Mosques across the nation!

The wounds that America is now suffering are, by in large, self-inflicted. We have forgotten the God who made this nation great and free. We have killed His children through abortion (over 50 million dead), called homosexuality good (an abomination in His sight), and prostrated Him to the level of all other false gods. God has not been silent. We are being judged. 9-11, the rise of Islam, and our present financial and social distresses are warnings of worse to come.

"God is calling America to repentance. We must begin here. Once we have returned to Him, we must go to those lost in the darkness and misery of Islam. We cannot build bridges or dialogue with this murderous false ideology. We are called to storm the gates of hell and set the captive free! We bring to America the warning that the rise of Islam is a sign of God's judgment upon a nation that has turned from Him!" Rev. Flip Benham, Director, Operation Save America.

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First Amendment Rights Are For Christians Only!

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on August 13, 2010 - 9:20am

Earlier this week we noted that Flip Benham and members of Operation Save America had been targeting mosques for protests, screaming that "Jesus hate Muslims" and declaring "This is a war in America and we are taking it to the mosques around the country."

Even though the group is based in Texas, it has chosen to target mosques in Connecticut and Muslim leaders in the state are holding a press conference today to discuss the attacks: 

The Muslim Coalition of Connecticut and other organizations are hosting a press conference and rally at 3 p.m. today (Friday) on the north side (Bushnell Park side) of the State Capitol.

The gathered hope to address recent outbreaks of Islamophobia in Connecticut, as well as the rest of the country. During Islam's holy month of Ramadan, Muslims have asked for police protection so that they can go to their mosques to pray in this state.

And so, of course, Operation Save America is responding by accusing Muslims of violating their First Amendment rights: 

In an unprecedented move, Muslim leaders in Connecticut are staging a press conference in Hartford this afternoon, to plead with legislators to censor the Gospel of Christ from the public forum around mosques.

That's right! They are using their own potential for violence to silence the Gospel of Christ. Gentle Christian saints will be conducting a press conference on the public sidewalk in front of the Bridgeport Islamic Center, aka Mafjid An-Noor Mosque in Bridgeport, Connecticut. Truth is hate to those who hate the truth.

Islam is not a religion, nor a cult, but a total and complete 100 % system of life. It has religious, legal, political, economic, social, and military components. In all of the 27 countries ruled by Islam, the church is the state! No other religion will be tolerated.

"Islam presents a monstrous worldview, birthed in the pit of hell, which brings untold misery and murder upon precious people created in the image of God. Religion is its cover (its beard) by which it gains entrance into nations where the 'freedom of religion' is sacrosanct. It then takes this freedom afforded to it, and begins its insidious takeover." Rev. Flip Benham of Operation Save America.

In essence, Benham is upset that Muslim leaders are exercising their First Amendment free speech rights in defense of their First Amendment religious freedoms because doing so represents a threat to his First Amendment right to scream that Jesus hates them.

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Operation Save America Takes Anti-Islam Ideology To Its Logical Conclusion

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on August 9, 2010 - 2:07pm

The New York Times reports that protests against mosques are popping up all over the country, spurred on at least in part by the right-wing opposition to the "Ground Zero Mosque."

So I guess this sort of thing should not come as a surprise:

About a dozen right-wing Christians, carrying placards and yelling "Islam is a lie," angrily confronted worshippers outside a Fairfield Avenue mosque Friday.

"Jesus hates Muslims," they screamed at worshippers arriving at the Masjid An-Noor mosque to prepare for the holy week of Ramadan. One protester shoved a placard at a group of young children leaving the mosque. "Murderers," he shouted.

Police arrived on the scene to separate the groups, but said no arrests were made.

Flip Benham, of Dallas, Texas, organizer of the protest, was yelling at the worshipers with a bullhorn.

"This is a war in America and we are taking it to the mosques around the country," he said.

Muslim leaders in Connecticut are concerned that such protests will only escalate as Ramadan approaches and are now seeking police protection.

As it turns out Benham and his Operation Save America have been protesting Islam and all other religions for years now.  And until recently, OSA was a fringe group advocating an extremist right wing view.

Today, they are advocating that exact same view ... only it has now become the mainstream conservative view. 

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Religious Right Launches Holy War To Combat Muslim Prayer Rally

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on September 24, 2009 - 9:23am

As we noted yesterday, Religious Right leaders are gathering for their own prayer rally/conference call to combat the upcoming Muslim prayer rally in Washington, DC in order to combat Islam's "dark spiritual intent" and efforts to take over America.

Now Operation Save America is getting into the act as well, openly declaring that they are heading to DC in order to wage spiritual battle against the rally participants and "storm the gates of hell to defeat the false god of Islam with the unsheathed Word of God and to set people free from the monstrous tyranny and bondage of this religion birthed in the deepest pits of hell":

The "Our Time Has Come" Islamic Juma prayer vigil to be held at our nation's capital. Thousands of Muslims from across the nation will be gathering at the Capitol Building for prayer from 4:00 AM Friday morning to 7:00 PM Friday night. They will make this statement of faith that will echo off the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial: "There is no God but Allah, and his prophet is Mohammad." This last statement demands a rebuke from the people of God. We are headed to D.C. to do just that with our faces low to the ground and our hearts filled with the Gospel of Christ that made this nation free and made this nation great.

Abortion is Murder
Homosexuality is Sin
Islam is a Lie

"What do these three have in common? They are, all three, physical manifestations of the battle between two seeds -- the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman. Genesis 3:15. Islam is a visible manifestation of this battle and has been at war with Christianity for fourteen centuries. There is no dialogue, no common ground, no reaching across the aisle in this battle. We are not called to build bridges to Islam. We are called to storm the gates of hell -- to defeat the false god of Islam with the unsheathed Word of God and to set people free from the monstrous tyranny and bondage of this religion birthed in the deepest pits of hell." -- Rev. Flip Benham, Director, Operation Save America

The muslims say their "day" is come but we know that it is the day of the Lord -- not Allah but the one true Lord and the only king -- King Jesus! It is the Gospel of Christ that made this nation freer than any nation that ever existed on this planet. It is this Gospel that we will bring to the U.S. Capitol on 9/24/2009.

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The Next Phase In the Battle Over Operation Rescue

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on August 5, 2009 - 11:04am

We have written several times in the past about the confusing in-fighting among anti-choice activist over the rights to the name "Operation Rescue."

After Randall Terry shut down the original Operation Rescue in the late 1980's in an effort to evade various restraining orders, debt, and monetary judgments against the organization, it was reborn as a smaller group headed by Flip Benham and called Operation Save America.

Eventually another member of the original OR created a group called Operation Rescue West that was headquartered in California, though it eventually moved itself to Wichita, Kansas to focus on protesting Dr. George Tiller and now goes by the name Operation Rescue and is headed by Troy Newman.

Benham has protested Newman's use of the name "Operation Rescue" and Terry has sued Newman over it, which in turn has set off feuding among activists as they chose sides in the fight while all three men (Terry, Benham, and Newman) battle over who truly owns the right to the name "Operation Rescue."

That was as much as we've been able to figure out about this fight, but it looks like there are some developments in the works, as in the last two days we have seen Terry allies suddenly lash out at Newman.

First, it was announced that Newman had been booted from Women Against the Killing and Exploitation of Unprotected Persons' [W.A.K.E.U.P] advisory board "because of his continued unethical and divisive behavior" pertaining to his on-going fight against Terry.

The following day, a former ally on Newman's named George Offerman announced that he was starting a new website to fight Newman's lies against Terry:

"In my 27 years in the movement, I have seen extensive infighting and accusations from one pro-lifer to another. It sickens me. There needs to be more unity in the pro-life movement, and the constant bickering and backbiting is actually causing problems with the intended goal of ending legalized child-killing. In that light, I intend to also focus on other attacks against pro-lifers by fellow pro-lifers.

"In the past, I was a large supporter of Troy Newman, and I encouraged many friends and family to give to Mr. Newman. This resulted in well over $10,000 in contributions to Mr. Newman's work.

"Nearly 2 years ago, Mr. Newman made allegations against Mr. Terry that I believed, and have since learned to be false. When I approached Mr. Newman to discuss these falsehoods, he became more and more belligerent over time.

"I then decided to launch this site to fight these false allegations made by people like Troy Newman against Randall Terry.

This seemed so sudden and out-of-the-blue that we didn't really know what to make of it, but now it looks like it was part of an effort by Terry to do preemptive spinning and damage control ahead of an anticipated article about the trademark fight from the Los Angeles Times:

Background: Mr. Randall Terry has been attacked repeatedly on line and in the press for some of his recent statements and actions, including activities and Notre Dame and his comments about the shooting of George Tiller. The Los Angeles Times is doing a story on Mr. Terry and his fiercest critics and adversaries in the pro-life movement.

Mr. Randall Terry states:

"I have been doing interviews with journalists for over 25 years. When an LA Times reporter contacts me and says, 'I want to do a story about the trademark dispute,' and then proceeds to repeat slanderous allegations -- with the possibility of printing false allegations -- I smell a big dead rat. The Washington Post recently did a feature story on me -- and while certainly not favorable, and at points a little demeaning -- the Post had the integrity to not stoop to printing false allegations against me made by my pro-life adversaries. Let's see what The Los Angeles times is made of."

Mr. George Offerman states:

"I've been in the mental health field since 1987, I've been a licensed clinical social worker since 1995, and worked with a myriad of pathologies including both Axis I and Axis II diagnoses. I was contacted by the journalist from the Los Angeles Times, ostensibly to talk about my knowledge of the parties involved in a trademark dispute. I attempted to discuss the possible pathologies involved with those falsely attacking Randall. I left the phone call with the concern that this would be a hatchet job on Randall. I will reserve judgment until the piece runs, but I want my friends in the pro-life movement to know with absolute certainty: if the article is untrue or inaccurate... you'll be hearing from me!"

The article in question has not yet been published, but when it is, we'll certainly have to read it just to see what all the fuss is about.

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Feuding Anti-Abortion Activists Agree: Obama Bad

Submitted by Anonymous on July 15, 2008 - 5:01pm

When Randall Terry, founder of the militant anti-abortion group Operation Rescue, recently sued Troy Newman over the use of the name, he certainly opened up a can of worms.

A number of former OR activists issued a statement on Newman’s behalf, calling for Terry’s repentance for “unbiblical lifestyle decisions”; “[W]e can no longer remain silent while Mr. Terry continues to fleece unsuspecting pro-life people out of hundreds of thousands of dollars for his personal and selfish gain,” they added. Terry responded with his own list of supporters vouching for his character.

And Flip Benham, who runs Operation Rescue/Operation Save America, put aside his distaste for Terry (“Giving more money to Randall Terry is like giving booze to an alcoholic,” he has said) to attack both Newman and the former OR activists who criticized Terry. “These are the same ones who would not stand with Operation Rescue leadership in the fall of 1993 and call the premeditated shooting (murder) of abortionists, sin,’” wrote Benham, recalling the darkest period of the militant anti-abortion movement.

But while Flip Benham’s Operation Rescue and Troy Newman’s Operation Rescue remain locked in their bitter name dispute, there is at least one thing they can agree on: Barack Obama.

Newman’s OR called for anti-abortion activists to descend upon an Obama appearance at the National Council of La Raza convention in San Diego this past weekend:

“Abortionists are famous for targeting minority communities and those who are most vulnerable. When Obama throws his support behind the abortion industry, he is also tacitly supporting the exploitation of Latinos and African Americans,” said Operation Rescue spokesperson Cheryl Sullenger. “Operation Rescue urges all pro-life supporters in the San Diego area to let their voices be heard in protest of Obama’s extremist abortion policies, and his tacit approval of the abortion industry’s despicable pattern of racial exploitation.”

Meanwhile, Benham’s group is conducting an anti-abortion campaign in Atlanta, which doesn’t seem to have much to do with Obama. But in announcing a church OR plans to picket, the group adds:

According to their bulletin, this is a UCC church which will host the Human Rights Campaign Gospel Concert. The HRC is the largest group advocating gay & lesbian rights and the UCC is the denomination of Rev. Jeremiah Wright and Barak Obama. For the first time in the history of our nation, we have a man running for president who is neither a Christian nor a patriot.

Lest John McCain get too excited about this new source of support, they don’t have a whole lot of nice things to say about him, either. Benham wrote back in October, “[T]here is no way we true evangelical Christians will support Giuliani, McCain, Thompson, or Romney.”

And Randall Terry, who led a small band of protesters against GOP candidate Rudy Giuliani over the winter, recycled the same language (“an enemy inside your camp”) for McCain in an interview with Playboy:

Q: What impact would a John McCain presidency have on the pro-life agenda?

A: If McCain would appoint judges who would overturn Roe, it could be a huge boon. I don’t think we have any assurance that would happen. Justices Anthony Kennedy, David Souter and Sandra Day O’Connor were all appointed by Republican presidents who did not do their homework. If presidents Reagan and Bush Sr. had done what they said they would do, we would already have overturned Roe because we wouldn’t have had Kennedy, Souter and O’Connor. There’s a very strong movement afoot in the conservative wing of the Republican Party to deny McCain the White House. Their attitude is, an enemy outside your camp makes you vigilant and unites you, but an enemy inside your camp makes you dead because he can cut your neck in the night or poison your food by day.

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Randall Terry, the Twiggy of the Far Right

Submitted by Anonymous on May 28, 2008 - 4:12pm

Last year, we tried to untangle the complicated legacy of the militant anti-abortion protest group Operation Rescue, famous for its massive clinic blockades in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Nothing so abstract as its role in shaping the debate over reproductive choice—no, it was hard enough trying to figure out which small, bickering group using the OR name was which.

Now Randall Terry, who founded Operation Rescue back in 1988, is adding another level of confusion: He’s claiming trademark infringement by Wichita-based Operation Rescue (also known as Operation Rescue West), headed by Rev. Troy Newman.

Bo Jackson, Twiggy, Marc Chagall, Jimmy "Margaritaville" Buffett and Randall Terry find themselves in the same company: a pretender tried to steal their identity. …

Mr. Terry seeks to regain control of the name Operation Rescue, which is his moniker.

Mr. Troy Newman lied under oath to the Trademark Office when he filed his registration of the name, Operation Rescue. Moreover, Mr. Newman has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars by falsely claiming a connection with Operation Rescue. …

Randall Terry states: "Mr. Newman mistook my patience for a lack of resolve. His identity theft of a name, a heritage, and a history over which he has no right is as offensive as it is ludicrous."

Terry dropped out of the anti-abortion protest scene after declaring bankruptcy during drawn-out litigation against the National Organization of Women, but he resurfaced to help create the media circus around the death of Terri Schiavo in 2005. More recently, he returned to protesting—albeit with a more modest-sized crowd—to oppose Rudy Giuliani’s presidential campaign.

As we explained, Rev. Flip Benham took over OR after Terry left, eventually changing the name to Operation Save America/Operation Rescue—apparently to try to elude further lawsuits. Meanwhile, Newman moved Operation Rescue West—which moved in the same small circle of hard-core activists—to Wichita, Kansas, the place of OR’s infamous 1991 “Summer of Mercy” protest. Newman then dropped the “West” from his group’s name—much to the objection of Benham, who claimed to have never given up the OR appellation. “Troy owning the name Operation Rescue is no more legal than abortion is,” complained Benham. The two groups apparently also disagree on strategy and tactics: They released contradictory statements about James Dobson and the Partial Birth Abortion Ban.

It’s not clear where Terry fits in to all this, other than as a sui generis publicity hound. While Benham’s group is apparently the same one Terry founded, Terry makes no mention of it in his press release. Indeed, Benham has no love for Terry: He published an article on his web site entitled “Please Remove Randall’s Feeding Tube.” “Giving more money to Randall Terry is like giving booze to an alcoholic,” Benham is quoted is saying.

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Huckabee Gets No Love From the Right

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on March 26, 2008 - 8:18am

When he was running for president, Mike Huckabee made no secret of his displeasure with the current leadership of the Religious Right, regularly chiding them for refusing to support his candidacy.  It was, at least in part, because of their glaring lack of support that Huckabee’s campaign eventually folded, forcing him to drop-out of the race and it looks as if Huckabee is not particularly prepared to let bygones be bygones:

Mike Huckabee can't definitively explain why he couldn't win the Republican presidential nomination, but he thinks the desire of Christian leaders to be "kingmakers," media coverage and Mother Nature all had something to do with it.

"Rank-and-file evangelicals supported me strongly, but a lot of the leadership did not," the former Arkansas governor says. "Let's face it, if you're not going to be king, the next best thing is to be the kingmaker. And if the person gets there without you, you become less relevant."

Religious broadcaster Pat Robertson backed Rudolph W. Giuliani; American Value President and former presidential hopeful Gary Bauer endorsed Sen. John McCain; and Family Research Council President Tony Perkins remained neutral, even as Mr. Huckabee was wowing their supporters and winning the values voter straw polls they organized.

Huckabee seems particularly galled by Religious Right’s allegations that he was weak on foreign policy issues and didn’t fully comprehend to threat posed to this country by “Islamo-fascism,” which he says was nonsense since he was the only one who really understood the true nature of the threat:

"I was the one person who talked about this being a theological war, not just a geopolitical war [because] it was unlike a traditional war over borders and boundaries," he says.

While Huckabee remains bitter over his inability to win over the Right’s current leadership, it appears as if various other right-wing outsiders are equally bitter over the prospect of having to support John McCain and are considering defecting to the Constitution Party:

[I]is 2008 the year when a third-party candidate would find some traction among those disaffected by the abortion, marriage and national security stances found in the records of the three front-runners left in the race?

Charles Lewis, national outreach director for Christian Exodus, is one of those behind the launch of the new Save America Summit website, and believes it's not only time, it's overdue.

Among those participating in this third-party-seeking Save America Summit are Flip Benham, Wiley Drake, Bill Federer, Gordon Klingenschmitt, Howard Phillips, Chris Simcox, as well as representatives of organizations such as Gun Owners of America, the Council for National Policy, and Stop the ACLU and others who are convinced that McCain, Obama, and Clinton all plan "an EU-style unification of America with socialist Canada and Mexico during the next administration."

Sadly for Huckabee, he can't seem to get any love from these right-wing activists either, since they seem to have already narrowed down their choices for president to four people: Alan Keyes, Roy Moore, Jerome Corsi, and former Sen. Bob Smith.

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"A Gathering of Eagles"

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on December 4, 2007 - 4:42pm

Pass the Salt Ministries (yes, you read that right) has big news for right-wing activists in Ohio -  a bevy of second and third-tier Religious Right leaders will be gracing their fair state later this month for "A Gathering of Eagles":  

"A Gathering of Eagles" is taking place in Coshocton, Ohio on December 14-15 as some of America's finest Christian leaders are gathering for a Leadership Summit and Biblical Worldview Conference. Dr. Alan Keyes is confirmed as the keyniote [sic] speaker and will be joined by the likes of Rev. Flip Benham, Chaplain E. Ray Moore Jr. , Rev. Rick Scarborough, Peter Labarbera, and Pastor Ernie Sanders and others. This NON-POLITICAL event is designed to educate Christians about the great moral issues facing this country. Learn the truth from the front lines in the cultural war regarding issues such as The Gay Agenda, Abortion, Individual Liberty, Hate Crime Legislation, and the religion of Secular Humanism.

This doesn’t really sound like a “non-political” event at all.  In fact, it sounds likes a distinctly political event designed to rally right-wing voters heading into the Republican primaries and general election.  After all, Rick Scarborough has endorsed Mike Huckabee and is currently in the midst of an “all out effort to move Values Voters to vote their values on Election Day '08” while Alan Keyes is currently running for President (though you’d be forgiven for not knowing that.)

As for Pass the Salt, it is the brainchild of Dave Daubenmire:  

[A] veteran 25 year high school football coach, [Daubenmire] was spurred to action when attacked and eventually sued by the ACLU in the late 1990’s for alledgedly [sic] mixing prayer with his coaching. After a two year battle for his 1st Amendment rights and a determination to not back down, the ACLU relented and offered coach an out of court settlement. God honored his stand and the ACLU backed off. Coach’s courageous stand, an inspiration to Americans everywhere, demonstrated that the ACLU can be defeated. As a result of the experience, Coach heard the call to move out of coaching a high school team, to the job of coaching God’s team.

Of course, the claim that ACLU “relented and offered coach an out of court settlement” is accurate only if you ignore the fact that Daubenmire was ordered to stop leading religious activities at school and the school board agreed to pay an estimated $18,000 settlement.

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Right Wing Marks Katrina Anniversary

Submitted by Anonymous on August 31, 2007 - 3:51pm

New Orleans after KatrinaTwo years ago this week, Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans and other stretches of the Gulf Coast. At the time, the response by many on the Right was to blame the victims and/or social-service programs, and to take advantage of the “golden opportunity” to advance a far-right economic agenda. Remember Pat Buchanan, who criticized the “failure” of the “character and conduct” of the population of New Orleans, who “waited for the government to come save them” and “screamed into the cameras for help”? Then-Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA) called for “tougher penalties” for those who were stranded when the storm hit and the city was flooded. Bill O’Reilly saw video footage of the tragedy as an ideal object lesson for young people: “If you refuse to learn, if you refuse to work hard, if you become addicted, if you live a gangsta-life, you will be poor and powerless just like many of those in New Orleans.” (Watch the video.)

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