Vision America

• For all you thespians out there, Tea Party Patriots wants you to star in their latest movie as someone either standing “in line at the Food Distribution Center to receive your ration of food” or witnessing “SWAT team arrests some member of the resistance who are protesting the big government control.”

• Rick Scarborough of Vision America is angry that “we’ve got an administration that has progressed at lightning speed to an all-out militant assault on marriage.” 

• Family Research Council is thrilled that Rick Perry and Texas Republican lawmakers have called on the Boy Scouts of America not to lift its ban on gays.

• Jeffrey Kuhner of the Washington Times argues that Obama is a weak president who is “asleep at the wheel” while at the same time a powerful “socialist autocrat.”

• Alan Keyes warns American elites will not be satisfied “until all are burning in the lake of fire, nourished with bitter ashes.”  

• We have the sneaking suspicion that Ronnie Cohen of Reuters did not want his article titled: “Poll Shows Sodom and Gomorrah Traits in Calif.”

The American Family Association’s Sandy Rios today continued to press the Boy Scouts of America against opening the organization to gay members on her radio show. She said that opponents of the ban like AT&T CEO Randall Stevenson, Ernst & Young CEO James Turley and Mitt Romney (!) who are affiliated with the BSA should be forced to pay for any future settlements of all the child abuse cases that Rios claims will be a consequence of having openly gay Boy Scouts.

I think I have a solution, I just thought of it this morning. I think these guys, let’s put Mitt Romney in there, and let’s put the guy with Ernst & Young whose name is James Turley, and let’s put Randall Stevenson the CEO of AT&T, and any of the other organizations or corporate sponsors who are pushing the Boy Scouts for this policy change. I think actually we might let this go through with the stipulation that whatever lawsuits are brought from now until the end of time against Boy Scout leaders who have sexually molested their Scouts, that they personally are responsible to pay them. Let’s go after Mitt Romney, let’s go after the guy at Ernst & Young, let’s go after Randall Stevenson at AT&T, let them write a check and just say, ‘I believe in this so much that I am willing personally to cover any costs on the outside, ridiculous chance that some Boy Scout should be molested by a gay Scout leader or seduced. If there is any harm then I’ll pay, I will pay.’ If they are willing to sign that statement, go for it. While we’re at it, we should have AT&T and all the other organizations like Ernst & Young that are pushing for this put their corporate—just think of all the money, the potential of lawsuits.

The AFA has even called for Stephenson to resign from the BSA board for “using his corporate influence to bully the BSA into gay assimilation,” and joined a whole host of Religious Right groups demanding that both Stephenson and Turley step down.

Along with the AFA, the coalition includes ex-gay groups like the Restored Hope Network and Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays (PFOX) in addition to Mat Staver’s Liberty Counsel; Rick Scarborough’s Vision America; Scott Lively’s Abiding Truth Ministries; Linda Harvey’s Mission America; Peter LaBarbera’s Americans For Truth About Homosexuality; Brian Camenker’s MassResistance... and the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, which apparently still exists.

Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) joined the fervently anti-gay, anti-Latino pastor Rick Scarborough of Vision America for his “40 Days to Save America” conference call today, and delivered a somber message to participants about how America is on the verge of collapse if their prayer efforts to shift the election don’t work. “The truth is if you look at great nations, great civilizations, great powers throughout recorded history, when they’ve passed some of the milestones we have as a nation, that was the sign that they were toward the end of their existence,” Gohmert said. He stated that “the only reason I continue to run for Congress is because I still have hope" as he urged Americans to “follow the rule book as to what blesses a nation” and join Scarborough’s prayer initiative.

The congressman argued that our Founders “followed biblical teachings” and therefore gave us “more liberties, more individual freedoms and values, ease of living, quality and standard of living than even more than Solomon’s Israel.” Gohmert went on to claim that the U.S. is in a state of such spiritual disrepair that the country is even worse off than during slavery, arguing that while “Andrew Jackson’s time was not a great time, at different times slavery was a blot on our existence,” America has “never as an entire nation overall been so far away from God’s teaching and so openly rebelling, even from the top, against God’s teaching in the Bible.”

There is so much that is so critical to whether or not this country continues, the greatest gift of a country to any people in history: more liberties, more individual freedoms and values, ease of living, quality and standard of living than even more than Solomon’s Israel. No explanation as to why we’ve been so blessed other than the people who went before us were blessed, they followed God’s rule book, in our founding they followed biblical teachings. We strayed away at different times, Andrew Jackson’s time was not a great time, at different times slavery was a blot on our existence, but the trouble is we have never as an entire nation overall been so far away from God’s teaching and so openly rebelling, even from the top, against God’s teachings in the Bible.

Vision America's Rick Scarborough has been organizing and hosting regular conference calls for his 40 Days to Save America campaign aimed at getting conservative Christians to pray and fast leading up to the election. 

During a call last week  featuring Penny Nance of Concerned Women for America, Scarborough said that over the next forty days, they would be praying for every member of Congress by name, as well as members of the Supreme Court and the Obama administration and asking God to remove those who are ungodly from office:

In the course of the next forty days, we're going to pray for every member of Congress by name, every member of the Senate by name, the President, the Vice-President and the Attorney General every single day and also every member of the Supreme Court every single day. But we do want to call out, cry out, for these major leaders for our country and forty days from now we want to be able to report to them that thousands of people called their name to Heaven and asked God to give them wisdom, and if their heart is hardened, to remove them from leadership so that godly people can take their place.

Texas governor Rick Perry spoke today on a conference call with extremist pastor Rick Scarborough as part of his “40 Days to Save America” campaign to motivate and organize Religious Right voters. Perry said that the separation of church and state, which he dismissed as a myth, is being used to drive “people of faith from the public arena.” Perry said that he believes Satan is using the “untruth” of the separation of church and state to remove Christians from public life: “The idea that we should be sent to the sidelines I would suggest to you is very driven by those who are not truthful, Satan runs across the world with his doubt and with his untruths and what have you and one of the untruths out there is driven—is that people of faith should not be involved in the public arena.”

This separation of church and state, which has been driven by the secularists to remove those people of faith from the public arena, there is nothing farther from the truth. When you think about our founding fathers, they created this country, our Constitution, the foundation of America upon Judeo-Christian values, biblical values and this narrative that has been going on, particularly since the ’60s, that somehow or another there’s this steel wall, this iron curtain or whatever you want to call it between the church and people of faith and this separation of church and state is just false on its face. We have a biblical responsibility to be involved in the public arena proclaiming God’s truth. You know, are we going to get up and say ‘you are going to vote for X’? No, but we’re going to talk about Christian values. When you think about the issue of life and protecting life, it’s so important that we as Christians put legislation into place, that we elect women that defend life. The idea that we should be sent to the sidelines I would suggest to you is very driven by those who are not truthful, Satan runs across the world with his doubt and with his untruths and what have you and one of the untruths out there is driven—is that people of faith should not be involved in the public arena.

Perry said that America is undergoing “spiritual warfare” and Religious Right activists who “truly are Christian warriors, Christian soldiers” need to stand up to “activist courts” and “President Obama and his cronies” whom he said are making “efforts to remove any trace of religion from American life.” He called on listeners to use such spiritual warfare against the “growing tide of secularism and atheism” that “preach[es] tolerance and diversity while they engage in oppression and bullying tactics.”

You think about what has gone here in the last few days around the world and never has there been a time that I think we need more spiritual courage, that we need more moral fiber if you will. The American family is under seize, traditional values are somehow exclusionary, a simple prayer in our public schools is the basis for these secular attacks; you think about this spiritual warfare that’s going on and [inaudible] going strong as President Obama and his cronies in Washington continue their efforts to remove any trace of religion from American life. It falls on us, we truly are Christian warriors, Christian soldiers, and for us as Americans to stand our ground and to firmly send a message to Washington that our nation is about more than just some secular laws. Activist courts, we see them chipping away from our values and remove so much that is very special and unique about the United States. I don’t want to get too far off course here but when you think about what’s going on in the Middle East and the president stood up in Cairo in 09 and either incredible naïve or very unschooled in the ways of these radical Islamists, and four American lives were lost in Libya. It is our founding fathers knew and understood the importance of the role of our Creator in public discourse and they didn’t shy away from referencing Him, using the values he brought and the message of his son Jesus Christ to build the system that we as a society have e enjoyed for more than 200 years. Securing that system, rebuilding our nation is what these 40 Days to Save America is really all about. It’s about saving our nation, it’s about preserving the values that make us special, about rejecting the concept that freedom of religion means freedom from religion, about turning away from this growing tide of secularism and atheism, the way they preach tolerance and diversity while they engage in oppression and bullying tactics.

The US Embassy in the Czech Republic, as part of the State Department’s new LGBT rights initiative, is supporting a pride festival in Prague “to address discriminatory behavior based on sexual orientation and to promote a tolerant civil society and equal opportunities in the Czech Republic.” Already irate over Secretary Hillary Clinton’s speech on LGBT rights, American Religious Right activists joined their European, African and Latin American allies to denounce the Obama administration for “aggressively promoting the ‘gay’ agenda internationally” and leading a campaign of “cultural imperialism” [PDF]:

At the directive of the president of the United States, Washington is aggressively promoting the “gay’’ agenda internationally, including same-sex “marriage” and the stigmatization and marginalization of any who object to the same.

The Obama’s administration’s embrace of “same-sex marriage” has been overwhelmingly rejected by the American people. There have been 32 state referenda on marriage. In every one of them, voters endorsed the natural definition of marriage (a man and a woman). The North Carolina vote, on May 8, was 61% in favor of natural marriage.

…

It stands to reason, then, that anything which undermines the family – including changing the definition of marriage – is a breach of the State’s responsibility to protect this indispensable institution which precedes government and makes a stable and free society possible.

The Madrid Declaration of World Congress of Families VI (May 25-27, 2012) --which was unanimously adopted by more than 3,200 delegates from 72 countries --provides, in part: “We affirm the natural family to be the union of a man and a woman through marriage for the purposes of sharing love and joy, propagating children, providing their moral education, building a vital home economy, offering security in times of trouble, and binding the generations.”

Regarding “gay rights,” those caught up in this lifestyle have the same rights as other citizens. This does not include the “right” to force others to validate a lifestyle they find objectionable, for religious or other reasons. It also does not include the right of men to marry men and women to marry women.

The foregoing pseudo-rights do not advance human freedom and dignity but debase them.

We can not imagine a worse form of cultural imperialism than Washington trying to force approval of the “gay” agenda on societies with traditional values.

The list of signatories is mighty long, including former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay; Liberty Counsel’s Mat Staver and Matt Barber; American Family Association’s Tim Wildmon; Catholic League’s Bill Donohue; Vision America’s Rick Scarborough; Rabbi Daniel Lapin; American Civil Rights Union’s Robert Knight; Concerned Women for America’s Janice Shaw Crouse; Pastor Jim Garlow; WND’s David Kupelian; TFP’s C. Preston Noell III; conservative activist Richard Viguerie; World Congress of Families’ Don Feder; Media Research Center’s Brent Bozell; Traditional Values Coalition’s Louis Sheldon and Andrea Lafferty; and the Southern Baptist Convention’s Paige Peterson.

Other activists like Peter LaBarbera of Americans For Truth About Homosexuality, Scott Lively of Defend the Family International and Sharon Slater of Family Watch International are also among the signatories, as is Mission America’s Linda Harvey, who believes people should refuse care for themselves and their children from openly gay doctors and nurses:

Another signatory was Yehuda Levin has claimed that gay marriage caused last year’s D.C. earthquake and linked gay rights to the 9/11 attacks, Hurricane Katrina, the Tsunami and the 2010 Haiti earthquake:

The list even included former chaplain Gordon Klingenschmitt, who performs gay exorcisms:

Vision America’s Rick Scarborough explained today that the movie theatre massacre in Aurora, Colorado, was a result of God lowering His hand of protection, adding that the shooter “only killed 12 because of God's intervention.” “The fact is that, as a culture, we have sown the wind and are now reaping the whirlwind,” Scarborough explained, “If people of good will and conscience do not stand up and demand that God be acknowledged once again in the public square, we are destined to continue our slide toward Gomorrah.”

"Many in our society, and especially many liberals, refuse to recognize the existence of evil," Scarborough explained. "Since they believe individuals aren't responsible for their actions -- that everything is determined by heredity or environment -- they flail about for explanations to mass murder, like 'easy access to firearms, or impoverished environment, including lack of education or access to opportunity.' But in Aurora, like Columbine more than a decade ago, the shooter had every opportunity and was well-educated. Still, he chose to shoot innocent men, women and children, and only killed 12 because of God's intervention. A fact no one seems willing to acknowledge."

Scarborough continued: "Rick Warren stated the obvious when he tweeted within hours of the tragedy, 'When students are taught they are no different from animals, they act like it.' Congressman Louie Gohmert essentially agreed when he stated: 'People say... where was God in all of this? We've threatened high school graduation participations, if they use God's name, they're going to be jailed... I mean that kind of stuff. Where was God? What have we done with God? We don't want him around. I kind of like his protective hand being present.'"

"How did the mainstream media react to such truth?," Scarborough asked. "Both men are being maligned and lesser men are refusing to speak up. The fact is that, as a culture, we have sown the wind and are now reaping the whirlwind. If people of good will and conscience do not stand up and demand that God be acknowledged once again in the public square, we are destined to continue our slide toward Gomorrah."

Scarborough disclosed: "We know the man in custody for these horrendous crimes was, until quite recently, a student in the prestigious neuroscience doctoral program at the University of Colorado. But intelligence isn't a safeguard against evil. Some of the brightest men in Germany conceived and carried out the Holocaust."

"Christians understand that there is evil in the world, and that -- as society turns its back on God -- His hedge of protection is lowered and evil grows stronger," Scarborough explained.

"As our society has become more corrupt -- as Americans have rejected Biblical truth -- evil has flourished. The spate of these seemingly senseless mass murders -- Columbine, Fort Hood, Virginia Tech, and Tucson -- are committed against a backdrop of 1.2 million abortions a year, 40% of all children in this country born out-of-wedlock and the ongoing war against our Judeo-Christian heritage."

Eagle Forum’s San Diego chapter is hosting a conference in June to unite conservatives in Democratic-leaning California before the upcoming election:

Tomorrow, Friday June 1, 4-9pm prominent national, state and local leaders will address hundreds of conservatives at the "Rise Up California" Eagle Forum San Diego Convention at Skyline Church in Rancho San Diego. The purpose of the convention is to gather, energize, educate, empower and activate conservative Californians 4 days prior to the primary, and into the November general election.

Skyline Church is led by Jim Garlow, a close adviser to Newt Gingrich who led efforts to pass Proposition 8 and has since become a national spokesman for anti-gay causes.

Brian Brown and Jennifer Roback Morse of the National Organization for Marriage will also address the conference alongside Vision America’s Rick Scarborough, a birther and “Christocrat” who believes AIDS is part of God’s judgment and is working against the “sexual anarchy led by sodomites.” The NOM leaders’ appearance with Scarborough, who as Kyle noted earlier today mourned the decline of the white population, won’t help their attempts to distance NOM from a campaign memo based on sowing racial divisions and build a “rainbow coalition” to oppose the gay rights “storm.”

Joining them will be Frank Gaffney of the Center for Security Policy, the anti-Muslim conspiracy theorist who was banned from CPAC and the “Weyrich lunch” for his extremist views and attacks on fellow conservative leader Grover Norquist.

Another speaker is Dinesh D’Souza, who is turning his discredited book, The Roots of Obama’s Rage, into a movie with the help of Republican megadonor Joe Ricketts, who recently had to drop a proposed plan to finance racially-charged ads linking President Obama to Jeremiah Wright.

Other activists appearing at the event include Frank Pavone of Priests for Life, Charles LiMandri of the far-right Thomas More Law Center, the Libertarian Party’s nominee for Vice President in 2008 Wayne Allyn Root, Dran Reese of the Salt and Light Council, and anti-environmentalist campaigner Holly Swanson.

As we have noted before, Rick Scarborough of Vision America is organizing an effort called 40 Days to Save America which seeks to mobilize Christians who will engage in forty days of prayer, fasting and repentance leading up to the election. As part of the organizing effort, Scarborough has been hosting conference calls featuring Republican members of Congress and Religious Right leaders. 

Earlier this month, Scarborough teamed up for a call with David Barton, who discussed the importance and effectiveness of prayer and fasting, which then prompted a discussion between the two about how Rick Perry's "The Response" prayer rally ended the drought in Texas as well as how prayer controlled the BP oil spill along the Gulf Coast:

Scarborough: Our Governor here in the state of Texas called for a day of prayer and fasting last May. We were at the height of a drought that meteorologists were telling us was part of a cycle that would last perhaps for a number of years and that it would take us years to get our lake levels back up and so forth. It occurs to me that, not immediately, but after that prayer event that thirty thousand people participated in, we started getting rain and in less than a year, our lakes are full, our fields are brimming. A lot of people seem not to connect the dots on that, but we've got a fresh illustration of how God honors prayer.

Barton: Yeah, that's one of those many things that historians will looks back upon and say 'look at the correlation.' But I look back over the last few years at Sonny Perdue of Georgia who called, in the middle of their drought - that was an unprecedented century drought that they had there - he called for prayer and within three days they had rain falling in Georgia again. They're back in good condition.

I recall what happened with the oil spill in the Gulf, how all the Gulf governors except for Charlie Crist of Florida got together and called for a time of prayer that God would mitigate the damage of that and cause that thing to be sealed. And guess what? All the expected damage along the shorelines to all the wildlife, it didn't happen.