Mitt Romney

On today’s episode of the 700 Club, Pat Robertson urged viewers to avoid false prophets and televangelists caught up in scandal. “By your fruits you shall know them, what’s their track record?” Robertson told cohost Terry Meeuwsen, “You can dominate somebody that way: I’ve heard from the Lord, I have a message for you, do this.”

Funny he should mention this, because just today we stumbled across an interview between Pat Robertson and televangelist Benny Hinn the week before the presidential election where Robertson bluntly informed Hinn that “the Lord told me” that Mitt Romney would defeat President Obama.

Not only did God inform Robertson that “Romney will win” but that he will be a two-term president who presides over a huge economic boom.

Robertson even told Romney to save him a ticket for the inauguration: “I told Mitt a long time ago, I called him and said listen, I’ve been in prayer and number one you’re going to win the nomination and number two you’re going to win the general election, he said ‘well what can I do for you,’ I said give me a seat on the platform during your inauguration, give me a ticket to your inauguration.”

“The Lord said he’s going to have a second term, I told him there will be to be trillions of dollars coming into the economy when you’re elected,” Robertson continued, “the stock market ought to boom, everything ought to boom.”

This all deeply reassured Hinn who said that Robertson was conveying “God’s voice.”

Watch:

Gary Bauer filled in for Family Research Council head Tony Perkins on Washington Watch yesterday where he once again blamed the Republican Party’s problems on a lack of opposition to gay marriage and abortion rights.

Bauer, who once led the FRC but now runs American Values and the Campaign for Working Families, chided President Obama for favoring marriage equality and claimed that “if Martin Luther King, Jr. were alive today” he would condemn Obama’s pro-gay rights stance, which Bauer said “twisted and distorted” the legacy of the civil rights movement.

“But in spite of all we’ve done, all of our work, everything that you’ve done at the grassroots level,” Bauer lamented, “we are right on the edge of losing that issue.”

Later in the program, Bauer told a caller from North Carolina that the sole reason Romney won the state and no other swing states was because Bauer ran ads there attacking Obama’s position on marriage equality.

“We lost them all again except for one state and it was North Carolina,” Bauer said. “I believe the only reason that Gov. Romney won North Carolina was because the voters of that state were reminded of that issue, so it’s a lesson I think for the Republican Party.”

Let me give a tip of the hat to North Carolina, you know in 2008 President Obama won all of the swing states that are so important in presidential politics. In this last presidential election in 2012 there was a major effort made by conservatives to get those swing states back. Unfortunately, we lost them all again except for one state and it was North Carolina. The people of North Carolina took another look at Barack Obama and decided, ‘hey, we made a mistake four years ago,’ and this time around they voted differently. I’d like to think at least in part that happened in North Carolina because of some ads that I and other groups ran in that state on the marriage issue, reminding the voters of North Carolina who had just voted just a little over a year ago to keep marriage between a man and a woman, that President Obama had come out right after that vote and had endorsed same-sex marriage. I believe the only reason that Gov. Romney won North Carolina was because the voters of that state were reminded of that issue, so it’s a lesson I think for the Republican Party.

That’s right; Bauer thinks that this ad put Romney over the top in North Carolina.

• Jamin Raskin @ Huffington Post: The President’s Agenda Faces Peril in the Courts. 

• Zack Ford @ Think Progress: Associated Press Caves, Acknowledges Same-Sex Marriage As ‘Husbands’ And ‘Wives.’ 

• Laura Conaway @ Maddow Blog: Ladypeople, Indiana Republicans would like a look at your insides. 

• Steve Kornacki @ Salon: It’s OK to stop pretending, Mitt. 

• David Taintor @ Talking Points Memo: Crowd Cheers After McCain Tells Aurora Victim’s Mother She Needs ‘Straight Talk.’ 

• Wonkette: Montana Law Enforcement Will Protect You From Other Law Enforcement Because Freedom. 

• Alex Koppleman @ The New Yorker: ‘Friends of Hamas’ and Andrew Breitbart’s Legacy.

Election Day was a lousy day for the Religious Right. But movement leaders have been quick to assert that they are not to blame, pointing fingers variously at Hurricane Sandy, Mitt Romney, the unknown waiter who recorded Romney’s dismissive “47 percent” remarks, and the strong turnout of young voters and people of color.

As RWW has noted, most Religious Right leaders have cast aside whatever reservations they once had about voting for Mitt Romney, whose Mormonism many do not consider a Christian faith.  Sure, they’d rather have a conservative evangelical or right-wing Catholic as the GOP nominee, but they lost that chance in the primaries.  And they are so eager to defeat Barack Obama, and avoid the divine wrath that his re-election would provoke, that they have circled the wagons around Romney.

Governor Romney has been criticized by some for being a Mormon.  I find this curious given the fact that little criticism has been given to the President who belonged to a church headed by a pastor who condemned the United States of America.  

 

The Mormon Church is the only religion that has canonized the Constitution of the United States as biblical truth.  The scripture in point is Doctrine and Covenants, Section 101, Verses 77-80.  In verse 80 the Lord is speaking, “And for this purpose have I established the Constitution of this land, by the hands of wise men whom I raised up unto this very purpose, and redeemed the land by the shedding of blood.”

 

Mormons believe the principles within the Constitution are eternal principles given to us from God Himself for the benefit of all mankind.  They support the Constitution, they revere it, and they will defend it with all their strength.  It is fundamental to their belief.

 

If you are an evangelical and concerned about the federalization of moral values without consideration of the 9th or 10th Amendment, if you are a small business owner concerned about unfair taxes from a big business viewpoint, if you are a community banker concerned about onerous regulations based upon the concept of “big banks are too big to fail,” if you are worried about federal judges who legislate from the bench and do not respect the Constitution or state laws, then Governor Romney is the answer for your security.

In a new opinion piece, Lou Engle explains that that he has always had a strict principle that he will not vote "for anyone who by legal decree supports the shedding of innocent blood, believing such a vote would make me an accomplice to the act" and always "to reject the compromise of simply voting for the lesser of two evils, believing that my allegiance is given to a higher King and a higher kingdom, therefore my no-vote actually becomes a prophetic act, a vote of conscience, not abdication."

Engle's position also included "no exceptions for rape and incest, understanding that life begins at conception" ... but like so many other Religious Right activists, Engle too has found a way to justify voting for Mitt Romney; in his case because a close friend had a dream that showed "Romney was clearly favorable from a divine perspective" and other "prophetic experiences [that] seemed to indicate that Romney was a sort of window of mercy to America":

At about this time of crisis in my own thought processes, my closest friend (and a true prophet in my life) had a compelling dream concerning Romney's viability as a candidate. In the dream, Romney was clearly favorable from a divine perspective. After this, the substance of my friend's dream was immediately confirmed by another prophetic encounter from another well known prophetic voice.

Now hear me, this election is not about Romney being the great answer to America's problems. Rather, these prophetic experiences seemed to indicate that Romney was a sort of window of mercy to America on several fronts, but chiefly the dividing of Jerusalem. The thought of protecting that ancient covenantal bond of God shifted my paradigm dramatically. I found myself having to peer into another biblical principle that I heretofore had not pondered with the same intensity as I had the life issue.

As I sought the Lord concerning these various biblical truths and prophetic words, it was as if a light began to shine into my heart. I sensed the Lord saying, Will you stand with Me in my covenantal faithfulness? Will you stand for my ancient covenant with My people? A deep abiding "yes" began to conquer my arguments.

...

With that said, I am declaring my best, personal understanding of the Lord 's heart in this hour: that in this election, America 's future is on dangerous ground, facing judgment not only over abortion and other key issues, but most definitely over the high possibility of breaking faith with God's covenant with Jerusalem, the land of Israel, and His covenant people. President Obama has publicly called for the return of the land of Jerusalem and Israel to the pre-1967 boundaries. I can't go there. I won't. My heart had been opened to another great theme: The Life of the unborn has called me and God 's covenant to the Jewish people restrains me.

I am voting for Romney.

In clean conscience,

• Sahil Kapur @TPM: Conservative Scholars Bullish That A Romney Supreme Court Could Reverse Longstanding Liberal Jurisprudence.
• Zeke Miller @ BuzzFeed: Romney Surrogate: Colin Powell Endorsed Obama Because He's Black.
• Michelangelo Signorile @ Huffington Post: Romney: 'Some Gays Are Actually Having Children. It's Not Right on Paper. It's Not Right in Fact.'
• Jeremy Hooper: NOM responds to 'worthy of death' pastor; jumps on the 'mischaracterized' bandwagon.
• Steve Benen @ The Maddow Blog: Ralph Reed, lost in translation.

Glenn Beck was mystified by Mitt Romney's performance in Monday night's final debate and frustrated that Romey did not take advantage of what Beck believed were the dozens of opportunities for him to eviscerate President Obama over his claims and statements.

But while Beck could not, for the life of him, understand what Romney's strategy was, he is confident that it was the right strategy because Romney is "being guided" by God and apparently God's message to Romney was that "it’s important to be less contentious [so] it may be he’s doing what the Lord wants him to do right now" ... because he is just like George Washington: 

Anti-Muslim activists on the Right have consistently warned that the Muslim Brotherhood has infiltrated the Obama administration. But if their unhinged McCarthyism is to be believed, then Mitt Romney’s campaign has been penetrated by the Muslim Brotherhood as well, as Romney’s campaign has named George Salem, Samah Norquist and David Ramadan “National Co-Chairs of Arab Americans for Romney.”

Pamela Geller labeled George Salem’s Arab American Institute a “nototrious anti-Israel Israel [sic] organization” composed of “Islamic supremacists” and led by a “Jew hater.” She even suggested that the AAI seeks “Jewish annihilation” by backing Mideast peace efforts.

Geller, Frank Gaffney, Robert Spencer, William Murray, Andrea and James Lafferty and others sent a letter to Edwin Meese demanding he withdraw his endorsement of Virginia Del. David Ramadan because of his purported ties to Muammar Gadaffi and “radical views,” including his support for the right to build the Park 51 Islamic Community Center. James Lafferty said Ramadan is an “extremist” who should not even “be allowed to continue to live in the United States,” and Geller said he is a “stealth jihadist” and a “Muslim Brotherhood plant.”

Perhaps no chair of Romney’s committee is despised more than Samah Norquist, wife of conservative leader Grover Norquist. Glenn Beck and Jerry Boykin have said that Norquist is a lackey for the Muslim Brotherhood and according to anti-Muslim activists like Gaffney and David Horowitz, Norquist secretly converted to Islam and joined the Muslim Brotherhood at the behest of his wife. Conservative attorney Cleta Mitchell wrote in a report for the American Conservative Union that she is “certain that Mr. Gaffney’s hatred [for Norquist] is further fueled by the fact that Grover is married to a Muslim-American woman (who also has worked for the United States government in very responsible positions, I might add!).”

Of course, these spurious claims against Ramadan, Norquist and Salem are just as baseless and wrong as their attacks against the Obama administration and the Muslim-Americans serving in it.

But while extremists like Geller, Gaffney, Horowitz and others are quick to attack Obama with such bogus charges, for some reason it seems unlikely Romney will receive similar treatment.