ROBERTSON PRAISES FLA TEENS

Power of Babble

Virginia Beach (WPI) - Quoting from the Old Testament, “If thine eye offend thee, pluck it out!” TV evangelical Pat Robertson yesterday praised the actions of two teens arrested in Florida and charged with the murder and beatings of homeless men.

Robertson, speaking on his daily religious program, “The 700 Club,” said, “God has charged us all with the duty to care for our communities. These young men were following God’s word!”

The teens, Brian Hooks, 18, and Thomas S. Daugherty, 17, have been charged with the murder of Norris Gaynor and aggravated battery for the beating of Jacques Pierre, police Capt. Michael Gregory said.

The Pierre attack, which took place on the Fort Lauderdale campus of Florida Atlantic University, where he had been sleeping on a bench shortly after 1 a.m., was videotaped by a campus surveillance camera. The footage showing two males chasing and beating Pierre with baseball bats was broadcast nationally in an effort to locate the assailants. (Watch the attack in its entirety and looped for endless replay, here: dailyhotvideos.FOXnews.com)

“These people are a blight on our families, a danger,” Robertson said, “they must be cleansed from our communities!”

Invoking Old Testament quotations referring to Sodom and Gomorrah and Lot’s wife, Robertson drew a parallel to today’s society.

“Our Blessed Father instructed us to care for others, ‘Love they neighbor as thyself’ This means to love your neighborhood as thyself! If a stinking drunk started to invade your house you would thrash him to an inch of his life!”

Robertson, himself the son of an abusive and alcoholic father, which he details in his autobiographical book, “Some Wounds Never Heal,” was visibly angry when he discussed the arrests.

“These boys did nothing wrong! Nothing I would not have done. God has charged us to care for our communities and beating and beating and beating and beating these drunken bums- beating them as hard as you can, over and over and over, hitting them, punching them, kicking them, slapping them, embarrassing them in front of their friends, beating up their mothers, hitting and hitting and hitting and hitting and hitting them...well, this is only the righteous justice of the Lord!”

Robertson’s co-host, Terry Meeuwsen, took over the balance of the broadcast as Robertson abruptly left the set.

A spokesman for the program said that Robertson left the stage, for personal reasons, “Dr. Robertson has been on a strict diet of ‘Pat's Age-Defying Shake.’ Sometimes, at his age he needs to go the bathroom in a hurry. This was not another breakdown.”

The multimillionaire religious broadcaster and former radical-right presidential candidate, Robertson became a "health-food promoter" when he introduced "Pat's Age-Defying Shake" to viewers in August 2001, signing a deal with GNC to distribute it.

Robertson, 75, has said he created the recipe himself when he turned 60 and began studying the connections among nutrition, aging and health.

The commercialization of Robertson's shake has drawn fire from the Trinity Foundation, a Dallas-based religious media watchdog organization. Trinity has been critical of most Robertson business ventures, such as his African gold and diamond mines and Kalo-Vita ("Good Life"), a multilevel marketing company that hawks vitamins and "Sea of Galilee," cosmetics to his religious constituency.

Ole Anthony, Trinity's president, claimed Robertson has improperly and illegally used his tax-exempt, nonprofit ministry to create a market for his shake and other dubious products.

"None of this stuff would even exist unless it was promoted on donor-paid-for air time on CBN," he said, adding, “Robertson’s entire career has been built on the ‘Bait and Switch’ technique of religion and bogus products. Come to think of it- aren’t they the same thing?!”