Many Americans think of Pat Robertson as buffoon, a foil, a fading TVangelist who asked God to kill a Supreme Court justice he doesn’t like. But to the rest of the world, he’s an important American religious leader who meets with our president and who once ran for the office himself. So, when Robertson suggests that we murder the president of Venezuela, the democratically elected leader of another country — which happens to be the world’s fifth largest oil producer — because the alternative is to start a war, the rest of the world is not going to laugh in anticipation of the Saturday Night Live sketch that will result.

It’s not enough for Rumsfeld to say “Certainly it’s against the law. Our department doesn’t do that type of thing” and “Private citizens say all kinds of things all the time.” He and President Bush need to say more than that they’re not taking the suggestion, but it’s fine with them for a religious leader to make such suggestions. They should — IMO — say that while private citizens can say what they like, they find the suggestion despicable and anti-democratic. Reacting as they have so far makes America less safe.

They could even blurt out the truth that Robertson is getting crazier with age and has been making a fool of himself for years now.
[Tags: venezuela PatRobertson HugoChavez]

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