During a recent discussion about ISIS on Bill O’Reilly’s FOX ‘news’ show, Rev. Franklin Graham was brought on for really no other reason than to give his religious bigotry perspective. He actually said the government had been infiltrated by Muslims when in reality bigoted Christians, like himself, have infiltrated the government and they are actively passing their form of Sharia law on the rest of us.
“Why do you think the world will not unite to stop ISIS?” Bill O’Reilly asked.
Graham said that first, he wanted Muslims to know that God loves them. He meant, Jesus, of course, not the God Muslims worship – and probably believe loves them. “We love them and pray for them… He sent his son from heaven to this earth, Jesus Christ, for them,” Graham said piously. Right before he rolled out the prejudice.
Graham continued, “One of the problems that we have in the west is that our governments, especially in Washington, have been infiltrated by Muslims who are advising the White House, who I think are part of the problem. And we see this also in Western Europe.”
To his credit, O’Reilly challenged that statement. “Give me some names. …I don’t know any Muslim advisors to President Obama. Do you have any names?”
No, Graham didn’t. There was a pause and finally, he said, “I can get those for you, Bill.” He added, “But I do know that they are there. And I’ve been told this by a number of people that they influence – I’m not saying they’re sitting next to the president, whispering in his ear, but they are in the halls, they are speaking to the staffers.”
Franklin Graham: Our Government Has Been ‘Infiltrated By Muslims’
Of course this hasn’t been the first time or last time Graham has put his bigotry on display.
In a clip flagged by Right Wing Watch, the son of renowned pastor Rev. Billy Graham spoke to Family Research Council head Tony Perkins in a radio interview.
“[President Obama’s] mother must have been a Muslim,” Graham said. “We don’t know that, but she married two Muslim men, so there must have been something there.”
“And the framework that the President has growing up, his influences in his life, was that of Islam,” he added.
Rev. Franklin Graham: Obama’s Mother ‘Must Have Been A Muslim’
The reality is that the radical religious influence on our government comes not from Islam but Christianity. The Congress and many state legislatures are dominated by Christian extremists trying to install a Christian form of Sharia law on all of us.
One example, the GOP, in Congress, is trying to add more abortion restrictions onto a bill that was suppose to just address the problem of human trafficking:
An overwhelmingly bipartisan Senate bill to combat human trafficking hit a wall last week after Democrats said they discovered a provision to impose new limits on abortion rights, and threatened to filibuster the bill unless the provision is removed.
Senate Republican leaders now find themselves caught between wanting to show they can pass even the most noncontroversial legislation and the passions of the pro-life base they roped into the battle by making it a high-stakes proxy war over abortion.
The provision expands the restrictions on government funding of abortions beyond those contained in the decades-old Hyde Amendment, Democrats complain. In a statement, the National Right To Life Committee insisted that Republicans keep the abortion language, declaring that “a vote to remove the Hyde provision from S. 178 would be a vote in favor of direct federal funding of abortion on demand” and threatening to include the vote when it calculates its score of how committed individual lawmakers are to the anti-abortion cause.
Inside The Senate GOP’s Self-Made Debacle On Sex Trafficking And Abortion
The Daily Show had an entire segment on state legislatures, infected by Christian extremists, trying to impose their beliefs through state law:
Not to be outdone, next up was Arkansas and the Intrastate Commerce Improvement Act, which the Washington Post described here: Arkansas wants to attract businesses by allowing them to discriminate against gay people.
Of course not to be outdone, last but not least we had Texas, who just celebrated the ten year anniversary of their same-sex marriage ban with some tasty “hate-cake” and whose homophobic State Rep. Tony Tinderholt who blocked a gay couple from getting married when the man has five marriages of his own under his belt.
And as Stewart noted, the attack on gay marriage wasn’t the only crazy thing to come out of the Texas state legislature these days. Texas Rep. Debbie Riddle is terribly wants to make sure transgendered people aren’t allowed to use the ladies’ room: Texas Bill Would Jail Those Whose Chromosomes Don’t Match the Restroom They’re Using.
The Daily Show Takes On Our ‘Meth Labs Of Democracy’ And Gay Marriage
We have the same problem of Christian extremists in our state house here in Ohio.
So, Rev. Franklin Graham, the real threat to American Freedom isn’t your dog whistle about Muslim infiltrating the government, it is the reality that Christian extremists are already busy passing their Sharia law on the rest of us.