After last month’s earthquake, Robertson said the following about the history of the Haitian people:

“They were under the heel of the French. You know, Napoleon III, or whatever. And they got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said, we will serve you if you’ll get us free from the French. True story. And so, the devil said, okay it’s a deal [...] ever since, they have been cursed by one thing after the other.”

On the January 14th Matthew Hill Show radio, TRA Director Hill read through an entire Sydney Morning Herald article about the tragedy that quotes Secretary of State Clinton, equated the comments of
Mrs. Clinton with the comments by Robertson, and then said:

“And so for CNN or anyone else to pull this and say he doesn’t like the Haitian people or to infer that he’s a crazy man, you’re wrong! He has a opinion, he stated his opinion. What’s yours? You can state yours…”

So how was TRA Director Hill able to defend Robertson? By conveniently leaving out the “True story” part when he read the statement on the air.

Here’s the version of Robertson’s statements that Hill used:

“They were under the heel of the French. You know, Napoleon III, or whatever. And they got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said, we will serve you if you’ll get us free from the French. And so, the devil said, okay it’s a deal. Native Haitians defeated colonists in 1804 declared independence. You know the Haitians revolted and got themselves free but ever since they’ve been cursed by one thing after the other.”

Listen to the excerpt:
Download audio file (kenneth_hill_on_pat_robertson.mp3)

You can listen to the whole show here.

What’s missing between the two versions? The truth. It’s not an opinion if during your statement you say “true story.” Once a trusted adviser (and let’s face it, Robertson is a trusted adviser to some) says “true story,” then it’s fact until proven otherwise. And if you’re a follower, then who is going to take the time to prove it otherwise?

Hill knew that what Robertson said was unconscionable and so he twisted the truth to make excuses for it. An act that in itself is also unconscionable.

And one more thing, after this latest incident, why is the 700 Club still on the air 5 days a week on local station WSMV?

Fear that they are losing their powerful ideological grip on American political culture and desperation as the gravy train they’ve been traveling on for too long begins to dry up.

As their fear and desperation increases, so do their lies.

Local conservative talker Steve Gill got caught by the Sumner County Democrats lying about a Vol State class. Is it right that his listeners called the college to harass a professor based on Gill’s lies? No, it’s irresponsible broadcasting.

During one of his shows last week, Steve Gill took aim at a Vol State class that encougrages meaningful community service with instruction, a widely recognized and respected concept called “service-learning” Listen:

Download audio file (SG-volstate.mp3)

…98% of what he and his caller say are lies. The class isn’t connected to http://serve.gov/, nor is it connected to ACORN, nor does it require students to dig ditches. The 2% that is not a lie? Jennifer Pitts teaches at Vol State! Not surprisingly, Volunteer State has been flooded with calls denouncing the “liberal professor” and her “crony of the Democratic party” boss.

If you have a free moment, please call 230-3501 or write Warren.Nichols@volstate.edu to express your support for their mission and to express your disapproval for the hatred and lies of Steve Gill.

And Tom Kovach is spreading the lie that started at Breitbart.tv and quickly spread through the right-wing echo chamber that “community organizers” were “praying” to Obama. Tom wants you to be very afraid. But Tom is lying. He is desperate. An afraid.

And Fox News is lying about another Obama Admin official. This time it’s that Kevin Jennings of the Dept. of Education “cover[ed] up statutory rape” in Massachusetts and wants to “turn” your child gay. Hannity is after Mr. Jennings as is minions at the Washington Times. But they are also lying.

Mendacity. It’s oozing out of the pores of radical right-wing commentators everywhere.

John McCain, who has risen to political prominence on his image as a Vietnam POW war hero, has, inexplicably, worked very hard to hide from the public stunning information about American prisoners in Vietnam who, unlike him, didn’t return home. Throughout his Senate career, McCain has quietly sponsored and pushed into federal law a set of prohibitions that keep the most revealing information about these men buried as classified documents. Thus the war hero people would logically imagine to be a determined crusader for the interests of POWs and their families became instead the strange champion of hiding the evidence and closing the books.

You can put lipstick on a lie, but it’s still a lie.