Despite the reality that it's America's conservative Christians who are attempting to foist their biblically based anti-gay, anti-abortion agenda on the rest of us, in their alternate reality, they are the ones being persecuted. As the mouthpiece for the church of the perpetually besieged Christian, Fox News constantly advances this bogus persecution narrative and nobody embodies this narrative more than, sweet mercy, Todd Starnes, a Jesus loving, homo hating Brooklyn non-hipster whose very existence is consumed with ferreting out examples, regardless of their veracity, of how those Jesus hating, homo loving secularists are out to destroy Christianity. Friday night, Laura Ingraham spoke to Starnes about persecuted Christians and in so doing helped him pimp his new book which is about - you guessed it - persecuted Christians!
Culture warrior queen, Laura Ingraham, filled in for Bill on Friday night. Wearing her great, big, Catholic cross (because she's a great, big, Catholic) she started off the "Back of the Book" segment with this doozy: "The Factor prides itself on fighting the good fight when it comes to the culture war." (Oh, like saying that "clustered" gays near children, is "insane?") She continued: "We often cover stories that you won't hear about in the mainstream media." (Right, because they're total bullshit!) She introduced her guest, the aforementioned culture warrior and gay pride parade thong connoisseur, Todd Starnes who, as Stephen Colbert pointed out, is definitely "not a lesbian."
Starnes started off his litany of persecution. He claimed "high ranking officers" have told him that they have "been told to hide their faith." He spoke about military training sessions during which soldiers were told that Catholics and evangelicals were religious extremists. According to Politifact this is mostly false because it was one training session which was not done by the military, but by an individual. The military addressed the issue upon receiving complaints. He mentioned other examples of good Christian soldiers being told that homophobic hate groups are, well, hate groups. He didn't mention that these training programs have been halted. Ingraham looked incredulous as he continued to bloviate about how this is an example of "President Obama's military." Ingraham asked what the reaction would be if a solider was told that they couldn't give money to GLAAD or that GLAAD has controversial views.
Starnes then proceeded to tell a *great, big, fat lie when he claimed that, an Air Force airman was "ordered, by his lesbian commander, to reveal his personal held position on gay marriage and when he refused to do so, he had to suffer the consequences." He claimed that there is "an all out assault in the military" because Pres. Obama "has turned the military into a social engineering petri dish and if they're able to implement this attack on Christianity, it's a war on religious liberty." He continued to whine: "But they're coming after Christians if they're able to come after Christians in the military they're certainly going to be able to do that in the general population." Ingraham prompted him to talk about "the war on Christians in the public schools."
He talked about how his book is "flavored with southern sensibilities." (Like segregated facilities, creationism as science, KKK night riders....???) He provided a real yuk when he quipped that he feels "like a Duck Dynasty guy living in a Miley Cyrus world." He claimed that "young Christian students are coming under fierce attack. He praised Fox boy hero Roy Costner who "had his graduation speech censored by his school." Starnes didn't mention that Coster didn't give the speech but instead said "the Lord's Prayer." Ingraham praised his "terrific" book as a "must read." (If you want a flavor of Toddles' book, check out this review. Rather than "must read," it's a must vomit!)
Poor Toddles. Do I hear the sound of a whambulance?
*The Air Force has determined that Phillip Monk's claims, as articulated by Starnes, are unsubstantiated. The Military Times reports that the Air Force found that “The weight of the evidence shows that religion was never discussed between the two" and that “In the end, this is a case about command authority, good order and discipline, and civil rights — not religious freedoms."