Apparently, Fox News loved Rev. Franklin Graham’s amateur prescription for fighting ISIS so much, the “fair and balanced” network got him to do it on prime time. This time, Graham worked in an “Obama’s a secret Muslim” dog whistle while he was at it.
You may recall that on April 20, Graham – who has not a single credential in national security, terrorism or combat – gave his completely unqualified opinions for all of the above on The Real Story with Gretchen Carlson. Apparently, the suits at Fox News loved his remarks so much, they found a pretext for him to do it all over again on The O’Reilly Factor.
Host Eric Bolling teed up the attacks for Graham by asking, “Why is President Obama so silent on all the atrocities going on against the Christians around the world?”
GRAHAM: I can’t answer that question. …As a youth, his influence was Islam. His father was a Muslim and his stepfather was a Muslim, he went to Muslim schools so growing up, his impressions as a young man came from Islam, not the Christian faith. So that may have something to do with it, I don’t know.
Actually, President Obama’s father, who left the family when his son was two, was an atheist. Fox’s own Alan Colmes has corrected the record on Fox News previously. Yet Bolling let Graham’s falsehood stand.
Instead, Bolling further validated Graham’s “credentials” by asking, “Did (Obama) make a mistake pulling troops out of Iraq too soon?”
“No question,” “national security expert” Graham replied. “As a result, we now have ISIS. …And now we have a mess on our hands and the president and his policies are responsible for this.”
“General” Graham called the airstrikes against ISIS “almost too little, too late.” He also said, “I’m afraid, the United States is going to have to put troops back into Iraq which I would hate to see. But that may be the only way to defeat ISIS."
Bolling also prodded Graham to attack Obama as anti-Christian. “Why would he be calling out Christians in history” Bolling asked, referring to Obama's remarks at the National Prayer Breakfast and the Easter Prayer Breakfast?
Graham used that as an opportunity to both attack Muslims and boast about his own Christ-like qualities (just pay no attention to how he was deliberately slandering his fellow Christian who happens to be President of the U.S.).
GRAHAM: I don’t understand where he’s coming from, who’s advising him. …God will forgive any one of their sins if they’re willing to put their faith and trust in his son, Jesus Christ. And as a Christian, I want to follow Christ and I want to emulate Christ and I want to do good to all men.
Islam – the God of Islam – requires you to die for him. My God, the god that I worship, he died for me. And he’s willing to save me and forgive me if I put my faith and trust in his son. But Islam, the Muslims want to emulate their prophet Mohammed. Mohammed raped, he murdered, he killed and so we’re seeing the followers of Islam emulate the prophet Mohammed.
Even if you give Graham the benefit of the doubt that he was not blowing another “secret Muslim” dog whistle there, Graham was clearly inferring that Obama’s softness on Islam could get us all killed.
GRAHAM: And it’s not just the Muslims in the Middle East. We have to be careful of the Muslims in this country. We need to stop the immigration. We need immigration reform, but stop the immigration of Muslims coming to this country from countries that have active terrorist cells. If we don’t stop that, we’re going to regret that because we will be importing that into this country. Sooner or later, we’re going to see a major terrorist attack …just like we saw what happened in Kenya recently. …That could happen in this country. And so I hope that our politicians will close the door to these people.
Bolling never challenged a word.
Watch it below, from the April 24 The O’Reilly Factor, via Media Matters.
“….Muslims die for their god; the Christian god has died for us…” And Christian martyrs are what then?
Unfortunately, for me, the heavenly breath of god
was too and heavy. He has every right to exist….but he’s annoying.
That’s what appears to be ‘persecution’ of christianists here in America: non-believing.
And I seem to recall his own father’s ministry holding up the example of all the poor Christians in Russia and China and other places behind the Iron and Bamboo Curtains, who were so willing to worship Christ that they accepted torture and harsh imprisonment (the latter frequently leading to death). In fact, as I recall, the old Billy Graham Crusades (speaking of Christians who took up arms “for the faith”) used the idea of people who “fought—and died—for their faith” to help fund his work.
And doesn’t that whole “Revelation” book (at the end of the Bible) exist solely for the idea of “fighting FOR Jesus?”