Why do we pay attention to televangelists?
CNN has an insipid front page article right now talking about how Pat Robertson predicts a massive terrorist attack on the United States in 2007.
VIRGINIA BEACH, Virginia (AP) — Evangelical broadcaster Pat Robertson said Tuesday that God has told him that a terrorist attack on the United States would cause a “mass killing” late in 2007.
“I’m not necessarily saying it’s going to be nuclear,” he said during his news-and-talk television show “The 700 Club” on the Christian Broadcasting Network.
“The Lord didn’t say nuclear. But I do believe it will be something like that.”
Robertson said God told him about the impending tragedy during a recent prayer retreat.
God also said, he claims, that major cities and possibly millions of people will be affected by the attack, which should take place sometime after September.
Why does this make the front page news? Pat Robertson has just as much standing to make these predictions as the homeless loony who proclaims “The end times are near”. Who honestly believes that God is personally talking to Pat Robertson and giving him some kind of special information? Why is this reported on the front page as if it matters? By sheer virtue of acting as if these ridiculous prophecies as newsworthy, CNN is giving Pat Robertson undue credibility.
The article also points out that Pat Robertson made the (utterly false) prediction that 2006 would be a bad hurricane/tsunami year, but gives some weight to his hand-waving rationalization.
In May, Robertson said God told him that storms and possibly a tsunami were to crash into America’s coastline in 2006.
Even though the U.S. was not hit with a tsunami, Robertson on Tuesday cited last spring’s heavy rains and flooding in New England as partly fulfilling the prediction.
Unfortunately, it’s not so easy to rationalize away a false prediction of a terrorist attack. Pat Robertson has frequently gotten these “predictions” of his dead wrong, and it is obvious to any logical observer that he has no more predictive power than the average person making an educated guess. So why is he paid so much heed? One word: faith. Some idiots actually believe this nonsense.
