At one time, and for quite a long time, I proudly called myself a "New Lifer." After all, New Life Church is where I came to know G-d, and there was always a flurry of activity that allowed fellow believers to fellowship. Obviously, I no longer feel the same way. Numerous theological issues kept popping up, some so slightly off that I am hard pressed to even identify them. More immediately noticable is how the focus has changed from saving souls to filling seats. But I digress.
Pastor Ted Haggard is also the president of the National Association of Evangelicals, and has stated that he may soon be running for Congress. In today's Gazette is an article on Pastor Haggard trying to apologize to the (tyrant) Venezuelan President, Hugo Chavez, for the assasination comment made by Pat Robertson. Robertson made a shrewd assesment of the situation, and one that should not be ignored, and certainly not apologized for.
Who is Chavez? Joseph Farah wrote an item on that today, stating "This is a man who, according to his former pilot, paid $1 million to al-Qaida after Sept. 11 – a kind of reward for a job well done.
He rigs elections in his country and has brought nothing but misery to his people – expropriating millions of acres of privately held land, jailing dissidents, banning civilian ownership of guns, bedding down with Colombia's narco-terrrorists, propping up Castro in better style than the old Soviet Union ever did, buying nuclear material from Spain and attempting to build a 2-million-man army in a country not threatened by any external forces.
The chances are excellent that some day – sooner or later – American troops are going to have to deal with Chavez. "
To deal now, or to deal later? That is the question.