Point of View June 24, 2024 – Hour 2 : Issues in the News with Gary Bauer

[00:00:00] Across America, live. This is Point of View Radio Talk Show.

[00:00:43] Commentary Today, my commentary which you can find on the website, The Viewpoint's Commentary on Illegal Immigrant Terrorists. Gary Bauer, always great to have you on the program. Same here, Kirby. You know, every time I hear you introduce me as being the former domestic

[00:00:59] policy advisor to Reagan, I have to pinch myself. Did that really happen? Was there really a Ronald Reagan president and did I work for him? I mean, the country now under this failed leadership, it's hard to imagine when things were going so well in America.

[00:01:16] You know, I was thinking about you the other day because we were hearing about this idea of deep fakes and defective videos and all that, and I was thinking back when you were the chief domestic policy advisor that if Sam Donaldson had asked about the mental ability

[00:01:33] of Ronald Reagan, don't you know that Marlon Fitzwater, if that existed back then, would have said, well those are just deep fakes that your media have created. It would have been such a convenient answer. But again, we are headed towards a presidential debate

[00:01:48] on Thursday and I think anybody that's convinced that these are deep fakes or that these are fake videos really needs to get some kind of a mental checkup because it's pretty obvious what's going on right before our very eyes. Don't you wish Marlon Fitzwater had that in

[00:02:05] his bag of tricks back then when Sam Donaldson was asking tough questions every single day? Boy, don't I wish that. Yes, things are considered completely normal now that this White House can do. That would have never worked if we would have employed them in the Reagan administration

[00:02:25] or even if Donald Trump would have tried employing them in his first term in office. But that's the age we're in right now. You know Kirby, I dare not question Donald Trump's judgment

[00:02:39] because he's got such great instincts. But man, it seems to me that this debate, he agreed to some details that I think it's going to make a real challenge for him and makes it unfortunately a lot easier for Biden. Yeah, I know sometimes it'll be three against one.

[00:02:57] Well, we understand that and that's where the game gets played and all the rest. But it will be difficult because if you're going to try to address the number one issue for voters, that's immigration. And everybody that goes to the Point of View website or

[00:03:11] maybe is already on your website have read you talk about the fact that we have another example of more open border victims. And the other day I thought there was another great Gary Bauer quote because the President Joe Biden said, you know the American people don't

[00:03:28] understand. And you came back with, well I think Rachel Morin's family understands and Lake and Riley's family understands and every angel mom and father understands. So there is this unwillingness to acknowledge that we have people that are dying because

[00:03:46] people are allowed to go across the border that are criminals. Your thoughts? Well, thanks Kirby and thank you for also taking on this issue for quite a while now. You know, this

[00:04:01] is something I never thought I would see because it seems that almost points into a flaw in our system. The courts, as you know, have ruled that states cannot do much on this because it's the responsibility of the executive branch of government and the federal government.

[00:04:18] So we have a president and his allies in Congress that won't do anything to restrict this flow of so-called migrants into the country. And it's causing more, there's a migrant crime wave. There are American citizens of all races who are dying or being raped or

[00:04:40] robbed at the hands of people that should not be in America. That alone is a colossal failure by this president. A failure of what the number one purpose of a federal government

[00:04:55] is, which is to keep us all safe. And Kirby, I can't help but think as we see some of these things leaking out now that some percentage of these people that have entered the country

[00:05:09] are going to end up voting. There's been stories on this and it makes me wonder whether that was one of the goals all along. Yes. Well, and again, just before I take a break, I thought there's a time when Gary

[00:05:22] Bauer and Kirby Anderson sometimes think alike and that is I was struck by the fact last week that we found out that some of these individuals that actually came across the border from Tajikistan, and in my commentary, Karen even put a picture of Tajikistan so

[00:05:38] you can see that comes from a really bad area of the world, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Communist China, whatever, which is a hotbed for radical Islamic terrorism. Not only did these individuals come here from Tajikistan and are part of the group ISIS-K, which was

[00:05:54] the group that was responsible for at least four of the people in the attack of the Moscow concert hall, eight of these guys were ISIS-K, but isn't that they snuck across? They weren't

[00:06:03] part of the two million gotaways, but instead they, at least one of them used an app provided by the Biden administration and it looks like all of them were intercepted by the border patrol and allowed to come here and they were planning a terrorist attack.

[00:06:20] Yes, no question about it. The media ought to be ashamed of themselves for not zeroing in on this in a way that every American would hear about it. The media is not asking any questions about why all of a sudden tens of thousands of people from Communist China

[00:06:37] are crossing our border. You would think there'd be a little bit of journalistic curiosity about that. Kirby, there ought to be, here's a basic rule that ought to be in place. If the border patrol thinks they've got to put an ankle bracelet on you to track you, you

[00:06:52] probably shouldn't be allowed in the country. Well said. Yes, and you know one of the people we've had both in studio and by phone is Gordon Chang and you know who he is as well because you quote him. And again, we have a record

[00:07:05] breaking number of Chinese illegal aliens. Most of them are military age. We have, of course, these individuals from Tajikistan. The other day, of course, in New York City, they pulled over somebody that had a vehicle full of loaded magazines, body armor and

[00:07:23] everything else. And then to say that, well, we're safe and to be assured with all sorts of confidence by the Homeland Secretary Alejandro Mejores that yes, we vet these individuals. I think there is a need for somebody to take a polygraph test or something because they're

[00:07:41] just not telling us the truth. There aren't enough polygraph machines in the United States to cover all the people that need to take one. And Kirby, let's not forget about the fact that for months now,

[00:07:55] U.S. military bases, Navy bases, Marine Corps bases, Army bases, there's been efforts by people that have entered the country illegally during this surge to penetrate the perimeters of these bases. Now they end up getting caught, but a lot of the experts think that these

[00:08:16] are basic probes, getting information, checking out what security does. And it leads to the belief that something big is being planned that could hurt the United States very dearly. Let's take a break. I'm sure that Gary Bauer has a few other comments about what's been

[00:08:33] happening on the campus, the anti-Semitism, the lack of any prosecution by the Manhattan District Attorney and a few others. And we'll certainly get to more of those conversations with Gary Bauer right after this. This is Viewpoints with Kirby Anderson.

[00:09:02] Depending on the news source you have, you may or may not have heard about the arrest of eight individuals from Tajikistan who are suspected terrorists. In case you're unfamiliar with that country, it is at least 95% Muslim and located near Afghanistan, Pakistan and

[00:09:16] Communist China. Put another way, they come from a country that has been a hotbed for radical Islamic terrorism. The FBI and other intelligence agencies believe that these eight illegal aliens were planning a terrorist attack like the attack on the Moscow concert hall.

[00:09:32] At least four of the men involved in that attack were from the group ISIS-K. All eight of these men were connected to ISIS-K. How did they get into the U.S.? First, let's remember that President Joe Biden and Homeland Secretary Alejandro Mejores assure us that people crossing

[00:09:47] our border have been vetted. Second, we now know that at least one of these individuals used the app provided by the Biden administration that allowed people to get into the country. Third, some of the others apparently were intercepted by border security and supposedly

[00:10:01] vetted and set on their way. Let that sink in for a moment. These men are not gotaways that I sometimes talk about in my commentaries. Yes, eight million have crossed the border since President Biden took office and another two million are gotaways that I usually suggest

[00:10:15] may be involved in trafficking or terrorism and did not want to be caught. But these men were confident they could game the system. They didn't even try to avoid being caught. And it might mention that another potential terrorist was caught in New York City with

[00:10:29] a full arsenal of weapons in his vehicle such as loaded magazines and body armor. This is the danger America faces from an open border and a vetting process that is broken. I'm Kirby Anderson and that's my point of view. For a free copy of Kirby's booklet, A Biblical

[00:10:50] View on Inflation, go to viewpoints.info slash inflation. That's viewpoints.info slash inflation. You're listening to Point of View, your listener supported source for truth. Back for a few more minutes with Gary Bauer again. We have made available his Friday end

[00:11:08] of day report must reading for all of you. And of course, we've talked about his open article about open border victims. But there's another one and it relates to double standards. That is, we over the last couple of months, certainly Gary have been talking about the

[00:11:24] district attorney in Manhattan, Alvin Bragg, who wanted to bring and did bring a case against Donald Trump. And I kept even saying at the time that when we had all the activity there at Columbia, it was quite likely that there would be two different standards of justice.

[00:11:42] One for the former president of the United States, another for the pro Hamas rioters who were engaged in what the mainstream media says, mostly peaceful. But it wasn't when they broke into Hamilton Hall, destroyed material. There was physical violence. They were assaulting

[00:11:58] and harassing Jewish students. And now we hear that no surprise, unfortunately, to those of us that tend to be a little bit cynical, that Alvin Bragg is dropping all the charges. And look, they're so brazen about it at this point. I mean, the charges against Donald

[00:12:18] Trump that required him to sit in that courtroom week after week, obviously intended to keep him off the campaign trail. Many legal experts, even ones that are not sympathetic to Trump, have said that the charges themselves were absurd. I think it was even Cuomo who said

[00:12:37] the other day, if this guy's last name was not Trump, these things would not even have been brought up in a court of law. But then you turn around where you have an obvious case of riot, trespass on private property, all the things that happened going into that

[00:12:55] building at the university and then holding the building for hours until police went in and arrested a lot of folks. On that, Bragg can't find any grounds to really pursue the cases. And his excuse that, well, they were wearing masks and it's hard to identify people.

[00:13:14] Well, they were virtually all of them arrested inside the building. So it doesn't matter if they were wearing masks. They were arraigned. They were fingerprinted. Their names and addresses were taken down. I presume the police asked them to take their mask off. No doubt the mug

[00:13:32] shots would have been taken. So it's obviously another example that the left, the message that's being sent to the left's foot soldiers is you can do anything you want. You'll never have to pay a price. And the message that's being sent to not only Donald Trump, but to

[00:13:49] pro-life peaceful demonstrators, to conservatives, to parents, to Christians, is that if you do anything out of the lines that we've drawn, you will pay a big price and you will regret it.

[00:14:05] Yes. And again, about five years ago, we did a booklet that we make available to our donors on anti-Semitism. But I revised that again because who would have guessed that anti-Semitism would go from bad to worse using this idea of intersectionality and a number of other

[00:14:22] things. And so this, ever since October 7th, has been a, I think, a wake-up call for a lot of individuals. And yet I would love to get your thoughts because nobody is a greater

[00:14:33] supporter of Israel than you are. But when I listen to President Biden talk about a two-state solution, I think he's talking about Michigan and Minnesota. That's a great line, Kirby. You ought to have a radio show. Oh, wait a minute. You do have

[00:14:47] a radio show. You're exactly right. He's playing politics with something that no government official in the United States should ever play politics with, the anti-Semitism that you summarized so well. We saw another example over the weekend when these hateful demonstrators

[00:15:09] literally went to a synagogue and tried to block entrances. Just the act of going to demonstrate at an American synagogue because you disagree with Israel's foreign and national defense policies is itself an act of anti-Semitism. What does that synagogue have to do with what

[00:15:32] the government of Israel is or is not doing? But the lack of denunciation of that, the lack of accountability, the two-state solution idea has been poking around forever. The only place I can find a poll that shows favorability for it is among the elites in Washington,

[00:15:54] D.C. Not only does Israel reject it, but most Palestinians in Gaza reject the idea. They have a one-state solution in which Jews in the Middle East are a minority. The majority would be Muslim Arabs and others, and that would just be another state where human rights are

[00:16:17] violated and Jews would be discriminated against. Let me just mention that before we go any further, one of the reasons we love to have you on, especially as we come to our fiscal year end, is to, of course, remind people how important it

[00:16:30] is to support various ministries. And as I said at the outset, we bring in not only people that help us understand why it would be important to support Point of View, but also to support your organization because American values oftentimes has been our eyes and ears in Washington,

[00:16:46] D.C. You've heard me say so many times that your end-of-day report is required reading. So what would you say? Because I certainly will encourage people to support you. I do. But I know that you also are encouraging our listeners to support Point of View.

[00:17:01] No question about it, Kirby. In fact, as the time was passing by here, I thought to myself, has Kirby forgotten that there's a budget to have to be met? Look, it would take me all day

[00:17:14] to summarize all the things that Point of View has done to help us at least have a chance in this battle. One of the things the Left wants to do is just cut off all sources of true information.

[00:17:29] In fact, they label true information misinformation or lies or hate speech. There aren't many outlets left, unfortunately, but Point of View is right up there with the creme de la creme of the ones that still exist of telling the people that tune into your show

[00:17:50] the information they need if they're going to be good, responsible citizens and be able to cut their way through all the lies that are being promoted by the Left. So I urge any listener that has followed me,

[00:18:05] has been a supporter of my work this month, certainly, to take those funds and support your work, Kirby, and support Point of View. I love what you do. I can't imagine how I would have won some of the battles

[00:18:19] I won without the support that you gave me on Point of View. And I hope it continues to grow and is well-funded so you don't have to waste much time doing this, and you can spend all of it telling the truth about faith, family, and freedom.

[00:18:35] Ken, we have a link also to your website, Our American Values, and I would encourage you to support Gary. But just in about the minute or two left, let's talk about the interesting debate so early.

[00:18:46] I think you and I have been around for a long time. I can never remember a debate taking place in June, a presidential debate, and it will be interesting. And even with some of those limitations that may be favored

[00:19:00] Joe Biden, what's he going to be talking about other than just to say the other guy is so bad because the economy is not doing very well? Certainly we've talked about immigration, we've talked about Israel,

[00:19:09] there's three I's right there, and we go down the list of the alphabet, we can find very few successes so I don't know how you can defend your last three and a half years, but we'll see where it goes.

[00:19:21] I agree, Kirby. I don't think the guy's got anything he can point to, and that means it could be a long, long debate with him just repeating lie after lie about the former President Trump as they've been doing for years now.

[00:19:38] That certainly wouldn't serve the American people. I also agree with you, it's awfully early, suspiciously so. It makes me wonder whether somebody thought maybe we ought to see Joe perform, and if he can't do it in this debate

[00:19:54] we still have time to pull some shenanigans and end up nominating somebody else. Well, some of us have said that and we will see, but certainly I can't wait to see Gary Bauer's end of day report

[00:20:07] this Friday after you've watched, I'm sure you and I will both watch the debate on Thursday so other people don't have to, but it will be interesting. Matter of fact, I think this may be one of the most watched presidential debates ever

[00:20:20] because there's just so much at stake, so we'll see where it goes, but if nothing else, it is always just a great delight to be on the program. I would encourage people to find out more about American Values, we have those links on our website

[00:20:32] and Gary, you're a great friend and a great team member, and it's always great to have you with us. The pleasure is all mine, Kirby, keep up the great work, and folks, while you're thinking about it, go right now

[00:20:43] and make a donation to Point of View to keep Kirby fighting the good fight for the things we love and care about. What a great setup, 800-347-5151 if you would like to make that donation online, it's at pointofview.net

[00:21:00] or if you'd like to call, 800-347-5151, either way works for you, but when we come back, we've got a couple other very important issues to address, I thought it would be worthwhile to talk about that.

[00:21:11] We even talked about this idea of censorship and the rest, well Katie Pavlich has a piece about that, and before it's done, we do have some scandals that probably need a mention or two in the clergy, so we'll talk about that right after these important messages.

[00:21:27] Americans need news they can trust, and wouldn't it be nice if our leaders began implementing at least some conservative and common sense policies? But even those things wouldn't be enough to fully restore the clarity we need because above all, we need a return to biblical truth.

[00:21:52] And that is why for over 50 years, Point of View's first commitment has been restoring a biblical worldview to our culture and it is working. Here's a comment from Thomasine, a Point of View listener in South Carolina.

[00:22:08] Kirby Anderson and his guests are great teachers to those of us who need help understanding national and world events from a biblical perspective. You can equip more listeners like Thomasine by supporting Point of View. Help Americans build and live out the biblical worldview our nation needs.

[00:22:30] Give today at pointofview.net or call 1-800-347-5151. That's pointofview.net and 800-347-5151. Point of View will continue after this. You are listening to Point of View.

[00:23:03] The opinions expressed on Point of View do not necessarily reflect the views of the management or staff of this station. And now, here again is Kirby Anderson. Final half hour, let me just mention that as a program note, tomorrow we have Lathan Watsabe in studio with us.

[00:23:19] He is the vice president of Alliance Defending Freedom. We're going to be talking about some things happening in Europe. Why? Because what happens in Europe sometimes comes to the United States.

[00:23:28] We'll also be talking about a couple of cases that they're dealing with right now here in the United States that you need to know about and the whole issue of religious freedom and religious liberty. We'll be getting into that with him. Wednesday, Penedexter will be in studio.

[00:23:41] She was supposed to be with us last week and that didn't work out, so we'll be talking about some of the commentary she's done. Also on the anniversary of the legalization, if you will, by the Supreme Court of same-sex marriage.

[00:23:51] Thursday we have Robert Knight and Chuck Bantley. Of course, they are certainly regulars that we've had with us as well. And then on Friday we have Kelly Shackelford and Meryl Matthews.

[00:24:01] So I'd say this is a pretty good week and that's one of the reasons why we put together this group of individuals. You've already had a chance to hear from George Barna and Gary Bauer.

[00:24:11] And I'd love to hear from you maybe later this week as we open up the phones. But let's just for the next few minutes address some of the topics Gary surfaced but get into in more detail.

[00:24:22] And that is easily illustrated by this piece by Katie Pavlich in which she said, look, you know, you have the White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, and for months they've been talking about misinformation or disinformation.

[00:24:39] You'd think after a while they'd get off of it. Well, they finally did. Cheap fakes. That's the latest one. These videos that supposedly show President Biden staring off into space or losing track of where he is or wandering off.

[00:24:55] Well, these are just cheap fakes that have been created. They aren't really anything at all, or maybe they're manipulated so that would make them deep fakes. And of course, that's what she said. This is something coming from your part of the world, calling them cheap fakes and misinformation.

[00:25:12] We're seeing these deep fakes, these manipulated videos. It is all done in bad faith. OK, it is a little hard to take that seriously because I think we can still pretty much pick out when something has been digitally manipulated.

[00:25:27] As a matter of fact, as I pointed out the other day, if you go to Instagram and I post some of my pictures on Instagram and other places like that,

[00:25:36] you will see that if they can detect and they usually can whether or not something has been digitally altered. Maybe if all you did was change the lighting in Lightroom, it will have a disclaimer there.

[00:25:49] So, of course, these different videos are really obviously showing an individual who is 81 and will soon be 82 before he would be reelected. And as I shared before, we had one guest that said, look, I'm 28. It's not really exciting to want to vote for somebody who's reversed my age, 82.

[00:26:13] But again, having to be led in the right direction and all the rest and then to say that those are cheap fakes. Well, that's a little bit much. And I think Kenny Pavlich says the cheap fake videos are as fake as the Hunter Biden laptop.

[00:26:28] In other words, they're not fake. And we've also learned a lot more about that because after the court case with Hunter Biden,

[00:26:36] nobody's denying what's on the laptop now, even though there were 50 different individuals associated with or actually in the intelligence community that said they all have this all laptop had the look of Russian disinformation and all the rest. But again, we're not the only people bringing this up.

[00:26:57] We can see that the latest polls that have come out through Associated Press show that two thirds or 63 percent of U.S.

[00:27:07] adults said they lack confidence in President Biden's mental capability to serve effectively as president, which is why I said there may be a lot of people watching Thursday night.

[00:27:19] We'll see how that goes. And of course, you can recognize that this game has been played for some time because then Katie Pavlich reminds us of the former White House press secretary. That would be Jen Psaki said we've increased disinformation research and tracking.

[00:27:36] We're flagging problematic posts for Facebook that spread disinformation. It's important to take faster action against harmful posts and Facebook needs to move more and more quickly to remove those harmful posts. And so that's what was happening in 2020.

[00:27:54] But as Katie Pavlich points out, that was 2020 when Twitter censored negative stories that would help Team Biden or even in the first three years of the Biden administration. But Elon Musk now owns Twitter and has rebranded it as X.

[00:28:13] And last summer, a federal judge also slapped down the Biden administration's systemic censorship of things on the Internet that were inconvenient, leading to, of course, this lawsuit by the state of Missouri, which, by the way, we'll probably be talking about by the end of this week because who knows?

[00:28:33] Supreme Court might rule on some of that. So the point she makes at the very end is, is now that Team Biden can't pressure social media companies to censor information. They're resorting to desperate claims that what people see with their own eyes is fake.

[00:28:48] I don't think you're faking faked out by that or convinced of it. She says that tactic won't carry them very far and certainly won't ease concern from voters about Biden's mental acuity.

[00:29:01] Instead of making Biden or his physician available to the media for questioning to combat accusations that the president slipping behind closed doors or to refute the special counsel report done by Robert Her. You might remember that one, which said Biden is an elderly man with poor memory.

[00:29:18] The communication shop keeps them both hidden. There are ways to mitigate the situation. It is obvious that why other options cannot be deployed.

[00:29:27] So it's a reminder that we've been in this realm of censorship for some time, and I think it's just a reminder of some of the illustrations that are going to be surfacing during the campaign and some of the techniques that might be used.

[00:29:46] But just before we take a break, let me just mention that during the particular debate, I know some things are going to come up. And the first that's going to come up is a claim because we were just saying a minute ago, what would President Biden claim?

[00:30:02] Well, I think he has oftentimes claimed that he's created so many jobs. OK, that is actually somewhat true, but terribly misleading.

[00:30:13] That is, when you come off of the pandemic and lockdown and a lot of people don't have jobs and then you remove the lockdown within the jobs come back.

[00:30:21] So a lot of this so-called job growth is simply, if you will, like stretching a rubber band and then letting it go or whatever illustration you want to use. It was sort of a snapback from what was existing before the time of the pandemic.

[00:30:40] And I think if Donald Trump is wise, he'll just point out that if you compare the number of jobs now to the number of jobs that existed before the pandemic, the jobs are still lower. But there's another aspect of that that nobody's really talked about.

[00:30:56] So I thought I would. And that is, if you look at all the jobs that have actually been created, half of them have been created in two states. You probably can guess which ones, Texas and Florida.

[00:31:11] So, again, let's acknowledge that jobs have been created, but the jobs that have been created have been in low tax, low regulation states. Neither of those have a state income tax, for example.

[00:31:28] And as a result, because of that, the highest share of job creation has come from two states. The other 48 are the other half. So that's pretty good. And you might wonder about the other half.

[00:31:47] I don't know, Massachusetts, New York and California, which have high wages, but they also have high taxes. And so you can actually begin to look at the map that many people have created. And you can see that there are a couple of states which have done very well.

[00:32:06] And, of course, the two best would be Texas and Florida. And then there are other states that have done very poorly. And, of course, I just mentioned a few and a couple of others kind of in the Midwest.

[00:32:17] So, again, when you are claiming that you have created jobs, first of all, let's be honest that I think presidents, and you've heard me say this so many times, presidents sometimes get too much criticism for down economic circumstances.

[00:32:32] And presidents take too much credit for up economic circumstances because presidents don't really create jobs. Small businesses and corporations create the jobs. But the benefit is that if you have an environment, a pro-business environment, as some of these states do,

[00:32:51] or as a country does, those jobs will be created. So, anyway, as there will be a lot of throwing back and forth about jobs that are created, can I just point out one very obvious statistic?

[00:33:04] And that is more than half of all of the new jobs in America were created either in Texas or in Florida. What do those particular states have in common? If you want to have more jobs and you want to have more people working,

[00:33:20] maybe some of the things those two states are doing should be actually exported to the rest of the country. Don't think it's going to happen. But it's just another fact to have in your mental arsenal as you listen to the debate that will take place on Thursday.

[00:33:36] We'll take a break and come back with more right after this. ... minutes, and I don't really relish talking about this, but there are scandals in the Christian church. Sometimes it is better to ignore some of those because oftentimes I use the grid of faith, family, and freedom.

[00:34:15] And if this scandal happens in a small church or in an isolated part of the country, as important as it is to address that maybe in the local community, in the congregation, it doesn't necessarily merit talking about that on a national level.

[00:34:31] But for the last week and a half, the Christian Post has covered the scandal of Robert Morris. And also it seemed appropriate to mention it at least because five years ago, although I've never met him, we did do an interview on his book by phone.

[00:34:49] And of course it is a very significant, if you will, megachurch. And because it's gotten so much coverage, I think it deserves at least a mention. And it's not the only scandal right now that we could talk about.

[00:35:03] There are some people in different areas of Christian radio that cover, you know, false teachings, scandals, and all the rest. That's not something we do every day here on Point of View.

[00:35:13] But it's worth mentioning in this particular case because it also involves someone else who's been on the program with a little more regularity, and that is James Robison. And James Robison the other day felt the need to go out and clarify some of the misinformation about that.

[00:35:29] And so that's why I thought it would be worth covering. Now, if you go to the website, it's the last article here. The Christian Post has numerous articles, and I've just picked this particular one that came out on Saturday, in which it says, Robert Morris Scandal.

[00:35:44] James Robison refutes claims he met with a victim's family and knew that she was 12. There's a lot more to this story than apparently we thought because you had Robert Morris who has been, of course, identified as an individual

[00:36:01] who was indeed abusing a 12-year-old girl when he was with the family. And so since then has resigned from Gateway Church in South Lake, Texas. But because this might indirectly implicate someone else that we've had on the program, James Robison,

[00:36:23] I just thought it would be worth mentioning, and then I have a few final comments. And that is James Robison with his wife Betty at his side addressed the allegations in a video. You can watch the video. There's a link to it there, which was posted on Friday,

[00:36:38] in which he vehemently denied having any prior knowledge of the meetings between Robert Morris and the victim's family, or even knowing the age of the victim when the abuse took place in the 1980s.

[00:36:53] Now there have been all sorts of people that said, why did this come out now? And again, you can follow the links to follow all of that. But nevertheless, on Tuesday of last week, Robert Morris did resign from the Mega Church,

[00:37:07] which attracts in round numbers about 100,000 worshippers across its campuses. Hence also the reason to talk about it as well. Admitted to, of course, what's called inappropriate sexual behavior with a young lady.

[00:37:21] But that's what started most of the controversy because young lady sounds to me like somebody in their 20s. No, this was an individual. And since we now know the person who's come forward, Cindy Clemshire, when she was just 12 years of age. Okay, now you're talking about something else.

[00:37:43] I think more than just sexually inappropriate behavior. You're talking about something that could be potentially criminal. And so again, this is where it was important for James Robison to clear his name.

[00:37:58] And I'm glad he took the time to do so because he says people have been asking questions about my relationship with Robert. Some people are claiming that I was present when Robert met with the victim's family in 1987. And I knew the girl's age when these incidents took place.

[00:38:14] That is false. It is a lie. And of course, the televangelist, that is James Robison, went on to say that the victim corrected the record after an initial news report.

[00:38:25] James Robison stated he possesses a statement from the victim's attorney affirming that he was not present at any meeting Morris had with the victim's family. He also mentioned that he only learned about the victim's age after news reports emerged last week.

[00:38:41] One last comment from James Robison, he said, I was stunned. I was aware that Robert had moral failures in the past but had no idea it was a crime involving a child. This is totally unacceptable. The way Robert handled it was absolutely incorrect. It was wrong.

[00:38:58] Abuse of a child should not be tolerated. I would do anything to appeal to Cindy and her family. Betty and I are praying for everyone who has been hurt by these terrible events. Well, I just wanted to cover that because it is something that we are aware of.

[00:39:12] Something we should talk about. Just before we end, I've got three recommendations. You can agree with me or disagree with me. There's certainly an opportunity for you to respond by email. But the first thing I would say is we need to stamp out celebrity Christianity.

[00:39:29] You know, human pride is deadly. Robert Morris has admitted that pride has been one of his problems. I think it's one of the surest weapons that Satan uses, especially against church leaders. You know, when you get really big and you get lots of influence, that is the case.

[00:39:46] And some of this is played into it because we sometimes elevate those individuals to positions of high esteem and honor. And I think we need to get rid of celebrity Christianity. You know, I've said before, and you've probably heard me sometimes when we've been getting out there

[00:40:05] and meeting some of you at some of the radio rallies we've had, people say, well, do you enjoy the people that you get to interview? And I say yes and no.

[00:40:15] There are some people that are just such genuinely nice people that you would just certainly enjoy being with them. And they're so gracious and helpful and all of the rest. And then there are some that do tend to believe their press clippings,

[00:40:33] and they are sort of people you just sort of put up with. And we certainly need to deal with that issue of celebrity Christianity. Number two, we need more than church discipline. You know, it is critical that we have church discipline. I believe in Matthew 18.

[00:40:55] But it's insufficient when a crime has been committed. And if these allegations are true, and there's no reason to deny them now, I think, we're talking about pedophilia. And so while it is true that a sexual mistake, elders can restore a person back to the pulpit,

[00:41:12] and again, that's controversial enough, we're not dealing with this. We're dealing with something that actually is a criminal offense. And I think there has been a tendency sometimes to think that, well, the church can solve all sorts of issues.

[00:41:27] And I know that sometimes when I've been allowed to speak at Christian camps, and we talk about some of the training we do for the counselors, you have a duty to report.

[00:41:35] And that is we render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, render unto God the things that are God's. And if you've broken the law, then saying, well, we'll just hide that, that's been the mistake that has been made by so many denominations, so many churches.

[00:41:52] Number three, one obvious one, take claims seriously. I hate to cliche, but it is true. When there's smoke, there's fire. And sexual abuse oftentimes is underreported. So if a young girl says, I was abused, take it seriously.

[00:42:09] I know sometimes people lie, but most of the time you have to assume it is true. In every case, assume it is true until you can prove otherwise. And so if something might have happened, don't ignore it.

[00:42:25] Anyway, those are three recommendations that even though this particular decision and action and scandal may not affect your church, maybe those are some recommendations you might think of implementing in your church to make sure that you're not the next scandal we hear about.

[00:42:42] That's all we have for today. I hope that as we wind down for today, you can see we cover lots of issues here on Point of View. And we ask if you would consider what you might do to support this ministry.

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