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The 7 Craziest, Cruelest Right-Wing Statements from Just Last Week

The country’s right-wing fringe offers some headscratchers, kneeslappers and assorted absurdities.

Glenn Beck


It was a week of both stupid and cruel Republican tricks. Stupid in the beginning of the week when Florida Gov. Rick Scott led an effort to ban Internet cafes, and the bill was so poorly worded, it inadvertently banned all the state’s computers. Oops. Cruelty came later, when the Republican-led house successfully disentangled food stamp funding from the farm bill. There was the convoluted logic of Republican lawmakers crying foul that the implementation of Obamacare, the law of the land they have vowed to overturn, is now being delayed. And there was Rand Paul’s outlandish defense of his Confederacy-loving top aide—you see, wearing a confederate flag is similar to smoking pot. Oh…wait, huh?

Here are some more headscratchers, kneeslappers and assorted absurdities from the country’s right-wing fringe. And, just to cheer us up, an egregious example of far-right thinking coming from the president of a country not our own.

1. Glenn Beck: Teresa Heinz Kerry faked her illness.

Glenn Beck does not seem to think that Democrats, or their wives, ever actually just fall ill, even when they are no longer young. He believes it is usually a conspiracy or coverup involving the State Department. Such was the case this week after Teresa Heinz Kerry, 74-year-old wife of Sec. of State John Kerry, was hospitalized with seizure-like symptoms over the July 4 weekend in critical condition. But actually, according to Beck, Heinz Kerry’s sudden illness was a ploy…to divert attention...from events in Egypt. Why exactly is not clear, but Beck drew a connection between this and another "imaginary" medical scare, Hillary Clinton’s 2012 concussion, you know, the one she faked in order to avoid answering questions about Benghazi. See the pattern?

2. Pat Robertson: Gay people are just confused straight people.

On the “700 Club” this week, Pat Robertson sought to clarify that he does not in any way hate gay people, blaming them for 9/11 and for destroying America not withstanding. In fact, he expressed happiness that “many many homosexuals” watch his show, which is strange because apparently, according to Pat, people are gay “because they have forsaken God, it’s not something that is natural and when people reunite with the Lord, the Lord will get their priorities the way it is supposed to be….You work through it and if you meet the Lord it should be, it can be instant.”

Gay people, you see, are really just confused straight people, according to the televangelist. They are confused either because they were abused, or they have chromosomal damage. So, really gay people just need to “come out” as the straight people they really are.

3. Bryan Fischer: Pat Robertson’s views on gay people are way too liberal.

Bryan Fischer of the American Family Association took a slightly different view when he tweeted that "Christians are being moved out of the United States military so hyper-masculine homosexuals can move in, similar to the kind of homosexuals that formed Hitler's stormtroopers."

4. Louie Gohmert intelligently debating food stamps: “Objection.”

On Thursday, Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) really elevated the debate about food stamp funding by repeatedly yelling “Objection” whenever political opponents suggested that the Republican-backed move to remove food stamps from the farm bill would hurt poor and working families. Gohmert did not want that on the record. When Democratic Rep. Suzanne Bonamici of Oregon asked the speaker for consent to “revise and extend her remarks in strong opposition to the farm bill rule and the underlying bill because it will increase hunger in America,” Gohmert had an answer for that as well: “Objection.”