Kony 2012

[psynapz]

^^^ If I didn't have time to read RI (and I don't), I think I would get by fine by just watching this guy's videos. How the hell does he say so much so well so fast?

[eyeno]

<snip>

He is an invulnerable ghost whose legend surpasses logic and reason, whose mere image is enough to motivate the passive into action no matter what the cost. He is the perfect villain for a state grown weary of war.

This applies to Kony is so much that even Invisible Children have to admit (though not in their film) that Joseph Kony has not been in Uganda for the past 6 years.

Perhaps one reason for that is the persistent rumor that Joseph Kony died 5 years ago.

That makes Kony the perfect villain in Obama’s new vague war on Africa: he can be anywhere at any time and he will never show up and say he didn’t do whatever they accuse him of. (do you think it’s odd that after all of this hype he hasn’t released a statement yet?)

That is the Goldstein Effect.

What is Kony 2012?

1. The Kony 2012 campaign is certainly designed to make money for the JP Morgan ex-banker and Hollywood sleazebag who set it up in the first place. They are asking school children to contribute on a monthly basis so they can run this thing called the “Kony Tracker” on their website which will supposedly show these kids where the evil illusive Joseph Kony is terrorizing little children throughout Africa.

https://willyloman.wordpress.com/2012/0 ... more-18690

[eyeno]

Angelina Jolie: I don't know anyone who does not hate Joseph Kony

Angelina Jolie expresses her support for a viral video which calls for the arrest of Joseph Kony, the fugitive leader of the Lord's Resistance Army militia group in Uganda


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(bad old embed code originally meant for old windows media player embeds of some sort. now removed from main posting screen.)
here's what was enclosed in old wonky embed tags:
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The video swept across the internet this week, attracting a wave of support on social media as well as a skeptical backlash against the charity responsible for producing it, Invisible Children.

By Thursday, the YouTube video had been viewed almost 60 million times, while Kony had become the number one trending topic worldwide on Twitter.

At an event to mark International Womens' Day in New York, actress and humanitarian activist Angelina Jolie added her voice to those supporting the movement, stating, "I don't know anyone who doesn't hate Kony."

She added: "I've been to Uganda and Congo and been to the International Criminal Court myself and spoken with the chief prosecutor about the case and he's the one that we all want to see in jail so I think it's great that more people are talking about it."

"He's an extraordinarily horrible human being who, you know...his time has come and it's lovely to see that young people are raising up as well.


The film has had its share of supporters and detractors.

Jacob Acaye, the child at the centre of the film, who was taken prisoner by Kony's LRA in 2002, said: “Until now the war that was going on has been a silent war. People did not really know about it.

“Now what was happening in Gulu is still going on elsewhere in the Central African Republic and in Congo. What about the people who are suffering over there? They are going through what we were going through.”

The Obama adminsitration also congratulated the "hundreds of thousands of Americans who have mobilised to this unique crisis of conscience."

Critics argue Kony and his diminishing troops, many of them kidnapped child soldiers, fled northern Uganda six years ago and are now spread across the jungles of neighbouring countries.

“What that video says is totally wrong, and it can cause us more problems than help us,” said Dr Beatrice Mpora, director of Kairos, a community health organisation in Gulu, a town that was once the centre of the rebels’ activities.

“There has not been a single soul from the LRA here since 2006. Now we have peace, people are back in their homes, they are planting their fields, they are starting their businesses. That is what people should help us with.”

Footage from Reuters
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newsvid ... -Kony.html

[vanlose kid]

African voices respond to hyper-popular Kony 2012 viral campaign


By Xeni Jardin at 11:55 am Thursday, Mar 8

(Updated with additions, March 10, 2012. Here's a Twitter list, so you can follow all of the African writers mentioned in this post who are on Twitter.)

The internets are all a-flutter with reactions to Kony 2012, a high-velocity viral fundraising campaign created by the "rebel soul dream evangelists" at Invisible Children to "raise awareness" about Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony and child soldiers. As noted in my previous post here on Boing Boing, the project has many critics. There is a drinking game, there are epic lolpictorials, and a chorus of idiots on Facebook.

There are indications the project may be about stealth-evangelizing Christianity. The Invisible Children filmmakers have responded to some of the criticism. Media personalities and celebrities are duking it out as the campaign (and now, backlash) spreads.

But in that flood of attention, one set of voices has gone largely ignored: Africans themselves. Writers, journalists, activists; people of African descent who live and work and think about life on the continent. In this post, we'll round up some of their replies to #Kony2012.

• Above, a video by Rosebell Kagumire, a Ugandan multimedia journalist who works on "media, women, peace and conflict issues." She writes, "This is me talking about the danger of portraying people with one single story and using old footage to cause hysteria when it could have been possible to get to DRC and other affected countries get a fresh perspective and also include other actors."

• Ethiopian writer and activist Solome Lemma writes that she is disturbed by the "dis-empowering and reductive narrative" evidenced in Invisible Children's promotional videos: "[It] paints the people as victims, lacking agency, voice, will, or power. It calls upon an external cadre of American students to liberate them by removing the bad guy who is causing their suffering. Well, this is a misrepresentation of the reality on the ground. Fortunately, there are plenty of examples of child and youth advocates who have been fighting to address the very issues at the heart of IC’s work." Update: Here's another from Lemma on "Seven steps for critical reflection." She urges those concerned about human rights in Africa to "think before you give."

• Musa Okwonga, a " football writer, poet and musician of Ugandan descent," writes in an Independent op-ed: “I understand the anger and resentment at Invisible Children’s approach, which with its paternalism has unpleasant echoes of colonialism. I will admit to being perturbed by its apparent top-down prescriptiveness, when so much diligent work is already being done at Northern Uganda’s grassroots... Watching the video, though, I was concerned at the simplicity of the approach that Invisible Children seemed to have taken."

• Award-winning Nigerian-American novelist and photographer Teju Cole published an inspired set of tweets today on sentimentality toward Africa by Americans. Ethan Zuckerman gathered them here, and Alexis Madrigal did the same here. "From Sachs to Kristof to Invisible Children to TED, the fastest growth industry in the US is the White Savior Industrial Complex," Cole writes. "The white savior supports brutal policies in the morning, founds charities in the afternoon, and receives awards in the evening." He is brilliant and you should be following him on Twitter, anyway.

• Angelo Opi-aiya Izama, a journalist and researcher based in Kampala, Uganda, writes: "The simplicity of the 'good versus evil,' where good is inevitably white/western and bad is black or African, is also reminiscent of some of the worst excesses of the colonial era interventions. These campaigns don’t just lack scholarship or nuance. They are not bothered to seek it."

• Benin-born "Author and Africa Enthusiast" Mafoya Dossoumon focuses less on the shortcomings of "Invisible Children," and more on the power elite within Africa. "I urge you my African brothers and sisters, and friends of Africa to direct more energy towards holding our leaders accountable. Our leaders have failed us! "

• TMS Ruge, the Ugandan-born co-founder of Project Diaspora is pissed. He says he wants to "bang my head against my desk" to "make the dumb-assery stop." writes, "It is a slap in the face to so many of us who want to rise from the ashes of our tumultuous past and the noose of benevolent, paternalistic, aid-driven development memes. We, Africans, are sandwiched between our historically factual imperfections and well-intentioned, road-to-hell-building-do-gooders. It is a suffocating state of existence. To be properly heard, we must ride the coattails of self-righteous idiocy train. Even then, we have to fight for our voices to be respected." Update: Ruge has a commentary in the New York Times: "‘Kony 2012’ Is Not a Revolution."

• Semhar Araia, founder of the Diaspora African Women's Network (DAWN), is based in Minneapolis and is of Eritrean descent. DAWN "develops and supports talented women and girls of the African diaspora," and is focused on African affairs. In an opinion piece at the Christian Science Monitor titled "Learn to Respect Africans," Araia writes of Invisible Children: "They must be willing to use their media to amplify African voices, not simply their own. This isn’t about them."

• At National Geographic, a guest essay by Anywar Ricky Richard, a former child soldier of the Lord’s Resistance Army, and director of the northern Ugandan organization Friends of Orphans. Richard writes of perceptions of Invisible Children in northern Uganda, where the group has had a presence for some years, "They are not known as a peace building organization and I do not think they have experience with peace building and conflict resolution methods. I totally disagree with their approach of military action as a means to end this conflict."

• Dayo Olopade, a Nigerian-American journalist who is writing a book on the connection between disruptive technology and African development, wrote an opinion piece for the New York Times: "The mundane march of progress in poor countries is what 'awareness' campaigns often miss. And when, as in this case, success is determined by action from outside the region, cries of a new imperialism should be taken seriously. Few international NGOs working in Africa define success properly — as putting themselves out of business. Invisible Children seems no better."

• London-based Ida Horner "grew up in Idi Amin’s Uganda," and says the first 20 years of her life were "marked by civil wars." She now consults to companies that want to ethically source products from East Africa, and writes and speaks about sustainable development and issues affecting African women in poverty. Among her concerns: how will Kony 2012 fever affect tourism income, and investment, which she sees as a better solution than aid? "Uganda was voted by Lonely Planet amongst the top destinations for 2012 but has this NGO just undone the potential for Uganda’s tourism? After all the tourism industry provides a real opportunity for Ugandans to work their way out of poverty through providing services that tourists want to consume."

• Kampala-based "Poet, Artist, and Computer Engineer" Frank Odongka published a poem about Invisible Children, titled " Mocking a Mocking Bird." In an intro, he writes about how he felt immediately after seeing the video: "I was only filled with emptiness. I felt our past was being used by some external figure to attract attention to their cause; which cause is obviously not a better life for my relatives. In 2000, travelling to Kampala from the West Nile was suicide and Invisible Children didn't realize we were invisible and holed up there. Today, more than ever, we are visible but someone suddenly feels the need to exploit our past and paint it as our present! I wrote this poem, short as it is, to reflect how I feel about it."

• "Let’s call Joseph Kony what he is: a narcissist, a pedophile and a terrorist," writes Ghanaian-American blogger Malaka Gyekye Grant in a post titled Joseph Kony Is Still At Large and It’s all My Fault. "Why are we not speaking out until our voices are impossible to ignore? Here’s a better question: Why did an AFRICAN not start the Kony2012 campaign?"

• Ethiopian-American writer Dinaw Mengestu, at the conflict journal Warscapes: "If there is one thing Invisible Children is right about, it’s that ignorance is blinding. Change has never come with a click, or a tweet; lives are not saved by bracelets. We all want solutions, but why should we think or expect an easy one exists for a twenty-year-old conflict in Uganda when we have none for the wars we’re engaged in now. "

• Former LRA abductee turned peacekeeper Victor Ochen is a social entrepreneur and peace builder in Uganda who founded The African Youth Initiative Network. They work to physically and psychologically rehabilitate youth affected by war. He writes at AYINET's blog: "I agree that Kony must be stopped as soon as possible. However, it must be done in a way that avoids further civilian casualties and the loss of the lives of innocent children. Raising potentially false expectation such as arresting Kony in 2012 will not rebuild the lives of the people in northern Uganda. Rebuilding communities and rehabilitating victims is what we need. The stronger survivors become, the less Kony remains an issue. Restoration of communities devastated by Kony is a greater priority than catching or even killing him."

• The Guardian has published an interview with Jacob Acaye, the Ugandan former child abductee featured in the "Kony 2012" video. Acaye is now a 21-year-old law student in Kampala. He says the filmmakers wandered into a village where he and other children sought refuge; the Invisible Children representatives were looking for a child who spoke English, to feature in their film. "They could not understand what was happening. They wanted a kid who was sleeping there and who spoke English," Acaye said. "I could understand English and I could say what was happening, so that is how I was in their film."

http://boingboing.net/2012/03/08/africa ... -hype.html

*

[IntegratingInsanity]

A few things i found strange after watching the video.
They send out paper documentation outlining their goals etc - why? Why not just have a webpage that does it? Why spend that much money doing sending paper documentation?
You pay £3 to a charity associated to them. Why?

They are backing the Ugandan military - which prob rapes and kills its own people also.

Another observation - its states its a "social experiment" in the video. Thats prob all it is. Hidden in plain sight and all that.

What crossed my mind is that it could be a template to use charity money to 'take out' anything or anyone.

[82_28]

A few things i found strange after watching the video.
They send out paper documentation outlining their goals etc - why? Why not just have a webpage that does it? Why spend that much money doing sending paper documentation?
You pay £3 to a charity associated to them. Why?

They are backing the Ugandan military - which prob rapes and kills its own people also.

Another observation - its states its a "social experiment" in the video. Thats prob all it is. Hidden in plain sight and all that.

What crossed my mind is that it could be a template to use charity money to 'take out' anything or anyone.

Yes. It is a classic double bind. Charity to kill, kill for charity, in the name of a non-Jesus, taking into account regional religious beliefs, in the name of Jesus, non-Jesus, for $30 a pop for a "KIT". Oh come the fuck on! We're at "war" all over the fucking world.

I am glad so many around and about have seen through this for the bullshit it is. However, there could be the next "double" in the bind. Knowing that it would come out as such, because people are savvy enough to see bullshit for what it is. There could be another step in the whole process which might freak us out -- upping the ante -- without anyone's say. Just like 9/11, Iraq, Afghanistan et al. . .

It will just happen. When it does, it will. There will be nothing we can do, but sit around saying I should have done something when I could. But feel bad and pay fealty to the growing morass of nothingness as we know it.

The Empire Never Ended.

[MinM]

.
"We need new dark-skinned Disney Villains..."

My Little Kony

[Nordic]

That Tony 2012 picture upthread really says it all. We have our own war criminal maniacs to focus on. Oh wait, but they're not scary black savages. They wear business suits.

[Hugh Manatee Wins]

Besides the CIA-media posturing as 'viral marketing debunker'...

GOP primaries in Georgia and Mississippi, where cops and FBI murdered blacks during the civil rights movement.
Upcoming anniversary of US police-state murders Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. on April 4.

So...how about meme-reversing the associations with 'godly' blacks to a...murderous child-snatching negro?!
Yeah! Psyops diversion countering historical oppression accomplished!

[JackRiddler]

Today's "Wake Up Call 7AM" program on WBAI awakened me with the deep-ocean voice of Esther Armah and, near the top, a marvelous deconstruction of "Kony 2012," including a segment recorded at a Ugandan village that has suffered LRA incursions in the past (back when Kony was more, um, lively?). People who had to deal with the real-life Kony watch the film, and you can hear first how they yell in anger, then throw objects at the screen and shut down the viewing.

Play here, March 14:
http://archive.wbai.org/show1.php?showid=wuc2

Direct download:
http://archive.wbai.org/files/mp3/wbai_ ... 51wuc2.mp3

So if this is an experiment, the published response shows that it failed; except in the sense that all blanket advertising succeeds, even when all of the people who have an informed opinion agree that it's bullshit. Because as with all blanket advertising, tens of millions saw it and have already forgotten it, but now know Kony's name and associate him with negative emotions and a vague opinion that "something must be done."

[D.R.]

More God and Gold in Africa

http://www.msmagazine.com/sept03/sizemore.asp

Pat Robertson's Right-Wing Gold Mine
The little-known tale of the evangelist and the dictator

by Bill Sizemore

Ms. Fall 2003


Charles Taylor, the freshly exiled president of Liberia, has a rap sheet that would have been the envy of Genghis Khan: Accused embezzler. Ruthless warlord blamed for torture, killings, forced labor, extortion. Partial bankroller of al-Qaeda. Indicted by a U.N. war crimes tribunal for arming Sierra Leoneon rebels who specialize in mass rape and in hacking off the limbs of civilians.

With his small West African country devastated by near-constant civil war since he began his bloody march to power 14 years ago, Taylor in recent months faced a rising chorus of calls from world leaders, including President George W. Bush, to step down.

Where's a guy like that going to find a friend?

Well, here's one place: the set of The 700 Club, the daily TV talk show presided over by Pat Robertson.


Christian Broadcasting Network's Pat Robertson (AP Photo)

The Liberian dictator and the American televangelist have emerged as one of the oddest couples of the year, a pairing some critics are calling a testament to the gospel of greed. And it's not the only such coupling for Robertson.

But first, the setting: The 700 Club is taped in a state-of-the-art studio in the palatial, cross-shaped headquarters of Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN), nestled amid magnolias and crepe myrtles in suburban Virginia Beach, Va. The telecast reaches 1 million households with Robertson's trademark blend of faith healing, fundraising and fundamentalism.

Robertson is perhaps best-known in recent years for teaming up with Jerry Falwell to blame feminists and gays for the Sept. 11 attacks. Falwell is just one in a succession of hard-right guests, from Bill Bennett to Phyllis Schlafly, given a platform on The 700 Club.

This summer, Robertson launched a "prayer offensive," seeking divine intervention to turn the Supreme Court rightward-- an effort he hopes will culminate in a recriminalization of abortion. He's suggested prayers be directed to getting three of the judges, two of them presumably John Stevens and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, to resign.

But even with the energy expended on that effort, he still had time to prop up Liberia. "The United States State Department has tried as hard as it can to destabilize Liberia," Robertson complained on his June 26 show. "They only wanted to destroy the sitting president and his government."

Robertson returned to the issue again and again. On July 7, he asserted that the United States had no business forcing the "duly elected" Taylor from power. On July 9, he recommended sending U.S. troops to protect the Taylor regime from the rebels trying to overthrow it. "We sent our troops to

Kosovo to back up a Muslim group," he said. "In this case, we're looking at Muslim rebels trying to overthrow a Christian nation... If we can go out and defend Muslims, it looks to me like we can defend Christians."

Taylor's checkered past notwithstanding, Robertson saw the Liberian dictator as a bulwark of Christianity standing against the encroaching hordes of Islam. And Taylor had played his part to the hilt. At a three-day CBN-sponsored "Liberia for Jesus" rally in February 2002, Taylor was the star attraction, lying prostrate on the red-carpeted stage of Samuel Doe Stadium in Monrovia, the Liberian capital, and exhorting the crowd to come to Christ. "I cannot help you," he told his long-suffering people. "All help comes from God."

The spectacle was duly covered on The 700 Club. But there's one thing Robertson didn't tell his viewers: He and Taylor were more than brothers in Christ.

In 1999, Taylor signed a mineral development agreement with Freedom Gold Ltd., a for-profit company chartered in the Cayman Islands, granting it exploration and mining rights in the Bukon Jedeh region of southeastern Liberia, which is believed to have substantial gold reserves. Robertson is the company's president and sole director. If and when Freedom Gold begins to turn a profit, the Liberian government is guaranteed a 10 percent equity interest in the company.

The evangelist certainly didn't hide his Liberian business interests in a letter to Secretary of State Colin Powell in June 2002. "May I respectfully inquire as a taxpayer of the United States and one with significant financial investments in Liberia," he wrote, "why the State Department of the United States of America is determined to bring down the President of Liberia?"

After several news reports, Robertson has sought on the CBN.org website to distance himself from Taylor: "I regret that my sentiments in support of the suffering Liberian people were misinterpreted by The Washington Post as unqualified support for Charles Taylor, a man who I have never met, and about whose actions a decade ago I have no firsthand knowledge."

IT'S UNCLEAR WHETHER ROBERTSON ever heard back from Powell. But Robertson did get an earful from one of his longtime critics, Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. "Taylor is one of the most brutal dictators in Africa, and it is appalling to me that Robertson would enter into a partnership with him merely to make money," Lynn said. "Now Robertson is using his tax-exempt Christian broadcast ministry to lobby the U.S. government to keep his crony in power. This is astounding."

But to veteran Robertson-watchers, this is deja vu. A decade ago, the evangelist befriended another notorious African dictator, President Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire (now Congo). A onetime darling of the West during the Cold War, Mobutu had become an international pariah by the 1990s, reviled for looting his country's treasury and committing human rights abuses. That didn't stop Robertson from speaking out on his behalf and calling for an end to U.S. sanctions against his regime. In 1994 The 700 Club carried frequent reports on the humanitarian work being done in Zaire by Operation Blessing, Robertson's international relief organization. Typically, the reports were accompanied by appeals for donations.

What Robertson didn't tell viewers was that he also owned a for-profit company, African Development Co., which, with Mobutu's blessing, was doing exploratory mining for diamonds in Zaire.

Also unreported-- until two pilots came forward with the story in 1997-- was the fact that Operation Blessing's tax-exempt cargo planes were used almost exclusively for Roberton's diamond-mining operation, not for humanitarian purposes. A subsequent investigation by Virginia authorities turned up evidence for charging Operation Blessing with violations of the state's charitable solicitation law. But the office of Virginia Attorney General Mark Earley, who had received a $35,000 campaign contribution from Robertson, declined to prosecute. Robertson reimbursed Operation Blessing for the use of the planes, and the charity agreed to tighten its financial controls.

In the end, Robertson's diamond-mining venture was a big bust. Estimates of his losses ranged as high as $ 10 million. And his gold-digging gig in Liberia has been no gold mine either. In his agreement with Taylor, Robertson pledged to spend $10 million to $15 million in the exploratory phase of the operation-- but so far there's been no income.

Now the whole venture is threatened by the advances of the anti-Taylor rebels. A Liberian newspaper reported in April that Freedom Gold had halted operations amid fears of an imminent rebel attack on a nearby town. In August, Taylor finally yielded to international pressure and stepped down, taking asylum in Nigeria.

But Robertson, ever the adventurous entrepreneur, remains undaunted. His far-flung business ventures embody the "prosperity gospel" school of evangelical Christianity that seeks to fuse doing good with doing well. He never tires of telling the story of how he showed up in Portsmouth, Va., in 1959 with $70 in his pocket and, acting on God's instructions, bought a down-at-the-heels TV station, which he parlayed into a media empire worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

Playing down his aristocratic pedigree-- he's the son of a U.S. senator, is related to two U.S. presidents and has a law degree from Yale-- Robertson says his success is all the Lord's work. He calls it "God's law of reciprocity: God is the source of wealth. You give and God gives back. You give more and God gives back more."

That formula figures prominently in his TV fundraising appeals. If it worked for him, he implies, it can work for anyone. Pledge drives on The 700 Club feature frequent testimonials from viewers who say their financial circumstances improved dramatically once they became regular CBN donors. And the cash continues to roll in. CBN and Operation Blessing together reported nearly $150 million in contributions last year.

Even so, Robertson isn't above taking a little government largesse. Last fall, just a few months after he criticized President Bush's "faith-based initiative" as a "narcotic" that would make religious charities too dependent on the government, Operation Blessing was awarded a $500,000 grant under the program. Apparently, Robertson is now a convert. On the May 8 700 Club, he argued that charities like Operation Blessing should be allowed to participate in the program even if they practice religious discrimination in hiring. Such discrimination, he said, amounts to "nothing more than choosing steak over apple pie in a restaurant."

[Grizzly]

Joseph Kony resolution introduced in House


http://www.cbsnews.com/2102-503544_162- ... ontentIous

Two House lawmakers on Tuesday introduced a resolution supporting efforts to counter the Lord's Resistance Army, hoping to build on the momentum created by a viral YouTube video spotlighting the atrocities of LRA leader Joseph Kony.

The resolution, introduced by Reps. Jim McGovern, D-Mass. and Ed Royce, R-Calif., calls for, among other things, expanding the number of regional forces in Africa to protect civilians and placing restrictions on individuals or governments found to be supporting Kony.

Kony gained notoriety in the U.S. this month when a 30-minute video produced by the group Invisible Children went viral, picking up more than 50 million views in just four days. The video spotlighted how the Ugandan warlord has been accused of kidnapping up to 30,000 children in the past 26 years, using girls as sex slaves and boys as child soldiers.

Invisible Children has since taken heat for how much of its budget it spends on aid to Africa versus marketing. Additionally, some Ugandans have complained the video misrepresents and over-simplifies the issue.

Still, McGovern said in a statement that the new attention the African conflict is receiving is a good thing.

"I am hopeful that we can use this momentum as a force for change," he said. "We must do all that we can to protect innocent civilians -- especially children -- and end LRA violence once and for all."

Last year, McGovern and Royce introduced and helped pass into law "The Lord's Resistance Army Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act." Subsequently, President Obama sent 100 U.S. troops to Central Africa to serve as advisers in efforts to hunt down Kony.

[JackRiddler]

[Allegro]

More God and Gold in Africa

http://www.msmagazine.com/sept03/sizemore.asp

Pat Robertson's Right-Wing Gold Mine
The little-known tale of the evangelist and the dictator

by Bill Sizemore

Ms. Fall 2003

< snip from top >

Also unreported-- until two pilots came forward with the story in 1997-- was the fact that Operation Blessing's tax-exempt cargo planes were used almost exclusively for Roberton's diamond-mining operation, not for humanitarian purposes. A subsequent investigation by Virginia authorities turned up evidence for charging Operation Blessing with violations of the state's charitable solicitation law. But the office of Virginia Attorney General Mark Earley, who had received a $35,000 campaign contribution from Robertson, declined to prosecute. Robertson reimbursed Operation Blessing for the use of the planes, and the charity agreed to tighten its financial controls.

< snip to end >

Note in the paragraph above: Virginia Attorney General Mark Earley, who, according to wiki, has been since 2002 the president of Prison Fellowship, a prominent Christian organization dedicated to ministry to prison inmates and their families. In 1976, Prison Fellowship was founded by a Baptist, Chuck Colson, once (and perhaps still is) associated with The Family.

_________________
REFER The Prosperity Gospel; Prosperity Theology | Dominion Theology | Reconstructionism | The Joshua Project | 1040 Window | Christian Fundamentalism | Christian Dispensationalism | Christian Evangelism | Campus Crusade for Christ | Focus on the Family | Family Research Council | The Family

[Project Willow]

Could one of you kind mods somehow stop the autoplay on Eyeno's video, if you have some free time, because it's an annoying pita.

Tx.