"Randall (Terry) can avenge Terri's (Schiavo's) death" in FL-State Sen. 8

Vengeance can be Randall's, so sayth William Greene, President of Rightmarch.com.

Last month, Greene sent out an e-mail to those on the "Christian Response" mailing list soliciting support for Randall Terry's State Senate campaign in Florida's Eighth District.

Mr. Terry, playing off his previous visiblility as the founder of Operation Rescue and more recently in the Schiavo case (he was a spokesman for Schiavo's parents at the time), is now working a right flanking maneuver against Republican State Senator Jim King, whom www.RandallTerry.com characterizes thusly:

Mr. Terry's opponent is a liberal, left wing Republican who is responsible for the death of Terry Schiavo.

or as Greene puts it in the e-mail:

PLEASE, let's do everything we can to KICK OUT the man in the state Senate who is the most responsible for the death of Terri Schiavo.

Also quoting Greene from the e-mail:

Now -- with your help -- Randall can avenge Terri's death by defeating Jim King in the upcoming Republican primary.

That would be high hopes for the former used car salesman.

(more below the fold)

Randall Terry, in the same e-mail describes Sen. King thusly:

I'm taking on the former President of the Florida Senate. He is a powerful and corrupt man.

Terry goes on to accuse King of having given nothing to the district but a "radical liberal agenda". Despite the name calling directed at King, he is but a stepping stone to what Terry really hopes to achieve, something he's had his eye on for almost a decade now, elected office.

No matter how Mr. Terry attempts to reframe his campaign- as if it were suddenly birthed as a result of the Schiavo mess, being a candidate is not a new role for him, nor something he approaches reluctantly, as you see this is not his first bid for political office.

He ran for Congress from upstate NY in 1998 alongside other christian candidates labeled "Patrick Henry Men". Back in 1998, his platform included such gems as 'completely dismantling' welfare, labeling it a 'government as savior' program. His platform, as summarized by John Whitehead of the Rutherford Institute ammounted to "no property taxes, no IRS, no social security, no abortion, and no homosexuals." Running as a Republican was an interesting twist, considering his role in the US Taxpayers party- which then eventually morphed into today's Constitution party.

Of course, one 'good thing'- for Mr. Terry that is, did come of that failed 1998 campaign, his second wife, Andrea, who served as his personal assistant during the congressional race. In Aug. 1999 Mr. Terry left his previous wife, Cindy, and divorced her in Nov. 2000. Seven months later, he remarried. Ah, family values in action.

You can see the campaign video from that 1998 Congressional campaign here. from deep within the archive of our site, (complete with an archaic version of our page layout).

Despite his recent attempts to pass off past statements as products of his 'youth', or as 'humor' that didn't translate well into written accounts, Mr. Terry's actions speak far louder than his pathetic excuses. At campaign events, Randall Terry has been passing out copies of his revolutionary manifesto favoring a so called 'christian nation', "The Sword: The Blessing of Righteous Government and the Overthrow of Tyrants" (we've posted a tiny excerpt from which one of our articles here.

While Terri Schiavo, and Jim King may be the excuses he's using to motivate people from across the country to give him money,

Don't let Terri Schiavo die for nothing. Her death should AT LEAST result in the political "death" of one of her worst persecutors.

they are but mere political motivators and brief layovers in his ongoing quest for both power and a larger megaphone to reach a larger audience, or at minimum, an enlarged national database and mailing list to suck cash from later.

There is a full copy of the e-mail from the Christian Response e-mail list online here, for full context.

•  You know you've maxed out on outrage

  when a story this heinous only elicits a roll of the eyes.

  I mean, really.  Am I beyond shock, even at something this tasteless?

  by pico on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 06:34:44 PM PDT

•  what can I say?

  Looks like they missed that pesky little Romans 12:19 bit. Not that they ever let any thing like oh, say, the bible get in their way. D'oh!

  by stormcoming on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 06:40:34 PM PDT

•  A is for Avenge, B is for Barbarians....

  "...avenge Terri's death..."

  Right.

  Just like they do in the Middle East?  Or with a little more finesse?  

  Vengeance is a sign of barbarians everywhere.  

  I do hope that this guy's emails go out far & wide, the farther and wider the better.  The more publicity he gets, the bigger the hole he digs for himself.

  If he left Wife #1 in August 1999 and married Wife #2 in December 2000, that leaves him with sixteen months of probable adultery to explain.

  As for "youthful indiscretions," someone should start bird-dogging him at campaign appearances, asking him what he thinks should be the age of majority.  

  by G2geek on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 06:43:12 PM PDT

•  it's cetainly yet one more embarrasing moment

  for the GOP. My schadenfreude knows no bounds.

  by shpilk on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 06:50:04 PM PDT

•  Wait wait wait wait a minute here

  I thought I was responsible for her death? Jesus he is attacking the wrong man!

  by bebacker on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 06:54:03 PM PDT

  •  Spoken like a true progressive! No pointing

    fingers at someone else, or making up a lie to cover your @ss, just step up and shoulder responsibility.

    by maggiemae on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 07:44:51 PM PDT

•  Terry advocates stoning to death of teens

  When Terry ran for Congress in upstate New York, he advocated the stoning to death of rebellious teenagers. Oh, yes. And he said on videotape. I wrote about it for Front Lines Research in a 1995 piece edited by Talk to Action's Frederick Clarkson, published by Planned Parenthood Federation of America. And then David Corn cited my piece in a profile of Terry that he wrote for The Nation, published September 28, 1998.

  Corn wrote:

  Then there was a private meeting in 1995 at which he said that striking or cursing a parent is a "capital offense." What did he mean by that? Terry is outraged by the question: "I was quoting the Torah.... Are you asking me do I think that teenage rebels should be stoned today? The answer is no.... I was a rebel teenager." It is unfair, he maintains, to "take a speech, a sermon in a church about the Law of Moses and try to implicate me on a policy level." There is Terry the Bible-believing preacher, and there is Terry the politician with policy proposals. The roles, he claims, are distinct. The remark about rebellious teens, he protests, is unrelated to his attempt to become a lawmaker.

  
  But according to a videotape obtained by researcher Jonathan Hutson, this is what Terry said about teenage rapscallions: "Our enemies would throw the tough cases up in our face...and say, `Do you actually mean that you would support the stoning of a rebellious teenager?' Well, you know what? I might not understand everything, but I know that God is perfect. And if God spoke those words out loud, audibly, to Moses, so that Moses could write them down--which God did--who am I to say that God is unjust? I fear God, and I think that we would have a heck of a lot fewer rebellious teenagers if a law like that existed in America today." The remark suggests that Terry's advocacy of "Law" is relevant in considering how he might behave as a civil lawmaker. "There were liberties that 1 was able to take before that I cannot take now," he concedes. "I have a lot of baggage."

  Corn told me that he followed Terry for days on the campaign trail. Terry patiently answered all his questions, and never seemed perturbed by anything -- until Corn asked Terry about calling for teens to be stoned to death. Terry denied it. Corn said he had my article, and the videotape to back it up. Terry just lost it: blew up. Then he admitted it, and told Corn he had "a lot of baggage."

  Ahhh... Good times. And hey, Terry, I'm happy to help you carry those bags -- to every voter household in your district, if necessary.

  by jhutson on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 07:22:36 PM PDT

  •  Teens aren't the only ones he advocates murdering

    for transgressions against "God's Law".  Any doctor who performs abortions is fair game as well.

    This is from the Planned Parenthood site:

    The New York Times reported that, during a March 1993 speech in Melbourne, FL, the man who once called Margaret Sanger a "whore" said, "We've found the weak link is the doctor in fighting abortion." In a speech two years later, he said of doctors who perform abortions, "When I, or people like me, are running the country, you'd better flee, because we will find you, we will try you and we will execute you."

    He's a bastard, through and through.  Of course, I'm from Binghamton (so is he) so I could be biased.  He and his little groupies are not well thought of there.  

    by Rogneid on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 07:51:39 PM PDT

•  Excellant!

  I wrote long ago that we need to make Randall Terry the anvil around the GOP's neck. With him running it makes it that much easier.

  A refresher on what Terry has said in the past.

  "I want you to just let a wave of intolerance wash over you... I want you to let a wave of hatred wash over you. Yes, hate is good... Our goal is a Christian nation. We have a biblical duty, we are called by God, to conquer this country. We don't want equal time. We don't want pluralism."

  or the one that shoul really hurt the son of a bitch:

  "When I, or people like me, are running the country, you'd better flee, because we will find you, we will try you, and we'll execute you. I mean every word of it." He added, "I will make it part of my mission to see to it that they are tried and executed." "

  by Mike S on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 07:46:53 PM PDT

  •  Hey, great minds think alike!

    I used the same quote!

    I can't stand the man.  He's such a hypocrite.

    by Rogneid on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 07:53:57 PM PDT

•  Randall Terry=longtime fascist lunatic

  I recall the descriptions of him by people who encountered him during the late 80s/early 90s clinic wars as a quasi-militaristic, supermacho, order-giving control freak.

  Another friend of mine was playing drums in a band for a contemporary Christian artist at a festival and told me how they were in their trailer after their set and this man came in and started talking in a very hectic, hyper fashion to the artist he was playing with who called him "Randy." My friend said it was weird because he felt like there was this dark, evil presence in the trailer. Afterwards he asked who that was and it was, of course, Randall Terry.

  by anastasia p on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 08:07:25 PM PDT

•  One more thing about his "family values"

  he not only dumped his first, longtime wife but left her holding the bag for all the lawsuits and problems his activities in the 90s caused. He continued to beg for money online after his second marriage claiming it was needed due to those problems but instead he and his second wife were taking that money and building an expensive house in Florida while first wife continued to deal with the problems. This whole situation created quite a schism in his church community, with some condemning and others supporting him.

  This is a truly evil and corrupt person who really should not be considered a Christian in any meaningful way.

  by anastasia p on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 08:10:30 PM PDT

•  I didn't point this out for mere 'outrage' sake,

  nor was I focused upon Mr. Terry's positions and quotations, though I am well aware of the oft repeated ones. 'Outrage' was not the response I was looking for.

  Rather, I was trying to point out some key features of these events and the motivations that lie just under the surface.

  The reason I created this diary entry actually had more to do with how people like Randall Terry and the broader social moment behind him utilize and harness 'cultural fury' to leapfrog themselves, and their organizing forward.

  In this case, Mr. Terry has made yet another career move. Moving from 'spokesperson' on into candidate (for a second time), via utilizing the emotional polarization caused by events like the Terri Schiavo mess (which he was a key persona in) to launch the next stage of his own carreer.

  Now, more than a year after the fact, some of the genuine feelings surrounding that event and motivating  some of those christian activists who were part of the events at the time, are finally becoming much more clear, in words like "Vengeance".  

  At the time of the event, they may portray themselves as motivated by 'love' or 'compassion', but in places where they often feel no one is looking, much later, the lust for revenge and anger becomes obvious.

  It's ugly in there.

  by stormcoming on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 08:44:17 PM PDT

•  He is only emulating that stupid baby killing

  God of the Bible who said in Deuteronomy 24:16 that a son shall not die for the sins of the father then he has the sons of Pharoah and David whacked for just that reason.
  He also told Saul to kill all including suckling babise.
  That great God of the Bible was quite a piece of work but the clergy never talks about that just like the King David story can never be told in an Orthodox Jewish house of prayer.
  For the real King David story go to www.religionquestioned.com

  by saul2006 on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 09:01:52 PM PDT

•  Terry is a sad, sick man.

  by jimreyn on Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 10:07:44 PM PDT