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Falwells: Palin to help McCain in key areas

By Ray Reed

Published: August 29, 2008

John McCain’s choice of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate on the Republican presidential ticket raised the excitement level for Lynchburg-area leaders including the Rev. Jonathan Falwell and Mathew Staver, dean of the Liberty University School of law.

“Not only is she pro-life, pro-family and pro-marriage, but she has a great record of exposing government corruption and government waste,” said Falwell, pastor of Thomas Road Baptist Church.

“I’m excited to see this,” Falwell said Friday. Palin’s selection surprised some observers, he said, but “I think it’s a good surprise.”

Staver said Palin represented “an absolutely brilliant choice” and “a master genius stroke.”

Jerry Falwell Jr., president of Liberty University, said he learned about Palin from an airport TV monitor while traveling through Florida. “I think it’s a brilliant choice.”

“I think it will help him with women and conservatives, and I think that’s where he needed help,” Falwell Jr. said.

Jonathan Falwell said he was happy to see McCain set a course that he had indicated during an Aug. 16 forum held by Rick Warren at Saddleback Church in California. Democratic candidate Barack Obama and McCain both talked about faith during separate interviews with Warren, who wrote the best seller, “The Purpose-Driven Life.”

“John McCain made it very clear that his administration was going to be a pro-life administration, and he proved that’s his belief and his passion today with the choice of Sarah Palin,” Jonathan Falwell said.

Falwell credited Palin with a role in stopping Alaska’s often-ridiculed “bridge to nowhere” that was proposed as a Congressional earmark of $398 million to connect the city of Ketchikan to its airport on a nearby island.

Congress removed the earmark status from the funds and sent them to Alaska as general-use road money, after which Palin cut the bridge completely out of the state budget. At the time, she said it was too expensive.

“We need someone to step into leadership in Washington who believes higher taxes are not the answer, but less spending is the answer. We need a Congress with a leadership that tells them that’s what you need to do,” Jonathan Falwell said.

Falwell said he had never met Palin, but “I’m familiar with her record, her beliefs and her values.”

Staver spoke by phone from Minneapolis during a meeting of the Council for National Policy, a group of religious and government officials.

“The excitement in the room is absolutely palpable,” Staver said.

Attendees included evangelical leader James Dobson, “who said he has not been this excited since Ronald Reagan,” Staver said.

“Senator McCain could not have chosen a better vice president than Sarah Palin,” Staver said. “She is intelligent, effective, articulate and has substance. She has shown she has the ability to clean up government corruption and balance the budget.

“She can reach women, and I think she’s trans-generational,” said Staver, who also is founder of Liberty Counsel, a nonprofit legal group that defends religious freedom, traditional family, and pro-life issues.

Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-6th District, issued his own endorsement of Palin.

“She has a reputation for being a fiscal conservative who has made tough decisions and cut spending, and has worked to pass landmark ethics reforms in her state,” Goodlatte said.

“The voters of the Sixth District will find her a well-qualified candidate who shares their values of energy independence, personal responsibility, and a strong national defense,” Goodlatte said.

Reader Reactions

Posted by ( poet ) on September 02, 2008 at 12:56 pm

t4nymets, that was real cute, juvenile but cute.

However cute is not substance, nor does it negate your obvious hypocrisy.

Want to try again?

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Posted by ( t4nymets ) on September 02, 2008 at 11:28 am

Freedom,
Although we are almost always on opposite sides of the issues, I must admit that you make me chuckle! I’m glad to hear that you don’t support Ted Kennedy. I will take that back, but only for you. It made me sick to see how everyone just made over him at the DNC. I guess now that he has a brain tumor, he’s a hero. Even with a brain tumor, at least he got to live to be 76 years old!! Poor Mary Jo only made it to 28 thank to him!

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Posted by ( t4nymets ) on September 02, 2008 at 11:23 am

Poet,
I clearly defended my position in my first post, which you obviously can’t grasp (even freedom gets it), and I will stand by it. I’ll see if I can dumb it down so your little liberal pea brain can understand:

Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
You call me a hypocrite,
But so are you!

Read my original post, and get someone to explain it to you!

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Posted by ( Freedom ) on September 01, 2008 at 1:41 pm

hey 14NYMETS,,watch out !!that POET guy is WICKED !!,,anyway he was suppose to take me shoping for a ROBE/HOOD/and some rope !!but never did !!sniff sniff tear tear ,,:(,,warning dont take that rope he is feeding you !!

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Posted by ( Freedom ) on September 01, 2008 at 1:34 pm

NAVAJOE!!is that coffie at starbucks !!speaking of starbucks ,,sorry but it was the rich that got them here,,barnes and noble is yours,,,now employment ,,all these jobs are min.wages w/no benefits ,,thats real good comming from christian insitution,,and since you brought up 4 decades,,tell him does pope falwell still take his 10 % out of everyone,s paycheck,,ahh you do know that they did for years !!and to your misinformed uneducated economics,,business come here because way before falwell had his 29 member church,,its called eco.developement,,based on population of areA ,,which is 270,000 people,,nothing is built in lynchburg because of 70,000,,they take in all the surrounding area,,afterall what does campbell,bedford,appomatox,amherst..lynchburg is and economic hub that in and of itself and demographics brings in business,,you my friend brought in WAL/MART,,and wset13 showed us just how much liberty shops their,,and you brought in hotels motels that pay no taxes cause they run in the red and write it off as business loss,,along with illegals to run them,,except of course the management,,and lets not forget the business you drove away and keep from comming to lynchburg ,,HOOTERS ,,you will find one in every city that one of your jolly jerries come from ,,!!now to polotics if you cant take the bashing /venting/and free exchange of ideas,,then exercise your freedom to exit !!its called POSTING !!its BLOGGING!,,which means ,,we aint being graded so who cares about the MR senator ,,bull crap,,u rite like you wanna and us who drink blue ribbon ,,,buuurrrpp,,we will have our fun !!and that parking thing ,,sorry but that horse has been beaten to death,,we have the greatest superbowl going on in the political arena,,and a hurricane hitting n.o.and another won on the way to LYNCHBURG !!HOWEVER i am all for taxing CHURCHES ,,due to your political involement and that CHURCHES hold the largest chunk of realestate in the WORLD,,and not paying taxes is the same as government endorsement,,and no taxes you get more return money on that property investment,,and who cares about the polls,,the truth is we dont have a vote ,,our seceret government has electronic voting machine in 25 states,,that can be altered,,hack into ,,and no proff of vote cause no PAPER TRAIL,,its a farse !!and our poloticians has only a 20 % approvial rating,,and BOTH are for illgeals given a blanket citizenship,,and 75 % of this country dosent want that!!so buddy we have no FREEDOM,,git it right !!until we go back into the streets and take it back!!60,s-70,s-,,but this time we will have homeland security..legalized wiretaping ,,but no matter what our gov,does and plans ,,it cant control all 300 million of us !!ok with that in mind do you really think i give a hoot about a darn PARKING LOT !!i do care who screwed up !!REAGON,,and his corporate raiders,,his amnisty to illegals,,yet anti-vietnamers in canada still cant get amnisty,,a wreck eco,,10 trillion in the red,,and none of it spent on CHRISTIAN SOCIALISM,,and yet you grab every federal dollar you can for your social programs,,unweds mothers,,and wWAFFLEFOOT already said it ,,dito,,in closing ,,i trin to stop falwell from stoping my HOOTERS !!

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Posted by ( poet ) on September 01, 2008 at 12:09 pm

t4nymets:

Have you ever heard of a little thing called ï¿½reading comprehension?ï¿½

I have t4nymets, but apparently you haven’t.
That question is designed for one thing: for you to run under for cover. Its used to allow you to pretend you didn’t say what I responded to.

You see, what you falsely claim as my lack of reading comprehension, is, in reality, your admission of fearing those that grasp what you say; the catch words, the catch phrases, the meanings of such, and then expose you for what you are.
Its a tried and true method of the right wing. When you know you can’t defend your position, you sling this kind of nonsense and hope it sticks.
Doesn’t work with me at all, and, I might add, the American electorate is waking up to it as well.

If there’s one thing a neo-con hates, its being exposed to the truth.

I can probably tell you word for word what your response to this will be, you wing nuts are just that pedictable, but why would I do that? I’ll just feed you the rope.

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Posted by ( t4nymets ) on September 01, 2008 at 10:00 am

poet,
Have you ever heard of a little thing called “reading comprehension?“ Not once in my post did I praise the behavior/mistakes that Republicans have made. I simply pointed out that all these liberals on here calling Christians hypocrites need to take a look at themselves. I said that at least Palin was HONEST about what she did in college. And Obama was honest about it as well. So why do you people continue to bring that up, and bring up ethics? Is that all you have?

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Posted by ( Cosmo Wafflefoot ) on September 01, 2008 at 9:07 am

OH (novajoe), where do I begin? There is growth, and then there is cancer. Growth “can” be seen as good but not cancer. To many of us Liberty and all that the Falwells represent is cancer. Why? Because they perpetrate hate of the other, unequal rights for women, a ridiculous world view based on absurd mythology and teach their children a disrespect for both the scientific method and people who think differently that they do. Do lots of people make money off of this activity? YES! They also make bundles of money off of cancer. Economics and what you see as growth are besides the point. The point is that they represent things and ideas that many people find reprehensible. One of your mistakes is in thinking that this has ANYTHING to do with politics (republicans or democrats). It really doesn’t. It does, on the other hand, have EVERYTHING to do with people not wanting to live in the 15th century no matter how much money it produces for the local economy. All the money in the world doesn’t cover the stink of a town that thinks the Earth is 6000 years old and science is a Satanic plot. If money and population is your goal…. move to New York, Tokyo or Mexico City. Lynchburg is for super-naturalists and many people just don’t like that at all.

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Posted by ( modernprophet ) on August 31, 2008 at 10:53 pm

I notice that they failed to mention that Alaska actually received the funds for “the bridge to nowhere” and Palin distributed the money to citizens. She also raised taxes on oil companies operating in Alaska and distributed these funds also. Sounds like good, old redistribution of wealth to me, at tax payers expense.

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Posted by ( novajoe ) on August 31, 2008 at 9:31 pm

In an effort to get everyone back to reality, here are the facts:

1) The Falwell family has impacted the economy of Lynchburg. With 2 major employers (Liberty University and Thomas Road Baptist Church), the Falwell family has brought jobs to Lynchburg over the last several decades. Shame on them. During those decades Liberty University has grown to a student body of over 20,000. Assume only half of those students actually live in Lynchburg (10,000 for any math challenged). Those 10,000 students shop at Wards Crossing and throughout the Hill City. Families and friends of those 10,000 students visit Lynchburg and stay in our hotels and buy meals at our dining establishments. Those 10,000 students and their families spend money here. Lots of money. Shame on them. And shame on the Lynchburg news reaching out to such an impactful family for their PERSONAL opinions on the VP pick of one of the Presidential candidates that happens to support a number of causes that are near and dear to the Fallwells.

2) Next, imagine this…your next door neighbor has a party and invites 50 of their friends over. Those friends decide they are going to park as many cars in your driveway as possible (note I said your driveway - private property and not a street – public property). Your neighbor doesn’t ask you in advance if they can use your driveway as a parking lot. Is that acceptable to you? I’m thinking not. Now apply what we have learned above to the fact that an entity affiliated with the Falwells purchased the Plaza. A Democratic candidate to be the Presidential nominee from the party came to Lynchburg for a visit and gave a speech at E.C. Glass High School where he expected 2,000 of his friends to attend. The entity owning the Plaza did not allow his friends coming to E.C. Glass to park on their property. Same thing? I think so.

3) The majority of VOCAL democrats do not respect anyone in authority. Their names are President Bush, Senator John McCain and Governor Palin…..and yes, I call Senator Obama by his proper name as well out of respect for the office he holds. The vocal majority of Democrats are bitter and downright disrespectful. Based on the vocal majority of Democrats I would say that every one of them has been wronged directly in some way by President Bush.

4) Obama and McCain are in a statistical dead heat, with some polls showing Obama with a 2 to 3 point lead. If the entire country was so much behind Senator Obama, why is he not ahead by 20 points or more? We are a country divided right down the middle and we have been for the last 8 plus years. Why? Because we are no longer a nation with great leaders in government. Polls rule our government and polls have screwed up government. I want a guy or gal running this place that is willing to be decisive and stand by their convictions. I want someone that will get the job done. I don’t care if they have screwed up in the past because guess what, we learn from screw ups and improve because of them. I look for a person to lead this country that has shown leadership capability in the past, period. In my opinion, Biden is more qualified to be President than Obama and McCain is more qualified than Palin. Those I believe to be the facts.

In closing, grow up Lynchburg. Find something better to do than to complain about someone not letting you park on their private lot. I was born and raised in the Hill City. I spent the first 21 years of my life there (now 14 years removed). Make the city something great…or watch the Falwells continue to do it for you.

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