Blast From the Past: Croaking the GOP Cocksucker Myth of Morality - #71

#71 JIM BAKKER
TELEVANGELIST

Only the Fat Junkie squirming could top this case, which struck at the very heart of the GOP Cocksucker belief that they are very, very moral. Much more moral than those filthy Democrats.

Actually they weren't more moral so much as they were suckers. It was the Bakker Case and his PTL Club that really rammed it home. All through the early and mid 90s I carried a picture of Bakker and whenever I encountered a clergyman on a tear, I took out the picture during one of his rants and held it up where people could see it. It never failed to get a laugh. *Never.* Plus, the longer the preacher went on with his bullshit, the funnier it got because he'd been instantly discredited. However long he ran his mouth determined how deep his grave would be.

In '88, Bakker was convicted in North Carolina on eight counts of mail fraud, *15* counts of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy. This wasn't any liberal conspiracy, either. Not only had he fucked Jessica Hahn on the sly and then paid her over a quarter of a million to get her to keep her mouth shut, Bakker had also taken over $3 million of his contributors' money and used it to finance he and his wife's lifestyle. Here's is what the judge said at Bakker's sentencing hearing. The words should ring in your ears with the ominous sound of truth:

-- U.S. District Judge Robert Potter:
''Those of us who do have a religion are sick of being saps for money-grubbing preachers and priests.''

Man, if I was Bakker's *attorney* and I heard that before the judge pronounced sentence, I would have known to the center of my being that there was a bad moon rising somewhere.

And sure as shit, here it came. Potter hit Bakker right in the mouth with a $500,000 fine and 45 YEARS IN PRISON.

The lawyers gasped. Potter didn't give two shits. A jury had just convicted this little fucker in front of him on 24 counts of fraud. This was just before sentencing guidelines were established, so Potter didn't have to screw around. He threw Bakker's crooked ass of the edge of the world.

Two years later, a federal appeals court voided the fine and changed Bakker's sentence to *18* years. Bakker served five years of it before he got paroled. A class-action suit in North Carolina representing more than 160,000 of Bakker's former contributors was hurled out of court in a decision that basically said, "Hey, assholes, you were warned but you still gave the little fuck your money. Now you get to live with being stupid. You should have had oodles of practice by now."

Two years ago, Bakker's makeup-coated first wife, Tammy Faye, died. Bakker remarried and is now in Branson, MO, trying to reconstruct Heritage USA, which at the time was the third-largest amusement park in the world. Bakker still owes $5.75 million to the IRS.

S. Olson