Whack Job of the Week (Operation Rescue, Soldiers in Gods Army… or Domestic Terrorists?)

Whack Job of the Week

Operation Rescue
Soldiers in Gods Army… or Domestic Terrorists?

“We are at war…”
-- Randall Terry, Founder of Operation Rescue

Operation Rescue is a militant anti-abortion group founded by former used-car salesman turned fire-and-brimstone-hell-and-damnation preacher, Randall Terry, in the late 1980s. Terry is a carnival fast-talker on the extremist right-wing midway, a conman and a grift just out to make a buck from the ignorant and the religious. When he's not cheating on his wife (and getting thrown out of his church for it), condemning his gay son or looking for any TV camera he can find to spout off about his ideas of Christianity, he's busy recording bad country albums. Desperate for national attention, Operation Rescue first made themselves known by storming the 1988 Democratic Convention in Atlanta, Georgia, where members of the group began their studies in how-to-get-arrested for what they called, “civil-disobiedience.”

The biggest spotlight came to Randall Terry and his ministry of terror in 1991… on the abortion “battlegrounds,” of Wichita, Kansas…. during what they called the “Summer of Mercy.” Many of the residents of this mid-sized mid-western city referred to it as the “Summer of Hell.”

Thousands of militant anti-abortion protesters marched through Wichita, disregarding the civil in civil disobiedience, and performed mass "rescues" the three clinics in Wichita that perform the legal procedure of abortion. Their targets were at a clinic owned and operated by George R. Tiller, and what was then known as Wichita Family Planning, where a large "rescue" involving members of the clergy took place.

The horrid event, which Operation Rescue said would last six days went on for six weeks resulting in over 2600 arrests and severe financial distress on the city and area businesses. The city of Wichita was being torn apart by media, protests, counter-protests, and violence over politics and religion. Hmmmm sounds like Baghdad.
An attempt at a similar success happened in 1993 when Buffalo mayor Jimmy Griffin stupidly invited Operation Rescue for a rally called "Spring of Life." Thousands of out-of-area protesters on both sides of the argument descended on Buffalo and Amherst, again causing massive riots and financial distress because of the additional security necessary to control the often out-of-hand protesters.
Independent Operation Rescue organizations cropped up around the country during these early years, the most successful of which was the California organization, Operation Rescue West, run by OR’s national tactical director, Jeff White.
Randall Terry stepped down from Operation Rescue in 1989. Keith Tucci then feablily attempted to run the national organization after the 1991 Summer of Hell, and was then replaced by Philip “Flip” Benham.

In 1997, Benham changed the name of Operation Rescue National to “Operation Save America,” and broadened the scope of the organization to include issues surrounding homosexuality, pornography, and Islam.

It was under Benham’s leadership that hundreds of al Qaeda operatives were allegedly allowed to attend secret courses in bomb-making, breaking and entering and the targeting of physicians, at Operation Rescue centers throughout the Midwest.
Jeff White stepped down in 1999 following an $880,000 judgment against his organization for harassment and intimidation of Planned Parenthood staff and handed the organization over to the leadership of Troy Newman.

Under Newman’s leadership by adopting the name of Randall Terry's organization, Operation Rescue has regained prominence in the pro-life movement. In 2002, Newman moved his Operation Rescue West headquarters to Wichita, Kansas, to focus its efforts on George Tiller, and dropped the “West” from its moniker.

In June 2006, Operation Rescue bought the building housing Wichita’s smaller abortion clinic, Central Women’s Services, (once known as Wichita Family Planning), after the business had been purchased by Dr. George Tiller.

Operation Rescue operates a disgusting fleet of so-called "Truth Trucks," large panel vehicles that bear images of aborted fetuses. These scare-tactics on wheels, travel around the nation showing what Operation Rescue calls the "grisly truth about abortion." Such images are often criticized as intentionally shocking and insensitive given how sensitive an issue abortion often is… especially when they park them outside of elementary schools.
Operation Rescue lost its tax-exempt status following charges of improper use of contributions, and illegal endorsements of political candidates. Operation Rescue is currently under investigation on charges of money laundering and tax evasion… but that won’t stop their domestic terrorism.
FOX News’ Bill O’Reilly, has been in the middle of a slight controversy over documents he obtained from, “inside sources,” allegedly containing information on patients of Dr. George Tiller. O’Reilly has called out for, “thousands of people,” to picket George Tiller’s clinic in Wichita… and now the religious fanatics at Operation Rescue have decided to answer that call.

Their protests/rescues/terror tactics will be going on in January… here in Wichita… they’re calling it, “A Cry for Justice.” Patriotic Thunder will be keeping an eye on these genuine Whack-Jobs and we’ll be reporting on their movements. Being Pro-Life is a position that can be respected and the abortion issue can be debated to a certain point… but hatred, terror, intimidation, and violence used in trying to stop what is still a legal procedure all in the name of your God… is the equivalent to using hatred, terror, intimidation, and violence against another human in the name of Allah.

That’s whack.