#1859: James Lafferty

James Lafferty is the husband of Andrea Lafferty, serious wingnut. and chairman of the Virginia Anti-Sharia Task Force, which not only constantly accused the Obama administration of being infiltrated by radical Islamist but in 2012 even accused the Romney campaign of being infiltrated by the Muslim Brotherhood, too. The reason being that Romney’s campaign named George Salem, Samah Norquist and David Ramadan “National Co-Chairs of Arab Americans for Romney” and Lafferty had at that point long been opposed to David Ramadan, whom he has accused of of supporting the “Ground Zero” Mosque in New York and having had some ties with lobbying firms for Libya in the United States (like a large number of Republicans, but Lafferty didn’t mention that). Accordingly, Ramadan is an “extremist” who possibly should not even “be allowed to continue to live in the United States,” said Lafferty. He also complained that he and his ilk were getting a “sort of condescending attitude from extremists like Mr. Ramadan”. In 2012 Lafferty received some attention for a speech in which he apparently expressed support for vandalism against mosques (Lafferty afterwards released a statement saying that he didn’t condone or encourage vandalism against mosques, even though he sort of did in the earlier speech.)

Lafferty also runs the Coalition for Religious Freedom, which ardently fights for religious freedom for anyone who agrees with Lafferty and against the religious freedom of anyone else, is a member of the Taliban-inspired hate group the Traditional Values Coalition and executive director of the Christian Seniors organization, which reacted with horror when Congressman Peter Stark admitted, in an inquiry from the Secular Coalition for America, to being a Unitarian. Lafferty took the admission to be evidence that the “liberals in Congress want to throttle any school child who bows his or her head in prayer, but they want to establish a right for liberals to bash Christians and berate God around the clock” – since allowing Unitarians to serve in Congress is an attack on Christians and an example of “liberal bullies” using “the power of government to silence prayer and every other religious expression of free speech.” Yes, anyone who admits to not sharing Lafferty’s religious beliefs is an oppressive bully who should not be eligible for office or – if you are Muslim – American citizenship, because of religious freedom.

Lafferty is, of course, also a committed anti-gay activist.

Diagnosis: Hateful bigot, with the hateful bigot’s characteristic persecution complex and snowflakiness – anyone who disagrees with him is oppressing and offending him. He does apparently wield quite a bit of influence, however.