We know that to give any attention to lunatic fringe dweller the Rev. Pat Robertson only encourages him, but we can’t resist. Because now in addition to advocating murder, we can add lying (and lying badly) to his resume of transgressions.

It seems Robertson has finally apologized for advocating that the elected president of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, be assassinated. But it took what Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld calls “a long, hard slog” to get there. Let’s go on a slightly abbreviated journey with Pat, shall we? Various Things & Stuff’s comments follow each quote, in italics.

“I don’t know about this doctrine of assassination but if he [Chavez] thinks we’re trying to assassinate him, I think we really ought to go ahead and do it. We have the ability to take him out and I think the time has come that we exercise that option.” — Robertson on The 700 Club on Monday.

Clearly, Robertson is advocating the United States assassinate Chavez, in violation of U.S. law and the Sixth Commandment. We only say this because “go ahead and do it” so closely follows “assassinate him.” But watch what the good reverend does with that here:

“I didn’t say assassination. I said our special forces should take him out. Take him out could be a number of things, including kidnapping.” — Robertson, The 700 Club on Wednesday.

First, Robertson did say assassinate, so he’s a liar. Second, he’s a bad liar. (“Take him out” could mean many things? Yeah, we thought he meant “take him out for a nice ice cream sundae, the kind with cherries and chopped-up peanuts on top. Mmmm, good!) Third, he’s an idiot: So we don’t kill a foreign head of state, we kidnap him? And then what? Put him on trial in Miami for drug running? What kind of a complete and utter moron would do that? … Oh, wait.

“Is it right to call for assassination? No, and I apologize for that statement. I spoke in frustration that we should accommodate the man who thinks the U.S. is out to kill him.” — Robertson on a website posting Wednesday.

It’s also not right to lie about having called for assassination, Pat. And it’s downright stupid to argue that just because Chavez has some (not so illegitimate) concerns about a coup, we should oblige him. Should we oblige every crazy person’s paranoid fantasy? We only ask because, as a crazy person, Robertson no doubt has plenty of paranoid fantasies.

Some might at this point call for Robertson to step aside from his broadcasting empire, having forfeited all rights and claims to leadership with crazy talk and subsequent lying about the aforementioned crazy talk. Not us. We want the guy to go right on talking, as much as possible. See, we think it’s a good idea for the Christian right to support people like Robertson, so nobody will ever take them seriously again, which is good for all of us.

So preach on, Brother Pat! We hear gay day is coming up at Disney World. How about calling down some meteors?