Harold Camping and the Fleecing of the Faithful

Oh boy. What a bummer. I waited all day for The Rapture, clinging to the top of a tree with a butterfly net, hoping to catch Jason Kenney as he floated by. But it never  happened.

Except in Iceland.

And while some were exultant.

After 6pm passed without incident in New Zealand and Australia, Stephen Fry tweeted: “Marvellous news! Rapture doesn't mean end of world; apparently all the planet’s imbeciles disappear in one go.”

Others were disappointed.

Keith Bauer, a 38-year-old tractor-trailer driver from Westminster, Md., took last week off from work, packed his wife, young son and a relative in their SUV and crossed the country.

If it was his last week on Earth, he wanted to see parts of it he'd always heard about but missed, such as the Grand Canyon and the Painted Forest. With maxed-out credit cards and a growing mountain of bills, he said, the rapture would have been a relief.

Or worse.

Tuter said Family Radio's AM station in Sacramento had been "severely vandalized" Friday night or Saturday morning, with air conditioning units yanked out and $25,000 worth of copper stripped from the equipment. He thinks it must have been an angry listener. He was off Saturday but planned to drive past the headquarters "and make sure nothing's burning."

As for me I'm just glad I wasn't home eh?

When they knocked on my door...

And of course, I've never been so proud to be an atheist and a gay wizard.

Oh yeah. Did I mention that Harold Camping is laughing all the way to the bank?

As May 21 drew nearer, donations grew, allowing Family Radio to spend millions of dollars on more than 5,000 billboards plastered with the doomsday message. In 2009, the non for profit reported that it received $18.3 million in donations, and had assets of more than $104 million.

So don't feel sorry for him. Feel sorry for all the desperate people that old homophobe fleeced.

And since it's still the long weekend. And most of my friends are still at the Rupture Party on the beach. Dancing around a bonfire without any clothes on. And threatening to come here next.

I'm just glad I survived eh?

And Harold this one's for YOU...



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