I knew it.

I asked my father the other day if he knew anything about Jerry Fallwell beside what's been written and talked about in the news. I asked him because I figure since the news media hated him so much, he MUST have been an admirable and honorable man.

Take, for example, Justice Clarence Thomas. Remember how the news media VILLIFIED him? The whole "Anita Hill" thing? Remember? Turns out that Anita Hill was a publicity hound, hell-bent on smearing the name of a good man. Oh, just read about it - you'll find what I'm talking about if you look in places other than the New York Times.

Or how about Joe McCarthy? Just hearing his name conjures up visions of dark-of-night secret meetings and the destruction of innocent actors and actresses lives and careers. Right? Well, I've come to realize that the villification of Mr. McCarthy was wrong, too. He was right, you know. Communists were in every corner of Hollywood and even in high-level offices of government. Don't believe me? Read "Witness" by Whittaker Chambers.

So. All of the above being true, I just knew that the Rev. Fallwell wasn't as bad as people in the media wanted us to believe. I was right. One source that confirmed my suspicions is the venerable Ann Coulter in her latest column.

Despite venomous attacks and overwhelming pressure to adopt the fashionable beliefs of cafe society, Falwell never wavered an inch in acknowledging Jesus before men. Luckily, Jesus' full sentence, quoted at the beginning of this column is: "All men will hate you because of me, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved."

Regarding him being ridiculed about "outing" Tinky Winky:

Michael Musto of The Village Voice boasted that Tinky Winky was "out and proud," noting that it was "a great message to kids — not only that it's OK to be gay, but the importance of being well accessorized." All this appeared before Falwell made his first mention of Tinky Winky. After one year of the mainstream media laughing at having put one over on stupid bourgeois Americans by promoting a gay cartoon character in a TV show for children, when Falwell criticized the cartoon in February 1999, that same mainstream media howled with derision that Falwell thought a cartoon character could be gay.

Gee, you mean he didn't invent the gay Teletubbies character? You'd never know it from listening to the news. You mean his only crime that got him laughed at and hated was his strong, unwavering belief in God and the values of the Bible? He is remembered in the media as a raving nutjob because he wasn't PC and didn't just accept homosexuality without objection?

RIP, Rev. Fallwell. May there be many more men (and women) like you who are willing to be hated for Jesus' name sake, and who will remain firm in his (or her!) beliefs to the end.