The opening salvo has been fired! A two-page article discussing the
"secret double life" of Paul and Jan Crouchhas appeared in the
September 9, 1997 issue of The Globe. And while it is the first one, it
is virtually certain not to be the last. It could be a long, hard
fall....
In pertinent part, the Globe story alleges that Paul and Jan Crouchare the Christian version of Bill and Hillary -- trapped in a marriage
of convenience. That they live in separate mansions ... and Jan is more
often in the company of muscular twenty-something bodyguards who
"hand-feed [her, and she them] hors d'oeurves and fruit." That just
like Tammy Faye before her,Jan is more at home in Bloomingdale's than a
prayer room, and has had her face "pulled back so many times you could
bounce a quarter off her cheeks." And that while Paul and Jan "own
several expensive motorcycles," and Jan "loves nothing more than hanging
out with her wild, tattooed biker friends," they cancelled Pat Boone's
show because he was "representing a bad element."
I rather suspect it was because Pat stole her favorite biker
outfit.... :)
The most intriguing part of the story was an independent confirmation
of what we have been hearing for some time: that son Matt was not at all
happy with the moral meltdown at TBN. You may recall that Matt produced
Bob Larson's show; working in close quarters with BegBoy probably
convinced him that TBN was in serious trouble. It's the old 'frog in
the pot' scenario: Turn up the heat too fast, and he'll jump.
It is more likely than not that Matt has already inked a
'kiss-and-tell' book deal -- after all, his last name _IS_ ,Crouch and
if you threw the kind of money at him that a major publisher would be
capable of throwing, he could start singing like Beverly Sills. Besides,
after working with pond-scum like Larson, the guy probably _NEEDS_ a
cathartic, if not an industrial-strength enema. Matt might as well take
the money and run, because he's not going to be the only one in that
choir....
From what I understand, some of the 'rats' are already starting to
make plans to jump ship. Benny Hinn has reportedly been making noises
about moving to secular TV, and has already distanced himself from the
Counterfeit Revival. There are enough "disgruntled ex-employees" out
there to finally reach critical mass, and one or two are pretty sure to
end up with lucrative book deals. And the mainstream media undoubtedly
won't be far behind....
The Crouches' lawyer denied it all ... but, then again, that's what
lawyers DO. ;)
For TBN, the two-page spread in The Globe is potentially more damaging
than a network expose, since many of their financial contributors are
regular readers. :)
Since the good folks at TBN have been uncharacteristically ungracious
in failing to respond to my earlier inquiries, I have cc'd their VP of
Engineering, Ben Miller. Ben, how _DOES_ TBN justify keeping pond-scum
like Bob Larson on the air, when it kicked the (comparatively)
squeaky-clean Pat Boone off, when he really hadn't done anything wrong?
