Design concept for the Cardoba “Mosque”
Carl Paladino, developer, attorney, CEO of the Ellicott Development Company, and tea party activist is running for governor of New York and has pledged:
Of course this plan to circumvent the laws of private property flies right in the face of what conservatives supposedly hold dear. Susette Kelo was given the 2006 Ronald Reagan award by CPAC for her role in fighting eminent domain in Kelo v. New London, when she was threatened with eviction by eminent domain so that her property could be turned over to developers.
And that eminent domain stuff wasn’t just some off the cuff remark. No, it’s his TV ad. By the way, the same “conservative values” let’s-protect-marriage-from-the-gays preacher kept his extramarital love child a secret from his family for 10 years. Nice guy I’m sure.
Bill Keller, a Florida pastor, Birther infomercial host, and son of the former CEO to Chevron, said that even though he’s never been to New York, he’s proposing a $1 million project next door that he dubs “the 9/11 Christian Center at Ground Zero.” In describing the project, which he said should be up by the first of January 2011, Keller said that, “This is not to be confrontational with the Muslims, it really isn’t.” When asked about the center’s website, which calls Islam a “false religion” whose 1 billion adherents “are going to Hell,” Keller said it was not intended as confrontation but rather “telling the truth.”
In order to stop the “Islamist cultural-political offensive designed to destroy our civilization,” Newt Gingrich suggested that, were he president, he would “declare the area around the World Trade Center a national military battlefield because that was a battle and it part of a real war.” Oh yeah, and Gingrich also said of the Axis of Evil: “We’re one out of three.”
It was bad enough when these demagogues wanted to block them with a cynical attempt at declaring the Burlington Coat Factory a historical landmark (and then accuse the Commission of political bias), now they just come out and say, “Vote for me and I’ll steal the private property of a random cleric of a religion you don’t like and replace their community center with a monument to how awesome our two perpetual wars are.”
What does it tell Muslims who are now watching this debate? It tells them that Osama Bin Laden is right: that the War on Terror is just a euphemism for a war on Islam, not Islamic terror, not violent Islamic sectarians, but Islam in general. That’s telling the Arab community in New York: “Remember the fear and anger you felt when the twin towers fell and your neighborhood got blanketed in toxic dust? Well, that was nothing compared to the fear and anger felt by the Christians — the real Americans — who were watching those attacks on television. In fact, that was not an attack by terrorists against you, that was an attack by you against us.”
There’s another 40-year-old pre-WTC mosque sitting just four blocks away from Ground Zero. Why not complete the circle and just force this mosque to move out, break their windows, and spray paint slogans equating Islam with fascism without realizing that you’re basically parroting part what the SS did to the Jews?
Backers of the “Ground Zero Mosque” that isn’t really at Ground Zero and isn’t really just a mosque (it includes a gym and a swimming pool) pledged to incorporate a memorial to 9/11 victims and possibly an interfaith chapel, but that’s a ridiculous gesture because it assumes that the people doing the complaining want to reach a compromise. What they want is more festering wounds so they can howl and rage until a Republican is in office again.
As for those calling them to just move it a few blocks away, Jon Stewart points out this isn’t the only place where Islamic cultural centers and mosques are being picketed. Even if they found a place where people wouldn’t have a problem, certainly they would lose tons of money and time, and for what, to placate the irrational proposition that Muslims shouldn’t pray in their own pre-WTC community?
If no mosque should be built within two blocks of Ground Zero, does that mean no church should be built within two blocks of anywhere America has bombed?
The Anti-Defamation league sadly posted a mixed message condemning the bigotry involved in the controversy while also complaining that building the Islamic Center “in the shadow of the World Trade Center will cause some victims some pain — unnecesarily — and that is not right.” Paul Krugman poignantly remarks: “It causes some people pain to see Jews operating small businesses in non-Jewish neighborhoods; it causes some people pain to see Jews writing for national publications (as I learn from my mailbox most weeks); it causes some people pain to see Jews on the Supreme Court. So would ADL agree that we should ban Jews from these activities, so as to spare these people pain? No? What’s the difference?”
The Philadelphia-based Shalom Center are among the leaders vocally opposing the Anti-Defamation League. Imam Feisal Abdul-Rauf’s wife Daisy Khan said: “Your support is a reflection of the great history of mutual cooperation and understanding that Jewish and Muslim civilizations have shared in the past, and remains a testament to the enduring success of our continuing dialogue and dedication to upholding religious freedom, tolerance and cooperation among us all as Americans.”
Fox News is trying to paint the Sufi leader of the Community Center as a radical because he refuses to call HAMAS a terrorist organization. The accusation is certainly in line with the Republican strategy of goading Jewish American voters to abandon Democratic politicians for their perceived lack of devotion to Israel. But the reason for this is because the Sufi imam sees his role as trying to bridge Muslim and American communities together and calling the Democratically-elected Palestinian government group would not be helpful in that respect. It’s sort of like how in the Synoptic gospels the Pharisees tried to trap Jesus between cultural perceptions by asking if Roman taxes were legitimate. The imam’s philosophy is actually very Unitarian and he believes that American democracy is an embodiment of Islam’s ideal society.
Don’t expect the “liberal media” to fight too hard about it. CNN just recently fired their Senior Middle East News Editor, Octavia Nasr, for tweeting a lament for the death of the mainstream Shi’ite cleric Sayyed Mohammed Hussein, who was the religious guide for our ally, Iraq’s Dawa Party. The Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki even took the very unusual step of leaving Iraq to attend Fadlallah’s funeral.
Most of the mainstream media seemed more interested in the fact that Palin mispronounced another word, and then tried to compare herself to Shakespeare in response to the media circus. This led to a very entertaining Twitter meme, #ShakesPalin, in which participants revamped classic Shakespeare quotes, Palin-style. The funniest entry came from The Cato Institute’s Julian Sanchez: “To suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous liberals, or to quit halfterm, and by opposing, rake in speaking fees.”
Bryan at YouAreDumb.Net did a much better job of defending it:
Also, can we get the fuck over 9/11 already? It’s nine years later. The number of people who should have strong passions and keen sensibilities at this point is small enough that they shouldn’t be granted carte blanche to run roughshod over the lives of the hundreds of millions of us who have moved on. You don’t hear the Pearl Harbor Families and Newt Fucking Gingrich raising a ruckus every time someone opens a sushi restaurant near Pearl Harbor.
Hell, it’s not even all the families who are feeling anguish over 9/11 that are in play here. There are a few, sure, but they’ve been shamelessly co-opted by Newt and Sarah and Fox and everyone else who thinks it’s excellent for the 2010 elections if they can demonize some brown people that are outside Arizona for a change. And that demonizing has become so prevalent that not only are hardly any Democrats willing to go to bat for the Cordoba House (site of the proposed community center), but it’s given Joystick Joe cover to throw a little of his patented gentle Arab-hate into the mix.
“Well, I guess I’d say I’m troubled by it. But I don’t know enough to say it ought to be prohibited. But frankly I’ve heard enough about it, and read enough about it, that I wish someone in New York would just put the brakes on it for a while and take a look at this.” – Joe Lieberman.
So you don’t know enough to say it ought to be prohibited, but you’ve heard enough to wish that New York had prohibited it. Makes sense to me. Or at least as much sense as condemning the bigotry of people opposing the community center then blaming the community center for inciting it.
And in case there was any doubt in your mind that the right was just using this bullshit to position themselves for future political runs, Tim Pawlenty weighed in on it. Tim Pawlenty. Barely even governor anymore of a state so geographically and culturally distant from NYC that we wonder why delis put sesame seeds on donuts. And Timmeh was his usual loquacious self.
“I’m strongly opposed to the idea of putting a mosque anywhere near ground zero — I think it’s inappropriate. I believe that 3,000 of our fellow innocent citizens were killed in that area, and some ways from a patriotic standpoint, it’s hallowed ground, it’s sacred ground, and we should respect that. We shouldn’t have images or activities that degrade or disrespect that in any way.” – Timmeh, delicately fluffing the cock of wingnut site RealClearPolitics.
It must be pretty hallowed ground. That’s why they haven’t actually built anything there. But how far does hallowed ground extend? Do we kick the existing mosque near Ground Zero out? Who gets to decide what images or activities degrade or disrespect our patriotic hallowed ground? Tim Pawlenty? He’s running for President, which is about as disrespectful to America as you can get.
So the Republicans are picking on a minority to score political points, the Democrats are unwilling to spend the political capital to defend the minority because they don’t want to lose the votes of fiscally liberal bigots, and the media keeps it all going for the sake of ratings. Business as usual, in other words.
Actually, in reference to Bryan’s remark about “a sushi restaurant near Pearl Harbor”, there actually is a Shinto shrine right around the bend from Pearl Harbor.
Before its destruction in 2001, the World Trade Center featured a prayer space, where hundreds of Muslims would gather every Friday to practice their faith. The number of Muslims who died during the 9/11 attack is estimated as being between 28 and 75. We shouldn’t let Osama Bin Laden prove that he was right when he said: “The West is incapable of recognizing the rights of others. It will not be able to respect others’ beliefs or feelings. The West still believes in ethnic supremacy and looks down on other nations. They categorize human beings into white masters and colored slaves.”
