Build The Damn Mosque!

I can't help but shout this out to all the irrational fearmongers who are afraid of a mosque being built in Lower Manhattan. So a few muslims want to build a place to pray in New York City, the idealized place of hardworking immigrants coming in to the melting pot that is our great country. Why are people so nuts about this? Irrationality and ignorance is what propels their hatred of anyone that doesn't look and act like themselves, even if freedom of religion is enshrined in the Constitution they claim to admire, adhere to and protect.

Tom Robbins from the Village Voice gives us a glimpse at the insanity observed at the latest hearings to approve the mosque:

Preserving urban landmarks hasn't been high on the roster of concerns in Tea Party land, from where a lot of the protesters were recruited. But many who showed up to denounce a Muslim-sponsored development so near sacred ground tied their cause to municipal art. All were suddenly gung-ho advocates for salvaging this splendid example of 19th-century Italian palazzo mercantile architecture.[...]

Testifying at a microphone on the aisle, a heavy-set woman pointed to a tiny teenager seated nearby wearing a hijab. "How do I know this young woman isn't going to be strapped with explosives?"

That was about par for the course during the three-hour session. One speaker suggested that this is how Muslims took over London. "It's unsafe for a Westerner to go to London's East End," she said. "The mosques are used to subvert the neighborhood." After she sat down, she was asked if she'd been to London. "No, but I've been doing a great deal of reading about it, mostly on the Internet," she replied.

Ah the internet, and I'm sure her reading was fully of well-sourced material....straight out of the tea party websites esteemed for their fact-checked stories and award-winning journalism.

The sight of this melée for the even-keeled Robbins must have been nauseating to say the least. I'd like to say that these displays are infrequent and unrepresentative of the general body politic, but sadly it is not. Too many Americans indulge in ignorant views that help them feel greater than. It has been practiced in America since the beginning of miscegenation laws of 17th century Virginia. It continued with the Know-Nothings of the mid-19th century and the Ku Klux Klan of the late 19th century and well into the 20th century.

Despite all that miserable bigotry, I do hope that the decision-makers in the approval process for the mosque are above that nuttiness. America is supposed to be better and bigger than it's lowest common denominators. Allowing freedom of religion to flower, especially in spite of 9/11 is exactly what will help us win the battle of ideas with the actual terrorists who wish us harm, not muslims like Sharif El-Gamal who are working for the common good.

Seven Years Later It Is Time To Make A Choice

Seven years ago today my Mom called me early in the morning. I was living in Tucson at the time and she was home in Los Angeles. Calls that came before seven always scared me from her, because the ring usually foretold bad news. This time though, she told me to turn on the television and she was crying. Needless to say, I watched the news all day long, sometimes with friends but mostly by myself. I just couldn't believe what I saw on television. The horrific nature of it all was overwhelming and to a degree hard to fathom far away from Ground Zero at the edge of the Sonoran Desert. Then I watched what our President and his minions did with our national tragedy and global goodwill. Now look at where we are.

This morning I am sitting in City Hall Park, a few stops on the 6 train from where I have been living for nearly three years. It is relatively quiet in here save for the beautiful fountain that graces the center of the park. Every few minutes a fire truck passes by, no doubt on its way to the memorial for those that lost their lives just a few blocks from here.

When I lived two thousand miles away I saw New York through a tourist's eyes and marveled at the city but I was too busy with Tucsonan politics to deal or even have much interest in the minutae of the vast web that NYC politicians and bureaucrats weave over and around the city. I have gotten to know some of it since I moved here and while parts are good, there are a lot of things that need to be fixed. The Deutsche Bank still stands as a stark reminder that corruption and incompetence has played a major role in the clean up of the area. Hundreds of FDNY firefighters lost their lives because of the terrorists, but last year another two died because of substandard conditions and negligence by FDNY's very own inspectors. That just isn't right, yet even after that tragedy last August, problems still remain. Seven years later, we must not only remember, but take action as well.

While New York must take care of the clean up and reconstruction of the area, our Federal government must act to make sure we prevent future attacks and not only seek out the terrorists that helped commit that heinous act, but stop giving them reasons to recruit more from wanting to do us harm.

This year we must make a choice between two men that want to take our country in two different directions. To decide, we must not only look at "experience" but more importantly we must examine their judgment. Shortly after the buildings collapsed, John McCain called for war with Iraq. George Bush gave him that wish and simultaneously kissed our international cooperation goodbye.

When the propaganda was spread by the right that we must invade Iraq (under false pretenses) few spoke out against them. The traditional media happily beat the war drum for the Republican-dominated government. One of those few though, was Barack Obama. He was against the war from before we started it and he is still against it and most importantly wants to end it. There is no difference more clear between him and McCain. One wants to get out as quickly as possible and the other wants to stay there for a hundred years.

So as I sit here in park, enjoying the people, the landscaping and the array of buildings that surround me, I realize that my view has changed in seven years. Not that I was for the war and now I'm against it...I've always been against the war and was part of the ten percent that disapproved of George Bush immediately following the attacks. No, what has changed is my perspective because of my location. As a relatively new New Yorker, I see what needs to be changed here in the city and what needs to get done, but I could tell you from anywhere in the world that we can not have four or eight more years of the same destructive policies that George Bush has used to run our nation into the ground.

Bush Turns His Back On 9/11 Workers Again

He may not have had to do it himself, but the Department of Health and Human Services walked away from a commitment to men and women that risked their lives on September 11th. As long as its a federal agency, it is inherently a part of the Bush Administration. HHS no longer wants to pay to monitor workers who live outside the five boroughs, many who have sought drier climates due to their devastated respiratory systems.

From ABC7:

New York's congressional delegation and some ailing workers stood outside the World Trade Center site Saturday to protest this week's decision to not fund screening of workers outside New York City.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services filed paperwork this week canceling plans to pay a company to medically screen those who got sick after working in the toxic rubble of the trade center.

The government said the program could cost far more money than Congress has provided. U.S. Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., on Saturday said of the explanation: "That takes a lot of chutzpah."

It takes more than chutzpah, it requires a callousness of the heart and soul that is unimaginable here in New York. Who in their right mind would not want to give anything to those that worked on the pile, whether they were searching for survivors or cleaning up the wreckage. Obviously Bush and his underlings are not in their right minds.

What Does Bloomberg Know About Being A Hero?

The Mayor has some nerve determining who was and wasn't a hero on the pile at Ground Zero. During September 11th he was far from the death and destruction that was wrought down in the Financial District. The man isolated by his money tries to be like one of the people by riding the subway (after being driven to the express stop by his police detail) but in reality he is no hero, just a rich media tycoon that was anointed by Rudy Giuliani right after the attacks.

For him to call a man who spent 450 hours working and trying to rescue people in the smoking inferno nothing more than a drug addict is nothing short of atrocious. Bloomberg made those comments while accepting an award at Harvard, well Detective James Zadroga didn't have a chance to make it up to Cambridge, he died from scarred lungs as have many other workers on the pile.

From The Daily News:

"Our chief medical examiner believes that the deceased was using some of his drugs in a manner for recreational drugs," Bloomberg said.

Bloomberg said that instead of taking his medications orally, Zadroga "was injecting them into his veins - a common practice, I gather."

"Nobody wanted to hear that," Bloomberg said. "We wanted to have a hero. There are plenty of heroes. It's just in this case, the science says this was not a hero."

Zadroga's father was shocked.

"For Bloomberg to say that he's not a hero, that is a disgrace," Joseph Zadroga said. "Why is he trying to malign my son and deny that Jimmy is a hero."

Bloomberg made those shocking comments based on a second autopsy done on Zadroga. Before the family wanted their son's name added to the official list of 9/11 victims the autopsy showed he had in fact succumbed to the toxic air of Lower Manhattan.

Only after there was something at stake for the city did the results change. Michael Palladino, president of the Detectives' Endowment Association is now accusing the Chief Medical Examiner that his results were politically motivated. Serious charges for a serious case of degrading treatment of a hero by a callous and insensitive Mayor.

The Senate Throws Some Change At 9/11 Workers

Fifty-five million dollars is a lot to the average person but not much at all when we are talking about helping the brave men and women that worked on the pile after September 11th. The Senate voted to add that sum to the $50 million already appropriated. Sure, its great to have any money at all, but is that the way we should treat our heroes?

From The Daily News:

The measure encourages the development of long-term solutions to screen and treat everyone affected by the post-9/11 risks.

Health problems suffered by the thousands who were affected range from asthma to posttraumatic stress.

"The message of this vote is clear," said Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.). "America is here for you in your time of need."

That message sounds very un-clear to me. When we are talking about settling lawsuits in the billion dollar range, $55 or $105 million just isn't that much. That billion dollar lawsuit wouldn't even cover all the costs that these heroes-turned-victims endure on a monthly basis. With a war that will cost at least $2.4 TRILLION dollars, why can we not spare the one or two billion that these people need to get by?

And another thing, will George Bush even sign that bill for $55 million?

Kerik Decries 9/11 Politics By Playing Politics

Ah, Bernie Kerik. You don't hear much about that guy in the news these days. Thankfully for our reading pleasure he gave an interview while attending the ceremonies this morning at Ground Zero. For the most part he stayed away from his former pal Giuliani in the physical sense, but that did not stop him from praising the Presidential aspirant and slamming the people opposed to him.

From The Huffington Post:

Asked to respond to criticism that Giuliani made a terrible, life-costing mistake by putting New York's terrorist response center in one of the Twin Towers - thereby rendering it moot when the building was hit - Kerik noted the clairvoyance of hindsight.

"Yeah," he said, "I wish I could look back and say some of the things I've done and moves I've made, I didn't make. But the reality is you don't have that luxury of going back. Was it a bad decision? Possibly. But I think people have to look beyond that and look at the scope of the response on 9/11."

As for the criticism expressed by the International Association of Firefighters that Giuliani's performance on 9/11 was more or less a disaster, Kerik decried it as politics.

"The unfortunate thing is they have brought this into the political arena," he claimed. "As an insider in the administration, I know what Rudy did for the fire department. And I know what he did for the city... For anybody to question his leadership, I find it pretty appalling"

Appalling? Really? Those are brave comments coming from a man criminal such as himself. As for questioning Rudy's leadership....that is the right of every American to ponder before thinking of making him our next President. Speaking of people running for President, Kerik even took the time to lambast Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH):

Kerik even waded briefly into the presidential campaign, lobbing criticisms at Representative Dennis Kucinich, D-OH, who, in a recent radio interview from Syria, derided America's presence in Iraq.

"I was so sickened by it, I had to turn it off," Kerik said. "The reason we are never going to win this war is because we can't unite against the enemy. I don't know what the parameters are for treason, but this guy should be impeached."

Kerik is so far out of bounds he can't even see the field on this one. He might want to keep his mouth as far away as he does his distance from Rudy on this day....and any day.

The Air Of Ground Zero May Ultimately Choke Rudy

In the last five and a half years, Rudy Giuliani has profited enormously both financially and in stature from his stewardship of New York City during the terrible attacks of September 11th. The light shown on him from the press as it did for George Bush immediately following the tragedy. Since Bush has remained in the spotlight consistently until now, that surge in popularity has been erased and then some. Yet Rudy was mostly out of the picture until recently, so he kept up his favorable ratings.

Now that the harsh glare of the Presidential primary lens is upon him, the cracks in his veneer are beginning to show. "America's Mayor" is being called out by various groups affected by Rudy's leadership or lack thereof related to the aftermath of the terrorist attack. What is particularly dangerous to the candidate is how residents and rescue workers became ill from breathing the toxic air while Rudy did nothing about it.

From The New York Times:

An examination of Mr. Giuliani’s handling of the extraordinary recovery operation during his last months in office shows that he seized control and largely limited the influence of experienced federal agencies. In doing that, according to some experts and many of those who worked in the trade center’s ruins, Mr. Giuliani might have allowed his sense of purpose to trump caution in the rush to prove that his city was not crippled by the attack.

Administration documents and thousands of pages of legal testimony filed in a lawsuit against New York City, along with more than two dozen interviews with people involved in the events of the last four months of Mr. Giuliani’s administration, show that while the city had a safety plan for workers, it never meaningfully enforced federal requirements that those at the site wear respirators.

At the same time, the administration warned companies working on the pile that they would face penalties or be fired if work slowed. And according to public hearing transcripts and unpublished administration records, officials also on some occasions gave flawed public representations of the nature of the health threat, even as they privately worried about exposure to lawsuits by sickened workers.

The findings clearly show that Rudy cared more about making New York look pretty again to the detriment of those that cleaned up Ground Zero. Plenty of experts are ready to testify against Giuliani and his Administration for the way the situation was handled. There are also thousands of victims that can't breathe normally to this day. Some have even died as a result.

So if Rudy wants to run on an image that depicts him as tough on terror and a brave leader when faced with adversity, then he better be ready to pay the price when his demons come back to haunt him. His victims are ready to have their revenge on Rudy where it hurts him most. More importantly, with him being on such a stage, it might just set him up for a little bit of justice for the brave men and women that breathed the air of Lower Manhattan for far too long without the proper equipment.

Now You See It, Now You Don't

Last year the leaders of the WTC site put webcams up around Ground Zero to show the public the progress at the site years after the disaster. A year later, the cameras are mysteriously pulled from the internet as construction finally begins downtown.

From the AP:

The view of ground zero just got a little smaller. The agency that oversaw the redesign of the World Trade Center site on Thursday stopped posting on its Web site hourly images from a camera pointed at ground zero.

The agency introduced the Web camera less than a year ago, saying it wanted to show progress in rebuilding more than four years after the 2001 terrorist attacks. Construction of the Sept. 11 memorial had just begun last March, but the site is much busier today.

Concrete footings are being poured around the footprints of the twin towers to support the memorial, steel columns are rising for a 1,776-foot skyscraper, a transit hub is under construction and officials are preparing land to build three more office towers.

There has been no comment as to why the images were abruptly stopped.