NY Mosque Leaders Object to Neighbor's 'Bomb' Sign

BuffaloNews.com
May 10, 2011

AMHERST, N.Y. (AP) - Muslim leaders are upset that a homeowner who lives next door to a newly opened mosque has posted a sign on his front lawn that reads "Bomb Making Next Driveway."
Michael Heick lives along a heavily traveled road in the town of Amherst, a Buffalo suburb. The next driveway on the same side of the road is the entrance to the Jaffarya Center.

Freedom of speech or freedom to hate?

Heick told local media outlets that he put up the sign last weekend because he was frustrated with how the mosque and town officials handled his complaints that the mosque was built too close to his property and that its bright lights violate town code.

"The place is too close. I don't care what people think. It doesn't matter what people think," he told the Buffalo News. "This is a way to get answers now. I get none from the town. The intent was to catch the eye of the people who I have a problem with."

Mosque officials said the sign's message is offensive and that Heick hasn't responded to their requests for a meeting.

"I would really think it's an incitement of hatred against Muslims," said Dr. Syed Jaffri, an Amherst psychiatrist and member of the mosque's board of trustees. "Law enforcement should take it very seriously. Tomorrow, somebody could say, 'Oh they have weapons,' and people believe it."

Mubarak Abidi, mosque president, said he called Amherst police over the weekend about the sign and was told its posting wasn't illegal.

Comment: Sure the fool has problems with the mosques' lights.  Are they all just going nuts up there?

Onward!

Picture and Story Credit

The Unthinking Immorality of the United States

Accepting a highly controversial Nobel Peace Prize, Obama said this: “Where force is necessary, we have a moral and strategic interest in binding ourselves to certain rules of conduct. And even as we confront a vicious adversary that abides by no rules, I believe that the United States of America must remain a standard bearer in the conduct of war. That is what makes us different from those whom we fight. That is a source of our strength. That is why I prohibited torture. That is why I ordered the prison at Guantanamo Bay closed. And that is why I have reaffirmed America’s commitment to abide by the Geneva Conventions.”

Yet the torture goes on, Guantanamo is still there and the Conventions are still ignored. The true difference between the US and those it fights is that only the US has active forces and military bases all over the world. For a relatively young nation, its record of invasions into other states is appalling. Since achieving its independence the US has become the world’s largest war machine. Far from being a ‘standard bearer in the conduct of war’, it is the world leader in invasion and interference.

 Read the rest of Lesley Docksey's Dissident Voice article here.

Comment:  Doesn't it just defy sensibility that they awarded Tom the Nobel Peace Prize?  I like the opening poem that Docksey uses in the article.  It reads in part:

Each man’s death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee.
– John Donne

I have never quite felt these words of Donne in the way that I feel them now.

Onward!

It's not hard being young black and smart.

My father -in- law is a wise man. He has always done a good job of taking care of himself and his family, but you would never know what he has or how comfortable he is by outward appearances.

I remember a story he told me just after I met him: He was working for an old white man on a sweet potato farm when he was much younger, and when he saved up enough money to buy a new car and drove it around the farm, the man fired him. He never forgot that, and he wanted to make sure I understood the moral of his story before I went off to the East Coast with his daughter.

Anyway, reading the story about Chris Johnson and the subsequent response the story got from one particular person posting about it, made me think of my father- in- law.

"ORLANDO-Tennessee Titans, star running back, Chris Johnson had some harsh words for the police after they visited his house allegedly because there was a tip about a number of high end cars entering the premises. TMZ reports:

Moments after cops walked out the door, Johnson tweeted, 'Y did the police just walk in my condo saying they think it’s drug activity because it’s alot of traffic but it was the MTV camera crew.'

He added, .'Hard being young, black and rich.. '"

Comment from some person calling himself "The_Donlamb"

'That's what you get when you are simple, black and suddenly becomes super rich, you flash and dash and you get the attention of the rulers of this society; and they will let you know who's still in charge. Do yourself a favor; stay off mtv, buy you a modest home, get you a wife and calm yo black @#### down. because whether you realize it or not, you are still owned by the white slave master for his entertainment, and if you don't break your d###n neck to entertain him, he's going to toss you to the dogs when he's done with you; just ask oj and mike. you ni##@s never cease to amaze me! But you thugged out though! you probably think you larry hoover, or frank lucus huh?"' [Story]

Man you Negroes can be tough with the real talk. *still laughing*

Chris, there is nothing wrong with being young black and rich my brother, but please try not to be young black and broke in a few years because you blew all of your money on things of no value.

Make sure that you take care of your family and invest your money wisely so that your children and grandchildren won't have to work as hard as you did.

In the meantime, go ahead and get your party on, and don't fight the po po when the come knocking at your door. You can't spend your money if you are dead.

Chris Hedges: Your Taxes Fund Anti-Muslim Hatred

"... the plight of Muslims is beginning to mirror that of targeted ethnic
minority groups on the eve of the war in the former Yugoslavia,
or Jews in the dying days of the Weimar Republic."

The major candidates for the Republican nomination for the presidency, including Rick Santorum, Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich and Mike Huckabee, along with television personalities such as Bill Maher, routinely employ hate talk against Muslims as a way to attract votes or viewers. Right-wing radio and cable news, including Christian radio and television, along with websites such as Jihad Watch and FrontPage, spew toxic filth about Muslims over the airwaves and the Internet. But perhaps most ominously—as pointed out in “Manufacturing the Muslim Menace,” a report by Political Research Associates—a cadre of right-wing institutions that peddle themselves as counterterrorism specialists and experts on the Muslim world has been indoctrinating thousands of police, intelligence and military personnel in nationwide seminars. These seminars, run by organizations such as Security Solutions International, The Centre for Counterintelligence and Security Studies, and International Counter-Terrorism Officers Association, embrace gross and distorted stereotypes and propagate wild conspiracy theories. And much of this indoctrination within the law enforcement community is funded under two grant programs for training—the State Homeland Security Program and Urban Areas Security Initiative—which made $1.67 billion available to states in 2010. The seminars preach that Islam is a terrorist religion, that an Islamic “fifth column” or “stealth jihad” is subverting the United States from within, that mainstream American Muslims have ties to terrorist groups, that Muslims use litigation, free speech and other legal means (something the trainers have nicknamed “Lawfare”) to advance the subversive Muslim agenda and that the goal of Muslims in the United States is to replace the Constitution with Islamic or Shariah law.

“You would not expect a Democratic administration to fund right-wing groups,” Thom Cincotta, a civil liberties attorney and the author of the Political Research Associates report, told me, “and yet we continue to have hard-right, Islamophobic speakers and companies being paid taxpayer dollars to promote racist doctrines that undermine U.S. national security policy concerning Islam and the Muslim world. Policy expert after policy expert point out that framing our counterterrorism efforts as a war against Islam is a recipe for building increased resentment among Muslims, as well as a potent recruiting tool for those who would like to carry out violent attacks against us. This kind of demonizing breaks down communication between law enforcement agents and Muslim communities, which have proven to be strong allies in the rare instances of domestic extremism. Not only does it threaten to erode basic civil liberties, it threatens freedom of expression and freedom of worship.” 

Read the rest of this TruthDig article here. 

Comment: The US cannot exist without racism and hatred.  Muslims who are living there and fighting for acceptance and tolerance and the rest of the bullsh*t terminology that goes for multiculturalism-speak will only find respite when the next race/religious target is found.

Muslim is the new black unless, of course, you are both Muslim and black then it is double-jeopardy.

Onward!

Cartoon Credit

Mr. Speaker, why would you flood out the people of Cairo?You know that black folks can't swim.

It must really suck to be the most famous birther, Mr. Bad Hair, these days. Has anyone heard from him lately? I am afraid that my man might be thinking about jumping from one of his towers. Donald, I hope your timing in business isn't as bad as your timing in politics, because, if it is, I am sure that there are some very nervous bankers out there. Thank you Kevin Allen, for confirming what we have long suspected.

Staying with the birther theme; I see that my Indian American friend down in Bayou country is having some birth certificate issues of his own. What goes around comes around Bobby. I am sure you were born in A-merry-ca, but, as a child of immigrants, you might need to be a bit more sensitive with this issue in the future.

Finally, speaking of stuff coming back to bite you; it seems that the folks in the Cairo, Illinois area are experiencing a little bad karma these days. You remember those folks, right? They were the ones that had that public lynching of Will "Froggy" James back in 1907. And they were the ones who chose to put cement over their municipal pool before they let you Negroes swim in it.

So anywhoo, we fast forward fifty years or so and now Cairo is a town made up of mostly you Negroes. It is a poor town, but you Negroes chose to stay there, because, let's face it, where else were you going to go?

Here comes the mighty Mississippi, and rather than flood out the town of Cairo and its Negroes, the Army Corp of Engineers decided to blow up a levee and flood out valuable farmland belonging to white folks to save you Negroes in Cairo. The horror!

As is to be expected, some folks were not pleased. "What? Flood valuable farmland to save a bunch of Nig...I mean Negroes?" I am paraphrasing here, but that was Missouri's republican speaker of the house weighing in on the subject. Wait, I have a direct quote, let me give it to you:

"Missouri's Republican House Speaker Steve Tilley was asked by reporters about the dilemma. "Would you rather have Missouri farmland flooded or Cairo underwater?" Tilley is asked.

Without hesitation, he replies, "Cairo. I’ve been there. Trust me. Cairo.” [Source]

I have never been there Mr. Tilley, but I think I know what you saw.

Nato Units Left 61 African Migrants to Die of Hunger and Thirst

by Jack Shenker

Guardian

May 8, 2011

Dozens of African migrants were left to die in the Mediterranean after a number of European and Nato military units apparently ignored their cries for help, the Guardian has learned.

A boat carrying 72 passengers, including several women, young children and political refugees, ran into trouble in late March after leaving Tripoli for the Italian island of Lampedusa. Despite alarms being raised with the Italian coastguard and the boat making contact with a military helicopter and a Nato warship, no rescue effort was attempted.

All but 11 of those on board died from thirst and hunger after their vessel was left to drift in open waters for 16 days. "Every morning we would wake up and find more bodies, which we would leave for 24 hours and then throw overboard," said Abu Kurke, one of only nine survivors. "By the final days, we didn't know ourselves … everyone was either praying, or dying."

International maritime law compels all vessels, including military units, to answer distress calls from nearby boats and to offer help where possible. Refugee rights campaigners have demanded an investigation into the deaths, while the UNHCR, the UN's refugee agency, has called for stricter co-operation among commercial and military vessels in the Mediterranean in an effort to save human lives.

"The Mediterranean cannot become the wild west," said spokeswoman Laura Boldrini. "Those who do not rescue people at sea cannot remain unpunished."

Read the rest here.

Comment: Nato is too busy killing Africans for oil to save Africans trying to 'invade' Europe.

Surprised?

Onward!

Imams kicked off a plane.

That sounds like a movie title or something.

There have been times when I was getting on a plane and I felt a strong urge to tell the pilot that I was uncomfortable with certain passengers: The ones with the infants who were acting up in the waiting area, for instance. Or, the family with the screaming obnoxious teen aged kids. But I never did it, because I knew that it wouldn't do me any good.

So how did those passengers in Memphis manage to get the pilot of an ASA flight heading to Charlotte to return to the gate area after taxiing onto the runway? I guess all fears aren't created equal. Only a really strong fear would cause a pilot to do such a thing to protect his or her airplane.

Boy It must really suck to be a Muslim these days. I guess if you are a Muslim and planning a trip you have to make all kinds of contingency plans and prepare yourself for the worst. Kind of like us Negroes used to do back in the day when traveling down South. We always had to pack our food because stopping in some places just wasn't an option. Rest room stops? Forget about it. Your restroom was where you felt safe getting out of the car and getting your tinkle on. God forbid you really had to do the business. But I digress.

Anywhoo, it seems that the Imams were heading to a conference on prejudice and "Islamophobia". "My brothers and sisters, do we ever have a story to tell you about our trip...." Talk about irony. Fellows tell your peeps to hold your next conference in a place like Philly. We see folks in traditional Muslim garb everyday. Even if they were born and raised right here in the USA. Just an FYI; you guys might not want to hold a conference south of the Mason- Dixon line in the future.

Oh well, all is well that ends well. There were apologies all around and the men said that they were treated very well by TSA agents. In fact, they said that the folks at Delta Airlines seemed downright embarrassed by the whole incident. Meanwhile, those worried passengers were able to head along on their merry way without having to worry about those funny looking people on their plane.

I could never be so lucky.