Drawing a line in the dust at Ground Zero

Northeast Intelligence Network

26 May 2010: Shortly after efforts turned from rescue to recovery at Ground Zero, I walked amid the rubble with a New York City police officer named “Mark.” It was just after daybreak over lower Manhattan, and the noxious odors of death, jet fuel and oppressive toxic dust still filled the air. We said nothing to each other as we stopped at the edge of a darkly stained area on the ground where bodies had fallen or people had jumped to their deaths. Debris and dust covered over portions of the grotesque paisley patterns that extended beyond yellow police tape that flapped in the morning breeze.

The NYPD officer was first to break the silence. “I remember the first one,” he said, referring to the February 26, 1993 bombing that killed 6 people and injured over a thousand more. “This time it’s going be a whole lot different,” he added.  As we walked away from the area, he said that our response was going to be decisive. America was deeply wounded, but Americans were angry. And it seemed like we were united in our anger.

We were going to fight, prevail, rebuild and grow stronger. Standing there that morning, neither of us had any doubt that our leaders would not just avenge the deaths of 9/11, but take steps to make sure that such an attack would never happen again. We would emerge stronger and smarter.

Barney Frank wants to see Rep. Djou’s birth certificate

The Hill

Tongue firmly in cheek, Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) on Tuesday afternoon called on reporters to demand to see the birth certificate of new Rep. Charles Djou (R-Hawaii). As Djou (pictured here) was being sworn into office, Frank walked the hallway of the Speaker’s Lobby off the House floor calling on the media to “do your job” and review Djou’s papers. It was a small bit of payback for the enormous amount of attention some conservatives (and the media) paid to the is-the-president-really-from-America controversy. But, unlike the commander-in-chief, as Frank knows, being born outside the U.S. does not preclude you from becoming a member of Congress. Source:

Echoes of the reconquest near Ground Zero

Power Line

Plans to build Cordoba House, a 15-story Islamic Center two blocks north of Ground Zero, received a major boost yesterday when a Manhattan community board backed the proposal by a 29-to-1 vote. Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf said the center would help “bridge and heal a divide” among Muslims and other religious groups.

Perhaps the Imam is sincere but I find the whole project an outrage. The name Cordoba House at best conveys a total insensitivity to the families of victims of the attack at worse it shows sympathy with the terrorist’s goals. Cordoba, was the Capital of Al-Andalus the Islamic Caliphate that ruled much of Spain during the Middle Ages. One of Al-Qaida’s main goals announced after the 9/11 attack was the restoration of the Cordoba Caliphate in Al-Andalus.

The Project is said to cost $100 million and no one seems to know who is paying for all of this. There are hundreds of Mosques in the New York area in a nation dedicated to religious freedom. If the Imam wants to “bridge and heal a divide” among Muslims and other faiths he should look beyond Manhattan. There are no churches or synagogues in Mecca, Riyadh or Kuwait. In Egypt, Iran and other Islamic nations those who don’t adhere to Islam practice their faiths at great risk to themselves and their families. I don’t understand why Mayor Bloomberg and other local officials are supporting this project.

Source:

Freshmen Dems to Obama: ‘Stay the hell away from us’

Capitol Hill Blue

President Obama: Don’t call us, we’ll call you

Freshman Democrats who owe their seats in Congress to the Barack Obama poltical tsunami in 2008 now want to keep the President at arm’s length because they fear his increasing unpopularity and political missteps cold hurt them in the November midterm elections.

Many fear alignment with Obama could cost them the election and want to campaign without his endorsement or a presence in his district.

“I just think we don’t quite know yet where his popularity is,” Pennsylvania Democrat Kathy Dahlkemper told Congressional Quarterly in a recent interview.

Some have already told the White House they don’t want or need help from the President.

“It might upset some people,” says Virginia Democrat Tom Pirriello.

Obama’s eroding popularity is taking another hit from the administration’s lackluster response to the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Some are calling the situation “Obama’s Katrina,” referring the the federal government’s failure to react quickly to the Hurricane Katrina crisis that became a benchmark of George W. Bush’s failed Presidency.

Source:

Monica cut from Clinton movie

This was just too good to pass up, I guess they think if they don’t show it, it didn’t happen. I wonder if Bill is still saying, I did not have …………………

1 Dragon

New York Post

The new HBO movie “The Special Relationship” — about the friendship between Bill Clinton and Britain’s Tony Blair — is missing something: a scene about Monica Lewinsky.

The scene that showed Bill telling Hillary for the first time about his affair with Monica Lewinsky was shot but cut from the film at the last moment, according to actress Hope Davis, who plays the former First Lady in the movie.

“It felt very strange trying to shoot it,” Davis told the celebrity-news Web site becksmithhollywood.com. “It was a very uncomfortable feeling.”

Hope Davis as Hillary

The movie, starring Dennis Quaid as Clinton and Michael Sheen as Blair, covers the friendship between the two statesmen during the 1990s.

Originally, the movie contained a scene recreating the moment in 1998 when Clinton told his wife that his relationship with Lewinsky was more serious than he had led her to believe.

“In the end, it was not included, which was smart on their part,” Davis says.”I felt, the less said, the better.”

HBO’s head of films, Len Amato, said the scene was trimmed but not cut completely.

“You don’t need a lot of it to make the point for the story we were telling,” he said.

“The Special Relationship” is set to air Saturday night.

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/tv/monica_cut_from_clinton_movie_IfCfGp3gXc2qTLEd51cLRK#ixzz0p3rKoUK6

Jihadist al-Awlaki: Washington Post Saved Me From Airstrike

NewsMax

Anwar al-Awlaki, the U.S.-born imam linked to the Fort Hood shooting spree in Texas in November, the botched Christmas Day airliner bombing, and the failed Times Square bombing early this month, credited the Washington Post with tipping him off and allowing him to elude a U.S. airstrike in Yemen in December.

Most of the attention given to al-Awlaki’s lengthy interview in an al-Qaida video released Sunday has focused on his call to kill civilian Americans. But far more provocative is his revelation of how the U.S. media can inadvertently assist and protect al-Qaida terrorists.

Government hard at Work, oops

Anyone in Congress care to introduce a Bill on this?

Illegal Immigrant Rapist Had Been Deported 9 Times

Judicial Watch

In what appears to be a growing national trend, an illegal immigrant with an extensive criminal record and multiple deportation orders remained in the U.S. long enough to commit yet another atrocious crime.

The tragic case in Washington State marks the latest of many examples illustrating the government’s inefficiency in keeping dangerous illegal aliens out of the United States, even when they have well-documented criminal histories and federal orders to leave the country.

In this case a Mexican national with an extensive criminal record and nine deportation orders raped a woman in Edmonds, a picturesque waterfront town famous for its views of the Olympic Mountains rising above Puget Sound. The illegal immigrant (Jose Lopez Madrigal) was first deported in California more than two decades ago and has since been convicted of a multitude of violent crimes, including armed theft, sexual assault and drug-related offenses.