Saturday, August 21, 2010

The Zero at Ground Mosque

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When I first read about the plan to build a mosque almost next door to the site of the September 11 attack on America, I expected -- perhaps too cynically -- that it was a done deal before the cornerstone was put in place. Not despite it being almost at Ground Zero, but because of it. (Oh, pardon me, Associated Press, you in your unfathomable wisdom have decreed that your writers must not call it Ground Zero, but instead Ground Man-Caused Disaster or something. Good luck with that.)

This is, after all, New York. Immigration worshiping New York. Mega-liberal New York. Home to Jewish fools who would rather support their sworn enemies than give the slightest comfort to the hillbilly mobs of trans-Hudson America.

Opponents would grumble, I reckoned, but they would be drowned out by lectures from civil rights absolutists insisting that Proposition Nation U.S. derives its only legitimacy from being tolerant of the intolerant, "reaching out" to the followers of a totalitarian politico-religious system.

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Actually, it might have played more or less that way. We'll never know now. President Obama, or "Zero" as his more benign critics call him, took the occasion of a White House dinner celebrating Ramadan to announce his backing for the mosque. (Typically, he tried to hedge the next day, then corrected his earlier correction. It was too late. The cat was among the pigeons.)

My reading of what has happened since is as follows. For many Americans, smaller resentments and doubts about Pres. Zero that had been collecting for the past year and a half crystallized. As a people we are generally willing to give our head of state a good deal of respect, however much we dislike him or disagree with him. It was possible to see the useless, borrowed $787 billion stimulus package as a well-meaning mistake. Ditto the force-fed passage of the disastrous Obamacare legislation. Likewise a lot of sharp-elbows, Chicago-style politics. Maybe there was an excuse for bad mouthing his own country in progressive Cairo.

But for most of us, this was too much, period, tout court, full stop, that's-all-she-wrote.

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Of course, the whole complex web of globalists and leftists are not ceding any ground, except Ground Zero, and that to Muslims. It's like the weeks after September 11 all over again. Remember the op-eds telling us that unless we [insert the writer's prescription for dhimmitude here], Al Qaeda will have won? To put it more honestly than they did, unless we agree to lose further, Al Qaeda wins.

Nine years later, we're told by the mosque-eteers that we must allow this thing to be built because it will show we have no hard feelings. We're permitted to show a little sensitivity about the site, and its planned opening on September 11, 2011, but that's all. As a columnist for the McClatchy syndicate -- according to its logo line, it has registered "Truth to Power" as an official, legally protected slogan -- says:
... It was predictable that some New Yorkers who lost loved ones on 9/11 would object to building a Muslim institution so near the site of their tragedy. They're entitled to their feelings, and a cultural center that hopes to bridge gaps among Muslims, Christians and Jews needs to take those feelings into account. But they're not entitled to make their feelings a basis for discriminatory government action.
Normally, any charge of "discrimination" (a death-ray word, like "racist") is enough to make the target keel over. Not, apparently, this time.

Quite possibly without intending to, our hapless president has created an absolute standoff. A Zero-sum game (pun intended). Sarajevo. Fort Sumter. I hope I'm exaggerating; we'll see.

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Unfortunately, as usual, the mosque opponents are fighting the right battle with the wrong weapons. Stupidly, they've made it all about distance from Ground Zero. If only the Muslims would understand our feelings, as we understand theirs, and realize why we're touchy about the location.

Two blocks isn't far enough. If they built it three blocks away, that would be 50 percent better. Four blocks, 100 percent improvement. Now we're getting somewhere. Let us reason together. Why don't we ring up the Sheik of Araby and ask him to buy the Plaza Hotel on Fifth Avenue in mid-town, raze it, and slap the mosque down there? Everybody wins.

After all, the cry "Allahu Akbar!" is already heard in prayers at the Pentagon, where that unfortunate accident occurred a few years ago when a plane went off course.

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For the umpteenth time: I don't want to root around like a truffle hound looking for "moderate" Islam. I don't want to reform Islam. I have no time for converting Muslims, updating their politico-religious system, winning their hearts and minds. They're welcome to believe their beliefs and practice their practices, in their own historical turf, even territory that they took by military force. But they must not be allowed to colonize the United States and gradually expand their influence and pressure, culminating in sharia law, as is happening in Britain.

We should put an end to these idiotic arguments about mosques, prayer mats, foot baths, dogs in taxicabs, halal meals for "American" soldiers, and all the rest. The only way to do that is to end Muslim immigration and convince the Muslims already here to leave, even if we have to pay them.

If we do not, I fear the whole country will become -- one way or another -- Ground Zero. Because there are still enough of us who refuse to let it become Ground Mosque.


17 comments:

trencherbone said...

If Hitler had claimed that 'Mein Kampf' was revealed by God, would that have made the Nazi Party a religion?

Islam is first and foremost a totalitarian political system. The Muslims' only loyalty is to the Ummah - the global 'brotherhood' of believers in Islam. Muslim theology describes the West as Dar al-Harb - the domain of war, consequently they regard their host countries as ripe for plunder, predation, extortion, parasitism and eventual subversion and takeover.

Islam can add nothing to Western societies apart from trouble.

Muslims in America will have to choose between loyalty to their country and loyalty to Islam. The two are irreconcilable - Islam is implacable and allows of no compromise on this matter.

Anonymous said...

Excellent post, Rick. As usual, people nitpick the details but cannot articulate the principles underlying their opposition. The precise location of the mosque is not particularly relevant; it's whether or not we need any mosques built in this country. My part of Texas is heavily Chinese and Indian/Pakistani; one woman told me they specifically chose our city to live in because it had a mosque (built a number of years after we moved here, or it would have been a big sticking point for me).

Van Wijk said...

A commenter at VFR recently opined that the Muslims are cannily preparing to outmaneuver mosque opponents by building it a mile away. But another commenter replies that a mosque has historically been a symbol of Muslim victory over the infidel, and if they move it a mile or more away from GZ it will lose this effect.

This is evidence of another advantage: the machismo on display is an integral part of Islam, just as it is an integral part of Mestizo culture. An enemy who rushes blindly forward vastly increases his chances of stumbling and leaves himself open for ambush.

They will keep getting in our faces. They must. And each time they do, our side moves a little bit further away from a flaccid libertarian stance toward a more conservative one.

Anonymous said...

I wish they would hurry up and stone their first homosexual here in the US and load it to Youtube. That might cause a pause. (Please note I am not personally advocating violence against peter puffers.)

Nicholas Stix said...

Doyle McManus. What a bore. And he and his editor couldn't even get their lies straight. The editor called it, rightfully, a mosque, while McM of McC tried to fob it off as a "prayer room."

Marcus Marcellus said...

As perhaps the only resident of the financial district who reads this blog, I'm a little surprised someone like you has fallen for this Ground Zero mosque nonsense. I expect it of Mr. Obvious, Larry Auster, or that shrill, monstrous Geller creature, but really, Reflecting Light seemed to go beyond the left-right distraction and move toward...the light?

This story is a manufactured attempt to: 1) distract the public from what is happening to the economy, the dollar crisis, the looting and installation of a full-blown police state; 2) turn our local anger from the politicians who have allowed the WTC site to rot for nearly a decade as they fight over money, rights and ego posturing; and 3) drum-up support for the next American cum Israeli adventure into disaster in Iran.

The supposed Imam of this community center is a member of the Council of Foreign Relations. The whole affair is being bankrolled by the same people who manufacture the news, the weapons and the policies that have led to the current world situation. The second largest shareholder of News Corp (Fox News) has donated hundreds of millions to this imam in the past. This is such a classic divide and conquer sideshow - all the more insulting in that it's taking place a few blocks from where the actual looting of the nation is headquartered, 85 Broad St!

Very disappointing to see how easily people fall can be manipulated, like little spineless marionettes. Boy, this propaganda thing is easier than I thought.

Ground Zero Mosque! Please.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/0821/fox-shareholder-funded-mosque-imam/

http://www.infowars.com/ground-zero-mosque-imam-is-globalist-stooge/

Marcus Marcellus said...

For the record, I agree with you entirely on Muslim immigration. Note that the more we are there, the more they are here. Ironic that this manufactures circus will lead to many (including you) supporting more of us there, which will only intensify our dealings with them here.

Rick Darby said...

Ave, Marcus Marcellus. They say you run into everybody in the Forum sooner or later, and here you are! It's been a while. After Cicero gets done bashing Verres — he's getting to be quite the orator, what? — why don't we take a cup of wine and talk over old times. Drop by my place, you remember where it is, up on the Palatine.

Anyway, while the Ground Zero mosque may have the unfortunate effect of distracting from other pressing matters, I have a hard time crediting that it is a centrally directed diversion.

I don't get what you mean about "many (including you) supporting more of us there … ." By "there," do you mean venues like Iraq and Afghanistan? Except for a brief deluded period seven years ago, I have opposed spilling American blood occupying them.

Marcus Marcellus said...

Actually, I posted something about gold ETFs just days ago. I guess I'm partial to what are called conspiracy theories because the higher up I get on the money ladder, the more they are true.

Rick Darby said...

Marcus Marcellus,

Oh, yes, the posting about GLD. Did I mention I've taken a position again? For a trade, when the price climbs again — I don't think it will be a long wait.

From your perch on The Street, what rumors reach you about what the government will do when they can't sell Treasurys by the carload anymore? Will they go after our retirement funds? Worried minds want to know.

Anonymous said...

Rick Deby wrote:The only way to do that is to end Muslim immigration and convince the Muslims already here to leave, even if we have to pay them.

The only way that is possible, specially the last wish, is if we are in full-scale war with Islam. Only in a general full-scale war do the combatants and their civilian supporters segregate without coercion.

Thankfully, we are still in Iraq and likely to be there for a while yet. We are also likely to be in Afghanistan for a while. In the meantime, it is essential that we take the light of democracy and women's rights to other Islamic nations, just as we have in done in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now this selfless effort on our part has created a lot of animosity in the Islamic world, as well as in the USA and the UK, to the extent that it has led to despicable demonstrations by Muslims, supposedly loyal to Britain, against our returning troops.

Some argue that our selfless duty to take liberal democracy to the Muslim world is doomed to failure. Moreover, there is great danger that it will ignite terrorism from within, as well as general war with Islam. I do not agree. I believe it is our duty to atleast attempt to modernise Islamic countries, so that they too become liberal democracies such as us, and thus a better world for our descendants.

Van Wijk said...

That's one of the most insanely naive statements I have ever read.

Anonymous said...

DP111, please tell me your tongue is superglued to your cheek. Otherwise, my silly friend you need to get back on the meds.

I know your words brought a smile to my face.

Marcus Marcellus said...

Rick:
I agree on gold generally and especially silver. I trade futures instead and take some physical possession, not the ETFs. I mostly deal in wheat, corn, barely and uranium.

Though I live downtown, I am not currently working at any bank or fund. I used to work at Deutsche Bank and will likely re-enter the industry in mid-2011 as a strategist or macro person. Right now I actually work in film finance, art dealing, trading those unglamorous foodstuffs (ya can't eat an iphone! & w/world populations out of control...). I'm also writing and will be publishing this fall - will alert Reflecting Light.

So, to answer your question, I follow the work of Jim Rickards on that: a movement to IMF-issued Special Drawing Rights will replace the Dollar as world reserve currency. The basket will include commodities, including gold and silver, and Russia will play a bigger role than Americans expect. Germany and the euro will survive in some form, and the European sector will make America look like a Third World country in terms of living standards, crime, culture, etc.

QE2 will further destroy the Dollar, and the notion that we will have a Japanese "lost decade" is wishful thinking (that's what one of my pieces is on). Instead of going for pensions they will devalue, perhaps formally. That's my guess. They can accomplish this through the printing press and punish those who have done the right thing - save. There's no escape.

Morgan Stanley now thinks governments will actually default. Je ne se pas...

Sites like Zero Hedge, Solaris, Omnis are good sources from insiders who are now on the outside (sort of) and give a good sense of future trends.

Best Regards,
Sebastian

Anonymous said...

Van Wijk said...

That's one of the most insanely naive statements I have ever read.

Correct.Couldnt agree more.

Rick Darby said...

Van Wijk and Anon.,

DP111 is an old hand at commenting on sites I follow, and he was certainly parodying the neocon world view.

DP111 — can I call you DP for short? — I do wish you'd spell my name correctly. As the trial lawyers say, "Goes to the issue of credibility."

Rick Darby said...

Marcus Marcellus/Sebastian,

You've pointed to exactly what I fear: not that savings will be overtly confiscated, but rather destroyed by inflation-on-skates. I would put a large portion of my retirement account in commodities and precious metals, except the damned TIAA-CREF 403(b) I'm stuck with (no withdrawals permitted as long as I'm at my job) offers nothing but a bond fund, a few index funds, real estate, and cash equivalents.

My fingers are crossed hoping the debacle won't happen until after I'm retired (or laid off?) and I can access my account.