I attended the Gainesville District Townhall meeting and here’s a quick update.
- Transportation projects include the widening of 15, widening of 66 and the Linton Hall Corridor Project are all on track to be completed either early or on-time. And let me just say, I stand in awe of these transportation engineers who are able to squeeze a lane out of nothing. Unfortunately, new project funding is in doubt because of current economic conditions and funding issues related to the Northern Virginia Transportation Authority and Bob Marshall’s lawsuit where the Virginia Supreme Court ruled the collection of the funds unconstitutional.
- There was literature available concerning the Journey thru Hallowed Ground designation.
- Transmission Lines have been approved by the Virginia State Corporation Commission conditional on West Virginia and Pennsylvania. West Virginia has given the go ahead while Pennsylvania has not. Also, there’s this interesting article in today’s Washington Post about Maryland regulators requesting electric utilities to draft conservation plans.
- USDOT representative reports federal highway funding legislation runs out at the end of September 09 and will need an overhaul.
- Stirrup again refuses to answer question about his membership in ‘Help Save Manassas’ instead decides to call me an ‘illegal alien apologist.’ Okay, if you think McCain and Reagan were apologists then so be it.But I did seem to learn who’s Stirrup’s spin meister is – Mr. Murphy. By the way, you were not his first choice for the job, greater men with more integrity declined this position. Better get back to crunching those numbers since ER visits have not decreased.
Hello here is the problem: some people ARE anti-immigrant when they claim they are anti-illegal-immigration. We know this when they use things like crowded homes as an excuse to hunt “illegals.” Crowded homes have nothing to do with immigration policy and equating them is disingenuous at best. People who do this—and they are alive and well in HSM, at BVBL, in JS/GL/RD—hide their racism (yes I used the word) by confusing the issues of culture clashes with immigration policy. Stirrup does this ALL THE TIME when he uses his “invasion” terminology, leaving his home county because he couldn’t stand all the immigrants moving in. “Rule of law” is nothing but an excuse for him to exercise his bigotry that he demonstrates time and time again.
Fortunately, not everyone is like this, but there are enough of “them” to make PWC look like a bunch of raving racists.
Thanks Chris for keeping everyone updated! It would be great to see people here live!
I rarely call anyone a racist. No further discussion is needed there. As for saying anti-immigration, yes, I do that.
I might change when I see people really making an effort to make distinction between who is illegal and who is not. I haven’t seen it. All too often I see the dreaded broad brush. So, as Rick B says, too many syllables.
Most importantly, I try to meet people in the middle, even when I think they are set ups. Being courteous costs me nothing. Do I always meet my goals? No. But I don’t pounce on people the minute their opinion doesn’t do a DNA match with my own.
Now, the topic is about Stirrup’s quarterly meeting. Let’s return and stop personalizing this so much.
I do want to go out on a limb before we leave this topic and thank Chris publically for her out-reach to all sides of this issue. She, Marie and Cindy B are real forerunners in community harmony as I see it.
I hope I left no one out.
I agree with some of your comment PAP but way too many people here paint with such a broad brush (as many like to say here) with the term that it’s gotten to be a bit ridiculous. If your going to get pissed about being called an “illegal alien apologist” then ask yourself one question “have I ever called someone anti-immigrant simply for being for tough illegal immigration policy”. Is it childish, you bet your ass but it’s a valid point. I know from personal experience being called anti-immigrant doesn’t feel good, probably the same as someone who is for immigrant rights being called an illegal immigrant apologist (which by the way I’ve never called anyone).
DAMN Moon, you beat me to the broad brush comment! 🙂
This reminds me of the Fairness doctrine and being politically correct.
There we go again, Hello. Thinking alike again. 😉
Actually, I don’t personally know anyone in favor of illegal immigration.
I simply do not think that a public official should be attaching a label with questionable…I will even concede questionable…..connotation to a citizen in a public venue. I have been around the blogs enough to know exactly what is meant by illegal alien apologist so I am not even going to get into the semantics. Unless he was calling her an asset to Prince William County or Citizen of the Year, there should have been no names attached.
I would have had more respect for him if he had said, ‘yes I belong to HSM because it represents my beliefs.’ Now who would that have left holding the ball?
Red Dawn,
Public officials shouldn’t be calling their constituents names in public. They should wait until they are in the backroom with their cronies and then make sure there are no open mics.
It isn’t a smart thing to do and will probably follow him around a long time.
This has nothing to do with Fairness Doctrine or PC. It has to do with common courtesy and political wisdom.
–have I ever called someone anti-immigrant simply for being for tough illegal immigration policy–
Well, I know I haven’t, and I know people here haven’t EXCEPT in the case where culture was being used as an excuse to get “tough” at a local level where it could only serve to tear the community and budget apart.
So we get back to that issue again of being disingenuous–some people really ARE anti-immigrant. Those are the people who belong to hate groups. And if you support a hate group, then you just might get broad-brushed. This goes back to the importance of affiliations: choose wisely with whom you affiliate because THAT will follow you even if nothing else does. Birds of a feather, after all….
I had an emergency at work today, so I couldn’t respond to the poster that claimed Alanna’s question was not well articulated until now. She did not bumble or stumble over her words…she was as polite as possible in asking him the question and was very direct in what she was asking him. Was there an uncomfortable silence after she asked the question? Well, I would say yes. The room was full of mostly (at least 75% I would wager) senior citizens of one race and one gender…I won’t mention which, since I don’t want to be jumped on for pointing it out, but it’s a fact.
Yes, I think Stirrup was embarrassed that this topic came up when he clearly only wanted the questions to relate to what was on the Agenda, however, as Alanna said, the question and answer period did not say that it was only to relate to those topics and what other forum is there besides a “Town Hall” meeting? As soon as he finished his “answer” to Alanna, which was not an answer, he asked if there were any more questions ONLY related to agenda topics. So after he said that, and the fact that I was still pretty surprised that he would choose to “answer” Alanna’s question about why he won’t renounce his association with BVBL with a BVBL front page term (that is not regularly heard or seen outside of that blog) I was too scared to ask my question. My issue is, should a constituent ever be too “scared” to ask their supervisor a reasonable question? I feel my question was totally reasonable, but it was outside the topics of last night’s meeting, so therefore I should not feel comfortable asking it? When should I feel comfortable asking it?
PAP, I agree with your disingenuous reasoning however, you must be joking when you said – I know I haven’t, and I know people here haven’t EXCEPT in the case where culture was being used as an excuse to get “tough”.
Did you seriously mean that? If so, wow, in your (and allot of other people here) opinion everyone must be a member of HSM or be a supporter on BVBL. I don’t see how you can tell if someone is either unless they admit to it or provide evidence of it, kind of like how you can’t tell if someone is legal or illegal by looking at them. The “anti-immigrant” term is flung around here so often it would make you think HSM has 1,000,000,000 members.
Moon,
I am in TOTAL agreement that it was WRONG ( esp., an elected official) but does this not scream the fact that minds are made up andthat we-THE PEOPLE-when elections are over,are not a voice? (and the issue’s get lost on verbiage)
Reminder
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2jjbCFyviU
Go Bobby…lol
Well, GL claims to have a gazillion members, doesn’t he? 🙂
We all know who the hate bunnies are. They are easy to identify because they usually don’t make much sense.
And most of the people like AW, RD, SA and Rick who also post on BVBL but aren’t necessarily supporting the hate agenda are open about where they post . I don’t think any of them has ever been called “anti-immigrant” here, but I could be wrong. I’m not saying there aren’t tiffs. There sure are! But there is a difference between the people like Stirrup and people like those I just mentioned. You can be against illegal immigration without being racist or anti-immigrant. Unfortunately, most of the HSM crowd isn’t capable of that and those that ARE shouldn’t be affiliating IMHO.
Regardless of how he described Alanna didn’t he pretty much infer he follows the law and she doesn’t? It sounds arrogant and righteous. Not my idea of how a public servant should behave or anyone as a matter of fact.
But then again Mr S thinks Duecaster/Advocator is a plus for human services in PWC.
Arrrgghhh. What humans do to each other under the guise of religion and law. No wonder so many fear death so.
If one is only allowed to ask agenda related questions, then why bother. This doesn’t seem like a very accessible supervisor to me.
Isn’t a town hall meeting, by definition, one where you go talk to your supervisor (or any elected official) in a small, casual setting?
I do think it is fair game to ask about associations. Certainly in the recent national election it was fair game as we heard nightly about Ayers, Keating 5 and Rev. Wright. And even without a national election, I think it is fair game to ask Mr. Stirrup about his involvement with an activist group like HSM. He needs to be more forthcoming. Either he is a member or he is not. Is he ashamed of his associations?
Alanna is not the bad person for asking the question, even though Stirrup is attempting to turn the tables and make her out to be.
Twinad, thank you for bringing your observations to the table here tonight.
Sounds like it was more of a lecture than a meeting – very controlled! Might as well print what he wants to say and mail it.
Guess we now know what he’s thinking during citizens time!
Pink makes a good point when she mentions those people who post both places. Those 4 people and a few others I know are interested in dialogue. We can all scrap and argue like old Grizzly bears and yet remain civil. I believe they are a welcome addition to anti.
It should be noted that many people here cannot post on the dark screen. The blog owner has locked out the IP addresses because they didn’t agree with others. That is how anti formed. It, however, is the owner’s blog and he may run it as he choses. However, if you lock people out who have something to say, they are surely going to turn up elsewhere. Talk about people just vanishing. Well, there was a reason.
Good analogy MH about relationships questioned during the election.
Posting as Pinko: You’ve called people Nazis many times for supporting the resolution. How is that not insulting? It is very disingenuous of you to act insulted about name calling when you’ve done it many times yourself!
NAP,
Do you not see the difference in name calling by an elected official and name calling by someone on the blog? I don’t approve of either but one takes on much greater significance in the grand scheme of things, in my opinion.
Probably none of us are totally innocent about name calling. Would my opinion of Mr. Stirrup improve were I to find out he sent Alanna an apology? You betcha.
Mom,
thank you for your clarification 🙂
The difference is, and you hit the nail on the head, that there is truly a human element to the topic of immigration, and when I see and hear, people being hateful regarding children, especially immigrant children, I just can’t find any excuse for that behavior.
I will say that I do not agree 100% with the folks over at BVBL, but nor do I agree totally with the people here…and I probably never will at all with some people on both sites. Personally, I do not approve of arbitrarily removing people simply because they disagree…that’s censorship and does not belong in reasonable discourse and debate, and it certainly doesn’t belong in a democracy. Of course, that cuts both ways. How often has intimidation been applied to people here to shut them up? How many folks have been attacked and accused of being racist, even Nazi’s, simply because they strongly disagreed with someone here? You all do recall the gentleman from Greece who was unceremoniously attacked for offering his opinions? As I recall, he even sounded like he was on your side. Perhaps he didn’t articulate them well, but he was never even offered the opportunity to clarify them before he was run off. This site also gained certain notoriety by painting the entire COUNTY as a place of ethnic cleansing!! Now, how reasonable is that?
No, I don’t care who you are or what your opinion might be, merely calling someone “an illegal alien apologist” does NOT equate with calling someone a Nazi, or a racist, and most certainly not a Klan member! It does not equate with calling someone a Socialist, or a supporter of criminal aliens/rapists/murderers, or some of the other similar words/terms that we’ve seen which were totally out of line and over the top! Even the terms anti-illegal alien and pro-illegal alien unfairly paint people with a broad brush of extremism on the issue, and NO thinking adult can fit 100% into either category. Inon explained it best…apologist is NOT meant as a negative or derogatory term. If it has become so, it is because those who prefer to use those broad brushes have made it so.
How can mutually respectful debate and dialogue occur in an atmosphere where everything is turned into or assumed to be an insult? Look at what’s happening in Arizona…they could potentially eliminate the word ILLEGAL from a criminal courtroom. Sorry folks, but that word will come up in the discussion of a crime. You can’t remove the word without removing it in EVERY context. That is truly censorship as well, and particularly ridiculous! This is where we are headed…where every word must be carefully measured and politically correct otherwise it will sanctionable. THAT’S not the country to which MY parents brought me as a child after WWII…from Germany. THAT’S not the country my parents thought this would become.
Elena, I find it difficult to remove the human element, especially as it relates to children, also. Vermin remarks push me over the edge.
AWC,
The man from “Greece” was actually Elvis 🙂 We didn’t run him off, he just finally couldn’t keep himself from outing who he really was!
As far as “illegal alien apologist” is concernced, greg used your term to villify people, to question their patriotism, to question their motives in wanting to broaden the debate from us vs them. He used that term like a sickle, hoping to cut the knees out from under anyone that dared question the “crisis” over illegal immigration in this county.
So how does that make me wrong, Elena? As I said, there is nothing inherently derogatory in the term…so many words and terms have been made so by those “broad brush” people. What does that say about supposedly intelligent people who continuously buy into that broad brush? All they’re doing is supporting a descent into censorship. Is that who you want to be?
Oh Crispers….. here are my concerns:
http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/september2007/250907NWOquotes.htm
Since we are ARGUING Sj5t, lol 🙂
Wow, AWCheney, I think that your dead-on with your 22:45 comment. Man, I only wish that your kept up with your site more because I loved it! Finally, a straight shooting, non-bias view of the subject. I’d kiss you if you weren’t married (or me as well)!! I know not may people commented on your site but that does not mean that it’s not appreciated!
Thanks hello…actually, I’m just trying to get my “blogging” legs back by hanging around the other blogs a bit. I’ve been a bit under the weather for quite awhile and not up the strenuous research necessary to keep the blog going. Don’t give up on me…I’ll be back. 🙂
Sorry…not up TO. There’s that lack of proofreading again.
Hi AWCheney, I really hope your feeling better! To me your site offers something neither of the other sites do, a voice of reason. I’m a huge fan of yours and I’m sorry I never posted more. Please, for me (and I’m sure others as well), keep up the good work!
I will never give up on someone who looks at things from both points of view! Your awesome and do me a favor, don’t give up on readers such as myself.
Just wondering how Pinko (KG) can say that she hasn’t called anyone names! She’s done it in blogs, in editorials and in public. Sad when one can’t remember what she has done in the past. Those that live in glass houses and all –
And BTW – quit wasting money on FOIA’s. Private membership isn’t subject to FOIA’s as was stated earlier. It’s quite funny that you all on this blog whine about how much money has been “wasted” on the resolution, yet how many of you are responsible for this money? How many FOIA’s have you all requested, either individually or as a group? Enough is enough. Stop wasting money that could be better spent.
Yes, AWC, your blog is excellent and I have referred several people to it. Actually, I referred J@mes the Greek to it because he was complaining about people fighting here. I told him your blog was well researched and you had rules.
Unfortunately, he was not who he said he was and it was fairly obvious to some of us here from the get-go. He had been previously banned for very rude behavior. Elena stated who he was in reality. Actually, no one tried to run him off. Several people called his bluff. He, in turn, whined about it and made it out to be like he was tortured. That was not the case and it was all a game and a set up.
Chris and Cindy both took their time to get him the study circle information. He didn’t really want it. As I said, it was a set up. Other people have dumped ugly crap on here, then come along and scooped it up, said we were writing stuff like that. The stuff shows up other places, credited to this blog. One of the blog dumps showed up at the bocs on one of the overheads.
In general:
That kind of stuff is just childish and immature. I suppose it goes with the blog territory but I am mighty tired of listening to complaints. I have gotten a lot thicker skin. I no longer care if everyone is happy and feeling good. There are other blogs if this one doesn’t suit.
Rant over here.
You wish, were you addressing the entire blog? Please put the broadbrush away. Most of us here have never filed a FOIA request.
You are right. They are expensive. Even if the person filing the request pays 50 cents a copy or whatever the going rate is, that is chicken feed compared to the personnel hours that are spent gathering information and not doing the job they were hired to do. All FOIA’s are supposed to go through the county attorney’s office so that time must be factored in also.
In most cases, at least 3 people are involved in a request. If the average pay is between $40-50 an hour times 3 then 1000 hours of work has expended $140,000 –
$150,000 of county money.
I personally do not like being swept up as one who does FOIA requests. I do not and neither do most of the people I know here.
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Hello, I would like to think there are some voices of reason on this blog that you have come into contact with. I certainly have tried to be respectful of your opinion and I have also tried to give both sides of whatever it was….thinking back to the election.
Furthermore, not all of the articles posted as thread leads have an opinion attached to them. I try to chose topics that will give people something to think and talk about. I don’t know how many times I have had a snarl or a nip because of the post. People assume I have an opinion. I am a moderate. Often I see both sides of an argument. I guess this trait serves to just get everyone pissed off at you rather than just half of them.
Hello, I do agree that AWC has a fine blog, as stated above. Going to her blog is like going to the reserve book room of my college library. You must whisper and show great respect. She is well researched. The Anti blog is more like the snack bar at the student union to me. Different moods often dictate where I go. On her blog, I generally read rather than comment. I will be glad when she is up and running again also.
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AWC, I hope you are on the mend.
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I hope everyone has stopped by the puppy thread just to look. There really isn’t much to say. But the puppies are darling and they are rather loud tonight. You need to hit the arrow to activate the live stream. They are whining and frisking around tonight. Mr. Howler thought it was our dogs getting in to something.
The term Stirrup is using is an anachronism from 2007 before Greg Letiecq was exposed as a fraud, before John McCain faced down the Anti-Immigrant Lobby mortally wounded it, and before the election of Barack Obama put the last nail in the Anti-Immigrant coffin.
To show how out of touch he is, the very John Stirrup that predicted the 2008 election would be a referendum on anti-immigrant zealotry (and then was shown screaming like a teenage girl at a rock concert when John McCain accepted his party’s nomination) now uses an Anti-Immigrant Lobby sheep slogan in a public forum.
“Illegal alien apologist?????” It seems Mr. Stirrup is trapped in the past. Perhaps he also believes anyone who opposes the occupation of Iraq is a terrorist or Osama Bin Laden apologist too?
If there are still Freedom Fry thinkers reading this blog, I’ll spell out the sarcasm. The liars who promoted the Iraq war justified it by saying there was a connection to 9/11, and that WMD’s would soon be forming “mushroom clouds” over American cities if we did not take over Iraq’s oil reserves immediately. For those who objected, these liars had a host of names to call us … yes, including “traitor.”
This “apologist” melt down Stirrup unfortunately had in public is the same tactic regurgitated. You attack your critics for being on the side of what you SAY you are against, when really you are simply lying about what you are against, and therefore lying about who is against you.
It’s child’s play, and it does not work anymore. Otherwise you’d have a VP named Sarah.
You do understand, Moon-howler, that my intent was not to personalize this issue, except insofar as pointing out that everyone on all sides have actually been guilty of genuine name-calling. It’s simply that, in my opinion, “illegal alien apologist” simply does not fall under that category and that it was silly for everyone to make such a big deal about it. Nothing personal at all. As a matter of fact, in the comment where my “Irish” is showing (actually a misnomer…Germans have worse tempers), I wasn’t referring to you directly at all…I said “your friends.” 😉
Correction, I meant to say that “many on all sides,” not everyone…aside from being untrue, that’s a broad brush.
Oh, I just noticed that WHWN showed up to prove my point…anti-immigrant rather than anti-ILLEGAL immigrant, hmmm? There are certain people who you can always depend upon to do that.
Sure AWC, no one on earth is anti-immigrant. That would be too inconvenient for your tunnel vision. Keep telling yourself that if you must.
I didn’t say that, WHWN…but you just did. So, who is it that really has tunnel vision of a sort?
Saying people act like Nazis or are Neo-Nazis isn’t a crime. It’s about as descriptive as “illegal alien apologist” which is ‘pretty much inferring some of us don’t follow the law’ because we want immigration reform. Stirrup is an elected leader for God’s sake. He was holding a public meeting during which he was asked a legitimate question he refused to address.
I will address any and all questions and I am not even a public official.
Personally, I’d rather be an apologist than a Neo-Nazi any day. These people with the help of Duecaster, GL and his hate gang act like Nazis in that their agenda is to promote ethnic cleansing of anyone who doesn’t speak their language or look white. They don’t promote fair immigration reform–they persecute. For God’s sake, they call themselves “foot soldiers” and show up at 7/11’s wearing army fatigues! I don’t have any compunction about telling them what they act like. Their HSM is no better than the KKK IMHO. They are about one step away from committing hate crimes if they haven’t already slipped under the wire yet without us knowing about it.
Take it somewhere else, GL and Robert Duecaster. Most of us don’t need your insanity.
AWC, when are you going to stop apologising for idiot opportunists like John Stirrup? There is zero electoral advantage in clinging to this issue, not in the short term, and not in the long term.
Controversial issues with minority targets are supposed to divide the Democrats, remember? But what has “illegal” immigration done for the Republican party? It divided and weakened our side, and it united Democrats, Independents, and minority communities against us. If “what part of illegal” is such a fail safe slogan, why can’t Republicans agree on this issue, even in little old PWC. Republicans can no longer win using tactics like this. Isn’t that clear by now?
“Illegal” immigration as a campaign issue was a desperate measure for desperate times. It failed as it should have. Stirrup and Stewart are going down with the ship. The rest of the party doesn’t have to.
If our leaders weren’t so incompetent, we wouldn’t need to do FOIA requests. Imagine how much money we could save if our “leaders” would answer questions directly and honestly!
AW, since you can’t pick out a single quote where someone has called someone else here anti-immigrant, I’m dismissing your argument (though I DO hope you feel better….I’ve been under the weather a lot recently as well and it’s a drag).
You Wish, you don’t read my postings so here are some again for your convenience:
“And most of the people like AW, RD, SA and Rick who also post on BVBL but aren’t necessarily supporting the hate agenda are open about where they post . I don’t think any of them has ever been called “anti-immigrant” here, but I could be wrong. I’m not saying there aren’t tiffs. There sure are! But there is a difference between the people like Stirrup and people like those I just mentioned. You can be against illegal immigration without being racist or anti-immigrant. Unfortunately, most of the HSM crowd isn’t capable of that and those that ARE shouldn’t be affiliating IMHO.”
“First, when he takes his policy from HSM (which he did), then YES, this should fall under FOIA. Second, if he takes the campaign money, it falls under FOIA. Third, if this is part of his professional affiliations (i.e. as on a resume) then it falls under FOIA. He has his church listed. He should be as proud to list his ‘clubs.’ If he is not, there’s a reason. He is either hiding it (dishonest) ashamed of it (rightly so, in which case we are owed an apology) or doesn’t want to answer for another reason (anti-transparent).”
It should be fairly easy to see who donates to Stirrup’s campaign unless he is hiding that as well. That doesn’t mean Stirrup is an HSM member. Still, if he is, why is he hiding it?? He ought to be proud of it, shouldn’t he? No matter. He shows up and sucks up to them in public anyway.
AWC, my husband is part Irish-German. I understand what you meant 😉
(rolling eyes)
I think I am hanging up the argument for the day. It is too early for me to care, folks.
LOL! MH…..I was up early this morning making my hubby PBJ sandwiches. Yes, that is what he really wanted for lunch today.
For the record, there are a few posters here and elsewhere that simply hate my guts and will do anything they can to express it. That’s fine if they want to waste their time. I don’t hate anyone, even the people I think are neo-Nazis. THOSE people I just like to avoid because IMHO they are dangerous.
–AWC, when are you going to stop apologising for idiot opportunists like John Stirrup?–
Should we call these people “Neo-Nazi Apologists”? Hee hee. Just pushing some buttons.
Still, I don’t understand why people feel the need to defend Stirrup, Stewart, GL/RD and the CLAN. If they are doing the right thing, why should they NEED defending? Makes you wonder what relationship these “defenders” have with the racist club.
so, I still do not know what an “illegal alien apologist” is.
Pat.Herve, I don’t either but it is something to call someone when you don’t like their stance on illegal immigration.
For instance:
–you might be an illegal alien apologist if you state that importing 15 million people is not possible.
–you might be an illegal alien apologist if you insist that the children born in the USA to illegal aliens are American citizens.
–you might be an illegal alien apologist if you state that children are entitled to an education.
I am sure others will want to add to this ANTI-foxworthy definition.
In general, let’s declare a moratorium on the word RACIST today. I think it got worn out yesterday and frankly, I need a break from it. Several people have emailed me begging for this suggestion.
Thanks everyone.
Good idea Moon, how about adding Nazi, Neo-Nazi, Clan, KKK and apologist to the list as well.