Not to sound like George III, but nothing important happened today. Those were ominous words. He uttered those ill-fated words on July 4, 1776. Had we fast-forwarded to July 4, 2010, he would have known instantly that the colonies had rebelled.
I am headed to God’s country for a few days but I am going well armed with computers, ipads, cameras, gkids, etc. My idea of roughing it differs a bit from most people’s idea. Mr. Howler will remain home with the young howlettes. ruff ruff.
How was the F-word? (ssshhhh-I mean Fair) Is that wretched thing over yet? The weather should be wonderful all week. No more 90 degree days in August. The dog days must be over…at least until September.
Rallies over mosque near ground zero get heated
By VERENA DOBNIK, Associated Press Writer Verena Dobnik, Associated Press Writer – 1 hr 17 mins ago
NEW YORK – The proposed mosque near ground zero drew hundreds of fever-pitch demonstrators Sunday, with opponents carrying signs associating Islam with blood, supporters shouting, “Say no to racist fear!” and American flags waving on both sides.
The two leaders of the construction project, meanwhile, defended their plans, though one suggested that organizers might eventually be willing to discuss an alternative site. The other, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, said during a Middle East trip that the attention generated by the project is actually positive and that he hopes it will bring greater understanding.
Around the corner from the cordoned-off old building that is to become a 13-story Islamic community center and mosque, police separated the two groups of demonstrators. There were no reports of physical clashes but there were some nose-to-nose confrontations, including a man and a woman screaming at each other across a barricade under a steady rain.
Opponents of the $100 million project two blocks from the World Trade Center site appeared to outnumber supporters. Bruce Springsteen’s “Born in the USA” blared over loudspeakers as mosque opponents chanted, “No mosque, no way!”
Signs hoisted by dozens of protesters standing behind police barricades read “SHARIA” — using dripping, blood-red letters to describe Islam’s Shariah law, which governs the behavior of Muslims.
Steve Ayling, a 40-year-old Brooklyn plumber who carried his sign to a dry spot by an office building, said the people behind the mosque project are “the same people who took down the twin towers.”
Opponents demand that the mosque be moved farther from the site where more than 2,700 people were killed on Sept. 11, 2001. “They should put it in the Middle East,” Ayling said.
On a nearby sidewalk, police chased away a group that unfurled a banner with images of beating, stoning and other torture they said was committed by those who followed Islamic law.
A mannequin wearing a keffiyeh, a traditional Arab headdress, was mounted on one of two mock missiles that were part of an anti-mosque installation. One missile was inscribed with the words: “Again? Freedom Targeted by Religion”; the other with “Obama: With a middle name Hussein. We understand. Bloomberg: What is your excuse?”
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100823/ap_on_re_us/us_nyc_mosque;_ylt=AoIdW4xpimcCx7P8.7ILnSKs0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTNlZ2IxZGo1BGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTAwODIzL3VzX255Y19tb3NxdWUEY2NvZGUDbW9zdHBvcHVsYXIEY3BvcwMzBHBvcwMxMgRwdANob21lX2Nva2UEc2VjA3luX3RvcF9zdG9yeQRzbGsDcmFsbGllc292ZXJt
I’ve never seen this level of hatred in America in my lifetime.
Establishment candidates in Arizona, Florida rally against ‘outsider’ rivals
By Dan Balz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, August 23, 2010
Tuesday’s primaries in Arizona and Florida appear likely to deliver a few surprises — surprises, that is, for anyone who accepted the conventional wisdom of just a few months ago.
Back then, Arizona Sen. John McCain (R) was considered in danger of becoming the next victim of a “tea party” uprising that was threatening Republican candidates seen as straying from conservative orthodoxy.
In what was taken as a sign of his nervousness, he brought in his 2008 vice presidential running mate, Sarah Palin, who vouched for his conservative bona fides. Now he enjoys a double-digit lead in the polls over his challenger, former representative J.D. Hayworth.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/22/AR2010082201288.html?hpid=topnews
Well, there’s one Sarah Palin endorsement that worked!
Has a clear cause/effect been established with Palin? Did she show up and all of a sudden there was a love fest with McCain?
As for the mosque issue, I haven’t heard much out of AZ since the mosque issue started.
Before we start getting in such an uproar about ‘sacred ground’ it seems to me that the strip clubs and roach coaches need to be moved out of that area. What is the proper distance? What would be far enough?
After I heard members of that crowd blaming Obama, I lost support for their cause. I believe Andy of Brooklyn pushed me over the edge. There is nothing about any of this that is Obama’s fault (or George Bushes fault either.).
Slate has an excellent summary of how this whole mosque controversy was manufactured:
Monday, Aug 16, 2010 07:01 ET
How the “ground zero mosque” fear mongering began
By Justin Elliott
A group of progressive Muslim-Americans plans to build an Islamic community center two and a half blocks from ground zero in lower Manhattan. They have had a mosque in the same neighborhood for many years. There’s another mosque two blocks away from the site. City officials support the project. Muslims have been praying at the Pentagon, the other building hit on Sept. 11, for many years.
In short, there is no good reason that the Cordoba House project should have been a major national news story, let alone controversy. And yet it has become just that, dominating the political conversation for weeks and prompting such a backlash that, according to a new poll, nearly 7 in 10 Americans now say they oppose the project. How did the Cordoba House become so toxic, so fast?
In a story last week, the New York Times, which framed the project in a largely positive, noncontroversial light last December, argued that it was cursed from the start by “public relations missteps.” But this isn’t accurate. To a remarkable extent, a Salon review of the origins of the story found, the controversy was kicked up and driven by Pamela Geller, a right-wing, viciously anti-Muslim, conspiracy-mongering blogger, whose sinister portrayal of the project was embraced by Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post.
Here’s a timeline of how it all happened:
http://www.salon.com/news/ground_zero_mosque/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2010/08/16/ground_zero_mosque_origins
Code Pink founder, and Obama bundler, Jodie Evans got a taste of her own medicine from Move America Forward (a pro-troop orginization) at a fundraiser she was holding for Jerry Brown.
http://biggovernment.com/taylorking/2010/08/22/l-a-leftists-get-the-code-pink-treatment-at-jodie-evans-jerry-brown-fundraiser/
Trash link alert. Trash link alert. Breitbart has zero credibility.
Too bad that extremists will turn moderate muslims into non-moderates. We need to be building bridges rather than creating canyons.
From today’s Slate website:
Estimated donations per victim:
2004 Tsunami – $1,249
2008 Haiti – $1,087
Pakistan
2005 Earthquake – $388
2010 Flood – $16
Trash link? I like to think of it as more of the “anti” Huffington Post. 🙂
Is this one better for you Moon?
http://www.redstate.com/moe_lane/2010/08/23/moonbeam-brown-protested-at-code-pink-shindig/
@Big Dog
Might be better for Pakistan if they could make up their mind whose side they are on. I know, I know–visiting the sins of the parent on the child–right? TFBAT
I think George hits at the heart of the matter. And I suppose it is sad. Most of those victicms don’t look like they care who their government is.
There is another point of view….after Haiti and the tsunami, the media was all over it…begging and pleading and drawing our attention to the extreme desperation of the situation in both cases. In the case of the flooding, the silence has been deafing.
FINALLY!!! Barak Hussein Obama elementary school will open in MD on Monday.
http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local-beat/Barack-Obama-Elementary-Opens-in-Maryland-101286799.html
just to get back to your “Trash link alert. Trash link alert. Breitbart has zero credibility.” post… Did you know that regular contributor to the Huffington Post, Robert Creamer, is a convicted felon? Stole $2 MILLION in writing bad checks. Also, they have home grown terrorist Bill Ayers and several ‘JournOlist’ members as ‘reporters’ for them as well, here are a few:
Dan Froomkin
Nico Pitney
Sam Stein
So “Trash link alert” and “credibility” are relative terms I suppose. A site that uses convicted felons, domestic terrorists and journOlisters to do their reporting doesn’t count as “Trash” and are very “credible”?
VP Biden: Democrats Will Keep Control of Congress This Fall
August 20, 2010 5:41 PM
ABC News’ Karen Travers reports:
A fired-up Vice President Biden said today that despite the dire predictions from pundits, Democrats will keep control of both the House and the Senate after the midterm elections.
“The reports of the death of the Democratic Party have been greatly exaggerated — greatly exaggerated,” he said at the Democratic National Committee’s summer meeting in St .Louis today. “I’m here to tell you that on November the 3rd…this coming election, there will be in Washington, D.C. a Democratic majority in the House and a Democratic majority in the Senate.”
The always loquacious Biden told the Democratic Party’s rank and file members that if it were not illegal, “I’d make book on it.”
Biden hammered the opposition, calling them the “Republican tea party,” and said they are offering voters the same failed agenda of the past, albeit one “on steroids.”
“This ain’t your father’s Republican Party. This is the Republican tea party,” he said to applause from the party faithful. “[Voters are] going to begin to see a Republican Party that’s a combination of the old failed policies of the Bush administration, the old neoconservative notions about international relations as well as economic policy, combined with a new set of draconian ideas basically on steroids, the old process — literally.”
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2010/08/vp-biden-democrats-will-keep-control-of-congress-this-fall.html
I used to think that the Dems would lose the Congress too, but now I’m not so certain. I think the extremists in the Republican party will do more harm than good for the Republicans’ chances in November.
Look – the squirels gathering they’re nuts!
Yahoo News reported today on a 62 mile traffic jam near Beijing that
has lasted nine days. China is closing in on us — they are getting
close to the norm on I-95!
@Starryflights
Good old Joe Biden… I read that as well and almost fell out of my chair laughing. He is quite the comedian.
3 dead, 4 wounded in shootout in central Virginia
By ZINIE CHEN SAMPSON, Associated Press Writer Zinie Chen Sampson, Associated Press Writer – 2 hrs 5 mins ago
LOUISA, Va. – A man who shot and killed his son and nephew and wounded four other relatives had been involved in an ongoing family dispute over a piece of property in a rural central Virginia neighborhood, authorities said Monday.
Sheriff’s deputies had been called to the property nearly two dozen times in recent years — including once earlier in the day Sunday — before Charles P. Steadman Sponaugle, 52, opened fire on his family members, Louisa sheriff’s Maj. Donnie Lowe said.
Sponaugle fired at two deputies and unleashed his pit bull at them before deputies responded, fatally shooting both Sponaugle and the dog, said Corinne Geller, a Virginia State Police spokeswoman.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100823/ap_on_re_us/us_virginia_shootings
Gun nuts gone wild.
Apparently Obama didn’t remove all of the ‘combat’ troops from Iraq… he is just calling them something different now.
“Combat brigades in Iraq under different name
7 Advise and Assist Brigades, made up of troops from BCTs, still in Iraq”
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2010/08/dn-brigades-stay-under-different-name-081910/
Democrats Hold Financial Advantage Over GOP
Posted: August 23, 2010
WASHINGTON — The Republican National Committee’s $5.5 million in July receipts includes a $900,000 insurance payment, helping boost anemic fundraising by the national party.
Federal campaign reports show that Democratic Party committees maintained a cash on hand advantage over their Republican counterparts as they entered the final three months before the election.
The Republican Party’s insurance payment was from Illinois National Insurance, a subsidiary of insurance giant American International Group. A party official said the money was for an insurance claim but said there was a confidentiality provision in the agreement. The official was not authorized to discuss the claim publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.
http://politics.usnews.com/news/articles/2010/08/23/democrats-hold-financial-advantage-over-gop.html
Not looking too good for Repug’s these days
@hello
No argument from me on that one.
Went to the Newseum in DC with family this weekend and it was
fascinating. It certainly brought back a number of memories and
also reminded me that while we may know vigilance is a price
of freedom, newspapers are shrinking and often even disappearing
across our country, so – who is our “sentry on the wall”? Note
that Bell, Calif. where the city leaders raised their salaries sky high,
has no local paper and the LA Times has been hit by waves of staff cuts.
Consequently, Bell was not part of anyone’s regular beat – the cats
were all laid off so the mice played for years.
Some favorite mottoes:
– The New Times “All the News Fit to Print”.
– The New Sun “It Shines For Everyone”
– The Atlanta Journal “Covers Dixie Like the Dew”
– Wautauga (Boone, NC) Democrat “A Damn Good Newspaper”
– Blackshear (Ga) Times “Liked By Many, Cussed By Some, Read By All”
Seems as though are BoS will be having a PM session tomorrow evening for a couple of presentations on Stimulus $$$. Agenda is here.
http://www.pwcgov.org/documents/bocs/agendas/currentagenda.pdf
@Lafayette
Thanks Lafayette. This looks fishy to me. The County Executive presentation says use of “funding not yet allocated to Prince William County.” The BOCS can’t vote to budget money we don’t have yet.
If the purpose of the meeting really is to budget funds from the stimulus, why are they also authorizing and holding a closed session? They don’t need a closed session to authorize and budget some Obama education money that might be coming our way.
This is the first I’ve heard about the meeting. Maybe I’ve been out-of-touch. Did anyone else know about it?
Will Stewart ask to change to amend the agenda when the meeting opens and ram some new scam down out throats?
Stay tuned. The soap opera that is Prince William County continues.
Public info session tonight, Aug. 23 at City Hall from 5 to 7 pm — The Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies (CALEA) is conducting an on-site assessment for the re-accreditation of the Manassas City Police Dept.
Public comments are welcome.
If you can’t make it and want to say something about MCPD, write CALEA at 13575 Heathcoate Blvd, Gainesville, VA 20155.
@Need to Know
You are most welcome.
This was not on schedule of meetings for the year. It just popped up today. I got notice via email from the county. I was shocked when I saw a BoS agenda attached to the email.
I see no need for a Closed Session with such a short agenda of presentations and Citizens’ Time. Perhaps, they have some personnel matters to discuss.
Soap Opera, I love it. That it is. I think we need to come up with a name for this local Soap. Where’s that darn Mom at? Naming a Soap should be right up his alley. 🙂
@Mom
Are you out there?
Did anyone visit the Open House of The War Time Musuem this weekend? According to the paper thousands came out for the event. How much money is this newest “museum” going to cost we the taxpayers?
http://www2.insidenova.com/isn/news/local/nokesville/article/open_house_for_proposed_wartime_museum_draws_thousands/62337/#comments
There was no agenda for this meeting when I looked a week ago of less.
What are they up to? Why a closed meeting? Rat smelling time!
Hello, big resounding…SOOOOO….Creamer has an opinion, same as G. Gordon Libby. If yo are a convicted felon does that mean you no longer are entitled to an opinion?
Brietbart is a liar and he is dishonest for political gain. That is one of my unfavorite traits.
So what is your point?
As the Worm Turns
The Guiding Blight
All My Anchor Children
The Smug and Restless
Right, but Huffington Post and Media Matters, THOSE are credible sites, am I right?
@Mom
Those are actually very good!
@Slowpoke Rodriguez
You’re travelling through another dimension. A dimension, not only of sign and sound, but of mind. A journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. Next stop, The Twilight Zone.” – Rod Serling
So, Starryflights can post all the lunatic-left diarrhea she will, bringing everyone’s intelligence down several notches in the process, but one link from from a Breitbart site, and we pounce……did I get those rules right?
The whole “Democrats will prevail” stuff by Sgt. Smart-ass is the funniest story going right now. You know the people in the audience during that speech could smell the potatoes on his breath!
@Mom
Thank you, Mom!! I knew you wouldn’t let us down. They are all just so fitting. I don’t which one is my favorite. They are all truly CLASSICS. 🙂
I love Breitbart. I think he actually hates liberals. So much so that he can’t hide it (his heroic flaw). I love listening to him go off, it’s awesome!
Mandatory OT so short on time. Surprised this hasn’t been covered yet..
http://hamptonroads.com/2010/08/virginia-can-regulate-abortion-clinics-cuccinelli-decrees
I can smell that becoming a thread topic with all the Cooch haters. ENJOY!
@hello
Good old Joe Biden… I read that as well and almost fell out of my chair laughing. He is quite the comedian.
Having Joe ‘Plugs’ Biden as VPOTUS is not a happenstance. A candidate of average intelligence would have upstaged the POTUS. Can’t have that! 😉
@hello
I remember all those advisors we had in Vietnam!
Marin, I was on the road today. There really isn’t much to say about Bob Marshall and Ken Cuccinelli. They make no sense and they have a very direct, not so hidden agenda. That agenda is to end abortion in the United States. Those of us who are pro choice know that this is not acceptable. Kookoonelli’s opinion, if acted on, will be struck down by the courts. The pro-choice community is rather intolerant of horse’s asses and has a great deal of money backing it.
I will leave all the howling and carrying on to the dark screen. One thing I know about the anti choice crowd. They get so puffed up on their self-righteousness that they make fatal errors. This might just be one of those times.
Oh and if you ask Bobby Marshall his honest opinion, he would have to tell you about his connections to American Life League. He not only wants to end all abortion, he also wants to end all contraception, and that includes the pill and condoms. Is that what you all want?
Here is the synopsis from the Richmond Times Dispatch. Actually,Kookoonelli can say whatever he wants. It isn’t going change anything. McDonnell can tell the Va Health Dept to require different regulations. That is when McDonnell, should he tread in those muddy waters, brings the hounds of hell down on himself.
I am not sure they can all survive all these different fronts involved in the culture wars.
Slowpoke, It depends on what you like I suppose. I think brietbart is a dishonest bastard. He sets people up and he lies. The worst part about him is that he doesn’t care who he hurts to accomplish his mission. I believe that is some sort of perverted manefest destiny. I will call Brietbart out each and every time and frankly I might ban his links from the blog I dislike him so much. What he tried to do to Ms. Sherrod was horrible. He knew what he was doing. That is just immoral to do to your fellow man.
And I give you an explanation because you like Clinton.
McCain Looks to Complete a Comeback
Mr. McCain’s comfortable position as Arizonans prepared to vote on Tuesday was a reversal of fortunes from earlier in the year, when he was considered a potential victim of the anti-establishment fervor sweeping the nation. Even some of his supporters had predicted that he would be cleaning out his office like his veteran Senate colleagues Robert F. Bennett, Republican of Utah, and Arlen Specter, Democrat of Pennsylvania.
Mr. McCain had clear vulnerabilities going into the race: his 27 years in Washington at a time when the anti-incumbency mood was fierce and his high-profile efforts to reform the immigration system that ran up against the hard-line approaches emanating from Arizona.
But by spending freely and by acting as if he might lose, the senator managed to turn things around. Mr. McCain tapped into money left over from his failed presidential effort, spending more than $20 million (compared with about $3 million for Mr. Hayworth) making his visage and his harsh attacks on Mr. Hayworth omnipresent on Arizona’s airwaves. Mr. McCain’s spending was among the highest ever for a Senate primary in Arizona and, depending on turnout, could translate into more than $75 a vote, political analysts said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/24/us/politics/24arizona.html
Well, well, well, looks like the tea partiers didn’t do so well!
Mr. McCain pursued comprehensive immigration reform more aggresively than any other politician (including then-Senator Obama who voted against it). Let’s hope he does so again!
Is it possible that the Obama education money is just a pretext to have a meeting so Stewart can amend the agenda? Any number of things is possible. More taxpayer money for the Wartime museum before it comes before the Planning Commission next week?
Perhaps a nuclear option is in the works. Back in 2006, the massive Brentswood development was only deferred rather than defeated. It’s still on the Development Application Processing Schedule. It dwarfs Avendale. Stewart can open that again with no announcement or public hearing. Stewart, Covington, Nohe and Jenkins would be definite yes votes. Developers bought off Caddigan for Avendale. Maybe it was a package deal with her for a vote on something else also.
Regarding a title for the soap, let’s not confine ourselves to daytime shows. Corey Stewart reminds me a lot of J.R. Ewing, just not as smart. I don’t know what a good title playing on “Dallas” would be, however.
Governor McDonnell is to be on Fox and Friends at 8:15 this AM to discuss the state’s surplus.
From the PWC Government web site:
“PRINCE WILLIAM, VA……. The Prince William Board of County Supervisors will hold a special meeting on Tuesday, August 24, 2010, beginning at 7 p.m. The meeting will be held in the Board Chamber of the James J. McCoart Building, 1 County Complex Court, Woodbridge, Virginia. The meeting will include a presentation on Prince William County School System’s intent to utilize Federal stimulus monies to hire approximately 180 additional teachers for the 2010-2011 school year. In addition the Board will hear proposed uses of Federal stimulus funding not yet allocated to Prince William County.”
Neither of these items is critical. According to this statement, the meeting is to hear two presentations rather than vote on some urgent matter. Both, according to the description above, could wait until the next regular BOCS meet on September 14.
Philly is now requiring bloggers to pay $300 for a business
license tax — can PWC be far behind? (trust Cooch would decide
far right blogs to be exempt).
@Big Dog
Sounds like a good revune generator. I can’t stop laughing at Cooch’s possible exemptions. I think you are onto something there. 🙂
McCain wins renomination, novice shines in Fla.
By LIZ SIDOTI, AP National Political Writer Liz Sidoti, Ap National Political Writer – 20 mins ago
WASHINGTON – Veteran Sen. John McCain sailed to nomination for a fifth term Tuesday over an Arizona challenger with tea party support, but big-spending political novice Rick Scott beat an insider in Florida’s Republican gubernatorial primary as voters split on the merits of establishment candidates vs. outsiders.
In other big-name races, Rep. Kendrick Meek prevailed for Florida’s Senate Democratic nomination over upstart Jeff Greene, and Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska hoped voters would reward political experience as she faced a spirited Republican primary challenge 10 weeks before the general election. She was in a surprisingly close race with about a third of the vote counted.
Nominating contests in five states — Vermont also was voting, and Oklahoma held GOP runoffs — highlighted dominant themes of this unpredictable election year, including anti-establishment anger and tea party challenges from the right. But the early results indicated that if there was a single pattern to the night, it may have been the lack of one.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_primary_rdp;_ylt=AsAftqNsNsbnmd6p6rd2Tdus0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTNlc3Rhb2c2BGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTAwODI1L3VzX3ByaW1hcnlfcmRwBGNjb2RlA21vc3Rwb3B1bGFyBGNwb3MDMQRwb3MDMgRwdANob21lX2Nva2UEc2VjA3luX3RvcF9zdG9yeQRzbGsDbWNjYWlud2luc3Jl
So much for the tea party
Why are the comments closed on the school thread? I’ve never heard of voting with your feet until last night.