Last night I caught the beginning of the 10 pm news. This story was the lead. I noticed that, while the names and states these asshats represent were discussed, their party affiliation was not.

Now, way back in high school and college when I was taking journalism classes, we learned that when dealing with an elected official..like say...oh...a congressman, the proper syntax (ok, they said 'style' but I prefer syntax) is to state the person's name, then in parentheses their party affiliation and state. Here is an example Sen. Robert Dole (R-KS). See? Always with the party.

But the news story last night, it didn't tell us if the lawmakers that took the Saddam sponsored junket were dems or repubs. I told the 5/8 and No. 1 Son that those three had to be democrats, because if they had been republicans, the news bimbo would have said so. Instead of the headline being "Saddam Paid for Lawmakers' Iraq Trip" the headline would have read "Saddam Paid for Republican Lawmakers' Iraq Trip."

No. 1 Son had some trouble understanding why. I tried to explain to him that the news reporting is mostly biased towards the leftards. That most of the reporters and editors are leftards, and glorify the likes Chavez and Castro, which is why we see so little news about the piss-poor living conditions, and the atrocious human rights violations that occur there.

I don't think he completely understood what I was getting at. But he'll learn. We all had to learn that lesson. The hard lesson when we discovered that Dan and Peter and Tom weren't giving us the full, un-biased skinny and any damn thing they talked about.

Now, the question is, did these fellows know their trip was sponsored by the Butcher of Baghdad? Probably not. I don't believe that any lawmaker who would travel to Iraq on the eve of the US invasion could be smart enough to figure it out. But then again, only they know. I mean, it was, after all, paid for by a charity group. And seriously, how would these male-bimbos know they guy who runs the charity was getting oil in exchange for getting them to Iraq?

I'm certain though, if the congressmen would have been republicans, we'd be hearing all the screaming and crying of corruption that the leftards are so good at spewing.

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Editor's Note: I have been part of this blogburst for many months now. I fully support this endeavor. We, as Americans, cannot....must not allow a memorial which is supposed to enshrine the heroes and victims of Flight 93 for all times, be hijacked by those who wish to honor the perpetrators of this heinous event. Please, I beg of you, please sign at least the electronic petition. It won't cost you anything but a few minutes of your time. Americans must stand up for justice. This sham of a memorial MUST be stopped.
~Thank you

Petition for Congressional investigation

A petition to stop the crescent memorial is now being circulated on the ground in western Pennsylvania. As a complement to this old fashioned canvassing effort, an electronic petition has also been created at ipetitions.com. Please circulate far and wide!

The petitions highlight four cases of apparent Islamic symbolism in the memorial design. Here is the text (electronic):

Call for Congressional investigation of Islamic symbolism in the Flight 93 memorial

Many features of the chosen Flight 93 Memorial design are intolerable:

1. THE GIANT CRESCENT. The centerpiece of the original “Crescent of Embrace” design was a giant red Islamic shaped crescent. Every particle of this original crescent design remains completely intact in the so-called redesign, which only added a few irrelevant trees. The giant crescent is still there.

2. IT POINTS TO MECCA. The giant crescent points to Mecca. A crescent that Muslims face into to face Mecca is called a "mihrab," and is the central feature around which every mosque is built. The Flight 93 Memorial is on track to become the world's largest mosque.

3. THE ISLAMIC SUNDIAL. The minaret-like Tower of Voices is a year-round accurate Islamic prayer-time sundial (one of many typical mosque features that are realized in the crescent design, all on the same epic scale as the half mile wide central crescent).

4. THE 44 BLOCKS. There are 44 glass blocks on the flight path, equaling the number of passengers, crew, AND terrorists. Intentional or not, these features are entirely unacceptable. This travesty must stop and investigations must begin.

1) We the undersigned call on our state and federal legislators to undertake their own thorough and independent investigations of the Flight 93 Memorial design. The truth must come out.

2) We ask that the crescent design be scraped entirely and that it be replaced with a new design that is not tainted by Islamic or terrorist memorializing symbolism.

3) We demand a fitting and proper memorial that HONORS the brave men and women of Flight 93.

Please take a minute to electronically sign this petition. All signatures collected by the end of April will be printed out and delivered to the May 3rd public meeting of the Memorial Project, along with Xeroxes of the hand-signed petitions.

That is just the start. There will be another public meeting in August, where we hope to present a much larger pile of petitions, and all signatures will eventually be delivered to the Pennsylvania state legislature and to Congress. Keep sending until the crescent design is stopped!

In the short term, we have a number of supporters in the Pennsylvania legislature at this point who are working to gain backing for an investigation. A demonstration of public demand should help that effort.

The paper petition

In order to make the paper petition self-sufficient, there is a second page, to be printed on the back of the petition, that provides explanations and graphical documentation of the four highlighted cases of Islamic symbolism. The idea is to have a petition that can circulate virally. Anyone can print it out and have enough information right on the petition itself to know that the objections are legitimate. (Mailing instructions are also included.)

Here are the back-side explanations of the four intolerable features:

1. THE GIANT CRESCENT

The original Crescent of Embrace design was a giant Islamic shaped crescent with the crash site placed between the crescent tips, in the position of the star on an Islamic crescent and star flag:

The redesign was supposed to eliminate these Islamic symbol shapes, but as Congressman Tom Tancredo wrote to the Park Service in November 2007, these features remain completely intact in the so-called redesign, which only disguised the crescent with a few additional trees. Architect Paul Murdoch’s refusal to eliminate the Islamic symbol shapes suggests intent, but intentional or not, these symbol shapes are unacceptable. Congressman Tancredo is now calling for the crescent design to be scrapped in its entirety, and we join in that request.

2. IT POINTS TO MECCA

Several credible analysts have found that a person facing directly into the giant crescent (still present in the redesign) will be facing almost exactly at Mecca:

The green “qibla” circle in the graphic above is from the prayer-direction calculator at Islam.com. It shows the direction to Mecca from Somerset PA (ten miles from the crash site). The red arrow shows that a person standing between the crescent tips and facing into the center of the crescent will be facing almost exactly at Mecca.

This Mecca orientation claim must be authoritatively investigated and answered. If it is true that the crescent points to Mecca, and hence can serve as an Islamic prayer direction indicator (the central feature around which every mosque is built), then whether this construct was intentional or not, it indelibly taints the design.

3. THE ISLAMIC SUNDIAL

Anyone can see the overt similarity between a traditional Islamic sundial (left-hand image) and Tower of Voices part of the Flight 93 Memorial (right-hand image):

When the shadow of the traditional sundial reaches the outer curved vertical in this photo, it will be time for Islamic afternoon prayers. Shadow calculations confirm that, on any day of the year, when the shadow of the 93 foot tall crescent shaped Tower of Voices reaches the inner arc of trees, it will also be time for Islamic afternoon prayers.

4. THE FORTY-FOUR BLOCKS

Tom Burnett Sr. does not want Tom Junior’s name inscribed on one of the 44 translucent blocks that are to be emplaced along the flight path. Forty-four is the number of passengers, crew, AND terrorists:

The left side of this graphic shows the Memorial Wall, which follows the path of Flight 93 down to the point of impact. At eye level are 43 glass blocks. Forty are inscribed with the names of the 40 heroes. Three are inscribed with the 9/11 date.

Right-hand image: the 44th glass block sits at the end of the Entry Portal Walkway, where the flight path crosses the upper crescent tip. It marks the spot where, in architect Paul Murdoch’s description, the terrorists broke our humanitarian circle, turning it into a giant (Islamic shaped) crescent. This circle-breaking, crescent-creating feat is memorialized by the inscription: “A field of honor forever.”

The Park Service dismisses the suspicious block count on the grounds that the 44th glass block is much larger than the others. Mr. Burnett is not comforted by the magnificence of the 44th block, and neither are we. This design must be stopped, and investigations must be launched!

Other petition formats

The same four intolerable features are described in the annotated "Map of Betrayal" that was the subject of one of last month's blogbursts. Thus the map makes a perfectly serviceable back side for the petition, providing an alternative petition/flyer combination.

The information on the map is denser than the explanations above, but has its own intrigue, showing how the different terrorist memorializing parts fit together like an elaborate puzzle.

The petition being circulated on the ground now in Pennsylvania is still another variation. It has slightly different wording than the electronic petition, and slightly different explanations of the four points than presented above. All the different formats are interchangeable. They all highlight the same four objectionable features, and they will all be delivered together to state and federal legislators.

Until we get a Congressional investigation, the petition will be an ongoing tool for raising awareness and registering opposition. If you participate in any activist fora or email lists, please forward the text and links along. (The electronic and paper-petition links are collected together on this petition Page at CrescentOfBetrayal.com.)

Blogburst blogroll

To join, email Cao (caoilfhionn1 at gmail dot com) with your blog's url.

I'm not a big fan of fantasy literature. Sure, I've read "Lord of the Rings" and "Watership Down" and they were  enjoyable. But mostly, I'm not into reading stuff where people are named stuff like 'Glimmermear', just can't seem to get to into it. I mean, seriously, if you have refer to a glossary just to pronounce the names, it's just too much work to make for an enjoyable read. But I digress...

Jack Whyte is an author I hadn't heard of when I ran out of reading material and was at the local Dillon's store where I managed to find this book. It is book one of the "Templar Trilogy". Now, I've always been a sucker for the mysteries of the Knights Templar, the Priory of Sion, ancient Church societies and the like. So I picked it up. He starts his tale just before the first Crusade in the mid 11th Century. Knowing this, I was a bit curious how he would handle the Crusades and subsequent occupation of Jerusalem and other areas of the Middle East.

And true to any author in today's climate who doesn't want to have a fatwa issued against him, or be branded a racist, the occupying Muslims were all nice, peaceful folks until the Franks from Christendom invaded their land and brutalized everyone. And even after that, the Muslims (along with the group who were to become the Knights Templar) were the only people who had any honor.

Now, I don't mind books that are critical of the Church or Christianity. I loved Dan Brown's "Angels and Demons" (even more than his "DaVinci Code"). And I know that throughout history, and especially in the early part of the second millennium, the Church was full of people who were only out for themselves. People who, by birth order, were pretty much forced into priesthood and what not. But come on, could Whyte not find one single Church official that would display at least some modicum of Christian ideals? For him, every pastor, bishop, cardinal and pope, everything they did, they did for some ulterior, self-gratifying motive. In addition to that, there must have been twenty or thirty pages, peppered throughout the book, where he kept repeating how evil and dishonorable the invaders from Christendom were. Once or twice, and I can get the message, but over and over ad nauseam. It started to remind me of that 50+ page speech given by John Galt in "Atlas Shrugged" (I have to be honest about that, I didn't read the whole speech).

But his misrepresentation of history aside, the book wasn't all bad. His descriptions of the people and the surroundings and the activities were well thought out. The story, while a bit slow to get rolling, did start to click along at a good pace once Jerusalem was conquered. I'm certain that I will finish the trilogy when the others come out in paperback - if only because I'm a sucker for stories of the Templars. Kind of like I'm a sucker for time travel movies, no matter how badly they stink, I can't not watch 'em.

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The Bigsibling Blog » Crescent of Betrayal Blogburst…
Islamic symbolism causing fundraising problems for Flight 93 Memorial Pennsylvanians know about the Islamic symbolism in the Flight 93 Memorial, and have stopped donating. The first indication came last September when State Senator Jane Orie came aboard as a fundraiser. She got a quick education in growing controversy. In a 9/11 radio interview with Pittsburgh talker Fred Honsberger, Orie explained why she hoped the Flight 93 families would get back together and revisit their design choice:

Orie: "No matter who it is, and no matter where I went today for 9/11 events, everybody brought up this crescent. Whether it is intentional or not, it is disturbing to people." Honsberger: "So everyone is bringing it up to you." Orie: "Absolutely."

At that time, the Memorial Project had collected about $12.5 million, far short of the huge design's anticipated 60 million dollar price tag. Six months later the amount sits at "A little more than $12 million." It is possible that they are actually spending more on their fundraising efforts than they are raising. Bill Steiner, who has been rustling up opposition on the ground in PA, dropped by Somerset recently and had a conversation with Memorial Project Superintendent Joanne Hanley. She appeared beleaguered, and confided that fundraising was sluggish, suggesting that the memorial would probably have to be built in stages. Presumably she meant something other than the normal stages of building, but was anticipating delays. Now this week the Somerset Daily American has an editorial complaining that the whole state seems to be dumping on Somerset County, bemoaning amongst other things the lack of funding for the Flight 93 Memorial. This is not the preferred way to stop architect Paul Murdoch's terroist memorial mosque from being built. The damn thing ought to just be stopped by those in government who are in a position to stop it, so that a new and fitting design can be selected. At that point, money will be needed, but for now, with Murdoch in full command of the hijacked memorial, lack of money is what is needed. Starving the engines of fuel is one way to keep the hijacker from reaching his target, and until the hijacker is stopped, nothing else matters. The people get it, and are voting with their pocketbooks. When are our our elected representatives going to step up and do their part? Senator Orie is not the only Pennsylvania state legislator who has expressed concern, but Congressman Tancredo is as yet the only politician to actually call for the crescent design to be scrapped. If our representatives can't be leaders, can't they at least be followers? To join our blogbursts, email Cao (caoilfhionn1 at gmail dot com) with your blog's url.

It seems to me, and granted, I am a few hours short of my political science degree, that if we pull out of Iraq now, things in that region would get tons worse than they currently are.  It seems that Iran would become a huge and heavy handed influence.  In the 1980s we supported Iraq in the Iraq/Iran war because it was in absolutely no one's best interest that Iran gain control of the Iraqi oil fields (other than Iran's of course).  Now the liberals want to pull out. 

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Most Democrats share the view that we should pressure the White House to commence the phased redeployment of U.S. troops from Iraq in four to six months — to begin that phased redeployment

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If only the liberals would pull out early more often, we wouldn't have so many around to mess things up.