Tennessee: Refugee Absorptive Capacity Act could be the ticket for other areas experiencing refugee overload

A model for other states?

Just a week ago we told you about the mayor of Manchester, NH begging for a moratorium on refugees being resettled in his city.   The Tennessee bill, just passed and signed into law and discussed in some detail in the Shelbyville Times Gazette, may be just the model other states could use to demand some control of the refugee program at the local level.

Frankly in many locations, citizens are incensed when they learn that “church” groups like Catholic Charities are being paid by the US State Department and the Dept. of Health and Human Services to financially stress towns and cities by the importation of poverty.

From the Shelbyville Times Gazette (emphasis mine):

A bill that originated from the desk of State Sen. Jim Tracy has been signed into law that would make sure that local communities would be able to absorb refugees.

But a state immigrant rights group has blasted the new measure, calling it an “unprecedented attack on refugees.”

Called the Refugee Absorptive Capacity Act, the new law, signed by Gov. Bill Haslam on May 27, will require Catholic Charities, the state’s refugee program agency, to meet four times a year with local governments to plan and coordinate “the appropriate placement of refugees in advance of the refugees’ arrival …”

A number of refugees from a variety of countries, such as Somali, Burma and Egypt, have moved to Shelbyville in recent years to be closer to jobs at the Tyson Foods facility.

Tracy told the T-G in February that there has been “a lot of discussion across the state about this, particularly in Bedford County … but other counties also.” He explained at the time that the law would require resettlement agencies to let local governments know when a large number of refugees are coming “because it puts a burden on the local community.”

“Absorptive capacity” refers to a community’s ability to meet the existing needs of its current residents, the availability of affordable or low-cost housing, including existing waiting lists, and “the capacity of the local school district to meet the needs of the existing or anticipated refugee student population.”

The law also refers to “the ability of the local economy to absorb new workers without causing competition with local residents for job opportunities, displacing existing local workers, or adversely affecting the wages or working conditions of the local workforce.”

It also states that a local government can request a moratorium on new resettlement activities, by documenting that the community lacks the absorptive capacity and that further resettlement would result in an adverse impact to existing residents.

The bill passed the state house by a vote of 86-10 with passage in the Senate side by a vote of 22-9-1.

Of course the state Open Borders advocacy and lobbying group—the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition* (search RRW for them, we have written about them on many occasions)-–calls the measure the “Refugees not welcome act.”

*For our Maryland readers this is the Tennessee equivalent to CASA de Maryland, except they are not as rich as CASA.

Refugee resettlement: why are we doing it and how do we stop it?

I’ve been writing this blog since the summer of 2007 when I first became aware of the fact that the Virginia Council of Churches was bringing mostly Muslim refugees to our rural county in western Maryland.  At first all I wanted to understand was the governmental process that would allow an out-of-state “church” group to drop off refugees in lousy neighborhoods and then not take very good care of them.  I’ve been working almost daily since then to bring news about the refugee program to you, the readers.

The comment I received yesterday from Rowana and posted here this morning is more detailed than usual but typical of the comments we receive.  We also had a commenter named Gary who commented on this post yesterday as well.  Gary said:

Is there a process in San Diego, or any other town or state, that requires local permission to be granted before George Soros, The State Department or the United Nations sends refugees? It seems that the entire government now acts without our permission or the permission of our elected representatives.

In addition to Rowana and Gary, Lion of Kabul (also yesterday) sent a news report from France about how Islam has taken over sections of some cities in that country.

I feel like screaming to all of you—STOP COMPLAINING AND GET TO WORK!    I’m not talking about Rowana, Gary, and the Lion of Kabul, but all of you.   At least those three have taken some action by writing.

Frankly, it is time (past time!) for a moratorium on all immigration.  No one will say that, not even the major immigration restrictionist groups like NumbersUSA or FAIR.  I will say it because our economy is crashing and that is partly (maybe largely) due to the importation of impoverished immigrants who come either legally or illegally. And, we must impose a moratorium on the thousands upon thousands of Muslims we are admitting who have no intention of becoming Americans.

Why is this happening?  Why are we allowing America to be overrun?

As Gary noted, George Soros, the State Department (even under Republicans!) and the UN are all involved.  The drivers of immigration are one-worlders and Socialists.  They are also control freaks and have some notion that, if they can just run the world their way, they will even-out the differences between the rich and poor, erase ethnic tensions and we will live in one big happy sustainable world.  To accomplish that mythical goal, they need to erase boundaries and destroy capitalism by overloading our welfare system (Cloward-Piven).  They need the do-gooders for cover.

And, like parasites, Muslim extremists are tagging along with the Socialists and Marxists and will just wait their chance to impose Sharia law in the West once the Leftists have brought enough chaos to bring down governments.

This is not a conspiracy theory.  We just saw it happen in Egypt—the do-gooder Left, the hard core Marxists and the Muslim Brotherhood took over Egypt.  Unfortunately for the do-gooders and the Marxists, the Muslim Brotherhood is about to devour their Leftwing host. (Update:  See Egypt Muslim Brotherhood and the modesty police, here)

The more important question is how do we stop it?

When I am tired, I think it’s too late.  Then at other times, I pledge to myself to go down fighting for freedom and for our God-given country—America.

I urge all of you to stop dithering around with the Why-question and move on to the How-question.

As Gary asks, how do I stop the importation of poverty and a radical element to my city?

You have to work—plain and simple—work!  You are up against a media that has long ago given up doing any real investigative work especially on a topic where the wrong word will bring the name callers down upon you, so you must do it.   You must investigate and let the word “racist” roll right off your back.   Then you have to figure out how to disseminate what you have learned, but with all the new social media you can do that too!

You have to work! Work involves digging into documents, learning how the various immigration programs work, learning who the political leaders are who are behind it in your city or county.  You need to find out if certain business interests are pushing for more immigrants for cheap labor.  You need to put pressure on your US Congressman and your two US Senators.  You need to get to work on the state level as well, putting pressure on elected representatives and your governor.

Also if you are a member of one of the nationwide immigration control groups, put pressure on them too to start looking into one of our largest importers of Muslim immigrants—refugee resettlement.

Then you have to get the word out.  I RECOMMEND THAT EACH AND EVERY ONE OF YOU FRUSTRATED BY IMMIGRATION-GENERATED POVERTY AND CRIME WRITE A BLOG TO PUBLISH YOUR FINDINGS.  If I can do it, you can.  Or, start a facebook page to get your information out past the old media filter.  Write letters to the editor, get on radio talk shows, start or join local groups of like-minded people.

Just stop complaining and focus your work. We are all short of time, so stop with the forwarding of cutsy or outrageous e-mails to your friends, stop with the TV reality shows, and become an investigator, a reporter and a political activist who doesn’t mind being called a racist, bigot, xenophobe, Islamophobe, hatemonger, etc. etc. etc!

To Rowana, in about 5 minutes I found the following links for Ohio Refugee Resettlement here, here, here and here (scroll down to Ohio).  You must start to pull the information together for your location and then get the word out to the public where you live.  By the way, there is also something fishy (besides the terror connections) going on in Columbus with micro-loans to Somali businesses and someone there needs to dig into that and tell the public who is funding those micro-loans (probably international shariah finance outfits!).

By the way, Rowana, there are 10 or 11 major federal contractors and some 300 plus subcontractors so its hard to keep track of which ones are operating in your city.  One of those links above lists some subcontractors.  That is why I recommend a local investigative approach and news outlet (blog or website written by you).

One more thing, Rowana, you have a pretty good governor right now, why not get a little delegation together to go and tell him what you know about corruption in the Somali community in Columbus.

To Gary,  by law the resettlement contractors are supposed to “consult” with local government.  Some do and some don’t, but you can be sure the “consultation” is cursory and does not include you—-the citizen and taxpayer.

Get in touch with me if you are serious about working on exposing the flaws in our legal immigration system by e-mailing me here:  Ann@vigilantfreedom.com

Senators object to agency using “Discover the Networks” for info on jihadists

Newsweek reported on March 11 an “exclusive” headlined Senators Accuse Homeland Security Spies of Cribbing From ‘Questionable’ Right-Wing Sources.

Actually, it’s just one source:  Discover the Networks, David Horowitz’s excellent database of information about leftist and jihadist individuals, organizations, and funding sources. We’ve used Discover the Networks many times. Here is our page of search results for it. So have Glenn Beck and Bill O’Reilly, and many other talk-show hosts and journalists interested in learning about leftist individuals and groups and their funding. Here’s how Newsweek’s piece opens:

Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Dianne Feinstein and other prominent Senate Democrats have accused spies at the Homeland Security Department of basing official intelligence reports on dubious open-source material. Inquiries by Declassified indicate that at least some of the data that Feinstein and her colleagues deemed “questionable” came from a website set up by outspoken conservative activist David Horowitz to catalogue negative information about the political left.  

It’s wrong to try to find out information about the political left, you see. It goes on:

In an  official report accompanying an intelligence authorization bill last year, Feinstein’s committee alleged that Homeland’s Office of Intelligence and Analysis had been issuing papers that “inappropriately analyze the legitimate activities of U.S. persons” – papers that “often used certain questionable open source information as a basis of their conclusions.”

…She went on to allege that on a number of occasions, Homeland’s spies had “produced and disseminated finished intelligence that has been based on non-credible, open source materials or focused intelligence resources on the first amendment-protected activities of American citizens.”

Let’s see. It’s okay for Homeland Security to produce a report on the right-wing threat, titled “Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment,”  which lists no specific threats. I don’t remember Dianne Feinstein getting upset about that. The first finding of the report is summarized thusly:

The DHS/Office of Intelligence and Analysis (I&A) has no specific information that domestic rightwing* terrorists are currently planning acts of violence, but rightwing extremists may be gaining new recruits by playing on their fears about several emergent issues. The economic downturn and the election of the first African American president present unique drivers for rightwing radicalization and recruitment.

In other words, DHS put their resources into preparing a report on something they imagined might happen, and apparently on their own initiative, not in response to a request. And that was fine with liberal members of Congress. Now, here’s how the report the senators object to came about:

Congressional officials say the Homeland intelligence report that particularly angered Feinstein and other committee members is still classified. Nevertheless, three current and former intelligence officials, requesting anonymity when discussing sensitive information, say the report in question is a profile of an unnamed but prominent American Islamic leader and was produced by Homeland Security’s intelligence office during the latter years of the Bush administration. The report was requested by the Department’s civil rights office, whose officials were preparing to meet with the Islamic leader. But instead of sending the civil rights office a quick bio of the individual in question, Homeland’s intelligence office issued a “finished” intel report that was circulated to other intelligence agencies and, eventually, to Congressional oversight committees.

DHS concluded that he was not a threat.

According to the letter, the Homeland report specifically went on to conclude that the Islamic leader in question was a “mainstream voice” and that information on him “points to politically controversial statements but not to extremism”  — conclusions that Rockefeller and Feingold declared to be “political assessments that are outside of the bounds of the authorities granted U.S. law enforcement and intelligence entities.”

So it’s okay to assess anti-illegal immigration groups who produce academic studies, but not Muslim leaders who possess many of the same characteristics as other Muslim leaders who turned out to be funneling money to Hamas, and other jihadist activities.

Feinstein and her colleagues are deeply confused. She objects to papers that “inappropriately analyze the legitimate activities of U.S. persons.” First of all, what is a “U.S. person”? A citizen? An illegal immigrant? Second, if someone is acting suspiciously, how do we know his activities are legitimate unless they are investigated?  It makes the point clearer to use an analogy from ordinary crime. Suppose a policeman sees someone breaking into a house and goes to investigate. The person turns out to be the owner who forgot his key.  Was the policeman’s action wrong?

Many Muslim leaders have turned out to have connections to terrorist groups abroad, or to have made statements inciting followers to violence. Not all leaders, but enough so that we need to consider it legitimate to investigate them. Particularly under the circumstances here. This was a leader meeting with an agency of the federal government; we don’t know why. There have been a number of cases in which Muslims became connected to the federal government in one way or another and turned out to be jihadists. Translators, for example, or liaisons to the “Muslim community.” President Bush entertained several at the White House. It is the most natural thing in the world for a government official to know about any Muslim leader he is going to have any contact with. In case Dianne Feinstein has forgotten, we are at war with Islamic extremists, and these enemies do not proclaim their identification as such on their foreheads.

Finally, the Senators object to open source material. Why? The question is whether it is true or not, rather than whether it is open source. And since the government is dangerously delinquent in its investigations of possible jihadists, I am grateful that so many citizens have taken it upon themselves to find out vital information and make it available. It was a citizen “Net Posse” that followed the recently come-to-light Jihad Jane for three years, and credibly claim to have alerted the feds to her. Let’s have more open source information; maybe the government agencies charged with protecting us could read these sources more widely so they can do the jobs they are supposed to do.

Here is the post on the Newsweek article at David Horowitz’s NewsReal blog.

Notes on the anti-jihad conference of the Freedom Defense Initiative

Update February 25:  Jamie Glazov interviews Pamela Geller at FrontPage Magazine on the conference, here. Well worth reading.

Update February 23rd:  Richard Falknor at Blue Ridge Forum also has an excellent post on this conference, here.

Yesterday I attended the anti-jihad conference put on by Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller, which Ann posted on a few days ago. This two-hour program was not officially part of CPAC, though that’s where it took place. CPAC is the Conservative Political Action Conference. Pamela pointed out that the only official CPAC session that dealt with jihad was one on the opposite side called “You’ve Been Lied To: Why Real Conservatives are Against the War on Terror.” But I noted there was one called “What is a conservative foreign policy?”   John Bolton was a speaker and he probably dealt with it in some way, and certainly Lt. Col. Allen West (Retired) did, since he spoke at the anti-jihad program and didn’t pull any punches (as I report further on).

I’m going to note below some of the points the speakers made, not trying to include everything. They were all knowledgeable, eloquent and courageous. I found it hard to understand some of the people for whom English was not their native language, but I got the gist of their talks.

1. Wafa Sultan is a psychiatrist originally a Muslim from Syria, now an American citizen and not a Muslim. She said: Islam is not just a religion but a political ideology. Neither George W. Bush nor Barack Obama has recognized this. Jihadists have reinvented themselves as mainstream civil rights activists in America.

The envoy Obama appointed to the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) is associated with the Muslim Brotherhood. Where is his first loyalty, to the U.S. or to Islam? The OIC is 57 countries working to stifle freedom. Does Obama support freedom of speech?

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia has the power to effect change overnight. He needs pressure on him.

2. Stephen Cloughlin was a senior analyst for the Pentagon. His contract was not renewed; they disagreed with his conclusions about Islam. His job, he said, is not to define true Islam, but to define the beliefs the enemy holds. Everything is in publicly available books. He showed several titles, Islamic Laws of Warfare published in 1955; Islamic Jurisprudence,  and others.

He spent quite a while talking about the doctrine of abrogation. That means that parts of the Koran that were written earlier are abrogated or overruled by parts written later. So when someone quotes verses in the Koran that advocate tolerance and peace, we need to know that these have been abrogated in favor of later verses that command Muslims to fight and slay the unbelievers.

Coughlin was just one of several speakers who pointed out how clueless American intelligence and military officials are about Islam and what the threat really is. They talked about political correctness and how it made it impossible to define the threat. A major theme of the conference was the danger to our freedom of speech, and how there is no free speech in Europe any more when it comes to Islam, and we are not far behind.

Coughlin pointed out that in Sharia law, slander means noticing anything that does not benefit Islam. So under Islamic law, associating Islam with Muslims who carry out acts of terrorism in the name of Islam is slander. (Does this sound like 1984, or maybe a surrealist play?)

Robert Spencer said that even at CPAC most people would say that Islam is peaceful, it just has some violent extremists. Conservative leaders marginalize Robert and his allies. The only weapon against this is the truth.

3. Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff is an Austrian woman who is, or might be, charged with hate speech offenses because she talks about Islam negatively. A magazine sent an undercover journalist to a seminar she was giving for the Freedom Party, and reported on it. Establishment people, including representatives of religions, were outraged at her words. They did not say that what she said was false; they said “You can’t say that.” Wolff has spent many years in Muslim countries so knows the problems firsthand.

The European Union Declaration of Human Rights, she pointed out, says (or is interpreted as saying) that freedom of expression must be balanced against community harmony. Criticism of a religion is called racism.

4. Anders Gravers is the head of a Danish organization, Stop the Islamization of Europe. He talked about the salami method of making demands — a little at a time. When Muslims in Scandinavia were few, they demanded little. As their numbers grew they demanded more, and each time a demand was fulfilled, which they always were, they demanded more and more. Their goal is to become dominant, and they show this in their behavior. There are gangs of Muslim young men who intimidate people on the streets and commit rape and other crimes of violence. The crime rate has risen sharply. Jews are beaten up; many have left Europe.  There is a need to push back, such as holding demonstrations against the building of mosques, which have been successful in several instances.

5. Simon Deng is a Sudanese Christian who spent several years as a slave of Muslims and is now an activist for human rights in Sudan. He calls himself the voice of those who have no voice under Islamic law. He spoke eloquently of his love of freedom and his appreciation of the United States.

6. Lt. Col. Allen West is a retired war hero who is running for Congress in Florida. Introducing him, Pamela said we need to elect the right politicians, and we need to ask candidates if they understand jihad.  West was a riveting speaker who got many standing ovations. He said people look to the conservative leadership to protect them. If they don’t, people will turn away.

He is sick of people using the term “war on terror.” We didn’t talk about the “war on kamikaze pilots” in WWII; we don’t fight against a tactic. We are not fighting with a strategic perspective. The drone attacks are not strategically sound. We are at war with an ideology and we need to understand it and their methods. Not every Muslim participates, but it is a Muslim ideology.

Bin Laden sent a letter to the United States in the 1990s telling us to convert, submit, or we’ll come and get you. Ahmadinejad recently sent a similar letter. These letters constitute a declaration of war but we have not recognized this.

Our soldiers are operating under restrictive rules of engagement. We need to develop strategic-level rules of engagement. An enemy tactic is to use our legal system to get us to shut up, and we have not developed a way to fight back, or even recognized what they are doing. Through our political correctness and multiculturalism we are paralyzing ourselves. (Speaker after speaker made this central point.)

The media need to stop using the word “profiling.” It is actually identifying the enemy.

We need to get the right kind of leadership here and in Europe. “When tolerance becomes a one-way street, it becomes cultural suicide.”

Amen, Lt. Col. West. Let’s hope he wins his election and inspires other politicians to speak out.

Rep Gutierrez to introduce Amnesty bill Tuesday

The Federation for Immigration Reform is alerting its supporters that Amnesty is back!  Rep. Gutierrez  plans to introduce his bill, so-called Comprehensive Immigration Reform, on Tuesday, December 15th, according to the Dan Stein Report, here.

“On Tuesday, December 15, Congressman Luis V. Gutierrez (D-IL) will introduce new legislation, the Comprehensive Immigration Reform for America’s Security and Prosperity Act of 2009 (CIR ASAP), to the U.S. House of Representatives,” notes a press release today. “The time for waiting is over. This bill will be presented before Congress recesses for the holidays so that there is no excuse for inaction in the New Year,” Gutierrez said in the release.

Be sure to follow the link back to the press release and see who the co-sponsors are.  If you are looking for some action you can do now, contact your Congressman and tell him or her not to co-sponsor the bill.

Tea partiers and friends will be in Washington Tuesday for another demonstration on health care reform, Gutierrez bill introduction tells us we will have many more reasons to be riding the bus to DC in coming months.  Code red rally, here (wearing red and seeing red)!

Comment worth noting: ‘Mad in Maine’ wants to know what she can do

In response to my post this morning about another immigrant food stamp scam, this one in Utica, NY, here.    Frustrated ‘Mad in Maine,’ a lady we met a few days ago (here), is asking what she can do.

Back again and getting Madder in Maine.

We’ll pay for public defenders and use tax dollars to keep them in jail/prison. Our tax dollars are probably the money they’re going to use to bail out as well. I say send them home. If they can’t follow the rules here, they shouldn’t be here. I have to follow the rules.

This is another thing that’s really grating my cheese today. I have to budget $100 for our weekly shopping trip that will include groceries for the next week (and hopefully a few things I can put in the freezer for upcoming meals), toiletries, paper products (toilet paper, as I refuse to use leaves even in Maine) and cleaning and maintenance products. I’ve heard of some refugees (of all nationalities) using food stamps to buy grocery items that they then turn over to the resturants and shops their families/friends/neighbors own, to ultimately sell back to us!!

Mortgage payment due, car insurance due, electric bill due…I still haven’t turned the furnace on though.
And I’m about to lose another part on my old car…hopefully it will hold out until next payday.

I guess I have a really big question: Is there anything I can do to help put a stop to all of this?

Mad in Maine

First, I don’t think any one person can stop all this, look at ACORN for example, people have been investigating the fraud there for years and finally it took one daring effort by a couple of brave young people to finally push the whole issue into the mainstream.  Few of us are going to become James O’keefes or Hannah Giles, but we can do our  little bit within the framework of our lives.   My first admonition to ‘Mad’ and everyone else, is to find your role and focus like a laser on it.   I don’t know you, ‘Mad in Maine’, or what sort of person you are or how much time you have so these suggestions are for you and all of our other angry and frustrated readers to think about.

1) Write a blog.  Don’t just run your mouth with your opinions, but pick a topic and become an expert on the topic (you can still throw out your opinions!).  Research and provide a service to your readers.  Eventually, if you are patient, what you do will have an impact.  You could for instance write a blog about welfare/food stamp/home health care fraud in Maine, or the whole US.  Or, write a blog about immigration issues in Maine.  There is enough material out there for that for sure!  And, there are very few real investigative reporters anymore, so this is a sorely needed job.

Don’t be deterred by computer technology.  Blogs like this one are really simple and free.  Oh, and one more thing.  To fit blogging into your life, you can write posts as often as your schedule allows.

2)  Get involved in local and state politics.  Goodness knows you have a couple of US Senators in Maine who need their backbones stiffened from time to time.   I don’t know what city you live in, or are near, but you could get involved there too.

3)  Write letters to the editor.  I was at a meeting this past weekend and a few people told me they set google alerts for some topic (like illegal immigration) and then when they see an article, even in another state, they write a letter to the editor in response.

4)  Join a group that is fighting for the same things you are, and become involved enough to run a local chapter.  Maybe a local Tea Party, Beck’s 9/12 Project, Federation for American Immigration Reform, NumbersUSA and so forth.

5)  I know some people who have built e-mail lists and they send out articles daily to their lists on given topics.

6)  Here is a suggestion for the ‘skulker’ personality.  Pick a subject that you are personally passionate about.  I’m thinking more about local type issues.   Dig into documents, use the Freedom of Information Act or your states open government laws, attend meetings of groups you oppose or are promoting what you object to, and basically gather information to make a case someday to expose the whole corrupt business–whatever it is.

7)  If you are someone most comfortable in a circle of local people, get together with others who have the same concerns and jointly make a plan for what you can do.

Those are just a few ideas.  But, I need to emphasize again, don’t get frustrated if you can’t work at this every minute of the day. Don’t be a gadfly either.  Pick your project, focus and know that you are doing your little piece to save America.  I hope that helps!

New civil rights group to protect former Muslims will launch next week

Earlier today I told you about a new group making its debut in Washington next week called  Stop Islamization of America (SIOA), and now tonight I received a press release for another group concerned with the threat of Islamic activity in America.  This one, Former Muslims United, has formed to protect the rights of apostates and it too will hold a press conference in Washington next week.

WASHINGTON, DC (September 21, 2009) – Prominent former Muslims– apostates from Islam– will hold a press conference Thursday, September 24 to announce the launch of a new civil liberties organization, Former Muslims United, and the start of a national campaign to educate the American public and policymakers about the threat from authoritative Shariah– Islamic law– to the religious freedom and safety of former Muslims.

At the press conference, Former Muslims United founders Nonie Darwish and Ibn Warraq (both internationally-respected authors and scholars) will release letters calling on the Department of Justice and the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights to investigate possible hate crimes and civil rights violations against apostates from Islam, including the circumstances of the current Florida case of 17-year old Rifqa Bary, a former Muslim. The letters are also signed by Former Muslims United co-founders Mohammad Asghar, Wafa Sultan and Amil Imani.

Darwish and Warraq will release the text of Former Muslim United’s groundbreaking “Muslim Pledge for Religious Freedom and Safety from Harm for Former Muslims,” copies of which will be received in the offices of dozens of Muslim leaders across America by September 25, the 220th anniversary of Congress passing the Bill of Rights. They will also distribute a list of the names of this first group of Muslim leaders to be asked to sign the Muslim Pledge. Additional Muslim leaders will be sent the pledge in the next month as the national campaign gets underway. The names of all pledge recipients will be listed at Formermuslimsunited.org

President Obama, an apostate himself, might want to join this much-needed new group.

New group launched to educate about the Islamization of America

From New English Review:

WASHINGTON – Stop Islamization of America (SIOA) will hold an organizational launch and press conference with speakers and panel discussion on September 25th, to coincide with Islam on Capitol Hill Day and the 220th anniversary of the passage of the Bill of Rights.

[....]

SIOA’s mission is to educate the American people about the political doctrine of Islam, its history, Sharia (Islamic Law), and Jihad. SIOA believes that Sharia Law is incompatible with our Constitution and Bill of Rights.

So what’s this Islam on Capital Hill Day?  Pamela Geller at Atlas Shrugs has the inside story, here.

We were there — among hundreds of thousands in Washington

I got home a short time ago from the 912 March in Washington. Ann and I went, along with my daughter, on a bus from Hagerstown. Eight buses went from the Hagerstown area, and that’s a little sample of what was happening from all over the country.

You’ll hear widely varying estimates of the number of people there. I’ve been on a lot of demonstrations in Washington (because I used to be a leftist), starting with a civil rights march in 1958 and continuing with other civil rights demonstrations, and then peace marches (until I came to my senses in 1967).  I could hardly believe how large today’s march was. The original meeting place, Freedom Plaza at 14th and Pennsylvania, filled up so fast that the march to the Capitol had to start much earlier than planned to make room. Pennsylvania Avenue was packed, and it took hours to get all the people into the Capitol area. No, that’s wrong, because not everybody fit into those huge grounds in front of the Capitol and there were always people on the Mall and on the sidewalks blocks away.

I was at the famous 1963 civil rights march, where Martin Luther King gave his “I have a dream” speech. That was estimated to be 200,000 to 300,000 people. In my opinion this one was bigger. I don’t think there were a million people, as some have claimed, but there were at least 350,000 and possibly many more. That is huge.

It was also the politest demonstration I’ve ever been to. Nobody was angry. I mean, they were angry at the government, but nobody seemed to have the kind of chip-on-the-shoulder anger that so many leftists have. It was good-humored. Also — and this was astounding — there was no trash on the ground. None. Unlike the Obama inauguration, unlike Woodstock, unlike even an ordinary crowd standing around, this event was as clean at the end as at the start.

Maybe that’s because there were no journalists strewing trash, or almost none. There was a Fox truck and a CNN truck and that’s all the TV we saw. When Ann and I went to a counterdemonstration to an ANSWER peace march in 2007, the streets were lined with trucks from every media outlet we’d ever heard of, and some we hadn’t. We were interviewed by Australian and German reporters. And that was a march of about 5,000 on ANSWER’s side and about 15,000 on ours. I know some people were interviewed today because I read some reports, but there was nothing like the coverage that peace marches routinely get.

I’ve just heard a few reports that lead me to believe some reporters accidentally went to Mars instead of the Capitol. One said there were Confederate flags in evidence, and Ku Klux Klan type signs. We spent a lot of time walking around looking at people and their signs, and we commented that there were no confederate flags. And I don’t even know what is meant by Ku Klux Klan type signs. Maybe the one that said “I’m not a racist — I hate Pelosi and Reid too.”

That was typical of the signs — original, and often funny. There were no mass-produced signs, and not more than a few of any one type. Here are some we saw:

      Spread my work ethic, not my paycheck.

     Chicago gangsters go home.

     Give me liberty, not debt.

     Thank God for Glenn Beck.

     Right wing extremist: Jefferson, Adams, Madison, me.

     Capitalism delivers what socialism can only promise.

     Read the bills or get off the Hill.

     Constitution: read, learn, live it.

Lots of signs about czars — 44 czars; Czar wars; Czars czuk; You’ll be czarry; and more.

Lots of signs about ACORN — ACORN: bringing brothels to your community; Congress investigate ACORN; shut ACORN down–cancer on our republic; and more.

I kept calling my husband at home to see what the media were saying. He didn’t go because he doesn’t walk well. He’s a bit crippled from his 5-1/2 years as a guest of the North Vietnamese government during the Vietnam war. But he also didn’t go because he was so moved by the idea of all these Americans coming together to oppose socialism and big government that he was afraid he would cry. He was thrilled to hear the reports from Fox during the afternoon.

Now I’m going to look for more reports. I hope some of them are true.

Addendum, 9/14:  After looking at aerial photos I have to update my estimate. I think there were a million people there, maybe more.  It is harder to estimate this than the usual demonstrations on the Mall. The Mall is a plain rectangle and you can just photograph from above and count, or count a small area and multiply. The west side of the Capitol has a lot of trees and you can’t see what’s under them unless you’re on the ground. The area is far from rectangular and is not continuous. And the crowd was spread far and wide beyond the west lawn.

Note from Ann:  On Judy’s point about how clean the Tea Party demonstrators left Washington, see Gateway Pundit’s photo essay on clean conservatives vs. filthy liberals here.

CAST: Taking a stand against the spread of Shariah law

Update August 14th:  Protests continue, here.

Amid all the very large and angry demonstrations occurring over the last week and planned for the coming weeks on Obamacare, a small cheerful band of patriots stood outside the JBS Swift meatpacking plant  in Greeley, CO on Saturday to declare that Shariah law was not going to get a foothold in America.   Coloradans against Shariah Task Force (CAST) maintain, as do we, that when meatpacking companies and other employers give in to religious demands by Muslim employees for special workplace accommodation that is the beginning of the Stealth Jihad.  See my first report about CAST here.

This protest in Greeley (the birthplace of Al-Qaeda) in advance of Ramadan, the Muslim holiday which surely portends another contentious month in meatpacking towns across the country, is believed to be the first time that citizens have stood up to tell the public of the dangers they see with employers caving to Muslim (Somalis mostly in this case) demands.  By elevating Islamic requirements to the highest concern in workplace functioning, these demands are detrimental to other ethnic and religious workers in the plant.

Although the Greeley Tribune interviewed CAST leader Michael Gale, little mention was made of the real purpose of the demonstration.  See the Greeley Tribune coverage here (very strange, I know the paper had more the other day, I saw it!).   Read Jerry Gordon’s reports here and here.

Here is my recent post about Greeley and the Somalis filing Civil Rights complaints against Swift.

To catch up on this contentious issue, visit our entire category on the Greeley/Grand Island Swift controversy going back to last year here.