Debate: On what legal grounds could the Ground Zero mosque be rejected?
Bookworm on Aug 04 2010 at 3:13 pm | Filed under: Jihad
In a comment to an earlier post, a reader raised a good issue: Let’s accept as absolutely true that the proposed Ground Zero mosque is emotionally offensive, and that, for Islamists, a mosque at the site of a battleground is the sign of conquest. Do those two factors justify refusing the mosque on legal grounds, whether those legalities arise from municipal codes, state legislation, federal legislation, or the Constitution?
Debate, please. I ask only that the debate be polite, since this is a heated issue. As an aid to the discussion, I offer both John Hawkins’ list of quotations making the case against the mosque and Dorothy Rabinowitz’s WSJ article.
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9 Responses to “Debate: On what legal grounds could the Ground Zero mosque be rejected?”
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Debate??? What’s to debate? Absolutely any legal means that might work should be attempted. What possible rationale would prevent someone from trying to stop the mosque from being build other than lack of funds?
Hey…I’d even be willing to organize a herd of swine to run in and out of the present building, or in and out of whatever they build.
Guess my question is who’s going to actually do the work on the building? Think they have enough muslims in NYC who can handle all the construction?
Greetings:
Well, now that you ask, actually no. As a private property aficionado, I’m of a mind that most zoning and, even worse, historical preservation rulings are a “taking” by government of a property’s value to the owner. While zoning laws have positive aspects, they are, at best, a slippery slope. Even more so, the historical preservation laws which I see as kind of an Endangered Species Act for Buildings.
But, that being keystroked, the problem isn’t the mosque or its location. The problem is the Islam. Muslims have been doing things like this for 13 centuries. They are well practiced at it. While trying to resist the mosque is in a sense admirable, it takes the focus off Islam and Mohammed and his 9-year-old trophy wife Aisha. The muslims are getting their jollies watching the idiot infidels banging their heads against the Islamic wall. They have put the infidel, once again, into a no-win situation. If the mosque is stopped, Americans have suspended their American values. If the mosque goes forward, the muslims have put their supremacist Islamic thumb in America’s eye. If the muslims walk away from the deal they are magnanimous benefactors to their fellow citizens.
It’s the Islam, stupidos. It always has been and always will be.
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Have they bought the property already? Is it a done deal? If so, then they get to proceed, I suppose.
If they haven’t, then find a way to award the property to someone else. Then let this mosque-building group sue. Drag it out in court forever. You don’t need an airtight case. Just throw up every roadblock you can.
Especially after the dismal “Kelo” decision by the Supreme Court regarding the right of government to take property, the Federal, State or Local government(s) certainly have the power to step in and avoid this situation altogether by putting limits on what can versus what cannot be built within a certain distance from Ground Zero.
I would recommend specifically banning ALL houses of worship within that zone. As Sarah Palin is wont to point out, however, that takes cojones, which appear to be in very short supply.
The Left likes to say that government needs power to keep people safe, because centralized decision making is better than a rag tag vigilante mob.
However, the truth is that even with such power, the government does not use it to protect you, your loved ones, your property, or whatever rights the government deems you fit to have.
Even if the government was a benevolent dictatorship and used its power to protect, at best it would only break even. It would even about a few years into the reign of the next dictator, who would most likely be a mass murderer and megalomaniac even if the first dictator was strong and had the people’s best interests at work.
So at best, dictatorship breaks even. At worst, you have government using the power it ostensibly holds for protecting people, into turning them into slaves of foreign enemies like Islamic Arab states.
What legal grounds are there to stop the Ground Zero mosque? How about terrorist ties to the funding? This should be thoroughly investigated. Also, whether or not there are endangered species or wetlands involved, disturbed Native American gravesites, asbestos and lead at the site, EPA violations, etc. Whether or not the building will fulfill diversity requirements in hiring, contracting, etc. Go for it.
What moral reason is there for not building the mosque there? Because it is not “healing” anything, it is ripping up more wounds. If the mosque-builders are serious about their intentions, they would have realized and acknowledged this by now and withdrawn to build elsewhere. If they were really serious about interfaith peacemaking efforts, they would open up the project to Jewish, Christian, Buddhist, and other religious groups, planners, and programmers from the beginning. I think everyone recognizes this is not the case. We are calling their bluff.
Listen to Suek…..whatever legal means are available, just as we would with any other outrage of a sacred space.
And if you don’t understand what that means, then Charles Krauthammer explains:
http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/243668/sacrilege-ground-zero-charles-krauthammer
I second Earl’s link to Krauthammer’s article. It’s a beautifully written piece of work.