GOP House Candidate Pantano Claims Rauf, Iran Behind Gaza Flotilla
Posted in Main Blog (All Posts) on September 13th, 2010 4:39 am by HL
GOP House Candidate Pantano Claims Rauf, Iran Behind Gaza Flotilla
Speaking yesterday at Stop Islamization of America’s rally at Ground Zero against the Park 51 Islamic cultural center, North Carolina GOP congressional candidate Ilario Pantano attempted to turn the event into an anti-Iran rally. Pantano also spun a bizarre conspiracy theory in which Imam Abdul Feisal Rauf, the leader of the Park 51 group, was in league with Iran to support the Gaza flotilla in late May that resulted in the killing of nine Turks — including one Turkish American — by Israeli commandos.
“Let’s take a moment to take a look at the person that wants to bring it [the Islamic center] here,” Pantano said, referring to Rauf. “Does anyone find it interesting that he’s also involved in the Free Gaza flotilla movement that had a made-for-TV action with Israel just as all of this was developing?”
PANTANO: But there was something else that happened. Because, and I want to stretch your imagination for a second, but every time Iran is about to face a nuclear sanction, from the EU or the UN, what happens? Something flares up with Israel! I wonder how that happens? I wonder in 2006 when Iran was about to face nuclear sanctions for their nuclear weapons program — yes folks, we want to give radical extremists nuclear weapons, it’s unconscionable to me — but remember back to 2006, a fight in Lebanon with the Israelis. Who provoked that? Iran! Iran! Think back to 2008, again, Iran about to face sanctions, who provoked attacks from Gaza, missile attacks on Israel? Iran. And radical Islam. That’s exactly right.
Ladies and gentlemen, in 2010 as Iran faced its toughest round of sanctions, we have the made-for-TV episode, with Israel rightfully trying to protect itself by maintaining a blockade to make sure murderous rockets don’t kill its innocent citizens, where did that come from? Imam Rauf is a member of the organization that has been behind all of that. We know that Iran has been complicit in all of that. I want to know where the money for this mosque is coming from!
Watch it:
Pantano’s rant was neatly emblematic of the entire event, stirring together half-truths with outright falsehoods into a stew of anti-Muslim paranoia. His claim that Imam Rauf is a member of the organization behind the Free Gaza movement is probably a reference to the Malaysian-based Perdana Global Peace Organization, a major donor to the flotilla campaign. Like much of the misinformation floating around about the Park 51 project, this claim originated with the New York Post. But a Cordoba Initiative FAQ page notes that Imam Rauf “has never been a member of this group,” explaining that “several years ago, Imam Feisal was invited to Malaysia, the most moderate Islamic country in the world, to participate in a Peace Conference sponsored by the Perdana Peace Group. He was one of the hundreds of speakers present.”
The idea that Iran was “complicit,” along with Rauf, in the Gaza flotilla is a strange new element, one that hasn’t been claimed elsewhere, let alone proven. And while it’s clear that Iran maintains supportive relationships with Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza, it’s simply false to present the aims and actions of the groups as identical to those of Iran, or to suggest that they have anything to do with Imam Rauf. Unless, of course, your purpose is to gin up paranoia and hatred against an Islamic cultural center in lower Manhattan.
John Fund Attacks Public Workers By Claiming ?Very Few Teachers Have Been Laid Off?
One of the right’s newest crusades has been to claim that public employees are overpaid and have too much job security. As Jonathan Cohn writes, it is almost as if “public employees are the new welfare queens.”
The Wall Street Journal’s John Fund was the latest to push this crusade this morning on Fox & Friends. During a discussion about public employees’ pay and the New Jersey budget, Fund complained that public employees have “far more job security than private employees” and that their “benefits and pay packages are bigger than the average private sector salary.” He even went as far as to say that “public servants are in danger of becoming the public masters.” As evidence, he told the Fox host that “very few teachers have been laid off in New Jersey or elsewhere”:
FUND: The public employees basically have job security. Very few teachers have been laid off in New Jersey or elsewhere. We used to have a bargain, the public employees have job security but they didn’t quite get the kind of salary that private employees did. Now, they not only have far more job security than private employees but their benefits and pay packages are bigger than the average private sector salary. The public servants are in danger of becoming the public masters.
Watch it:
While the phrase “very few” is relative and it’s hard to know how many teachers would have to be laid off to qualify for being more than “very few” in Fund’s mind, it would be difficult to imagine that the thousands of teachers that have been laid off during the recession across the country as states face budget constraints would agree with his assessment. Here’s a short but not comprehensive list of some of the layoffs teachers have faced just in the past few months:
– As many as 8,000 teachers are expected to be laid off in Georgia over the coming school year. Budget constraints in the state are expected to force more than 30,000 public employees to lose their jobs over the next year. Federal assistance legislated last month may help blunt the layoffs. [7/18/10]
– Two weeks before school started in Kansas City, 175 teachers were notified that they would be laid off. The budget woes the state is facing also forced the closing of 24 schools in that same district alone. [8/12/10]
– 66 teachers were laid off for the coming school year in the Glendale Unified district in Glendale, California. “I don’t know what we’re going to do,” said the district’s Chief Financial Officer, fearing further layoffs in the future due to the recession. [6/23/10]
– Last spring, Cleveland was forced to lay off 545 teachers, unable to get the funding to keep them on. The layoffs also included a total of 800 public employees. [4/22/10]
– 19 teachers just found out they will be laid off in the small town of Methuen, Massachussetts. Administrators say stimulus funds helped keep them on until now. [8/24/10]
– Hundreds of Miami-Dade teachers were laid off over the summer. The district hopes that federal legislation will allow it to rehire at least some of them. [8/11/10]
While important federal legislation has kept many teachers from being laid off and may help rehire many of those who were let go, it is clear that teachers — and the children and communities that depend on them — have suffered greatly during the recession. With thousands of teachers having been laid off across the country, it is difficult to argue that “very few” have been faced with losing their jobs.
It is also worth noting that there is little merit to the notion that public workers are wildly overpaid versus their private sector counterparts. As a study by the National Institute for Retirement Security shows, once you factor in comparable education, “employees of state & local government earn an average of 11% and 12% less, respectively, than comparable private sector employees.”
