Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Terry Kemple: Wasting Hillsborough County Resources For Political Gain

So much time and tax payer money and  resources are being wasted because Terry Kemple and his supporters are filibustering the school board meetings with outrageously false statements that America’s largest Muslim Civil Rights organization is a “Terrorist Organization” “Funds Terrorism” “Flew Planes into the Buildings” and Islam “calls for death of infidels after the call to prayer” and wants to “over throw our constitution.”

Many other clearly false statements have been said at the school board meeting. A transcript is in the works to highlight such statements.

These statements are easily checked for their veracity and it is clear they are completely false. How long will we Kemple and his group to continue to waste tax payer resource. Hence I am requesting everyone to do some investigative reporting and question Kemple about all the false accusations he and his supporters have made against CAIR and Islam, and then in light of the evidence below show how they are clearly false and then bring up the point, why is he wasting so much taxpayer resources to use school board meetings to throw false accusations. Why are many media outlets silent and not calling Kemple and his supporters out for wasting time to spread clearly false allegations against America’s largest Muslim civil rights organizations. (Although quite a few have done an excellent job!)

The tactics taken by Kemple’s group are very clear. They consist of either outright lies and false statements, innuendo, or guilt by association (twice removed).

It doesn’t take a genius to realize if CAIR really was a terrorist organization, as was said verbatim at the school board meeting, we would be prosecuted. And yet Kemple is able to waste so much time and money spreading clearly erroneous lies.

CAIR is transparent and we have nothing to hide which is why I am asking for investigation into this.

No evidence is needed to prove we are not a terrorist organization. We would be shut down and prosecuted if we were. However, below are some points that address the misinformation spread.

 I hope the media can do an investigative story or fact check on this. It is just outrageous Terry Kemple and his group continue to waste so much time and take up the school board meetings to spew unchallenged hateful false information, without being called out for it.

Thanks
Hassan


Clearing Misconceptions:

Internet Disinformation #6: The labeling of the organization as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation (HLF) trial in Dallas, TX implies that CAIR was somehow involved with criminal activity and is facing indictment.

This issue was settled by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and the U.S. Department of Justice in CAIR’s favor.

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals found that the U.S. Department of Justice violated the Fifth Amendment rights of the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT), and by implication the rights of more than 300 similarly-named Muslim organizations and individuals, such as CAIR, when it included them on the publicly-filed un-indicted co-conspirator list in 2007. The court also ruled that inclusion on the list was the result of "simply an untested allegation of the Government....”

In 2011, Attorney General Eric Holder indicated that Department of Justice officials determined after “looking at the facts and the law, a prosecution would not be appropriate.” This conclusion was reached after two reviews conducted under both the Bush and Obama administrations.

After Holder, the chief law enforcement officer in America, stated this fact, internet rumor held that a prosecution had been suppressed due to political interference.

This allegation has also been put to rest.

James Jacks, the U.S. Attorney who led the prosecution of the Holy Land Foundation issued a statement that was partially re-produced in the Dallas Morning News: “‘The decision to indict or not indict a case is based upon an analysis of the evidence and the law,’ [Jacks] wrote. ‘That’s what happened in this case.’”

The Dallas Morning News (U.S. attorney in Dallas says Obama’s White House didn’t meddle in case, April 29, 2011) went on to report the following:

“Nathan Garrett, a former FBI agent who was also a prosecutor in the Holy Land case until he left for private practice in 2007, said ‘politics played no role’ in determining who was prosecuted when he was there.

“‘Decisions were hashed out in often tough and pressure-filled situations and conditions, but always—in my experience—grounded in evidence and law,’ he said. ‘The process was what the American people would want and expect it to be.’”

Finally, there is no legal implication to being labeled an unindicted co-conspirator, since it does not require the Justice Department to prove anything in a court of law. Merely claiming someone is guilty without due process is both unconstitutional and offensive to the principles of our justice system

Internet Disinformation #1: CAIR is “the Wahhabi lobby,” a “front-group for Hamas,” a "fund-raising arm for Hezbollah," or “...part of a wider conspiracy overseen by the Muslim Brotherhood...”
CAIR was born out of a desire on the part of its founders to “concentrate on combating anti-Muslim discrimination nationwide.” The organization’s advocacy model—work closely with media and provide direct services to local Muslim communities—was developed when Nihad Awad and Ibrahim Hooper worked as community activists.

In a March 14, 2007 New York Times article, Michael Rolince, a retired F.B.I. official who directed counterterrorism in the Washington field office from 2002 to 2005, said, “Of all the groups, there is probably more suspicion about CAIR, but when you ask people for cold hard facts, you get blank stares.”

The article also reported, “Government officials in Washington said they were not aware of any criminal investigation of the group. More than one described the standards used by critics to link CAIR to terrorism as akin to McCarthyism, essentially guilt by association.”

CAIR is not is “the Wahhabi lobby,” a “front-group for Hamas,” a “fund-raising arm for Hezbollah,” “...part of a wider conspiracy overseen by the Muslim Brotherhood...” or any of the other false and misleading associations our detractors seek to smear us with. That we stand accused of being both a “fundraising arm of Hezbollah” and the “Wahhabi lobby” is a significant point in demonstrating that our detractors are hurling slander not fact. Hezbollah and the Salafi (Wahhabi) movement represent diametrically opposed ideologies.

CAIR’s origin story is simple. In the February-March 2000 edition of “The Link,” a newsletter published by Americans for Middle East Understanding, Nihad Awad wrote the following, “The core challenge [to American Muslims], that of stereotyping and defamation, was having a devastating effect on our children and paralyzing adults from taking their due roles in civic affairs.” Based on a desire to address this issue on a national level, Awad, “contacted my friend Ibrahim Hooper, a professional journalist and communications genius, and tried to persuade him to move to Washington and join the project.”

With this premise in mind, CAIR was founded in 1994.

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