Friday, August 21, 2009

ACT! for America People Power strikes again!








homelearnactlocal chaptersContact Congress









ACT! for America
People Power Strikes Again!
(And Again, and Again…)
By Guy
Rodgers, Executive Director



Not long after Brigitte Gabriel launched ACT! for America, Los Angeles shelved
a plan to “map” the metropolitan area so as to better identify the
hotspots for likely terrorists and terrorist activity. Why?


Because the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), in
league with the ACLU, organized a demonstration to protest the plan – and
there was no opposing voice from the grassroots.

Those days are gone.

For instance, the Washington Post article below about a proposed Obama
administration plan to house some of the Guantanamo detainees in Michigan
included this sentence:







But
state Sen. Jim Barcia (D), a former five-term congressman, said that
the vocal town hall attendees,
many
recruited from other parts of the state by the group Act! For
America,
were wrong in insinuating that the federal
government would force Guantanamo detainees on them. He said the
idea of transferring detainees to Michigan was first floated by
Michigan legislators seeking investment.


We don’t necessarily agree with Barcia’s
assertion that the federal government won’t force the detainees on
Michigan.
But the real point here
is that ACT! for America has reached a point where we can organize locally
in most areas of the country, when necessary, to make our voice heard on
issues like this one.









  • We did it this
    week in Florida
    ,
    when ACT! for America members sent
    hundreds of emails and phone calls to the Governor’s office and
    the office of the Department of Children and Families, on behalf
    of Rifqa Bary.


  • We did it last
    week in San
    Diego
    , when CAIR-San Diego attempted to shut
    down a local ACT! for America educational event at the public
    library. Not only was CAIR unsuccessful, the publicity surrounding
    the issue helped increase attendance at the event to over 200
    people.


  • We did it last
    month in northern Virginia
    , when ACT! for America helped
    turn out hundreds of people to protest an expansion of the Islamic
    Saudi Academy, a madrassas that for years has been using
    hate-filled and Islamist extremist textbooks.

Everywhere Brigitte and I travel we tell anyone
who will listen that patriotic Americans now have a voice and a vehicle to
resist the threat of radical Islam, in whatever form that threat takes.
The vision Brigitte had when I met her over two years ago has become a
reality!

We tell them:
“Look at what’s happening when we have 62,000 members and 300 chapters.
Imagine the people power we’ll have when ACT! for America has 250,000
members, then 500,000, then 1,000,000; and 500, 800, even 1,000
chapters!”


This is why you hear us say, over and over
again, that the way to defeat the threat of radical Islam is “organized
resistance,” and that the bigger the organized resistance, the more
victories we will win. And that we need your help to do this.


Please email this alert to your friends with a message asking them
to log on to
www.actforamerica.org
and sign up for our emails at the upper right of the home page. If just
10% of our members did so, and signed up one new person, we would add
6,200 members in one day.

Help us grow our people power by ACTing
today!








http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/20/AR2009082004226.html?hpid=topnews

Washington Post


Detainee Plan Draws Fear, Opposition

Residents Decry Idea of Guantanamo Prisoners at Mich. Facility


By Kari Lydersen

Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, August 21, 2009


STANDISH, Mich., Aug. 20 -- More than 200 people gathered here
Thursday to voice their concern that the federal government could transfer
detainees from a facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to the local prison,
conjuring up images of terrorists holding busloads of schoolchildren
hostage, firing shots in the church and poisoning the water supply.


The meeting was dominated by
opposition
to the possibility, which surfaced two weeks ago,
that the Obama administration would move some prisoners to facilities
within U.S. borders, including Standish and Fort Leavenworth, Kan.


The town hall meeting was organized by local tavern owner Dave
Munson, who traveled to Washington in June to ask legislators about the
possibility of moving Guantanamo detainees to Standish's maximum-security
prison. That prison is scheduled to close in October if prisoners are not
brought in from the federal system or another state.

At the time,
Munson said he saw the idea as an economic lifeline for the town and the
prison, which provides more than 300 jobs. Then he met U.S.
Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.) at a cocktail party and quickly changed
his mind.

"He told me things that really scared the heck out of
me," Munson said. "He told me about soft targets and safe zones, that if
they came to this country they would have rights, visitors and friends
would come who could be jihadists."

Hoekstra, ranking Republican
on the House Intelligence Committee, told those in the crowd that they
have much to fear if the detainees are transferred to Standish, a town of
1,500 about 150 miles north of Detroit.

But state Sen. Jim Barcia
(D), a former five-term congressman, said that the vocal town hall
attendees,
many recruited from other parts of
the state by the group Act! For America
, were wrong in
insinuating that the federal government would force Guantanamo detainees
on them. He said the idea of transferring detainees to Michigan was first
floated by Michigan legislators seeking investment.

And Barcia
said federal officials who toured the prison Aug. 13 indicated they would
not send detainees to Standish in the face of intense local opposition. He
said legislators and locals who are open to the idea skipped the town hall
because "they probably thought they'd be subject to the same behavior
we've seen at many town hall meetings about health-care reform."


Barcia, who said he had not taken a position on bringing detainees
to Michigan, was among state senators who passed a resolution Wednesday
demanding that the federal government share information with state
legislators and Gov. Jennifer M. Granholm (D) on detainees and their
possible transfer.

Also Wednesday, Hoekstra refused to sign
routine funding requests until the Pentagon releases more information
about plans for transferring detainees. In a letter to Defense Secretary
Robert M. Gates, Hoekstra complained that the department was sharing
information with Democratic legislators but ignoring his requests.


"Apparently, the Department is providing information only to
Members of Congress who it believes are likely to agree with the
Administration's policy on this matter," he wrote.

Hoekstra, a
co-sponsor of the Keep Terrorists Out of America Act, which opposes the
transfer or release in the United States of Guantanamo Bay detainees, was
joined at the town hall by Debra Burlingame, co-founder of 9/11 Families
for a Safe & Strong America.

"These detainees aren't like
ordinary criminals. Those hardened criminals [in the Standish prison] do
not have global jihadi networks," said Burlingame, whose brother was a
pilot on the flight that crashed into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001. She
predicted that detainees would assault and throw bodily fluids at guards,
plan attacks on tourists and attract suicide bombers to local gatherings.


Panelist David Littman, senior economist with the free-market
think tank Mackinac Center for Public Policy, referred to the detainees as
"rubbish." He said that Michigan should import trash from Canada for
payment, a long-standing controversial proposal, "yet we have government
officials wanting us to take in human trash instead."

Many in the
crowd blasted Granholm for not opposing the idea of Guantanamo detainees
more vehemently. Standish prison guard Dave Horn, 29, wore a homemade
shirt depicting Granholm's face with a slash through it and had painted
"No More Granholm" and "No Gitmo" on the windows of his pickup truck.


"The governor has concerns that have not been addressed, and until
those concerns are addressed, she is not in favor of relocating Guantanamo
detainees to Michigan," spokeswoman Megan Brown said.

Hoekstra is
running for governor. Another Republican gubernatorial candidate, Oakland
County Sheriff Mike Bouchard, visited Standish on Wednesday to speak out
against Guantanamo detainees.

Michigan Department of Corrections
spokesman Russ Marlan, who was not at Thursday's town hall, said the
federal government had not made a formal proposal. The corrections
department had hoped to contract with California to house their prisoners,
but California officials notified Michigan this week that such a plan
would be too expensive.

Marlan said the department is in
preliminary discussions on bringing Pennsylvania prisoners or
non-Guantanamo federal prisoners to Standish. Several people at the town
hall meeting said they were concerned about Standish's proximity to
Dearborn, a Detroit suburb that is home to a large Middle Eastern
community.

"If we put them in the middle of Iowa, they would stand
out if they got loose," said Jeff McQueen, who said that he is a direct
descendant of American Revolution fighters and that as a Christian, he
considers Muslims "my cousins."

"Here, they could go to Dearborn
and disappear," McQueen said.
















ACT for
America

P.O. Box 12765
Pensacola, FL 32591

www.actforamerica.org




ACT for America is an issues advocacy organization
dedicated to effectively organizing and mobilizing the most powerful
grassroots citizen action network in America, a grassroots network
committed to informed and coordinated civic action that will lead to
public policies that promote America’s national security and the defense
of American democratic values against the assault of radical Islam.
We are only as strong
as our supporters, and your volunteer and financial support is essential
to our success. Thank you for helping us make America safer and more
secure.








HOW CAN I TELL OTHERS ABOUT YOUR ORGANIZATION?
Send a personalized version of this message to your friends.






HOW CAN I SUPPORT YOUR ORGANIZATION?
Click here to give an online donation.

No comments:

Post a Comment