A New poll showing 61 percent of New Yorkers oppose the Ground Zero mosque illustrates the bitter battle taking shape around the project. The statewide survey finds “large majorities of all New Yorkers, every party, region and age give a thumbs-down” to the mega-mosque, the Siena Research Institute reports.
The findings are bad news for the sponsors, and also for Mayor Bloomberg and other government officials, including Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, who rushed to instantly support the $100 million project.
The mayor has been the most vocal, and his misguided vehemence — essentially arguing that opponents are anti-Muslim bigots — is a shocking error of judgment that is adding fuel to the fire.
The mayor is also off-base in seeing the issue as a constitutional test of separation of church and state. It might be if government was blocking the practice of Islam, but that is hardly the case.
Still, the mosque has a long way to go before it is built, and the mayor has an important role to play. Just not the one he’s chosen.
Instead of being a fierce advocate who plays Whack-a-Mole with dissenters, the mayor needs to shift gears and help calm the city. To do that, he must make himself and his office an honest broker, a middleman operating between the warring parties. He should start now, before the tensions spin out of control.
Bloomy could begin a kind of shuttle diplomacy by inviting both sides to Gracie Mansion separately for informal conversations. Once he has a better grasp of the issues and the personalities, he could bring the parties together to see if they can calmly resolve their differences.
Like chicken soup, hand-holding and a nudge for a solution can’t hurt. Many prominent New Yorkers more skilled in the art of diplomacy would surely be happy to help.
If he does settle on a middleground approach, I believe the mayor will find significant good will. Daisy Khan, the wife of the cleric behind the Islamic project, has said that “we want to repair the breach” of the 9/11 terror attacks and promised “interfaith collaboration” with the project.
“We’ve heard and felt their pain, and we’re extending ourselves,” she said. Her pledge invites the question of why they picked a spot so close to Ground Zero. On the other side, most opponents have concerns about just two areas.
The first is funding, which matters because some strains of Islam are especially intolerant. Wahhabism, for example, is a fundamentalist interpretation spreading from Saudi Arabia that aims to cleanse Islam of most modern and Western influence.
The second concern is far harder to finesse — location. The proximity to Ground Zero is causing suspicion that the aim is to signal religious triumph where the Twin Towers stood.
Even many of us who don’t share that degree of suspicion believe anything controversial so close to where nearly 3,000 people died is inappropriate. After all, Ground Zero is the final resting place of 1,100 people whose remains were not recovered.
Reflecting the possibility of conciliation, the Siena survey found that many opponents nonetheless like the idea of building bridges to Islam. They recognize a need for mutual tolerance between East and West.
That’s a good start for a conversation and a place for the mayor of New York to insert himself. But first, he’ll have to show more tolerance for opponents and stop lecturing them as if they are rednecks.
Of course, there is no guarantee that mayoral mediation would yield success. In fact, the odds are small unless the sponsors are willing to move to another site.
But the effort is worth making because the stakes are so big. The attacks of 9/11 caused more than enough suffering, and heading off this ugly reminder clearly is in the city’s best interests.
The mayor is the key. It’s time he became part of the solution.
Zero gold stars for ‘Sheriff Joe’
Somebody is messing with Joe. Actually, many somebodies are messing with Joe.
The Joe is Biden, the vice president, the man his boss called “Sheriff Joe” when he put him in charge of making sure the stimulus money was well spent.
“Nobody messes with Joe,” President Obama said in a speech before Congress, where he promised government officials would be held “accountable for each and every dollar” they spend.
Biden clowned around at the affair 17 months ago, but three busts later, nobody is laughing.
Bust No. 1: Obama sold the stimulus as the only way to keep unemployment from hitting 8 percent. At 9.5 percent and holding, we know how that worked out.
Bust No. 2: Obama sold the initial price tag at $787 billion, but a closer look after it was passed put it at $862 billion, proving the government is equally good at forecasting and counting.
Bust No. 3: Sheriff Joe has been a Keystone Kop at policing waste, unable to find a single instance since he got his badge.
Perhaps the sense that nobody is watching explains why bureaucrats are so brazen in flushing taxpayer cash down the toilet, according to a new list of 100 wasteful stimulus projects.
Compiled by Republican Sens. John McCain and Tom Coburn, the list shows officials spent $500,000 for new windows at a closed tourist center in Washington state, $6.9 million for repairs to an 1846 brick fort in the Florida Keys, accessible only by private plane or a four-hour boat ride, $2 million for California researchers to study ants in the Indian Ocean, and $762,000 for “interactive choreography programs” at the University of North Carolina.
My personal favorite is the $89,000 sidewalk in Oklahoma that is said to be near no homes or businesses and leads into a ditch.
All this evidence dumped in his lap and yet no peep of protest is heard from Sheriff Joe. His boss is also dismissive, with aWhite House spokesman calling the list of waste just “politics.”
Indeed it is. It’s also money, taxpayer money, and Biden is supposed to watch it.
Michelle slips us the $panish fly
First Lady Michelle Obama is developing a champagne taste on the public dime, with her “private” trip to the coast of Spain with a daughter and friends hitting taxpayers for $148,000 in Air Force Two costs alone. Some critics are calling her Marie Antoinette and Lady Obama for her royal tastes, but that’s progress. She used to be called Lady Macbeth.
O’s a real downer
Last week marked another milestone in Obama’s falling popularity. For the first time, a majority of Americans disapprove of the president’s job performance. Friday’s average of recent polls found him with a 50.1 percent disapproval and only 45 percent approval, according to RealClearPolitics.com. In your heart, you know it’s George Bush’s fault.
Live from DC, it’s your gov’t
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell scolded Al Franken, the comedianturned-Democratic senator, for rolling his eyes and making other gestures while McConnell was speaking on the Senate floor. “This isn’t ‘Saturday Night Live,’ ”McConnell reportedly said.
Right he is. “SNL” is comedy. The Senate is farce.