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Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Mary Bomar's fraudulent investigation

In April 2006, Park Service Director Mary Bomar ordered an internal investigation into claims that the planned Flight 93 Memorial is actually a terrorist memorial mosque, built abound a giant Mecca-oriented crescent. Bomar's investigation was a total fraud, concluding, for instance, that it isn't possible to calculate the orientation of the crescent because the site-plan has not been geo-referenced. (Page 2, PP2 of September 2006 summary report. Page 1 here.)

In fact, the original Crescent of Embrace site-plan was drawn on a topo map that the Memorial Project provided to all participants in the design competition. A topo map is the epitome of a geo-referenced map. North marked on a topo map is true north, which is the only piece of information needed to calculate the orientation of the crescent. Just connect the tips of the crescent, form the perpendicular bisector, and calculate how many degrees it points from north (53.4).

Also known are the crash-site coordinates, which is all that is needed to calculate the direction to Mecca (55.2° clockwise from north). All of this is trivially easy to verify. Just use the Mecca-direction calculator at Islam.com to get a graphic of the direction to Mecca from the crash site and place it over the crescent site plan:

Giant crescent pointst to Mecca
Somerset PA is ten miles from the crash-site. The "qibla" is the direction to Mecca. Red lines show the orientation of the crescent. The crescent points 1.8° north of Mecca. (Click for larger image.)


A request for oversight

Because it is the director's office that has been covering up the Mecca-orientation of the crescent, oversight can only come from Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne himself. Several people sent letters to Secretary Kempthorne two weeks ago, showing how the giant Mecca-oriented crescent remains completely intact in the so called redesign. But Mr. Kempthorne also needs to know that he is getting bad information from his subordinates in the Park Service. Thus a request for all readers of this post: if you have a minute, please copy and paste this entire post into an email for Secretary Kempthorne.

We don't need for the secretary to understand all the terrorist memorializing features in the design, or the numerous proofs of intent that architect Paul Murdoch included so that his accomplishment will be undeniable once it is a fait accompli. It is enough that he be concerned about features that can be readily interpreted as terrorist memorializing, whether they are intended or not. As Congressman Tancredo put it: we need "a new design that will not make the memorial a flashpoint for this kind of controversy and criticism."

But even getting to the most basic facts about what is in the present design requires getting past Mary Bomar’s fraudulent report, which tries to pretend that there is nothing that can even be interpreted as untoward.


Mary Bomar's intellectually dishonest "experts"

In addition to claiming that topo maps are not geo referenced, Mary Bomar's internal investigation cites a small number of academic experts, all of whom spout nothing but the most absurd non sequiturs. One is Dr. Daniel Griffith, professor of "geo-spatial information" at the University of Texas. About Alec Rawls' analysis of the Mecca orientation of the giant crescent, Dr. Griffith writes:
... Mr. Rawls’s arithmetic calculations appear to be correct ... [but] ... just because calculations are correct does not make the resulting numbers meaningful.
Dr. Griffith’s point, it seems, is that the mere fact of Mecca orientation does not imply intent. Who said it did? The way Murdoch proves intent is by repeating his Mecca orientations (scroll down to the last section here). But intent is not the only thing that matters. Even without terrorist memorializing intent, it is inappropriate to plant a giant Mecca oriented crescent on the crash site.


Bomar expert #2

Dr. Kevin Jaques, specialist in Islamic sharia law from the University of Indiana, acknowledges that the Mecca-oriented crescent is similar to the mihrab around which every mosque is built, but says:
...just because something is ‘similar to’ something else does not make it the 'same'.
Yes, well, similar--very, very similar--is exactly the problem.

Like Daniel Griffith, Mr. Jaques is trying to make hay of the fact that Mecca orientation does not by itself imply intent. So what? Intentional or not, it is unacceptable for the central feature of the Flight 93 memorial to be a geometric match for the central feature of a mosque. Jaques is pretending that the questions he raises about intent somehow make the facts irrelevant.

Professor Jaques also dismisses the likeness between the Mecca-oriented crescent and a traditional Islamic mihrab by noting that lots of religious structures have prayer-direction indicators, not just mosques:
The biggest hole in [Rawls’] argument is that all of the elements he points to are common architectural features that one would find in a church or synagogue. The mihrab originated in pre-Islamic buildings and can be found in temples, churches, and synagogues around the Mediterranean.
This is logic? Because Christian churches are often oriented to the east, that somehow makes it okay to build the Flight 93 memorial around a half-mile wide Mecca oriented crescent? If this is “the biggest hole in [Rawls’] argument,” then there are no holes in Rawls’ argument.


Project spokesmen know the truth, and are lying about it

Memorial Project spokesmen have followed the lead of these academic frauds, using doubts about intent as a pretext for denying the facts. Asked about Rawls’ Mecca orientation claim, Patrick White, vice president of Families of Flight 93, denied it:
Rawls’ claims are untrue and “preposterous,” according to Patrick White, Families of Flight 93 vice president. “We went through in detail all his original claims and came away with nothing.”
In fact, Patrick White is fully aware of the Mecca orientation of the giant crescent. At the Memorial Project's public meeting in July he argued that the almost-exact Mecca orientation of the giant crescent cannot be intended as a tribute to Islam because the inexactness of it would be "disrespectful to Islam."

Joanne Hanley has done the same:
"Alec Rawls bases all of his conclusions on faulty assumptions," said Joanne Hanley, the superintendent of the Flight 93 National Memorial. "In addition, the facts are twisted and people are misquoted, all to serve his intended purpose."
But she too has admitted the Mecca-orientation of the giant crescent, telling Mr. Rawls in a 2006 conference call that she wasn't concerned about the almost-exact Mecca orientation of the crescent because: "It isn't exact. That's one we talked about. It has to be exact." (Crescent of Betrayal, download 3, page 145.)

These are your subordinates Mr. Kempthorne. Please do not let them get away with this fraud. Congressman Tancredo is demanding answers from Director Bomar and many of us are hoping that you will do the same. There is not much time. Construction on Paul Murdoch’s terrorist memorial mosque is about to begin.

Sincerely,

[Your name]


UPDATE: I originally included another snippet in the above letter, but I think it reads better without it. In the Daniel Griffith section, I had included a second example of Griffith's astounding dishonesty:
Dr. Griffith is telling every reporter who will listen that there is no such thing as the direction to Mecca. "Anything can point toward Mecca," he told the Pittsburgh Post Gazette, "because the earth is round." One billion Muslims face Mecca five times a day to pray, and Griffith pretends there is no such thing as facing Mecca!

Of course he knows better. The first thing that Griffith’s report does is calculate the direction to Mecca:
I computed an azimuth value from the Flight 93 crater site to Mecca of roughly 55.20°.

My taqiyyist neighbor

Taqiyya is the Islamic concept of religiously sanctioned deception. In particular, it allows Muslims to disguise their religious beliefs, and even deny their Islamic faith, in order to protect themselves or advance Islamic conquest. (Taqiyya is a Shiite usage, while the doctrine of "war is deception" is common to Islam in general.)

Manipulation and deception are also primary tools of the Western left, even extending to the specific concept of deception about allegiences, as I witnessed firsthand today.

I was trowling over a concrete repair in the driveway when a tall sixty something man on a bicycle said he was looking for one of the neighbors. He introduced himself as Jeb somebody and we talked for a minute. He spotted my "Elect Bush" bumper stickers and asked if that was me. "Yup. Sure is."

"What do you think now?" he asked with a jocular sneer. "Of course I am very pleased," I told him. "We just won the Iraq war. What's not to like?"

Jeb's face twisted in horror. "We didn't win," he cried. "We lost! And the whole world hates us now. We've done nothing but make enemies."

"We made enemies?" I challenged him: "The entire country of Iraq has turned against al Qaeda."

So he tried labeling me a chickenhawk: "Were you in the military?"

His next ploy was just as transparent: "I've been a registered Republican for 30 years," he said mournfully, "but because of George Bush, I'm thinking I have to go independent."

If he was going to pretend he was a Republican, I was going to pretend that he was capable of listening to reason: "Our accomplishment in Iraq is huge," I told him. "Every traditional Islamic sect embraces the jihadist concept of Islamic supremacy. No Islamic society has ever embraced religious liberty, where people of different faiths are treated equally. But now in Iraq, the entire population hates the religious intolerance of the jihadists, and they have the democratic power to enforce that choice. It is going to change the Islamic world. It is a huge victory."

As I spoke, my interlocutor started sidling around his bicycle, trying to escape. When he actually turned and started walking away I was having none of it. "Wait a minute!" I said firmly, catching up to him and pinning him on the spot: "If you have a different view, what is it? How could there possibly be a better outcome in Iraq?"

"As soon as we leave," he insisted, "that country goes to the terrorists. It doesn't matter if it is twenty years from now." He had already worked out how he was going to deny our victory in Iraq for the next twenty years!

As I finished up my concrete I recalled the case of an activist Democrat from Palo Alto who had been outed a couple years ago in the blogosphere for pretending to be an anti-war Republican. Just for kicks I googled "palo alto democrat pretends republican." Lo and behold, there was Jeb, occupying the first three links:

Jeb Eddy, pretending to be Republican

Wizbang, tipped off by Crockspot, had the campaign contribution proof from Newsmeat. As of September 2005, Mr. Jeb Eddy was listed as having donated exclusively to Democrats since 1998 (the start of his donation record). He is now listed as donating another $1000 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in 2006.

Apparently his strategic dishonesty extends to personal contacts. That is very much the jihadist mentality.

Technically I should say that my neighbor is practicing kitman (manipulative dissimulation) rather than taqiyya (avoidance of detection). And this is not the only coincidence between Mr. Eddy and the Islamofascists. He is also desperate for them to win in Iraq. He goes out protesting with Moveon.org, which places him squarely in the unilateral withdrawal camp that has been striving for several years now to abandon Iraq to al Qaeda and Iran. (This from someone who by his own profession believes that as soon as we leave, the terrorists will take over.)

I called the registrar of voters and Jeb Eddy is indeed registered Republican. He has actually donned the uniform of the opposition. It is like a Muslim telling people he is Christian (which is perfectly allowed in Islam), then telling them how disappointed he is in Christianity and how he thinks he should convert to Islam. It is a classic Islamic technique: pretend an allegiance that will make you seem trustworthy to your enemy, then sow dissention. As Donald Hudson writes:
Taqiyya has been used by Muslims since the 7th century to confuse and split 'the enemy'.
I wonder how often Mr. Eddy uses this kitman-esque form of dawa (proselitization). I suppose there are quite a few Republicans at this point who believe what they read in the newspaper and are convinced that the Iraq war has been a disaster. In this context, Mr. Eddy's fraud might actually have some success in sowing Republican dismay.

I hope that Mr. Eddy's continuing dissimulation is just a manifestation of his obvious irrationality (would a loss in Iraq really be to Mr. Eddy's advantage?) and is not an indication that his ploy has actually been working for him.


UPDATE: Thanks to Curt for the link. Don Surber notes that Chris Matthew's is also pushing the line that if we have to stay in Iraq it means we have lost. Don replies:
For thousands of years, you take over a country, you’re the winner. Matthews wants to change that, saying, “As long as we‘re stuck over there, it seems we‘re losing.”
In other words:
Chris Matthews’s new definition of Victory in Iraq means we lost World War II. But, hey, we finally won Vietnam.
More phony "Republicans": Michelle Malkin has a round-up of "Republican" voters who CNN rounded up to ask questions at the CNN/You Tube Republican Debate. Four of them were Democrat plants.

Powerline rounds up two more Democrat plants at the CNN/You Tube fraud, and Michelle reports that another was a CAIR intern. (Sounding like Jeb Eddy, this intern declared that the Iraq war has ruined America's reputation throughout the Islamic world. I would have liked to see Giuliani answer: "not in Iraq.")

Tuesday, November 20, 2007

Memorial superintendent admits giant crescent still present in memorial design

No comment from the Park Service yet on Congressman Tancredo's request for a new Flight 93 Memorial. We did a little better with last week's blogburst letters. Some emailers got a response from Memorial Project Superintendent Joanne Hanley, answering Mr. Tancredo's contention that the original giant crescent is still present in the redesign. Interestingly, her description of the redesign actually admits that the giant crescent IS still present, both geometrically and thematically.

In 2005, architect Paul Murdoch explained his original Crescent of Embrace design in terms of the flight path: as the hijacked airliner came over the ridgeline above the crash site, its flight path symbolically broke the circle, turning it into a giant crescent. In the original design, the broken off part of the circle was removed entirely:

Crescent and star
Flight 93 came down from the Northwest (the upper left). The flight path breaks the circle at the upper crescent tip, says Paul Murdoch, then continues down to the crash site, which is located between the crescent tips (roughly in the position of the star on an Islamic crescent and star flag).

In describing the barely altered redesign, Superintendent Hanley uses the exact same "breaking the circle" language that Paul Murdoch used to describe the original design, only now the broken off part of the circle is not completely removed. A broken chunk of it remains, so that the design now includes "two breaks" instead of one:
The most prominent refinement was in the treatment of the naturally occurring bowl-shaped landscape feature. The design now surrounds that area with a circle of trees which is broken in two places - the location which marks the flight path as it breaks the circular continuity of the bowl edge, and the Sacred Ground where the crash occurred. The locations of the two breaks in the circle are based on the flight path and crash site of Flight 93.
The site plan graphic for the redesign was dramatically re-colored, making the crescent LOOK more like a circle. You have to examine closely to see that the original break in the crescent is still there, along with the new "second break." But as Superintendent Hanley admits, the original break IS still there, and it is still intended to be seen as being there. Hanley is directly admitting what Congressman Tancredo is complaining about, that the original crescent has only been disguised.

A side-by-side comparison of the Crescent of Embrace site-plan and the redesign site-plan confirms that the only change was to include a chunk of the symbolically broken off part of the imaginary full circle:

Two breaks
Ignoring the re-coloring of the image, the only change is the additional arc of trees to the left side of the crescent. (Click pic for larger view.)

Including a chunk of the broken off part of the circle does nothing to remove the original crescent, but on the contrary is perfectly consistent with it, both geometrically and thematically. The terrorists are still depicted as breaking our humanitarian circle and turning it into a giant Islamic shaped crescent.

Just to make sure people get it, Paul Murdoch has placed a huge glass block at the spot where this circle-breaking, crescent-creating feat takes place. It is the 44th translucent block emplaced along the flight path (matching the number of passengers, crew, AND terrorists) and is inscribed: "a field of honor forever."


Earlier admissions that the redesign retains the crescent and star configuration of an Islamic flag


An August 18th article in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette quoted Superintendent Hanley denying the Mecca orientation of the giant crescent:
"The only thing that orients the memorial is the crash site," she said.

Mr. Murdoch reinforced that idea.

"It's oriented toward the Sacred Ground," he said. "It just couldn't be clearer."

The symbolism of the memorial, he continued, is representative of the geography of the crash site, an idea that predates Islam or any other major religion.
They are not calling it a crescent and star configuration, but that is what they are describing, and what they are talking about here is the redesign. They are admitting that the design still has the arms of the crescent reaching out towards the crash site, which sits between the crescent tips, in the position of the star on an Islamic flag. “It just couldn’t be clearer.”

Connect a line from the lower crescent tip to the thematic upper crescent tip (the 44th glass block, commemorating the spot where the flight path breaks the circle) and a perpendicular to this line (the direction of a person facing directly into the giant crescent) points exactly to Mecca. Thus does Paul Murdoch tie the Islamic features and the terrorist memorializing features of his design into a perfect bin Ladenist crescent of embrace.

We hosted an open design competition in time of war. Of course the enemy would enter. The only thing that is hard to understand is why the Memorial Project is willfully blind to this ploy.

Click here to join our Stop the Memorial blogbursts

Monday, November 12, 2007

Support Tom Tancredo's call to scrap the crescent memorial

The Park Service has a history of keeping the Secretary of the Interior in the dark about the decisions it makes in his name. It is likely that Secretary Dirk Kempthorne has never been told about the many warnings of Islamic symbolism in the planned Flight 93 Memorial. Please help bring Dirk into the loop by pasting the following letter (or one of your own) into an email for him.

Dear Secretary Kempthorne:

Please heed Congressman Tom Tancredo's call to completely scrap the present design for the Flight 93 Memorial. The original Crescent of Embrace design would have planted a bare naked crescent and star flag on the crash site:

Crescent of Embrace and crescent and star
The memorial plaza that sits roughly in the position of the star on an Islamic flag marks the crash site. (Click pics for larger images.)

All the redesign did was add some trees to the west of the original crescent:

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket
Aside from the re-coloring of the site-plan image, the only actual change in the design is the additional arc of trees to the rear of a person facing into the original crescent.

The Park Service promised Congressman Tancredo in 2005 that Islamic iconography would be removed from the memorial. Instead, this iconography has only been very slightly disguised. Every particle of the original Crescent of Embrace design remains completely intact in the redesign.

The giant crescent points to Mecca
In September 2005, a half dozen different bloggers verified that a person facing directly into the original Crescent of Embrace would be facing almost exactly at Mecca. That makes the crescent a mihrab, the central feature around which every mosque is built.

Face into the crescent to face Mecca:

Cordoba mihrab and crescent orientation
Left: mihrab from the Great Mosque in Cordoba Spain. Right: Crescent of Embrace also faces Mecca. The green circle is from the Mecca-direction calculator at Islam.com. When it is placed over the original Crescent of Embrace site plan, the Mecca-direction line (the "qibla") almost exactly bisects the crescent.

You can plant as many trees around a mosque as you want and it will still be a mosque. But this isn't just the world's largest mosque. The planned memorial is also full of terrorist memorializing features.

Please hear my voice along with those of Congressman Tancredo and Tom Burnett Sr., who is refusing to allow Tom Jr.'s name to be used in the crescent design. The memorial to Flight 93 should not be a terrorist memorial mosque.

Sincerely

Secretary Kempthorne's phone number is 202-208-7351.

Snail-mail:
Hon. Dirk Kempthorne, Secretary of Interior
Office of the Secretary
Rm. 6156, ms7229-MIB
1849 C St, NW
Washington, DC 20240-0001

Monday, November 05, 2007

Tancredo condemns continued use of giant crescent in Flight 93 Memorial

In September 2005, Colorado Representative Tom Tancredo said that he would not be happy so long as the Flight 93 Memorial still included the giant crescent. He has kept his promise. The crescent is still there, and Tom Tancredo is NOT HAPPY.

Representative Tancredo just cc'd me a letter of complaint that he sent to Park Service Director Mary Bomar this afternoon. It notes the continued presence of the crescent:
Unfortunately, it appears that little if any substantive changes to the most troubling aspect of the design – the crescent shape – have been made.
And it calls for scrapping the crescent design entire and starting anew:
And while I regret having to contact the Park Service again about this issue, I sincerely hope that you will direct the committee to scrap the crescent design entirely in favor of a new design that will not make the memorial a flashpoint for this kind of controversy and criticism.
Thank you Tom Tancredo! The full text of Mr. Tancredo's letter is pasted below.


G Gordon Liddy is on it


I will be on G Gordon Liddy's radio show tomorrow morning (Tuesday) from 11-12 Eastern, talking about the many Islamic and terrorist memorializing features in the planned memorial. The show should be a blockbuster.

Tom Burnett Sr. is going to call in. Tancredo or his press secretary TQ Houlton may call in. And YOU can call in:
1 800 GGLiddy
Streaming audio and broadcast stations here. Podcasts here. For the full exposé, see my Crescent of Betrayal book, available for free download until the print edition of the book comes out in February.


A crescent and star flag on the crash site


For those who are not familiar with the memorial debacle, the original Crescent of Embrace design would have planted a bare naked Islamic crescent and star flag on the crash site:

Bare naked crescent and star flag on the crash site

Architect Paul Murdoch's job is to work with symbols. He did not plant an Islamic flag on the crash site by accident. But even if this were somehow coincidence, it would still be wrong to build the memorial in a shape that the terrorists claim as their own.

Representative Tancredo was the only Congressman to state the obvious, that "the crescent's prominent use as a symbol in Islam--and the fact that the hijackers were radical Islamists," raises the possibility that "the design, if constructed, will in fact make the memorial a tribute to the hijackers." (Tancredo Press release, 9/12/2005. See Crescent of Betrayal, download 1, page xiii.)

Two days later, Tancredo's press secretary laid out Tom's conditions:
... that the congressman would be happy with the changes only if the crescent shape is removed.

Nothing was changed


All the Memorial Project did was add some surrounding trees. Every particle of the original Crescent of Embrace design remains completely intact in the Bowl of Embrace redesign. The crescent shape was NOT removed. It was only very slightly disguised:

Crescent/Bowl of Embrace comparison
The graphics were recolored, and a few trees were added outside of the mouth of the crescent (lower left). Every particle of the original crescent and star structure remains. (Click here for site plan view.)

Representative Tancredo was right to demand removal of the crescent. It turns out that a person facing directly into the half mile wide crescent will be facing Mecca. That makes it a mihrab, the central feature around which every mosque is built. You can plant as many trees around a mosque as you want and it will still be a mosque. This is the world's largest mosque, by a factor of a hundred.

If you want to thank Tom Tancredo for keeping his Flight 93 promise and standing up again for the honor of our murdered heroes, his phone numbers and online email form are here.


Full text of Representative Tancredo's letter to Park Service Director Mary Bomar



November 5, 2007

The Honorable Mary A. Bomar
Director
National Park Service
U.S. Department of Interior
1849 C Street NW
Washington, DC 20240

Dear Director Bomar,

I am regrettably writing you in reference to the proposed memorial to commemorate the victims of Flight 93 which crashed in Pennsylvania on September 11, 2001. As you may know, I contacted Director Mainella in late 2005 about my concerns with the design.

The appropriateness of the original design, dubbed the “Crescent of Embrace,” was questioned because of the crescent’s prominent use as a symbol in Islam – and the fact that the hijackers were radical Islamists. As I pointed out in my September 2005 letter, the use of the crescent has raised questions in some circles about whether the design would make the memorial a tribute to the hijackers rather than the victims whose mission the flights passengers helped to thwart.

When I received Director Mainella’s response to my letter on October 6, 2005, I was pleased to read her assurance that the advisory committee and the architect were amenable to “refinements in the design which will include negating any perceptions to the iconography.” I was also pleased to learn that the name of the memorial was to be changed.

Unfortunately, it appears that little if any substantive changes to the most troubling aspect of the design – the crescent shape – have been made. This deeply concerns me. As I told Director Mainella in 2005: Regardless of whether or not the invocation of a Muslim symbol by the memorial designer was intentional, I continue to believe that the use of this symbol is unsuitable for paying appropriate tribute to the heroes of Flight 93 or the ensuing American struggle against radical Islam that their historic last act has come to symbolize.

I remain committed to ensuring that this memorial is a powerful symbol for the whole nation and a testament to the courage and will of the passengers of the flight – as I am sure you are. And while I regret having to contact the Park Service again about this issue, I sincerely hope that you will direct the committee to scrap the crescent design entirely in favor of a new design that will not make the memorial a flashpoint for this kind of controversy and criticism.

Thank you in advance for your assistance.

Sincerely,


Tom Tancredo, M.C.


The phony redesign


To see clearly how the redesign leaves the original Mecca-oriented cescent fully intact, note that the orientation of the crescent is determined by connecting the most obtruding points of the crescent structure, then forming the perpendicular bisector to this line (red arrow):

Crescent bisector points to Mecca
The green circle shows the direction to Mecca (the "qibla" direction) from Somerset PA. It was generated using the Mecca-direction calculator at Islam.com. Just place this qibla graphic over the original Crescent of Embrace site plan and the Mecca-direction line almost exactly bisects the crescent.

Looking closely at the above graphic (click for larger image), you can see that the most obtruding tip at the bottom of the original crescent structure is the last red maple at the bottom. On top, the most obtruding tip of the crescent structure is the end of the thousand foot long, fifty foot tall, Entry Portal Wall. Here is an artist's rendering of the end of the Entry Portal Wall as seen in the Bowl of Embrace redesign. It shows how overtly this upper crescent tip remains intact in the redesign:

Upper crescent tip unchanged
The redesign only added the extra row of trees on the left, behind the visitors in this graphic. Notice that these trees are not even visible to a person who is facing into the crescent. They do not even affect a visitor's experience of the crescent, never mind affect the presence or integrity of the crescent itself.

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