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From the Queens Chronicle:
He’s the deputy prime minister of a backwards Arab nation that lives under Sharia law, oppressing women, gay people and the foreign guest workers who make up nearly 90 percent of his hometown’s population.
He’s Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the deputy prime minister of the United Arab Emirates, a monarchy that won’t even allow Israeli citizens to cross its border, and a member of the royal family in his home principality, oil-rich Abu Dhabi.
And he’s the man to whom Mayor Bloomberg is reportedly about to essentially give more than a dozen acres of Flushing Meadows Corona Park, for free, so that Major League Soccer can build a stadium for a team the sheikh would own.
This is a plan that absolutely must be stopped.
From the Queens Chronicle:
The UAE’s record has the two gay members of Queens’ council delegation vehemently opposing the sheikh’s ownership of the franchise and stadium.
“I urge my colleagues in the City Council and elected officials across the state to join me in saying that New Yorkers will not do business with a murderous regime and we will not sell, trade or giveaway our public assets to those who discriminate and participate in human rights abuses,” said Councilman Danny Dromm (D-Jackson Heights).
Councilman Jimmy Van Bramer (D-Sunnyside) noted the sheikh’s wealth while also blasting his human rights record.
“The potential swapping of public parkland to a family wealthy enough to purchase the vacant land necessary to construct a stadium is deeply troubling,” Van Bramer said. “To do so with the member of a royal family from a country that actively prosecutes gay men, under threat of the death penalty, for having consensual sex is appalling.”
The vast sums of money involved can be tough to process. But here’s one context that may help: Sheikh Monsour has enough cash on hand to rent 13 acres of Flushing Meadows Corona Park for over four billion years if the city and MLS agree to the $1-per-year fee previously reported in Crain’s.
Councilwoman Julissa Ferreras (D-East Elmhurst), whose district includes the chunk of the park affected by the proposal, declined to comment about the potential owner. Ditto state Sen. Jose Peralta (D-East Elmhurst), who would likely call the project up to Albany to approve the alienation of replacement parkland.
But Dromm and Van Bramer jumping ahead of Ferreras on the matter breaks with the common councilmanic practice of deferring to the presiding lawmaker. It leaves Council Speaker Christine Quinn (D-Manhattan) in the odd bind of being AWOL on an LGBT and women’s rights issue.
The speaker’s office did not respond to requests for comment after being given Dromm and Van Bramer’s statements.
Well this puts the tweeders in a bit of a bind, doesn't it? Note that the main outrage is not alienation of public parkland to benefit the bottom line of a billionaire, but rather the policies of a country on the other side of the world. Speaks volumes about our elected officials. Hey, whatever works.
13 comments:
I don't care how good or bad a person is, NO ONE SHOULD GET OUR PARKLAND...
Correction:
THE VOTERS WILL ULTIMATELY DECIDE THIS ISSUE!
If Julissa Ferreras doesn't thumbs-down the MLS project...the voters will thumbs-down her at the polls....and she knows this.
PLEASE RECOGNIZE THE POWER THAT YOU (the individual) HOLD IN YOUR HANDS at the polling place.
You squeeze her. She squeezes her collegues and the city council, in turn, squeezes bad boy Bloomberg.
It is the ONLY REAL POWER WE HAVE.
Don't be lazy or pessimistic. Always vote....and vote wisely. Americans have given their lives so WE CAN have that PRIVILEGE!
That's what separates us from barbarian nations.
A warning for Emperor Bonaparte-Bloomberg.
DON'T TREAD ON ME!
DON'T TREAD ON MY PUBLICLY OWNED PARKLAND!
This sawed off Napoleon had better remember this!
We'll be rid of that avaricious little runt soon enough.
So, hold on, and keep on sticking it in his eye...the arrogant bastard!
"Abu Dahbi doo-doo"!
QC's comment is dead on.
This rationale begs the question, if a magnate from France, Israel, Japan, or some other country with a better human rights record were to come in with the same offer, these Council members would then approve of this attempted theft of FMCP?
Like temporarily killing off the Queen Catherine statue when she was tied to the African slave trade.
Note that the tweeders cannot accept any criticism, and can only back off when tweeder group A (Middle Eastern tweeded) is trumped by God's gift to creation, the deep pocket media savvy gay lobby.
Cannot wait when the gay image slips from two old librarians quietly living together to flaming drag queens insisting that they can address elementary school assemblies.
Force feed this guy a bacon sandwich cooked by an AIDS infested male hooker.
Just like that old joke: What's a Jewish dilema? Free bacon.
I love it. Sign me up. Fighting with the Rainbow banner against the Sword of Islam. The Danny Dromm Brigade. The Van Bramer Platoon.
C-h-a-r-g-e!!!
“I urge my colleagues in the City Council and elected officials across the state to join me in saying that New Yorkers will not do business with a murderous regime and we will not sell, trade or giveaway our public assets to those who discriminate and participate in human rights abuses,” said Councilman Danny Dromm (D-Jackson Heights).
Coming from a guy who publicly ENDORSED the Ground Zero Mosque!
Deke DaSilva ~
Thanks for the reminder!
I wish that annoying Ass-torian would give up on the Queen Catherine nonsense....BORING!
That big Queens west waterfront statue is sunk. The molds have been destroyed at the Tallix Foundry, way up in Beacon, New York.
It's "artist-sculptor", Audrey Flack is gone from that project. It was never fully paid for. it's been abandoned for good...KAPUT! Capeesh?
Only a paranoid from middle Europa (the Balkans?) would insist on harboring this kind of fantasy.
"Queen Catherine's gonna invade Serbia".
C'mon, bub. YAWN...give it up, already.
Actor, Peter O'Toole as Lawrence...from director David Lean's epic film, "Lawrence of Arabia":
"The Arabs are a little people...a silly people...petty barbarous and cruel".
I think I got that right.
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