You'd have to have been living overseas or under a rock to have missed the controversy ginned up by rabid Islamophobes about a plan to build a community center/mosque in lower Manhattan near the World Trade Center site. Today Mayor Bloomberg gave a speech at Governors Island surrounded by religious leaders, defending the planners' right to build there. Bloomberg noted:
"Muslims are as much a part of our city and our country as the people of any faith. And they are as welcome to worship in lower Manhattan as any other group.That's the gist, but there's a lot more. He traces the origins of the fight for religious freedom in the city all the way back to Peter Stuyvesant (against it) to the Quakers (for it). I'd like to have heard it. Posted by Linkmeister at August 3, 2010 01:52 PM | TrackBack