It's about parking spaces, really!

I guess Brooklyn isn't far enough from Ground Zero for some people. On Sunday the Tea Party brought out their best vitriol to protest the building of an Islamic community center in Brooklyn, about 15 miles from Ground Zero. John Kenneth Press, President of the Brooklyn Tea Party stirred up 'patriotic' passions during his speech in which he framed the issue as not one of zoning but making America safe from democracy. These comments opened the door for hate-filled, racist shouts and chanting from the protesters.

Now John Kenneth Press is a nut job - even other Tea Party people think he's nuts. But it highlights the problem with the Tea Party movement. Too many nuts, not enough squirrels to bury them.

November is fast approaching and Tea Party candidates are flooding our airwaves. If you consider yourself a Tea Party supporter, it's on YOU to ask you candidates about what they believe. Are they couching racism and bigotry in terms of "culturalism"? Look past the easy rhetoric of lower taxes, smaller government, etc... and listen to what they are saying about immigration, Islam, and our own President who - just so we're clear on this - is an American, eligible to hold office, and a Christian (not that being a Christian should be a prerequisite for being President of the United States, IMHO).

This rally on Brooklyn should have been about zoning, traffic impact studies, and parking issues. To be fair, that's what the initial debate was all about. Some neighbors felt that the residential street won't be able to handle the additional traffic and parking needs of the community center. Hate should have been left out of it.

Let's do our part to make sure that this November's elections are about REAL issues and leave the politics of hate behind.