Via Think Progress we learn that vandals struck a St. Louis Mosque – for the second time in the two weeks.  (And why didn’t I learn this in the Post-Dispatch?) A pentagram and the slogan “Worship Satan” were spraypainted on the Mosque wall.

The response from the Mosque officials:

In an interview with local news station KMOV, mosque spokesman Tim Kaminski said the mosque is not interested in pursuing charges against the vandal or vandals. “What we would like is for this person to come forward and come clean,” said Kaminski. “We have no rancor, no anger. We want to talk to this person. Explain to them what Islam is, that we worship the same God as the Christian and Jewish traditions do.”

Aren’t Christians supposed to be the ones who turn the other cheek? One comment brought up the new survey from the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, and it occurred to me that this event certainly helps put into perspective its finding that even atheists know more about the Christian religion than most self-professed Christians.

Another comment voiced a much darker concern:

It’s a short step from vandalism against property to attacks on people.

I was in Detroit just after 9/11, and I remember an incident reported in the local papers in which a mechanic attacked and injured an innocent Muslim man with a crowbar. As I remember it, the victim had done nothing other than enter his shop seeking service. The moral is that there are more than a few murderous fools with poor impulse control hiding in the woodwork, and, unfortunately, there are also lots of cynical demagogues who ought to know better, but who are hell-bent on using raging zenophobia as a political tool.

The March 11 issue of the Muleskinner, the weekly student newspaper at the University of Central Missouri, included a front page article on an unfilled Missouri Sunshine Law request pertaining to the search for a new president for the institution. This morning a significant number of newspapers were scattered about the University’s visitor lot (and the University president’s designated parking spot) and along South Street. We had heard rumors that previous issues of the paper had gone missing from campus newsstands.

At the entrance to visitor parking.

Along South Street.

Along South Street.

It couldn’t have been because of the headline story, could it?

This couldn’t have been about the headline story, right? Nor stories about an armed robbery near campus, or funding for a campus center which helps youngsters with autism…

It was probably just someone who doesn’t like to read.

There is that story asking about the number of applicants, though:

Request denied for number of presidential applicants

Patrick Nolan: Muleskinner

Issue date: 3/11/10 Section: News

In response to a Sunshine Law request by the Muleskinner, the Board of Governors last week refused to provide the number of applicants for the open position of University president….

….The number of applicants doesn’t seem on the surface to be information that can be closed under the Sunshine Law as there is no individually identifiable information contained within a number.

However, Setser said he reads the law allowing to close the records and the University decided to keep the number of applications confidential for the time being.

“At some point it may be that we decide to release more information,” Setser said. “It’s all geared for what we think is best for the presidential search process….”

[emphasis added]

That’s very interesting. Somebody forgot to tell the search consultant who has an $80,000 contract with the University. From the January 28, 2010 issue of the Muleskinner:

…With the narrower time frame, the Board, along with Hutchinson and Baker and Associates, has mailed out 216 letters to various presidents of universities across the nation as of Jan. 20. They are also advertising the position in The Chronicle of Higher Education, Diverse Issues of Higher Education, Women’s Issues in Higher Education and Hispanic Outlook. UCM has received nine applications for the position so far. Seven candidates responded to the mailed letters, and two responded to the advertisements. There isn’t a set due date for resumés, but the Board believes the optimal date would be March 1, 2010….

[emphasis added]

So much for experience. It would appear that a few people need to work on keeping their ducks in a row.

In response to a previous post on bumper sticker vandalism, How teabaggers mark “their” territory, I received a snail mail care package from an operative living in the Glorious Socialist Fascist Communistic People’s Republic of the Greater Chicago Metroplex containing, count ’em, two replacement bumper stickers.

Being a resident of the Glorious Socialist Fascist Communistic People’s Republic of the Greater Chicago Metroplex and possessing a college education allows one to make ready allegorical references to ancient Greek stories. Except, if we recall, this story didn’t end too well for the Hydra, did it? Eh, we got the basic point.

Now I’m good to 2036.

Right wingnuttia just can’t get over it. It’s in their nature. Today I found the following vandalism on a bumper sticker that has been attached to my vehicle since the 2008 election:

How witty.

Not to worry, there is another:

I have approximately twenty-five remaining from the campaign. At this rate I’ll run out of replacements in 2034, when Chelsea Clinton is president.

An ACORN office in Arizon was vandalized Wednesday night. Staff arrived for work Thursday morning to find windows broken, computers stolen and files taken. Wait. What? The burglars took files? Your run of the mill burglar doesn’t burden himself with worthless paperwork about the doings of a non-profit. What is this? Grandson of Watergate?

So now the office will go into lockdown. People won’t any longer be able to stroll in off the street looking for help. They’ll have to be cleared before they get in. The incident is one small sign, on a local level, of the way ACORN is suffering these days. Both the House and the Senate have passed bills barring ACORN from receiving federal funds. It’s not much money. ACORN has only received about $53 million in federal funds since 1994. That’s less than a drop in the federal bucket. But it still burns me to see Democrats–out of ignorance or cowardice, or both–voting for these bills just because Republicans have brayed so loudly about community organizers.

The Democrats who voted yes are denigrating an organization that, here in eastern Missouri, for example, is working to prevent AmerenUE from gaining an 18 percent rate hike. Ameren rakes in fifty million a month in profits from its monopoly status as electricity distributor over a large chunk of Missouri. In this recession, the Ameren ghouls want to suck almost 20 percent more blood out of rate payers. ACORN is demonstrating against that and working to defeat it. That’s just one example of their worthwhile work.

Glenn Burleigh, the head field organizer for St. Louis, says that the Baltimore organizer has been fired who advised a woman posing as a prostitute about how to avoid paying taxes on her illegal income. Burleigh notes that a white glove standard is being applied that would never happen to the big money boys. Can you imagine Halliburton, with its legion of sins, being similarly persecuted or prosecuted for one employee who advocated fraud, without actually even committing it? Imagine away, because so far, in your mind is the only place you’ve seen even minimal accountability for corporations that screw us the people in the form of our government.

auto da fé

…the ceremony accompanying the pronouncement of judgment by the Inquisition and followed by the execution of sentence by the secular authorities; broadly: the burning of a heretic…

Kristi Kenney, the Democratic candidate in the 120th Legislative District open seat race, has to contend with particularly obsessive sign vandals.

We received the following photo:

Old school vandals would just use spray paint, the folks that did this are obsessive/compulsive…

The e-mail described what happened:

…Kristi Kenney sign that was stolen last Sunday night (10/12).  It appears as if they did burn outs on it and melted it to the pavement.  They also stole two other 4×4’s which they decided to burn and a whole bunch of our small signs.  The Clinton police department found them Monday morning still smoldering…

What a bunch of losers. It’s symptomatic of the incompetence manifested by republican control over the last eight years. Their supportive vandals can’t even muster enough ability to properly and permanently bring down a  4 x 8 campaign sign. I almost feel sorry for them – to witness how far they’ve fallen.

A 4 x 8 along a well traveled road on a lot in an upper middle class neighborhood in the southeast part of Warrensburg. The sign faces south and greets a significant chunk of the “return from work” traffic in the evening.

In 2004 their sign vandals were properly old school. You knew that they had some self respect. They’d use black spray paint (“Communists!”) on a Kerry/Edwards 4 x 8. And when it got really close to the election they’d just cut the signs apart, leaving only thin strips of sign strapped to the steel posts. It was a different world in the old days. We could count on vandals with a modicum of skill, and even with a sense of panache. No more.

Now all we have to look forward to is this. You can hardly see anything from the road.

I don’t even want to know…

Then again, all that time spent vandalizing signs late at night and sleeping in late means they aren’t working the phone banks or out canvassing for their candidates.

I sent out our first canvassing team an hour and a half ago.