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The Forsyth County News
Opinion
This is a page of opinions ours, yours and others.
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CUYCOUNCIL
Mayor, H. Ford Gravitt
P.O. Box 3177, Cumming, GA 30028; (770) 887-4342
Mayor Pro-Tem, Lewis Ledbetter
205 Mountain Brook Dr., Cumming, GA 30040; (770) 887-3019
Ralph Perry
1420 Pilgrim Rd., Cumming, GA 30040; (770) 887-7474
Quincy Holton
103 Hickory Ridge Dr., Cumming, GA 30040; (770) 887-5279
Rupert Sexton
705 Pine Lake Dr., Cumming, GA 30040; (770) 887-4332
John Pugh
10813th St., Cumming, GA 30040; (770) 887-3342
COUNTY COMMISSIONERS
Charles Laughinghouse, Post 1
3550 Rosewicke Dr., Cumming, GA 30040
(770) 886-7937; office, (770) 886-2810
David “A.J.” Pritchett, Post 2
4840 Chesterfield Court, Suwanee, GA 30024
(404) 392-6983; office, (770) 886-2809
John A. “Jack” Conway, Post 3
6130 Polo Club Dr., Cumming, GA 30040
(770) 886-9226; (770) 886-2807
Marcie Kreager, Post 4
9810 Kings Rd., Gainesville, GA 30506
office, (770) 886-2806
Eddie Taylor, Post 5
4195 Morningside Dr., Cumming, GA 30041
(770) 886-2802
BOARD OF EDUCATION
Ann Crow
96 Barker Rd., Cumming, GA 30040
(770) 887-9640; acrow@forsyth.kl2.ga.us
Paul Kreager
9810 Kings Rd., Gainesville, GA 30506
(770) 889-9971; pkreager@forsyth.kl2.ga.us
Chairman Nancy Roche
7840 Chestnut Hill Rd., Cumming, GA 30041
(770) 889-0229; nroche@forsyth.kl2.ga.us
Rebecca K. Dowell
2030 Commonwealth Place, Cumming, GA 30041
(770) 844-0830; rdowell@fbrsyth.kl2.ga.us
Jeffrey Stephens
RO. Box 169, Cumming, GA 30028
(770) 889-1470; jstephens @ forsyth. kl2.ga.us
NATIONAL LEGISLATORS
U.S. Sen. Zell Miller
Russell Senate Office Building, Room C-3
Washington, D.C. 20510
(202) 224-3643; Fax: (202) 228-2090
U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss
1019 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515
(202)224-3521
U.S. Rep. Nathan Deal, 10th District
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2437 Rayburn House Office Building,
Washington, D.C. 20515
Gainesville: RO. Box 1015, Gainesville, GA 30503
Gainesville, (770) 535-2592
Washington: (202) 225-5211; Fax: (202) 225-8272
U.S. Rep. John Linder, 7th District
1727 Longworth House Office Building,
Washington, D.C. 20515-1011
Washington: (202) 225-4272; Fax: (202) 225-4696
STATE LEGISLATORS
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Sen. David Shafer, 48th District
109 State Capitol
Atlanta, GA 30334
(404)651-7738
Sen. Casey Cagle, 49th District
421 State Capitol, Atlanta, GA 30334
(404) 656-6578; (fax) (404) 651 -6768
Sen. Dan Moody, 27th District
(770) 695-3127;
Office (404) 463-8055
Sen. Renee Unterman, 45th District
(770) 466-1507;
Office (404)463-1368
Rep. Tom Knox, 14th District
Legislative Office Building, Room 504
18 Capitol Square, Atlanta, GA 30334
(404) 656-0188, (770) 887-0400, law office
Rep. Jan Jones, 38th District
412 Legislative Office Building, Atlanta GA 30334
(404) 656-0137
Rep. Jack Murphy, 14th District
Legislative Office Building,
Room 612, Atlanta GA 30334
(404) 656-0325
(770) 781-9319, home
Terrorism behind D.C. snipers
From the moment John
Allen Muhammad and Lee
Malvo were arrested in the
Beltway-area sniper case last
fall, the media and Muslim
activists wanted us to believe
that the serial killings had
absolutely nothing to do with
Islamic terrorism.
CNN downplayed Muham
mad’s religious conversion
calling him by his old name,
John Allen Williams, when his
identity was first revealed.
Malvo was cast as a clueless
dupe with no true convictions.
Nihad Awad of the Council
on American-Islamic Relations
(CAIR) argued: “There is no
indication that this case is
related to Islam or Muslims.”
Chicago Sun-Times columnist
Richard Roeper railed against
conservative commentators
such as the indomitable Mark
Steyn, who had taken note of
Muhammad’s Islamic faith and
his reportedly expressed anti-
American sentiments after the
Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Roeper also ridiculed
National Review columnist
James Robbins for astutely
observing that the sniper was
acting “like a jihadist warrior.”
Roeper smugly concluded: “ ...
an awful lot of conservatives
really, really wanted the
snipers to be terrorists. But
they were wrong. I’ll say that
because they never will.”
Now it is time for Roeper,
CAIR and the militant
Religion of Peace propagan
dists to face the facts once and
for all. A chilling stack of evi-
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Dean practicing politics of avoidance
WASHINGTON, D.C. lf
running away from problems
could solve them, then Howard
Dean's Southern strategy might
not be so dangerous.
Dean announced this week
on “Fox News Sunday” that if
during this presidential cam
paign Democrats would stick to
issues like “jobs, health care
and education” and not get
trapped into talking about
things like “guns, God, gays,
abortion and all this controver
sial stuff that we’re not going to
come to an agreement on,” then
the party would have a better
chance of winning votes in the
South.
(In his prepared remarks on
this subject, Dean made ihore
sense, but then Dean usually
makes more sense in his pre
pared remarks.)
There is nothing new about
Dean’s dream. It was more than
two years ago that I wrote
about the Democrats Southern
strategy, which I called a “high
risk attempt to attract rural vot
ers.”
“We are aggressively put
ting together a rural strategy,”
Democratic Chairman Terry
McAuliffe told me back in June
2001. “Democrats are aggres
sively going after parts of this
country that traditionally have
been difficult for us.”
Al Gore had won the popu
lar vote the previous year with
large margins in urban areas
and came within 2 percentage
points of George W. Bush in the
suburbs. Bush easily carried
rural America, however.
And some strategists identi
fied a “cultural gap” between
liberal, urban, Democratic
America and rural, small-town
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Michelle M ’ ■
Malkin
dence, introduced by Malvo’s
own lawyers last week at his
capital murder trial, exposes
accused sniper Malvo as an
unrepentant Muslim extremist.
He may not have been a card
carrying member of al Qaeda,
but as Claremont Institute fel
low John Hinderaker notes on
Powerlineblog.com, Malvo
was more of a “freelance”
Islamofascist as legions of
aggrieved fanatics around the
world are.
Malvo’s violent drawings
and anti-American and anti-
Semitic rantings show him to
be every bit as blood-thirsty,
hatemongering and martyr
craving as any Sept. 11 hijack
er or Palestinian suicide
bomber. Among Malvo’s jail
house artwork, (online at
http://www.fairfaxcounty.gOv/c
ourts/cases/malvo_defendant_e
xhibits.htm):
• Exhibit 65-006: A self
portrait of Malvo in the cross
hairs of a gun scope shouting,
“ALLAH AKBAR!” The word
“SALAAM” scrawled vertical
ly. A poem: “Many more will
have to suffer. Many more will
have to die. Don’t ask me
why.”
• Exhibit 65-013: The word
“INSHALLAH” above a por
trait glorifying “Muammar
Kaddafi” as “The Liberator”
' Ro 9 er
’ Simon
Republican America. “The
party that emerges victorious
will figure out some way to
bridge that chasm,” said Stuart
Rothenberg, editor of the non
partisan Rothenberg Political
Report.
The trick, he said, was for
each party to address its current
weaknesses without sacrificing
its strengths. In other words, the
Democrats had to reach out to
rural voters, he said, “without
risking their strength with sub
urban soccer moms.”
That, however, is some
trick.
And candidates who now
advocate a headlong rush to get
“NASCAR” or “Bubba” or
rural voters forget that only 28
percent of the votes cast in the
last election came from rural
areas, while 29 percent came
from urban areas and 43 per
cent came from the suburbs.
In the suburbs and cities, a
lot of Democratic voters want
to hear about protecting abor
tion rights and gay rights and
strengthening gun control. They
don’t want their presidential
candidates to run away from
these issues they want their
candidates to stand up and fight
for these issues. (And I suspect
at least some rural voters feel
the same way.)
One of the most significant
divides between urban and rural
America does come over guns,
which many rural Americans
FORSYTH COUNTY NEWS Friday, December 12,2003 I
dressed in full military regalia.
• Exhibit 65-016: A portrait
of Saddam Hussein with the
words “INSHALLAH” and
“The Protector,” surrounded by
rockets labeled “chem” and
“nuk” (sic).
• Exhibit 65-043: Father
and son portrait of Malvo and
Muhammad. “We will kill
them all. Jihad.”
• Exhibit 65-056: A self
portrait of Malvo as sniper,
lying in wait, with his rifle.
“JIHAD” written in bold let
ters.
• Exhibit 65-057: A draw
ing of the Twin Towers burning
with a plane flying toward the
buildings. Captions: “JIHAD
ISLAM UNITE RISE!” along
with “America did this” and
“You were warned.” Portrait of
Malvo as sniper labeled
“Believer” and portrait of
Osama bin Laden labeled
“prophet.”
A poem: “Our minarets are
our bayonets, Our mosques are
our baracks (sic), Our believers
are our soldiqrs.” The
American flag and the Star of
David drawn in cross hairs.
• Exhibit 65-067: A suicide
bomber labeled “Hamas”
walking into a McDonald’s
restaurant. Another drawing of
the Twin Towers burning cap
tioned: “85 percent chance
Zionists did this.” More
scrawls: “ALLAH AKBAR,”
“JIHAD” and “Islam will
explode.”
• Exhibit 65-103: A lion
accompanies chapter and verse
from the Koran (“Sura 2:190”):
tend to view as instruments of
recreation and many urbanites
tend to view as instruments of
destruction.
And guns made a big differ
ence in 2000, especially in
some key states that Al Gore
lost, like Tennessee and
Arkansas. According to exit
polls, some 48 percent of voters
owned guns in 2000, up from
37 percent in 1996. (This did
not necessarily mean that more
people owned guns it could
mean rather that more gun own
ers went to the polls.)
Among those owning guns,
61 percent went for Bush.
Among those not owning guns,
58 percent went for Gore. More
significant, however, is what
gun ownership did to other vot
ing patterns: Overall, union
households gave Gore 59 per
cent of their votes. But if there
was a gun in that household, the
vote was split 50-50 between
Bush and Gore.
But the problem for the
Democrats was not really one
of guns, but of trust. When Bill
Clinton advocated strong feder
al gun control laws, but told
hunters he did not want to take
their guns away, they believed
him. When Al Gore said the
same thing, they did not.
Terry McAuliffe’s solution
was to get Democrats to stop
talking about guns altogether, at
least at a national level. “I
believe we ought to move it out,
let the individual communities
decide their gun laws,” he said.
Howard Dean believes in
the same approach. He wants to
duck the gun issue entirely. He
wants to let the states decide
their own gun controls laws.
And, on Fox News, he applied
“Fight in the cause of Allah
those who fight you and slay
them wherever ye catch them.”
• Exhibit 65-109: Portrait
of Osama bin Laden, captioned
“Servant of Allah.” . :
• Exhibit 65-117: The
White House drawn in cross
hairs, surrounded by missiles, ■
with a warning: “Sep.. 11 we
will ensure will look like a pic
nic to you” and “you will bleed
to death little by little.”
• Exhibit 65-133:
Reference to “Islamic counter
attack force ... ICAF.”
• Exhibit 65-114: Self-por
trait of Malvo as sniper. Rant
says “they all died and they all
deserved it.”
• Exhibit 65-101: Malvo’s
thought for the day: “Islam the
only true guidance, the way of
peace.”
Ten Americans were mur
dered at the hands of the
Beltway-area snipers. Malvo’s
lawyers say he was insane and
“brainwashed.” No more so
than your average madrassa
student in Jeddah or America
hating cave dweller in Tora
Bora. Malvo is, in his own
words, a “believer” of Allah
and a “soldier” for “JIHAD.” '
Stop telling me Islam had
nothing to do with it.
Michelle Malkin is a
nationally syndicated colum
nist and the author of
“Invasion: How America Still
Welcomes Terrorists, Crim
inals, and Other Foreign
Menaces to Our Shores”
(Regnery). Her e-mail address
is malkin@comcast.net.
this state’s rights theory to “all
this controversial social stuff,”
too.
It is an old dodge. If a presi
dential candidate wants to avoid
dealing with a tough issue, he
just says, “Let the states handle
it.” That way he doesn’t have to
take a position and risk offend
ing anyone.
This was not the way
Clinton approached tough prob
lems, however. Clinton wanted
to solve them. And one of his
proudest political legacies was
converting gun control from a
left-wing to a mainstream issue.
Clinton did so by focusing
on widely unpopular items like
“cop-killer” bullets and assault
weapons, and stressing that
Americans needed neither for
sport or protection. The issue
resonated especially well with
women, who rewarded Clinton
in 1992 and 1996 with their
votes.
Clinton could have said,
“Let the states handle if.” But
that wouldn’t have solved the
problem.
You can’t win over every
voter on every issue.
Sometimes you have to take a
stand simply because it is the
.right thing to do. Sometimes
you have to take a stand on a
divisive issue in the hope that
by doing the right thing, you
will eventually unite people.
Howard Dean made his
early reputation in this cam
paign by standing up and
speaking out and fighting, not
by ducking and weaving. He
ought to remember that.
Roger Simon is a nationally
syndicated columnist. He can
be e-mailed at Writeßoger
, ©aol.com.
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