Midland Beach made us look like a bunch of dickheads

There's no polite way to put this.

The only time the national media wastes their airtime and precious ink on Staten Island is when a) there's a tragedy or b) something stupid happens.

We can disagree politically but one truism has become all too common in the Staten Island vs. The World rubric: we will constantly be portrayed as a bunch of backwoods rubes until something changes.

The local news descended on us once again last week, focusing on the recent meeting about the proposed mosque in Midland Beach.

Again, at this point, we don't really give a shit about the mosque -- just please guys, don't make us look stupid, ok.

NYT:

“Wouldn’t you agree that every terrorist, past and present, has come out of a mosque?” asked one woman who stood up Wednesday night during a civic association meeting on Staten Island to address representatives of a group that wants to convert a Roman Catholic convent into a mosque in the Midland Beach neighborhood.

OK, honestly don't know where to start here. EVERY terrorist?!?

Starting domestically there are your garden variety nuts like the Oklahoma City bomber, the Holocaust Museum guy, the IRS air-bomber, the Weatherman, the crackpots who kidnapped Patti Hearst. Internationally there is your IRA in Northern Ireland, Italian mafia, the Japanese Aum Shinrikyo, Tamil Tigers, and Iran's Revolutionary Guard.

Obviously this woman doesn't know what the fuck she is talking about, but the real problem seems to be that she decided to stand up and spout this ridiculous garbage at a public event with reporters present. This isn't your living room lady, other people will hear this.

Moving on.

“I was on the phone this morning with the F.B.I., and all I want to know from you is why MAS is on the terrorist watch list,” said Joan Moriello

Wow, the FBI, really? Well, the Times looked into it:

The State Department maintains a terrorist watch list for foreign organizations, and the Justice Department has identified domestic groups it considers unindicted co-conspirators in various terror-related prosecutions. The American Muslim Society is on neither of those lists.

D'oh! Joan, what the fuck? What fucking FBI did you call?

We know what's happening here. She probably meant the Muslim Brotherhood, which the Advance has been insinuating some connection with. So, she's playing the game --we think -- six degrees of terror. Let's play along:

Muslim American Society - Muslim Brotherhood -- Hamas

See that was fun! let's do it with the Pope:

Pope Benedict - Hitler Youth

Pope Benedict - Child Molesters

Yeaah. good times.

Anyway, the meeting was properly summed up when a soldier, Bill Finnegan (Marine lance corporal, home from Afghanistan) stood up to address the audience:

Then he turned to the crowd. “And will you work to form a cohesive bond with these people — your new neighbors?”

The crowd erupted in boos. “No!” someone shouted.

Both in Iraq, and to a lesser extent in Afghanistan, generals such as McCrystal and McMasters have employed the strategy of working alongside local leaders in the provinces to make the US military seem less of an occupation and more of a means toward self governance.

After all these years, billions and dollars, and thousands of lives, the US military may have finally pulled Iraq from the crippling rule of an iron-fisted tyrant to something resembling at least the potential for a functioning society.

This may have been the experience that the soldier was bringing to this ill-fated meeting.

But, as it turns out, the Iraqis may be more congenial neighbors than the residents of Midland Beach. Forget a foreign occupation, Midland Beach doesn't even want a foreign contingent.

So the thousands of people who happened to peruse this article (and have never been to,  or maybe never even heard of, Staten Island) will have forever imprinted into their brain this decidedly unflattering portrait of our borough.

Good job Midland Beach. Way to make us look like a bunch of misinformed assholes.