The Hallowed Ground Near the 'Ground Zero Mosque'
Sarah Palin objects to the proposed Park51 community center—aka the "Ground Zero Mosque"—because the area around the former Twin Towers site is "hallowed ground." What else is on that "hallowed ground"? A strip club and McDonald's.
The mainstream criticism of the Park51 project—located about two blocks from the World Trade Center site—has been that it's "too close" to Ground Zero. This might be a valid objection, if the entire area had been closed off and turned into a shrine, and only buildings that were properly reverent to the memory of 9/11 were allowed, and everyone who worked in Lower Manhattan was in constant mourning.
But that's not the case. Blogger Daryl Lang, who works in the area, went out and took some photographs of buildings and locations that are the same distance from the World Trade Center site as the Park51 center will be. Among his findings? An Off Track Betting parlor, a Burger King, and a Vitamin Shoppe. (What better way to pay respect to the victims of 9/11 than to play the ponies and purchase some fish oil supplements?)
"Look at the photos," he writes.
This neighborhood is not hallowed. The people who live and work here are not obsessed with 9/11. The blocks around Ground Zero are like every other hard-working neighborhood in New York, where Muslims are just another thread of the city fabric.
