The victims of 9/11, man, they are the ones who always get their names on the plaques and monuments and things remembering 9/11. How is that fair? There are some other people too, you know, some politician people, who are doing the important work of building 9/11 monuments. Maybe a 9/11 monument could share some of the attention with those people just for once? Small town New Jersey mayor Samir Elbassiouny went to the trouble of having a fancy granite memorial made up for the community’s 10-year 9/11 remembrance ceremony, so what’s the big deal if he puts his and some other town politicians’ names he likes on it? His air-tight rationale: “If I write a proclamation honoring someone, I sign my name to it.”Â
From NBC New York:
The marker sat next to a piece of steel from the World Trade Center, and while it acknowledged the 10th anniversary of the attack, the only names listed were the mayor and the town’s committee members and administrator.
Mayor Samir Elbassiouny, whose name was on the stone, said it was just a small part of the main memorial.
“If I offended anyone, I apologize,” said Elbassiouny.
No one from the Warren County town died in the attack.
The mayor promised the granite marker will be put back next to the piece of steel with an overlay to cover the politicians’ names. The message will honor those who died and note that the people of the township will never forget.
Rudy Giuliani on the other hand is probably laughing his ass off, because he gets away with this kind of thing every day. Amateurs! [NBC New York]
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Roland Burriss wishes he'd thought of this. The stone mason is on his way now.
Way to blast from the past! 2 thumbs up for the truth of it all!
"Way to blast from the past!" is also the tagline for the Mc Fly parody, Back Dat Azz Up to the Future.
Obscure political reference FTW.
There's no "I" in "September Eleventh." unless you host SNL.
Chris Christie is boarding his State Police helicopter to look into this matter as we speak.
Unwashed Mass Visits Unwashed Masses.
Thanks for the image of Gov. Christie's "Loofa Squad." Eeeergh.
you know? this is your fault for mentioning loofahs:
"hey, Bill! move that falafel to the left a bit! and those aren't my breasts!" –Chris Christie
I bet he says that about ALL his fleshlumps, poncho.
I *was* contemplating breakfast, poncho. So thanks. Thanks a LOT.
that's what i'm here for…to ruin things.
Oh, so you're not part of Michelle Obama's "Keep 'em on they diets" squad? That's nice to know.
Good for him! I hope his son's team wins.
Fat Hawk Down.
Fat Chicken Hawk Down.
/fixed
"We're gonna need a bigger helicopter."
Sikorsky troop transport.
Did he spend NJ tax dollars buying a Mi-26 Halo heavy transport helicopter. I am outraged at this abuse of tax payer dollars. And just imagine the fuel consumed getting tubby from place to place.
Chicken wings and cheese steak sammiches?
So the mayor promised to put an "overlay" over the granite marker memorializing his name? Inscribed with what?
"We Will Usually Remember 9/11?"
"9/11 — Never Forget The Politicians Who Were In Office?"
"Never Forget How Opportunistic Politicians Co-opt 9/11 Anniversaries?"
Which one to vote for? Yeah… I know… "All of them, Katie."
"Keep Off the Grass"
samir? sounds muslin. the terrorists have won again!
Either Muslin or a Jersey Shore cast member:
Or accomplice in larceny committed against Initech.
Samir Naga…Naga…not gonna be a Mayor anymore…
It's definitely muslin. Probably Egyptian, even.
I was guessing either Moroccan or Egyptian. Foreign for sure.
These days anyone from the Mediterranean Basin or parts North, South, East, or West qualifies as a Muslin Terrist.
Regime change brought to bear against Berlusconi, then?
Damn forners!
Like as not, sweetie. Say, could you replace that hideous av? I know it's all Republican-wimminz-like and all, but it's tough to fap to.
Ok I have a new one coming up soon, let me just get things sorted!
New avatar just for you.
iz our hero buried under it?
Don't let Rick Perry find out about this or he will want every mentally challenged prisoner he executes get his name tattooed on their forehead before he signs off on frying them.
But Barb, there are no fry-days anymore, just some gentle needling.
CHEERS!!1! WILD APPPLAUSE!!!1!
I can tell you like justice.
Excuse me, but Texas does not "fry" people, any more. What do you think we are down here? Savages? We POISON them.
Thereby rendering them unusable to man and beast.
"But Mom! I'm HUNGRY! And it's not like he's gonna NEED that leg any more!"
“If I offended anyone, I apologize,” How is that an apology again?
I'm only sorry if you think it was a dick move…..Yeah I've used that one.
It's right up there with, "Some of my best friends are black/gay/Jewish/amputees."
It means, "I'm an asshole and I just don't get it."
That is the standard Republican apology. Just like resigning when the attention of the law gets a little close using the "more time with family" excuse.
WIN! Part of a sincere apology is demonstrating that one has learned from the mistake.
Of course, sincerity is everything. Once you can fake that, you have it made.
NEVER FORGET (not to trip over this thing)!
What a GREAT use of public funds. Cause god knows every city's coffers are just overflowing these days and those in the city who lost loved ones need this important granite support.
I bet the guys who work at the stone carving place have a hard time explaining to some customers the whole idea of a memorial is to commemorate the departed, not the guys who paid for the rock.
So they just give up, shrug their shoulders, and take the order.
Here's the best part: No one in the city lost any loved ones.
Just one more example of the commercial whoring of 9/11 begun by the Bush admonishstration. Fuck these fucking fucks.
Never forget, never flush. Both are also the same, too.
They missed a golden opportunity to sneak in the 10 commandments on it.
Coming soon to an Alabama monument near you.
Samir's Muslin. They have different commandments.
so 9/11 is the gift that keeps on giving? i wonder how long politicians will cynically milk 9/11 for their own personal gain/glory. it's like an endless loop of Ed McMahon showing up with a giant check.
i wonder how long politicians will cynically milk 9/11 for their own personal gain/glory.
Is there a word that means forever plus another few forevers just in case, plus infinity? I think that's the word you're looking for here.
It's the ronnie raygun of the new century. Take the absolute worst thing that could've happened to our country and hitch your wagon to it forever, for the $$$.
The memorial is such a hack job that politicians are the only names that should be on it.
really america?
This is why we can't have nice things.
This is disgraceful. Everybody knows the only appropriate way to remember 9/11 is to buy the limited edition $19.99 "gold" coins that are advertised during episodes of Storage Wars (limit 5 per household).
The ones made from gold stored in vaults below the WTC?
Those are so five year anniversary. I'm talking about the new ones that depict Seal Team Six blowing Osama's head off. "Guaranteed" to only go "up" in "value."*
*Not a real guarantee.
Don't forget the 9/11 Merlot and Chardonnay….
Eww.
Can't watch "Storage Wars' because it's on opposite "Cutlery Corner."
I think Samir's re-election campaign just died.
Nevar forget. 9-11-11.
Are you kidding? He's a patriot!!!11!!
He is elected as a Committeeman at large with four others on a rotating basis so no more than two are elected each year. Then the "Township Committee" of five elect the mayor. This is one of the many, many forms of local government in NJ. Washington Township, and others that use this method, got the idea from an old episode of The Sopranos.
Oh, look! Samir and his buddies remembered something. Too bad they all forgot that they are self-important dickheads.
This is a warning not to sign the 20th Anniversary block of stone. And the 25th. and the 32nd anniversary statue of GWB in his flight suit. And the 50th anniversary…
This memorial in Somewhere, New Jersey is totally more important than those other memorials in those other places that actually had something to do with 9/11.
Someday I'll plan a road trip to Somewhere and reflect on something.
I don't want to sound like an ass hole but I've had enough of this 10 year thing. When I was watching football on Sunday the budwiser clydesdales were bowing to NYC at Liberty Park. FUCKING TACKY. I understand remembering the that horrid day where we all gasped in shock, but marketing it? Rest in PEACE isn't it? Not rest in PURCHASE. And don't even get me started on all the insurance commericals for companies that fought tooth and nail NOT to pay the families of the first responders and victims because there was no "Proof" that they were dead.
The monkeys at the zoo were all jacking off in memoriam for 9/11 too, but you didn't see that in a beer commercial.
Caesar! Enough!
No, you don't see that in a beer commercial. But give the folks at Budweiser's ad agency some time and they could probably work it in somehow, and make it pretty funny.
Monkeys…Jerking off…C'mon caveman it writes itself.
I can't wait for the first 9/11 sale (assuming there hasn't been one already) — it's like someone flew an airliner full of savings into our store!
Praise be to Allah savings at Sears this weekend!
Not quite a sale, though the reduced cost is pretty much the same thing: In honor of our Fallen Heroes, free medium fries.
I'm calling foul. That can't be real!!!!!
Sears did it. Sent a single purpose flyer with a special 'Freinds & Family Sale" from 6:00 pm to 9:00 pm Sunday September 11, 2011 ONLY. Had messages inside commemorating and memorializing the "First Responders" and "Heros in Harm's Way" among the listing of fridges and washers.
Oh, that is excellent.
Stories like these are the reason that Bill Hicks is the new Jesus.
So, can I put you down for Team Krugman, rather than Team Newell?
Can we just skip 9/11? Within 10 years it will be like 12/7 which nobody remembers really.
I'll never forget where I was the first time Tex-ass used lethal injection (wipes a tear from my eye). God bless this great land.
Remember the New Hampshire!!!
4/20 Never forget
You almost have to forget that one, especially if you really celebrate it.
Why do have the feeling that every park bench, tree trunk and bathroom wall in Warren County have the intials SE carved into it?
Probably has his phone number on the monument. For a mediocre time call…
I'm gonna do what he did as soon as I can get a $1 million 9/11 grant. I'll display it in my office next to my poster of Metallica
Ride the lightning, IP!
the best part are the comments under the article. the assumption was that they must be democrats, but in fact they are all republicans, so of course they were quickly labelled as RINOs.
Of course. If they do *any*thing unacceptable to the Republican orthodoxy, they're immediately not-Republican. Disirregardless of anything Democrats might do or get smeared for. Although I'm beginning to hate the Democrats with a passion heretofore reserved for motherfucking father-raping Republicans, they're still a better choice until we get a better political system.
There are no Republicans in Warren County. My brother lost re-election to the school board because opposition research discovered he registered as a Democrat in another county in 1969. This is in a state where school board elections are, by statute, non-partisan.
I bet Samir was also outraged by Paul Krugman's column and canceled his NYT subscription.
You know who else built monuments to himself?
Aaron Spelling?
Louie Gohmert?
Ozymandias?
I am Samir Elbassiouny, mayor of mayors. Look upon my works ye mighty, and go fuck yourself.
Funny, I seem to remember some other vast and trunkless legs of stone making the same announcement.
Ice T?
Rudy Guilliani?
Bender?
Qin Shi Huang?
Qin Shi Huang Di was entitled to build 'em, dood. Although I wasn't wild about his book-burning, the insufferable little prig.
the destroying of books (even shite ones by hacks/politicians) is always bad unless the book is too far gone and needs to be put out of it's misery.
i have a friend who used to say he wanted to be bronzed when he died. i think that's kind of awesome.
But wouldn't you start to … smell, after a while? Despite the copper coating?
Didn't Dorothy Sayers write a short story about some guy who had his wife bronzed and turned into furniture, after he killed her? Macabre little story, I loved it.
Washington!!
That reminds me: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l7iVsdRbhnc
Roland Burris?
My dog, every time he shits?
++++++++ !
Hunter S Thompson?
Kufu?
Ted Leo?
Saddam Hussein? I think we still got a big bronze head around here somewhere…
Napoleon?All of them Katie!
Kim Jong Ill?
Yay! I know this one!
Hitler.
DAMNITTT!!!! 39 minutes!
I gotta stop beatin' ya to it, huh?
Worshipping rusty chunks of structural steel is the official mandatory State religion here in New Jersey. We hold parades for the pieces of steel when they enter town, its quite the sight, you put the steel on a black sheet in the back of a firetruck, call out the high school marching band and the baton twirlers and Shriners to march down the sidewalk-less highway in front of the mall, grown wannabee firemen get all teary in an "emotional ritual" of dedicating the rusty steel next to some cheap gravestone "memorial" like this cheesy piece of shit in the story. Its a laff riot, to me, anyway. "Ha ha," I say, "ha ha." Then I take another drink of my martini and stare blankly into space.
Perhaps something a little stronger is needed, prommie. Absinthe?
Opium?
All those old opium dives I used to haunt have undoubtedly been closed by the po-pos, by now. (sniff!)
Yes, we had a couple of pieces of the steel in my NY town. A couple of residents DID die in the towers, so the town argued for years about where to put it. Some idiot residents thought it would be too depressing if it was centrally located, and one of these opponents even had a sign that said: "Fuck the steel!" Nice.
I think they found an alternate site, but I'm not sure because I found the whole thing too depressing to follow.
I live in the NY commuting area, lots of victims in my town and surrounding towns. I think worshipping the rusty steel is right up there with giving awards to an inanimate carbon rod, but at least NY and NJ, it happened to us, whats worse than this pathetic shit is all these fucktard red-staters trying to own 9-11, when they hate NYC anyway and talked about bombing it themselves.
Speaking of hating NYC…
I remember thinking "what an asshole," when W was asked, (a few days before 9/11), if he was enjoying his visit to NYC, and he replied, (oh so smugly), "it's a nice day."
My husband's boss was killed, (attending a conference in place of my husband), and when we went to the house after the funeral, there was a "condolence package" from Bush and Cheney. I couldn't help but think of what I would have done. Sent it back? Asked for a letter from Clinton instead?
Precisely. They can't hate those east-coast elites enough, yet they want to smear crying eagle snot all over every fucking thing. I just want to line them up, ass-the-heavens, and make my way up and down each row, kicking heartily as I go. Fucking worthless fucks.
Well said!
I looove the way you express yourself!
(I wish I had more than 1 pee to give.)
Channelling Vonnegut, my friend?
There is WTC steel relics all over Michigan. Mostly, they are set up for first responders to hold an annual ceremony around. Hell, the one where I live is even lit by ridiculously bright floodlights every night. That said, they at least tried to tie it in locally by the fact that it sits on the site of the city's most dangerous fire, so it's really like a duel 9/11/firefighters monument.
Don't you remember Samir Elbassiouny running towards the towers on 9/11 without a thought to his own safety?
Neither do I.
I hope Samir Notgonnaworkhereanymore still has that job offer at Intertrode.
FTW!
Jersey. Classy as usual.
"Dat's right,doll."
There is a big difference between appropriate remembrance and this kind of self serving porn. People who seek to personally profit deserve our contempt and should be shunned. In addition if you are going to do something this politically tone deaf you would be well advised not to carve it in granite.
"self serving porn"
Really, is there any other kind?
Oh sure, make it all about the victims — can't we just have a little appreciation for all the folks like mayor Samir Elbassiouny who have pledged never to forget? 'Cause that's not easy, either, all that constant never forgetting. Mayor Samir Elbassiouny is so busy never forgetting that sometimes he forgets his name, and then what's he gonna do? Why, he's gonna look at that memorial and remember that he's Samir Elbassiouny, and that he's never forgetting. It's like nobody appreciates all the work mayor Samir Elbassiouny is doing.
Wookie win. I chuckled for a few on that one.
Considering how bogged down the actual WTC monument / replacement's become — in politically gummed-up logistics and dubiously implemented cost control safeguards —
well, a rose putrefying by any other asshole-&-cronies' name makes perfectly good sense to me.
Answers the age-old question: Where to piss in Warren County, New Jersey?
You're Ozzy Osbourne?
Oh Horse, you so crazy!
This is an age-old question?
The more a man ages, the more this question presents itself.
Ah, yes. (I know when I've been slapped back into my place.)
Just trying to be clever with words, no more.
This is basically the same thing that everyone wrote on their facebook pages on Sept. 11, just with a little less "me me me" and in granite.
This is almost as bad as Michelle telling Barry that she "hates the flag, and America" or whatever the fuck, at the 911 Memorial. Or, it's almost as bad as the wingtards assuming that's what she said. And, if she wasn't saying it, she was THINKING it.
I can just see someone telling this fucknut after the fact:
"No, no, Mayor Elbassiouny, you have to DIE first before you get parks and streets named after you."
If only.
It gets better. Well, it almost got better, at least.
Perhaps said constituent could arrange?
So small town. Sarah's recarving of Mt. Rushmore to depict a vision of her on the wings of an eagle crying into a Nordstrom's hanky will put this to shame.
MONUMENT LIBEL!!!!!!!!
MONUMENTAL libel.
FIFY, NNTT.
Mayor of JERK-water NJ.
And to think they used cheap Chinese labor for this project.
I wonder if any of the other folks on that monument have tact?
"Um, Mayor, maybe we should NOT put OUR names on it."
The next phase of the memorial is a larger-than-life sculpture of the mayor, deputy mayor, and committeemen sadly looking across the river at the destruction.
Elbassiouny said he considered the marker similar to a proclamation.
"If I write a proclamation honoring someone, I sign my name to it," he said.
This monument was 1/3 remembrance of 9.11, 2/3 politicians' names. Way to honor the 9.11 victims, asshole.
Soon we're bound to get our Joe McGinness/Sarah Palin post. When we do, let's remember that Joe McGinness is something of a douche bag.
Yeah, but as that book argues so are almost all journalists who do original reporting. Spoken as someone who has been on the wrong end of a journalist's pen more than once.
But not all journalists sit at the defense table of a man on trial for murder and tell him they think he’s innocent, while at the same time writing to their editor discussing the technical problem of not spoiling his work's effect by making MacDonald, in the book, appear "too loathsome too soon."
Joe’s in a class by himself. From the Wiki:
It's not clear why MacDonald would have thought that Joe McGinniss should have believed in his innocence at all. Certainly, no one else did, and McGinniss started off looking for a way to prove MacDonald's innocence, but gradually become convinced MacDonald had committed the crime.
McDonald seemed more like a calculating, cold-blooded killer than a psychopath, but to the extent McGinness pretended to believe in McDonald’s innocence to “get the story,” while not actually believing it himself, he’s pretty awful too, if not a murderer. The fact that he’s a good writer, or that I take a voyeuristic interest in what he’s writing about, doesn’t change that for me.
Got to go—some journalist is on line two.
Sounds like a pissing match between two crime-cultists who disagree on guilt, like a fight between someone who thinks the mother killed JonBenet and someone who thinks it was an intruder.
You can't handle the truth! Son, we live in a world that has walls. And those walls have to be peeked over by men with notebooks. Who's gonna do it? You? You, V572 T-Blow? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep for Jeffrey MacDonald and you curse douchebag celebrity journalists. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know: that McDonald's downfall, while tragic, probably entertained people and provided voyeuristic schadenfreude. And my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, provides voyeuristic schadenfreude…You don't want the truth. Because deep down, in places you don't talk about at parties, you want me on that wall. You need me on that wall.
— Joe McGuiness
Thanks, Joe! I'm cool with it now.
I would give you all the thumbs up.
Palin takes the dark cock. End of story.
What more could a book about $arah say that interests the wonkeratti?
I read that book (along with McGinniss' book on MacDonald, which is what Malcolm was discussing in *her* book), and frankly, that was not my take. McGinniss also wrote a refutation of Malcolm's work, IIRC, in which he explained his position clearly, to my satisfaction. MacDonald is/was a psychopathic killer, and undoubtedly had his own version of their interaction, but I am not sure his version is borne out by facts, insofar as the facts of the case are knowable. I'm not necessarily defending McGinniss, but the fact is, he's written quite a few true-crime books, and they are excellent. And while Malcolm raises some excellent points about the right of writers to pry into the lives of killers and earn their cooperation by means best labeled "dubious," I regret to say that the public's *desire* (not "right") to know tends to afford remunerative opportunities that most of us would have little shame about seizing.
I watched the TV movie. I enjoyed it. The Ted Bundy TV movie was better, though.
God, we're old.
Even the serial killers we remember are, like, so last century.
we are all some dumb town* in New Jersey-ers now
*I'm too lazy to even scroll back up the page to find out the name of this stupid as podunk shithole.
Memorializing our 10th year of the nightmare that was W.
I think the only fair thing for the mayor to do now is to give the memorial a reason to exist. Self-immolation would be my recommendation, and those other guys named on the stone they should join him. A weenie roast of you will.
Who will ever forget where they were when they heard Mayor Samir Elbassiouny signed that proclamation?
This is actually the follow-up to the Wrens — Meadowlands.
This boy is exhausted.
My family has been told to only allow my name to be put on a memorial if it can be shown that I did something heroic or otherwise cool enough to warrant such attention. If I get killed by a piece of space junk falling through the roof while I type this, then do not allow my name to be put on the memorial.
Wait, what's that noi
I'm sorry, I laughed. Pretty fucking mean.
Now you know why I didn't last long in NJ local politics!
There's a lot I could say about this, but I'll refrain, because it wouldn't be funny. I would mention that the remainder of the idiots mentioned on the stone must have voted to do this, because NJ mayors can't do anything without a vote from the committee.
Let's roll him up and smoke a Elbassiouny doobie.
Wait a minute – I know that name – isn't he the 20th hijacker?
Mayor Samir Elbassiouny, I was offended by your stupid decision and that rock and do not accept your lame attempt at an apology. If that offends you, well, fuck it…
NEEDS MOAR STONEHENGE
And oh how they danced the little children of Stonehenge.
thank goodness it's only 18 in
And recorded in dobly!
Aw c'mon. It's NEW JERSEY! What did you expect?
Dedicated September 15, 2011
20 Year Anniversary
Vanuatu Becomes A Member Of The United Nations
I Will Never Forget
MissTaken
Oh, MissTaken! Are you a Vanuatuanian? I too have decided never to forget this date, instead of the other.
Thank you. Hah, foolish Nine-Eleveners! To you I say HAH!
He's no Bud Dwyer.
OMG don't you see?!?! ELBASSIOUNY DID 9/11!!1!
Well of COURSE his heroism is not well-known! It says right here that Elbassiouny was in the CIA!!
http://wcccfoundation.org/foundation.asp?Category...
ISWYDT
As a culinary professor, or something!
I added a plaque to my old condo, in the middle of the living room where I watched the towers go down on the TV. Never forget, bitch who bought my place in 2009 and scavenged my toilet-flushed 10 years of "equity"!!
Hey Samir. Apology not accepted. You opportunistic douche.
Not even close to what Richard Nixon did – his name's on the Moon, the freaking Moon!
http://0.tqn.com/d/history1900s/1/0/X/C/1/apollo1...
To be fair, though, nobody from that idiotic backwater died from 9/11! What were they supposed to do? Not put up a memorial for a tragedy that had nothing to do with them?
I don't mean to be disrespectful (and boy you will know when I mean it), but I laughed out loud at this.
Samir Elbassiouny, eh? Sounds a little Egyptian Mooslimy, to me…
Hmm. Perhaps we need to agree on terms, although this is hardly the forum for it. I was under the impression that "calculating, cold-blooded killer" = "psychopath," since psychopaths are incapable of any but a shallow affect and do not view their victims as having any inherent value.
Watch what you tell that journalist. My boss always told me my conscience was too tender to be a *real* journalist. He was of the "if you have to sell your grandmother down the river to get the scoop, you do it" school of journalism.
You ARE adorable! But I won't fap to that. I will put it in my directory to remember my sweet pretty friend by. Thanks, sweet lady.
Thank you, my friend. Appreciation of my insane rants is more than I expected. I shall treasure those words forever (unlike the memory of 9/11).
i imagine you could inject the body with some sort of preservative. aside from formaldehyde. something in a plastic? think i saw that in a horror movie once.
don't think i've read anything by her. i have read the Cask of Amontillado.
that was pretty good.
i bet all his flesh lumps say that about him.
i try to stick to what i'm good at.
Oh, sweet Lordy Jesus! I thought this woman had 'em bad, but Chrispy's just HAVE to look worse.
Warning: Serious back boobies.
B! 9! i thank i sunk your battleship.
http://t3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTHmexTxb...
(retires in defeat)
I just want you to know that THOSE back boobies look exactly like giant breeding hog testicles.
i thought Rush was a eunuch.
OK, PONCHO! OK, already. I has died in defeat, dood. I R so teh deed puppeh!
Man, you just no haz teh mercee.
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