CONTROVERSIAL SPEAKER PAID $5,000 FOR RAPID CITY APPEARANCE - TOP
David Montgomery, Rapid City Journal, 5/21/11

A speaker at a Homeland Security conference in Rapid City whose remarks about Muslims sparked controversy earlier this month was paid $5,000 plus expenses for his appearance.

The Rapid City Journal originally requested the fee amount immediately after the May 11 event, but Alexa White, assistant coordinator of Rapid City-Pennington County Emergency Management, denied the request. The Journal subsequently filed a request under the Freedom of Information Act with White, who released the fee information May 19.

The speaker, Walid Shoebat, is an author and professional speaker who says he is a former terrorist in the Palestine Liberation Organization. Now converted to Christianity, Shoebat says that terrorism is inherent in Islam.

His appearance at a state-sponsored conference attended by law enforcement was criticized by local Muslims and by national organizations such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations and the American Civil Liberties Union. . .

The money for the honorariums came from the federal Department of Homeland Security.

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CAIR ASKS S.D. AGENCY TO DROP CONFERENCE FEATURING ISLAMOPHOBE - TOP

WASHINGTON, May 6, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) is calling on the South Dakota Department of Public Safety (DPS) to drop its endorsement of a national security conference featuring Walid Shoebat, a notorious Islamophobe who claims "Islam is the devil" and that President Obama is a Muslim.

CAIR said the DPS' continued sponsorship of the 2nd Annual South Dakota Homeland Security Conference to be held next week in Rapid City, S.D., would send the message that the department endorses Shoebat's anti-Muslim views.

The Washington-based Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization also expressed concern that law enforcement personnel -- including FBI agents -- who attend the conference will apply Shoebat's extremist views in their security investigations and in interactions with American Muslims.

CAIR-CA: Mideast Stereotype is a Training No-No

. . .Shoebat once told a Missouri newspaper that he sees "many parallels between the Antichrist and Islam" and "Islam is not the religion of God -- Islam is the devil." (Springfield News-Leader, 9/24/07)

In a YouTube video, Shoebat said, "[I]f Islam is not playing the major role in Antichrist spirit, why do you think the devil wants to appoint somebody connected to Islam in theWhite House?" He told radio host G. Gordon Liddy, "No one is called Hussein unless he is Muslim. So it is very clear that Barack Hussein Obama is definitely a Muslim."

Video: Shoebat Says Devil Wants Obama in White House

Walid Shoebat Falsely Claimed that Obama is "Definitely a Muslim"

According to an official who attended a similar Shoebat lecture at a conference in Las Vegas, the solution he offered for the threat of "militant Muslims" was to "Kill them...including the children."

SEE: Islam-Bashing Bigots Train Counterterrorism Agents

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PHOTO: ARMED TEXAS SEPARATIST GROUP BURNS QURAN - TOP

For 10 years, a religious separatist group led by John Joe Gray, a self-proclaimed "freedom fighter," has been barricaded behind locked gates at a remote 47-acre compound along the Trinity River in Trinidad. They've warned that any law enforcement agents who attempt to come onto the property would be shot. John Joe Gray burns a copy of the Koran with his granddaughter Jessica on Wednesday, May 18, 2011. Star-Telegram/Joyce Marshall)

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TENN. BILL CRITICIZED FOR TARGETING MUSLIMS SPLITS TEA PARTY - TOP
Bob Smietana, The Tennessean, 5/22/11

The Kingsport man is a conservative Christian who wants the government to keep its hands off his wallet and his personal life. And that's why, he said, a bill in the TennesseeLegislature that originally targeted supporters of Islamic law is a bad idea for Tennessee. State officials could have used the bill to punish unpopular groups, he said.

Today, that's Muslims, he said. Tomorrow, that could be the Tea Party. He pointed to a 2009 report by the Missouri Information Analysis Center, funded in part by theDepartment of Homeland Security, that labeled Ron Paul supporters as potential terrorists.

"If you don't like the ideas that someone supports, how is that illegal?" he said. (More)

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EDITORIAL: KETRON TAKES LOW ROAD ON TERROR BILL WITH VIDEO - TOP
The Daily News Journal, 5/22/11

It appears McCarthyism is creeping into the state Senate through Sen. Bill Ketron, ranking member of the Rutherford County delegation.

U.S. Sen. Joe McCarthy targeted alleged communist sympathizers in the early 1950s amid the Cold War, marking one of the most embarrassing episodes in American history, and now Ketron is lining up his own easy target — Muslims. (More)

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HERMAN CAIN IS NOT RUNNING FOR SECOND - TOP
New York Magazine, 5/21/11

Herman Cain, the Godfather's Pizza CEO and Republican who already declared he wouldn't appoint a Muslim cabinet member or judge, formally announced his presidential bid on Saturday, before an alleged crowd of 15,000. (More)