On May 10th, a middle-aged man carried a can of gasoline and a pipe bomb into the Jacksonville Islamic Center of Northeast Florida during evening prayers and detonated it. Fortunately, there were no injuries to people, though the bomb did damage property.

The surveillance video above gives a fairly decent picture of this man, who is clearly white, middle-aged, and on a mission.

The local news is all over it, of course. WOKV.com reports the FBI investigating it as a hate crime and possible domestic terrorism.

"It was a dangerous device, and had anybody been around it they could have been seriously injured or killed," says Special Agent James Casey. "We want to sort of emphasize the seriousness of the thing and not let people believe that this was just a match and a little bit of gasoline that was spread around."

Casey says surveillance video from the Islamic Center shows the arsonist carrying gasoline and the pipe bomb. When the explosive went off, parts of it were found 100 feet away on 9A.

So, a mosque is bombed by a white guy and the bomb isn't exactly small, but the national media sees no value in reporting it? Really? And yet, that is evidently the case.

Anti-Muslim sentiments in Florida have been bubbling to the surface, particularly after Republican Dan Fanelli's campaign commercial was aired asking if a man appearing to be from the Middle East "looked like a terrorist." According to Yahoo News, there were two other ads with even more pointed messages against Muslims:

Another ad has Fanelli saying, "This is a terrorist," as he presents a "Middle Eastern" man strapped with a "bomb" and wearing what appears to be a dish towel "turban."

Yet another ad shows two Arabic-speaking "terrorists" constructing a bomb while discussing "martyrdom" and "killing infidels." The ad also mocks long-standing due process rights such as Miranda warnings and access to lawyers.

These ads air, and a mosque is bombed. The bomb could have killed many people. To further stir the pot, this:

Last month, CAIR reported that a Muslim university professor was appointed to the Jacksonville, Fla., Human Rights Commission despite a prolonged smear campaign by the anti-Islam hate group ACT! for America, whose leader says Muslims should not be allowed to hold public office.

There's a deep pattern of anti-Islam behavior in Florida. CommonDreams.org has the list. It's a story worthy of attention by every single citizen in this country.

I did a quick Google news search. I found lots of local stories. But look what happens when I try major news sites:

FOX News: Nothing

CNN: Nothing

MSNBC: Nothing

CBS News: Nothing.

Why is that?

(h/t Shoq and BaileyMcC)

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Hm. Wonder how long before this planned domestic-terrorism attack on a police headquarters in McKinney, Texas, is labeled "just another isolated incident":

A man apparently bent on destroying the police headquarters in McKinney was shot and killed this morning after spraying the building with bullets.

Police say 29-year-old Patrick Gray Sharp drove a Ford F150 pickup pulling a trailer to the station and set it on fire in an apparent attempt to draw people out of the building. Inside the trailer, police said, were wood chips, roadside flares, gasoline, and ammonium nitrate fertilizer, the type used in the bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City.

"He had a plan. He was executing his plan," McKinney Police Chief Doug Kowalski said at an afternoon news conference at which he confirmed Sharp's identity and talked about the unusual nature of the attack.

Kowalski said more than 100 shell casings were found in the area, and 23 windows were broken in the building. Officers returned fire, and Sharp was killed 50 to 200 yards south of the police station. It was unclear whether he was shot by police or died from a self-inflicted wound.

No one else was injured in the incident, which began about 9 a.m. and according to Kowalski lasted less than five minutes.

"We know the who, what, when, where. "We don't know the why," Kowalski said.

He said Sharp, who lived in Anna, did not have a criminal record.

"We're delving more into his background," the chief said.

CBS-11 has more details:

Police say Sharp may have been trying to draw people out of the building and blow up a trailer loaded with explosives. Kowalski says Sharp fired more than 100 rounds before he died.

During a morning news conference McKinney Police Deputy Chief Scott Brewer confirmed that around 9 a.m. a man driving a Ford F-150 truck drove up on south side of the Public Safety Building, pulling a trailer. The building houses both the McKinney Police and Fire Departments.

Immediately after Sharp exited the vehicle it became engulfed in flames. Police believed there was ammunition inside the pickup. "Subsequently the fire itself set off that ammunition, causing rounds to be dispersed in immediate area," explained Brewer.

Sharp began yelling something toward the building and opened fire. Officers in and outside the building began searching for the shooter. The suspect was located and there was an exchange of gunfire.

The Dallas Morning News went out and talked to his neighbors. Apparently Sharp had a roomie named Eric McClellan who was nowhere near the scene:

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Canadian Bacon - 1995

To function as a country, we apparently must have an enemy. Peace and diplomacy doesn't work, as this scene in Michael Moore's 1995 movie satirically depicts. When lacking a real enemy, we must create one.

And that is what the Senate did last week, apparently without the blessings of the President. Who is the enemy? Iran.

In a surprisingly swift move on Thursday night that could have wide-ranging implications, the U.S. Senate passed a bill containing broad unilateral sanctions to punish foreign companies that export gasoline to Iran or help expand its domestic refinery capabilities.

The voice vote came at the eleventh hour before the chamber recessed so legislators could go home to campaign. The bill cannot come before the president to be signed into law until a conference procedure combines it with a similar House bill, the Iran Refined Petroleum Sanctions Act (IRPSA), passed in October.

The Senate move reveals an administration losing control of even its own party in foreign policy dealings, as U.S. President Barack Obama has tried to maintain engagement with Iran aimed at curbing its nuclear programme, which the Islamic Republic insists is for peaceful purposes.

Along with scores of Democrats, who favoured the bill over the administration's objections, the effort was supported by Iran hawks including Republican co-sponsor John Kyl and neoconservative independent Joe Lieberman, and was characterised by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell as a shot at Obama.

"If the Obama administration will not take action against this regime, then Congress must," McConnell said.

Take action for what? Remind me again, what American interest has Iran threatened? That's right, NONE. Now the neo-cons/hawks will scream "nuclear weapons!", but we had a new NIE this month on Iran, and guess what? No nuclear weapons program. But don't let some little piddly facts get in the way of starting yet another war front in the Middle East:

As the Obama administration edges toward imposing tougher sanctions on Iran, it has begun upgrading its approach to defending its Persian Gulf allies against potential Iranian missile strikes, officials said Saturday.

The United States has quietly increased the capability of land-based Patriot defensive missiles in several Gulf Arab nations, and one military official said the Navy is beefing up the presence of ships capable of knocking down hostile missiles in flight.

What the hell, people? Where are all those deficit queens now? Can we possibly afford--in both lives and treasure--yet another war of choice, with a country that is not threatening us?

Are we doomed to keep repeating mistakes of lessons not learned, or is this another example of needing an enemy?

Just a little over three months ago, President Bush declared he "hadn't heard" that gasoline would soon reach $4 a gallon. Today, the milestone anticipated by all save the President of the United States came to pass:

"Drivers are paying an average of $4 for a gallon of gasoline for the first time. AAA and the Oil Price Information Service say the national average price for a gallon of regular gas rose to $4.005 overnight from $3.988. But consumers in many parts of the country have already been paying well above that price for some time."

Given the stratospheric - and uninterrupted - rise in oil and gas prices, Bush's February 28 display of ignorance is all the more jaw-dropping. Asked by a reporter about the looming arrival of $4 gas, Bush the former oil man did what comes naturally and played dumb:

Q What's your advice to the average American who is hurting now, facing the prospect of $4 a gallon gasoline, a lot of people facing --

THE PRESIDENT: Wait, what did you just say? You're predicting $4 a gallon gasoline?

Q A number of analysts are predicting --

THE PRESIDENT: Oh, yeah?

Q -- $4 a gallon gasoline this spring when they reformulate.

THE PRESIDENT: That's interesting. I hadn't heard that.

Perrspectives has more on Bush's mind-numbing mindlessness and his dismal history of broken promises to "jawbone" his Saudi and Kuwaiti friends into opening the spigots.

This is whacked:

A small group of protesters gathered near the funeral services to criticize the man who mobilized Christian evangelicals and made them a major force in American politics -- often by playing on social prejudices. And Campbell County authorities arrested a Liberty University student for having several homemade bombs in his car.

The student, 19-year-old Mark D. Uhl of Amissville, Va., reportedly told authorities that he was making the bombs to stop protesters from disrupting the funeral service. The devices were made of a combination of gasoline and detergent, a law enforcement official told ABC News' Pierre Thomas. They were "slow burn," according to the official, and would not have been very destructive.

"There were indications that there were others involved in the manufacturing of these devices and we are still investigating these individuals with the assistance of ATF [Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms], Virginia State Police and FBI.

Usually law enforcement just hauls off protesters or clubs them senseless, but now Liberty University has a new system of dealing with it. Blow em all to hell! When the authorities say the bombs were not very destructive---what does that mean? A cherry bomb can take off your hand. Will they just blow off a few limbs? Is bomb making part of the new curriculum at Regent and Liberty Universities? And many of these students have been hired by the hundreds to run our government by the Bushies.

Bonddad Blog:

From the Atlanta Journal Constitution

The average price of self-serve regular gasoline hit a record high of $3.18, rising more than 11 cents over the past two weeks, according to a nationwide survey released Sunday. [..]

How long until this starts to impact consumer spending? I don't have a clear answer, but when gas prices hit records in May the picture isn't that good.

As a rough rule, every penny increase in gas prices lowers consumer spending by $1.3 billion.

Just in time for the Memorial Day weekend. Have the increased costs (it's about $3.48/gallon in my neighborhood) forced you to abandon your plans for the long weekend or adjust your driving during the week?

UPDATE: Despite being the majority party since 1994, and being the minority party since January, Minority Leader John Boehner laughably blames the high gas prices on....wait for it....the Democrats.

I'm not holding my breath on this one. I truly believe that American companies are being typically short-sighted as ever. Considering there is a six month waiting list for Toyota and Honda hybrids in my area, I would imagine that the company on the forefront of offering an electric car would have consumers beating down their door, especially as gas prices go higher and higher and people want less and less to be dependent on foreign oil. Further, I simply cannot believe that we have the technology to create a space station, but we cannot figure out a working electric battery for a typical commuter car.

SJ MercuryNews:

The company that killed the electric car, at least according to the makers of a popular 2006 documentary film, intends to announce today that it's getting back into that business.

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"Boutique" gasoline blends to help states meet clean air rules are not a factor in higher prices as President Bush has suggested, says a draft of a study ordered by the White House...read on