No More CAIR Days for Iorio – UPDATED

Was Mayor Iorio right to sever ties with the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR)?

This Trib article by William March says her decision “was based on her own research on the group.”

Maybe. And she can always cover her decision by noting that the FBI recently dropped CAIR because of its possible links to Hamas.

However, if March is correct and one of the recommendations came from Joe Kaufman, then Iorio was wrong to stop the CAIR Day proclamations. Kaufman is a right-wing propagandist whose arguments are little more than damning by assertion. A trip through his site shows that he is not a fair-minded terrorist watcher, but a Muslim-bashing bigot. (Google him if you want, I don’t want to give him the traffic.)

When I see that the people who oppose CAIR are groups like Worldnetdaily (who want to see Israel control the West Bank so God can annihilate the Jews), Little Green Footballs (a festering cesspool of bigotry, conspiracy, and paranoia), and Kaufman (who is incapable of providing evidence, facts, or making a cogent argument) I have to wonder if CAIR can really be that bad. (Human Events, FOX, Front Page, and other organs of the right are also notable CAIR-bashers.)

And, then when I see that CAIR works in conjunction with the ACLU, NAACP, and Amnesty International I have to wonder if some of the hyperventilating criticism might be a tad biased.

Note that this is not a full-throated defense of CAIR. It’s a large and complex organization, and there have been positions they’ve taken with which I disagree.

My point is that if Iorio has let herself be swayed by the disinformation campaign from the likes of Kaufman, LGF, and WND, then she has done a disservice to CAIR and Tampa Muslims.

***

UPDATED: This Janet Zink article quotes Iorio as not knowing anything about Kaufman and AAH.