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roosnumramo
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Name: Munsoor - Omar
Gender: Male
Interests: eating, cooking, pertending to be edu-micated, feigning an interest in team sports
Expertise: being non-professional disenfranchised 20-nothings, yet too docile to do anything about it.
Occupation: Other
Industry: Other
Message: message meEmail: email me
Member Since:
8/1/2005
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| moo. Don't forget to schedule or perform your qurbani this eid... If you prefer to give in the US, check this out: (i hear that last year's qurbani was the single largest protien donation the chicagoland food depository received) http://www.chicagomuslims.com/sacrifice/buy.asp And if you prefer to meet (no pun intended) the needs overseas, check this out: http://www.islamic-relief.com/submenu/Appeal/qurbanidec2006.html | | |
| talkin' turkey... OK. Five (yes, count 'em five) years ago, i partook in the preparation of a turkey using a 2 liter of 7-up as the base of the marinade. trouble is... the PC that recipe was on has long since passed on. i know i have given this recipe to a few of you out there, and if you have, it i would really appreciate it if you could give it back to me... thanks! -ramo | | |
| DC Reflections
(part I)
So I spent Saturday and Sunday on our nations capital (thank you Southwest Airlines DING fare!!!) and hung out with munsoor and co. Admittedly, I have very little time outside of Chicago and Urbana in my life, so I looked forward to "something different." All things considered, it was 48 hours of good people, good food, and good times.
DC Proper
In walking around the capitol area this weekend, I am shocked at how casually abject poverty and power co-exist in this city. I have seen my share of homeless people in Chicago, but here, they are everywhere. And its not like it's a "bad" neigborhood. There are neighbrhoods with half million dollar townhomes with streets lined with volvos, saabs, mercedes, and BMWs. Looking around the national mall area, you could see that the park service deals with the issue by bolting dividers onto the park benches. To the casual observer, they serve as armrests for patrons in the day, and conveniently prevent people from sleeping on the benches at night.
Speaking of the national mall, I was very disappointed with the common areas themselves. I always pictured the national mall as being something like the quad at U of I, paved walking sections with a vibrant lawn. Instead, it seemed more like adhoc gravel paths with a weedy, patchy lawn on either side.
We never made it to most of the regular tourist haunts, though we spent a good hour in the air and space museum. It's been over 5 years since 9/11, and in walking around the capitol area, I was surprised at how "temporary" the security measures were. Rudimentary checkpoints still gated the entrance to the legislature, even though there is no lack of new construction on surrounding blocks.
Haunts
Saturday, we had lunch at the Colorado Kitchen which is a little brunch place in a different quarter of the city, in an area conspicuously absent of the pomp, grandeur, and unbroken sidewalks of the capital area. This was a small establishment, seating about 20 and had a line out the door when we went for brunch on saturday (a promising sign). I had their catfish lunch special (amazingly fresh, with homemade tartar sauce and a sweet corn biscuit). The highlight of the meal was their homemade donuts. Fresh and cakey from a deep fryer, they are dressed with melted chocolate, powdered sugar or toasted nuts before being hustled out to the tables. Un-be-lievable!
Dinner Saturday was hands down one of the best restaurant experiences I have ever had. This was courtesy of Amina Thai which is a halal thai restaurant about 40minutes from the capital. This restaurant is in my opinion what makes ANY restaurant great. Pleasant decor, friendly faces, attentive service, and PHENOMENAL food, halal or otherwise. The proprietor of the establishment, Amina cheerfully greets every customer, while her husband, who runs things in the kitchen, often came up when there wasnt an order in the wok to say salaam to all the customers.
(to be continued...)
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| The White House Warden
Congress may give the president the power to lock up almost anyone he thinks is a terror threat.
By Bruce Ackerman
BRUCE ACKERMAN is a professor of law and political science at Yale and
author of "Before the Next Attack: Preserving Civil Liberties in an Age
of Terrorism."
September 28, 2006
BURIED IN THE complex
Senate compromise on detainee treatment is a real shocker, reaching far
beyond the legal struggles about foreign terrorist suspects in the
Guantanamo Bay fortress. The compromise legislation, which is racing
toward the White House, authorizes the president to seize American
citizens as enemy combatants, even if they have never left the United
States. And once thrown into military prison, they cannot expect a
trial by their peers or any other of the normal protections of the Bill
of Rights.
This dangerous compromise not only authorizes the president to seize
and hold terrorists who have fought against our troops "during an armed
conflict," it also allows him to seize anybody who has "purposefully
and materially supported hostilities against the United States." This
grants the president enormous power over citizens and legal residents.
They can be designated as enemy combatants if they have contributed
money to a Middle Eastern charity, and they can be held indefinitely in
a military prison.
Not to worry, say the bill's defenders. The
president can't detain somebody who has given money innocently, just
those who contributed to terrorists on purpose.
But other
provisions of the bill call even this limitation into question. What is
worse, if the federal courts support the president's initial detention
decision, ordinary Americans would be required to defend themselves
before a military tribunal without the constitutional guarantees
provided in criminal trials.
Legal residents who aren't
citizens are treated even more harshly. The bill entirely cuts off
their access to federal habeas corpus, leaving them at the mercy of the
president's suspicions.
We are not dealing with hypothetical
abuses. The president has already subjected a citizen to military
confinement. Consider the case of Jose Padilla. A few months after
9/11, he was seized by the Bush administration as an "enemy combatant"
upon his arrival at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. He was
wearing civilian clothes and had no weapons. Despite his American
citizenship, he was held for more than three years in a military brig,
without any chance to challenge his detention before a military or
civilian tribunal. After a federal appellate court upheld the
president's extraordinary action, the Supreme Court refused to hear the
case, handing the administration's lawyers a terrible precedent.
The
new bill, if passed, would further entrench presidential power. At the
very least, it would encourage the Supreme Court to draw an invidious
distinction between citizens and legal residents. There are tens of
millions of legal immigrants living among us, and the bill encourages
the justices to uphold mass detentions without the semblance of
judicial review.
But the bill also reinforces the presidential
claims, made in the Padilla case, that the commander in chief has the
right to designate a U.S. citizen on American soil as an enemy
combatant and subject him to military justice. Congress is poised to
authorized this presidential overreaching. Under existing
constitutional doctrine, this show of explicit congressional support
would be a key factor that the Supreme Court would consider in
assessing the limits of presidential authority.
This is no time
to play politics with our fundamental freedoms. Even without this
massive congressional expansion of the class of enemy combatants, it is
by no means clear that the present Supreme Court will protect the Bill
of Rights. The Korematsu case — upholding the military detention of
tens of thousands of Japanese Americans during World War II — has never
been explicitly overruled. It will be tough for the high court to
condemn this notorious decision, especially if passions are inflamed by
another terrorist incident. But congressional support of presidential
power will make it much easier to extend the Korematsu decision to
future mass seizures.
Though it may not feel that way, we are
living at a moment of relative calm. It would be tragic if the
Republican leadership rammed through an election-year measure that
would haunt all of us on the morning after the next terrorist attack. | | |
| This labor day weekend, a time when I would usually be at ISNA, I went to NY to visit Ammoura. At first I wasn't planning on going anywhere because of ticket prices, but someone ended up telling me about something called "the chinatown bus." Basically there are a number of bus companies operated that travel exclusively to and from the chinatowns in ny, dc, and boston at a dirt cheap price of $35 round trip .. where it was costing over $150 for amtrak. So after riding on it, I understand why its so cheap. First, I'm not certain the drivers have licences, and their driving reflects that .. tires were screatching and the bus was swaying the whole trip, and a few passengers were apparently so scared that they got off before we even got to d.c. at a random rest stop. But outside of the bus, the trip was pretty fun.
Chinatown in NY was the real deal, you could eat good food at a sit down restaurant for a few bucks, items at bakeries were a dollar or under, and many places actually expected you to speak chinese. My first goal of the trip was to eat some good food ive never eaten. So first we went to a cuban restaurant, where I saw my first and only that star. We were standing outside of this really small joint in this cool little fashion district called "Nolita" and walks passed me is Rogue from X-Men (Anna Paquin). It didn't click who she was, but she seemed really familiar, like we went to school togethar, so I stared at her, she stared at me I assume because I was staring at her ... and that was it. I wish there was more to the story for you all .. but unfortunately not. Food was great, they had this corn on the cob dressed with stuff that was great. For dinner Saturday, we went to this Ethiopian restaurant in the village which was fantastic. They brought all the food out on this huge plate, all communal style, and we all ate from it. The flavors were really pungent, not mellow at all, a must do again. But the best meal came the next day, when we went to this turkish brunch, which had literally 6 types of breads, 25 types of appetizers, 8 entrees dishes, and 10 desserts for a mere 18 dollars!!! It was crazy, we really thought we misheard the price over the phone because it was definitely worth at least double that, especially considering it was all delicious and quality food .. not any old buffet.
To round out the trip I did some shopping in Nolita and Soho, and spent money I didn't have on clothing I didn't need, saw a Jazz/Funk/Blues band, and visited the Metropolitan and saw what I think may be the largest collection of impressionist paintings outside of France perhaps. Oh and I visited the Malcolm X masjid which was nice.
So .... theres a post to end my non-posting streak.
- Roosnum
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