In the “politics make strange bedfellows” category, has anyone noticed the courting dance going on between the GOP and the country’s labor leaders?

AFL-CIO President John Sweeney stood side by side with U.S. Chamber of Commerce President Thomas Donohue on a stage recently to announce that the two historical opponents are joining forces to try to win legal status for millions of illegal immigrants in the United States.

“A few years ago people would have said those people will never be on a platform together unless they’re arguing with one another,” Donohue said at the time. This time around, though, it was all smiles and backslapping. (It takes two to tango.)

The Republican-leaning Chamber of Commerce and the traditionally Democratic-leaning AFL-CIO have found other issues on which they can make nice, like — apparently — lobbying Congress to provide health care coverage for the uninsured. And they recently filed court arguments together against new campaign finance restrictions that some fear might weaken unions’ political power.

Although the AFL-CIO and other major labor unions like the International Brotherhood of Teamsters have not officially announced that they are throwing their muscle behind the GOP this fall, their leader’s recent actions have borne the stamp of a man who thinks he’s made a deal. (Pirouette!)

Quite a bit of what Bush has been stumping for and signing into law lately makes much more sense when viewed from this perspective. Protectionist policies on steel and lumber, which may seem to be in conflict with orthodox GOP free-market boilerplate, are popular positions with many unions, as are things like oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

Bush has teamed up with the unions in an attempt to stimulate expanded coal mining, and has quietly acted to prevent the EPA from enforcing the Clean Air Act because his handlers tell him that killing lawsuits by the EPA against the biggest polluters will help boost coal production. (Dip!)

Construction union leaders in the country have suggested they might vote for Bush in 2004 if his war on terrorism results in more federally funded construction projects, and Bush for his part has recently attempted to make common cause with construction labor by urging Congress to approve government-backed terrorism insurance. While there is a case to be made for such insurance, which could make it easier for construction projects to get bonding coverage, Bush’s embrace of it again flies in the face of his party’s traditional anti-big-government stance.

One telling indication of the way the political wind is blowing came when Bush reserved a seat for Teamsters President Jimmy Hoffa Jr. at this year’s State of the Union address. And in a more substantive move, the administration has in recent months ratcheted down federal oversight of the Teamsters – a system put in place as part of the Teamsters’ settlement of a Justice Department suit filed in 1992 charging that the union was “a wholly owned subsidiary of organized crime.” (Swing your partner, Do-si-do.)

There’s a reason for Bush’s fancy moves, if you want to be cynical: a solid majority of union members backed Democrat Al Gore in the 2000 presidential election  — and look how close that was. (Bush came within a few thousand stolen votes of winning…) Bush wants to make sure that doesn’t happen again, because he needs all the help he can get to avoid his father’s fate. Once in office politicians often alienate some of those who put them there, and high polls during a war do not always translate into votes. Bush is leaving nothing to chance  — although whether he might once again leave it to his family is an open question.

Speaking of families, it’s obvious what Hoffa, the offspring of the country’s most famous missing person until Chandra Levy, expects from this deal. He wants the government to not just back down on the oversight of his union, but to use oval office influence to completely shut down the Independent Review Board set up for that purpose, and let the Teamsters police themselves. (Do the Hustle..?)

But the GOP does not seem to have all union support quite locked up yet. In the 2000 battleground of Florida, the AFL-CIO is still mulling over whether they want to change horses in midstream and vote against their own interests this fall in order to make an alliance which may help them in 2004. Sweeney has said immigration might prove to be a campaign issue in the governor’s race, where the unions want to unseat the president’s brother Jeb this fall, presumably in part because of the high number of union voters in that state who were improperly disqualified from voting by his secretary of state in 2000.  (Hey, Macarena!)

Will the unions decide that a future Bush in the hand is better than picking off a sitting duck?

I’d need a dance card to answer that question.

Dara O’Briain has a degree in maths (Picture: Dave)

Dara O’Briain: School Of Hard Sums, Dave, 8pmDara O’Briain is actually a dab hand at maths: he has a degree in it (and theoretical physics) from University College Dublin. And he wastes no time in showing off his flair in this new series, which sees numbers genius Marcus du Sautoy set him and another guest comic problems that can be solved by the tricky, seemingly pointless bits of maths we never bothered to learn properly in school. Tonight it’s all about ‘positioning’, which takes in 3D planes and angles, with O’Briain’s fellow Irishman David O’Doherty playing the guest doofus. Heart-cheering TV with brains.

The 70s, BBC2, 9pm

This thorough, evocatively soundtracked saunter through the decade that gave us sideburns, corduroys and the Morris Marina comes from twinkly-eyed Dominic Sandbrook, who asserts, in this first of four parts, that the new breed of wealthy created Margaret Thatcher, rather than the other way round. Later, he gets to Bolan and Bowie, whose assertive bisexuality sowed the seeds for the confidence  in, and tolerance of, alternative sexual identity.Scott & Bailey, ITV1, 9pm

Amid the pandemonium of Rachel and Janet’s personal lives – the former (Suranne Jones) is nursing a bruised fist, having punched a lamp post – is a particularly odd case to solve. A woman wearing a kinky Ann Summers police outfit has been found dead  in a field, her face covered in some sort of green substance. She also had more lovers than you can shake a baton at…Alcatraz, Watch, 10pmJJ Abrams’s time-warping thriller continues with an appearance from True Blood nice guy Jim Parrack. He’s playing a former prison guard who reveals more about the recent ancestors of San Francisco cop Rebecca Madsen. Whatever mysteries the island holds, her past seems intrinsically intertwined with them.Billionaires Behaving Badly, BBC1, 8.30pm

You probably haven’t heard of Glencore, a commodity giant that trades in coal, copper and wheat. But when it floated on the Stock Exchange last year, it made boss Ivan Glasenberg a whopping £5billion. The float also forced the publicity-shy company to come out of the shadows: over to Panorama’s John Sweeney, who quizzes Glasenberg about Glencore’s controversial dealings in Congo and Colombia.

Passenger 57, ITV2, 9pm

It’s back! This pretty good, if unremarkable, 1992 action flick was, inexplicably, on TV almost every day during 2011. Yes, even more often than Bridget Jones: The Edge Of Reason. Quite why remains a mystery. Its main function was to launch Wesley Snipes as an action star. He’s the cop turned airline security trainer with a troubled past who is trapped on a passenger plane when it’s overtaken by terrorists. No surprises that it became known as ‘Die Hard on a plane’.

VIDEO: Watch a clip from School Of Hard Sums here

The real fact is that at the core of Mormonism is a rather plain, low church Christianity, with decaffeinated adherents who go about their lives paying their taxes, loving their families, serving in their communities, helping the poor, and making mistakes along the way. The vast majority of Mormons would not be able to see themselves at all in Sweeney’s documentary. The British public, who could do with a sensible education in this interesting faith — let alone the tens of thousands of British Mormons who help fund the BBC — deserved much, much better.

I think these are sensible comments. From my own post on the article, I thought that much of the article was bizarre…and when I finally saw the documentary, I still felt that way.

That being said, I think that there were some things that The Mormon Candidate was able to point out about the whole Mormon experience. At Main Street Plaza (where the program may be found in six parts in 720p youtube links…although it appears BCC has posted the entire video in one par that is at 720p quality), Chino Blanco discussed the documentary and described it as “a Mormon documentary for the rest of us.”

I can get what CB is saying. One thing that the faithful bloggers at BCC decried in their discusssions was how lopsided the coverage was…the program featured several ex- and post-Mormons, evangelical Christians, and even polygamists, but was comparatively light on heavy hitters in defense of the faith.

As kuri and Angela commented over at MSP, however, I don’t think that the most damaging part of the video are what ex-Mormons have to say about the church. Rather, especially with Park Romney, the ex-Mormons for the most part seemed paranoid. The eagerness of everyone to bandy about the “c” word with aplomb didn’t really help matters much — I still feel that the word “cult” doesn’t really encourage productive conversation.

And other than the people interviewed, the editorial direction (videographical direction?) was kinda tasteless, what with ominous or weird music being cued in strategically when Mormons were around. I mean, it definitely got weird at some points.

That being said, I think that Mike Rose (commenting at LDS & Evangelical Conversations) is able to capture what the most damaging part of this program is:

The thing that makes this documentary amazing isn’t the amount it relied on ex-members, but the amount it relied on the LDS Church to be embarrassed about its past, to lie about its past and then finally to admit the claims that were being made.

Here is the section of the video in which Sweeney talks with Holland:

At the end of this section are interviews with Michael Purdy and Elder Holland on the SCMC…and that leads to Jake’s post today from Wheat & Tares. In reaction to the ignorance (feigned or otherwise) that Michael Purdy and Elder Holland expressed with respect to the Strengthening Church Members Committee, he asks: “So who on Earth knows what the ‘Strengthening Church Members Committee’ is or does?“

…even if the documentary was heavy-handed and polemic, I am still really confused about what the Strengthening Church Members Committee is all about. The official church release said that it was about teaching members about doctrine and alluded to gathering anti-mormon documents. The old spokesman, Don LeFevre, said it was about  collecting information for potential disciplinary action regarding criticism of the church, but Elder Holland is now telling me its all about Polygamy. With so many conflicting statements the whole thing is turning into a surreal Kafkan mystery in which we are like K in the Castle, who struggle to find out about a mysterious organisation that no one really knows what it is, not even the people who work for it.

Which leaves me to wonder…who on earth knows what the committee is or does? Do they even know themselves?

Are they letting on what they know?

So, the major issue here is whether Purdy or Holland are hiding something that they know, or if they simply do not know. If it is the latter, then the next question is: how can an apostle and the head of church PR not know these things? …That’s the rock.

But if it is the former, then the church shoots itself in the foot. If people suspect that the church is hiding the most distasteful aspects of its organization by playing dumb, then that’s the real PR nightmare. …and that’s the hard place.

I can understand that in a no-win situation like this is, then one is going to want to respond in such a manner…but at that point, there is basically no way out…no way to salvage the discussion.

Live accompaniment on piano by John Sweeney

It’s a balmy July evening as I wander down Piccadilly to Leicester Square. To reach the side street where the Prince Charles Cinema is located I must first pass a tall pretty white building that overlooks the square. The arched iron porch that juts out into the street announces its name: Queens House. I look up at the intricately beautiful carved exterior and continue walking through the crowds, turning left into the side street. Scaffolding dominates the side of the Queens; I recently read they are refurbishing it to restore it to its former glory.

It was in this hotel that, in July 1909, the Keatons’ family vaudeville act stayed during a visit to London to tour the music halls. The trip was not deemed a success; soon, they were on the next ship back to America. And on the subject of ships: I am here to see The Navigator, made twenty-two years after that trip, in 1924. It is one hundred and two years after a thirteen-year old Buster Keaton stayed next door to the Prince Charles Cinema, which sits in the adjacent street, Leicester Place.

After collecting my tickets electronically from an external dispenser (not a very 1924 experience, but 2011 has to be suffered on occasion), I wait in the gloomy underground bar area downstairs in the belly of the cinema where there is already a small gathering of people. A young dapper tweed-clad gentleman with retro glasses stands chatting with a girl in t-bar shoes; an older lone gentleman reads pamphlets announcing future films. Ten minutes before the film starts more people flood the bar area. People in their forties, fifties, and sixties join the twenty and thirty year olds. Generations and nationalities are spanned.  Around thirty people swell. I stand and sip water, and let my eyes flit around the room. I notice other people’s eyes are doing the same; they wander to one another politely, and behind their reserved gaze there is the recognition of one thing we have in common. It’s a kind of movie omerta; the code of ‘silents’ that speaks volumes.

The doors open and everyone hastily piles into the low-lit, lascivious, red theatre. I am amused to notice just how hastily. I sit in row three, mainly because I forgot my glasses, but regardless of that it’s a good position; just off centre.  Smooth jazz skips softly over the muffled chatter. The round frosted lamps burn low, guiding yet more people into the low ceiling-ed theatre. I like it. It’s intimate without being claustrophobic. I look back at the rest of the theatre; an ever-growing number of faces occupying the very comfortable deep red seats. I turn back to face forward. The design is deceptive; the ceiling opens up above me in a sudden dizzying height that hosts the red-velvet curtained screen. The altar.  The shrine. I suddenly feel part of a large congregation waiting for the revered one to arrived and begin his sermon. And with that, the lights dim…

I shall briefly lay the plot down here on paper, which is more than most did when making comedy films back in the 1920’s. A rich spoilt young man, and his equally rich spoilt girlfriend find themselves alone and literally at sea – set adrift on an empty ship. The couple is forced to learn the everyday life skills that their servants were employed to do for them: boil an egg. Open a can of food. Make a cup of coffee. And possibly the not so everyday chores, like repair a rupture in the ship’s hull, and defending yourself against invading cannibals.

The first full-bellied laughs tumble down the aisles when Rollo Treadway (Keaton) announces he thinks he’ll get married. Today. And the laughter continued much like the waves the ship itself floated on; rising and falling and rolling down to the front of the theatre like the tide coming in and out, back, forth, constant. Once one wave of laughs had fizzled out, another bigger one was waiting to rise and crash.

Higher those waves rose: Rollo tries to put The Girl (Kathryn Maguire) on the ladder after she has fallen overboard. As if this wasn’t hard enough work already, she faints. Rollo looks up at us; his face needs no more than the expressionless void he projects.  The squeals of laughter this brings forth are laced with empathy for poor Rollo.

None were so tidal as the second kitchen scenario. A far cry from the couple’s first attempt at basic culinary skills, it is now worked out to complex engineering perfection. The audience roars, claps and whoops with pure glee at Rollo’s domination of the tinned meat – which he previously failed so dismally in attempting to open – as he slices through it effortlessly with a cobbled together pedal-powered saw. It’s one of the biggest eruptions of the evening. A young gentleman can be heard breathlessly repeating a slide caption to his companion before becoming completely incoherent again as laughter consumes him, his giggles pealing.

John Sweeney’s work was nothing short of perfection; the rumbling keys as Rollo and The Girl first become aware that neither of them is alone on the ship have us gripped in suspense. The rumbles become more frantic as their speed increases, the pace quickening as the couple individually race around the ship seeking out the identity of the mysterious ‘other presence’. The choreography of this scene is nothing short of immaculate, beautiful symmetry; and the accompanying music makes one all the more aware of its meticulous timing.

When Rollo (unwillingly) sets to work underwater to repair damage to the ship, the murky depths are mirrored perfectly by Sweeney’s rippling piano keys. The music is hypnotic during this enchanting scene; only broken by bursts of giggles and the crescendo of hysterical laughter as he uses one swordfish to dual with another.

Back on deck, Sweeney’s piano keys signal to us that danger lies ahead for our stranded couple. Rollo looks through the binoculars: Cannibals! In the midst of his endeavours to protect his ship and his girl, he sets off flares (mistaken by him earlier in the movie to be candles, with comical consequences). Frantically, he attempts to run away from a small canon that has become accidentally tethered round his ankle. The sheer panic as he darts and dodges it only to see it staring it back at him with a diminishing lit fuse delights the audience; the scene’s climax rewarded by cheers and applause when, with not a second to spare, Rollo hits the deck and the canon fires timely, blasting one of the enemy.

Our hero couldn’t quite attain that silent movie hero status unless The Girl gets kidnapped. And so she does. Rollo emerges as a mysterious martian-esque sea-creature, eerily waddling out of the water onto the shore. The cannibals flee. The Girl straddles Rollo – now floating on his back, his air-filled, buoyant, deep-sea diving outfit serving as a dinghy – and rows them both back to the ship. The laughter, ebbing and flowing throughout, is a veritable Tsunami at this sight. The audience roars.

However, cannibals don’t give up that easily. Sensing there is no hope for them, the couple resign themselves to their fate; a cauldron full of hot water, or a sea full of cold water. They jump ship, and as they hold on to each other, we watch them slowly submerge.

As Sweeney’s melancholy gentle rippling keys have us believe that this in fact the end of the couple’s adventures and a watery grave is certain, the music gently lifts; as does the submarine that raises the couple out of the water. When the closing slide announces The End, applause fills the theatre, and Sweeney is given a very worthy hand for his excellent interpretative accompaniment.

The audience trickles out of the theatre, delirious and giddy with the euphoria of laughter. Some are content to stay, still gazing at the bare blank screen in front of them.

Hesitatingly, I walk up the stairs and out into the bright lights. I pass the buzzing crowds of a 2011 Leicester Square, and glance up at the Queens House hotel, now lit artistically to display its ornate Victorian façade. Underneath, the flashes and noise of the modern casino belt out into the street.

When young vaudeville Buster’s eyes took in the same towering façade in an Edwardian London, little did he know that he would be a world famous star within the following decade. And it would perhaps have been hard for him to imagine that a stone’s throw from that very building, over one hundred years later, they’d still be laughing at the frozen puss. The hotel would still be there for people to gaze up at. And so would he.

It seems that great stone façades are able to stand the test of time.

(c) Joanna Richardson 2011

Newt Gingrich has been picking up some political endorsements of late, in a state that leans heavily to the left, and despite an establishment Republican party that has thrown their weight behind Mitt Romney.

From Capital Tonight:

A Long Island source called in to report that GOP circles are abuzz with news of phone calls received this week from former Rep. John Sweeney, who is trying to put together a slate of New York convention delegates for presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich.

Numerous Suffolk and Nassau County electeds, donors, and former officials have received calls from Sweeney, who served in the House from 1999 to 2007, arriving just as Gingrich was ending his tenure there.

Sweeney’s efforts on behalf of Gingrich puts him at odds with most of the Republican establishment in New York, which is backing former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, not to mention his former colleagues in the Pataki administration, who are very pro-Romney (Pataki’s longtime political aide, Rob Cole, worked on Romney I in 2008 and is also on this campaign).

Additionally, Carl Paladino who proved he knows a thing or two about pulling off upsets, by shocking the establishment GOP in defeating Rick Lazio in the Republican primary in 2010, is also voicing support for Gingrich.

Buffalo businessman and 2010 GOP gubernatorial candidate Carl Paladino has said he plans to be a Gingrich delegate when the Republicans gather at the convention in Tampa, Florida this August.

A list of delegates is required to be submitted to the Board of Elections by February 21st.

Soldiers & Chiefs Exhibition, National Museum of Ireland, with display inspired by the Lieutenant McCarthy letter

While working with the National Museum of Ireland I was fortunate to be on hand when letters relating to Lieutenant Sweeney’s death were donated to the institution. Transcribing the letters, it was immediately apparent how poignant they were, as one young man attempted to comfort the father of his friend and comrade, while still struggling to deal with the shock of the loss himself. The National Museum had very little detail regarding either McCarthy or Sweeney, beyond the fact that they served in the 182nd New York (69th New York National Guard) as part of Corcoran’s Irish Legion. The battle in which Daniel lost his life was a major reverse for the Second Corps of the Union Army, which suffered a heavy defeat at the hands of the Confederates.

The letters provide a harrowing insight into the reality of combat in the American Civil War. One letter describes the failed attempts by Daniel’s comrades to retrieve his sword to send to his family; these efforts failed partly due to the horrific wounds the Irishman had suffered, which obstructed his belt and prevented the men from freeing the weapon before the position was overrun by the advancing Rebel line. In the other letter, Patrick McCarthy described his friend’s death to John Sweeney (most probably Dan’s father):

Camp 69^th Regt. N.Y.N.G.

(New York National Guard)

Before Petersburg, Virginia

Sept 8^th 1864

Friend John Sweeney,

I am in receipt of your letter bearing the date Sept 2nd, and I have haste to comply with your wishes. Poor Dan was killed in action on Thursday August 25th. He was killed nearly outright, he was hit by a cannon shot or a shell unexploded. When poor Dan was killed, our first line of battle gave way and the Rebels were within one hundred yards of us. I was standing by Dan’s side when he got killed. I had my [head] turned looking where a shell exploded amongst our Regiment and when I looked around again I saw Dan and a Captain in our Regiment by the name of Welpley fall. I was thunderstruck by surprise when I saw the two fall. Poor Dan, him and myself were talking not 20 seconds before he was killed. If there was any possibility of bringing Dan’s body off the field, depend on it, I would do it. We had to leave our wounded to a great majority on the field so you can judge how things were. We had only two small Divisions of our Corps engaged; our Division the 2nd and the first Division, and we had opposed to us two entire Corps and two Brigades of Cavalry, and one of their Divisions was larger than our whole force. You might say we fought them 1 to their 8, and we gave them such a bad cutting up that they abandoned their own dead and wounded. I can not say, my Friend Sweeney, who buried Dan’s body, but I know the spot as well as I know where Mulberry Street is, and if there is any possibility of recovering his body it will be attended to. I was speaking to Colonel Murphy, he told me he received a telegram from you and was going to write to you today. We have not much time to ourselves; we do not know if we be in one place 5 minutes we will hear the dreaded order ‘fall in’ given. As a sample, I will give you since this day week we have not had 3 hours sleep on a stretch, but marching and countermarching and building Breastworks. We are in the line awaiting an attack from the enemy. Lee has got reinforced by Early, we are under arms from before break of day awaiting him. By-him Come, he will get a bloody reception, for we are prepared for him.

Dan’s watch was taken off his body, and he gave $50 to the Quartermaster Sergeant for to keep for him, which will be delivered to you as soon as possible. His valise is in Warehouse No. 3 lower New York avenue and 19th Street Washington. Edgar M. Carr(?) is the gentleman in charge of his commission and other valuable articles are in it. Write to me and let me know if I will send them on to you. Give my kindest regards to all your family.  Poor Dan, the only words he said were ‘give my love to my father and mother and tell them I died doing my duty. Brave my God have mercy on my soul’ 3 times. Friend John Sweeney, any thing that layes in my power I will do it for you about Dan’s body. May God have mercy on his soul, I feel like I’m deserted. I can hardly begin to think about my poor lost Companion.  Write to me often. No more at present, but I remain yours in affection.

P. McCarthy

2nd Brig 2nd Div 2nd Corps

Potential 1860 Census entry for Daniel Sweeney and his family (Fold3)

Dan Sweeney had enlisted in the regiment at the age of 23 in September 1862. He initially served as First Sergeant in Company G, before receiving his commission in Company C in July 1863. Patrick McCarthy had joined up at the age of 21 in March 1863. His promotion from Company C’s Second Lieutenant to First Lieutenant in late June 1863 was what opened the way for Dan’s elevation to Second Lieutenant. Patrick survived the war and mustered out on 15th July 1865. The man who died with Dan was Captain Francis Welpley, a Co. Cork native and prominent member of the Fenian Brotherhood. (1)

The deaths of Sweeney and Welpley had lasting impacts that were felt by their families for many years after the guns fell silent. Examination of the 1860 census reveals what may be the 20-year-old Daniel Sweeney living in New York’s First Ward with his father John and mother Ellen. The young man’s occupation was recorded as a mason, while his father worked as a labourer. It would appear that within a few years of Daniel’s death his mother was left without significant financial support- it may be that his father died shortly after the war. In 1869 she sought a pension based on her son’s military service, most probably in an attempt to retain some financial security following the loss of male breadwinners in the household.

Pension Index Card recording the application of Dan Sweeney's mother for a pension in 1869 (Fold3)

Unlike Dan, the man who died with him was not a batchelor. In 1857 the then carpenter Francis Welpley had married Ann Donovan. In February 1865 the 28-year-old Ann travelled from her home on 52 Pike Street, New York, to seek a widow’s pension based on her husband’s wartime service. She was accompanied by Julia Donovan and Ellen Farrell, who vouched for her time spent with the Corkman. Her application was successful, and the pension was paid for some 30 years into the 1890s.

Declaration for Widow's Army Pension relating to Ann Welpley from February 1865 (Fold 3)

Such details provide glimpses into the far-reaching consequences that the death of a loved one caused for many families in the aftermath of the American Civil War. The single Confederate shell fired on 25th August 1864 at Ream’s Station not only killed two young men, it also changed the lives of the Sweeney and Welpley families forever. Over 140 years later, the letter written by Patrick McCarthy regarding the incident inspired the creation of a tableau in the National Museum of Ireland’s Soldiers & Chiefs exhibition, where a Federal soldier is shown writing home to his family, in order to highlight the often forgotten connection between events at the front and the future and well-being of those left at home.

(1) Roster 182nd New York Infantry, Kane 2002: 137;

References & Further Reading

Kane, Michael H. 2002. ‘American Soldiers in Ireland, 1865-67′ in The Irish Sword: The Journal of the Military History Society of Ireland, Vol. 23, No. 91, pp. 103-140

New York State Adjutant General’s Office: Roster of the 182nd New York Infantry

Fold3.com

Soldiers and Chiefs Exhibition, National Museum of Ireland, Collins Barracks

Civil War Trust Battle of Ream’s Station Page

Scotland Yard said that the eleven suspects – whose ages range from 16 to 22 – have all been bailed until January.

Oxford Street stabbing victim: Seydou Diarrassouba

Diarrassouba, who was 18, died on Monday after a fight broke out in the Oxford Street branch of Foot Locker.

A post-mortem later revealed he died from a stab wound to the heart.

In a second incident on Boxing Day a 21-year-old was stabbed in the leg at nearby Oxford Circus.

The second victim, who has not been named, survived his injuries.

Police have made no arrests in connection with the second attack and have so far not said if there is a link between the two stabbings.

The motive for the fight which broke out in the shop remains unclear, with authorities appealing for witnesses who may have filmed the incident on their mobile phones.

The stabbing occurred after a fight broke out at Foot Locker in Oxford Street (Picture: PA)

Detective Superintendent John Sweeney told reporters: ‘Our sympathy goes out to the family of the victim at this time and we are appealing for witnesses to come forward.

‘We know there were a number of people filming the incident inside Foot Locker and may have captured the incident or its aftermath and we are appealing for these people to contact us.’

Meanwhile, reports have suggested that Diarrassouba – who was from Mitcham in south London – had been facing charges of assault and robbery, and had appeared in court just a week before his death.

The teenager, who allegedly stole a Blackberry from one of his victims, had been due to stand trial in the new year.

The victim of the Oxford Street stabbing has been named locally as 18-year-old Seydou Diarrassouba

Police continue to view footage of the area at the time of the incident posted to YouTube, while CCTV tapes from the various cameras in the area near Bond Street Tube station are also being studied .

Meanwhile, a tribute page has been set up for users to pay their respects to the 18-year-old victim, who was from Mitcham in south London.

The page, RIP Seydou , has already been flooded with comments both from his friends and other users.

One, Justin Osei, wrote: ‘its not gonna be the same not seeing you around you were almost like a monument to mitcham, sad times.’

Salma Ali commented: ‘I didn’t know Seydou but I was shocked that yet another teenager, a Muslim brother, has been killed in London.

‘Things have got to change in this city.’

Another friend, Okoko Felly, wrote that his ‘heart goes out’ to Seydou’s family and said he would be ‘forever in our hearts’.

Others have expressed anger at reports the teenager, whose nickname was ‘Nutz’, was stabbed following an argument over a box of trainers.

The area around Foot Locker, where the stabbing occurred, has remained sealed off while the rest of Oxford Street re-opens (Picture: PA)

‘RIP bro, just an indicator of the wasted values of the world we live in today, where a pair of trainers are held by some sick individuals to be more valuable than a man’s life,’ wrote Omar Farooq Begg.

Meanwhile a former school friend of Seydou, who named him as the victim, described him as a ‘big personality’ who was always upbeat.

Student Munawar Shaikh, 20, who is studying at university in Leeds, said: ‘I heard about it on social network sites. It’s devastating.

‘I had lost contact with Seydou but he was such a big personality and a person everyone in Mitcham would know.

‘He was just a good kid who always had a smile on his face. Everybody will be cut up about it.’

Mr Shaikh added he was unsure whether the killing was gang-related or just a ‘misunderstanding between youths’.

Oxford Street was reopened to pedestrians on Tuesday – except for the area around Foot Locker which remains sealed off.

Police – who arrested 11 people and also recovered weapons from the scene – also appealed for witnesses who might have filmed footage of the stabbing on their mobile phones.

MORE: Footage posted to YouTube of the aftermath of the attack

Detective Superintendent John Sweeney told reporters: ‘There were several people who witnessed this event, both inside and outside the store.

‘A number of them recorded it on camera phones, and we’re particularly interested in those people coming forward so we have access to that footage.

‘But also anyone else who saw what took place inside and outside the store, we want them to come forward and assist us in establishing exactly what took place.’

PICTURES: Police attend the scene of the fatal Oxford Street stabbing

Moreover, those activists seem adept at insinuating themselves into national delegations. By Eschenbach’s count, the World Wildlife Fund hasn’t merely sent a delegation of its own to the summit, but 14 more

WWF members [are] masquerading as government delegates.

According to the WattsUpWithThat commenter who goes by the handle ‘eo‘ this is an important point. It means that activists are gaining access to events they’re supposed to be barred from – events that even the media are prevented from attending:

Persons [listed] in the government delegations have [almost] unlimited access to all events. Press, NGOs and even international organizations could not attend the negotiations, participate in the discussions, etc. So it has become a favorite strategy of NGOs to contact friendly government offices to include in the official delegations their own members…

Since reading Eschenbach’s analysis I’ve received, via e-mail, a press release that begins:

After Durban: Building the Climate Change Regime

As COP17 comes to an end, the launch a new paper entitled Building the Climate Change Regime: Survey and Analysis of Approaches on Friday afternoon provides an opportunity to reflect on developments in Durban and to discuss next steps for the global climate change regime. The side event will take place Friday, December 9, 2011, 13:00-15:00 in the EU Pavilion, Room Warsaw. [bold in the orginal]

When activists use the term regime in an earnest, non-ironic manner I get uncomfortable. And just look at how this paper came into being. The press release tells us:

This new paper, written by the World Resources Institute (WRI) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), with the support of the Government of Ireland…

Its primary author, therefore, is an American activist group – the World Resources Institute. The website of that group currently displays the graphic below while the accompanying text tries to inject some drama by reminding us that the clock is ticking:

The other main author of the paper is a United Nations body. Neither the World Resources Institute nor UNEP are remotely accountable to ordinary people. But that doesn’t stop them from trying to meddle with our lives.

The press release further tells us that a list of speakers will discuss the paper between 1 and 3 pm in the Warsaw Room at the Durban climate summit on Friday. Here’s the list:

• Noel Casserly, Department of the Environment, Community & Local Government, Government of Ireland
• Kaveh Zahedi, United Nations Environment Programme
• Jennifer Morgan & Remi Moncel, World Resources Institute
• John Sweeney, National University of Ireland, Maynooth
• Srinivas Krishnaswamy, Vasudha Foundation India and Climate Action Network International Legal Working Group

All of these people share a particular mindset. Noel Casserly is employed by the Irish environment department. If there were no climate crisis it’s unlikely he would now be spending time in glamorous South Africa. (A brief bio appears at the bottom of p. 14 here.)

Kaveh Zahedi is UNEP’s climate change coordinator. If there were no climate crisis, his cushy, Paris-based job would promptly vanish.

Jennifer Morgan may work for the World Resources Institute now, but she used to be the WWF’s chief climate change spokesperson. She, too, earns a fine living off the climate crisis. (As a bonus, she’s now helping to prepare the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s utterly objective, impeccably neutral upcoming report.)

Morgan’s colleague, Remi Moncel, would also be looking for work if there were no climate crisis. His bio here (backup link here) makes it clear that his professional life is devoted to promoting “collective climate action.”

And then there’s John Sweeney, an Irish academic who served as a contributing author, review editor, and expert reviewer for the last climate bible. He’s also one of those 78 IPCC personnel who’ve publicly aligned themselves with the WWF.

Sweeney has been called “Ireland’s most senior climate expert” (backup link here). Where, exactly, would his career be without a climate crisis?

Finally, those who attend the meeting in Durban will hear from Srinivas Krishnaswamy. He used to head Greenpeace India’s climate and energy campaign. As a current spokesperson for the Climate Action Network, he managed to get himself quoted in one of Canada’s national newspapers this week. What he’d be doing with his time if there were no climate crisis is uncertain – but it’s far from clear that the media would be paying him the slightest attention.

In other words, there is now a small – perhaps even middling-sized – army of people around the world whose economic lives depend on the rest of us believing that climate catastrophe is just around the corner. If we were to liberate ourselves from climate fear and anxiety they’d all be out of work. Their travel to exotic places, their moments in the media spotlight – and a significant portion of their self-identities – would all disappear.

So these people have no choice but to continue onward. They will keep holding meetings and will keep writing papers that attempt to convince the rest of us that a climate regime is necessary.

One day – but evidently not quite yet – they’ll get a real job.

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Info similar to that contained in the press release appears in the yellow box here.

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But that was before I did some basic fact-checking. Before I discovered that this organization is riddled with activists.

For every circumspect scholar who behaves in an upright and professional manner there’s another whose judgment is impaired. Blatantly and obviously so. Any scientist who gets into bed with lobby groups such as the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) is not a scientist who should expect the public to trust him.

Sorry, folks, but this is too important. We’re being told that, in order to save the planet, we have to restructure our economies, diminish our lifestyles, and even change our values. Well before I do any of those things I need to be assured that the people who’ve arrived at these conclusions are above reproach. I need to know there’s no funny business going on.

People who expect me to trust their judgment on something this momentous should be clean as a whistle. They should conduct themselves in a manner one would expect of genuinely impartial intellects working on concerns this consequential. But that’s not what has been happening.

IPCC assessments are really three smaller reports bundled together. Each is written by a different working group. Here we’ll examine the first five chapters of the Working Group 2 portion of the 2007 Climate Bible.

Three of the lead authors for Chapter 1 are formally affiliated with the WWF. These scientists belong to its Climate Witness Scientific Advisory Panel – which the WWF shortens to SAP. According to Dictionary.com, sap is a slang term for a fool or a dupe.

Chapter 1‘s SAPs are:

• David Karoly (Australia)
• Annette Menzel (Germany) and
• Piotr Tryanowski (Poland)

One of that chapter’s contributing authors is also a SAP – Dena P. MacMynowski (USA).

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Shifting our attention to Chapter 2, we discover that one of its most senior personnel – coordinating lead author Roger Jones (from Australia) – is a SAP.

I’ve written about one of Chapter 2′s contributing authors, Malte Meinshausen, previously. His link is to Greenpeace. Yet another contributing author is Michael Oppenheimer. I’ve similarly blogged about his 20-year gig with the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) – a US activist organization that he continues to advise.

In a single IPCC chapter, therefore, we find the WWF, Greenpeace, and the EDF. Sure, this is a scientific document.

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Chapter 3, which examines the rather important topic of fresh water, is also led by a SAP – Zbigniew Kundzewicz, a Polish professor whose online bio tells us that he is a member of “the inner circle of the IPCC.”

Is he formally affiliated with the WWF? Check. Is he part of the IPCC’s inner circle? Check. Did the IPCC put him in charge of one of its chapters? Check.

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Chapter 4 is in a league of its own. This is the species extinction chapter – the source of the IPCC’s dramatic claim that 20-30% of all plants and animals could perish if we don’t do something fast about climate change. Both of its coordinating lead authors – Andreas Fischlin (Switzerland) and Guy Midgley (South Africa) – are SAPs.

Lead author Jeff Price is employed by the WWF. Fellow lead authors Brij Gopal (from India) and Rik Leemans (from The Netherlands) are SAPs. So, too, are contributing authors Antoine Guisan (Switzerland), Lesley Hughes (Australia) and Christian Körner (Switzerland).

That makes a grand total of eight personnel. Now tell me, if you were striving for a rigorously neutral, above reproach examination of how at risk flora and fauna may be due to climate change would you really stack your team with eight WWF-affiliated personnel? Would you put two of them in charge?

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Chapter 5, which examined Food, Fibre, and Forest Products, has two lead authors who are SAPs – Punsalmaa Batima from Mongolia and Lin Erda from China. Contributing author Sophie des Clers (UK) is also a SAP. So is that chapter’s Review Editor, John Sweeney (Ireland).

Reviews editors have a special role at the IPCC. They’re supposed to help insure that all comments submitted by the IPCC’s expert reviewers are properly addressed. Expert reviewers are one of the mechanisms by which the IPCC tells us it ensures its reports reflect a broad spectrum of scientific opinion.

In other words, a review editor is expected to be especially neutral and above-the-fray. If it were me, and if I were serious about impartiality, I wouldn’t be appointing WWF-affiliated personnel to that role.

Chapter 5 is only one instance. We’ll see more soon.

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How the WWF Infiltrated the IPCC Part 1 and Part 2

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UPDATE: 28 September 2011, 8:25 am – when I posted this late last night I neglected to include direct links to each IPCC chapter under discussion. That oversight has now been corrected. Click each navy-coloured chapter heading and you can verify the presence of these folks for yourself on the IPCC’s website.

The link to the WWF’s SAP panel has also been corrected. Sorry about that.

h/t Hilary Ostrov

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Sherlock Jr (1924)

There are few things more joyous than watching a Buster Keaton classic with live music, but this event might be one of them. It’s a fundraiser for the Sing for Joy Bloomsbury choir, incorporating a concert by the group themselves and a screening of Sherlock Jr, with piano accompaniment by the marvellous John Sweeney.

Sing for Joy is made up of singers who have Parkinson’s disease or other neurological conditions, and their friends and carers. Singing as a group isn’t just fun, it boosts confidence and helps with the speaking and breathing exercises that people with Parkinson’s do to keep tremors under control. You can find out more about the choir, and their director Carol Grimes, here.

If you’re not familiar with Sherlock Jr, it’s one of Keaton’s most inventive and charming films. Keaton plays a projectionist who fantasises about being a detective hero in a movie. When he falls asleep in the projectionist’s booth one night, he dreams that he walks through the cinema screen and into the heart of the action. You may have seen some clips of it if you watched The Story of Film on Saturday night.

The Sing for Joy Sherlock Jr event will take place in the hall of The Church of Our Most Holy Redeemer (full disabled access) 24 Exmouth Market, EC1R 4QE (nearest tube Farringdon) on 13 October 2011. Tickets cost £18, which includes a buffet dinner. They are availale from Mike Blackstaffe on 07584 471 104  or tickets@blackstaffe.demon.co.uk. Doors open at 7pm, which is when dinner will be served. The programme begins at 7.45pm and there will be a licensed bar.

US model Melissa Halstead was 33 when she was killed in 1990, her body being thrown into a canal in the Netherlands. Her head and hands were never found, but the rest of her remains were identified using DNA tests in 2008.

31-year-old Paula Fields was found cut into pieces and places inside six bags which were discovered in Regent’s Canal in Camden, London in 2001. Her head, hands and feet are still missing.

Meanwhile, police are looking into the whereabouts of a number of other women with whom Sweeney was said to have been involved, and who have not been seen or heard from in a number of years. Sweeney is said to have created a gruesome catalogue of artwork showing dismembered women.

I’ve long been interested in the Balkans and the break up of the former Yugoslavia, so it’s good to see Balkan Scrapbook, a blog pulling together newspaper clippings, pictures and documentary film on what went down in the early 1990s.

It’s not been up long, but there’s already some interesting content, with new stuff being uploaded all the time. The focus at the moment seems to be on foreign fighters taking part in the conflict, and the death of journalist Paul Jenks near Osijek in east Slavonia, Croatia. Jenks was investigating the earlier death of Swiss reporter Chritian Würtenberg, who himself had joined the International Platoon (PIV) fighting with the Croatian HOS militia whilst looking into links between it and a pan-European fascist network. John Sweeney (he of shouting-at-Scientologists fame) was a colleague and a friend, and he returned to Osijek nearly three years after Jenks’ death to try and uncover what had happened – which made for a riveting documentary film, Dying For The Truth, which opened the Travels With My Camera strand on Channel 4.

The whole torrid tale brought together damaged ex-servicemen in search of excitement, wannabe warriors, and some seriously scary political soldiers – not least Eduardo Rózsa-Flores, a Bolivian-born Hungarian-Spanish Catholic fascist (try saying that in a hurry) who came to lead the PIV. Flores had turned up in Croatia ostensibly to work as a journalist, but soon set up the PIV under the patronage of Branimir Glavaš, a regional powerbroker subsequently convicted of war crimes.

After the deaths of Würtenberg and Jenks, and a third PIV volunteer, Anthony Mann Grant – all blamed on Serbs, but with many unanswered questions hanging in the air – Flores did a runner to Zagreb, before melting away from the Balkans. Ultimately he was involved in a right-wing secessionist movement in Bolivia, and he was shot dead by security forces there in 2009, alongside fellow mercenaries Mario Tadic, a Croatian, and Előd Tóásó, variously described as a Romanian and a Hungarian, plus Irishman Michael Dwyer.

Dwyer had been a security thug working at Shell’s Corrib gas pipeline project in County Mayo, where Integrated Risk Management Services had accrued a reputation for violence against environmental protesters, before he was apparently recruited for the Bolivian adventure by other IRMS goons with a background in Magyar autonomist politics. As if to demonstrate how the world is getting smaller, the Metropolitan Police’s “vancop” agent provocateur PC Mark Kennedy, AKA Mark ‘Flash’ Stone, had previously infiltrated the anti-Corrib activist groups, which were of great interest to Irish and British police as well as business interests and private security groups.

But I digress – if you’re interested in the former Yugoslavia and all that happened there in recent history, then keep an eye on Balkan Scrapbook.

Edited 9 September 2012 to reflect move of blog.

Sweeney is a socialist activist and a card-carrying member of the Democratic Socialists of America, or DSA, the principal American affiliate of the Socialist International. The DSA has demonstrated a close relationship with Obama over the years.

Sweeney is among 15 honorees that include former President George H.W. Bush, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and poet Maya Angelou.

“These outstanding honorees come from a broad range of backgrounds and they’ve excelled in a broad range of fields,” stated Obama. “But all of them have lived extraordinary lives that have inspired us, enriched our culture, and made our country and our world a better place.”

Sweeney is a member of the DSA’s Boston chapter. He served as president of AFL-CIO from 1995 until his retirement last September.

He previously served for four terms as president of the controversial Service Employees International Union, or SEIU. During his administration, Sweeney famously aligned the SEIU with ACORN and other leftist groups.

Activist and author Joel Kotkin, a fellow at the Progressive Policy Institute, observed how Sweeney brought communists into his union leadership.

“The public-sector unions have pushed the entire labor movement to the left,” he said. “The [SEIU] has embraced organizations with a New Left origin, such as ACORN and Cleveland’s Nine to Five, and has even set up its own gay and lesbian caucus. … The rise of these unions led to the elevation of SEIU’s boss, John Sweeney, to head of the labor federation.

“No George Meaney-style bread-and-butter unionist, Sweeney is an advocate of European-style democratic socialism,” said Kotkin. “He has opened the AFL-CIO to participation by delegates openly linked to the Communist Party, which enthusiastically backed his ascent. The U.S. Communist Party [CPUSA] says it is now ‘in complete accord’ with the AFL-CIO’s program. ‘The radical shift in both leadership and policy is a very positive, even historic change,’ wrote CPUSA National Chairman Gus Hall in 1996 after the AFL-CIO convention.”

Upon assuming the office of the AFL-CIO in 1995, Sweeney was quick to rescind one of the union’s founding rules that banned Communist Party members and loyalists from leadership positions within the federation and its unions. Sweeney welcomed Communist Party delegates to positions of power in his federation.

From: http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=229973

Rebel Rank and File brings out a hidden part of labor history and sheds light on this week's events in Madison, WI.

It’s been a wild and woolly week in Madison, Wisconsin, where public sector workers facing the elimination of their collective bargaining rights have protested, and, in the case of teachers, held several days of “sick outs.”

Labor opponents and supporters of Republican Gov. Scott Walker, who has largely cast the labor rights issues in the context of budget cuts, have had their say, too. There were dueling rallies at the state’s capital earlier today.

It is no secret that the past few decades have not been kind to organized labor.  The ranks of unionized workers in the private sector has dipped into single digits from a high of about 35 percent, with public sector workers also seeing a drop in their ranks.

Rebel Rank and File, a collection of essays edited by Aaron Brenner, Robert Brenner and Cal Winslow, a labor historian and father of one our interns at the Reporter, brings out the fact that the years from 1965 to 1981 saw an upsurge not just in strikes in general, but in wildcat actions taken by workers seeking to more directly influence their destiny.

The volume is informative in providing valuable background material to the conflict in Madison and in giving examples of previous struggles.

Rebel Rank and File grew out of a 2005 conference in UCLA, and moves from providing a number of general essays about the economy’s up and downs, and the surges and declines in union activity in the pre-1965 period.   The book then has a series of pieces about particular industries.  We learn about revolutionary auto workers in Detroit, coal miners in Appalachia, and teamsters members throughout the country.  We also read about categories of workers like women or, in a piece that resonated with me because of my earlier career and the week’s event’s about teachers.

Although their sympathies are clearly with the workers in their struggles against management and their leaders, the authors in the work generally are frank and clear-eyed about the successes and failures of the various campaigns they discuss. In his essay, Frank Bardacke does some myth-busting of the United Farm Workers of America. Specifically, he takes aim at the notion that farm workers were passive recipients of abuse before Cesar Chavez came along and singlehandedly liberated them.  Other essays look at the limited impact some of the grassroots radicals had, even as they contributed to organizational changes like, in the Teamsters’ case, the 1991 election of Ron Carey and the 1995 election of John Sweeney and his New Voice slate.

Steve Early fans who have not yet read the final chapter of Embedded with Organized Labor or his new book, The Civil Wars in U.S. Labor, can gain a taste of his SEIU critique in the final chapter of this work.

Early’s piece also looks at the legacy and lessons from the rank and file upheaval.

One of the clearest lessons that emerges from the work that he did not discuss is the importance of matching tactics with the moment.

For that, a picture in Egypt may hold a clue to how the Wisconsin workers can succeed.

Dear friend Dan Middleton sent me the image below of people in Egypt, whose citizens just have utilized technology and social media to great effect, voicing their support for the workers in Wisconsin.

While it is unlikely that a single sign will have much impact, the fact of the interconnection made possible through the Internet and sites like Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook, which I wrote about earlier this week, creates all kind of unprecedented opportunities for meaningful trans-border organizing and social action that was literally inconceivable in its current form at the time the book covers.

I  very much enjoyed the book, the second of Winslow’s that I have read, and appreciate its contribution to increasing my knowledge of organized labor’s history in our country.  I hope that people interested in these issues and who have a stake in the Madison struggle consider giving it a read for its thoughtful analysis and reminder of a prior period of people working for their rights.

At the same time, I also hope that more thought and action goes into exploring the possibility represented by the photograph taken half a world away and sent to me by a college friend that show once again geographic boundaries are less and less an impediment to statements of transnational solidarity.

But there was one choice that deserves our condemnation: John Sweeney.

First, here’s what our Fearless Leader had to say about him:

The Bronx-born son of Irish immigrants, John Sweeney was shaped by three things. His family — his mother was a maid, his father was a bus driver — instilled in him that fundamentally American idea that through hard work, we can make of our lives what we will. The church taught him our obligations to ourselves and one another. And as a child, he saw that by banding together in a union, we can accomplish great things that we can’t accomplish alone. John devoted his career to the labor movement, adding working folks to its ranks and fighting for fair working conditions and fair wages. As the head of the AFL-CIO, he was responsible for dozens of unions with millions of working families. Family. Faith. Fidelity to the common good. These are the values that make John Sweeney who he is; values at the heart of a labor movement that has helped build the world’s greatest middle class.

With that in mind, here’s some of who he was and is, thanks to Discover The Networks:

In 1960 Sweeney was hired as a contract director for New York City Local 32B of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), where he worked his way up to President and led two citywide strikes of apartment maintenance workers.

In 1980 Sweeney was elected President of SEIU International. While being paid for this full-time job, he continued to receive paychecks from the New York City local union. These payments from his former local, some adding up to $80,000 a year, continued until 1995 when Sweeney’s “double-dipping” became an issue in his successful run that year for the presidency of the AFL-CIO.

During his 1995 AFL-CIO campaign, Sweeney had a spokesman announce that he would no longer take money from his former local New York union because Sweeney had “decided both the amount of time he was spending with the local and the amount of money he was receiving was inappropriate.” Nonetheless, Sweeney never returned any of the “inappropriate” nearly-half-million dollars he had taken from his former union.

And…

According to activist and author Joel Kotkin, a longtime fellow at the Progressive Policy Institute:

“The public-sector unions have pushed the entire labor movement to the left. The [SEIU] has embraced organizations with a New Left origin, such as ACORN and Cleveland’s Nine to Five, and has even set up its own gay and lesbian caucus. … The rise of these unions led to the elevation of SEIU’s boss, John Sweeney, to head of the labor federation. No George Meaney-style bread-and-butter unionist, Sweeney is an advocate of European-style democratic socialism. He has opened the AFL-CIO to participation by delegates openly linked to the Communist Party, which enthusiastically backed his ascent. The U.S. Communist Party [CPUSA] says it is now ‘in complete accord’ with the AFL-CIO’s program. ‘The radical shift in both leadership and policy is a very positive, even historic change,’ wrote CPUSA National Chairman Gus Hall in 1996 after the AFL-CIO convention.”

Sweeney is a card-carrying member of Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), the principal American affiliate of the Socialist International.

Sweeney’s whole career has been dedicated to undermining The Constitution and the tearing down of what we hold dear.  If he cannot be labeled an actual traitor, he most certainly is, without doubt, a moral traitor to The United States Of America.

I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that the Socialist-In-Chief would give Sweeney a medal, after all, rat bastards take care of each other.  Also, Obama has debased and degraded everything else he has touched since being elected President, so why not this Medal?

That sound you hear, by the way, are the old AFL-CIO leaders who threw the Communists out of their unions rolling over in their graves.