Comcast takes action against Tom Bennett's hate-speech
Friday, July 06, 2007 Time: 5:18 PM
There have been some interesting developments in the crusade to remove Tom Bennett's "BigT's Talk and Variety Show" from the airwaves.
For those who don't know, Tom Bennett is a host of one of the most disgusting shows on Comcast local public access, The BigT's Talk and Variety show. The show is a favorite among the lowest of our community in Danbury: hate-mongers, xenophobes and several elected officials who are choose to express their bigotry in private.
For some time, Bennett and co-hosts John McGowan (Vice President of Elise Marciano's local anti-immigration group) and a coward, who too afraid to rant in front of the camera, that goes by the name "Bones", have repeatedly violated the rules and regulations set forth by Comcast. Using profanity, highly sexual explicit language, and racial slurs, Bennett uses his show as an outlet to promote hate-speech and bigotry against immigrants, minorities, and homosexuals.
Most recently, besides issuing a slew of racial slurs and threats against yours truly, in what could quite possibly be a criminal act, Bennett and his co-hosts repeatedly called upon residents in Danbury to go out into the streets and to assassinate members of the immigrant community.
As outrage over Bennett's hate-filled behavior mounted, we here at HatCityBLOG and as well as members of the YouTube community who know of Bennett from his online videos, led the way in requesting Comcast to take action against Bennett's outlandish behavior and terminate his contract. Letters and calls flowed into Comcast public access coordinator Dave King's office and most recently, I made an appeal to the members of the cable advisory board to also take action and terminate Bennett's contract
It seems like Comcast is beginning to get the message that the disgusting behavior from Bennett, McGowan, and "Bones" will not be tolerated.
After presenting my evidence of Bennett's outrageous behavior to the cable advisory board, the members of the committee ruled to label Bennett's show as an "adult program" and advised the member representing Comcast to move the show from it's current slot of 9-10 P.M. to 10-11 P.M. This is rather significant because since the employees of Comcast leave the building at 10 P.M., it would require Bennett to tape his program thus forcing him to change the format of his show, which in it's current state is a live program.
Does this mean we're going to stop in our demand that Bennett be removed from the airwaves? To put it simple...HELL NO! In fact, light of the recent events, and legal advice, we're going to continue to take the necessary steps to make sure that Bennett, McGowan, and "Bones" are held accountable for their language, disgusting behavior, and calls for violence.
Of course, none of this would have been possible without the outpouring of support from the readers of this site as well as members of YouTube. THANK YOU to all who help make holding Bennett's show accountable a reality and stay tuned for the next call of action.
Christine Stuart at CTNewsJunkie is reporting that State Rep. Jim Shapiro, D-Stamford has decided not to throw his hat into the 4th CD race against Congressman Chris Shays.
Shapiro's decision allows Jim Himes to focus his attention (and money) on defeating Shays without the prospect of the Democratic Primary, which is a always a good thing.
What do you think? Did Shapiro do the right thing by not entering the race? Go over to sister site My Left Nutmeg and take the poll.
Congressman Chris Murphy will be paying a visit to Danbury tomorrow to shake hands with residents at Super Food Mart, 1 Padanaram Road, between 1:30pm – 3pm. Unfortunately, I missed his earlier appearance this week at Candlewood Lake but hopefully, I'll be able to interview him tomorrow.
State Senator and Republican challenger David Cappiello's campaign website just went live recently. Not much there yet but a sign-up sheet but it's something.
I know that the 2Q reports have come out so I'll get the campaign fund raising figures and get back to everyone later.
UPDATE: A reader caught this when entering their personal info on Cappiello's site.
Committee to Elect DAVID CAPPIELLO CONGRESS, Mary Saracino Treasurer
Nice to see that Mary has so much free time on her hands as a member of the Common Council as well as Treasurer for Cappiello.
From Channel 24 (FINALLY), here's video footage of July's Common Council meeting from beginning to end (runtime: aprox. 1:16 min).
We're in the process of creating a special section of HatCityBLOG which will be devoted to the archives of Danbury Live, D-TV, and the complete HatCityBLOG video/audio library dating back to July 2005. As you can imagine, this will be a very difficult project and will probably be a work in progress for some time (there's hundreds of hours of footage to process) but we feel that it's important that you see you're elected officials in action BEFORE video footage was made available to the public...the difference in quite striking.
Finally, when you watch this footage, PLEASE keep one thing in mind. 99.9 percent of the events you see during a Common Council meeting is just for show. Most of the stuff you see is already decided upon during the Republican and Democratic caucus (i.e., how quickly things are referred to an ad-hoc committee, items on consent). Although this meeting on Channel 24 is a good step, it's far from the complete vision that was requested some time ago. Remember, what was asked is that ALL local government meetings be televised (and who gives a rats ass if it's live or not, just as long as it's recorded and played on Channel 24).
In other words, in terms of things that happen Common Council, the AD-HOC committee meetings MUST be videotaped and hopefully the crew at Danbury Live will pick up the slack where City Hall is still dropping the ball. Watch what goes on in Ad-Hoc, and you'll get a better understanding on the inner workings of the city and why local politics is a complete joke.
...and don't get me started on the board of education (NEWSFLASH: education probably gets the biggest slice of city's budget so it might be in your best interest to know how your taxpayer's money is being used).
Note to Ted: It would help if you don't WALK AWAY FROM THE CAMERA when doing a live broadcast. When people are at home watching the program and the camera is pointed to the wrong person OR THE FLOOR when someone speaks, it gives the impression that you're not taking the job seriously.
If you need help, I know of a couple of kids enrolled in the Audio/Video at Danbury High who can give you some pointers (but, you'll have to pick them up from school as they're too young to drive).
Sorry for the slow posts but I'm dealing with a great deal of information that readers are sending me.
Remember, if you have any tips or rumors that you would like the HatCityBLOG team in investigate, email me at hatcityblog@yahoo.com and I'll get the crew to look into it.
I'm going down to City Hall to watch this month's Common Council meeting. If you want to watch a viewing on the Common Council floor, tune into Channel 24 and watch you're taxpayer money go down the tubes. A guess the "so-called" camera man is so busy promoting the Mayor's crap on THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT CHANNEL (the laughable "Live with Mayor Boughton show", the over-hyped 311 phoneline, new police station), that he somehow forgot to MAN THE FREAKING CAMERA DURING THE LIVE BROADCAST!
You're doing a heck of a job Teddy...a heck of a job!
We'll have to keep the lid on this story until things unfold but lets just say that some bloggers have a great deal of learning to do when it comes to slandering people and making statements that they can't prove...and there is a possibility that they're going to learn things the hard way pretty soon.
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I'll come back to these two points and why a certain blogger might be in a bit of legal trouble for attacking the wrong person.
Xenophobe Marciano couple gets the double smackdown
Monday, July 02, 2007 Time: 1:35 PM
Seems like the Queen xenophobe, Elise "deer in headlights" Marciano and her sidekick "Curious" George were slammed pretty well in yesterday's News-Times LTTE.
I appreciated your June 26 editorial on illegal immigrants for finally saying in print what the letter writers who shout for "arrest and deport" and "don't hire them" never stop to consider: It is physically impossible to remove 12 million people and they are not going to go back home no matter what.
[...]
I was disturbed by your choice to outline the June 26 letter from Gregory Marciano and grace it with a political cartoon. Anyone who bemoans the fact that few came out to rally around the recognition of the murder of 14,000 to 46,000 Americans "who were killed by illegal aliens since Sept. 11" is moving close to the racial rhetoric of the Ku Klux Klan. (I was born and raised in the deep South before civil rights).
Next up to bat (and knocks it out of the park), Jean Hislop.
Gregory Marciano (letter, June 26) is angry with members of the interfaith community for not attending the "prayer" vigil held by his anti-immigrant group on June 23.
He's angry with members of Stop the Raids for not being there. He's angry with the community of Danbury for not coming out.
I believe he is angry at the simple fact that the people he's mentioned and the residents of Danbury have seen through the thin veneer of "spiritual" concern painted over very "unspiritual" hatred of immigrants.
Residents of Danbury, members of the interfaith community and activists are well aware of the xenophobia and racism which sits at the root of the diatribes, which he and other anti-immigrant zealots espouse.
We clearly see through the fear mongering they engage in. Linking the atrocities of Sept. 11 to illegal immigration being just one of those tactics.
I'd like to remind Mr. Marciano that the pilots who flew the planes into the World Trade Center that horrible day all had been issued visas. And while all cultures and groups have their bad apples, clearly, the idea of trying to tar and feather all immigrants with the same brush is clear and evident stereotyping.
This is something that most faith traditions and common sense warn us against. I, like many of my fellow Danburians, believe in a higher power who loves all people. Apparently, Mr. Marciano does not feel the same. But we'll continue to pray for him regardless.
04.25.22 (RADIO): WSHU Latino group call on Connecticut lawmakers to open a Danbury charter school
06.03.22 (OP-ED): KUSHNER: "Career Academy ‘a great deal for Danbury"
On September 26, 2007, ten plaintiffs filed suit in response to an arrest of aday laborers at a public park in Danbury, Connecticut. Plaintiffs amended their complaint on November 26, 2007.
The amended complaint states that plaintiffs sought to remedy the continued discriminatory and unauthorized enforcement of federal immigration laws against the Latino residents of the City of Danbury by Danbury's mayor and its police department.
Plaintiffs allege that the arrests violated their Fourth Amendment rights and the Connecticut Constitution because defendants conducted the arrests without valid warrants, in the absence of exigent circumstances, and without probable cause to believe that plaintiffs were engaged in unlawful activity. In addition, plaintiffs allege that defendants improperly stopped, detained, investigated, searched and arrested plaintiffs. Plaintiffs also allege that defendants violated their Fourteenth Amendment rights when they intentionally targeted plaintiffs, and arrested and detained them on the basis of their race, ethnicity and perceived national origin. Plaintiffs raise First Amendment, Due Process and tort claims.
Plaintiffs request declaratory relief, damages and attorneys fees.
There have been some interesting developments in the crusade to remove Tom Bennett's "BigT's Talk and Variety Show" from the airwaves.
On September 26, 2007, ten plaintiffs filed suit in response to an arrest of aday laborers at a public park in Danbury, Connecticut. Plaintiffs amended their complaint on November 26, 2007.
