(Since I'm going to be doing work around the house this weekend, I decided to take a small break from blogging and give newcomers to the site a little flashback.

Originally posted on March 26, 2006, here's video footage of Joe DaSilva in his first interview after becoming the new chairman of the Democratic Town Committee. Take note of DaSilva's critiques of Mayor Boughton during the interview and notice how many of the topics haven't changed that much in the last year and a half. Also pay close attention to DaSilva's comment regarding the BRT development and the SEVEN YEAR TAX DEFFERAL).

On Thursday night, Joe DaSilva, the newly elected head of the Democratic Town Committee, gave his first public interview since the Democratic primary. On the public access show "Ideas at Work and Beyond" DaSilva addressed a wide range of questions regarding the major issues in Danbury and had some very pointed comments about Mayor Mark Boughton.


To play any of the video segments, click on the play button. Also, this is a new video service so if you experience playback problems, hit pause and allow your computer time to upload the video stream.




1. Joe DaSilva addresses the new bond packages in Danbury and the BRT development on Kennedy Road.


2. Joe DaSilva continues his discussion on the BRT development on Kennedy Road.


3. Joe DaSilva addresses Mayor Mark Boughton and the illegal immigration issue.


4. Joe DaSilva addresses the police contract dispute.


5. Joe DaSilva and Eileen Coladarci discuss the recent developments surrounding the Robert's Avenue School project.

I guess this construction company can do no wrong...

As promised, here's my brief report on last week's Lebanese Festival "Mahrajan."

Being that this was my first Lebanese Festival, I was surprised with the turnout as the evening progressed. Held at St. Anthony’s Maronite Church on Granville Ave., the festival was so well attended, that it was necessary to bus people in from different locations (due to the limited parking on the street).

As with most festivals I make it a case to try out the food and if you never tasted Lebanese food, I encourage you to do so ASAP. I started with a simple Keftaburger (seasoned lamb with ground beef) but later stepped up to the plate and order a platter of lamb on rice with fattouch salad and hommus. Overall, it was a great meal as well as very healthy, and it reminded me how much I loved the food at the Sesame Seed Restaurant.

With it being campaign season, the local politicians were out in force. For the exception of Pauline Basso (who left at 5:30), unlike at the Italian festival, I noticed a couple Republicans were in attendance right at the peak time when most people were flooding into the grounds. Those in attendance included Treasurer Dan Jowdy, Mary Teicholtz, and Mayor Boughton (who arrived about 6:00 P.M).





The Democratic candidates were also in attendance as Lori Kaback and Master of ceremony, and Minority Leader Tom Saadi (with Democratic candidate for Treasurer Brian Cotter) shaking hands with just about every person at the festival. Also walking the grounds while I was there were Common Council candidates Christine Halfar, Warren Levy, John Esposito, Ben Chianese, as well as mayoral candidate Helena Abrantes and City Clerk Jean Natale's nightmare, candidate Eileen Coladarci.











When it came to visibility, Kaback clearly came out as the winner with just about a great deal of people walking around with Kaback stickers. Jowdy grabs the prize for best visibility placement with the placement of his lawn signs in front of the church right in the eyesight of those boarding and exiting the buses (smart move).










Anyway, this festival isn't about politics, it's about a celebration of heritage and on that note, here's my small video report on the event.



You can view the photos from the event by clicking here.

You can't make this stuff up folks.

On the August 21 edition of CNN's The Situation Room, White House correspondent Suzanne Malveaux showed a video clip of President Bush's denial that the federal government has plans for a "North American Union" or a North American superhighway that would link Canada, Mexico, and the United States, despite what Bush said "people are talking on TV about." Malveaux said Bush's denial followed "a lot of talk in the blogosphere and conspiracy theorists." Malveaux did not note that CNN's own Lou Dobbs, on whose show Malveaux regularly provides news reports, has repeatedly hyped the possibility of a North American Union. According to a search of the Nexis database, the North American Union has been mentioned on 53 broadcasts of Lou Dobbs' programs (Lou Dobbs Tonight and Lou Dobbs This Week)* -- 21 of which included Malveaux herself.** During a Malveaux report just the day before -- on the August 20 edition of Lou Dobbs Tonight -- on-screen text read: "Critics say SPP [Security & Prosperity Partnership] an Attempt to Create a N. Amer. Union."

I don't have the heart to post the details or video clips so go over to Media Matters for the details.

Once again, hello to those who came to this site from today's editorial in the Fairfield Weekly. Feel free to watch vintage clips of Tom Bennett's call to kill immigrants on thei right-hand side of this site.

Coming on the heels of Tom Bennett quitting his hate-speech BigT's Talk and Variety Show, in response to comments made by Elise Marciano's anti-immigrant organization Vice President John McGowan, The Fairfield Weekly releases an old-fashion bitch-slap of an editorial.

"The spook is not going to take me out without me going out in glory."

Those were fighting words from Danbury public access host Tom Bennett towards Al Robinson, the African-American blogger who led a crusade to convince Comcast to boot his Big T's Talk and Variety Show for, among other things, ethnic slurs and calls for viewers to shoot illegal immigrants.

[...]

Its final episode aired Friday night and Bennett wasn't there. In his place, sidekick John McGowan muttered about First Amendment rights.

"It seems that the blogger got his way," McGowan said. "Comcast caved in and invaded his freedom of speech rights." McGowan commemorated the end of the show with one last round of gibberish, claiming that Robinson was in league with the Weekly, is trying to shut down the comment boards at the Danbury News-Times' site and that the blogger may have been paid by the gummint to attack Bennett's show.

"I think John McGowan should be providing plots for the next Oliver Stone movie," said Robinson.

"They had one last chance to realize they had done wrong and apologize to the community." he added. "Instead they continued this smear campaign."

Series finales usually end with some milestone for the main characters—Hawkeye leaves the MASH unit or Dr. Richard Kimble catches up with the One-Armed Man. This one was no different: McGowan, vice president of the local U.S. Citizens for Immigration Law Enforcement, announced his candidacy for the mayor of Danbury. He'll run under the Constitution Party where he will once again be among hacks and losers.

Ouch...that was good.

Now that I've completed editing the video, I can present my report from the Danbury prayer vigil.

A crowd of about 70 people joined a group of clergy members and lay speakers (representing a wide spectrum of different religions across the Danbury area) came together at Kennedy Park on Sunday August 12th for a gathering of reflection, musical celebration, and prayer. The purpose of the prayer vigil was to show respect and dignity to members of the immigrant community who've been persecuted, harassed, and discriminated against in recent years.

As evident by comments by such notables as Tom Bennett, local anti-immigrant group President Elise "deer in headlights" Marciano and her band of goons, and bigots who hide behind such notable names as "Voice of Reason" and "AMERICA FIRST" on the News-Times board, the level of intolerance is reaching a boiling point in Danbury. With incidents of anti-immigrant fanatics shouting racial slurs and harassing people in Danbury on the rise, organizers Rev. Gail Keeney-Mulligan, of St. John's Episcopal Church, and Jean Hislop felt that it necessary to assemble a vigil and speak out against intolerance.

The message of the event was two fold, one was to respect and love one another, and the other was to speak out against intolerance and make sure that those in political office hear your message. As an individual who has attended just about every immigrant-related event in Danbury, I can honestly say that this event was one of the most uplifting events to date with each member of the clergy offering one insightful message after another.

After the prayer service, I caught up with Hislop and Rev. Keeney-Mulligan to get their views on the vigil.



Of course, as with most immigrant-supporting moments, the event couldn't go without members of Marciano's group making an complete ass of themselves.

Taking a quote from the our favorite deer, it was very "telling" that NO ONE from Elise Marciano's group came down and attended the religious ceremony opting instead of showing their real intentions.


One anti-immigrant member did his usual holding of the protest sign and was basically harmless and ignored by the most people who walked up and down Main Street. After about a half an hour of getting NO response from anyone, he rolled up his tired sign, put his tail between his legs, and walked away.



Although the trusty sign holder acted with common sense, one stupid anti-immigrant nutjob did the unthinkable...harass those in attendance, yelled, shouted, disrupt the vigil.

The Stop the Raids blog recalled the incident with Danbury's version of "Ugly Betty"

The event was not even marred slightly by the few anti immigrant protesters who found their way down to the site of the Vigil, intent on creating disruption. One man held up a sign that said "Immigrants have no rights" and another member of CTIC showed up and started loudly complaining. The man with the sign stood at a respectful distance, perhaps realizing that disrupting a religious assembly would be a very unintelligent move. The woman was quickly reminded of that, and left shortly.

Now a portion of this post is not entirely accurate because I went up and talked to this jerk who was stupid enough to disrupt a religious ceremony in front of the media.

After harassing anti-immigrant target Lynn Taborsak for several minutes, the local dumb-dumb was repeatedly reminded by several people around her that she was in the middle of a religious ceremony and was ask politely to quiet down. After several attempts to get her to do the right thing, I focused my camcorder on the tripod at the vigil, grabbed my camera, and made my way to this moron and asked her how could she be so insensitive and disrupt a religious vigil.

After hearing her anti-immigration rant, I cut her off and reminded her that A.) I have a camera, B.) she's really making herself look bad in front of me and C.) I'm taking a note of her outrageous behavior. At that point, realizing who I was she quieted down and didn't have that much more to say. Convinced that I encountered that the first person on the planet with one less chromosome than every other human being, I shook my head in dismay as she wobbled away.

Enough of the local dolts...

Overall, the vigil was peaceful and quite encouraging sign of solidarity. Hopefully, this will not the last of these types of events as it was received positively in the community.

Due to the length of the vigil, I had to cut the video into two portions. You can watch part one by clicking here and part two by clicking here.

For those who don't want to watch the entire vigil, below is a video highlight of the event.

Sorry for the lack of posts today. I'm up to my neck in raw video that needs to be edited and uploaded and I'm at a point where I really can't post on the things I want to talk about until I finish processing the videos.

I know I said I was going to follow-up on the bridge on Padanaram Rd, report on recent festivals and the Danbury prayer vigil, follow-up on the Elmer's Diner disaster, as well as a host of other things but I'm at a point where I have to get this video editing out of the way.

Be back soon...

Congressman Chris Murphy is making the best use of his August recess by reporting on his progress with the public.

Making the rounds of the Sunday political shows, Congressman Murphy made an appearance on Connecticut Newsmaker's to talk about some of the major issues being debated in Congress.

Yesterday afternoon, I attended the Lebanese Festival "Mahrajan" at St. Anthony’s Maronite Church on Granville Ave.

I did the usual thing and took photographs and captured video footage and I'll provide a full report on the festival at a later time.

A big thanks goes out to the people at the festival who either knew about, or congratulated me on my site. As I promised to those who thanked me yesterday, I'll provide a link to all the photographs I shot yesterday and you'll be able to download and print for yourselves.

The feedback to the developments in Tom Bennett's "Big T's Talk and Variety Show" has been coming in fast throughout the internet and across Fairfield County.

Of the different posts on Bennett, I think my favorite coffee drinker said it best over at Connecticut Local Politics.

CTBlogger has been blogging about Tom Bennet on HatCityBLOG for awhile now. You can view clips from the show on his site. I’ve watched a few of them and I still can’t quite believe Bennett hasn’t been pulled off the air. Obviously this video contains offensive content.

This is a perfect example of how important local blogging is. Without the pressure from CTBlogger nothing would have been done about Bennet’s using the public airwaves to spread hate. Now baby steps are finally being taken and if I’ve learned anything about CTBlogger I know that he won’t rest until Bennett’s show is pulled for good.

You're damn right. Bennett outlandish behavior has been well known to most people in Danbury for years. Supporters of Bennett include high ranking elected-officials, members of the local anti-immigrant group (co-host John McGowan is the Vice President of the organization), and other local access show hosts and all where well aware that Bennett crossed the line several times on his show (all of whom should be ashamed of themselves and have a great deal of explaining to do).

The clips I provided on this site represent an EXTREMELY small portion of the offensive material that went overlooked by supporters of Bennett.

While I promised that I'll respond to some of the outrageous comments from supporters of Bennett who called into Big T's last show, here's a list of comments from around the internet on Bennett's disgusting behavior.

That’s pretty unbelievable - blatantly using a racial slur to describe a critic and speculating about whether he is diseased… It will be a good day when this guy no longer has a megaphone!

[...]

Wow - All this guy needs to do is replace the baseball cap with a hood and he’d fit right in with all the Klansmen who probably make up the majority of his supporters. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black - he’s the one living in his own little diseased, warped world. Carry on, CTBlogger! Nothing makes cockroaches run like shining a light on them!

[...]

Jeez, who would watch this show? I’ve also been following this for a while and it is amazing that he’s still on the air.

Good for CTBlogger for kicking his butt.

[...]

If it were just on the internet, it’d be another thing, but for Comcast to allow that kind of hate speech to brought in to people’s homes?


[...]

I am torn. I am a firm believer in free speech. However, I also believe in the worth of all human beings. The best thing to do with this guy is TURN HIM OFF.

[...]

I live in Derby and I volunteer for the Thompson Campaign. From the start Mr. Thompson who is black has been taunted by bloggers writing as Derby Conservative and Connecticut’s smallest city. Even though the Derby Conservative ( and we know who he is) took down his blog after Mr. Thompson personally contacted the bloggers employer about using company computers to spread racist remarks, he still continues to lurk about town and on other blogs. The campaign has copies of all post daily that are racial in nature and will use them if need be. We also have the Derby Conservatives postings saved as well. The bloggers who exposed this idiot in Danbury should be proud but I wan to make people aware that the Derby Conservative has engaged and still engages in racist, sexist and ethnic insults. My point is that this type of garbage needs to be exposed no matter who it comes from. Thank you to the non-bigots in Derby who have welcomed Mr. Thompson’s candidacy even though the bigots in town ( and we have many) have not.

[...]

Way to go, ctblogger! Glad to see Fairfield County Weekly pick up the story too.
WHOOIE! Ctblogger's done a GREAT job with the documentation.. keep up the good work!

now hopefully Comcast will step up to the plate and do the right thing.

[...]

Wow! This is great work. I've never had Comcast so I've never seen this particular idiot before. I kept hoping he'd have an aneurism before the end of the video. It must be hard living with so much hate. I'm writing my letters to Comcast and FCW now..

[...]

What's the name of his female counterpart? Every once in a blue moon I'll see her on the telly when visiting friends in Danbury.. she's always holding her hands up in exasperation screaming "IMMMIGRANTZZZ!!"

she's this crazy little old lady, reminds me of my grandmother after she lost it, only this one is MEAN.

[...]

Fairfield County Weekly rocks! As usual, the FCW delivers great local reporting. I only wish it were the Fairfield County Daily!

Great work, ctblogger.

Word of the developments in Bennett's case has spread to the YouTube community. You see, Bennett also has quite a following of critics on YouTube who view his home-made videos on the site and they've been following this case with great interest. One particular YouTuber, who goes by the user name PaganWolf02, contacted me about 10 months ago after noticing an earlier post I did on Bennett's show. He's been involved in a bitter back and forth online exchange with Bennett over remarks Tom made about homosexuality (one of his favorite topics). You can watch his reaction to Bennett's retirement announcement by clicking here.

There are some other rather explosive developments in the works, which might include this site being picked up by a national monitoring organization but I've been told under advisement not to discuss any details at this time.