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Beirut boom kills another anti-Syrian lawmaker
Today's Headlines
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Page 4: Opinion
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-Lurid Crime Tales-
Video: New Yorkers Flunk 9/11 Quiz While the Aussies Laugh...
Posted by: Atomic Conspiracy || 06/14/2007 15:01 || Comments || Link || [6 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Surprises me not one bit...
Posted by: tu3031 || 06/14/2007 15:12 Comments || Top||

#2  They were all registered democrats.
Posted by: wxjames || 06/14/2007 16:02 Comments || Top||

#3  Nearly 6 years of the MSM and their Dhimmicrat bankrollers. This was their desired result - they've succeeded marvelously. All things remaining the same, we may yet win this war but we will surely fail as a sovereign nation.
Posted by: Rex Mundi || 06/14/2007 16:22 Comments || Top||

#4  I guess when the next major terror attack hits NY they might get their heads out of their asses and start paying attention. It's hard to feel too sorry for dipshits like this.
Posted by: bigjim-ky || 06/14/2007 20:15 Comments || Top||

#5  These people are morons but for all we know they interviewed ten thousand people and chose the handful of total morons because it's funnier.
Posted by: rjschwarz || 06/14/2007 20:20 Comments || Top||

#6  Who needs revisionism when sheer stupidity will suffice?
Posted by: Zenster || 06/14/2007 23:43 Comments || Top||


A story of a journalistic con artist
H/T to John Podhoretz at The Corner
Joke is on the journalists! Long, well written and a fun read
For four years, Elizabeth Albanese turned one of the most important journalism awards in the Southwest into her own myth-making machine, transforming herself from an obscure and ordinary business writer into the brightest star of the Dallas Press Club. Concocting a series of elaborate stories to hide her deception, Albanese rigged the Katie Awards to win 10 prizes over three years, fooling the working reporters and public relations pros who presided over the contest and counted themselves as her friends. It took a part-time journalist, who uncovered her reckless use of a press club credit card, to unravel Albanese's weird little web. That discovery led to a more important one: For at least three years Albanese had been randomly picking the award winners herself, with all the care and precision of a kid tossing nickels into a fountain.

In the grander scheme of things, Albanese was just a small-time scammer. She didn't kill anyone or steal money from a school district or bribe elected officials. The most ironic thing about her con is who she conned.

Journalists, at their most self-congratulatory, consider themselves watchdogs of the powerful. It is their job to root out corruption and collusion, to sniff out the crooks and the scoundrels. But in this case, Albanese fooled them all and, in the process, may have taken down what was once an influential institution.

Posted by: Sherry || 06/14/2007 13:23 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  My, what a lovely resume, Elizabeth. Shows initiative, daring...and I see you've won multiple Katie Awards.
I'm impressed beyond words. When can you start?
Posted by: Pinchy Sulzberger || 06/14/2007 14:40 Comments || Top||

#2  "journalistic con artist"

Redundant.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 06/14/2007 18:12 Comments || Top||


Norway: Food writer boils crabs, charged with animal cruelty
Aftenposten's food writer Yngve Ekern has been charged with animal cruelty by animal rights group NOAH after an article about cooking crabs. The case against Ekern has been dismissed and instead referred to the Conciliation Board, reports trade newspaper Journalisten on its web site, but there will be repercussions.
'Conciliation' between a food critic and animal rights terrorists? That should be entertaining.
Ekern angered animal activists with his description of preparing crabs on the beach while his children were watching. He described throwing the crabs into hot oil after bashing them on a cutting board, a process that didn't kill all of them.
Anesthetic ruins the taste, too.
The article also outlined how to boil crabs, and included recipes. "Showing how to boil living crabs is encouraging law-breaking. Crabs are also covered by the Animal Protection Act, and animals shall not be exposed to pain," NOAH leader Siri Martinsen told Journalisten.no.
Crabs are haram, too, so get with the program, infidel food writer.
"It is highly probable that crabs have the ability to feel pain. We know too little about it and the animals should get the benefit of the doubt," she said.
Whatever he says the doubt is. Wouldn't do to have someone else figure out the benefit of the doubt.
Onions have feelings, too.
Ekern was saddened by the charges and will meet NOAH at the Conciliation Board on Monday. "I think on should turn up and hear what NOAH has to say, and I am especially looking forward to hearing an alternative method of boiling succulent crabs, because they are traditionally boiled alive," Ekern said.
They start to spoil as soon as they've croaked. But Mr. NOAH's prob'ly never boiled a crab. He's probably been too busy abusing onions and making them cry.
Senior researcher Stein Martinsen at the Institute of Marine Research does not have good news for NOAH. "It is difficult to kill shellfish in other ways than boiling.
If you shoot them, they splatter all over the place. And crabs got no necks, so you can't hang 'em.
"I know some who hack lobsters in two, but they have a tiny brain that is not so easy to hit," Martinsen said. Personally, he lets the crabs get very cold before boiling them. "They get practically anesthetized lying in the refrigerator. If you then make sure that the water is boiling, it goes quickly," Martinsen said.
And they're delicious.
If you don't chill them, the little bougers will crawl out of the basket and romp all over your kitchen floor, terrifying the children and the cat. Trust me on this.
Norway's Food Safety Authority will establish a committee to examine the question of what crabs can feel during the boiling.
They'll be looking for several volunteers with tiny brains.
Ask NOAH.
Posted by: mrp || 06/14/2007 08:58 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  If more animal rights activists were boiled in oil, this would be less of a problem. Maybe the writer needs to do some investigation of these people, after all, we have PETA here in the US slaughtering thousands of animals in their 'no kill' shelters.
Posted by: Silentbrick || 06/14/2007 11:52 Comments || Top||

#2  I don't doubt the critters feel pain. It does not give me joy to inflict it on them (since I am not an Islamofascist jihadi), but they taste good. I have the benefit of being higher than they are on the food chain - at least while I am living, but if my dead body lands in the sea they'll be above me.
Posted by: Glenmore || 06/14/2007 13:10 Comments || Top||

#3  Norway's Food Safety Authority will establish a committee to examine the question of what crabs can feel during the boiling.

Looks like a job for...The Crab Whisperer!
Posted by: tu3031 || 06/14/2007 13:13 Comments || Top||

#4  Crawfish are a lot like crabs, and they try real hard to get out of the boiling pot (for a few seconds), but so far I don't see the Louisiana authorities prosecuting crawfish boiling as animal cruelty.
Cockroaches are also kin to crabs - do Norwegians risk getting arrested for stomping on them?
Posted by: Glenmore || 06/14/2007 13:16 Comments || Top||

#5  Needs a better headline. How about "Animal Rights Group Steamed Over Boiled Crabs"?
Posted by: Mike || 06/14/2007 14:35 Comments || Top||

#6  All of this was covered rather succinctly during an interview with a Maine lobsterman regarding whether lobsters feel any pain during the cooking process. His basic response was that, were the tables turned, lobsters wouldn't have the least compunctions about scarfing us down the instant they could latch a pincher onto our still-warm bodies.

These PETA morons seemingly fail to grasp that the miracle of life is that it relies upon death. In order to obtain nutrition, something's gotta die, be it crustaceans, plants, animals, mollusks, micro-organisms, fungi or the odd insect. If nothing died, this planet would be overrun in a matter of weeks. It's up to us right thinking humans to keep snuffing the competition in order that we maintain our position atop the food chain.

Causing needless suffering is and should be a bad thing. Worrying about the feelings of every last damned microbe on earth is flat-out STUPID. Lobbing crabs into some hot oil is a dandy way to perform a final quality spot check. If they don't skitter about for a few seconds, maybe they weren't such healthy specimens after all.
Posted by: Zenster || 06/14/2007 15:04 Comments || Top||

#7  Well said, Zenster! :-)
Posted by: trailing wife || 06/14/2007 16:17 Comments || Top||

#8  zenster

Although the 'life relies on death' trope has a bit of truth to it in a general sense, it is not specifically true that eating relies on death.

It is possible to live on a diet of fruit, nuts, milk, soybean products and non-root vegetables. It's not a fun diet and probably requires some monitoring to avoid specific deficiencies, but it is possible.
Posted by: mhw || 06/14/2007 16:47 Comments || Top||

#9  #8: "it is not specifically true that eating relies on death. It is possible to live on a diet of fruit, nuts, milk, soybean products and non-root vegetables."

All of which cease to exist (DIE) when you eat them.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 06/14/2007 18:16 Comments || Top||

#10  fruit, nuts, soybean
Jeeze what a ghoul. That's eating plant fetuses.
Posted by: ed || 06/14/2007 18:40 Comments || Top||

#11  I think Fred's Inspector Legume might object...
Posted by: Frank G || 06/14/2007 20:18 Comments || Top||

#12  Barb S.

fruit and nuts are not considered "living" by most biologists; the tree they come from is living; as ed implies, they have the potential for germination

as for milk, I don't think anyone would call it living



Posted by: mhw || 06/14/2007 20:37 Comments || Top||

#13  ... it is not specifically true that eating relies on death. ... It is possible to live on a diet of fruit, nuts, milk, soybean products and non-root vegetables.

To use a food-related term, HORSERADISH! Need I point out that this world's concentrated population centers make hunter-gatherer survival obsolete to all but a small percentage of this earth's people? Bulk agriculture of the sort needed to yield population supporting harvests require that the soybean, corn, tomato and wheat plants be killed after harvest. Your exceedingly rosy scenario simply no longer applies. No, we need not kill cows right after milking them, but unless you are maintaining your own dairy herd, you'd better believe that non-producing dairy cattle are ground up for pet food the instant a teat runs dry. Same goes for fruit trees, once they stop bearing a crop, they're uprooted in the time it takes to rev a chainsaw.

You evoke way too much of the noble savage myth. Our world's population requires the fast turn of crops and food stocks that no longer grants us the luxury of low impact harvesting. While this in no way justifies environmental rape, it certainly precludes the level of sensitivity you evoke.
Posted by: Zenster || 06/14/2007 20:39 Comments || Top||


Judge Seeks Millions for Lost Pants
Posted by: BrerRabbit || 06/14/2007 08:43 || Comments || Link || [6 views] Top|| File under:

#1  my son was in the courtroom as a spectator and was later interviewed by a German TV station

this case has gained international attention

prior to this case getting publicity, a bill was moving through the Maryland Legislature to change the contributive negligence law (current law makes it almost impossible to successful sue if the injured party was even slightly responsible for the injury); however, this case ended the possibility of the bill becoming law.
Posted by: mhw || 06/14/2007 20:40 Comments || Top||

#2  Those must have been very, very, very special pants. I've cried over shoes but not pants.

I'd say the judge is just a tad unbalanced here - millions for his Vee-Vee boutique find.
Posted by: Thinemp Whimble || 06/14/2007 20:45 Comments || Top||

#3  I've cried over stray kittens that Mr. Wife wouldn't let me adopt, but not yet over clothing. Not even when the necklace he bought me for our first decade anniversary was stolen... of course the insurance company gave us half its value in recompense (and then raised our rates, darn it!). TANSTAAFL*.

*There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch
Posted by: trailing wife || 06/14/2007 20:50 Comments || Top||

#4  This case exemplifies every worst aspect of our overly litigious society and the frivolous lawsuits it inspires. This asshole should be forced to pay all court and attorney's fees and then laughed out of court. Hysterically, even.
Posted by: Zenster || 06/14/2007 21:12 Comments || Top||

#5  Howja like to have a case of your own in front of this Administrative Judge? Ya think he could be fair and *balanced*?
Posted by: GK || 06/14/2007 22:03 Comments || Top||

#6  this POS should be stripped of his job, his title and pension, and left to earn a real living. I hear Wendy's is hiring people of his qualifications
Posted by: Frank G || 06/14/2007 22:19 Comments || Top||


-Short Attention Span Theater-
XDR-TB attorney to have affected lung portion removed
DENVER (AP) -- An Atlanta attorney will have surgery next month to remove lung tissue infected with extremely drug-resistant tuberculosis, hospital officials said Thursday.

A chance to heal with cold steel, as surgeons like to say. I wish him well & completely cured as a result. Hope we all learn some lessons from this story.
Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 || 06/14/2007 19:15 || Comments || Link || [3 views] Top|| File under:

#1  If the CDC recalls some critical lessons about mandatory quarantine, that would be nice, too. That father-in-law of his should be sent off for re-education.
Posted by: trailing wife || 06/14/2007 23:38 Comments || Top||


Join the Power Rangers Japan Maritime Self Defense Force!
The Japan Japan Maritime Self Defense Force continues its "proud" tradition of incomprehensibly goofy recruiting ads. This isn't quite as bizzare as the "Village People 'In the Navy' Dance" commercial from a few years ago, but I have no doubt that, somewhere in the afterlife, Fleet Admirals Yamamoto Isoroku and Tôgô Heihachirô are weeping bitter tears of despondency over the fate of the once-proud Imperial Navy.
Posted by: Mike || 06/14/2007 14:24 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:


Ghost town for sale, cheap!
Posted by: Mike || 06/14/2007 12:50 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:


Grand opera
A mild-mannered cell phone salesman appears on the British version of American Idol and sings operatic tenor.

Apropos of nothing except that the man can really sing.

Go listen. It rocks.
Posted by: Mike || 06/14/2007 11:48 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


India-Pakistan
Ahmadi woman's body exhumed
The body of a 60-year-old Ahmadi woman in Khuda Abad village, in Badin district of Sindh, was exhumed from a Muslim-Ahmadi graveyard after local clerics protested against the burial. Daily Times learnt that her body was exhumed and reburied in a local Ahmadi graveyard on June 8 in the presence of district police.

Bamby Bibi died on June 5. Her husband Alyas Ahmad passed away eight years before her. Before dying she allegedly declared in her will that she should be buried alongside her husband’s grave in the combined Muslim and Ahamdi graveyard.

Following the burial, local mullahs and some area residents started to protest the burial. They demanded that the Ahmadiyya community dig up the grave and bury the body in their own graveyard. Maulvi Abdulsttar Chawra allegedly led the protest.

Later, the district administration intervened and along with the Badin district nazim constituted a committee to decide the matter. After three days the committee approved the exhumation.

District Police Officer Hafiz Abdulhadi Ballu told Daily Times that the matter had been resolved peacefully and now the atmosphere was not tense at all. He said the Ahamdiyya community had not been able to produce the will of the deceased woman. The district nazim dealt with the issue through a committee and police only implemented the orders, he added.

An Ahmadiyya spokesman from the community’s headquarters in Rabwa strongly condemned the “discriminatory, unjust and inhumane act”. He said just like previous regimes, the present government had failed to protect their rights.
Posted by: Fred || 06/14/2007 00:00 || Comments || Link || [4 views] Top|| File under:

#1  The Paki constitution (read: Koran) says they are a "non Muslim minority." Some "muslims" are more equal than others.
Posted by: McZoid || 06/14/2007 1:21 Comments || Top||

#2  Seething US lawyers and beltway politicians.... yet another missed Supreme Court litigation opportunity. I blame Bush.
Posted by: Besoeker || 06/14/2007 6:09 Comments || Top||

#3  To get a passport in Pakistan one must swear an oath that you consider Ahmadis as non-muslim.
Posted by: John Frum || 06/14/2007 6:37 Comments || Top||

#4  Why would any sane person want to go to Pakistan, John?
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 06/14/2007 18:18 Comments || Top||

#5  Bamby Bibi died on June 5.

Deerly departed, we are gathered here today ...
Posted by: Zenster || 06/14/2007 21:03 Comments || Top||


Christian killed in Landi Kotal
LANDI KOTAL: Unidentified people killed a young Christian here on Tuesday night. Simi Salman, son of Mistri Inayat Masih, was hit in the back of the head with an axe. The killers then threw him in Tatara ground in critical condition. A Khasadar Force official received a phone call at 530am on Wednesday to take Salman to a hospital, but the victim succumbed to his injuries at the emergency ward. Masih told the Khasadar official that his son had brought home groceries in the evening, but had left later in the night and had not returned. The political administration and security agencies are investigating the case.
Posted by: Fred || 06/14/2007 00:00 || Comments || Link || [5 views] Top|| File under:



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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.

Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.

Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has dominated Mexico for six years.
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Meet the Mods
In no particular order...
Steve White
Seafarious
tu3031
badanov
sherry
ryuge
GolfBravoUSMC
Bright Pebbles
trailing wife
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Glenmore
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Two weeks of WOT
Thu 2007-06-14
  Beirut boom kills another anti-Syrian lawmaker
Wed 2007-06-13
  Qaeda emir in Mosul banged
Tue 2007-06-12
  Hamas Captures Fatah Security HQ in Gaza
Mon 2007-06-11
  Gunmen fire on Haniyeh's house in Gaza; no one hurt
Sun 2007-06-10
  Hamas-Fatah festivities renew in S Gaza, only 2 killed
Sat 2007-06-09
  Olmert 'offers Golan Heights in peace deal'
Fri 2007-06-08
  Lebanon Security Forces find 3 car bombs in Bekaa village
Thu 2007-06-07
  HuJi boss Hannan, 5 others to be charged
Wed 2007-06-06
  Kabul to trade Deadullah's carcass for hostages
Tue 2007-06-05
  Terror suspect surrenders in Trinidad
Mon 2007-06-04
  Clashes in Ein el-Hellhole between army and Syrian sock puppets
Sun 2007-06-03
  UAE gives $80 million to Palestinians
Sat 2007-06-02
  Report: Feds arrest 3 in alleged JFK airport plot
Fri 2007-06-01
  Leb army attempts to seize Fateh al-Islam positions inside camp
Thu 2007-05-31
  UNSC approves Hariri court


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