If this is an April Fool's joke, it's a damned elaborate one.
Riot police have taken to the streets of several cities in Mexico to ... defend emo kids?
A series of attacks on dyed-hair, eye-makeup-wearing emo kids began in early March when several hundred people went on an emo-beating rampage in Querétaro, a town of 1.5 million about 160 miles north of Mexico City.
The next week, shaggy-haired emo teenagers were harassed again by punks and rockabillys in the capital, prompting police protection and a segment on the TV news. Most recently, a Mexican newspaper reported that metal heads and gangsters have warned Tijuana's emo kids to stay away from the town's fair next month. . . .
Posted by: Mike ||
04/01/2008 17:01 ||
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Interesting post, Mike. Reminds me of the movie version of "Quadrophenia", where they re-enact riots between mods & rockers in the UK in the '60's. I think the girl from the second clip may be the one who sold me a Fats Domino compilation at Best Buy the other day - haha.
RIVERSIDE, Ohio -- Police say a pastor who was reported missing from his home in western New York has been found at an Ohio strip club. A police officer patrolling the K.C. Lounge parking lot Friday morning in the Dayton suburb of Riverside spotted out-of-state license plates on 46-year-old Craig Rhodenizer's car.
The FBI and New York authorities had been searching for Rhodenizer, who disappeared Wednesday after telling his wife he was getting his computer fixed at Best Buy. He is the pastor of a church in Lyndonville, N.Y. Detective Matt Sturgeon said Rhodenizer was disoriented when confronted by police and said he felt "emotionally guilty."
Posted by: Fred ||
04/01/2008 00:00 ||
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Placed in his current job by what "Witness Protection Program"?
Shouldn't they be staying up north where it's warmer?
The BBC will today screen remarkable footage of penguins flying as part of its new natural history series, Miracles of Evolution.
Camera crews discovered a colony of Adélie penguins while filming on King George Island, some 750 miles south of the Falkland Islands. The programme is being presented by ex-Monty Python star Terry Jones, who said: "We'd been watching the penguins and filming them for days, without a hint of what was to come.
"But then the weather took a turn for the worse. It was quite amazing. Rather than getting together in a huddle to protect themselves from the cold, they did something quite unexpected, that no other penguins can do."
BBC1 viewers will see the penguins not only take flight from the Antarctic wastes, but fly thousands of miles to the Amazonian rainforest to find winter sun. "The film reveals nature's stunning glory in exciting and unexpected ways, so much so that it defies belief," said Mr Jones. "Not only does it create a vivid and emotional experience for the viewer, it also illustrates just how bold and simple Darwin's idea of natural selection was." Click the link for pictures of the new behavior! ;-)
#1
The BBC also had a great segment on the annual harvest of spaghetti tree, with italian farmers starting to prune them from the spaghetti trees and letting them dry in the sun.
Sidd Finch was the subject of the notorious article and April Fools' Day hoax "The Curious Case of Sidd Finch" written by George Plimpton and first published in the April 1, 1985 issue of Sports Illustrated.
Plimpton reported that Hayden "Sidd" (short for Siddhartha) Finch was a rookie baseball pitcher in training with the New York Mets. Finch, who had never played baseball before, was attempting to decide between a sports career and one playing the French horn. What was astonishing about Finch was that he could pitch a fastball at an amazing 168 mph, far above the record of a "mere" 103 mph. He also wore only one shoea heavy hiker's bootwhen pitching.
Finch grew up in an English orphanage and was adopted by an archaeologist who later died in a plane crash in Nepal. After briefly attending Harvard University, he went to Tibet to learn "yogic mastery of mind-body," which was the source of his pitching prowess.
The subhead of the article read: "He's a pitcher, part yogi and part recluse. Impressively liberated from our opulent life-style, Sidd's deciding about yoga and his future in baseball." The first letters of these words (through "yoga") spell out "Happy April Fools Day." Despite this clue and the obvious absurdity of the article, many people believed Finch actually existed. The magazine printed a much smaller article in the following April 8 issue announcing Finch's retirement. It then announced it was a hoax on April 15.
The story was accompanied by photographs of Finch, including one featuring a young Lenny Dykstra and another of Finch talking with the Mets' actual pitching coach, Mel Stottlemyre. The Mets played along with the hoax, even providing a uniform for Joe Berton, a junior high school art teacher from Oak Park, Illinois, who posed as "Finch" for the photographs (usually with his face averted from the lens).
Posted by: Mike ||
04/01/2008 10:10 ||
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Golden Hill, Md. -- Contestant No. 1 sashayed down the catwalk, her hair bouncing in blond curls, and smiled a beauty-queen smile. She picked up a furry dead rodent about the size of a football.
Then she took out a very sharp 4-inch blade and stuck the point in just above the animal's tail. "Then," she said, narrating the incision as sweetly as a Miss America contestant talking about world peace, "you're going to want to take your knife ..."
This was the "talent" portion of the 2008 Miss Outdoors pageant, part of an improbable Eastern Shore festival that combines the worlds of beauty contests and competitive muskrat skinning. For years here, young women have paraded in glittery evening gowns, and then - on the same stage - skinners in camouflage hats have separated small animals from their pelts.
This year, two girls chose to do both.
Their story played out less than 60 miles from Washington, in a place where time is slowly eroding a culture built around the Chesapeake Bay's boot-sucking marshes. These teenagers were afraid that, without their participation, both the pageant and the skinning races might decline even further. So they sought to take on a hybrid role, one foot in their world and one in their grandparents'. In one weekend, they would be both modern princesses and old-time, blood-covered 'rat-skinners.
"You want to take your knuckles," 17-year-old Samantha Phillips, Contestant No. 1, was saying. One of the pageant judges squinched up her face in shock. "And separate the meat from the hide, just like this."
In 2005, when she walked out for the talent portion of the pageant with a muskrat thrown over her shoulder, a man in the audience yelled above the cheers, "I want to marry you!"
"Oh my God!" a boy in the audience yelled, at the sight of a woman in perfect makeup with her hand inside a muskrat.
Then, from another part of the crowd, an older woman's voice: "She's good." And no folks this isn't an April Fools Day joke. You can see a video of the skinning portion Here
#1
One of my kids was in a regional science fair last weekend. Across the aisle from where he set up his project, there was a project by a girl. The design of the display board was very, very girly: pastels, all the lettering in "cute" fonts, smiley faces, fluffy bunnies.
What was her project, you may ask?
She did a series of ballistics tests on broadhead arrow points, to determine which design had the greatest penetrating power and lethality in deer hunting.
Posted by: Mike ||
04/01/2008 8:41 Comments ||
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Thanks Mike - that give me hope for our future.
#4
From the sound of these ladies, I think PETA will just pretend that this event never happened. There's no need for any dead naked supermodels hanging by their feet from trees gutted like a deer...
Former Republican Georgia Rep. Bob Barr is considering a run for president on the Libertarian Party ticket, according to FITNews. Barrmaina is breaking out all over . . . isn't it?
Barr, who joined the Libertarian Party after leaving Congress in 2003, is looking to attract conservatives who are unhappy with the choice of John McCain as the expected Republican presidential nominee. . . . FITNews wrote that Barr will receive the endorsement of Texas Republican Rep. Ron Paul, a GOP presidential candidate who is still technically in the race but has not suggested he would throw his support to McCain. . . . Bob Barr with Ron Paul's endorsement--there's an unstoppable juggernaut if ever there was.
Posted by: Mike ||
04/01/2008 06:29 ||
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#1
WHAT'S THAT, BOB? I CAN'T HEAR YOU BECAUSE OF THIS DEAFENING CRICKET CHIRPING...RON WHO IS DOING WHAT?
#2
More than anything else, what would give the Libertarians a major boost would be the equivalent of the Contract with America. Say, ten major parts to their campaign platform that could be put on a sign.
This would appeal to a lot of people, and advance their agenda, because clarity is easier to support than complexity, even if you don't fully agree with what is clearly stated.
They could probably double the size of their party if they did this.
1. End the Drug War.
2. There is an individual right to Bear Arms.
3. Eased citizenship for non-criminal immigrants.
4. No mandatory federal ID cards.
5. No warrantless searches.
6. 50% reduction in the size of the federal government.
7. Return of most federal lands to the States.
8. No eminent domain land seizures for private redevelopment.
9. Privatize Social Security and Medicare and abolish federal welfare programs.
10. No federal regulation or subsidy of abortion.
(I wonder how many Rantburgers would look at this list and say yes/no to its items, then compare it to the Republican and Democrat agendas as something they might support.)
#4
Like Milton Friedman, I consider myself a libertarian with a little 'l' and a Republican with a big "R".
Which is too bad, because choosing between Barr and McLame is kind of a no brainer.
National Review, BTW, ran a wonderful article many years ago on Republican losses in '96 due to third party libertarian candidates. Given how current Republican leadership seems determined to gut the party, it is unlikely they will do anything to head off this new threat.
#5
Beavis: I specifically didn't include some of the truly contentious platforms of the current Libertarian Party, such as national defense. Even abortion, with a "it's not a federal concern" platform is seriously less arguable than an isolationist foreign policy.
That was the big reason that Ron Paul's campaign failed as well. Isolationism is dead. The only choice is how to engage the rest of the world.
One press of a button and you can end your life with a swift injection of potassium chloride. That is the boast of Roger Kusch, once one of Germany's most promising conservative politicians and now the improbable promoter of a mercy-killing machine. OSHA is OK with it as long as they include a kill switch. Then it will get its UL listing.
If the Perfusor, designed to sidestep strict laws banning assisted suicide, goes into production then Germany rather than Switzerland could soon become the destination of choice for those seeking to kill themselves.
Some 700 patients, including several terminally ill Britons, have travelled to Zurich where the self-help organisation Dignitas arranges suicide. Assisted suicide has been legal in Switzerland since 1942 providing a doctor has been consulted and the patient is aware of the consequences of his decision.
But Dignitas has come under fire for experimenting with suicide techniques. According to video evidence presented to the Zurich state prosecutor, patients have been placing plastic bags over their heads and feeding in helium gas.
In four cases being studied by the prosecutor, one patient died after nine minutes and three after between 25 and 50 minutes. The bodies twitched for several minutes, Andreas Brunner, the prosecutor, said. Swiss papers compared the gassing method to the techniques used in the Third Reich.
Dignitas argued that gassing was faster than poisonous injection because helium did not require a prescription, eliminating the cost and the time involved in finding a sympathetic doctor.
These revelations have struck home in Germany, where direct assistance in mercy killing is illegal and where most Dignitas clients live. The theme is highly sensitive because of the systematic euthanasia practised by the Nazis on the physically and mentally disabled.
The machine is simply an option for fatally ill people, said Dr Kusch, 53, presenting the green machine that looks like a cross between an electric transformer and a paint spraygun. Nobody is forced to use it but I do believe that it will contribute to a debate that is moving thousands of people.
The machine would be lent or rented so that the patients could insert the needles themselves and then push the button releasing the potassium chloride, used to execute Death Row prisoners in some US states. Supporters say the machine will bring about death in seconds. Death Row cases suggest the process could be longer. One of the responsibilities of the organisation lending the machine will be to consult with doctors about the exact dosage.
Merely lending the machine to a prospective suicide is not, say legal experts, against German law. Gerhard Strate, a defence lawyer from Hamburg, said: As long as the sick person is fully conscious and aware, then lending the machine to him is no more illegal than lending him a kitchen knife or a razor blade. It becomes illegal only if the potential suicide asks someone in the room to press the button for him.
Dr Kusch, whose doctorate is in law not medicine, was once a political star. Under Chancellor Kohl, he was head of the internal security department and in 2001 became Justice Minister in Hamburg. Tipped for high office, he became the victim of Christian Democratic infighting, left the party and set up his own grouping that actively propagated mercy killing for the terminally ill. He has now withdrawn from politics and he has established a legal practice, which will specialise in offering advice to old people worried about the legal and tax implications of ending their lives.
The tabloid Bild Zeiting denounced Dr Kusch's machine as perverse and other media outlets have tentatively skirted around the taboo.
The case of Chantal Sebires has moved Germany and triggered a debate. The Frenchwoman, allergic to pain-relieving morphine, killed herself after suffering an incurable tumour. Die Welt said: Opponents of assisted suicide stress that palliative medicine and new pain therapies make it unnecessary. The Sebires case showed that these have their limits.
For believing Christians the self determination of death is a violation, an attempt to interfere with the Creation which can be determined only by God, the paper wrote on Easter Sunday, but can believers really demand that non-believers adopt their point of view?
#1
Reminds of one of my older post 9-11 Net rants > D *** NG IT, GOOD AMERIKANS + PATRIOTS DEMAND TO BE DESTROYED FOR THE GOOD OF THE WORLD - SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL GULAG, DEATH-EXTERMINATION CAMP, AND MASS SUICIDE STATION. NO CHEATING IN LINE TO BE FIRST. Lets all hug each other and sing happy songs = Kumbaya as we gleefully happily joyfully report to the Death Chambers and local Execution Squads. Yada..Yada to the effect.
OTOH, RIAN > GLOBAL WARMING TO DISPLACE OVER 130 MILLION IN SOUTH ASIA, over 90 years. Bangladesh, India, + Paki etc. FUTURE GUAM _ HERE THEY COME!
*90 YEARS??? - HMMMMMM, so when a future Guam Babe sees a dead man coming/walking out of the sea, ala BATTLESHIP OKLAHOMA + GUNS-N-ROSES + CELINE DION [TITANIC Theme],etc., GOD TAINT KIDDING!?
*RISE, OR END, OF TIME AND EMPIRES???
*REPUBLIC, OR OWG EMPIRE???
#2
Reminds of one of my older post 9-11 Net rants > D *** NG IT, GOOD AMERIKANS + PATRIOTS DEMAND TO BE DESTROYED FOR THE GOOD OF THE WORLD - SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL GULAG, DEATH-EXTERMINATION CAMP, AND MASS SUICIDE STATION. NO CHEATING IN LINE TO BE FIRST. Lets all hug each other and sing happy songs = Kumbaya as we gleefully happily joyfully report to the Death Chambers and local Execution Squads. Yada..Yada to the effect.
OTOH, RIAN > GLOBAL WARMING TO DISPLACE OVER 130 MILLION IN SOUTH ASIA, over 90 years. Bangladesh, India, + Paki etc. FUTURE GUAM _ HERE THEY COME!
*90 YEARS??? - HMMMMMM, so when a future Guam Babe sees a dead man coming/walking out of the sea, ala BATTLESHIP OKLAHOMA + GUNS-N-ROSES + CELINE DION [TITANIC Theme],etc., GOD TAINT KIDDING!?
*RISE, OR END, OF TIME AND EMPIRES???
*REPUBLIC, OR OWG EMPIRE???
#6
Is this ok? Can we allow people to make this decision for themselves or can we prohibit them from making this decision. What is the moral and ethical stance on this issue? Personally i think that they should have the choice. If they believe that they could not lead a good rest of their life, then they should be allowed to kill themselves. If they think they cant do anything good just because they are sick then they all things are already hopeless for them.
Far from its arctic habitat, the bear was killed Thursday as a safety precaution. The polar bear was over 200 miles south of the coast of the North Slope. To get there, the bear had to cross over the Brooks Range mountains, which is a major mountain range. Very unusual for polar bears.
A polar bear wandering far from the Alaska coast was killed around the outskirts of the village of Fort Yukon. The bear was spotted eating lynx carcasses Thursday morning. It was killed later in the day because of safety concerns.
Who complained, the lynx?
The bear was first spotted outside a cabin on the edge of town by Peter John, said Tony Carroll, who had recently been skinning lynx at the cabin. Carroll said most people didn't believe him, but as word spread around town more than a half dozen hunters began tracking the bear. Zeb Cadzow, maintenance director at the Council of Athabascan Tribal Government, eventually shot and killed the bear.
According to the hunters, the young female bear appeared to be in good health.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/01/2008 15:15 ||
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Couldn't find a mate?
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
04/01/2008 16:29 Comments ||
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There has actually been a population explosion of polar bears in the last few years. A decline in their population around the Hudson Bay created the illusion that they were in decline, but further West, there may be as many as 5,000 more bears than previously believed.
Polar bears are both territorial and voracious killers, and typically they will attack about anything that moves including other bears.
At least a dozen protestors were wounded during several hours of clashes with police on 31 March as they demanded government action to curb food prices.
"We have so far registered eight people wounded at the hospital in Yopougon and four others in Cocody," said Thomas Kacao of the Ivorian Consumers Association (ACCI), one of the civil society groups behind the march.
The demonstrations took place in Cocody, where Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo has a residence, and in Yopougon, a thriving area for shopping and nightlife. Ivorian police used tear gas and batons to disperse youts protestors who were burning tires and overturning parked cars. At the height of the demonstration, before riot police started firing tear gas, IRIN saw around 1,500 protestors chanting "we are hungry" and "life is too expensive, you are going to kill us."
Kacao said the ACCI has recorded an "unending" rise in the cost of basic foodstuffs over the last three months. Some goods have increased by as much as 30 percent and 60 percent from one week to the next. "When women go to the market they don't stop complaining about how much more expensive things have become," he said. "Today, with 2,000 CFA (US$4.80) they cannot buy enough food to feed even a family of five," Kacou complained.
IRIN's requests for comment from the Ivorian ministry of commerce, to which the Kpangui's NGO had addressed its criticisms, were declined. But a member of the commerce minister's cabinet told IRIN, "I think the government will intervene by making a television announcement to calm things down," he said.
The World Food Programme says high global fuel prices coupled with an increased demand for food in wealthier Asian and Latin American markets and an increased demand for bio-fuel are behind food price rises around the world. So far the worst instability resulting from high prices has been felt in West Africa, which is where many of the poorest countries in the world are found.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/01/2008 00:00 ||
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#1
They just don't understand that this is necessary cause Al Gore et al, who are the Gulfstream Palace energy consumers, say this is the pain we you must pay for bio-conversion of food to fuel. Yes, you Africans will once again pay in lives for this generation's Rachel Carson crusade, but this time because of food, not DDT.
#2
After the ivorians' treatment of french expatriates (rapes and looting), they can just die; only trouble, food shortages in pleasant africa will mean more resentful and assertive migrants in depopulating Europe, sight.
Sweden's hopes of footballing victory at Euro 2008 have been dealt a blow with the news that coach Lars Lagerbäck may be forced to include a female player in his squad.
The country's Ombudsman for Equality in Sport has threatened to take the Swedish Football Association and Lagerbäck to court if they "continue to ignore clear anti-discrimination rules".
Sweden has a pretty good womens soccer team. What's the fuss about?
"I am not trying to harm Sweden's chances of winning Euro 2008, but it is my responsibility to ensure that women are fairly represented at the highest levels of sport," said ombudsman Gudrun Grönberg in a statement.
Grönberg, whose department falls under the remit of Minister for Culture and Sport, Lena Adelsohn Liljeroth, said she would use "all the powers at her disposal" to push through the recommendation. "This will send out all the right messages. Football is extremely popular among girls in Sweden and it is only right that they should be represented," she said.
Ultimately, individuals found guilty of discrimination could be barred from competing in professional sport in Sweden.
A source close to the Swedish national squad told The Local that Lagerbäck will fight the move up until the last possible moment. "Lars won't like this one bit. Plans for the squad are more or less complete and barring injuries he already knows who he'll be taking to Austria and Switzerland."
Sweden has a relatively successful women's team and if Lagerbäck is forced to name a woman in the 23-person squad then he will have plenty of international experience to call upon.
Hanna Ljungberg, 29, is the top scorer in Swedish footballing history with 72 goals from 129 caps - putting the record of her namesake, Freddie, to shame. The West Ham United player has only managed 14 goals from his 70 caps. Another candidate is Ljungberg's fellow attacker, Victoria Svensson, who has scored 61 goals from 143 caps. Alternatively, Lagerbäck could opt for a defender, which would almost certainly mean that 29-year-old Hannah Westberg, with her 122 caps, joins the squad.
But even Gudrun Grönberg acknowledged that the player selected would probably not have much of an opportunity to prove her ability against the best male players in Europe. "I accept that the player may not get a full match. But it would send shockwaves around the sporting world if Sweden brought on a woman for, say, the last ten minutes of a game," said Grönberg. "As long as we were already a couple of goals up and coasting," she added.
In other words, she believes in making the woman a token and a laughing-stock. Wonder who volunteers for that?
#3
I think its extremely sexist to have a token woman on the team. I think they should go all the way and require that half the team be female. And that assumption that women would only play "if they are already up a couple of goals and coasting" is insulting. Half the players on the field should be women also.
As an added benefit, we can find out if soccer can be even more boring than it already is.
#4
He should pick an all female team. It would get LOADS of publicity and come last by a long way. Be a great way to destroy this stupid equal outcome nonsense that's endangering equal opportunity.
I'm sorry but the Women's FA cup was on telly and I decided after watching it that Women and good football are (at the moment) an oxymoron.
One has to be far, far away to be nostalgic for the Capital Beltway. Beltway = Interstate 495, with an Inner Loop (clockwise) and Outer Loop (counterclockwise) and heavy traffic 18 hours a day.
Like Afghanistan. That's where 2nd Lt. Beth Sutey, a Burke native, is stationed with the 495th Movement Control Team, a logistics planning unit based near Khost. The unit has adopted the Beltway's Interstate 495 logo. 495th Movement Control Team = Interstate 495! I like it!
Her father, Bill Sutey, a Capitol Hill staffer and Army retiree, recognized the morale value of having a bit of home to rally around. So, after a few e-mails, he got the Virginia Department of Transportation to donate a couple of authentic, reflective, red-white-and-blue 495 signs to the unit. "They're proud of who they are and what they're doing," Sutey said. "And imagine how memorable it will be to land at Forward Operating Base Salerno and see those Beltway signs."
The signs were mailed to Afghanistan on Tuesday.
Hopefully, people there will have an easier time figuring out that whole inner loop vs. outer loop thing. A feel-good story in lsat Thursday's WaPo, page B03.
Posted by: Bobby ||
04/01/2008 06:47 ||
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Two Sunni Tehreek (ST) leaders were killed on Monday after being kidnapped the night before.
Both men were residents of Pak Colony and were between the ages of 23 and 25. They were kidnapped late on Sunday night and were found dead the next morning. One of them was identified as Faizan Qadri, the ST Pak Colony sector in-charge, while the second was identified as Anees Qadri, the Pak Colony unit in-charge. Faizans body was taken to Abbasi Shaheed Hospital and later to the Edhi morgue at Sohrab Goth, while Anees body was taken to Civil Hospital Karachi. Both ST workers also held private jobs.
Qadris body was found near a government school in Nazimabad. He was shot three times and his hands were tied with a rope when his body was found, Station House Officer (SHO) Naveed Nasir said.
Faizan was married and had two children. According to the SHO, the deceaseds brother-in-law had contacted the police to register a case against his killers, but he had not come to the police station yet.
Anees body was found near Qudosia Masjid, near Nauroz Chowrangi. He was shot five times. Anees was unmarried. Investigation officer Daniyal Adil said the deceaseds body did not have any signs of torture. A first information report had not been registered for any of the cases till the filing of this report.
This article starring:
ANIS QADRI
Sunni Tehreek
FAIZAN QADRI
Sunni Tehreek
Posted by: Fred ||
04/01/2008 00:00 ||
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I'm posting this, cause it getting mentioned all over the net .. Probably one of the better Frontlines from PBS ---
Posted By Blackfive
"You've got to be careful where you emotionally release as a leader, because you don't want your moment of weakness to cost another soldier a moment of strength." - Sergeant First Class Toby Nunn, during his second Iraq deployment
I'm going to start off this review of Frontline's Bad Voodoo's War the best way possible. SFC Toby Nunn, who I shared the honor of being a panelist at Brown University's Watson Institute last fall, speaks to Deborah Scranton (Director of "The War Tapes") about his experiences and why he is a soldier.
Toby is a Canadian citizen who loves America. He's smart, tough and can turn on the American badassery in heartbeat - and he is also brilliant.
I'd follow SFC Nunn into hell carrying a gasoline can. You'd want your son under his watch.
"Yeargh! Let's reconciliate!"
Hamas police and supporters on Monday beat a number of professors and students of Al Azhar University, the last bastion of Fatah in Gaza, wounding several, witnesses said. Hamas denied it had acted improperly and said the police restored order.The students and staff were protesting a rally that Hamas insisted on holding inside the university campus in memory of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the founder of the militant Islamic group who was killed in an Israeli air strike in March 2004.
Al Azhar University has continued to operate, despite having been raided five times since Hamas routed rival Fatah forces and took control of Gaza last June.
Before dawn on Monday, Hamas activists entered the compound and set up equipment for the rally, hanging pictures of Hamas leaders and Hamas flags. When members of the academic staff protested outside, Hamas police beat them with clubs, said Ayman Shaheen, a professor of political science. Shaheen said he was hit twice.
"All they know is the language of force," Shaheen said of Hamas. "We try to talk to them but they don't listen."
A number of female students were then attacked at the rally by participants who mostly came from outside, many armed with clubs, witnesses said. Tahrir Abu Latifa, 19, a student of commerce, was taken to Gaza's main Al Shifa Hospital unconscious but was able to leave a few hours later.
I was removing a poster that said 'Hamas forces will win over Al Azhar,'" she said, "then men surrounded me and hit me on my head and all over my body."
Rana Redwan, a student of psychology, said she received a blow to the head after she entered the rally and a speaker on the podium called her "impure." Witnesses said they saw her tearing a Hamas flag.
Another woman, Riham Abu Arrus, was struck in the leg with an ax, according to friends who accompanied her to hospital. Abu Arrus was first taken to Gaza's main Al Shifa hospital, which is now under Hamas control, but was refused immediate treatment, the friends said. Most of the wounded were treated at the private Ahli Arab Hospital.
The women who were wounded were all wearing colorful headscarves, in deference to Islamic rules of modesty, but not the more conservative uniform worn by female students at the nearby Islamic University that is run by Hamas.
Ehab al-Ghsein, a spokesman for the Hamas-run Interior Ministry in Gaza, said the police intervened when the rally threatened to become unruly. "The issue is between the administration of the university and the Islamic bloc," he said, referring to a small group of Al Azhar students who support Hamas.
Sharif Abu Shamala, 24, who heads the university's Islamic bloc, said that the women had provoked the audience by shredding a Hamas flag. In such cases "it is hard to control what happens," he said. "We have no control over our own acts, you know."
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.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
RIVERSIDE, Ohio -- Police say a pastor who was reported missing from his home in western New York has been found at an Ohio strip club. A police officer patrolling the K.C. Lounge parking lot Friday morning in the Dayton suburb of Riverside spotted out-of-state license plates on 46-year-old Craig Rhodenizer's car.
One press of a button and you can end your life with a swift injection of potassium chloride. That is the boast of Roger Kusch, once one of Germany's most promising conservative politicians and now the improbable promoter of a mercy-killing machine.
