An Afghan journalist who contributes to The Associated Press was freed Friday after his pictures and video footage of two women brazenly executed by the Taliban led intelligence officials to hold him for questioning for two days.
Rahmatullah Naikzad confirmed that authorities had released him, saying he was "fine," and that he'd been let go in time to attend a family funeral.
Naikzad's pictures and footage of the slain women in central Ghazni province, a few hours outside of the capital, were aired internationally and in Afghanistan, prompting widespread anger in Afghanistan over the killings.
President Hamid Karzai personally condemned the crime and, on Wednesday, Afghan intelligence authorities requested Naikzad visit their offices in Ghazni and answer questions about what he knew about the killings.
Prior to covering the executions of the women, whom the Taliban accused of working as prostitutes on a U.S. base in Ghazni city, Naikzad said the Taliban contacted him and asked him to attend the trial of a man and several women accused of various crimes. He said he did not know if the Saturday, July 12, trial would result in an execution.
Naikzad's pictures included one of the two burqa-clad women sitting next to each other a few minutes before their executions. Another photo showed their bodies the following morning, when Naikzad returned to the scene.
His video footage and photos did not show the actual execution, but the audio track did record the women's screams. He told the AP that the Taliban would not allow him to record images of the killings.
Naikzad, a native of the town of Ghazni in the Afghan province of the same name, has worked for AP Television News and AP Photos since July 2007. He also works with a local radio station and is known to government officials in the region, including Kazim Allayar, the deputy governor of Ghazni, who described Naikzad as a good person.
In Afghanistan, it is common for journalists from both local and foreign news organizations to communicate with Taliban. Spokesmen for the hardline militia frequently issue statements and can be reached by phone, text message and e-mail. On occasion, elements of the Taliban also communicate directly with local government officials.
Militants hold sway in sizeable tracts of the country, particularly in the south and east. Much of Ghazni also has come under Taliban control.
Arab language researchers of the Targeted Actionable Monitoring Center have intercepted communications from an organization closely associated with international terrorists, to include al Qaeda.
Previously intercepted communications from this organization has been proven over time to be reliable.
The communications indicated:
- Jihadist terror cells have been dispatched to an undisclosed location to execute a large scale attack.
- The report calls on everyone to pray for the operations success.
- For the reason of OpSec, the terrorist organization was not releasing this location of the attack
An analysis of this threat leads the TAM-C to believe that the large attack may include the Persian Gulf states or Turkey.
Such an analysis is based on earlier communications isolating these regions and the need to target westerners or governments that support the United States in these regions.
Conclusion: This is a clear threat on an imminent attack, and all ITRR clients should take this threat seriously.
Security management professionals are encouraged to immediately assess their preparedness to detect, deter, mitigate, and respond to an act of terror.
Clients of the Targeted Actionable Monitoring Center have received detailed information and the relevant client case workers will receive information as intelligence unfolds.
#2
I dunno. The web site shows ads, a "terror alert" is a great way to drive up traffic to increase your ad revenue. The link given on that sire to ITRR is dead and goes to a domain registrar.
Imam Samudra and the brothers Amrozi and Ali Ghufron have never shown any remorse for the 2002 bombings and have repeatedly said that they embrace death and wish to be martyrs. That can be arranged.
Indonesia's attorney general Henderman Supanji, in announcing that no further legal avenues are available to the condemned men, said, "the process would not be drawn out". Good
The bombers' lawyer, Fahmi Bachmid, said afterwards: "All of them have repeatedly said they will only ask pardon from God, not the president. This is their faith." Hopefully, Indonesia will help them meet their maker
DENTON, Texas - Police said they will not file charges against a clerk whose parents and husband were charged with robbing the pizza restaurant where she worked, officials said. Police said the clerk didn't know they planned to rob the Pizza Patron Friday night.
"Hi, welcome to Pizza Patron, will this be take out or dine in?"
"Dis'll be take out, as in take da money out of da cash register an' fork it over 'fore I fills ya fulla lead."
While the robbery was in progress, the clerk discovered her father was the robber when another clerk struck him, "Take that, you vile rapscallion!"
"OW!"
knocking him out THUD!
and knocking off his wig and sunglasses. "OMG, that's, like, my Dad! Wearing Granny's wig! This is like, totally embarassing!"
He was later apprehended after witnesses followed the getaway pickup. "Hey, that's my Mom's F150!"
"Your family is, like, majorly dysfunctional--I mean, like, hell-oooo! Paging Doctor Phil, stat!"
"You're tellin' me!"
"Her husband told us she didn't know. He knew they were going to rob someplace but he thought it was going to be a convenience store," police Sgt. James Brett said in a story in Monday's online editions of the Denton Record-Chronicle. . . .
Posted by: Mike ||
07/18/2008
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MADRID (Reuters) - A groundbreaking interfaith conference this week ended on a sour note, with a political spat between Muslims and Jews that Saudi organizers wanted to avoid.
Hopes of a follow-up meeting appeared to be scotched. It was the Jews fault
Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah had gathered followers of the world's major faiths for the Madrid conference to seek religious reconciliation and showcase a more liberal image of his kingdom's austere version of Sunni Islam. That would be wahabism
It was the first time Saudi Arabia, where non-Muslims cannot practise their faith openly, had invited Jews to such a meeting and the aim was to skirt hot issues like the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, in order to focus on problems facing humanity. How nice of them
But televised exchanges between Jewish Rabbis and Muslim participants went too far, according to one Middle Eastern diplomat. What, they refused to pay the poll tax?
"This was too much, it crossed the line," said the diplomat, who asked not to be named.
Organizers played down a discussion on Zionism between Ezzeddin Ibrahim, an adviser to the president of the United Arab Emirates, and Rabbi Marc Schneir, North American chairman of the World Jewish Congress, which drew media attention.
"UAE Official Attacks Zionism at Saudi Conference," said The New York Sun newspaper.
A VITAL lesson Israeli strategists must draw from this nauseating display of perverted unity: Lebanon and Hizbullah are one. If, heaven forbid, there is another war, the IDF must wage it with ferocity - not on Hizbullah's terms, but across the Lebanese battlefield.
#1
So where are the secular humanists? Where are the Socialists? Where are the atheists, Buddhists, "Native American" religious practioners? Where are the environmentalists?
At home in their comfy chairs vilifying Christians, that's where.
I can tolerate quite a bit, but hypocracy is one of the things on the short list that makes my hackles rise.
#10
300 people? Hell, by the time you get 300 people to agree on something, you have been overtaken by events and whatever point they were deliberating is moot.
Mattel Inc. has won a nearly complete victory in its federal copyright infringement case against rival MGA Entertainment Inc. over which toymaker owns the original drawings for the $1 billion-plus Bratz fashion doll franchise.
The federal jury found that the creator of the multi-ethnic, big-headed dolls, Carter Bryant, created their characters and the name while he was under contract as a Barbie designer at Mattel.
The decision put Mattel in commanding position going into the damages phase of the trial, in which the jury will determine if the Bratz doll infringes on the drawings Mattel now owns and whether MGA owes Mattel damages as a result.
Other than four drawings that Bryant testified he made in a notebook while on an eight-month hiatus from Mattel in 1998, privately held MGA lost the rights to all drawings and sculpts of the Bratz.
The verdict could be the start of a reversal of fortune for MGA, which grew Bratz from drawings to a multibillion-dollar franchise in seven years as Mattel watched market share for its venerable Barbie line melt away. Barbie's sales troubles have extended into the first quarter of 2008, domestic sales fell 12 percent, while worldwide sales were flat compared with a year earlier.
Two police officers are on sick leave after being attacked by a mob in south London after they asked a 15-year-old girl to pick up her litter. One officer was dragged to the ground and kicked while the other was bitten by a girl who jumped on his back.
Up to 30 people took part in the attack, which happened in North End, Croydon, on Wednesday afternoon. A girl who was arrested at the scene on suspicion of assault has been released on bail. Two men, aged 34 and 38 and both from South Norwood, south London, have been arrested on suspicion of assault and violent disorder.
Trouble flared when the 15-year-old threw her food wrapper back on to the ground and became aggressive. Police said the girl initially picked up the fast food wrapper when asked by the patrolling officers, but immediately dropped it again sparking the confrontation.
The officers, aged 34 and 29, suffered bruising and knee injuries and are currently on sick leave. The officer who received the bite wound required hospital treatment.
Officers have been examining CCTV footage from the area. Insp Simon Ellingham said: "We have heard from several retailers in the area who were horrified at the level of violence used by the crowd against the officers." Which is, of course, an utterly meaningless thing to add.
#6
Enoch Powell tried to tell them what the end result of their immigration policies would be. He was cursed and vilified for his pains, but he was absolutely right.
In the days of the Empire, Britain used to export law and order to violent parts of the globe. Now that the Empire is gone, Britain is shown to have imported anarchy and disorder from those violent places to its own shores.
Diversity is all too often a recipe for disastrous social violence. It certainly isn't the unmixed blessing its proponents on the left claim it to be. Note carefully the fact that most of its white adherents live in areas where they don't have to live with its consequences.
#7
I wonder if this could be the beginning of the backlash against the 'Nanny State'? Per this article, I'm guessing no, based on what looks like a racial situation.
That said, further incidents such as this won't surprise me.
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The United States should be making all of its electricity with renewable and carbon-free energy in 10 years, former Vice President Al Gore said Thursday. "The survival of the United States of America as we know it is at risk," Gore said.
There is an energy-related problem. It exists. It was brought to us by people like al-Gore, who now claim to have all the solutions.
I shall be polite.
Al Gore is an idiot.
We use about 4 terrawatts of energy each year. A nuclear power plant generates about 1 - 1.5 gigawatts. A coal plant, ditto. We burn petroleum in our cars, we burn coal to make steel, we use energy for lots of stuff. Indeed, you can use energy usage as a surrogate for GDP and the ability of a society to live in comfort. 'Renewable', carbon-free energy generates currently about 0.5% of our energy needs, and there is no way in twinkie-land that we'll get to 100% in ten years.
And that means we'd have to cut our energy use substantially in order to meet the concerns of the Goracle. I invite him to lead the way in that regard by switching off all the damned stuff in his home.
In a speech at Washington's Constitution Hall, Gore touched on an array of the nation's current woes, saying the economic, environmental and national security crises are all related. "I don't remember a time in our country when so many things seemed to be going so wrong simultaneously," Gore said.
"Our lives have become perfectly woeful!"
To begin to fix all the problems, Gore said, "the answer is to end our reliance on carbon-based fuels."
"The answer is not to become productive and competetive again! We can't drill our way out of the problem! Don't even think about it! Don't try it! I'm warning you! Man-bear-pig is real!"
Gore called on the country to produce all of its electricity from renewable and carbon-free sources in 10 years, a goal he compared to President Kennedy's challenge for the country to put a man on the moon in the 1960s.
Kennedy's dream took a bare nine years to realize. Man walked on the moon within what should have been his lifetime. Then we went home from the moon and stopped going. People like al-Gore didn't think it was worth it.
Gore chastised those who have proposed opening new areas for oil drilling as a solution to U.S. energy problems. "It is only a truly dysfunctional system that would buy into the perverse logic that the short-term answer to high gasoline prices is drilling for more oil 10 years from now," Gore said.
"It's better to just continue talking about the subject, like we've been doing off and on since 1973. That's the way to get things done! Had we taken that approach in December, 1941, we'd have been ready for war by 1954, by Gum! Or we'da known the reason why!"
New demand from places like China means oil supplies won't be able to meet increasing demand, Gore said. "The way to bring gas prices down is to end our dependence on oil and use the renewable sources that can give us the equivalent of $1 a gallon gasoline," the former vice president and Nobel laureate said.
al-Gore doesn't believe in attacking a problem from as many angles as possible. When you take that approach, very often the eventual solution come from an angle you hadn't considered important when the project began.
To counteract the effects of global warming, Gore has pushed for polices that would reduce the emission of carbon dioxide, such as greater energy conservation and the development of alternative energy sources like wind and solar energy. Gore has also advocated for governments to tax the emission of carbon dioxide. But, of course...
Gore and the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 for increasing awareness of the climate change issue and for advocating for policies that could potentially offset the effects of global warming.
Our problem isn't global warming, which evolves into "global climate change" every time temperatures go down. Nor is nuclear winter isn't just around the corner. Our problem is that we used to be the world's preeminent industrialized nation. Then we decided our children were to good to work in factories, actually producing things, and we exported the jobs to other nations. We've coasted into the "information society," selling each other information, while other countries makes the machines we use and the clothes on our backs. Our houses, with four times the square footage of the houses our parents bought, are too valuable to be located close to warehouses, refineries, factories, or shipyards. We've been cleaning the environment ever since Lady Bird Johnson. The nation, and much of the civilized world, is today squeaky clean compared to the heady days of my youth. But "lots" is never good enough. Theoretical perfection remains a goal that will never be achieved.
Gore's return to the political arena has drawn increased scrutiny, particularly of his energy use. In 2007, the Tennessee Center for Policy Research chastised Gore for "extravagant energy use" at his Nashville, Tennessee, mansion. Gore subsequently has installed solar panels, a geothermal heating and cooling system, compact fluorescent light bulbs and other energy-saving technologies in his home. Nuthin to see here. Get on your private jets and return to your homes.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
07/18/2008 12:17
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#4
Whats sad?
The whole carbon thing is falling apart - its an after effect not a cause, of warming.
Warming, for the most part, stopped in 2001. And just like the scientific evidence shows, CO2 increases AFTER the warming trend.
IT IS NOT CAUSATIVE.
Get that through your thick green skull.
As for drilling had we not sat on our hands thanks to you and other environuts and wimps (GHW Bush) 10 and 20 years ago, we'd ALREADY have the oil flowing from those areas.
#6
I thought Gore said in the 90's we only had 10 years left...now that 10 years has gone by, and more, why in the world does he think anyone would believe him now?
To me, Al Gore is the same as Ted Danson, shrilly screeching about his pet project while doing the exact opposite of what he claims that we must do.
Al Gore to me is a Traitor. He's owned by the Chinese, he's a proven liar, and deserves no more attention or time than any other crackpot.
#7
They've always gone about this wrong. They push the wrong kinda green. If you tell me, "Oh, because you drive your car to work, the polar bears are gonna DIE!", I'm gonna say, "so what?". The only time most people see polar bears is at the zoo or when they're about to gun one down because he wandered in a garbage dump in East Muckluck, Canada looking for a free lunch.
Now, if you tell me, "If you drive a hybrid car, you can tell the Arabs to drink their oil, and maybe save a few bucks.", that I'll listen to. Don't tell me about globalwarmingclimatechange and the melting ice caps. It's still cold here in the winter and hot in the summer like it always is and Boston is still not under water. Don't tell me I'm gonna have to spend money to solve a problem that I personally have never seen any evidence of.
Another beef. The point people who propose these vast changes in my lifestyle really seem to have serious issues walking the walk. How'd ya get to DC yesterday, Al? Horse and buggy?
#11
As stupid as they are, we do owe the Church of the Immaculate Global Warming our thanks for their help in bringing back nuclear power. Thank you. Now go away.
Posted by: Al Gore, Savior of the Universe ||
07/18/2008 15:41
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#14
we had Greenpeace volunteers in front of our office building yesterday - looking to sign up members (and donors, of course). Guy asked me if I wanted to save teh planet. I said (loudly):"Pave the planet? What kind of sick f*ck are you? I'm a civil engineer and build roads and bridges, but even I don't wanna pave the planet. You suck! Assh*le"
the look on his face as I walked away was priceless
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/18/2008 16:24
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#15
Good for you, Frank. These jerks need an upfront lesson in the kind of contempt any person with two neurons to join feels for them.
#17
Gore has also advocated for governments to tax the emission of carbon dioxide.
Great. Now it's gonna cost me to light my farts.
Pave the planet? What kind of sick f*ck are you? I'm a civil engineer and build roads and bridges, but even I don't wanna pave the planet. You suck! Assh*le"
#18
Gore would have been much more convincing if he had said "Blah blah blah global warming blah blah polar bears blah blah ... and build a bunch of nuclear plants and tell the Saudis to FOAD".
#24
gotta have some, I read that his already exorbitant domisile energy costs were up 10% this year, even with his "savings measures" implemented. Hypocrite, Liar, Fraud, Loser
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/18/2008 22:04
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#25
"I don't remember a time in our country when so many things seemed to be going so wrong simultaneously"
This more than anything shows how delusional this man is. Never have so many been so healthy, wealthy and prosperous compared to all the previous millennia of human history.
CARACAS, Venezuela - Venezuela's ruling party pledged Thursday to seek to reform the nation's constitution to let President Hugo Chavez seek indefinite re-election. Ah, hell, Why even have elections? You know that's what he wants.
Proposed changes to end the two-term limit for presidents will be presented to Congress or the National Electoral Council and ultimately to voters after state and municipal elections now scheduled for November, said Freddy Bernal, a leader of Chavez's United Socialist Party. "The purpose of this amendment is to ask the country if they want or don't want the re-election of President Hugo Chavez," Bernal said in a televised interview. "If we want peace, tranquility and development in the country, Hugo Chavez must continue being president." ...or else.
Chavez, who was first elected in 1998, is barred from running again when his term expires in 2013. Venezuelan voters rejected a sweeping package of reforms that would have ended presidential term limits by a vote of 51 percent to 49 percent in a national referendum last December, according to partial results released by Venezuela's National Electoral Council. The proposed reforms had raised concerns among government opponents that Chavez intends to serve as president for life.
Thomas Shannon, the top U.S. diplomat for Latin America, told a congressional panel in Washington Thursday that Chavez is an "ambitious politician" with intentions to remain in power for years to come. But he urged Chavez to "think about the possibility of an election in 2012 in which he cannot be a candidate." Sure, gringo. I'll get right on that.
Chavez a close ally of Cuban leader Fidel Castro told supporters last year he could continue governing until 2027 if voters do away with re-election limits, saying he needs more time in office to establish a socialist economic model in Venezuela. Which should just about be complete the day he dies.
Opposition leaders predicted that voters would again reject any new proposal to end term limits."Venezuelans are growing tired of the government's failure to resolve pressing problems" such as soaring inflation, rampant crime and corruption, said Cesar Perez Vivas of Copei, one of Venezuela's oldest political parties.
#1
In theory any Vz constituional changes voted on (up or down) during a presidency cannot be re-introduced. This was voted down a couple of months back. That said look for Thugo to pull Court short hairs.
#1
It's because all wars have two front. The second being the Home Front. While the military culture will address PR in their training at CGSC or the War College, they don't organize for, fund, or fight on that front. Just like the Air Force senior leaderships blind pursuit of more Raptors, the military pursues what it feels comfortable and familiar with rather than fight the war they have. They refuse to acknowledge that MSM is in fact allied with the enemy and that they have to fight that fight. The whole episode of the military blogs and the leaderships response to it demonstrated beyond any question they do not grasp how to take it the enemy. Here they were given a technological weapon to leverage against their opponent and instead of embracing it and exploiting it, they turned around and sought to crippled it. It's one of the problems of 'professionalism' in that it can narrow the focus at the expense of the overall objective. Vietnam should have taught them that you can win all the battles and still lose the war. Never do they cross the line to ask why fight the war you do not intend to win if winning it means having to operate outside of that focus.
#4
The trainees, especially those whod actually been to the wars, complained bitterly about the lack of realism there, crowding around my Humvee at one point to tick off their grievances. The injectsIEDs and sniperswere more typical of Iraq than Afghanistan, they said, where youre more likely to encounter rocket fire from a distance.
The some elements of the 'Iraq' training are still applicable. Which is why (without going into detail), some deploying Marine units are getting training for both environments.
Well it is Baghdad by the Bay...
SAN FRANCISCO, California (AP) -- A measure seeking to commemorate President Bush's years in office by slapping his name on a San Francisco sewage plant has qualified for the November ballot. The measure certified Thursday would rename the Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant the George W. Bush Sewage Plant. Let's hope it has lots of problems.
Supporters say the idea is to commemorate the mess they claim Bush has left behind by actions such as the war in Iraq. Heeeheeehee heeheehee...we'll show that doodoo head.
#1
Too bad this isn't being done by a legislative process. Then, one sane person, if any can be found in SF, could put forth an amendment that declares that all who vote for this do hereby declare themselves outside the human race and so are no longer under the protection of the laws of our land. Then, see how many would vote themselves out of humanity.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
07/18/2008 11:23
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#2
Not to worry, when they get their next big earthquake, the MSM will roll out the Katrina narrative again, and no irony at all will be seen in positing an equivalance between New Orleans welfare rats and high dollar San Francisco liberals. And Heineken Looter Guy will be there too...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
07/18/2008 11:44
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#3
This is great. I hope they do name it after him. I can see it now, GWB appears for the ribbon cutting with Mike Rowe from DSC Dirty Jobs and says " I am honored to have name affixed to this waste water treatment plant. I feel priviledge to stand hear today with all the men and women who do dirty jobs no matter what is asked of them. Likewise, I have always believed in doing what I say I am going to do no matter what is required......"
Posted by: Jairong Oppressor of the Poles6195 ||
07/18/2008 15:53
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#6
If I were GWB, I'd attend the opening, give a speech about the importance of sanitation and infrastructure and at the post event presser comment that I'd never seen a place in need of a sewage plant as SF.
European terrorists are trying to enter the United States with European Union passports, and there is no guarantee officials will catch them every time, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said Thursday.
Chertoff's comments on Capitol Hill comes as the country is entering a potentially vulnerable period with the presidential nominating conventions coming up next month; the presidential election in November; and the transition to a new administration in January - all of which may be attractive targets for terrorists.
In his last scheduled appearance before the House Homeland Security Committee, Chertoff said that the more time and space al-Qaida and its allies have to recruit, train, experiment and plan, the more problems the U.S. and Europe will face down the road.
"The terrorists are deliberately focusing on people who have legitimate Western European passports, who don't appear to have records as terrorists," Chertoff told lawmakers. "I have a good degree of confidence we can catch people coming in. But I have to tell you ... there's no guarantee. And they are working very hard to slip by us."
Chertoff and other intelligence officials have delivered similar warnings before, and he offered no new information about specific threats or an imminent attack.
Chertoff reiterated his concern that terrorists could sneak radiological material into the country on small boats or private aircraft. This material could be used to create an explosive device known as a "dirty bomb."
The Homeland Security Department has a strategy to protect against this small boat vulnerability and is testing radiation detection equipment in Seattle and San Diego ports.
Chertoff said that getting out a regulation to prescreen and enhance security of general aviation aircraft coming to the U.S. from overseas is one of his top priorities.
He also said he expects to approve new radiation detection technology this fall.
#1
Small boats from Mexico carrying illegal drugs and aliens have become a BIG problem in San Diego lately. Every week or so there is a local news report about one of these old, beater boats being washed up on the shore...sometimes full of marijuana. They are usually old and in very bad shape, probably stolen or abandoned, so they are probably considered expendable by the cartels that send them. But it's bad news if you're an immigrant out at sea without food or fresh water when the boat's motor dies. It's also worrying if the Coast Guard is looking for drug and immigrant smugglers while a terrorist slips through.
#2
That's a problem. Bosnians are indistinguishable from the average white European. And one report found that 10% of them prescribe to radical Wahabism.
The Pentagon said on Tuesday that Iran has the ability to launch a ballistic missile capable of hitting sections of eastern and southern Europe. Air Force Lt. Gen. Trey Obering, director of the Missile Defense Agency, told reporters he believes Iran now has a missile with a range of 1,250 miles, but he declined to say whether the weapon has been test-fired.
Iran said last week it conducted two missile tests involving a number of weapons including what Iranian state television called a "new" Shahab-3 missile, a medium-range missile that could be used to strike Israel.
Older versions of the Shahab-3 have a 800-mile (1,300-km) range. But a new extended version is believed to have a range of up to 1,250 miles, making it capable of hitting targets as far away as Greece, Serbia, Romania and Belarus.
Iran is also developing a solid-fuel missile known as the Ashura with a range of 1,250 miles, according to the Pentagon.
U.S. officials and independent missile experts have said last week's tests involved no new or enhanced technology, or even the latest generations of missiles known to be in Iran's arsenal. Obering did not dispute those assertions in a briefing for Pentagon officials on Tuesday. But his description of Iran's missile capability was stronger than what U.S. officials have said up to now.
"The Iranians themselves are describing ... a 2,000-km range missile launch," Obering said of last week's tests, adding that Iran also claimed to have such a missile in November. "I believe, based on what I have seen, that they have the ability to do that and to continue to advance in the future, based on what I have seen so far from those (Iranian state media) reports and from the intelligence reports," he added.
"I won't go into detail as to what was fired when. That's something I think the intel community should answer," he said.
The Pentagon's Defense Intelligence Agency, which monitors major weapons threats to the United States and its allies, was more vague in its February 27 testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee. "Iran continues to develop and acquire ballistic missiles that can hit Israel and central Europe, including Iranian claims of an extended-range variant of the Shahab-3 and a new 2,000-km medium range ballistic missile called the Ashura," DIA director Army Lt. Gen. Michael Maples told the panel.
U.S. officials and analysts dismissed last week's missile tests as an angry Iranian response to recent military exercises including an Israeli air exercise in June that some have called a rehearsal for an attack on Iran. He probably means a missile "in mass production". Iran has long had the SHAHAB-4, SHAHAB-5, and IRIS missiles for years now.
#3
Iranian wunderweapons have always seemed to have a Wile E Coyote/Acme vibe to them. Impressive looking and with high hopes, but never quite living up to the hype.
That said, You just can't take a chance on them not working given the stakes with potentially nuclear tipped missiles. Call it a reverse Pascal's wager.
Posted by: Bin thinking again ||
07/18/2008 9:14
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#4
You'd think the EUnicks would be worried about this.
But they think they can talk their way out of anything.
At any rate, they just became larger stakeholders in this gambit, like it or not.
#7
The thing is, they got these from the Norks, who got them from the Chinese. So they are not indigenously invented, and may actually be fairly capable.
#9
The photos I saw last week of some of their "missile" firings were late-50s technology rockets. Even those were probably photo-shopped. I wouldn't just ignore them, but I'm not going to get excited about it - now. Europe, on the other hand, needs to pull their heads out of their collective nether regions and take a long, hard look at the world as it is, not as they wish it to be. They have some serious problems, and they're getting worse daily. Not doing anything about them, or to prepare for even more dangerous future problems, is national suicide.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
07/18/2008 13:27
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What Obama does not seem to understand is that the Brandenburg Gate is something you earn. President Ronald Reagan earned the right to speak there because his relentless pressure had brought the Soviet empire to its knees and he was demanding its final "tear down this wall" liquidation. When President John F. Kennedy visited the Brandenburg Gate on the day of his "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech, he was representing a country that was prepared to go to the brink of nuclear war to defend West Berlin.
#1
Great opinion piece by Krauthammer. I just read it on WaPo and was checking to see if it was posted here yet. TU got it! Good find.
The stench of BO really is his own vanity. Always talking down off the end of his nose. Lecturing and lecturing us on basic aspects of our daily lives. Add the Civilian Defense Force he wants to form (see RB yeserday) and his Govt. may be the most controlling and intrusive Govt. since Soviet Communism.
I keep having visions of the endless TV promos with the daily lecture from BO on screens placed all over the public space. Everyone must stop and listen and bow to the BO. "Words just, Words"
#4
Obama is living a dream of being one with Kenedy. A nightmare for us?
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
07/18/2008 12:23
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#5
In addition to all the obvious comparisons to JFK and Reagan, I think everyone can agree that NObama is doing this in a shameless attempt to shore up his support within the international community. I suspect that he's hoping that if the rest of the world wants him to be President bad enough, it will push the odds in his favor back home. I guess you could call it global peer pressure.
I think he's making a potentially huge mistake. Let's not forget that in the 2004 election, the rest of the world was seething with rage for President Bush and Kerry was clearly the choice abroad. When he lost, all the cry-baby liberals were whining about all the face we lost with the rest of the world by re-electing that dolt, Bush. Well, I think the American people, being a traditionally independent bunch, don't much appreciate it when the international community pressures us, especially when it concerns our domestic politics. So at best, I think NObama is looking at a zero-sum gain with this stunt, electorally speaking (which makes me wonder why he would do it to begin with but then I remember how much he likes to talk in front of people), and at worst, while it may bolster international support for him, it could backfire on him back home.
Pakistan and Zimbabwe signed a draft agreement here Friday to avoid double taxation between the two countries.
Usman Khalid Mirza, member of Pakistan's Federal Board of Revenue (FBR), and Commissioner of Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (ZIMRA) George Chiradza, inked the agreement on behalf of their respective governments.
Mirza expressed the hope that the agreement will not only provide safeguards against double taxation on the income of the residents of both the countries but also will promote economic cooperation and enhance investment.
Chiradza said that the agreement would further boost the existing trade ties between the two countries.
Posted by: john frum ||
07/18/2008
07:53 ||
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Economic powers....
Posted by: john frum ||
07/18/2008 8:00
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Bangladeshi authorities alerted the country's northern border after two soldiers of paramilitary Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) were reportedly shot dead by Indian BorderS ecurity Force (BSF) in northern Chapai Nawabganj frontier Thursday midnight.
An official at the BDR Headquarters here confirmed the incident Friday, saying "this is true ... the northern border with India was put on alert."
The senior official who asked not to be named said the Indian BSF entered the Bangladesh territorial water last night while chasing some smugglers by speed boats in the Padma river, one of the three biggest rivers in Bangladesh.
As a BDR patrol team challenged, the Indian BSF opened fire killing two Bangladeshi border guards on the spot. BDR made counter fire forcing the Indian BSF to retreat.
The gun fight between the border guards of the two South Asian neighbors took place as the foreign secretaries of Bangladesh and India are holding meeting in New Delhi to resolve various bilateral issues including the border demarcation and prevent cross-border smuggling.
Posted by: john frum ||
07/18/2008
07:50 ||
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Four Israeli Arabs from east Jerusalem and two from Nazareth have been indicted for allegedly setting up an Al-Qaida cell in the capital and offering their services to Global Jihad elements, security officials announced Friday. One of the suspects allegedly made contact with those elements in an attempt to assassinate US President George W. Bush during his visit to Israel in May.
The group, arrested in a joint Shin Bet-Israel Police investigation, includes two Hebrew University students, one of whom lived in the university dormitories with a view of a helicopter landing pad. Using a camera, the student filmed helicopters taking off and landing and made contact via the Internet with Al-Qaida elements to discuss bombing one of Bush's helicopters on his visit for Israeli Independence Day.
The six were identified as, Ibrahim Na'ashaf, 22, from Taiba - a physics and computer science student at Hebrew University; Muhammad Najam, 24, from Nazareth - a chemistry student at the university; Yousef Sumarin, 21, from Beit Hanina; Anas Shwayke, 21, from Jebl Mukaber; Kamal Abu Kweidar, 22, from Jerusalem's Old City; and Ahmad Shwayke, 21, from Shuafat.
According to security officials, the six created a closed religious terror cell and contacted different Al-Qaida and Global Jihad elements over the Internet. They were also active in the Temple Mount's Al-Aksa Mosque as well as throughout east Jerusalem. Investigators found bomb-making instructions on the personal computers of several of the suspects.
On June 9, two Israeli Beduin from the Negev town of Rahat were charged with plotting terrorist attacks via the Internet with al-Qaida members overseas and marking out civilian and military sites as targets. Officials said Friday that the latest indictments were further indication of an Al-Qaida presence in Israel.
#3
I don't think these Arabs (Israeli or otherwise) thought this all the way through.
Do they really want Dick Cheney to be suddenly President, and extremely pissed off at Arabs? 'Cuz you know the paleotards would be whooping for joy and claiming responsibility.
I suspect Gaza just might disappear. For practice. And that's before he really got mad.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
07/18/2008 22:39
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Heh! They had an episode of NCIS where Hamas or Hezbollah terrorists were plotting to shoot down Marine 1. I'd bet good money that's where this plot was hatched.
Going into a recession that will get a lot worse with record deficits, is a bad sign. We have discussed before how societies will tolerate things in good times that they won't in bad times. I.e. more social disorder as people get poorer, welfare is cut, etc.
#1
Cuts in Welfare?
Surely you jest. It will more likely be cuts in job training and public works. You can be certain that the white middle class will take the brunt of it, and as usual for the British, will muddle through with little complaint.
Now cut the welfare and you will have street riots and pandemonium.
Since I have raised this issue twice here, I would like to retract the issue here too.
The image of Barack Obama's birth certificate posted on Obama's Fight the Smear website (posted also at better resolution on Daily Kos) has been analyzed with utmost expertise, and no evidence of alteration has been found. Two expert analyses are here and here.
Anyone who still thinks that the image has been altered should show how the alleged alteration can be done and then can pass such tests. Otherwise this image of this birth certificate should be considered to be unaltered.
There is no good reason to think that the Daily Kos, Jay McKinnon or any other organization or individual was involved in presenting an altered image to the public.
Posted by: Mike Sylwester ||
07/18/2008
07:24 ||
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I never thought much of the accusations, but legitimate concerns were raised.
Government scientists detailed a rising death toll from heat waves, wildfires, disease and smog caused by global warming in an analysis the White House buried so it could avoid regulating greenhouse gases. In a 149-page document released Monday, the experts laid out for the first time the scientific case for the grave risks that global warming poses to people, and to the food, energy and water on which society depends.
"Risk (to human health, society and the environment) increases with increases in both the rate and magnitude of climate change," scientists at the Environmental Protection Agency said. Global warming, they wrote, is "unequivocal" and humans are to blame. There! That's settled! Again.
The document suggests that extreme weather events and diseases carried by ticks and other organisms could kill more people as temperatures rise. Allergies could worsen because climate change could produce more pollen. Smog, a leading cause of respiratory illness and lung disease, could become more severe in many parts of the country. At the same time, global warming could mean fewer illnesses and deaths due to cold.
"This document if subsequently shown to be true and free of big-government regulation lust would inescapably, unmistakably shows that global warming pollution not only threatens human health and welfare, but it is adversely impacting human health and welfare today," said Vickie Patton, deputy general counsel for the Environmental Defense Fund. "What this document demonstrates is that the imperative for action is now."
While the science selectively cited in the report pointed to a link between public health and climate change, the Bush administration has worked to discourage such a connection. To acknowledge one would compel the government to regulate greenhouse gases the real heart of the matter.
The administration on Friday dismissed the scientists' findings when it made clear that the Clean Air Act was the wrong tool to control global warming pollution. Instead, the administration asked for public comment on a range of ways to reduce greenhouse gases from cars, airplanes, trains and smokestacks under the 1970 law.
A better solution, the EPA said, would have Congress writing a law aimed just at global warming. Jonathan Shradar, a spokesman for EPA chief Stephen Johnson, said that while the administrator knows that "the science is clear and that climate change is a significant issue", Johnson did not want to make a "rash decision under the wrong law." "Once there is an endangerment finding, then the Clean Air Act is activated and regulation may begin," Shradar said.
In December, the White House refused to open an e-mail from the EPA that included the finding that climate change endangered public welfare. The determination was based on an earlier, and similar version of the document released Monday. At the time, the White House insisted on removing all references to the science, according to Jason K. Burnett, a former adviser to Johnson on climate issues.
Burnett, a Democrat, has charged that Vice President Dick Cheney's office deleted portions of congressional testimony last October prepared by the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that made similar assertions on the health effects of global warming. The White House contends the testimony was changed because of doubts about the science.
After the release of the EPA analysis, industry representatives suggested the link between climate change and health was weak. "The question is not a scientific one. It is a legal and political question, of how much impact justifies the extraordinary use of the Clean Air Act," said Scott Segal, director of the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council, a coalition of power companies.
While no one doubts that more people die in a heat wave, the question is whether that death is "related to manmade greenhouse gas emissions," he said.
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/18/2008
06:24 ||
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#1
If the end is so close why can't we buy a hydrogen car , or an electric car that actually has a range far enough to go to work and back? Why can't we build a nuclear plant or an algae farm for ethanol on an industrial scale?
All the tech is there, nobody is turning out these products, why?
Yeah, yeah, I know, honda has a hydrogen car coming out sometime between now and the end of the universe. Electric cars are getting better and batteries need to be tested, blah, blah, blah. If things are so bad, why not release them even if they are not 100% perfect? I don't see the govt. or private business doing jack-shit to avert this so called doomsday scenario. Just a lot of whining
and crying and asking for more money/power in EPA's case.
#2
Government scientists detailed a rising death toll from heat waves, wildfires, disease and smog caused by global warming in an analysis the White House buried so it could avoid regulating greenhouse gases.
As real historical research shows, there are significant population drops when things got colder, not warmer. And anyone with more than an primary school education can see that climate is not static. It moves. It's always moved.
Could there be 'more' deaths because there are now 'more' people, particularly those who choose to live in areas that previously were not subject to mass habitation. However, why worry about little things like that when you have an agenda to push.
#3
Well they gotta get something passed before this gets to the masses:
The American Physical Society, an organization representing nearly 50,000 physicists, has reversed its stance on climate change and is now proclaiming that many of its members disbelieve in human-induced global warming. The APS is also sponsoring public debate on the validity of global warming science. The leadership of the society had previously called the evidence for global warming incontrovertible.
#4
Someone needs to stop the BULLSHIT machine in DC and the press, regarding anthropogenic global warming. Its is NOT NOT NOT a facts, its a supposition, and a poorly supported one at this point.
#5
If the end is so close why can't we buy a hydrogen car , or an electric car that actually has a range far enough to go to work and back? Why can't we build a nuclear plant or an algae farm for ethanol on an industrial scale?
All the tech is there, nobody is turning out these products, why?
You know why Jim. It's them. They've always been after us and our SUVs. Big oil and
Washington are working together to maximize our misery. I have gone ballistic about this, I've shed car and have gone to a bike and Shanks Mare. I'm being followed sometimes tho. The man from Exxon (2 xx!) is following me trying to force me to buy gas. I hate him, but I have dreams, bitter dreams in which all the big oil stocks collapse as the price of gasoline rises! It would serve dem right. I have plans, big plans.. bwaaaaaa brwaaaaaaaaaaa hahahahaha bwhahah!
tl:dr: Drive less, walk more, get a bike. Don't bitch so much.
#6
The best thing that could be done for America is to disband the EPA along with several other noxious federal regulatory agencies that do nothing but promote their political agenda by pretending to help we less enlightened citizens to the path of true enlightenment. Hypocritical ignorant bastards.
#8
Um yeah, it would be a 23 mile bike ride for me to go to the nearest town big enough to have a Kroger or Meijer. That's a tad long for me, the ice cream would surely melt on the way home.
Not everyone fits into the little gas saving schemes that they are pushing. There is no bus line out here, no taxis, no high speed rail. I'm not complaining, I like living away from the r-tards that infest every city in this country. But to callously tell people to "get a bike" is falling somewhat short of an effective argument.
#9
The EPA has threatened to fine the city of Wichita KS because they are on track to violate some EPA standards. But not because Wichita is polluting more but because the EPA has lowered the standards to an unachievable amount.
Are the farmers going drive a battery rig out into the field, plug their rig in somewhere, then carry 50 haybales to where they are needed. Then hop on their bike and ride it 10 miles home in December. Meanwhile hollywood flys overhead.
A power grab. I understand the point of the EPA but they are not mandated for this behavior.
If you really wanna stop the insanity you start with the bloated federal budget and the idea that impositions such as mandates increased taxes and tariffs help anyone except congress and government.
republicans have been getting by for decades with the idea that imposing mandates and increasing the size and pwer of the federal government, while simultaneously talking about small government and family values. Their activities are destroying both.
The federal budget must be gutted, and everything is on the table to cut, not reduce, not borrow, but to totally eliminate.
There is no other option to save America but to destroy the power of an overly bloated government.
Do not cut taxes, but eliminate them
Do not reduce government but destroy its size and its power.
If I hear anyone talk about anything but this, I will not be listening.
#11
You get the impression that the deck chairs on the Titanic are being shuffled and re-arranged in Washington. Do the grand dragons of government really believe that more regulations and taxes to support the regulatory load are the answer to all our problems. Man they are out of touch with reality. This is crazy.
Republican presidential candidate John McCain on Thursday ridiculed Democrat Barack Obama's vow to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq in 16 months as a political tactic aimed at getting votes. McCain, an Arizona senator, attacked Obama as the Democrat prepares to go on a foreign trip to the Middle East and Europe that the McCain camp called a rolling overseas campaign event. Ouch!
Obama in a speech this week stuck by his pledge to withdraw U.S. combat forces from Iraq in 16 months, a policy McCain said would sacrifice the security gains that have recently brought a measure of stability to parts of the country. "This success that we have achieved is still fragile and could be reversed," McCain said on his campaign bus. "And if we do what Sen. Obama wants to do, then all of that could be reversed," and leave behind chaos and Iranian influence, he said. In a town hall meeting in Kansas City, McCain said troop withdrawals must be governed by the situation on the ground, "not some artificial, politically inspired" timetable.
Obama is expected to soon go to Iraq and Afghanistan, the two major foreign policy challenges the next president will face. McCain called the visit "long, long overdue."
McCain, who is running behind Obama in public opinion polls, was trying to make a major campaign issue of Obama's Iraq policy in hopes of convincing Americans that the Illinois senator is too inexperienced to be trusted to lead the country as commander in chief. Thank you Rooters, for making a sensible argument seem like a desperate gesture.
On his bus, he said he hoped Obama will listen not only to commanders on the ground in the two war zones but also to the troops. "They'll tell him they don't want to be defeated," McCain said. "They'll tell him that the surge has succeeded," he said, referring to President George W. Bush's 2007 troop buildup.
"They'll tell him that we're winning this war, will win it, if we don't do what he wants to do, which is to set a date for withdrawal."
Having said all that, McCain said he was glad Obama was making the trip, disagreeing with his communications director, Jill Hazelbaker, who told the Fox News Channel: "Let's drop the pretense that this is a fact-finding trip and call it what it is: the first of its kind campaign rally overseas." How many others agree with Jill? Besides Rooters, I mean.
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/18/2008
06:12 ||
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It is a campaign rally - mainly for Obamas biggest supporters: the press. All 3 network news anchors are going with him.
#2
BO needs to shoot some hoops with the troops. Visit all the on base Gyms sit in the DFAC. You know, get the feel of the situation. "No questions please, I need to spend time on the ground" Maybe hire some TCNs to feint.
#3
OB's pro-gun now. Maybe he will pop off a few hundred rounds with his army buddies, a la John Kerry, the Great White Duck Hunter.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
07/18/2008 13:27
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McCain, an Arizona senator
Do they really feel they need to tell us that McCain is an Arizona Senator? Projecting him as a big unknown? These media outlet folks need to be put in their perspective places.
Posted by: Jan ||
07/18/2008 14:02
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"Let's drop the pretense that this is a fact-finding trip and call it what it is: the first of its kind campaign rally overseas."
#6
I check my forecast at wunderground. I got a kick the other day when checking out The Weather Underground (as the site calls itself) and bo's face/ads were all over the place.
#7
"Success ... is fragile and could be reversed" > Yep, NEITHER OVERT NOR COVERT US DOMINATION AND CONTROL OF OWG-NWO - E.G DESIRED BUREACRACIES, TREATISES, ECON, SOCIOPOL/CULTUR VALUES, etc. - IS ASSURED AT THIS TIME.
As for BARACK, I hope his trip includes major stops in Moscow, Beijing, and New Delhi, etc. to discuss the WOT wid the Govts. of these Nations. LEST WE FERGIT, OSAMA + RADICAL ISLAM > ARE POINTING THE ISLAMIST-JIHADIST SWORD SOLELY AT RUSSIA + ASIA NOW, NO LONGER AT THE USA, RUSSIA, EUROS, ETC.
As argued times before, RADICAL ISLAM + COLLUSORY COMMIE-RADICAL SECUL GROUPS ALL KNOW THEIR ANTI-US HONEYMOON CAN'T LAST FOREVER.
What gets under Barack Obama's skin? Criticism of his wife, Michelle Obama. In an interview with Glamour magazine, Obama said attacks on his wife are "infuriating." The likely Democratic presidential nominee blamed the conservative press for going after his wife as if she were the candidate.
"If they have a difference with me on policy, they should debate me. Not her," Obama told the magazine. How does one debate change? Or hope?
Michelle Obama has been highly active in her husband's campaign, appearing with him at events and by herself at other times in an effort to help tout his candidacy. She promotes his policy agenda at fundraisers and gives interviews to reporters in support of his views.
An Associated Press-Yahoo poll suggests Michelle Obama has higher favorable ratings than Cindy McCain, wife of presumptive Republican nominee John McCain. However, Michelle Obama's unfavorable ratings are also higher.
Michelle Obama came under fire in February when she said she was proud of her country for the first time in her adult life. She later clarified her remark, saying she has always been proud of her country and was particularly proud to see so many people involved in the political process.
As Michelle Obama appeared Thursday in Seattle with Washington Gov. Chris Gregoire, the state Republican Party began airing a video that questioned Michelle Obama's patriotism. It was similar to one run by the Tennessee GOP, showing a clip of her February comments.
Obama's campaign denounced the ad for its "shameful attacks on the wife of a candidate." The state Republican Party countered that it was fair play because Michelle Obama is a surrogate who came to campaign with one of her husband's supporters.
In the magazine interview, Obama said the attacks are ironic because his wife is "the most quintessentially American woman I know." Yet her anger and elitism keep showing through.
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/18/2008
06:06 ||
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#5
Bite me, Barry. She jumps into the ring with you, she's fair game, whether you like it or not. You could tell her to sit down and shut up, I suppose, but I doubt she'd do it.
#10
BO is learning that, while the kids are off limits, ANYONE who is an advisor to him and who actively campaigns for his is open to 1st Admendment comment. That includes wifey. Truman did battle with music critics about his adult daughter's piano playing qualities. It backfired on him. This will backfire on the Man of Change, too.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
07/18/2008 13:22
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#11
Bama won't win. Let's hope that after he gets his sorry butt royally kicked in the election that he and Omarosa II slink back into a Dukakis-like obscurity where the rest of us don't have to see or think about them anymore.
#12
Michelle Obama has been highly active in her husband's campaign, appearing with him at events and by herself at other times in an effort to help tout his candidacy. She promotes his policy agenda at fundraisers and gives interviews to reporters in support of his views.
Inferior electrical work by private contractors on U.S. military bases in Iraq is more widespread than the Pentagon has acknowledged, according to a published report. Aha! A published report! That's at least a step above 'an unnamed source.'
A Senate panel investigating the electrocutions of Americans on bases in Iraq was told last week by former KBR Inc. electricians upset that more of their friends weren't brought over that the contractor used employees with little electrical expertise to supervise subcontractors in Iraq and hired foreigners who couldn't speak English. Couldn't even speak English, is the way it was reported on the radio this morning.The Pentagon has said 13 Americans have been electrocuted in Iraq since September 2003. It has ordered Houston-based KBR to inspect all the facilities it maintains in Iraq for electrical hazards.
The New York Timesparagon of virtue reported on its Web site Thursday night that many more people have been injured, some seriously, by shocks, according to internal Army documents. A log compiled this year at one building complex in Baghdad disclosed that soldiers complained of receiving electrical shocks in their living quarters almost daily, the paper reported.
During just one six-month period - August 2006 through January 2007 - at least 283 electrical fires destroyed or damaged American military facilities in Iraq, including the military's largest dining hall in the country, according to the documents obtained by the Times. In a country where the grid is soooo reliable; how shocking!
An Army survey issued in February 2007 said electrical problems were the most urgent noncombat safety hazard for soldiers in Iraq. More so than up-armored Humvees rolling over into canals?
KBR, which is responsible for providing basic services, including housing, for American troops in Iraq, said last week that its investigation had not turned up evidence of a link between its work and the electrocutions. The Army report, however, said KBR did its own study and found a "systemic problem" with electrical work, according to the Times. Quagmire! Short circuits!
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/18/2008
05:58 ||
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Does this include the air-guard guys who keep getting caught by low-hanging powerlines from the tangles of freelance electrical infrastructure over public throughways? Or is that why the study only goes back to September 2003? Because I seem to remember one of our local Iraq losses was killed in that fashion during the original invasion.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
07/18/2008 7:37
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Several times in the past I have had to go behind and clean up wiring mistakes made by 'professional' (lisenced, union) electricians right here in the USA. Little things, like finding three prong outlets on ungrounded wires, copper service bus bars and connectors on aluminum wires - and loose at that (discovered because molten metal was sizzling as it hit the water in the flooded basement.) Etc. So not sure 'foreign' or 'non-English-speaking' is the whole problem.
Posted by: Menhaden S ||
07/18/2008 8:11
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#3
One of the requirements for those contracts in Iraq was the hiring of Iraqis.
Are those the foreigners they are talking about?
I wouldn't wipe my butt with this report.
Posted by: James Carville ||
07/18/2008 10:56
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#4
My thoughts, exactly, James. Sounds like disgruntled private contractors lost out on an opportunity to gouge the government to allow training of locals.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called President Bush "a total failure" on Thursday, among the California Democrat's harshest assessments to date of the president. I'm sure you'd make a much better president. If you were ever elected, of course.
"God bless him, bless his heart, president of the United States -- a total failure, losing all credibility with the American people on the economy, on the war, on energy, you name the subject," Pelosi told CNN's Wolf Blitzer in an exclusive interview. Bless you too. Bi+ch.
The comments came two days after the president sharply criticized Congress over what he described as relative inaction over the course of the legislative term. At the White House on Wednesday, Bush noted that there were only 26 legislative days left in the fiscal year and said Congress would need to pass a spending bill every other day to "get their fundamental job done."
"This is not a record to be proud of, and I think the American people deserve better," Bush said.
In the interview, Pelosi said the president was in no position to criticize Congress and brushed aside the criticisms as "something to talk about because he has no ideas." I say whoever has the higher approval rating gets to do the criticizing. But that's just my opinion.
"For him to be challenging Congress when we are trying to sweep up after his mess over and over and over again -- at the end of the day, Congress will have passed its responsibility to pass legislation," she said. He's looking for meaningful legislation, not just legislation.
But Pelosi's comments come as a new Gallup poll registers the lowest level of congressional approval among Americans in the polling organization's 30-year history of conducting that survey.
That poll showed that its approval rating had reached an anemic 14 percent, while more than 70 percent of those polled said they disapproved of the job Congress is doing.
The House speaker said she doesn't consider those numbers a negative referendum on the Democrats in charge, saying she thinks they stem largely from Congress' failure to end the war in Iraq. OK, you can take off the rose-colored glasses now.
"Everything I see says this is about ending the war -- 'I disapprove of Congress' performance in terms of ending the war,' " she said. "In the House, we, of course, have over and over, five or six times, sent to the Senate legislation for a time certain to reduce our deployment in Iraq and bring our troops home safely, honorably and soon. We haven't been able to get it past the Senate or the president of the United States. Well then what are y'all pacing around and wringing your hands fer? Git 'er dun!
"So, on the basis of that, count me among the 70-some percent," she continued. "But that is one measure. The other measure that I'm more interested in is the one that talks about what is their view of Democrats. And the generic, who do you prefer to run the country on all of these issues? We're in double digits in any poll that you can take." Can I take it that very same 'total failure' just got lucky (again) and unwittingly cornered you (again)? Is that what's got your Depends in a knot?
Republican National Committee spokesman Alex Conant derided Pelosi's comments as "the sort of partisan politics that Democrats once decried and promised to change."
"Rather than personally critique others, Speaker Pelosi should reconsider her own out-of-touch stance against oil exploration," he said. "With Americans paying record prices at the pump and Congress in gridlock, this is no time for the speaker to only offer personal attacks." Depends on your point of view, I suppose.
In the wide-ranging interview, the entirety of which will air Sunday on CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer," Pelosi also reiterated her longtime opposition to lifting a congressional ban on offshore drilling as well as opening up areas such as the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska for oil exploration. Bush and congressional Republicans have pushed for those two policy changes.
Pelosi has long opposed drilling offshore, a popular policy position among Californians, many of whom fear its environmental consequences along the state's coastline.
But a recent CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll showed that more than 73 percent of Americans polled approved of lifting the 1981 ban, and the move holds support among many in Pelosi's own party, whose constituents are growing increasingly angry over rising gas prices. Sorry, that's not an indicator that she's interested in. She has special interest groups financing values to adhere to, after all.
Pelosi said the oil industry is not aggressively exploring large amounts of federal areas already leased to them and approved for drilling, including 33 million offshore acres and 68 million acres in the lower 48 states. She has sponsored legislation calling on oil companies to increase their production in those areas before they are allowed to go into the offshore areas currently banned. Has anyone let her in on the fact that everyone knows that these areas either have no oil or would take a century to develop?
"Thirty-three million acres offshore are allowed for leasing," she said. "And we're saying to them, use it or lose it. You have the opportunity to drill there. When you have exhausted those remedies, then you can talk about something else." Ah, a tax increase that the little people with their little minds will never figure out!
She's also calling on the president to release 10 percent of the more than 700 million barrels of oil housed in the country's Strategic Petroleum Reserve. No way. We're going to need it all to make Vaseline here pretty soon if the Donks don't stop pandering to their myriad conflicted constituents, who band together and pay handsomely for the Dems to pimp their otherwise hopeless causes.
Bush said Tuesday that he is against any release from the reserve, saying that stash is for emergencies only. He also disputed that it would have any effect on lowering gas prices. For God's sake, this is an emergency if there ever was one! The Donks need some kind of cover before it's too late!
"What we are saying is, Mr. President, free our oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve," Pelosi said. "We're saying, let's take 10 percent of that, which has been paid for by the American taxpayer, and use that to put on the market so that we increase supply, reduce price." She'll never get it, but don't tell her that. Or she'll call you a failure, too.
"And when the price comes down, we can buy back the oil at a lower price, put it in the SPR, use the spread for renewable energy resources." Prices would be lower today but higher tomorrow. I remember some Donks whining recently that the price of oil was higher than it should be because the country was topping off its stragegic reserves. Pick one, Donks.
The House speaker has faced heavy criticism from House Republican leader John Boehner, who is leading a congressional delegation to ANWR this weekend and has said Pelosi's action does not adequately address the problem. Don't forget to bring your digital camera with you and bring back lots of pictures of caribou and beautiful landscapes. Everybody loves a good congressional slideshow!
He's also said Pelosi is leading the moderate faction of her party "off a cliff" by refusing to allow a vote in the House on offshore drilling. Moderate? Good one!
"Just because John Boehner, who is another loser my friend, has my respect, says it doesn't make it so," she responded, reiterating that she will block any vote to allow lifting the ban.
#6
But Pelosi's comments come as a new Gallup poll registers the lowest level of congressional approval among Americans in the polling organization's 30-year history of conducting that survey.
The House speaker said she doesn't consider those numbers a negative referendum on the Democrats in charge, saying she thinks they stem largely from Congress' failure to end the war in Iraq.
Sure, honey. You keep telling yourself that.
But it appears that not even CNN is buying your bullshit.
#7
Out of deference to the ladies that read and post here at RB, I'll not write the epithet that sprang to mind when I read the headline of this posting. Chalk it up to a rare instance of civility on my part.
#8
Pelosi has converted my lifelong Democratic mother to a registered Republican, wanting to know how we can impeach her! She gets so upset over her arrogant blather and the impact on poor Americans impeding viable legislation has that she can't sleep at night. Can I sue her if she has a heart attack?
#11
Maybe you were busy stretching your face out like a NY times editorial page, but I believe you forgot something in this hunt for failure, YOU are IT Pelosi. The only reason this President has to deal with your partys screwups is because we like to switch parties constantly - not that you are better, just that you represent the ignorance of the populace and intellectual bulwark of this here roman empire.
It is only done to ensure history repeats itself. If there were no manual in how to treat talking monkeys like yourself, you would be cutting peoples heads off like the Mayans.
I have a simple warning for you miss hotel bride, forget your ideology, fix problems, and shut your damn mouth. You work for ME.
I have at my disposal too much power to listen to your nonsense at this time. OUR country is in trouble and you are sitting there with your oil investments up your ass. As well as $59 million capitol you plan to flee with after you screw the nation out of it's life blood.
I marked you miles away.
You are not a failure, you are an abomination to America. A total Abomination.
North Korea's phantom hotel is stirring back to life. Once dubbed by Esquire magazine as "the worst building in the history of mankind," the 105-storey Ryugyong Hotel is back under construction after a 16-year lull in the capital of one of the world's most reclusive and destitute countries.
According to foreign residents in Pyongyang, Egypt's Orascom group has recently begun refurbishing the top floors of the three-sided pyramid-shaped hotel whose 330-metre (1,083 ft) frame dominates the Pyongyang skyline.
The firm has put glass panels into the concrete shell, installed telecommunications antennas -- even though the North forbids its citizens to own mobile phones -- and put up an artist's impression of what it will look like.
An official with the group said its Orascom Telecom subsidiary was involved in the project but gave no details.
The hotel consists of three wings rising at 75 degree angles capped by several floors arranged in rings supposed to hold five revolving restaurants and an observation deck.
A creaky building crane has for years sat unused at the top of the 3,000-room hotel in a city where tourists are only occasionally allowed to visit.
"It is not a beautiful design. It carries little iconic or monumental significance, but sheer muscular and massive presence," said Lee Sang Jun, a professor of architecture at Yonsei University in Seoul.
The communist North started construction in 1987, in a possible fit of jealousy at South Korea, which was about to host the 1988 Summer Olympics and show off to the world the success of its rapidly developing economy.
A concrete shell built by North Korea's Paektu Mountain Architects & Engineers emerged over the next few years. A proud North Korea put a likeness of the hotel on postage stamps and boasted about the structure in official media.
According to intelligence sources, then North Korean leader Kim Il-sung saw the hotel as a symbol of his big dreams for the state he founded, while his son and current leader Kim Jong-il was a driving force in its construction.
But by 1992, worked was halted. The North's main benefactor the Soviet Union had dissolved a year earlier and funding for the hotel had vanished. For a time, the North airbrushed images of the Ryugyong Hotel from photographs.
As the North's economy took a deeper turn for the worse in the 1990s the empty shell became a symbol of the country's failure, earning nicknames "Hotel of Doom" and "Phantom Hotel."
Yonsei's Lee and other architects said there were questions raised about whether the hotel was structurally sound and a few believed completing the structure could cause it to collapse.
It would cost up to $2 billion to finish the Ryugyong Hotel and make it safe, according to estimates in South Korean media. That is equivalent to about 10 percent of the North's annual economic output. Bwahahahaha! Looooosers! Maybe you could grind it into dust and feed 10% of your population with it.
Bruno Giberti, associate head of California Polytechnic State University's Department of Architecture, said the project was typical of what has been produced recently in many cities trying to show their emerging wealth by constructing gigantic edifices that were not related in scale to anything else around them.
"If this is the worst building in the world, the runners up are in Vegas and Shanghai," said Giberti. Yeah, well I'll bet the runners-up at least have occupants.
The Ryugyong Hotel is, in my opinion, the single most unsettling structure ever erected by the hand of man. Its 1,082 feet tall, has 105 floors, and encloses 3.9 million square feet of floor space. . . .
The Ryugyong Hotel looms over Pyongyang like some kind of slumbering bat. Something deep inside my brain tells me that the 75° angle of the hotels outer walls is exactly the wrong angle; it says sinister, it says creepy, it says get away.
Okay, so tastes differ. I think it makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up; maybe the North Koreans think its sweet as punkin pie. That still begs the question of why. The DPRK maintains strict control over tourists and other visitors. The Ryugyong was designed to have 3,000 rooms, but at the time it was built only a few thousand people were allowed into the country per year, and almost none of them were destined for Pyongyang. Even today, after the establishment of the Kŭmgang-san tourist region, the DPRK only sees about 130,000 tourists per year. Every single one of them could book a week-long stay in the Ryugyong and the hotel would still be significantly under capacity.
In fairness, we should note that the unfinished hotel has served at least one useful, though unintended, purpose. U.S. military sensor operators, supporting U-2 surveillance missions against North Korea, routinely used the Ryugyong as a focus point for tuning the optical and radar sensors on the spy plane.
Even at extreme ranges, it was easy to use the 105-story hotel as a target for the U-2s sensor pods, and ensure they were working properly. It wasnt what Kim Il-Sung and Kim Jong-il had in mind when they conceived the project, but the Ryugyongs role as an aim point may be its most lasting contribution in relations between North Korea, the ROK and the United States.
#9
One day, giant sirens will lift from the structure and shriek into the sky, and the Eloi will stop whatever they're doing, and stumble, mesmerized, into the lobby.
Prosecutors say a New York City police detective accused of forcing a 13-year-old runaway into prostitution has resigned from the force and pleaded guilty to attempted kidnapping. I assume he wasn't fired because they probably had more control over him or his testimony?
Wayne Taylor initially said he was "100 percent innocent" of keeping the teen as a captive and compelling her to sell herself at parties last winter. What teenager?
But Queens prosecutors say the 35-year-old officer and 29-year-old accomplice Zelika Brown pleaded guilty to the same charge Thursday. They face 3 1/2-year prison terms. Oh, that teenager.
Brown also originally contested the charges. Her lawyer challenged statements authorities said she made to them. Fine. The more you do that the poorer you are when you get out of prison.
Prosecutors say about 20 men paid Taylor and Brown $40 to $80 for sex with the girl. I hear the price varies in prison, too. Usually it's something between "do it with a smile and you get to keep your face" and "maybe your sphincter will work again before your face heals".
Taylor was an officer for about 14 years. I doubt he was ever an officer. Just some guy who went through the motions.
The Air Force's top leadership sought for three years to spend counterterrorism funds on "comfort capsules" to be installed on military planes that ferry senior officers and civilian leaders around the world, with at least four top generals involved in design details such as the color of the capsules' carpet and leather chairs, according to internal e-mails and budget documents. Production of the first capsule -- consisting of two sealed rooms that can fit into the fuselage of a large military aircraft -- has already begun.
Air Force officials say the government needs the new capsules to ensure that leaders can talk, work and rest comfortably in the air. But the top brass's preoccupation with creating new luxury in wartime has alienated lower-ranking Air Force officers familiar with the effort, as well as congressional staff members and a nonprofit group that calls the program a waste of money.
Air Force documents spell out how each of the capsules is to be "aesthetically pleasing and furnished to reflect the rank of the senior leaders using the capsule," with beds, a couch, a table, a 37-inch flat-screen monitor with stereo speakers, and a full-length mirror. The effort has been slowed, however, by congressional resistance to using counterterrorism funds for the project and by lengthy internal deliberations about a series of demands for modifications by Air Force generals. One request was that the color of the leather for the seats and seat belts in the mobile pallets be changed from brown to Air Force blue and that seat pockets be added; another was that the color of the table's wood be darkened. Changing the seat color and pockets alone was estimated in a March 12 internal document to cost at least $68,240.
In all, for the past three years the service has asked to divert $16.2 million to the effort from what the military calls the GWOT, or global war on terrorism. Congress has twice told the service that it cannot, including an August 2007 letter from Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.) to the Pentagon ordering that the money be spent on a "higher priority" need. Officials say the Air Force nonetheless decided last year to take $331,000 from counterterrorism funds to cover a cost overrun, partly stemming from the design changes, although a senior officer said yesterday in response to inquiries that it will reverse that decision.
The internal Air Force e-mails, provided to The Washington Post by the Project on Government Oversight (POGO), a nonprofit Washington group, and independently authenticated, make it clear that lower-ranking officers involved in the project have been pressured to create what one described as "world class" accommodations exceeding the standards of a regular business-class flight. "I was asked by Gen. [Robert H.] McMahon what it would take to make the [capsule] . . . a 'world class' piece of equipment," an officer at the service's Air Mobility Command said in a March 2007 e-mail to a colleague, referring to the mobility command's top officer then. "He said he wanted an assurance . . . that we would be getting a world class item this week."
A military officer familiar with the program, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak about it, likewise said that its extravagance has provoked widespread contempt among lower-ranking Air Force personnel. "This whole program is an embarrassment," the officer said, particularly because transport seating for troops en route to the battlefield is in his view generally shoddy. Much more at link
Please explain the above term. I always felt it an honor to sit in troop seats in the back of a C-17 medivacs carrying the wounded from Balad to Ramstein and Landstuhl.
#10
They always assume that it is being done for petty reasons.
That is, why go to all this trouble for a military aircraft when you can get much better right now on civilian aircraft? This is not an idle question. Who wants to fly in a military aircraft when you have a *choice* to fly in a luxurious civilian aircraft?
Obviously, someone who does not want to get noticed, either traveling discreetly, or in an area with a lot of surface to air missiles.
#11
What's next: the escape capsules as wonderfully demonstrated in ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK?
_____________________
Snake Plissken Rules! Purple Hearts in Leningrad and Siberia for operations "Black Light" and "Texas Thunder"!
Then, just as the bomber reached an altitude high enough to go over the mountain range, the engine abruptly stopped. Eisenhower was not very concerned since a B-17 with a light load could easily fly on three engines. But then there was something to worry about when an engine on the left wing began shaking and belching black smoke. Fortunately, the aircraft had just passed over the mountain peaks and had clearance to make a long, almost gliding, descent towards their destination. But just as they started down, the cranky engine on the left wing stopped. Then a third engine began to misfire. They werent far from Casablanca, but not close enough to make the airfield on one engine. The pilot ordered all of the passengers to put on their parachutes.
GENEVA: The youngest son of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi was arrested and charged with beating two of his servants at a luxury hotel in Switzerland, his lawyer said Thursday. Hannibal Gadhafi and his wife were taken into custody by police Tuesday after the alleged incident in Geneva, lawyer Alain Berger told Swiss radio. The couple, who face charges of bodily harm, making threats and coercion, deny the allegations and were freed on bail Thursday, he said.
Geneva magistrate Michel-Alexandre Graber could not be reached for comment Thursday. A phone call to the Libyan Embassy in the Swiss capital, Bern, went unanswered.
Berger said Gadhafi spent two nights in detention, while his pregnant wife, who came to Geneva to give birth, was transferred to a maternity unit.
The Swiss newspaper Tribune de Geneve said two of Gadhafi's domestic servants claimed Gadhafi and his wife repeatedly beat them at the President Wilson Hotel, which is next door to the United Nations' human rights office. The pair allegedly hit the servants with a belt and a hanger, the report said. It said a Tunisian woman was hospitalized.
The 32-year-old Gadhafi has had previous run-ins with the law. In 2005, a French court convicted him of striking his pregnant companion in a Paris hotel. He was given a four-month suspended prison sentence and fined $790. Gadhafi was also at the center of a commotion in Paris the previous year, when police stopped him for speeding on the Champs-Elysées and his bodyguards attacked several officers. Two of the bodyguards were taken into custody but released after Libyan diplomats apologized to police.
... Salafi-takfiri jihadists cannot build political alliances; they regard even Hamas and Hizbullah, Israel's main foes, as corrupted by politics. And once they start to spill blood, they become ever more indiscriminate: first they attack the "apostate" rulers or their foreign backers, then the ministers, then the security forces, then the civil servants, then anybody who objects to the violence, and so on. Those who recoil at the carnage, or object to the religious strictures imposed at gunpoint, are treated as apostates. At some point, though, local populations turn against their supposed champions.
This cycle of escalation and rejection was demonstrated in Algeria, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and, most recently, Iraq. Peter Bergen, the author of several books on Osama bin Laden, suggests that al-Qaeda, in turn, is starting to unravel. "Self-destruction is encoded in the DNA of groups like al-Qaeda," he says.
A Pew Global Attitudes survey last year found that support for Mr bin Laden and suicide-bombings had dropped across a number of Muslim countries. More importantly, even radical ideologues have become critical. Salman al-Oadah, a Saudi sheikh once jailed by the Saudi authorities and admired by Mr bin Laden, last year made a televised appeal for the al-Qaeda leader to change his violent ways.
Another blow was delivered from an Egyptian jail by Sayyid Imam al-Sharif, better known as Dr Fadl, one of al-Qaeda's founders in 1988 and a former leader of Mr Zawahiri's movement, al-Jihad. He had developed much of al-Qaeda's ideology, but at the end of last year he came up with a sweeping revision. "There is nothing that invokes the anger of God and His wrath like the unwarranted spilling of blood and wrecking of property," he wrote.
Jihad had to be authorised by a qualified imam or sheikh, he said, not the "heroes of the internet". He approved of jihad in Afghanistan and had mixed feelings about Iraq. But the September 11th attacks, he thought, were "a catastrophe for Muslims...What good is it if you destroy one of your enemy's buildings and he destroys one of your countries?"
Perhaps in response to such criticism, al-Qaeda's propaganda has gone into overdrive. Mr Zawahiri wrote a rebuttal of nearly 200 pages accusing Dr Fadl of seeking American-style "Islam without jihad". The reclusive Mr bin Laden has become more active, delivering four audio speeches this year, mostly on the crowd-pleasing theme of Palestine.
Al-Qaeda may have thought that, by goading America into invading Muslim lands, it would engineer a popular jihad against the "far" enemy. In part it succeeded. But it also discovered that fighting in Muslim lands means having to deal with a growing number of "near" enemies, be they fragile new governments, rival religious sects or tribes that have become fed up with the extremists.
Do al-Qaeda's setbacks answer Donald Rumsfeld's question about whether America is winning or losing the "war on terror"? Not really. The best that can be said is that America has stopped losing but is not yet winning it.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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The Afghan Border Security Force has started installing security cameras along the Chaman border while Pakistan has expressed concerns over this initiative, Voice of America reported on Thursday. Afghan security officials said that they were installing cameras in a bid to stop the entrance of militants into Afghanistan, Voice of America reported. It quoted an Afghan border military official as saying that militants coming from Pakistan were using the Chaman border to carry out terrorist activities inside Afghanistan's southern and southwestern areas. Quoting FC sources deployed at Chaman border, the show said that Pakistan had serious concerns over the installation of these security cameras and would raise the issue in the upcoming tri-partite commission meeting this month.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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#1
Pakis scared we will see military help/turning a blind eye to militants crossing the border!!!
Posted by: Paul ||
07/18/2008 7:17
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#2
same response as we should give to Mexico protesting our fence: STFU
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/18/2008 9:52
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#3
Good! They are working to secure their borders. Now, if we could do the same? A wonderful thought.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
07/18/2008 14:07
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I DEVOTED six years to carbon accounting, building models for the Australian Greenhouse Office. I am the rocket scientist who wrote the carbon accounting model (FullCAM) that measures Australia's compliance with the Kyoto Protocol, in the land use change and forestry sector.
FullCAM models carbon flows in plants, mulch, debris, soils and agricultural products, using inputs such as climate data, plant physiology and satellite data. I've been following the global warming debate closely for years.
When I started that job in 1999 the evidence that carbon emissions caused global warming seemed pretty good: CO2 is a greenhouse gas, the old ice core data, no other suspects.
The evidence was not conclusive, but why wait until we were certain when it appeared we needed to act quickly? Soon government and the scientific community were working together and lots of science research jobs were created. We scientists had political support, the ear of government, big budgets, and we felt fairly important and useful (well, I did anyway). It was great. We were working to save the planet.
But since 1999 new evidence has seriously weakened the case that carbon emissions are the main cause of global warming, and by 2007 the evidence was pretty conclusive that carbon played only a minor role and was not the main cause of the recent global warming. As Lord Keynes famously said, "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?"
There has not been a public debate about the causes of global warming and most of the public and our decision makers are not aware of the most basic salient facts:
The world has spent $50 billion on global warming since 1990, and we have not found any actual evidence that carbon emissions cause global warming. Evidence consists of observations made by someone at some time that supports the idea that carbon emissions cause global warming. Computer models and theoretical calculations are not evidence, they are just theory.
What is going to happen over the next decade as global temperatures continue not to rise? The Labor Government is about to deliberately wreck the economy in order to reduce carbon emissions. If the reasons later turn out to be bogus, the electorate is not going to re-elect a Labor government for a long time. When it comes to light that the carbon scare was known to be bogus in 2008, the ALP is going to be regarded as criminally negligent or ideologically stupid for not having seen through it. And if the Liberals support the general thrust of their actions, they will be seen likewise.
The onus should be on those who want to change things to provide evidence for why the changes are necessary. The Australian public is eventually going to have to be told the evidence anyway, so it might as well be told before wrecking the economy.
Dr David Evans was a consultant to the Australian Greenhouse Office from 1999 to 2005.
#2
JAB, good point. He may want to keep it in a locked, alarmed garage.
You might note this article is from Australia. All we hear about in the US today is the Algore lecturing Congress about the need to address "climate change" and renewable fuels. Note the cultists don't mention warming quite so often; getting ready for the freeze I guess.
The article also mentions 4 items that refute the global warming argument. The following is paraphrased:
1. Greenhouse signature in the atmosphere is missing.
2. No evidence that carbon emissions cause global warming.
3. Satellite measurements indicate the present global warming cycle ended in 2001.
4. Ice cores indicate that atmospheric carbon increases AFTER the warming cycle, not before.
#3
And of course CO2 levels rose _after_ a warming period because.... (drum roll please....) life flourished during the warming period (among other things)
As the great philosopher Homer Simpson would say: "Doh!"
#4
The author agrees with me that the whole carbon emission program of the Labour party is electoral suicide. Labour will be out of power for a generation, when people see how much this costs and that the weather does not change one whit.
#5
So global warmism is a religion that leads to irrational political acts up to and including "suicide." And it has chosen green as it's official color. Copycats.
My sense is that $4 gas has gotten peoples attention to the public policy but the electorate is going to demand nukes and drilling, not massive central planning to provide theoretical support for polar bears based on a model that cannot predict the past let alone the future.
#8
You know the tragedy of it is this. Most people would make changes to their own lifestyle and accept certain costs that businesses charged to help make a more eco-friendly economy. We as a people have no problem with trying our best to do what is right and make the environment cleaner and safer. But the Greens take it way past that, no personal choice, no dissent, no discussion, kill the heretic!!!
The tide is obviously turning on these fruitcakes, the monopoly on airtime is over, the truth will prevail and they are in the process of being discovered for what they are. Fascists of a sort, really nothing more than that.
#10
We even have a probable cause for "climate change" and the news isn't good.
http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/ice_ages.html
Of course the news is worse for the alarmists because there's not a damn thing we can do about it. So their little power trip is over once the cat is out of the bag, which is probably why they burn the heretics rather than engage in rational scientific discussion.
#12
NS, here's a statement from The American Physical Society website (http://www.aps.org/):
APS Climate Change Statement
APS Position Remains Unchanged
The American Physical Society reaffirms the following position on climate change, adopted by its governing body, the APS Council, on November 18, 2007:
"Emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities are changing the atmosphere in ways that affect the Earth's climate."
An article at odds with this statement recently appeared in an online newsletter of the APS Forum on Physics and Society, one of 39 units of APS. The header of this newsletter carries the statement that "Opinions expressed are those of the authors alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the APS or of the Forum." This newsletter is not a journal of the APS and it is not peer reviewed.
#13
Unless CHUCK HESTON finds a nuclear ICBM underground on a perceived primitive = regressed modern Alien Planet of Apes called Earth, Modern science wasn't around to observe, analyze, record or quantify the Great Epochs-Changes. espec as per THE SO-CALLED "SIRIUS EVENT(S)" WITHIN MY LIFETIME. WE DON'T KNOW WID ABSOLUT CERTAINTY HOW MANY OF THESE EPOCHS ENDED ANDOR BEGAN, i.e. WE DON'T KNOW HOW THE SUN BEHAVED DURING THESE TIMES.
Al Qaeda and its video production group are also distributing reruns. At least twice this summer, al Qaeda's media arm As Sahab has reposted old videos on jihadist websites, without identifying them as reruns. The move signals a shift in al Qaeda's strategy, and a decline in the frequency and quality of its propaganda videos.
Terrorism video experts point to the reruns as a change in focus among al Qaeda's leadership. Just last night As Sahab re-released its video "Windows of Paradise Part I." This time around, the video was translated into Urdu. In June, As Sahab re-posted an address from al Qaeda's number two man translated from its original Arabic into Urdu. Experts say these translations indicate al Qaeda's conscious effort to recruit Urdu-speaking Pakistanis.
Al Qaeda leaders have long railed against Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and the Pakistani government. In January, al Qaeda's Adam Gadahn called Musharraf one of the "world's worst dictators and tyrants," who "is holding on to power by the skin of his teeth." Last year, Osama bin Laden himself called for jihad against Musharraf.
Terrorism video experts have also commented on the drop in jihadist propaganda frequency. As Sahab has rolled out very few original productions this summer compared to its almost weekly releases earlier this year. This summer, jihadist websites have also relied on video postings from other production companies like Al Fajr and Al Furqan. The decline in As Sahab videos has raised questions in some national security circles as to whether al Qaeda's media operations division has taken a hit.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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#1
Speaking of reruns, has anyone heard from Adam the Traitor? I know there was specualtion he had bought the farm.
Does anyone know for sure?
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
07/18/2008 11:53
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Apple's new iPhone 3G is ready for the Muslim and Arabic speaking world even though it isn't available in those countries yet.
A US-based website in Arabic and English has already developed Islamic-themed software for the new iPhone. This includes providing Muslim prayer timings as well as the iQuran [software that allows you to read the Koran or the Muslim holy book on the iPhone], as well as the iMoon, which will provide the approximate moon phases for any given date - information that can be useful during Ramadan or the Muslim fasting month.
The latest version of the iPhone went on sale on Friday in 24 countries, but is not yet available in the Arabic speaking world, according to Apple's website. The American company said that the new version of the iPhone will be available in Jordan, Egypt and Qatar soon.
A grand jirga of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) has failed to come up with a final decision to end fighting between two militant organisations in Khyber Agency.
The 56-member jirga met here on Thursday to discuss its meetings with the chiefs of Lashkar-e-Islam (LI) and Ansarul Islam (AI) and to announce its decision regarding an end to fighting in the Tirah Valley of Khyber Agency. The meeting, however, merely set another date for further negotiations. More than 50 people have been killed in fighting between the LI and AI in the past month.
Another round: JUI-F provincial secretary general and head of the jirga Shujaul Mulk told reporters after the meeting that another jirga would be convened in Khyber Agency on July 22 to discuss an end to fighting and the restoration of peace. Mulk said that they would launch a decisive round of talks with both militant outfits and the negotiations would continue until a ceasefire was achieved between the warring sides. He said three members each from LI and AI and five members from the JUI-F would participate in the July 22 talks. The JUI-F jirga met LI chief Mangal Bagh and his AI counterpart Mullah Mehboob in Tirah last week. Mulk said that they had also decided to constitute a three-member committee to discuss peace in Mohmand Agency. The members included Mullah Samiullah, Mullah Mohabbat Khan and Mullah Sardar Ahmad.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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AFTER a period of relative lull we notice a recurrence of encounter deaths of alleged criminals in RAB custody.
We mods were just talking about this amongst ourselves earlier in the week ...
We had condemned such killings before and we are constrained to express our repugnance once again.
Come now, green Steve just got his mojo back ...
According to various accounts there have been a few hundred such deaths since the inception of RAB - a phenomenon that would be unacceptable in any country with a modicum of respect for rule of law and concern for justice and fair play.
But this is Bangladesh ...
This will certainly call into question the modus operandi of the elite force in such cases, apart from tarnishing its image.
Um no, in fact no one at all questions the modus operandi of the RAB ...
There cannot be two opinions about the many commendable achievements of RAB since the elite force was launched. It had successfully tracked down the top terrorists and helped in having them convicted and punished. It has preempted terrorist activities by capturing some of the second string leaders and workers of this group, as well as unearthing their arms and weapons cache.
Always at 3 am, too ...
A good deal of hard work has been done in respect of the problem of drugs and narcotics, and by and large many well-known and hardened criminals have been put behind bars because of RAB activity. It had succeeded in inculcating a degree of confidence in the common man.
Who for some strange reason don't seem nearly as upset as you guys ...
But the achievements, regrettably, stand in stark contrast to the dismal record of crossfire deaths. This is indicative of the lack of respect for the judiciary and brings seriously into question the role of the higher authorities entrusted with law and order duties.
But the achievements, regrettably, stand in stark contrast to the dismal record of crossfire deaths.
Then again, the achievements may be precisely due to the crossfires ...
This is indicative of the lack of respect for the judiciary and brings seriously into question the role of the higher authorities entrusted with law and order duties.
What we find rather patently unconvincing is the description of the events leading up to the crossfire death. The pattern is similar in almost every case, which raises the question in public perception whether some of these are not stage-managed in the first place? The explanations appear absurd and cannot be acceptable.
Noticed that, did you? The RAB's twelve-step program for ridding a country upazaila of non-Islamic riff-raff and Biplobis ...
Let us restate the fact that the law must be applied to everyone including those taken into custody by the authorities.
Except for Islamicists, apparently ...
No one can act as the adjudicator of guilt or innocence except the courts of justice, and no one can abridge the course of justice in a society that claims to follow civilised norms of behaviour. They raise serious human rights concern, and allowing such killings with impunity can only sully our national image.
Which has been so shiny to date ...
Justice must be allowed to take its own course.
Don't say that, you'll have Carla del Ponte on your doorstep, and good luck trying to get rid of her ...
No matter what the record of an alleged criminal may be, by resorting to extrajudicial killings -- which these crossfire deaths are construed as -- such law enforcers are not behaving as custodians of law.
That's clearly not the point of the RAB ...
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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#1
There cannot be two opinions about the many commendable achievements of RAB since the elite force was launched.
...Not if you know what's good for you.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
07/18/2008 6:38
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#2
Now, now, let's not be judgemental about a different culture. Racists.
#4
"What we find rather patently unconvincing is the description of the events leading up to the crossfire death. The pattern is similar in almost every case, which raises the question in public perception whether some of these are not stage-managed in the first place? The explanations appear absurd and cannot be acceptable."
Obviously the writer never watched a 50's era US TV western; the bad guy always wore a black hat, always threw his empty gun back at the good guys in pursuit, and on the off chance that the bad guy DID get the drop on the good guy, he always stood around bragging about what he did and how he was gonna off the good guys. Just before reinforecments broke the door down and wasted the bad guy in a Colt 44 Cross fire.
seems like stupidity is a inherited trait amongst bad guys and other miscreants.
#1
All day, on a deep down level, this has penetrated into my soul. Since when, does a swing through Europe by a presidential candidate deserve such coverage?
He hasn't even won the nomination yet, and rumors are flying, some of these Super-delegates are changing their votes.
These same networks are grousing 'cause they didn't stand up to Bush on his invasion of Iraq. They repent their sins that they didn't challenge him enough on his reasons for going, thus, he did it anyway.
If only they had been harder on him before the invasion, they could have saved the soul of America.
And now, their reporting continues to show their reluctance in announcing Bush's victory.
After this, how will they ever be able to stand up to the O, for any of the many stupid mistakes he will make? Will they ever admit, "We didn't challenge him enough during his campaign, about his 148 day resume."
Realizing that the Fairness Act is structured to collapse conservative radio... well, maybe we do need it now. McCain travels Europe, Iraq, Afghan, South American and gets an "In other news of the day...." Would that Fairness Act demand, that they give the same coverage to McCain's journeys as they do to the O's?
But then, one can only slump further into depression with the type of coverage they would give. "Due to his age, McCain chose not to meet with...." "With such stress of the travels on the elder statesman, he chose not to......."
This is our MSM that declared their role is "to be skeptical."
This is a worrying issue. Our campaign for our President has now moved to campaign spots in foreign lands. And our press is being the advance person, being sure that all goes as planned. Going forth, preparing to present to the world, the adulation that can only come from a person who excels on delivery skills and reading a teleprompter. Any of our Oscar winners could be as good. (some already know they are.)
With the blessing of our so-called unbiased media, they now are openly declaring themselves, the National Press of the United States of Obama.
Is there anyway we can do to stop this? Screaming about getting out the vote isn't working, cause McCain just doesn't generate any excitement.
As much as McCain has given to our country, and as much as he continues to give, it frightens me, he just can't stop this rush to elect, Obama as the leader of the free world.
But, after his first four years, in my nightmares, he will no longer be the leader of the "free world" cause our "free world" as we know it surely will not exist.
This press coverage is quickly stirring some distressed feeling in me. I hope I am not alone inside my thoughts.
To paraphrase Michelle, "For all of my life, I've been proud and love my country, but now, I fear for my country."
#2
We've friends from England visiting at the moment, so I asked them why so much attention is being paid over there to our little election. "Everybody is so tired of Bush," was the reply. Which isn't one, really, except the world had been equally invested in Senator John F. Kerry, war hero, last time around. It makes me wonder, though: whatever will the world do should Candidate McCain win? He's known for carrying a grudge and taking insult when insult is given... and the world has definitely given insult.
I consider McCain's lack thereof to be an asset, not a liability.
Posted by: no mo uro ||
07/18/2008 6:22
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#4
Every slimball in the world seems to want this guy elected.
And who gives a rat's ass whether the brits and EUnicks are sick of Bush? They better hope obambi wins or they may be looking at a frosty welcome from the Mic.
#5
Having news MEGASTARS hanging around ALL the time and NEEDING to fill 20 to 30 minutes of airspace with something interesting EVERYDAY. Is OB blessed or cursed? THEY REPORT and Report and report... YOU decide.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
07/18/2008 12:31
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#6
Somebody said on the radio yesterday that Jim McGreevey got better press coverage then McCain.
Indonesia has denied final appeals for three men on death row convicted for deadly bombings on the island of Bali in October, 2002. Chad Bouchard reports from Jakarta.
The Indonesian Supreme Court rejected appeals from the three Islamic militants, and sent their decision to a district court in Bali. The decision means Ali Ghufron, Imam Samudra and Amrozi Nurhasyim are one step closer to the firing squad.
The men were convicted in 2003 for their part in deadly nightclub bombings, which killed 202 people on the resort island. Court officials say their most recent appeal, which was filed in May, was declared invalid. Their last option is to appeal for clemency from Indonesia's president, but the men have repeatedly stated they would not do so because they are unwilling to admit wrongdoing.
Deputy Attorney General Abdul Hakim Ritonga says the three men are running out of legal options. He says in the case of the three bombers, they are waiting word on the decision from the Supreme Court. After that, he says, there will be no longer a reason to delay the executions.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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#1
Firing squad!?
That's a Soldiers right, to die by a firing squad.
These worms should be hanged, like criminals.
Note that this is from "The Long War Journal" but is printed in the leftist Worldpress.org.
The boundaries of the war in Yemen are expanding beyond the northern Saada governorate. Bombing is audible from the nation's capital for the first time. Recent battles are among the bloodiest in memory.
After four years of armed conflict between the government and a group of Zaidi rebels, the war's impact has spread far beyond the combatants and the field of combat. Military, judicial, and civil policies targeting the rebels have precipitated a humanitarian crisis in Saada and a civil crisis in the nation with rights groups protesting mass arrests and other tactics.
Malnutrition is widespread among the 750,000 Saada residents after a long-standing government blockade.
Opposition party leaders in Saada condemned the unannounced military bombing of Dhahian City in July, calling the tactic "an unprecedented crime." In May, rebel spokesman Sheik Saleh Habrah said government shelling in Dhahian, Al-Mahader, and Al-Ghabair killed 30 civilians and wounded scores. Over 85,000 Saada residents fled indiscriminate government bombing and are internal refugees. Malnutrition is widespread among the 750,000 Saada residents after a long-standing government blockade.
#4
When Marxists ruled the south, northerners retreated into fundamentalism. The war will end when the south annihilates the northern enemy. Prediction: bloodbath.
BAGHDAD, July 17 (VOI) A Baghdad-based newspaper on Thursday welcomed the security handover of Diwaniya province, describing the transfer as a "blessed step" to restore security and stability to Iraqi cities. Badr, the daily mouthpiece of Badr Organization, one of the main components of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council (SIIC) led by Abdel Aziz al-Hakeem said in article entitled, 'Diwaniya self-security,' by Kareem al-Nouri, that the handover has proven the province's ability to assume security responsibilities.
On Wednesday morning, Diwaniya received its security file from the Multi-National Force (MNF) during a ceremony attended by National Security Adviser Muwafaq al-Rubaei and Diwaniya Governor Hamed al-Khudari. Bad weather conditions and logistic miscommunication problems between the central Iraqi government and the MNF delayed a power handover of the province, which was scheduled to take place in last June.
Diwaniya, 180 km south of the Iraqi capital Baghdad, became the 10th Iraqi province to receive the security file from the coalition forces. In 2002, the population of Diwaniya was estimated at 420,000. The area around the province, which is well irrigated from the nearby Euphrates River, is often considered to be one of the most fertile parts of Iraq, and is heavily cultivated. The town is located on the main rail transport corridor between Baghdad and Basra. For birdwatchers, Diwaniya is a city with a rich bird list, as it has a wide range of biodiversity.
Under a main headline that read, 'Tragedy of a province', al-Ra'i newspaper, an independent daily, lamented what it described as the deteriorating situation in Diala province, citing "killings, robberies, plunder, forced displacement and terrorist operations in the province."
The author of the article, Sabah al-Ghareery blamed the situation on the central Iraqi government in Baghdad and tribal forces, demanding prompt action to destroy terrorist strongholds and drive out criminals and outlaws from the province.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/18/2008
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Events in South Waziristan, the largest of the tribal agencies, are particularly worrying. Last month the Pakistani army invited journalists on a rare visit to the area to see how it had dealt with the tribal redoubt of Baitullah Mehsud, the leader of the Tehrik-i-Taliban, the umbrella group of the Pakistani Taliban. In January the army told some 200,000 people to leave their homes before sweeping through with attack helicopters, artillery and tanks.
A few days after the journalists' visit, Mr Mehsud summoned them back to the region to demonstrate that he remained in charge.
The Taliban leader, surrounded by hundreds of long-haired fighters, said he would not agree to stop cross-border attacks: "Islam does not recognise frontiers and borders."
The Taliban leader, surrounded by hundreds of long-haired fighters, denied accusations that he had ordered the killing of Ms Bhutto, blaming Mr Musharraf instead. He said he would not agree to stop cross-border attacks: "Islam does not recognise frontiers and borders."
Pakistan's prime minister, Yousaf Raza Gilani, insists that his new civilian government must be left to deal with extremism in its own way. He says the government will fight terrorists vigorously, but has to regain the support of a sceptical public. The tribal areas need to be integrated into the rest of the country both politically and economically in order to isolate extremists. Peace deals have already been signed in the "settled" areas of NWFP, but Mr Gilani insists that "no talks will be held with anyone refusing to lay down arms."
All this sounds very similar to what the Americans are trying to do across the border in Afghanistan, yet they are not reassured. It is the army, not the government, that is in charge of the talks, and the Americans fear that it will surrender control to the Taliban and al-Qaeda, as it has done in the past. And the talks will do nothing to improve matters in Baluchistan, the seat of the main body of Taliban leaders known as the "Quetta Shura", that runs the most intense front of the insurgency in the southern provinces of Kandahar and Helmand, apparently untroubled by the Pakistani authorities.
America would like to see Pakistan adopt some of its counter-insurgency methods to strengthen its grip on the tribal areas, and is offering about $750m over five years for social and economic development in FATA.
But the Pakistani army seems reluctant to change its thinking. Having lost about 1,000 soldiers since 2001 and had 250 of its soldiers captured by Mr Mehsud's fighters, it is tired and demoralised.
But the Pakistani army seems reluctant to change its thinking. Having lost about 1,000 soldiers since 2001 and had 250 of its soldiers captured by Mr Mehsud's fighters, it is tired and demoralised. NATO says the number of cross-border infiltrations has risen sharply this year.
One bit of hopeful news was the rout of Islamist parties in NWFP in the recent election, where the winner was the secular Pushtun nationalist party, the Awami National Party, which opposes the militants. But the provincial capital, Peshawar, is surrounded by armed groups, prompting a paramilitary operation to stop the city falling into their hands. The province's chief minister, Ameer Haider Hoti, claims that past Pakistani governments had built up armed factions as a tool of foreign policy. Now, he says, "this monster was created, and nobody knows how to handle it."
This article starring:
Baluchistan
South Waziristan
Ameer Haider Hoti
Awami National Party
BAITULLAH MEHSUD
Tehrik-i-Taliban
Quetta Shura
Yousaf Raza Gilani
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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This is about the clearest delivery of the message to date, though I have confidence that the Donks can wield an even-bigger sledgehammer in the days ahead ...
Governor Paterson, delivering a speech today at the NAACP's 99th annual convention at Cincinnati, suggested that the defeat of Senator Obama in the presidential election would be a victory for racism in America.
Mr. Paterson, a former lieutenant governor whose sudden rise to power following the resignation of Eliot Spitzer has led the press to dub him the "accidental governor," said he is offended by the label and suggested that it was motivated by racism.
As opposed to being an inept career pol ...
Mr. Paterson, who supported Senator Clinton throughout her campaign and was a Clinton super-delegate before endorsing Mr. Obama after Mrs. Clinton conceded, cast the presidential race in stark racial terms, saying its outcome would decide whether the nation could finally move beyond its legacy of slavery and segregation.
"Can America reject the crucible of race that has dictated and pervaded all of our history to embrace an African American man who has the right polices for the next decade in this country? Can America overlook its past practices that were so grave that in 1820 the great Scottish Whig, Sydney Smith, writing in the Edinburgh Review, said of America: 'How can they protest the tyrannies of Europe when they torture and brutalize one-sixth of its population?' How can America get past this and elect an African-American president of the United States?" Mr. Paterson said.
He continued on and on and on and on: "Can America go past the crippling way that we've shot ourselves in the foot over and over, denying opportunity to people who are bright, to people who are qualified, to people who are able because they didn't look like us, or they didn't come from where we came from, or they are from a different gender, or they are from the African continent? Can America push that away and find new leadership? We'll find out in the next few months what America can do."
Mr. Paterson, who is New York's first black governor, ...
... which sort of suggests that the problem isn't as big as he paints it ...
... also turned the focus on himself, strongly suggesting that people have belittled his governorship not because of the unusual way in which he took office but because of his race.
"I am known as New York's accidental governor. I would like to point out a couple of facts: The two adjoining states to New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, have had three government changes in the last five years," he said. "None of those people were called the accidental governor."
Because they were elected ...
"... Nobody called Malcolm Wison, who became governor of New York in 1974 when Governor Rockefeller became vice president, he was referred to Google his name in any article as an accidental governor. Nobody called Teddy Roosevelt an accidental president. Nobody called Truman an accidental president. And nobody called LBJ an accidental anything. So why was this non-illustrious title held all of these years for me? I will leave the answer to all of you and the Freudians in the audience because I haven't had the chance to think about it," he said.
No, of course not, no sirree ...
Mr. Paterson, while praising a speech to the NAACP delivered yesterday by the presumptive Republican nominee for president, Senator McCain, echoed Mr. Obama's primary attack strategy by linking the senator to Bush administration policies.
"He wants to support policies of an administration that has seen jobs go overseas and the national savings cut in half, thousands of companies out of business and going out of business, state budgets wildly out of balance, more children going without food and without shelter than any time in the last 10 years, entire regions struggling for survival, people denied the opportunity of work and now others thrown out of work, and people who rather than living in prosperity as we were promised are more divided than ever, region against region, class against class, the halves and against the have-nots," Mr. Paterson said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/18/2008
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#4
An Obambi defeat would be a victory for common sense.
Posted by: Grease Dark Lord of the Algonquins9226 ||
07/18/2008 9:45
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#5
Crew him and the horse he rode in on.
Obama, black, whtie or even little green man from mars, is the least qualified person to run foir the presidency in a long time.
3 years in the US Senate, and that's it!
He's waffled on every major issue, been a gaffe a minute at many times, is a lightweight on foriegn policy, a peacenik rube on military policy, and is generally a vacuous, but well spoken, Chicago machine hack politican.
Posted by: James Carville ||
07/18/2008 10:58
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#8
There's little room for common sense in this year's election, so let's stick with racism.
As a racist, I'll have to vote against BO. I wasn't born a racist, I was born in a city with sections of Irish, and sections of Italians, and sections of blacks, etc. I have become a product of my environment.
#9
So how many people are going to vote for OB because the Donks are calling them rascist? And how many not? The more this is used, the bigger his defeat. You don't vote for someone who calls you a S*******d.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
07/18/2008 13:04
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#10
Mr. Paterson, who is New York's first black governor...
Actually, he's New York's first unelected black governor. Another pol who's a contestant in the "Luckiest Man on the Face of the Earth" contest. How convienient for him that Spitzer was addicted to hookers.
#11
As a middle school teacher in what is essentially an "inner city" schoo, albeit a private religious school, I am bombarded daily by this same attitude frm both the students and their families. Further proof, if any was needed,the apple(s) rarely fall far from the tree.
#12
I am bombarded daily by this same attitude frm both the students and their families. Posted by WolfDog 2008-07-18 14:39|| Front Page|| ||Comments Top
To be expected! They've been sucking down the Government pablum of vicimization and entitlement for decades. "A Lie Told Often Enought Becomes The Truth." Vladimir Lenin
Don't bother yourself with all that other "stuff," the Democrats will tell us (I can hear Howard Dean now...), because a vote for Obama is a vote against racism and a vote for McCain is a vote for racism. You're not racist, are you?
#14
Prediction for the night of November 4th, 2008:
If Obama loses there will be roits in many cities across the nation.
If Obama wins the riots will be even bigger.
Posted by: Bob ||
07/18/2008 15:48
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#15
An Obama Victory is a Big Win for Racism!
Posted by: Red Dawg ||
07/18/2008 17:16
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#16
RACIST: Person who is winning an argument with a liberal.
There's not a hope in Hell of me voting for Bama. If there are black riots when he loses, I hope the police shoot them down in the streets in job lots and we bury the mounds of corpses in unmarked graves. I'm damned sick and tired of the threat of black violence every time something doesn't go exactly their way. They don't have a monopoly on that tactic and it's time they got a lesson on that matter.
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/18/2008 18:15
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#19
Who ya talking about, Jomosing Bluetooth8431?
The "no justice, no peace" crowd, who are almost invariably black, undoubtedly for Bama, and will see his loss as an excuse to rape, loot, burn, destroy and generally terrorize the innocent civilian populace.
I've had it with black criminality and the excuses used to justify it. I've also had it with the "when there's something good to be gained, I'm a member of the black group; when there is a bad consequence involved, I'm an individual!" garbage.
If there are going to be group rewards, there should also be group punishments. Example: if you're going to give blacks affirmative action, so they have an advantage over whites and Asians in competition for school admissions and jobs (where they are supposedly less represented), let's also give them affirmative crime action, like ten extra years in jail for a violent crime, or a mandatory extra tax payment to offset the cost of incarcerating the vastly disproportionate number of criminals from their ethnic group.
Screw the pandering, screw the excuses. If blacks can't keep to the rules that the rest of civilized society expects, we need to hammer them for it until they do. It's going to have to be external pressure that causes them to shape up because the mechanism of internal societal pressure that motivates other ethnic groups has collapsed in the black community.
Most of the people who would need such strictures applied to them understand nothing but force anyway. Really, what percentage of the black community these days sees a stretch in prison or an out-of-wedlock birth as something shameful? DuBois "talented tenth?" Remember the Rev. Jesse's "love child" with Karin Standford? Does that seem like it hurt him much with the black community? For every Thomas Sowell or Walter Williams there are ten thousand Roderick Carrs and Letalvis Cobbinses; our jails are proof positive of it. There is no way to deter these people other than a bullet to the head or the prospect of a 40 year jail stretch in solitary. Like it or not, that's what it's going to take.
If you don't believe that, take a look at the general run of places where blacks rule. They're almost inevitably places where corruption and the rule of the gun are paramount, and certainly not places conducive to much other than a desperate and brutal struggle for survival. Zimbabwe is just the latest example in a very, very long line.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Oil prices fell steeply on Thursday, extending a decline to a three-day record $15.89 a barrel, as natural gas prices tumbled and investors anticipated declining demand. Light, sweet crude for August delivery fell $5.31 to settle at $129.29 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The last time oil settled below $130 was June 5, when it settled at $127.79.
The decrease may mean that the market has finally realized that the fundamentals cannot sustain such large prices, said Peter Beutel, an oil analyst with Cameron Hanover. "I think the days of seeing record prices every other day for 60 days running are behind us," Beutel said. "But that doesn't mean we won't see a few more highs."
Beutel said that uncertainty over the economy, the Middle East and hurricane season mean oil prices will remain volatile in the short run.
A sharp drop in natural gas prices scared many investors out of the energy market, said Tom Orr, head of research at Weeden & Co. The August natural gas contract fell 86 cents, or 7.5%, to $10.54 per thousand cubic feet after the government's weekly inventory report showed an unexpected increase in supply. "When gas cracked, [oil] really just fell off a cliff," said Orr.
A report from U.K. newspaper The Guardian eased concerns about a disruption in supplies from Iran, the second-largest producing member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. The paper said Thursday that the U.S. may announce a diplomatic interest section in Tehran in less than a month.
Crude fell $4.14 Wednesday to settle at $134.60 a barrel, following a huge $6.44 selloff the previous day - crude's biggest one-day dollar drop since the Gulf War in 1991.
Earlier in the week, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress that high fuel prices and a slowing economy may be cutting into the U.S. appetite for crude. His statements were later backed up by the Energy Department, which reported Wednesday that U.S. crude stocks had unexpectedly risen by 3 million barrels - analysts polled by Platts had expected a drawdown. "There is a continued fear that demand is going to drop," Beutel said. "The economy is definitely on a rocky road right now. There is concern about inflation and the declining purchasing power of the dollar."
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/18/2008
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#1
It's the speculators driving down the market to deprive us of our revenue through illegal manipulations. Off with their hands.
Posted by: Abdulla Saud ||
07/18/2008 8:39
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#2
why don't the speculators get into shorting the futures market instead of going long all the time.
Lets see how far they can get it down now.
#3
Demand going a little slack due to recession, coupled with the threat of margin regulation, and a looming possibility of more drilling in the OCS and shales....
#6
not good. We need the price outrage to overcome American's short attention spans, forcing the Donks to open up more drilling. I welcome the price drop, but it will just allow the sleazy Dems to say: "look, now we don't need to drill"
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/18/2008 15:59
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#7
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Oil prices fell Friday, marking a more than $16-a-barrel four-day drop, as the market focused on a possible thawing between U.S. and Iranian tensions.
Light, sweet crude for August delivery settled 41 cents lower at $128.88 a barrel. Prices had been higher for most of the session on Friday, reaching as high as $132.04 a barrel.
In Helmand province in southern Afghanistan, the British Defense Ministry said, British troops killed a senior Taliban leader. Mullah Bismullah Akhund was killed Saturday in the Now Zad district of Helmand, long a Taliban bastion.
The Defense Ministry, in a statement Wednesday, called Bismullah "a senior key facilitator and logistician responsible for the northern Helmand region." The ministry says his death will disrupt the Taliban's leadership structure and hamper the group's ability to conduct attacks. "He is believed to have commanded numerous fighters and was identified by Task Force Helmand as a key player in the insurgency, and criminality, before the strike," according to the International Security Assistance Force.
British troops, who are part of the assistance force, announced the killing Thursday. Saturday's operation occurred 15 days after British troops killed another senior Taliban militant, Sadiqullah, in an Apache missile strike. "Bismullah was closely associated with local Taliban leader Mullah Rahim, whose brother was also killed during this operation," the International Security Assistance Force said.
The Defense Ministry said that "combined with the elimination of Sadiqullah, this is the most significant blow struck against the Taliban logistics and facilitation chain in northern Helmand this year."
The U.S.-led coalition said it also is investigating an airstrike in western Afghanistan's Farah province. Launched after a coalition convoy was attacked Tuesday, it struck a house and killed eight.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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#1
Mullah Bismullah Akhund
In his spare time champion of Iron Bisquick Tonite
#2
Mexicans will now re-flag the sub and resale the merchandise. Mexico is a narco-state - pure and simple. I live in Tucson and with the Latino cultural concept of extended families (its seems at times that everybody is everybody's cousin) the cartels freely operate on both sides of the border. I am not a nativist - as I've stated on this board before. My family arrived here from Minsk and Odessa in 1912. They stayed and became Americans. Down here on the Mexican border many are literally confused about their nationality - they travel to Mexico incessently for legal or often other purposes. And even when in the U.S. the Chicano activists declare U.S. turf as AZTLAN.American leftists (read neo-marxists) have aided and abetted this confusion by a continual derrogation of nationalism and patriotism.
If demography rules, as some say, the southwest is lost U.S. territory. "One man, one vote" will be our demise, but will be the rise of a Greater Mexico.
#3
"One man, one vote" will be our demise, but will be the rise of a Greater Mexico.
Maybe, but even then they will be too far from gawd and too close to the United States Texas
Witnesses in Somalia say heavy fighting between Islamist insurgents and Ethiopian troops has killed at least five people in the capital. The latest fighting began after Islamic rebels attacked an Ethiopian military base in Mogadishu. Witnesses say several civilians were killed by stray bullets and mortar fire.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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(Xinhua) -- A suspected mentally-ill man was last Friday devoured by a pride of marauding lions at a motel in the northern Zimbabwean border town of Chirundu, The Herald reported on Thursday.
I smell a multi-squidgillion zimbuck lawsuit coming...
Only parts such as three leg bones, two fingers, three ribs and his private organs were recovered after the attack on July 11 at around 2 a.m. behind Chirundu Valley Motel, the newspaper said.
Also recovered were the victim's blood-stained clothes. Mashonaland West police spokesperson Inspector Paul Nyathi confirmed the incident, adding that the remains of the man were taken to Karoi Hospital mortuary.
A guard who was manning the motel witnessed the incident after peeping from a safe hideout when he heard the man scream as the roaring lions attacked him.
Lions are usually active from dusk until nightfall and Nyathi urged visitors to Chirundu and residents to avoid moving at night in the wildlife-infested area and to be extremely vigilant as an attack on humans normally leads to a spate of targeted killings. "Visitors and residents in the area are warned to be cautious and avoid walking at night as history has shown that once lions taste human flesh they begin hunting for it," he said.
He said police had alerted the Parks and Wildlife Management Authority about the incident.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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#1
Has nothing to do with taste. Unarmed humans are an easy prey.
#8
Back in the day, We could have counted on faithful side kick Jim to distract the maruding lions while Marlin sold this poor soul some Mutual of Zim life insurance. Then climbed back into the Land Rover and drove away......
At least 13 people were killed during Tuesday clashes in the Somali capital Mogadishu and a regional town of Berdale, Radio Garowe reported today. In Mogadishu, Islamist insurgents attacked a police station and engaged officers in a fierce battle that killed at least 6 people and wounded 7 others, according to witnesses.
A Medina Hospital official said that one police officer and two insurgents are among the wounded people being treated at the hospital.
Four of the victims died when a shell hit their home, neighbors reported.
A Mogadishu police spokesman told reporters that they killed 3 insurgents and repulsed the attack, while Islamist spokesman Abdirahim Isse Addow claimed that the insurgents briefly seized control of the police station. There were no independent reports to verify either claim.
In a separate battle, insurgents ambushed a joint Somali-Ethiopian force that was traveling by foot in Berdale town, in Bay region where the country's parliament sits. The bodies of at least 7 people - all of them fighters - were discovered on Wednesday by Berdale residents and town elders. According to reliable reports, 9 others were wounded during the 20-minute battle.
Islamist spokesmen claimed on local radio to have killed "many soldiers" and "burned vehicles." But one witness told Radio Garowe that "hundreds of Somali and Ethiopian troops arrived afterwards, flying the Somali flag." He stated that he "did not see any burning trucks," but admitted seeing wounded soldiers being transported out of Berdale.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/18/2008
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Squadron Leader Frank "Fearless" Day, who has died aged 91, came close to freedom during the Great Escape from Stalag Luft III; he was near the end of the tunnel when the exit was discovered, by which time 76 airmen had broken free, but he was forced to retreat and was soon in solitary confinement.
#1
A British hero from a time when there were many of them. I suspect he was not pleased to see what has happened to the country he gave so much to save. Rest in peace, Squadron Leader. Maybe someday Britons will again value your courage and sacrifice.
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/18/2008 18:30
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#3
It is about time for the Lady of the Lake gave Excalibur to some deserving lad, though that sword would become very bloody indeed before England was restored.
Amar Bil Maroof Wa Nahi Anil Munkir, a Bara-based militant group, has warned United States-led coalition troops against carrying out attacks inside the Tribal Areas, Dawn News reported on Thursday. According to the channel, Amar Bil Maroof spokesman Munsif Ali said at a press conference held in the Bara tehsil of Khyber Agency that the groups' fighters would fight alongside the Pakistan Army if the NATO forces launched an attack inside Pakistani territory. The spokesman said that if the NATO forces entered Pakistani territory, the militants would retaliate in a way that would remind the US of the devastation of the September 11 attacks.
This article starring:
Bara
Khyber Agency
Tribal Areas
MUNSIF ALI
Amar Bil Maroof Wa Nahi Anil Munkir
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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#5
While I don't consider the threat much more than hot air, as comments go on Pakistani army, you have to remember who's guarding those Pakistani nukes.
This may very well be insight into the possibility that opposition forces in Pakistan have allies in critical areas.
Pakistan might be a smoking hole in the earth sooner than we think (sequel, of course, to something very egregious)...
#8
Things are pretty simple Amar Munkir. We are fighting terrorists and Taliban in Afghanistan, and when chesed they run for sanctuary on your side of the border.
Either you stop those people on your side, or we will. We will pursue them, and if you get in our way, you will die. In large numbers. Quickly.
Threaten a 9/11 attack? Fine, we will flatten your entire region.
#9
I really do wish we'd take one of these goat-rapers up on his bs and do a "shock and awe" on them the RIGHT way - a dozen B-52s with iron bombs from 45,000 feet, a couple of dozen B-1s on the deck with JDAMs and incindiaries, and a half-dozen AC-130s down low for a follow-up on the survivors, if there are any. Of course, the demoncritters would never let us wage REAL war against anyone - heaven forbid! I'm getting really sick and tired of fighting a two-front war - one in south Asia and one in Washington, DC.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
07/18/2008 12:26
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#10
"Bite us, sons of pigs and munkirs"
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/18/2008 13:24
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#11
I dunno. Maybe an old Israeli thign woudl work (back when they had balls)...
Run a pair of 16's or F-18s at 200 ft above his ville, going mach+, with maybe a bone trailing it on full afterburner (B-1B, rated Mach 1.2 at sealevel), and a buff to rattle the windows. Too bad we dont have an SR-71 to use... (or do we? heh)
Sonic boom would shatter tons of things. And two within seconds would be sure to indicate that it was no accident.
That would scare the hell out of the locals, and let him contemplate just how bad the screams of his children and relatives are now, and how they would be were a real attack ordered.
from af.mil...
The strongest sonic boom ever recorded was 144 pounds per square foot and it did not cause injury to the researchers who were exposed to it. The boom was produced by a F-4 flying just above the speed of sound at an altitude of 100 feet.
In recent tests, the maximum boom measured during more realistic flight conditions was 21 pounds per square foot. There is a probability that some damage -- shattered glass, for example, will result from a sonic boom. Buildings in good repair should suffer no damage by pressures of less than 16 pounds per square foot.
#13
Wouldn't it be nice if we could tell these bast**** that we will pursue anyone anywhere who has shot at our troops. You come to Afghan turf. We will likely tolerate you. You shoot at us, you die. Whether it's on Afghan soil, Pak soil, or anyplace else, the results the same. We will go after you until you are captured or dead. Either way is fine with us. I know I'm daydreaming on this one, but isn't it such a lovely dream? And wouldn't it change a lot of people's behavior?
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
07/18/2008 13:53
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#14
Do they even have windows in their 7th century hovels?
Posted by: Cowboy is a compliment ||
07/18/2008 13:58
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#15
The strongest sonic boom ever recorded was 144 pounds per square foot
144? Jeebus, is that the same as overpressure? If it is that would knock down the Sunsshine Skyway. Maybe it's measured differently.
#17
I like OS's idea; and the data re: the Phantom would be ideal to use and since the US has retired all it's F-4's ( of all flavors) then we could hide behind the plausible denaibility shield. HEE-HEE, wudn't us.
Bet there are several Phantom Phliers and Phixers out there that would love to wind those J-79's back up........
Spain's supreme court has overturned the convictions of four of the 21 people found guilty of involvement in the 2004 Madrid train bombings that killed 191 people. The four men had been convicted of charges ranging from membership of a terrorist group to supplying explosives.
The court also upheld a lower court's acquittal of one of the alleged masterminds of the al-Qaida inspired attacks, Rabei Ousmane Sayed Ahmed, also known as Mohammed the Egyptian. The Supreme court said Thursday there was not enough evidence to condemn him as an organizer of the attack.
"Yeah. Da witnesses is all dead!"
The early morning bombing of four packed commuter trains was the deadliest terror attack in the west since the September 11 attacks in the US in 2001.
This article starring:
MOHAMED THE EGYPTIAN
al-Qaeda in Europe
RABEI USMANE SAIED AHMED
al-Qaeda in Europe
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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#1
Spain's Supreme Court Clears 4 in Madrid Train Bombing Case
Oh well...
Posted by: Red Dawg ||
07/18/2008 3:36
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#2
Now they are living among you, plotting their squalid little deeds again.
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/18/2008 11:47
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#8
Just another example why it's impossible to fight an unconventional war in the courts. These people only know how to deal with ordinary criminals. Terrorists are NOT "ordinary" criminals, but the most dangerous kind of rot any free nation could imagine. Shoot to kill, and accept the loss of intelligence value. At least you won't have to capture the same idiots over and over.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
07/18/2008 11:59
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#9
Do we have any sort of a rating for the degree of hospitality a country has for terrorists? A poor ranking on that would translate into many tourist dollars lost.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
07/18/2008 14:04
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#10
Mr Carville and others
I read fluent (fluent as a native spaker) Spanish and since I grew in Spain and it was West's first defat in the WOT I have studied the thing with passion.
So
1) Muach/all the evidence apperas to have been planted
2) There have been many, many bizaree things in teh investigation. Do you know that NO analysis of teh xplosives was performed, do you know that the wagons were sent to sacrpyard and destroyed the day after of the explosions thus amking forensics impossible? Do you think this is normal proceudre?
3) None of the suspects had links with the Islamist movement in fact a few of them to be silent apostates. One of the suspects was arrested just because a cell phone had been sold in his shop, the others were mere petty criminals.
4) All of them were confidents of the pôlice.
These are facts.
Nowask yourself: what if it waqs really done by other people? Who benefitted from the crime?
#11
Well, JFM, I think most of us got the feeling from the git go (American vernacular) that there was something "strange" about the way this case was handled by the Spanish authorities and the way the bombing seemed to have helped Zapatero (sp) get elected in the name of paz. Perhaps my comment about the law schools was aimed more at certain judges in the USA than in Spain.
#12
Now le's make some guessing but first agains ome facts.
The first there we are sure beacuse theyw ere made openly;
First; In the very moring a fter the bombings Zapatero was hinting to teh media its waqsn't ETA.
Second: It wasn't the bombings who upturned the result of the elections it was the combination of bombings and an agitprop propaganda made by the socualusts and Grupo Prisa the mots, by far, powerful MSM group in Spain who has and had had many, many things to thank to teh Socialists.
Third: he impact of teh agitprop campaign was multiplied hundedfold by the fact that government seemd to be lying was telling that every clue pointed to ETA while Prisa radios and TVs were reporting of clues being dicovered pointing to ilsmaists (BTW some of Prisa's allegations were white lies). Thus governement looked to be lying in order to win the elections.
The fourth one we don't know for sure since these were internal communications between governement and police but it seemd that polica was giving informations to governement with a delay of severl hours. Now reread point three.
And now le's go to the hypothesis.
1) Bombings were perpetrated by islamists and it was coincidence it was so close to the elections. Their goal was merely to kill infidels, specially the hated Spaniards who had had the insolence to liberate their land from Islam, athing who still hurst in places like Saudi Arabia. When learning of bombings some people in the socilist party mounted a conspiration to upturn the result of the elections. Notice that in this case it was not important to arrest the perpetrators, the important thing was to "discover" pieces of evidence, to arrest some Arabs and o it just in the right moment (BTW when the suespcts was arrested it was just in the day before the elctuions when the law severly retricted governmen's speak.)
2) THe choice of the date was not a coincidence. It really aimed to overthrow the governemnt. But as I said thisz wouldn't have worked without the agitprop made by socialists and Prisa and it wouldn't have worked without the discovery just at the right time, never an hour too late or too soon of pieces of evidence (who weren't there just an hour soooner) and arrests who were also made just at the right moment.
So either the perpetrators had a such thorough knowledge of Spain's political life and of the leadership of Spanish police tha they could predict their reactions or...., or whetver the perpetrators (ETA, Al Quaida, God know what) they were working hand in hand with some high ranking socialists and doing it before the elections.
I tend to believe it was hypothesis 1: PSOE using the bombings and having evidence planted: if they had had time for planning even a third artae policeman or spook would have done a better job.
#13
The last sentence of my previous post was wrong uncomplete. Here it is
I tend to believe it was hypothesis 1: PSOE leraning of the bombings when they were perpetrated and making a quick plan to having evidence planted in order to win the elections: if they had had time for planning even a third rate policeman or spook would have done a better would have done a better job at planting evidence so it didn't look too suspicious and at scapegoating more credible suspects (as I said none of them had links with Islamists and most/all of them were pôlice confidents).
#14
Jfm, you've hinted several times at making an article about this; I know this is time-consuming, and you've got a life, but I think it would be useful you put on your thoughts on this in an extented form; like France, Spain has had a dark underbelly of "parallal polices" (see the links between the socialists and the GAL), I'm not sure I would be as comfortable about the 1) hypothesis (bombing its own citizens is something I accept for putin, but would seem way too criminal for a western pol, this is NOT what they're expected to do)... but a nexus between the eta, the islamists and moles from the politicized intelligence agencies sure is a distinct possiblity (that is, the socialists could know it was going to happen due to some moles in the eta, again, see the GAL, and took plans to piggyback it to power).
In any regards, there most probably WAS a manipulation to get the PSOE in power, this has been discuted elsewhere by other people(media camaign by msm groups closely affiliated to the socialists, crowd manipulation & obsfucation police), and it jibes with your ideas about that. So, having you elaborate about it would be interesting IMHO.
#15
Ok, I misread Jfm (I read too fast), I thought he was hinted the PSOE was complicit in the actual bombing, while in fact, it's me who is the most conspiratorial here, sorry!
#16
Everywhere politically motivated judges are acquitting terrorists, in protest of the anti terrorism laws. The current government of Spain was only elected after the 3-11 massacre. The previous government was a supporter of the GWOT. The current goofs endorse the "fraternity of civilizations" fraud.
My belief is based on a tenuou ground: the planting of evidence and its coverup were far too botched up and amateur-like to have been preplanned. It looks like everything was organized "on the march".
But there is another fact: the bombs exploded at about ethe moment were they could cause the lesser number of victims. A bit later and the trains would have acquired speed, a bit earlier they would have been in railways stations, wait a bit more and they would have been in Madrid's central station and the number of victims would have been in the thousands.
Now the police is telling us that bombs were detonated not with timers but with cellphones. If perpetrators were not interested in election's outcome they simply gone for kiling as many infidels as possible. If they were interested in it then too many victims would have caused the postponement of teh elctions. Now look at my hypothesis: if perpetrators were intesrested in the election's outciome then either they had a really good knowledge of Spanish politics and of the Spanish police (I simply cannot envision our French socialists trying to use the bombings like the Spanish did and our police helping them) or they were working with the socialists (who were the only ones who could perform the agitprop part of the plot).
The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court says he will pursue charges against rebel groups that attacked African Union peacekeepers in Darfur last September, killing 10 of them. Just days after bringing charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity against Sudan's president, prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo said Thursday he would next seek charges against rebel leaders in the war-torn Darfur region.
Moreno-Ocampo said he has information about the names of two Darfur rebel commanders who were allegedly responsible for the attack at Haskinita in south Darfur last year that killed 10 African Union soldiers. He called on the rebel groups to cooperate with the court.
"I think it is a good opportunity for me to urge the rebels -- the rebels cannot commit crimes, they have to control their people, and they have to help the Court," said Moreno-Ocampo. "In fact, the Security Council called on all the actors - they have to help the court -- provide it evidence against those who committed the attacks in Haskinita and even arrest them."
He added that all attacks against peacekeepers come under his jurisdiction, including the July 8 one, that killed seven peacekeepers from the joint AU-U.N. force known as UNAMID.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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#1
"...And as long as I'm dreaming, I'd like a pony!"
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
07/18/2008 6:31
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#2
Note the "Nose of the Camel" tactic being used: Attacking "peacekeepers" is now a war crime. They are setting up "peacekeepers" as super-special-soldiers, not as regular ones.
There will, of course, be classifications and grades within grades: US peacekeepers being the bottom of the pile and fair game.
GENEVA - The World Health Organisation (WHO) has for the first time since 2003 redeployed expatriate staff to Iraq, the United Nations agency said on Thursday. It said several international staff had quietly returned to Iraq in late June, reestablishing a "permanent international basis" in the country after 5 years. U.N. agencies withdrew international staff after the deadly bombing of its Baghdad headquarters in August 2003, but Iraqi nationals continued their aid projects. The U.N. refugee agency recently sent back staff to Iraq.
Dr. Naeema Al-Gasseer, WHO country representative to Iraq, and a Bahraini who had been based in Jordan for the past few years in charge of WHO's Iraq programme, said WHO experts were helping the Iraqi health ministry expand vaccination programmes, monitor for diseases and improve standards of medical care.
"Needs are very huge," she said, noting hepatitis and rotavirus vaccines will be introduced for Iraqi children over the next year, complementing programmes for polio and measles. "We can deliver more, while not losing sight that security is still a concern. We have a challenge to continue to come up with innovative approaches to be able to move around inside Iraq," Al-Gasseer said.
"I managed during this past month to visit a women's prison, hospitals and public health services outside the Green Zone. I have seen a difference in the streets and in the movement of people," she said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/18/2008
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#4
Oh, crap! The scumbags are returning to Iraq to see how much they can screw up before the government cracks down on them. The UselessNosies is the least helpful organization ever put together. If you don't want something done, give the job to the UN. Barf!
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
07/18/2008 12:35
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#5
We must be winning. The U.N. Vampire Vulture Elite are returning to claim credit....
US authorities slapped sanctions Thursday on four suspected leaders of an Algerian branch of Al-Qaeda, saying the group had carried out "numerous attacks" in Algeria.
The US Treasury designated the four leaders of Al-Qaeda in the Lands of the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), who had been were added to a United Nations list of people linked to Osama Bin Laden, Al-Qaeda and the Taliban.
Those named included Salah Gasmi, identified as the head of the group's information committee; Yahia Djouadi, based in northern Mali and and leader of a cell that includes southern Algeria; Ahmed Deghdegh, identified as the group's finance chief and designated negotiator; and Abid Hammadou, a deputy leader a battalion based in northern Mali.
According to US officials AQIM carried out three attacks east of Algiers in early June 2008, including a bombing near a train station that killed a French national. The group was also believed to be responsible for the abduction of two Austrian tourists in Tunisia in February. One leader of the group told the New York Times in July that the group was prepared to attack the United States or its interests anywhere in the world.
The US action will freeze any assets of the individuals and prevent any Americans from financial dealings with them. "Algeria has shown remarkable courage in the face of horrifying terrorist attacks against its people," said Adam Szubin, director of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC). "The four terrorists that we have targeted today are among the most culpable for this violence, as leaders of Al-Qaeda in the Lands of the Islamic Maghreb."
This article starring:
ABID HAMADU
al-Qaeda in North Africa
Adam Szubin, director of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control
AHMED DEGHDEGH
al-Qaeda in North Africa
SALAH GASMI
al-Qaeda in North Africa
YAHIA DJUADI
al-Qaeda in North Africa
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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An opinion poll conducted by reputed international agencies has revealed that a majority of people in India want a resolution to the Kashmir issue as per the Kashmiris' aspirations.
The poll found that people in both India and Pakistan have expressed a readiness to have the Kashmiri people decide their own fate, adding that if the Kashmiris chose independence, a majority of Indians and Pakistanis would find it tolerable. In India, the opinion poll was conducted by reputed agency C-Voter, while in Pakistan, AC Nielson gathered views on behalf of the WorldPublicOpinion.org polling site.
The poll revealed that more than half of the population of India and Pakistan were open to a range of possible outcomes for Kashmir. It found no strong majority opposition on either side to Kashmir becoming an independent country or to dividing the state between Pakistan and India.
"Given the deep roots of the conflict over Kashmir, it is surprising that the conflict has not polarised majority of the Pakistani and Indian people, as they do not fall in line with their governments' positions," said Clay Ramsay, the research director of WorldPublicOpinion.org, a project run by the University of Maryland, United States.
In the survey, Indians and Pakistanis were asked to consider a range of possible outcomes for Jammu and Kashmir and to say whether they found them desirable, acceptable, tolerable, or unacceptable.
The idea that received the lowest level of opposition was for Jammu and Kashmir to become independent.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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#1
The poll revealed that more than half of the population of India and Pakistan
Wonder what sample size you use to poll 1.3 billion people, the majority in rural areas?
Posted by: john frum ||
07/18/2008 7:31
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#3
Wonder what sample size you use to poll 1.3 billion people
Assuming a geographical diserpershun, not all that many. 32 to 50 in each discreate secktor. These would have to be face to face, which naturally carries it's own bias risk, still, it's the only way. So rought estimater.... 640.
#4
Damn this is easy.
A well thought out poll in China would require 1742 individual interviews. The interviewer should were a poka dot shirt and clam diggers. This you should know from BS 101. The new line of heliostats will make it remarkablly easy to airlift thousands and thousands of polltakers to insure a non-biased outcome.
Now in the future the Chineese government will find it easy to to communicate with their citizens once this first (initial) poll is over. The hydrogen motorcycles will make it very easy to folllow up. The infrastructure is already being built, the hydrogen/oil wells in Shifcan Province (a traditionally Tan area) are in particular ready to um.... go.
#5
Noooooooooooo. Wait a second. Hinjooooos are prescribed from wearing Polka Dot shirts unless they are King-of-the-Mountain. Therefore the answer is 1796 and Reeboks.
Since the Hinjoos invented tennis shoes this should be a cinch. Matter of fact 12 out of the 14 largest sneaker factories in the Solar (from Sol the sun) System are in India. They employ thou........................
#8
Hindus have legitimate interests in maintaining sovereignty in Kashmir. Currently over half million Hindus are exiled from same. In a free vote, the Muslim majority would vote against Indian sovereignty. Since Partition, Pakistan has reduced native Hindus from 20 to 1%. They would do the same to Kashmir and Jammu.
#9
J+K state also includes mainly Buddhist Ladakh as well as mainly Hindu Jammu. It is the relatively small Kashmir valley with its Muslim majority population that is vulnerable to the calls to jihad.
Posted by: john frum ||
07/18/2008 16:47
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#10
Meanwhile....
Pakistani demonstrators burn tires in condemnation of a huge decline of stock market in front of the Islamabad Stock Exchange in Islamabad
Posted by: john frum ||
07/18/2008 20:08
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Two commanders of the Umer Khalid group and the Shah Sahib group, the rival militant groups fighting in Mohmand Agency, died on Thursday, raising the death toll in the ongoing fighting to three. Sources said that the clashes started between the two militant groups on Tuesday in the Khwazai area. Commander Nisar, who was from the Commander Umer Khalid group and Mansoor, who was from the Shah Sahib group, were seriously injured in the clashes on Tuesday. According to latest reports due to the mediations of a jirga formed by the political administration, the militant groups had ceased fire. Both sides had released hostages and withdrawn from their positions. The next meeting of the jirga would be held after three days.
This article starring:
Khwazai area
Mohmand Agency
COMANDER NISAR
Taliban
SHAH SAHIB
Taliban
UMER KHALID
Taliban
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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(Xinhua) -- A senior Palestinian official announced on Thursday that Israel has decided to increase the amount of fuel allowed into the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip.
Husein al-Sheikh, chief of civil affairs and liaison with the Israeli side in the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) in Ramallah said in a statement that the decision would come into effect on Friday.
"We were informed by the Israeli side that the amounts of diesel, cooking gas, gasoline and industrial diesel for operating Gaza power plant would increase on Friday," said al-Sheikh.
Following an Egypt-brokered truce between Israel and Gaza militant groups in the Gaza Strip which came to effect on June 19 and intends to last six months, Israel has eased restrictions imposed on the entrance of fuels and goods into the Gaza Strip.
However, the deposed Hamas-led government in Gaza complained that in spite of the truce, Israel only allowed limited amount of goods and fuel into the Gaza Strip.
After Hamas movement ousted President Mahmoud Abbas' security forces and took control of the Gaza Strip last summer, Israel imposed a tightened blockade on the enclave and only allowed humanitarian aids into Gaza.
Following an increase of homemade rocket attacks carried out by militants from Gaza at Israel before the truce was reached, Israel reduced the amount of fuel into Gaza, leaving Gaza population in hard living condition.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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#1
Does this seem like a truce, or more like a protracted campaign of blackmail and threats on a daily basis?
#4
Does this seem like a truce, or more like a protracted campaign of blackmail and threats on a daily basis?
Indeed.
I wonder what's going to happen when the wonder-chain is broken. Bushitler & O'Mart and the USDOS are the only entities keeping the Jooooooooooooo state in their lair.
Srsly, you can look it up.
We'll find out soon. Meanwhile, if you're looking for my permission I left it in the mailbox. If you don't need my permission then that's cool too.
Grit, determination, an eleventh-hour change of tactics and the Sunni tribal movement helped America to avoid the defeat in Iraq that seemed perilously close less than two years ago. Al-Qaeda is not so much fighting to beat America in Iraq but to survive. Increasingly, say Western officials, foreign fighters now prefer to take themselves to Pakistan.
But counter-terrorism experts worry about the consequences of America's success. Might Iraq now start exporting seasoned veterans, as Afghanistan did in the 1990s? Optimists say the danger is less acute than many fear, for three reasons. First, many of the foreign jihadists went to Iraq on a one-way ticket: to die as suicide-bombers. Second, governments are more aware of the danger of returning jihadists. And third, Zarqawi's death seems to have removed the main impetus behind exporting Iraq's violence.
Zarqawi's decision to bomb three hotels in Amman in November 2005 backfired badly, causing a wave of revulsion, especially in his native Jordan. Among the bombed-out ruins of his hideout, American forces found a letter from a man calling himself Atiyah who said he spoke on behalf of the whole of al-Qaeda's leadership. Written just weeks after the Amman bombs, it warned Zarqawi that his actions were alienating potential supporters. He risked repeating the jihadists' ruinous bloodletting in Algeria during the 1990s when, Atiyah said, "their enemy did not defeat them, but rather they defeated themselves, were consumed and fell."
The savagery of the Algerian jihad took the lives of more than 100,000 people through the 1990s. The worst of the fighting was waged by the Armed Islamic Group (GIA), which denounced democracy and embraced jihad as the only means to power. The Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), broke away in 1998. It had always been close to al-Qaeda, with strong links to fighters in Iraq.
In September 2006, thanks in part to matchmaking by Zarqawi, the GSPC rebranded itself as al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and introduced suicide tactics, attacking a series of foreign targets, including the United Nations office in Algiers. It also kidnapped Western tourists in Mauritania and Tunisia. The jihadists use the vast expanse of the Sahara to train recruits from across the region.
Other al-Qaeda offshoots have emerged, for instance, in Yemen and Lebanon. Whether these franchises will fare any better than Algeria's earlier kind of jihadism, or than the troubled one in Iraq, remains to be seen. Mr Jazairi, for one, thought the bombings in his native Algeria were "sheer idiocy". Better to fight in Iraq, he said. Still, it may be only a matter of time before AQIM, in particular, leaps across the Mediterranean into Europe.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2008
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#1
Again, 2008-2012 [2016?] Post-Dubya POTUS Period > ITS CALLED PAN-ISLAMIST NUCLEARIZATION + PROTECTING FUTURE NUCLEARIZED-WEAPNZD IRAN AND ISLMAIST CENTRAL ASIA/ASIA AMAP ASAP AFAP ALAP, such that even iff Iran or even Paki is invaded by the US-Allies, RADICAL ISLAM INCLUD ISLAMIST MILITANT-TERR GROUPS + STATES WILL STILL HAVE A GOOD CHANCE OF ACQUIRING OWG JIHAD-WINNING, INFIDEL-DEFEATING NUC/MILTECHS.
MILPOL DIALECTICISM aka DECENTRALIZATION > Iff Dubya = USA doesn't wish to attack and invade Islamist Iran = Persia as per the OSAMIAN-MOUDIAN ISLAMIST APOCALYPSE, RADICAL ISLAM WILL USE THE INTERIM TO REBUILD, REARM, AND STRENGTHEN THE JIHAD FOR FUTURE NEW OPS.
As warned long ago, Dubya's critics are beginning to realize that their Hyper-PC, Anti-WOT and Political Posturings, etc. rants are only PUTTING AMER AT GREATER LT DANGER, NOT LESS.
* "DR. FEELGOOD" Song vv STANGELOVE > HOW I LEARNED TO WORRY BY NOT USING THE BOMB = BY NOT GOING TO WAR, etc.
#2
I'm not holding my breath for al-Qaeda success in the Maghreb. First of all, it's in the middle of nowhere, empty, hostile desert. Any people around are hostile to everyone. You cannot enter or leave without being observed.
And lastly, our Special Forces likes to hang out there, and are just about as hostile as it gets.
(CNN) -- Local security forces and coalition soldiers in western Afghanistan killed several insurgents Thursday in what the NATO command called a "successful operation against high-priority Taliban targets." The operation took place in the Shindand district of Herat province. Two Taliban leaders, Haji Dawlat Khan and Haji Nasrullah Khan, and "significant number of other insurgents" were killed, according to a statement from NATO's International Security Assistance Force.
It added there was no evidence of civilian casualties or accidental damage in the operation, in which a "number of men were discovered handcuffed and imprisoned in appalling conditions in one of the insurgent compounds."
The incident reflects the increasing violence between troops and Taliban militants across Afghanistan and the growing concern in the United States that the war there should be more of a priority than it has been. Since May, the deaths of U.S. and allied troops have far outpaced the toll in Iraq. On Thursday, the toll in Afghanistan was 21 compared to six in Iraq. The International Security Assistance Force did not provide the nationality of the soldier who died in Afghanistan Thursday. Two top Pentagon officials said Wednesday they expect to be able to recommend more troop reductions in Iraq this fall and will try to find ways to increase troops in Afghanistan.
One of the toughest fronts in the war has been the southern province of Helmand. The British Defense Ministry said its troops in southern Afghanistan killed a senior Taliban leader, two weeks after another leading militant died in a British missile attack.
Mullah Bismullah Akhund was killed Saturday in the Now Zad district of Helmand, long a Taliban bastion. The Defense Ministry, in a statement on Wednesday, called Bismullah "a senior key facilitator and logistician responsible for the northern Helmand region." The ministry says his death will disrupt the Taliban's leadership structure and hamper the group's ability to conduct attacks.
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A top Taliban leader threatened Thursday to attack the provincial government in northwestern Pakistan unless it quits after the army launched an operation against militants in response to an ambush that killed 17 troops.
Spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said army forces, backed by helicopter gunships, drove out militants from the town of Zargari, and were advancing to other militant hideouts nearby. He gave no report of casualties, but local police official Saif Ullah said two civilians were hurt Thursday when a mortar landed near their home on the outskirts of Zargari.
Militant supporters of Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud on Saturday ambushed a convoy of paramilitary Frontier Corps near Zagari and killed 17 troops. Five militants also died in the clash, which came days after police arrested a militant known as Rafiuddin, a deputy of Mehsud. "We have cleared those areas of militants where they attacked and killed our soldiers," Abbas said.
An army statement said the operation was called by the government of North West Frontier Province to secure Hangu district, where Zagari is located, and would continue until the area was cleared of militants.
A spokesman for Mehsud blamed the provincial government for military operations in Hangu and other frontier regions. Maulvi Umar said in response, Taliban would not honor peace deals signed with provincial authorities and threatened violence if the North West Frontier Province administration, which came to power after Feb. 18 national elections, did not quit. "We will attack the provincial government and the ANP leaders after five days if they do not quit," he said, referring to the Awami National Party.
Provincial government spokesman Iftikhar Hussain rejected the threat, saying the administration had a popular mandate. "We will not step down (based) on a threat from some individual," he said. "They are threatening to follow the path of violence, while we believe in peace."
The ANP government has negotiated peace deals with militants and tribes in regions including the Swat Valley and Khyber since the election that ousted from power allies of President Pervez Musharraf.
In a shift in policy, the new civilian administration has promoted dialogue to curb the escalating militant violence in Pakistan rather than relying on the military force often used by Musharraf, a former army strongman and key ally in the U.S.-led war on terror. U.S. officials have expressed concern that the peace deals give Taliban and al-Qaida militants more freedom in Pakistan's tribal regions and say the tactic has led to a spike in cross-border attacks into Afghanistan.
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(Xinhua) -- India's Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation (GSPC) has discovered a huge gas reserve of more than 600 billion cubic meters of gas in the Krishna-Godavari Basin (Deendayal Block), announced Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday.
"I wanted to go personally and congratulate the GSPC's team for their big breakthrough and I therefore came here with my cabinet ministers," Modi said. He was speaking through video conferencing from Andhra Pradesh's KG-22 basin to the media at the GSPC Bhavan. "Today our find at KG-22 is worth 100 billion U.S. dollars," he said.
The GSPC team had slogged for three years in the middle of the sea digging over 6 km deep to find the gas reserve. "By god's grace the result has been satisfying. I congratulate all the team members," he said. The block covers an area of 1,850 sq km on the KG basin in Andhra Pradesh and GSPC as an operator has 80 percent participating interest.
GSPC, which spent 470 million U.S. dollars on drilling 10 wells in a 120 sq km offshore area so far, plans to dig five more wells. It had began drilling in July 2004 after acquiring 3-D seismic data, he said.
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#1
The GSPC team had slogged for three years in the middle of the sea digging over 6 km deep to find the gas reserve.
Offshore drilling? Isn't it bad for the environment?
ICC Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo sought an arrest warrant for Bashir on Monday on suspicion of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity in Darfur, a move that some powers fear could derail the fragile Darfur peace process. "There will be no direct cooperation with the International Criminal Court and no sending any Sudanese citizens to The Hague," presidential adviser Mustafa Osman Ismail told a forum on Thursday.
The decision to refer Darfur to the ICC came from the U.N. Security Council so any proposal to resolve the crisis should also come from there, he said. ICC judges are expected to decided in October or November whether to issue a warrant for Bashir's arrest. Ocampo asked the ICC for the warrant, accusing Bashir of a campaign of genocide in which 35,000 people were killed outright, at least 100,000 more died a "slow death" and 2.5 million were forced to flee their homes in Sudan's western Darfur region.
Sudan has asked Russia, China and members of the Arab League and the African Union to help it pursue a Security Council resolution suspending a warrant for Bashir for 12 months.
This article starring:
ICC Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo
International Criminal Court
MUSTAFA OSMAN ISMAIL
Government of Sudan
President Omar Hassan al-Bashir
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Security forces on Thursday hit militants around Hangu district, clearing several Taliban strongholds, sources told Daily Times. "We have cleared Shamana Fort and Zarguri and Naryab areas north of Hangu," military spokesman Major General Athar Abbas told Daily Times by telephone. He added that the "operation will be expanded as some areas are yet to be cleared".
In the crackdown launched late on Wednesday, "the security forces, backed by tanks and gunship helicopters, also secured Naryab Dam", local officials said. The spokesman said there were some casualties on the militants' side, adding that the exact numbers were not available.
Taliban spokesman Mulla Shaheen confirmed the clashes, conceding that four militants had been wounded. Sources in the security agencies said four vehicles of the militants were also hit in Zarguri and Sarmalo. The militants retaliated by firing rocket-propelled grenades at the security forces that called in gunship helicopters and targeted the area near Torawarey, the sources added. "There's normal resistance and now our troops are advancing," Abbas said, according to AFP.
Orakzai: Residents said intermittent mortar fire could be heard, but intelligence and government officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said most militants had already fled to Orakzai, a neighbouring tribal region. Security forces launched the crackdown after 15 soldiers were killed in an ambush last weekend.
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Recent reports from Indonesian health officials tie the high fatality rate in human H5N1 influenza cases there to the difficulty of diagnosing the disease, late treatment with antiviral drugs, and a shortage of well-equipped hospitals.
The case-fatality rate (CFR) in Indonesia, which leads the world in H5N1 cases, climbed from 63% in 2005 to 80% in 2006 and 85.7% in 2007, according to a report in the journal Annals Academy of Medicine Singapore. The CFR remains high so far this year, with 15 of 18 cases fatal, or 83.3%, according to World Health Organization (WHO) figures...
US military and Feds are watching avian flu in Indonesia closely - it's got prime conditions supporting the sorts of mutations that could lead to a serious pandemic. FWIW
#1
The difference between a pandemic and no pandemic is in all likelyhood fairly modest preventative measures, we in the West would take for granted, and many developing countries are capable of implementing, as Vietnam and Thailand showed.
The problem in Indonesia is a mixture of muslim fatalism and rampant corruption, which leads to a culture where all is show, nothing is substance.
#6
This is scary because even the developed world would likely not be much better off.
We will have vaccine for only 10% of the population six months after we know what the H2H strain is, in full production.
Second, while we have antivirals, we don't have any that really completely work, just give some partial protection.
Third, perhaps 20% of those who could have survived won't, because we have a shortage of respirators, just barely enough for a normal flu season.
What it will boil down to, is if you have the disease, you will get a chest X-Ray. The doctor can tell with one glance whether you are might live, with help, or die. And of those that might live, only a fraction are going to get the respirators they need to live.
This means that our first line of defense, sanitation and isolation, are our best means of defense. If you don't want to die, don't get sick.
#8
Moose, my comment was about whether a pandemic starts or not. Stopping a pandemic in the early stages is fairly easy. Once it gets going with daily cases in the thousands (or even less) it will be impossible to stop.
The stocks of vaccine and antivirals are there to put a blanket on small outbreaks. Once a small outbreak becomes a big outbreak these stocks are irrelevant.
(Xinhua) -- The Thai army expressed doubts on Thursday about the announcement of so-claimed insurgency leader to end the insurgency operation in the south, saying they have never known or contacted the group who claimed to be rebel leaders.
Thai Army spokesman Akra Thiprote said the army has never contacted or knew the three men who announced the ceasefire in the recorded video broadcast on televisions Thursday.
The army is looking for involvement of the group to the insurgency in the south, he said.
"The army plays no role in the incident or any negotiation that led to the said ceasefire. We believe that it is the job of former army chief Gen Chetta Thanajaro and his team," the spokesman said.
It would be an excellent work if the ceasefire can restore peace and stability in the southern provinces of Thailand, he said, adding that however, in spite of the announcement, the army will still be on alert to provide security for people.
The three men from a group calling themselves Tai Ruam Pak Tai Khong Prathet Thai appeared on television, saying that from July 14 onwards, all the militant and political units of our group will support peace formation in Thailand.
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(Xinhua) -- Two ambulance planes belonging to Turkish General Staff were dispatched to Mosul city in northern Iraq on Thursday to pick up 21 wounded Iraqis and their 21 companions, the semi-official Anatolia news agency reported.
Turkish military has taken this action upon direction from Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, according to the report. It said the 21 Iraqis were wounded in the northern Iraqi city of Tal Afar on Wednesday due to a car bomb.
The Iraqis will receive medical treatment at Gulhane Military Hospital (GATA) and Ataturk Research Hospital in the Turkish capital of Ankara.
A car bombing attack in a market of Tal Afer on Wednesday left at least 13 people killed, over 30 others injured, said Najem Abdulla, mayor of the city, some 80 km west of Mosul.
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#1
That's pretty remarkable. Turks helping anyone other than themselves.
Jesse Jackson would be incensed if any of us used the "N-word," but according to the Associated Press, Fox News is now saying that Jackson used the most hated racial slur in American English with some level of impunity in the same conversation where the microphone was turned on and Big Jesse declared his intention to castrate Barack Obama : The Rev. Jesse Jackson used an emotionally charged racial slur during a break in a TV interview in which he criticized presidential candidate Barack Obama, Fox News confirmed Wednesday. In additional comments from that same conversation, first reported by TVNewser, the African-American leader is reported to have said Obama was "talking down to black people," and referred to blacks with a slur...
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#3
the African-American leader is reported to have said Obama was "talking down to black people,"
Paging Mr. Jackson, he's talking down to all people. You only notice the 'black' part because you're a racist who views America through that narrow lens.
#5
They can't say the word, we can't say the word, what a powerful word this N-word must be. More powerful than the truth itself.
Silly ass mother-f*ckers!
Don't forget there are the other 'N' pejoratives.
Nazi - anyone who disagrees with my politics.
Nativist - anyone who believes in "We the People of the United States.."
They're hurled with the same intent at their targets.
#8
The truth is that blacks use the N as we use 'dude' or 'jerk' to replace the name in conversation. The fact that they do so with great regularity and yet no one gets offended is proof that the N sin is a rube, a giant strawman.
Now, once you realize that, why in hell should we even notice them or their supposed offending ?
Yet another reason for me to be a racist.
"Obama has spoken thoughtfully and frequently about the racial inequities and social divisions that continue to plague our imperfect society."
Obama has said that arguably the best economic development plan for black America is to convince them to stop throwing trash out of their car windows. It's true. He said that. Obama has said that black people can help solve their generational ills by putting away the Popeyes chicken. This is thoughtfulness in discussing America's racial inequalities and social divisions? No, no, no. These are things that white people say about black people when they think blacks aren't listening. These arguments rest on the worst stereotypes of black Americans. These are racist arguments.
Obama talks down to black people because he is talking over them to the larger white audience. He is saying what white people think but can't say in mixed company. Obama is a tool of the white establishment. Nothing could be more obvious than this. In fact, he is a tool of the new centrism, which is well to the right of progressive democratic politics. Review the facts. He voted for FISA which guts the Fourth Amendment. He supports restrictions on abortion. He supports executing those convicted of crimes in which murder did not result. He agrees with the NRA's interpretation of the Second Amendment. He plans to expand Bush's faith-based program. He should be running on the ticket of the other party.
My analysis sounds smart because it is. I have the guy pegged because my analysis of racism in America is state-of-the-art. The liberal left has been hoodwinked.
For the record, I was never mesmerized by the guy. Obama is a personality cult. Left liberals have jettisoned their principles to fit with the Dear Leader's proclamations. It's an embarrassment for left-liberalism and progressive democratic politics. You guys look just like the Bush zombies after 9-11 over at Jesus Camp. Obama is your messiah.
I don't know, but I think this is another indication that the worm is starting to turn on NObama. At least I hope so.
#11
In a 'sixties article in "Life" Jackson said he would spit in white people's food when he worked in a fast food place. Yah, he was there when Martin Luther King was murdered. And he wanted that presence stressed so much that he wore a shirt with King's blood on it for 3 days. And don't forget when he took his mistress on a tour of the Clinton White House, while he was giving Horny Bill much publicized "spiritual counsel" after the Monica staining.
#12
Obama is a tool of the white establishment. Nothing could be more obvious than this. In fact, he is a tool of the new centrism, which is well to the right of progressive democratic politics
He is whatever you want him to be. And you don't even have to ask him, because he already is what you want him to be. Clear?
#13
Why does anyone give this chump air time? He's a frickin' sham, a clown, a withered up old douchebag.
And yes, the word "nigger" is the most overrated strawman today. How much tax$$ and payoffs have we blown due to this stupid two-syllable word? Too much methinx. I think it's retarded when blacks use it - they say it's a form of endearment yet they use it heavily before they down in a fight as well - the whole situation is a load of crap. Whites ought to no better then to use it in front of or toward blacks in a joking or friendly manner because it's tacky & will never come out right.
(Xinhua) -- Insurgents in Thailand's southernmost province of Yala launched a fresh attack against soldiers on Thursday afternoon, just hours after some so-called insurgency leaders issued a cease-fire announcement through Thai army-controlled TV 5.
One soldier of an army patrol team was severely injured during the gun attack in Yala province, a military source told Xinhua.
The army unit was on patrol duty while the insurgents shot them from a roadside jungle. The attackers escaped from the venue after the attack and the injured soldier was rushed to a nearby hospital.
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(Xinhua) -- A senior Islamic Hamas movement official on Thursday warned Israel that Hamas would quit an Egyptian-brokered truce if Israel keeps Gaza Strip border crossing points closed. "If Israel doesn't commit itself to the truce and reopen the crossings, this truce should go to hell," Ahmed Yousef, an advisor to deposed prime minister Ismail Haneya of Hamas government in Gaza told reporters.
Egypt has brokered a truce between Israel and Gaza militant groups for six month in the Gaza Strip without including the West Bank. According to the deal, Israel should ease restrictions it imposed on Gaza Strip crossings. "Our fingers are still on the triggers if Israel is not committed to the truce," Yousef said, adding that "Israel has deliberately restricted the goods' movement at Gaza crossings during the truce term to exert more pressure on Hamas."
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#1
I think Israel should also supply water to Gaza. In order to be more efficient, the fuel and water should be delivered at the same time, in the same trucks.
Posted by: Rambler in California ||
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#2
Dont forget the cement, throw that in there too.
Swat police on Thursday arrested three suspected would-be suicide bombers, including one tasked to attack security forces, police officials told reporters in Mingora. Police arrested the three suspects during a routine check at the Ghat Pewchar checkpost in Matta tehsil, the officials said in a press briefing. The officials produced one of the young men at the briefing. "I was being imparted training to carry out a suicide attack and target security forces," 13-year-old Sardar told reporters.
This article starring:
Ghat Pewchar checkpost
Matta tehsil
Mingora
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A federal judge on Thursday refused to postpone the first military trial set for next week at the Guantanamo Bay detention center, rebuffing a last-minute plea from lawyers for Salim Hamdan, an accused member of Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden's former driver. Judge James Robertson, of the district court in Washington, ruled that Mr. Hamdan's claims that the military commission he faces is unconstitutional can be appealed to a civilian court only after his military trial is completed.
The ruling clears the way for the start of the first trial of a detainee at the prison complex in Cuba, opened in 2002 to hold prisoners captured in the campaign against terrorism. The trials have been delayed for years, in part by courts that found legal fault with the commissions created to try people designated by the government as "unlawful enemy combatants."
It was Judge Robertson who ruled in 2004 that the original procedures set for military commissions by President Bush were inadequate, a finding later upheld by the Supreme Court. In response, Congress in 2006 passed the Military Commissions Act, setting up new procedures for the trials.
On Thursday, after hearing two hours of arguments from lawyers for Mr. Hamdan and the government, Judge Robertson said the Congressional action was sufficient to permit the trial to begin. "Hamdan is to face a military commission designed by Congress under guidelines laid down by the Supreme Court," the judge said.
Judge Robertson noted that his ruling applies only to the case of Mr. Hamdan and is not binding on the many other Guantanamo cases pending before other judges. He also did not rule on what he said was a central question, the constitutionality of a provision of the Military Commissions Act that permits only limited appeals by Guantanamo detainees to a single court, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
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#1
You can't demand a speedy trial and then ask for delay after delay, no.
SOB killed the man who saved his life as a baby. Bastard should have swung. Instead he did a couple years then opened a store just below the widow's apartment so she'd have to walk past him every day.
Over 3,000 cases of gastroenteritis were reported to the Holy Family Hospital (HFH) and Rawalpindi General Hospital (RGH) -- the city's two major hospitals -- in the past six weeks beginning June 1 this year.
However, doctors claim that the situation is not alarming and could be controlled by improving hygiene.
Which is generally what we do in the civilized world ...
According to the data available with Daily Times 3,217 cases were reported to HFH and RGH from June 1 to July. The exact number of the patients visiting the District Headquarters Hospital (DHQ Hospital) could not be known, as the hospital does not maintain the record of gastro patients.
However, a doctor at the emergency department of DHQ said that out of 200 to 230 patients visiting the hospital in 24 hours, five to six patients suffered from gastroenteritis. Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Dr Mohammad Umair said that the number of gastro patients was now decreasing, as they were receiving three to four patients daily.
Around 862 gastro patients reported to the Holy Family Hospital till July 16 out of which 241 were adults and 621 children under 12. In June, a total of 1,350 patients reported to the hospital out of which 671 were adults and 679 children. Similarly, a total of 713 patients reported to RGH in June out of which 546 were adults and 167 children. In July, the figure was 292 out of which 137 were adults and 155 children.
The RGH, medical superintendent, Fayyaz Ahmed said that the number of cholera and diarrhoea patients had reduced after the first week of July due to low temperature. He said out of 100 patients, eight to 10 suffered from gastro.
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#2
"Improving hygiene" > wel-l-l, numerous TV- and Net News have indic or reported on Africa's pervasive SEWAGE TREATMENT PROBS, espec as per DRINKING-COOKING WATER.
(Xinhua) -- A senior Pakistani scientist on Thursday denied that Pakistan had dumped nuclear waste in southern Afghanistan during the 1996-2001 Taliban rule. "There is no possibility of dumping waste in other country," News Network International (NNI) quoted Pakistan nuclear scientist Samar Mubarakmand as saying.
Reports said Afghan President Hamid Karzai has appointed a team of experts to investigate allegations that Pakistan had dumped nuclear waste in southern Afghanistan during Taliban rule. Mubarakmand said that the claim by Afghan government is a political one and the government must deal in the same way. "It is not feasible to shift nuclear waste and dump far way," he said.
This article starring:
Samar Mubarakmand
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#1
Unless they find the waste. Then its, uh, it was Kahn!!!!!
From the pages of Die Weltwoche comes news that Jean-Pierre Gontard, the special envoy from the Switzerland Ministry of Foreign Affairs whom the Colombian government invited to assist in hostage negotations with FARC, is now under investigation himself. Information developed from the computer of Raul Reyes, the FARC senior commander killed by Colombian troops on May 1, implies that Gontard was a FARC sympathizer and provides details of strategic advice that Gontard gave to Reyes in meetings in 2004.
From a recent DW article translated into English: "The Swiss professor reportedly tells Reyes that a FARC demand for one hundred million dollars in exchange for a six month ceasefire is realistic. And verbatim: 'He says that Ingrid is a jewel [una joya] in the hands of the FARC, because she is very important for the French government.' According to the e-mail, Gontard suggests to the FARC that as a first step they could exchange kidnapped Colombian army personnel and politicians against captured guerrilleros. Then, as a second step, they could arrange to set free Ingrid and four other hostages under the patronage of Switzerland and France. In exchange, the UN would provide the FARC a platform in Geneva. On Gontard's estimation, this would amount to recognition of the organization as party to an armed conflict."
Die Weltwoche also reports that President Uribe personally criticized Gontard upon release of the emails in the Reyes computer. "(O)n 27 June 2008, just a few days before the army freed Ingrid Betancourt, a hostile encounter took place in Bogota between Colombian President Alvaro Uribe and the two negotiators, Jean-Pierre Gontard and his French counterpart Noël Saez. Uribe brought up the e-mails with the two negotiators and sharply criticized them: "That's bad, very bad!" Uribe was particularly outraged by the meetings that the two "mediators" held with Reyes behind his back (meetings made public two weeks ago by Die Weltwoche)."
The most explosive charge against Gontard was made on July 5 by the Colombian Defense Minister, that Gontard served as a courier for FARC, bringing in $500,000 for its use in another hostage matter. The Swiss ambassador to Colombia has denied the charge in this translated interview in El Tiempo.
Whether Colombia prosecutes Gontard or not, the episode is another example of how Switzerland sometimes "dances with the devil." See Olivier Guitta's post on the Swiss Foreign Minister's siding with Iran and my post last December on the Swiss' dropping all charges against Yassin al-Qadi, designated by the U.S. in 2001 for his activities as an Al Qaeda financier.
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.
The Pentagon said on Tuesday that Iran has the ability to launch a ballistic missile capable of hitting sections of eastern and southern Europe. Air Force Lt. Gen. Trey Obering, director of the Missile Defense Agency, told reporters he believes Iran now has a missile with a range of 1,250 miles, but he declined to say whether the weapon has been test-fired.
Four Israeli Arabs from east Jerusalem and two from Nazareth have been indicted for allegedly setting up an Al-Qaida cell in the capital and offering their services to Global Jihad elements, security officials announced Friday. One of the suspects allegedly made contact with those elements in an attempt to assassinate US President George W. Bush during his visit to Israel in May. 
Government scientists detailed a rising death toll from heat waves, wildfires, disease and smog caused by global warming in an analysis the White House buried so it could avoid regulating greenhouse gases. In a 149-page document released Monday, the experts laid out for the first time the scientific case for the grave risks that global warming poses to people, and to the food, energy and water on which society depends.
The Air Force's top leadership sought for three years to spend counterterrorism funds on "comfort capsules" to be installed on military planes that ferry senior officers and civilian leaders around the world, with at least four top generals involved in design details such as the color of the capsules' carpet and leather chairs, according to internal e-mails and budget documents. Production of the first capsule -- consisting of two sealed rooms that can fit into the fuselage of a large military aircraft -- has already begun. 
... Salafi-takfiri jihadists cannot build political alliances; they regard even Hamas and Hizbullah, Israel's main foes, as corrupted by politics. And once they start to spill blood, they become ever more indiscriminate: first they attack the "apostate" rulers or their foreign backers, then the ministers, then the security forces, then the civil servants, then anybody who objects to the violence, and so on. Those who recoil at the carnage, or object to the religious strictures imposed at gunpoint, are treated as apostates. At some point, though, local populations turn against their supposed champions. 
Apple's new iPhone 3G is ready for the Muslim and Arabic speaking world even though it isn't available in those countries yet.
AFTER a period of relative lull we notice a recurrence of encounter deaths of alleged criminals in RAB custody. 
Indonesia has denied final appeals for three men on death row convicted for deadly bombings on the island of Bali in October, 2002. Chad Bouchard reports from Jakarta.
BAGHDAD, July 17 (VOI) A Baghdad-based newspaper on Thursday welcomed the security handover of Diwaniya province, describing the transfer as a "blessed step" to restore security and stability to Iraqi cities. Badr, the daily mouthpiece of Badr Organization, one of the main components of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council (SIIC) led by Abdel Aziz al-Hakeem said in article entitled, 'Diwaniya
self-security,' by Kareem al-Nouri, that the handover has proven the province's ability to assume security responsibilities.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Oil prices fell steeply on Thursday, extending a decline to a three-day record $15.89 a barrel, as natural gas prices tumbled and investors anticipated declining demand. Light, sweet crude for August delivery fell $5.31 to settle at $129.29 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The last time oil settled below $130 was June 5, when it settled at $127.79.
In Helmand province in southern Afghanistan, the British Defense Ministry said, British troops killed a senior Taliban leader. Mullah Bismullah Akhund was killed Saturday in the Now Zad district of Helmand, long a Taliban bastion.
(Xinhua) -- A suspected mentally-ill man was last Friday devoured by a pride of marauding lions at a motel in the northern Zimbabwean border town of Chirundu, The Herald reported on Thursday. 
At least 13 people were killed during Tuesday clashes in the Somali capital Mogadishu and a regional town of Berdale, Radio Garowe reported today. In Mogadishu, Islamist insurgents attacked a police station and engaged officers in a fierce battle that killed at least 6 people and wounded 7 others, according to witnesses.
Spain's supreme court has overturned the convictions of four of the 21 people found guilty of involvement in the 2004 Madrid train bombings that killed 191 people. The four men had been convicted of charges ranging from membership of a terrorist group to supplying explosives.
Two commanders of the 
A top Taliban leader threatened Thursday to attack the provincial government in northwestern Pakistan unless it quits after the army launched an operation against militants in response to an ambush that killed 17 troops.
A federal judge on Thursday refused to postpone the first military trial set for next week at the Guantanamo Bay detention center, rebuffing a last-minute plea from lawyers for Salim Hamdan, an accused member of Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden's former driver. Judge James Robertson, of the district court in Washington, ruled that Mr. Hamdan's claims that the military commission he faces is unconstitutional can be appealed to a civilian court only after his military trial is completed.
Over 3,000 cases of gastroenteritis were reported to the Holy Family Hospital (HFH) and Rawalpindi General Hospital (RGH) -- the city's two major hospitals -- in the past six weeks beginning June 1 this year.
