A six-member delegation, led by Minister of Islamic Affairs, Endowments, Propagation and Guidance Saleh Al-Asheikh, will represent the Kingdom at the 10th anniversary of the massacre of over 10,000 Bosnian Muslims in Srebrenica, today. Bosnia's Charge d' Affaires Ali Moumnovic told Arab News the Saudi team would be among 50 international delegations invited from all over the world to take part in the ceremony marking the 10th anniversary of the Muslims' genocide by Serb forces.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/11/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
Yeah, honor the Saoodis, who did zip, zilch, nada. And don't forget to have some nifty anti-US demonstrations to commemorate the fact that we stopped it, while all others held conferences and meetings in far away places with 5-Star hotels.
Mods, please delete previous article.
Long before bombings ripped through London on Thursday, Britain had become a breeding ground for hate, fed by a militant version of Islam.
For two years, extremists like Sheik Omar Bakri Mohammed, a 47-year-old Syrian-born cleric, have played to ever-larger crowds, calling for holy war against Britain and exhorting young Muslim men to join the insurgency in Iraq. In a newspaper interview in April 2004, he warned that "a very well-organized" London-based group, Al Qaeda Europe, was "on the verge of launching a big operation" here.
In a sermon attended by more than 500 people in a central London meeting hall last December, Sheik Omar vowed that if Western governments did not change their policies, Muslims would give them "a 9/11, day after day after day."
If London became a magnet for fiery preachers, it also became a destination for men willing to carry out their threats. For a decade, the city has been a crossroads for would-be terrorists who used it as a home base, where they could raise money, recruit members and draw inspiration from the militant messages.
Among them were terrorists involved in attacks in Madrid, Casablanca, Saudi Arabia, Israel and in the Sept. 11 plot. Zacarias Moussaoui, the only man charged in the United States in the 9/11 attacks, and Richard C. Reid, the convicted shoe-bomber, both prayed at the Finsbury Park mosque in north London. The mosque's former leader, Abu Hamza al-Masri openly preached violence for years before the authorities arrested him in April 2004.
Although Britain has passed a series of antiterrorist and immigration laws and made nearly 800 arrests since Sept. 11, 2001, critics have charged that its deep tradition of civil liberties and protection of political activists have made the country a haven for terrorists. The British government has drawn particular criticism from other countries over its refusal to extradite terrorism suspects.
For years, there was a widely held belief that Britain's tolerance helped stave off any Islamic attacks at home. But the anger of London's militant clerics turned on Britain after it offered unwavering support for the American-led invasion of Iraq. On Thursday morning, an attack long foreseen by worried counterterrorism officials became a reality.
"The terrorists have come home," said a senior intelligence official based in Europe, who works often with British officials. "It is payback time for a policy that was, in my opinion, an irresponsible policy of the British government to allow these networks to flourish inside Britain."
Those policies have been a matter of intense debate within the government, with the courts, the Blair government and members of Parliament frequently opposing one another.
For example, when the Parliament considered a bill in March that would have allowed the government to impose tough controls on terror suspects - like house arrests, curfews and electronic tagging - some legislators objected, saying it would erode civil liberties. "It does not secure the nation," William Cash, of the House of Commons, said of the bill. "It is liable to create further trouble and dissension among those whom we are seeking to control - the terrorists." The measure is still pending.
Investigators examining Thursday's attacks, which left at least 49 dead and 700 injured, are pursuing a theory that the bombers were part of a homegrown sleeper cell, which may or may not have had foreign support for the bomb-making phase of the operation.
If that theory proves true, it would reflect the transformation of the terror threat around Europe. With much of Al Qaeda's hierarchy either captured or killed, a new, more nimble terrorist force has emerged on the continent, comprising mostly semiautonomous, Qaeda-inspired local groups that are believed to be operating in France, Switzerland, Spain, Italy and other countries.
"Terrorists are not strangers, foreigners," said Bruno Lemaire, adviser to Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin of France. "They're insiders, well integrated inside the country."
Another senior intelligence official based in Europe said the fear was that there would be additional attacks in other European cities by homegrown sleeper cells inspired by Al Qaeda and by the attacks in Casablanca, Madrid and now London.
"This is exactly what we are going to witness in Europe: most of the attacks will be carried out by local groups, the people who have been here for a long time, well integrated into the fabric of society," the official said.
Well before Thursday's bombings, British officials predicted a terrorist attack in their country. In a speech in October 2003, Eliza Manningham-Buller, the director general of MI5, Britain's domestic intelligence agency, said she saw "no prospect of a significant reduction in the threat posed to the U.K. and its interests from Islamist terrorism over the next five years, and I fear for a considerable number of years thereafter."
Britain's challenge to detect militants on its soil is particularly difficult.
Counterterrorism officials estimate that 10,000 to 15,000 Muslims living in Britain are supporters of Al Qaeda. Among that number, officials believe that as many as 600 men were trained in camps connected with Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and elsewhere.
British investigators say that identifying Islamic militants among the two million Muslims living here, about 4 percent of the population, is especially hard. The Muslim community here is the most diverse of any in Europe in terms of ethnic origins, culture, history, language, politics and class. More than 60 percent of the community comes not from North African or Gulf Arab countries, but from countries like Pakistan, India and Bangladesh.
Before Sept. 11, 2001, British officials monitored radical Islamists but generally stopped short of arresting or extraditing them. After Sept. 11, the government passed legislation that allowed indefinite detention of terrorism suspects. But last year, it was overturned by Britain's highest court, the Law Lords, as a violation of human rights law.
Complicating Britain's antiterrorism strategy is its refusal or delays of requests for extradition of suspects by some allies, including the United States, France, Spain and Morocco.
Moroccan authorities, for example, are seeking the return of Mohammed el-Guerbozi, a battle-hardened veteran of Afghanistan who they say planned the May 2003 attacks in Casablanca, which killed 45 people. He has also been identified as a founder of the Moroccan Combatant Islamic Group, cited by the United Nations as a terrorist network connected to Al Qaeda. An operative in that group, Noureddine Nifa, told investigators that the organization had sleeper cells prepared to mount synchronized bombings in Britain, France, Italy, Belgium and Canada. In an interview last year, Gen. Hamidou Laanigri, Morocco's chief of security, said Osama bin Laden authorized Mr. Guerbozi to open a training camp for Moroccans in Afghanistan in the beginning of 2001. Last December, Mr. Guerbozi was convicted in absentia in Morocco for his involvement in the Casablanca attacks and sentenced to 20 years.
But the British government has no extradition treaty with Morocco and has refused to extradite Mr. Guerbozi, a father of six who lives in a rundown apartment in north London. British officials say there is not enough evidence to arrest him, General Laanigri said.
Similarly, Baltasar Garzón, a Spanish investigating magistrate, has requested extradition of Abu Qatada, a radical Muslim cleric living in Britain who received political refugee status in the early 1990's. A Palestinian with Jordanian nationality, Mr. Qatada is described in court documents as the spiritual leader of Al Qaeda in Europe. Although Mr. Qatada was put under house arrest in 2002 and then arrested, he was freed in March and put into an observation program.
He is also wanted in Jordan, where he has been given a 15-year prison sentence in absentia for his connection to bomb attacks during 1998.
For 10 years, France has been fighting for the extradition of Rachid Ramda, a 35-year-old Algerian, over his suspected role in a bombing in Paris in 1995 staged by Algeria's militant Armed Islamic Group. Much to the irritation of the French, three years ago, Britain's High Court blocked a Home Office order to hand him over, citing allegations that his co-defendants gave testimony under torture by the French.
Last week, Mr. Clarke, the home secretary, approved the extradition order, but Mr. Ramda is appealing.
Another prime terrorism suspect who operated in London for years is Mustafa Setmarian Nasar, the suspected mastermind of the Madrid bombings. Although the authorities now cannot find him, he is believed to have visited Britain often and lived here openly from 1995 to 1998.
Officials believe he tried to organize his own extremist group before Sept. 11, but afterward officials say he pledged loyalty to Osama bin Laden. He lived in north London and was the editor of a militant Islamist magazine, Al Ansar, which is published here, distributed at some mosques in Western Europe and closely monitored by British security officials.
Across Britain since Sept. 11, 2001, nearly 800 people have been arrested under the Terrorism Act of 2000, according to recent police records. Of that number, 121 were charged with terrorism related crimes, but only 21 people have been convicted.
In one of the biggest antiterrorism cases made here, Scotland Yard arrested 12 men and charged them with making traces of the poison ricin inside an apartment in Wood Green, in north London, in January 2003. But 11 of the 12 men were acquitted without trial based on a lack of evidence.
Since Thursday's attacks, there have been calls for a crackdown on radical Muslims, including some from Britain's Muslim leaders.
"As far as I am concerned these people are not British," said Lord Nizar Ahmed, one of the few Muslims in the House of Lords. "They are foreign ideological preachers of hate who have been threatening our national security and encouraging young people into militancy. They should be put away and sent back to their countries."
He added, "They created a whole new breeding ground for recruitment to radicalism."
Even last week's bombings did little to curtail the rhetoric of some of the most radical leaders, who criticized Prime Minister Tony Blair for saying that the bombings appeared to be the work of Islamic terrorists.
"This shows me that he is an enemy of Islam," Abu Abdullah, a self-appointed preacher and the spokesman for the radical group Supporters of Shariah, said in an interview on Friday, adding, "Sometimes when you see how people speak, it shows you who your enemies are."
Mr. Abdullah declared that those British citizens who re-elected Mr. Blair "have blood on their hands" because British soldiers are killing Muslims. He also said that the British government, not Muslims, "have their hands" in the bombings, explaining, "They want to go on with their fight against Islam."
Imran Waheed, a spokesman for a radical British-based group, Hizb ut Tahrir, which is allowed to function here but is banned in Germany and much of the Muslim world, said: "When Westerners get killed, the world cries. But if Muslims get killed in Iraq or Afghanistan, it's the smallest of news. I will condemn what happened in London only after there is the promise from Western leaders to condemn what they have done in Falluja and other parts of Iraq and in Afghanistan."
So far, there appears to be little effort to restrain outspoken clerics, including prominent extremists like Sheik Omar, who has reportedly been under investigation by Scotland Yard.
Sheik Omar, who remains free, is an example of the double-edged policies in Britain. He is a political refugee who was given asylum 19 years ago and is supported by public assistance. Asked in an interview in May how he felt about being barred from obtaining British citizenship, he replied, "I don't want to become a citizen of hell."
Information Sought on British Man
By The New York Times
LONDON, July 8 - British law enforcement officials investigating the terrorist attacks here asked their counterparts in Germany and Belgium for information about a London man who is accused by the Moroccan government of engineering the May 2003 terrorist attacks in Casablanca, two officials said Saturday.
The man, Mohammed el-Guerbozi, 48, a British citizen who was born in Morocco, has lived in London for nearly two decades.
At a news conference, Scotland Yard officials denied that Mr. Guerbozi was a suspect in the bombing attacks on Thursday. But on Saturday night, senior British officials said that for caution's sake, they had asked several countries in Europe for information about Mr. Guerbozi and his contacts.
Several news organizations in recent days reported that Mr. Guerbozi had fled London on Thursday. But in a telephone interview Saturday night, he said he was still in London and denied any involvement in the London bombings.
"Nothing is true," said Mr. Guerbozi. "What they said about me after the Madrid bombings, they are saying it again and the media are writing the same things. It is not true. Now they say that I fled from London, but this is not true. I'm here."
Mr. Guerbozi said he offered to speak with the British police, but they did not accept his offer. "I'm not in the mountains and I'm not in the forest," he said. "I'm in hiding and the intelligence service and the police know where I am."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/11/2005 12:01 ||
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Suspected al Qaeda militants behind the London bombings may well have come from a previously unknown local cell and yet had access to military explosives, European security officials familiar with the probe said.
"The explosives appear to be of military origin, which is very worrying," said Christophe Chaboud, head of the French Anti-Terrorism Coordination Unit and one of five top officials sent by Paris to London immediately after Thursday's attacks.
"We're more used to cells making home-made explosives with chemicals. How did they get them?" he said in an interview with Le Monde newspaper.
"Either by trafficking, for example, in the Balkans, or they had someone on the inside who enabled them to get them out of a military establishment."
Chaboud's comments went further than London police, who have only said so far that the bombs contained less than 10 lb. (4.5 kg) each of "high explosives" and were small enough to be carried in rucksacks.
By comparison, the 10 bombs that blew apart four commuter trains in Madrid last year weighed about 22 lb. (10 kg) each. The explosive, known as Goma 2 Eco and used in quarrying, had been stolen from a mine in northern Spain.
Asked about the French comments, a senior London police spokesman said the explosives were still being examined and there was no confirmation that they were military in origin.
"We are waiting for the forensic tests," he said.
London police summoned investigators and intelligence officials from about 30 countries to a meeting at Scotland Yard on Saturday to brief them on last Thursday's bombings which killed at least 49 people.
A source at a European intelligence agency represented at the meeting said the attacks were most likely carried out by a local cell of Islamist militants with no previous track record.
"We think the known Islamists who live in Britain are under such close observation that they're limited in their capacity for action. Against that background, the suspicion is that it's a local group," the source said.
"At the moment there's no proof, but the thinking is that Islamists who have been known since Afghanistan or through other attacks could not have been involved in detail ... That is less suggestive of a big central network."
Even before the bombings, British officials had expressed increasing concern about a "homegrown" militant threat, and suspects held in several foiled plots have been British citizens.
The United States has sent FBI forensic specialists to help British investigators analyze the bomb sites -- a vast challenge because three of the attacks were on underground trains. The other, on a bus, spread debris over a wide area.
Spanish investigators are also assisting, because of the similarity between the mode of the attacks and those on Madrid 16 months ago.
Back then, Spanish police obtained an almost immediate breakthrough by analyzing a bomb which had failed to go off and tracing the origin of a cellphone whose alarm had been meant to trigger it. This led to early arrests.
London investigators have had no such breaks, but an anti-terrorist spokeswoman said the scarcity of updates about the investigation did not mean there was no progress.
"We wouldn't want that to come across at all. We are not in a position to go public with it," she said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/11/2005 11:56 ||
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A MOROCCAN asylum seeker living in London and said to be a leading suspect in the manhunt for the terrorists behind last week's atrocities yesterday broke cover to insist he was innocent. Mohammed al Garbuzi, 50, reputedly head of the Group of Islamic Combatants of Morocco (GICM), which was linked to the terror attacks in Madrid in 2004 and Casablanca in 2003, declared: "I am not hiding and I am not a terrorist." Al Garbuzi, a radical Muslim cleric, is said to have been living with his family in Britain since the 1970s, having been granted indefinite leave to remain here. Speaking from London, he told the Arab al Jazeera TV channel that suggestions he was behind last Thursday's atrocities were lies "all lies".
After his name appeared in several newspapers at the weekend, he told the Qatar-based network: "They have made up this story." He accused someone at the Moroccan embassy in London, whom he refused to name, of being behind the allegation that he had links to terrorist groups. Two years ago in Morocco, al Garbuzi was convicted in his absence and sentenced to 20 years in prison in connection with the 2003 Casablanca bombings, in which 33 bystanders and 12 suicide bombers died. French officials consider him to be the founder and principal recruiter of the GICM. Following the Casablanca attacks, senior Moroccan diplomats called for Britain to explain why al Garbuzi was never arrested, despite warnings that he posed a threat. In the al Jazeera footage, al Garbuzi is heard speaking while his bearded face is barely visible through a celluloid shadow the television network used to shield his face. He said he did not want to be shown in order to avoid public harassment after his picture was published in Saturday's papers. The al Jazeera reporter who interviewed him confirmed it was al Garbuzi by checking his passport.
Posted by: Paul Moloney ||
07/11/2005 04:51 ||
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#1
In the aftermath of 9/11, we invaded afghanistan and iraq and killed over 100,000 muslims. Maybe it is time for England to reap a little collateral damage.
I say, for every citizen they kill, we kill a thousand muslim subhumans. Now that is something they can understand, undeniable force.
#2
ES - I don't buy your 100,000 figure, nor do I buy the response. Focus. Let's do it right, checking off the boxes for all to see.
Externally...
Give The Bush Doctrine a chance, per Dave D's comment from yesterday. It may not work due to the interference and subversion from terrified Muzzy dictators, thugs, Royals, and Mullahs, but as Dave said, we've got to give it a shot. It's the right thing to do. If it fails, it will clarify the situation for the denser folks - and the next step will be obvious to even more of us.
Keep plugging away in Iraq - replace wankers who are place-holding (Gen Webster?) with gung-ho ass-kickers. Keep operational initiative alive - and in the hands of the guys at the pointed end. They know their business and what's what on the ground. Keep working with the Iraqi forces. I'll bet my retirement account that they aren't interested in being "trained" by the Iranians - only fuckwits in the new schizophrenic Govt could be that foolish.
Dramatically loosen the ROE in Afghanistan - it doesn't fit reality. We can debate Pervy, but he's just a wart on the end of the PakiWaki nose. The ISI is who we're fighting. I believe there are far better ways to deal with them than currently being employed. None of our folks, and that includes the NATO guys who are on the ground there, deserve to have their hands tied. Period. Fix it - it's broken, now.
Do what we can to get coordinated with the Persians who are fed up with the Mad Mullahs. Prep for the eventualities. We've been here many times, so I won't repeat.
Bitch-slap Syria hard and on several fronts at once - that little shithole is working against us in every way possible. Payback across the board. It will make things easier in Iraq, too, of course.
Stop the outflow of tech from NorKieLand - bottle Lil Kimmie up in his shithole and make him suffer. Put this turd back on China's plate and keep it there. Fire half of the State Dept, if necessary.
Speaking of State dicks, keep knocking the State Dept skids out from under the Saoodis. Their game stinks and it's past time to end the sham. If you think they're up to x amount of "no good" - you can bet your bottom dollar it's at least 10x. They never stop scheming and they have been at war with the US since 1973. Don't underestimate their capacity for subversion (State, UN, etc), their capacity for interference (Wahhabi activity world-wide), or their capacity for duplicity -- they make Chirac and de Villepin look like children in the back-stabbing department. Time to cut more of the Lilliputian Saoodi strings.
Bush is on the right track across the board. He's not satisfying the fools who expect their personal view to be instant national policy, but so what? They know dick, relative to what he does, so I'll trust him and his team. They've certainly done a LOT of things right in 4.5 yrs. The detractors? Lol. Dick.
Internally...
First, throw out the hate mongerers - and those infected by them: monitor the moskkks and publications and toss the shitheads.
Keep stopping the known foreign shitheads from getting in to preach and subvert the fools who'll listen. Fuck 'em, they have no "right" to come here.
Fight the good fight on immigration - it's long overdue and a huge failure of political will - a major flaw in the overall strategy to defend America.
Use the bully pulpit better - let the wishy-washy know what's going on - and as much of "why" as you can safely divulge. Time to make some domestic shit happen - and you'll need the support of all of the non-Moonbats.
Oh, and NUKE the Dhimmidonks. That will restore to the people of the country the legislative direction they voted for.
#3
Perhaps it would be time for Muslims to take a bit collateral damage for say, Sudan, Armenia, the Pontus Greeks, the atrocities in India and, since the Saudis speak of the "tragedy of Al Andalus" gat a payback for the people who were killed and enslaved in Spain.
And of course let's not forget about the atrocities perpetrated by Al Quaida and similar islamo-panarabist organizations against other Muslims in Afgahanistan and Algeria or by Arabs against Kurds. They could also get some pack time.
Four mosques in separate English cities have been damaged slightly by fires set deliberately since London was hit by terrorist bombings, police said Sunday.
Hey! Wotta coincidence! 49 Brits were slaughtered by bombs set by Muslims the other day...
Incidents reported by individual police forces included arson attacks on mosques in Leeds, Belvedere, Telford and Birkenhead which caused âlittle damage,â said Chris Fox, the president of Association of Police Chief Officers.
See? Hardly any damage at all. Toldja, Briton is a nationality of peace...
He added that there was evidence of some verbal abuse directed at Muslims in the street, and some criminal damage to cars, businesses and homes.
Oh, no! Not verbal abuse! Oh, hold me, Ethel!
The Muslim community is feeling increasingly concerned and vulnerable, a monitoring team from the association found, but it claimed there had been no upsurge in violence and abuse directed at minority groups.
That could be because, unlike some people, Brits are capable of controlling themselves...
âThere is no doubt that there will have been other low level incidents that have not yet been reported to police,â Fox said. âWe encourage everyone to report this type of obnoxious and dangerous behaviour, from whatever quarter, for full police investigation as we are determined that there will be a very robust enforcement response to it,â he said. The police presence in some areas would be boosted âwherever locally appropriateâ to reassure all communities that they are being protected, he said.
Meanwhile, at least six Islamic centres in New Zealand have been vandalised and their walls painted with the message âLondoners RIPâ, police said on Sunday following the deadly bombings in London claimed by Muslim militant groups. In what appeared to be a co-ordinated series of attacks across Auckland, vandals smashed windows and doors and left variations of the same message in black paint on walls facing the street. Muslim leaders and political leaders condemned the attacks. New Zealand Federation of Islamic Associations president Javed Khan said it was the first time an attack on this scale had occurred against Muslims. Prime Minister Helen Clark was also quick to condemn the attacks, saying it was wrong to target the Muslim community in New Zealand in retaliation for the terrorist attacks in London.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/11/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
This seems to be random amd low level, too bad. Not saying I encourage this kind of activity, but it's about time the moose limbs get the message. The cops can't protecty your useless asses if more of this stuff keep going down and you don't start coughing up the perps befoere hand or right after. I private you are cherring these terrorists on so screw you.
#2
Note also how the Brits and Kiwis are trying to get their message across by attacking property, not people.
Posted by: Elvis Churchill ||
07/11/2005 2:23 Comments ||
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#3
Preview is your friend.
This seems to be random amd low level, too bad. Not saying I encourage this kind of activity, but it's about time the moose limbs get the message. The cops can't protecty your useless asses if more of this terrorist stuff keeps going down and you don't start coughing up the perps before hand or right after you have found out who has done it. As it appearsd not in private you are cheering these terrorists on. So screw you if you can't be part of society, your stuff will burn and nasty people with do nasty things to you, even if you are "moderate".
#4
When moderate muslims make ANY effort to purge their communities of the jihadi filth, then I'll feel worse about this kind of thing. Unfortunately, we've seen the exact opposite.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
07/11/2005 7:35 Comments ||
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#5
cops should be investigating the 49 deaths, not worrying about a BBQ in a moskkks
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/11/2005 8:14 Comments ||
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#6
Redeem yourselves muslim dogs! Simply turn in the terrorists and aspiring terrorists and your standing in the community will be restored!
#10
I've got ten bucks that says if anyone's caught for these minor vandalisms and arsons, it turns out to be devout terror symps trying to drum up a little race war, publicity, and sympathy. The burned Korans strike me as suspicious.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
07/11/2005 15:10 Comments ||
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#11
To bad that big nasty mosque wasn't burned down. The one that all the terrorists have some connection to.
Personally I think if there is any connection found between the latests attacks and that mosque the British government should order it destroyed and the land confiscated to make a point.
"If you bomb our cities," Osama bin Laden said in a recent videotape, "we will bomb yours."' It was clear Britain would be a target ever since British Prime Minister Tony Blair decided to join President Bush's "war on terror" and his invasion of Iraq. We had, as they say, been warned. The G-8 summit was obviously chosen, well in advance, as Attack Day. It's no use Blair telling us, "They will never succeed in destroying what we hold dear." They are not trying to destroy "what we hold dear." They are trying to get public opinion to force Blair to withdraw from Iraq, out of his alliance with the United States, out of his adherence to Bush's policies in the Middle East. The Spanish paid the price for their support for Bush -- and Spain's subsequent retreat from Iraq proved that the Madrid bombings achieved their objectives -- while the Australians were made to suffer in Bali.
So we just roll over? Give them what they want? Do you know what they want? They want all of us dead, converted or dhimmi. It's not about the Middle East, it's about you.
It is easy for Blair to call yesterday's bombings "barbaric"' -- they were -- but what were the civilian deaths of the Anglo American invasion of Iraq in 2003, the children torn apart by cluster bombs, the innocent Iraqis gunned down at American military checkpoints. When they die, it is "collateral damage"; when "we" die it is "barbaric terrorism."
But don't acknowledge that the cluster bombs, when used, were used to remove the foot of an odious, genocideal thug from his people.
If we are fighting insurgency in Iraq what makes us believe insurgency won't come to us? One thing is certain: If Blair really believes that by "fighting terrorism"' in Iraq we could more efficiently protect Britain, this argument is no longer valid.
No one, not Bush and not Blair, ever said that the 'flypaper' strategy would be 100% certain. Al-Q has the ability to hurt us. What matters is the amount of time they spend in dire plots versus the time they spend on the run trying to stay alive.
To time these bombs with the G-8 summit, when the world was concentrating on Britain, was not a stroke of genius. You don't need a Ph.D. to choose another Bush-Blair handshake to close down a capital city with explosives and massacre its citizens. The G-8 summit was announced so far in advance that he gave the bombers all the time they needed to prepare. A coordinated system of attacks of the kind we saw yesterday takes weeks to plan; we can forget the idiotic fantasy these were timed to coincide with the Olympic decision. Bin Laden and his supporters don't set up an operation like this on the off chance that France will lose its bid to host the Games. Al-Qaida does not play football.
No, this would have taken months -- to choose safe houses, prepare explosives, identify targets, ensure security, choose the bombers, to plan the communications. Coordination and sophisticated planning -- and the usual utter indifference toward the lives of the innocent -- are characteristic of al-Qaida.
Let us reflect on the fact that yesterday -- the opening of the G-8 -- represented a total failure of our security services. These are the same intelligence "experts" who claim there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq when there were none but who utterly failed to uncover a months-long plot to kill Londoners. Trains, planes, buses, cars, metros. Transportation appears to be the science of al-Qaida's dark arts. No one can search 3 million London commuters every day. No one can stop every tourist.
So how is this a failure of the security services? You just said that the trains and buses are unsecurable.
Then come the Muslims of Britain, who have long been awaiting this nightmare. Now every one of our Muslims becomes the usual suspect, the man or woman with brown eyes, the man with the beard, the woman in the scarf, the boy with the worry beads, the girl who says she's been racially abused.
How 'bout the ones in Finsbury Park? The screeching, eye-rolling, face-making ones who are delighted at the turn of events?
I remember, crossing the Atlantic on 9/11 -- my plane turned around off Ireland when the United States closed its airspace -- how the aircraft purser and I toured the cabins to see if we could identify any suspicious passengers. I found about a dozen, of course, totally innocent men who had brown eyes or long beards or who looked at me with "hostility." And sure enough, in just a few seconds, bin Laden turned nice, liberal, friendly Robert into an anti-Arab racist.
Nah, you were always that.
And this is part of the point of yesterday's bombings: to divide British Muslims from British non-Muslims (let us not mention the name Christians), to encourage the very kind of racism that Blair claims to resent.
Perhaps British Muslims need to make clear where they stand.
But here's the problem. To go on pretending that Britain's enemies want to destroy "what we hold dear" encourages racism; ...
No, pretending that Britain's enemies aren't already deadly serious encourages them to destroy what you hold dear.
... what we are confronting here is a specific, direct, centralized attack on London as a result of a "war on terror" that Blair has locked us into. Just before the U.S. presidential elections, bin Laden asked: "Why do we not attack Sweden?" Lucky Sweden. No Osama bin Laden there. And no Tony Blair.
So the solution is to be like the Swedes -- the last Euros to be beaten into submission.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/11/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
Somebody should beat Fisk to a pulp and dump his stinking carcass on a country road somewhere...
#2
In short, if we allow the enemy to dictate our policy, he will not attack us.
Nobody could be stupid enough to believe this, which is why I think that leftists like Fisk and Pilger are conciously evil, and so are their rank and file followers. They lie about their own beliefs, and their motive is the sick power that comes from promoting torture and violence while wrapping oneself in the pretense of moral authority.
Sons of Britain. Rise up. Destroy the Fisks and Pilgers and the BBC before they destroy you.
#5
I demand that a manhunt be launched to find those responsible for attacking poor Fisk, so that I can buy them all several drinks.
Posted by: Elvis Churchill ||
07/11/2005 2:26 Comments ||
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#6
Wait a minute. The Bali bombings were in 2002. You mean to tell us that Australia suffered the Bali bombings a full year before the war in Iraq?
Yes. This is one of the most common taking points of the, um, "differently realitied" -- Australia was punished for supporting the US in Iraq by the attack in Bali. Never mind that the Bali attack occured a year before the invasion of Iraq. Doesn't matter. Time doesn't flow in just one direction in the cant-addled brains of the left.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
07/11/2005 7:31 Comments ||
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#7
How long are we going to allow traitors, who promote enemy propaganda to walk among us as respected citizens? Fisk is not a journalist, he is a traitor.
We are like the British Redcoats in the American War. Times have changed, tactics have changed, and yet we still march in line as there was some rule in Handbook of Civilized Human Beings, that required us to do so. There is not. You can't have a civlized society if you allow citizens to openly advocate killing at random.
Bombing mosques and targeting non-militant Iraqi citizens who may or may not support the war is useless - but fighting the enemy is essential. The difference in this war, from others, is the enemy walks among us with his head held high, sneering and taunting us and then relying on our civilized restraint to say, "you can't touch me". And we do nothing - so steeped in tradition we just march on in our bright red coats, as they hit us from the bushes. At some point, you think the British might have had a DOH! moment and fought back accordingly, but for similar reasons, they could not.
Fisk, CAIR, the iams in the mosque, and those who get on TV to blatantly promote the propaganda of our enemeys need to be labeled what they are - enemey's of a civilized society.
Until we are willing to call Robert Fisk, Iams, punks and others who openly support the war against us as traitors, this war cannot be won. We will just continue to march in our red coats as they cut us down from the bushes. Doh!
#10
"How long are we going to allow traitors, who promote enemy propaganda to walk among us as respected citizens?"
Good question. And I concur: until we work up the courage to do something about these people, we don't have a snowball's chance in Hell of winning this war.
Me, I'm at the point now where, if I were to wake up tomorrow morning and find that the entire leadership of the Democratic Party, along with all of their collaborators in the media and in academia, have been rounded up in the middle of the night, charged with treason, tried, convicted, sentenced and hauled off to spend the rest of their lives in some maximum-security internment camp in the Mojave Desert, I'd cheer.
These bastards have become an outright menace to our very survival.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/11/2005 9:14 Comments ||
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#11
someone needs to remind Mr. Fisk that German tourists were targeted by AQ at a historic synagogue in Tunisia, that French consultants were murdered in Karachi, and a French tanker attacked off the coast of Yemen, despite France and Germany's positions on Iraq.
If UK has been targeted for its alliance with the US, that does not mean its about Iraq. Its about a wider struggle, that includes Afghanistan and the wider Islamic world.
Yes, terrorist acts do make us suspect all muslims. Thats one MORE reason to want terrorist acts to end - and to end them we need to think more clearly than Mr. Fisk does.
#13
Yes, terrorist acts do make us suspect all muslims.
And the assent of the muslim community makes us suspect them all the more.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
07/11/2005 9:47 Comments ||
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#14
thanks .com.
Who respects Fisk? We've made his name a byword. What could be sweeter? Thats how we should deal with all like him.
I don't know Liberal Hawk. People are sheep. I live among the blue and some of the people I know suck Fisk up like water through a straw. It feeds some sort of weird need to see the world through enlightened eyes. The blogs help, but the sickness of the left needs to be fought on a grander scale than just hoping for some sort of reformation of thought. I really believe that the muslim fanatics could not wage this war without the support of these people, may who are good people, but just willingly blind. Just like in Nazi Germany, good people are being deluded and NPR, Fisk, the BBC and Michael Moore give them license to look the other way.
#15
I live among the same set 2b although here there is the additional twist in the form of plentiful quakers of the overeducated and wealthy variety. They are essentially good people but profoundly misguided is the kindest way I could describe their worldview. The utter inability to call something what it is because of an ingrained idiological bent to the contrary is the common moral flaw. It makes for great irony everytime. Almost like a todler who says no to everything mentioned until you say "ice cream" upon which there is a fast and sure "no" coupled by a moment of reflection, and then a "yes". I have to curb my inner alleycat everytime I visit a little concealed mindphuk upon them after listening patiently to pontifications upon the three dozen or so repeating themes of conversation. Education can be a slow but fruitful process sometimes I tell myself.
#16
The MSM, CAIR, and Fisk are more like Wormtongue of Lord of the Rings. Whispering sweet nothings in our ears while the real enemy chips away at us.
"But {Saruman | Saudi Arabia} is our friend and ally!"
"{Saruman | Islam} only wants peace!"
After 9/11 the mask was torn - a little - and (hopefully) people are starting to see the real ugliness underneath.
Three members of the Irish Republican Army convicted of training leftist rebels in Colombia may be hiding in Cuba, said an Interpol official in Colombia.
By way of Venezuela, I'll wager
The theory regarding the whereabouts of the men, espoused by an Interpol agent on Colombia television, comes more than six months after the alleged IRA members fled Colombia following their conviction on charges they helped train the rebels in terror techniques and explosives.
South America's most embattled nation has been embroiled in more than four decades of civil war that pits the leftist rebels against the government and the paramilitaries.
And who better to assist leftist rebels than Fidel
Colombia sentenced Niall Connolly, James Monaghan and Martin McCauley to 17 years in prison in December 2004. They fled soon after their convictions, having posted bail during the appeal process.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/11/2005 09:31 ||
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By way of Venezuela, I'll wager
Possible. I wouldn't leave out a direct flight; money can buy a lot of cooperation.
SEOUL - South Korea agreed to give 500,000 tonnes of rice to North Korea to help stave off a food crisis in the reclusive, communist state, South Koreaâs Unification Ministry said on Tuesday at the end of bilateral economic talks. Officials in Seoul have said they hope humanitarian aid can advance the diplomatic process.
North Koreaâs pressing food shortage has been seen as partially contributing to Pyongyangâs decision to resume talks, which also involve South Korea, the United States, Japan, Russia and China. Finding donors to prevent its food shortage from turning into widespread famine has become increasingly difficult with North Korea boycotting talks on its nuclear weapons programmes, a senior UN World Food Programme official said. âThe aid is provided as a loan based on brethren love and humanitarian principles,â a Unification Ministry official told reporters on Tuesday.
It's like giving money to a stupid, rude, lazy in-law 'cause you don't want to see your niece and nephew suffer.
South Korea has told North Korea that full-scale aid and commercial exchanges are impossible without the nuclear crisis resolved. Under the agreement reached in the talks, North Korea will also guarantee investment by South Korea to develop mineral resources in the North such as coal, magnesite and zinc, the Unification Ministry said in its statement. Officials from South Koreaâs Korea Coal Corp. (KCC) went to North Korea this month to discuss jointly developing North Korean coal mines, a KCC official said.
The two Koreas also agreed at their 10th round of economic cooperation discussions to hold fisheries talks this month in a bid to resolve fishing disputes in the Yellow Sea that have led to deadly naval clashes, the Unification Ministry said. South Korea said the agreement marks the beginning of complementary economic ties with more give-and-take rather than the largely one-way provision of aid that has been the focus of exchanges in the past.
South Korea will provide capital and technology to the North from next year to help its manufacturers of household goods, and the North will give mining rights to the South. The two sides will also complete work on railway and highways across the Demilitarised Zone border this year.
Although there has been some improvement since North Koreaâs famine in the 1990s when an estimated one million people died of starvation, Pyongyang continues to have trouble feeding its 22.5 million people, the UNâs World Food Programme has said. South Korea has been shipping 150,000 tonnes of fertiliser to the North after sending 200,000 tonnes last month. South Korea has provided 400,000 tonnes of rice to North Korea in each of the last three years.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/11/2005 23:37 ||
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The U.S. says North Korea is a sovereign state, and does not intend to attack it, the US Secretary of State said in Beijing this Sunday. According to Condoleezza Rice, Assistant U.S. Secretary of State Christopher Hill confirmed this position at talks with North Korea's Deputy Foreign Minister Kim Gye Gwan on Saturday.
The North Korean state news agency said on Saturday that Pyongyang had agreed to re-open the six-country negotiations on nuclear arms. The announcement came after Guy Gwan and Hill held their talks in Beijing on Saturday. 'The parties agreed to resume the six-party talks "in the week of July 25," the agency said. Rice said that the U.S. waited impatiently for progress at the six-party negotiations. According to Rice, intensive diplomatic efforts of all the parties, including China, South Korea and Russia, led to a decision to re-open negotiations.
At her talks with China's Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing earlier this Sunday, Rice said that the resumption of the six-party negotiations was just a first step and that progress in future discussions was the real issue. Rice also met with Chinese President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao. The U.S. Secretary of State arrived in Beijing on a 20-hour visit on Saturday evening.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/11/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
"We were kinda hoping they'd just fall over on their own. Honestly."
#3
I think she's reiterating that they're not important enough for us to attack. All we have to do is wait and they'll collapse all by themselves. But if she said that, they'd all have apoplexy at once.
Sayyyyy...! Never thought of that!
Posted by: Fred ||
07/11/2005 15:35 Comments ||
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#4
No intention --- yet.
Posted by: Captain America ||
07/11/2005 17:56 Comments ||
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#5
Nope, no invasion plan, no, nada. However, the Army Corps of Engineers are working on a project to make South Korea an island. The new Kimche Sea will stretch from the old shore line of the Chinese side of the Yalu river to somewhere around Munsan. Both Secretaries were overheard to have said those boys in the Corps need a break from the continuous cycle of reclaiming and restoring the Everglades and this is just the type of job to keep them busy for a time.
Thousands of people protesting at the site of the planned new headquarters for the U.S. military in South Korea clashed Sunday with police. Some 7,000 demonstrators threw steel pipes and stones at about 10,000 police guarding Camp Humphreys in Pyongtaek, about 50 miles south of Seoul. Some demonstrators were seen bleeding but the number of injured wasn't immediately known. "The government made an agreement with the United States without consensus from the residents," said one protester, Oh Jeong-sun, 56. The U.S. military in South Korea is now headquartered at Yongsan Garrison in Seoul, but is set to move its entire command to Pyongtaek by 2008 as part of plans to consolidate bases and reduce the number of U.S. troops.
Don't worry. We won't be there long.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/11/2005 00:00 ||
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I know Camp Humphreys well(1974-75),home of the 2nd ID.I was stationed at Alpha 1/44th ADA,38th BDE.Right across the river.The Red Door Bordello right outside the main gate.In regards to the pic:Bite me,kiss my ass.We have more a efficient use for our troops and treasure.Frigging a##holes!
France won plaudits in the Muslim world by opposing the US-led war in Iraq, but the insurgency there now poses one of the biggest terrorism threats to France, senior officials and experts warn.
France tightened security last Thursday after bombs killed at least 50 people on London transport, drafting in troops to protect key sites as officials from Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin downwards warned the country could be next in line.
But fears that France was a target had surfaced long before.
``We remain vulnerable, faced with the blind determination of splintered, mobile groups who know how to exploit the smallest crack in our security measures,'' Mr Villepin said on Saturday.
Many French people believed they would be shielded from terror attacks as France opposed the Iraq war but in the eyes of Islamic radicals, Paris is seen as just as much an enemy as London, experts on Islam and security say.
The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have radicalised a certain section of Muslim youth in France, whose five million Muslims are Europe's largest Islamic minority.
While France did not send troops to Iraq, its intelligence services have been working with the United States and Britain in the war on terrorism and it has soldiers in Afghanistan.
And Paris' policies banning Muslim headscarves in schools and backing its former North African colonies in their struggle against radical Islamic movements have also fuelled the anti-French feeling among some radical Muslims, experts say.
``Around 20 French nationals have definitely gone to Iraq,'' says Roland Jacquard, head of the Paris-based International Terrorism Observatory.
``Four died, others are in prison. But the real figure could be 150 French nationals who went to Iraq.
``They could be very dangerous when they return because they will have gained combat experience.
``The interrogations of some of the young French jihadists who have returned from Iraq show they were determined to carry out terrorist attacks in France. Not necessarily against French targets but against foreign interests,'' Mr Jacquard said.
Francois Gere, head of the French Centre for Strategic Analysis said, the US presence in Iraq had proven an effective recruiting sergeant for a new generation of fighters, not just from France.
``There is this phenomenon of to-ing and fro-ing from Iraq which we know has become a free training zone for a certain number of jihadists,'' he said.
Paris police chief Pierre Mutz says his force is alive to the danger. His force has ``had some successes in dismantling networks in Paris, notably in the 19th arrondissement in the capital'', he said last week.
The district was the focus of a network recruiting French youths to fight in Iraq, which police say they have dismantled.
In February, Paris said US forces were holding three French nationals captured alongside insurgents in Iraq. Police said they were recruited in that district by a Paris preacher.
Michel Gaudin, head of France's National Police force, has said the GSPC (the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat), a radical Algerian Islamist group, also posed a threat to France, Algeria's former colonial master.
The GSPC contacted al Qaeda's leader in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, last year to obtain his support for operations in Algeria, in North Africa ``and probably in our country'', Mr Gaudin said.
France has long experience combating radical Islamists. After a wave of attacks in the 1980s and 1990s France revamped its judicial apparatus, notably with a broad-brush terrorist conspiracy law that enables the conviction of anyone shown to have been in regular contact with a terrorist group.
Many French officials believe EU states should adopt a similar law, which makes it easier for the authorities to secure a conviction than in some countries, particularly Britain. ``The British have stepped up checks on Islamists by their intelligence services since 2001,'' said a senior anti-terrorist official referring to the Sept 11 attacks on US landmarks. ``But they still don't have a policy of cracking down on them.''
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/11/2005 15:32 ||
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What to do, what to do....
Well, the Phrogs could take the cops and the army and clean out the cites and jail or ship back (or just shoot) all the bad guys living there (that would be about 95%).
But they won't, gutless wonders that they are.
Practice surrendering to your latest invaders, Phrance - it's what you do best.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
07/11/2005 15:42 Comments ||
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But, but, the Islamists should phear our non-binding resolutions! - France
Germany's opposition aims to oust Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder with a program to boost Europe's largest economy and "reinvigorate" relations with the United States, according to a draft obtained Sunday by The Associated Press. The program, to be formally endorsed Monday by the Christian Democratic Union and its Bavarian sister party, includes an increase in sales tax and looser rules for companies to hire and fire staff. It also rules out Turkish membership in the European Union.
The parties are also trying to win back voters by invoking Germany's strained relations with Washington. Schroeder ran for re-election in 2002 on a platform opposing the U.S.-led war in Iraq, and Bush pointedly refused to offer the traditional congratulations to him on his victory. Germany's conservatives have been careful not to back the war — sending troops to Iraq would be deeply unpopular — but insist only a change of government can heal the rift with Washington. "We will reinvigorate the trans-Atlantic cooperation with the United States," the draft said. "European identity and European self-confidence don't require distance from the U.S., but rather a trusted partnership. They prove their worth in energetic engagement to solve international conflicts and fight international terrorism," it said.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/11/2005 00:00 ||
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"I mean, c'mon guys. France? Those losers couldn't find their own butt if it had a bell stuck in it. Seriously."
WASHINGTON â The U.S. Congress is again preparing to tackle one of the thorniest social issues in contemporary America â what to do about the thousands of illegal aliens attempting to cross U.S. borders every year as well as the millions who are already here. About fricken time!
"It is affecting every member of Congress in their district back home, it is a top-tier concern," said Rep. John Shadegg, R-Ariz.
Shadegg said the issue is gaining so much attention from the public that border security trumped White House marketing of Social Security reform.
"We were at home aggressively doing town halls on Social Security and people were saying 'Hey, wait a minute, what about illegal immigration?'" Shadegg said. Preventing illegals access to social security benefits would help
An estimated 700,000 illegals entered America last year; the national total is nearly 11 million.
California and Texas lead the pack of states, with nearly 4 million illegal aliens combined. Florida follows with 850,000, New York with 650,000 and Arizona has 500,000. Illinois, New Jersey and North Carolina all top 300,000 while another 3.1 million are scattered among the other 42 states.
"The big shift this year is that something has to be done. In the past, immigration has been one of those issues that politicians would just as soon cower stay away from," said Frank Sharry, executive director of the National Immigration Forum.
That is no longer the case on Capitol Hill, where lawmakers are boosting border patrol funding and drafting bills to penalize businesses that hire illegals. Can we penalize the ACLU for trying to apply laws for American citizens to non-americans?
"If we aggressively go after the employer â the people who are creating the demand side of the equation â I assure you that in vast numbers people who are currently here illegally will return to their country of origin because they won't have a job," said Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo.
Politically, the White House is now playing catch-up. President Bush's plan to legalize millions of alien workers, giving them guest worker status, has fallen flat on Capitol Hill. A comment in March in which the president described the Minutemen, a group of volunteer civilian border monitors, as "vigilantes" only made matters worse. Gee, that whole paragraph is a "No Shit" moment.
Days after the president's remark, more than 700 Minutemen (search) helped authorities dramatically reduce the number of illegal crossings on the Arizona-Mexico border. All sane Some Republicans still recoil at the president's use of the term.
"I think on that one he missed the mark," Shadegg said. Missed? He was aiming for Arizona and hit Alpha Centari with that one!
Senior Bush advisers are crafting a new immigration proposal â one with more emphasis on border control and less on legalizing illegal workers. Sometimes, politics DOES work.
But that hasn't been easy. Nearly 7 million illegals hold down jobs in the United States, half in the construction and service sectors. Half? Here in Colorado nearly 90%.
"You can say, 'Gee whiz, I wish they wouldn't come' or 'I wish they weren't here,' but the reality of our labor market is we need these workers for the new jobs that are being created in the service sector because we're sending our kids to college not to be busboys or housekeepers," Sharry said. Then issue more green cards after a background check and a health check to make sure they are not bringing in any pathagens. At least we know who is coming and if they are healthy.
On top of that, almost no one favors mass deportations of employed illegal aliens They haven't been reading Rantburg apparently.
"Rounding them up and shipping them back is not a possibility. Bullshit! Granting them blanket authority and rewarding them for having come illegally is not a possibility," Shadegg said. So, you are suggesting a catch 22?
Congress will tighten border security, but two other issues remain â how to create verifiable documents that employers can use to separate legal from illegal workers, and how to grant legal status to millions of illegals with jobs, families and U.S. connections without granting blanket amnesty. Many lawmakers say they want aliens to go home before winning legal status in the United States.
Make it well known that all illegals have 6 months to leave (and perhaps apply under the LEGAL process and wait - in their homeland - like every LAW-ABIDING immigrant). Any found after that are deported (without appeal or request for asylem (sp?)) and their property confiscated and auctioned off (to pay for their deportation), *AND* the get a LIFETIME BAN on any visa/immigration.
Grant citizenship only to newborns who's parents are *both* here legally.
Give local governments 6 months to rescent any 'sanctuary' laws - after that they (or those officals who vote against such a measure) are held personally liable for aid-and-abeding, arrested, and thrown in federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison for 3 months.).
Hold all federal funds to local governments who have 'sanctuary laws' until they are removed. The same for states who grant Drivers Licenses without valid proof of legal residents or citizenship.
If we need the workforce the CHANGE THE LAW to allow more LEGAL aliens to visit (after the approprate background check, etc...) from all countries - not just Mexico (which would be racist...).
BTW: I find it amazing that the LEFT would want a higher minimum wage and, in the same breath, advocate illegal workers (who don't get minimum wage....)
#3
"I find it amazing that the LEFT would want a higher minimum wage and, in the same breath, advocate illegal workers (who don't get minimum wage....)"
Heck, that's a no-brainer: increasing the minimum wage makes legal workers' labor more expensive, and flooding the market with illegal workers who'll work for lower wages will end up putting the legal workers on the unemployment line-- right where the Democrats want them.
The Democrats will then pretend to "help" the displaced legal workers with new social welfare policies, and in return the unemployed workers, now on the dole, will vote for Democrats out of deep gratitude for depriving them of their jobs.
Piece of cake...
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/11/2005 17:52 Comments ||
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#4
Solution:
Fix the public schools so these kids become assimilated Americans faster. End welfare. Open the doors wider, especially for Europeans and Asians who suffer a transportation disadvantage versus the Mexicans. Build a wall with Mexico and admit Mexicans proportionately to the rest of the world. Our real problem is not immigrants, but commuters.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
07/11/2005 17:52 Comments ||
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#5
I find it amazing that the LEFT would want a higher minimum wage and, in the same breath, advocate illegal workers (who don't get minimum wage....)
Speaking from personal experience, the Left are inherently a bunch of tight-fisted bastards. If they can get an illegal to work at 50% of going rates, they will. And then try to work the wage-level down, after the work is done.
#6
Solution ( because my forebears were immigrants):
Employed illegals who can document continuous employment here over 3 or 5 years get amnesty and a green card. Those folks are the salt of the earth and want to be Americans. That honors how our country was built.
Unemployed illegals get sent home. Want to come back? See next paragraph --
We figure out how many migrant/temporary workers we need and authorize that many temporary permits, with potential citizenship for a certain proportion who work hard and play by the rules. Temp workers get background checks. Middlemen make sure temp workers get matched up with employers and report all to INS. Employers who go outside the system get busted hard. Everyone gets minimum wage and obeys the labor laws.
Tighten the border. Shoot the coyotes (the evil ones who ship the illegals in under horrendous conditions).
Schools: English first, last, often, always. No bilingual ed. Nada.
Health: no one is denied emergency medical care because of their status.
Drivers licenses: citizens and permanent residents only. Legal migrant/temp workers can get a special license, clearly marked and colored.
Citizenship: if born here with at least one parent who is a US citizen or permanent resident.
There's my $0.0002.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/11/2005 18:19 Comments ||
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#7
Amnesty for illegal aliens? Absolutely NOT!
I like the 6 months to leave... and then if you continue your illegal occupancy of the USA and get caught immediate - deportation and ban from ever becoming legal.
I'm done with giving away our nation to invading 2nd worlders... they don't allow US to enter their countries and seize their jobs - why should WE allow the reverse?
Steve... I don't have any problem with emergency medical treatment for illegals... as long as they are immediately deported after treatment.
#8
close the border now, then start tackling the expulsion of illegals on welfare, illegals doing criminal acts, actively seeking and jailing the employers of illegals (sorry Tyson chicken, you first), lather, rinse, repeat.
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/11/2005 21:14 Comments ||
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#9
About fricken time!
Careful, Congress' idea of how to "tackle" the problem may turn out to have a surprise or two hiding in the creases....
#10
I dont like Amnesty - tried that and it only encourages more illegals (if you can survive for 5 years your home free!). Some legal immigrants have to wait longer then that.
Here is an example (I just looked these dates up...):
If you are a law abiding citizen - and you are petitioning your non-citizen brother or sister to immigrate the Vermont service center would just now be getting to your petition if you had filed in September 1999. If they are your son or daughter (married,over 21) its April 23, 2001 (in Texas its January 1999).
Why should some law-breaker (who is here in VIOLATION OF FEDERAL LAW) get an advantage?
ASPEN, Colo. â Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton went on the attack against President Bush in a speech Sunday, accusing him of damaging the economy by overspending while giving tax cuts to the rich. The Democrat from New York also accused Bush of depriving U.S. soldiers of equipment needed to fight the war in Iraq and cutting funding for scientific research. Like the clowns listening to her speech have anyone in their family in uniform. Or care.
"I sometimes feel that Alfred E. Neuman is in charge in Washington," Clinton said referring to the freckle-faced Mad magazine character. Maybe she's in a time warp and thinks it's 1998? She drew a laugh from crowd when she described Bush's attitude toward tough issues with Neuman's catchphrase: "What, me worry?"
Clinton, who was speaking during the inaugural Aspen Ideas Festival, organized by the Aspen Institute nonpartisan think tank, didn't mention the presidential election in 2008. But she's talkin' like it!
She said the United States should remain in Iraq until peace can be maintained by the Iraqi people, saying the mission was part of the "long struggle against terrorism" by the U.S.
"The threat of terrorism is as close as our daily commute," said Clinton, adding that people around the world admired the "famous resilience" of the British in the wake of last week's terrorist attacks.
When it came to the economy, Clinton accused the Bush administration of focusing on helping the wealthy while hurting the middle class, which she said has been key to Americans' success and stability. She said the middle class is now being threatened by an ailing economy caused by the growing national debt, growing health care costs, the loss of pensions and the loss of manufacturing diversity. Clinton also said the U.S. needs to focus on exploring alternative energy sources to become less reliant on oil.
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/11/2005 07:22 ||
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Here the dems go AGAIN saying the economy is crap. Never mind that tax recipts are 24% higher than the most optimistic estimate, unemployment is at an almost record low, durable goods orders are up, exports are up, imports are up (which is good, since we have more money, more cheap crap is being bought) and consumer confidence is good.
Never mind the facts, nothing to see here, move along....
When it came to the economy, Clinton accused the Bush administration of focusing on helping the wealthy while hurting the middle class
Yadda, yadda, yadda.
Ferchrissakes, can't these clowns at least come up with a new lie? The old ones are wearing thin. Meanwhile, the "damaged" economy that Her Heinous trashes is perking along quite nicely, thank you.
By the way, thanks to their rich friends, HillBill are now rich too. And the people she was talking to are rich. So are they returning their "tax cuts for the rich" to the Treasury, or at least handing the money over to the middle class?
/rhetorical question.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
07/11/2005 14:01 Comments ||
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#3
"Tax the Rich to feed the Poor until there are no Rich no more."
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
07/11/2005 14:10 Comments ||
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#4
Boy I sure wish some MSM reporter would ask her Hilldabeast exactly what her husband did to spur the economy, the .com bubble, or what plan he had to sustain it. I know! He had sex with an intern and that jump-started the economy!
#10
Oh, good God, are we going to have to listen to this idiotic "worst economy since the Great Depression" and "tax cuts for the rich" bullshit YET AGAIN?????
I was a Democrat for 31 years, but finally had enough of their depressive, victimist garbage. Jeez Louise!!!!!! Someone, please shut this bitch up.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/11/2005 17:21 Comments ||
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#11
Dave D - I'm curious.
Just what was the Democrat party supposed to stand for back when it was Democrat, not Moonbat?
They must have had some kind if platform - though judging from the laws they either got passed or got made by the SC, it was mostly big government.
Yet Harry Truman and JFK weren't big gov't types to my knowledge. JFK even pushed through tax cuts to stimulate the economy. Dems today would never do that, or even admit it works.
Do you remember what their platform was, before they went 'round the bend?
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
07/11/2005 18:31 Comments ||
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#12
If by "ruining the ecomony" she means "driving people farther from a socialist EUtopia type of thang"... then yes, I believe she is correct.
I'll keep investing and owning. Thanks for your concern, though, Hil. Really. No: really!
#14
Truman was a big government type. Tried to implement national health care. The Democrats have been about buying votes from the poor with the money of the Rich since at least the time of Jackson.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
07/11/2005 18:43 Comments ||
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#15
I think it was PJ O'Rourke who said:
"When the Republicans ruin the economy, at least someone makes some money; the Democrats just do it for fun."
#16
"Do you remember what their platform was, before they went 'round the bend?"
That was so long ago, I don't think it matters what their platform used to be. My own image of "Democrat" was JFK, who presided when I was in elementary school:
"Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country."
Today's Democrats, perverted beyond all recognition, have turned JFK's call to service around 180 degrees:
"Ask not what you can do for your country; ask-- no, DEMAND TO KNOW-- why this terrible, awful, racist, imperialistic, oppressive, corporatist hellhole isn't doing more for YOU!"
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/11/2005 18:55 Comments ||
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#17
Hillary needs to make more of these speeches where the mask slips a bit and you can see the shrill nanny-state bitch who wants to control every aspect of your miserable little lives, for the common good - as she defines it. She's been doing her best to do the makeover, posing as a hawk, and a "moderate" (as defined in the donk party, at least) for her 2008 run. Nothing will make me happier than to see her run, cuz she'll crush her parties' hopes for a decade
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/11/2005 20:53 Comments ||
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#18
But Frank,
When Rove mentioned the non-support of the WOT by the liberials [NOTE - He did not say Democrats], the Hildabeast had a hissy fit in front of Rumsfeld. So the 'moderate' tag is obviously out by her own admission. Walked right into that one she did. And she has the afront to imply W. isn't smart. Heh. That ought to play well on the political commercials come '07.
#20
even better: when your strongest campaign thrust is that you keep your mouth shut so people don't discover who you really are - you've already lost
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/12/2005 0:00 Comments ||
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The head of the Department of Homeland Security indicated Sunday that U.S. agencies were investigating possible "sleeper" cells in the country, a concern heightened by Thursday's attacks in London.
Asked whether there were Al Qaeda cells in the United States, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff pointed to groups in Portland, Ore., northern Virginia and elsewhere convicted on terrorism-related charges.
"We've seen these cells," he said in an interview on CBS' "Face the Nation." "And we're continuing to conduct active investigations of other cells."
Chertoff's response appeared to go beyond remarks from other federal law enforcement officials in recent months.
FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III testified before Congress in February that he was "very concerned" about a lack of intelligence on networks of Al Qaeda operatives in the United States, but he stopped short of saying there were sleeper cells in the country.
Critics have said that most cases brought in the United States against alleged terrorist cells have been weak, with little evidence of plots against domestic targets. Chertoff acknowledged that criticism but said U.S. agencies had been aggressive in disrupting groups before they became operational.
"A sleeper cell can become operational in the blink of an eye," he told NBC's "Meet the Press." "We can't wait until the fuse is lit."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/11/2005 12:35 ||
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MIAMI, July 9 -- The commanding officer of the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, was relieved of his duties Saturday after he was accused of inappropriate management practices, a Navy spokesman said.
Capt. Leslie J. McCoy, who had commanded Guantanamo since March 2003, was the subject of an investigation into inappropriate personnel and administrative practices unrelated to the base's detention camp for suspected terrorists. "His release and reassignment are in no way related to the detainee operations taking place in Guantanamo," said C. Patrick Dooling, spokesman for Navy Region Southeast, based in Jacksonville, Fla. Dooling would not elaborate on the allegations against the officer.
McCoy was relieved of his duties Saturday by Rear Adm. Annette E. Brown, the region commander, who had "lost confidence in his ability to effectively lead," Dooling said. McCoy will be transferred to the staff in Jacksonville. Capt. Lawrence S. Cotton, chief of staff of Navy Region Southeast, will command the base until a permanent replacement is named.
During McCoy's tenure, the base staff grew substantially to accommodate the arrival of prisoners after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the United States.
Posted by: Fred / Steve White ||
07/11/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
A Capt(=Major in the Army) in command of Gitmo,that doesn't seem right.He might as well resign,his carrer is over,he will get no more promotions and after 2 years(I think)of no promos you are automatically discharged.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/11/2005 7:47 Comments ||
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#3
Short bio of him here: Chopper pilot with 26 years in, most likely this would have been one of his last assignments anyway before retirement. Perhaps he had already become ROAD (Retired On Active Duty) and gotten lazy. Let his staff run things and they screwed things up and he takes the fall, as he should. Bet a few more people get short notice assignments and bad marks on their permanent record.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/11/2005 8:32 Comments ||
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#4
Ok,Fred.My first thought was Col.Thanks for the correction.
#5
"Inappropriate management practices" Sounds like the staff was running things for him. Probably real minor offence but the Navy is REAL ANAL about such things. If it had been a major screw-up the charge would be dereliction of duty. Base/Facility commands are not career builders for the most part. In twenty years I canât remember one going from Base Commander into an operational command or an O-7 selection.
#6
Back in the day, I was assigned to NATO PWHQ in Germany. Our AF personnel issues were handled by the Special Activities Squadron back in the Netherlands. This turned "I've got to run down to the orderly room" into a road trip with a government staff car. Anyway, one day we drive over and find a whole bunch of new faces running the show.
Turns out the whole command section, including first shirt and commander got busted for black marketing and (rumor has it) wife swapping. One day they were there, then "poof!", gone!
Posted by: Steve ||
07/11/2005 12:52 Comments ||
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#7
This guy just got done testifying to Congress a few weeks ago. Could it have been something he inadvertantly said? He testified to Hunter's committee.
Posted by: Captain America ||
07/11/2005 17:50 Comments ||
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Inmates from the US-led war on terror held at the prison camp at the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba are well treated, play outdoor sports, and have access to a broad Muslim-approved menu, a US senator who traveled to the site said. US Senator Pat Roberts, a conservative Republican from Kansas, said on "Fox News Sunday" that he just returned from visiting the Guantanamo detention site. "They have a Muslim menu down there of 113 dishes," said Roberts, chairman of the US Senate Intelligence Committee. "I saw them playing soccer. I saw them playing ping-pong. I saw them playing ... I think it was volleyball," he said.
US camp guards "strictly observe with reverence all of the prayer calls, five times a day, 20 minutes," he said. "And in regards to the health care, my word, they have better health care than many of my small communities in Kansas." According to Roberts inmate treatment there "is carrots, not sticks. We are treating people humanely."
Meanwhile the US soldiers guarding the inmates "are getting very rough treatment from some of these detainees -- and I don't call them 'detainees,' I call them 'terrorists' -- throwing excrement at them and everything else." The US guards "are more worried about what's happening in Congress in regards to their future than they are the terrorists," Roberts said.
I've commented a few times before on my philosophy of how to turn these guys from their terrorist ways, or at least assure that they become ineffectual. I like the idea of them having lots of good food. I hope that seconds are available, and I hope they're using lots of real ingredients: butter, cream, extra sugar, all that sort of stuff. They're far from home, and incarcerated, so they need happy food: cakes, pies, peanuts, popcorn, potato chips, lots and lots of baclavah. If I was in charge, I'd be feeding them about 5000 calories a day and redirecting their exercise time into video games. My goal would be that no one under 435 pounds would be released from Gitmo. The sign over the gate would read: "You can't leave if you can see your feet."
I'd also make sure they had unlimited access to whatever Arabic versions of Playboy, Penthouse, Busty Hot Blondes, Limber Lasses, Boys at Play, and similar skin mags there might be, and if there aren't any I'd be printing them and handing them out. I might even set up an intranet that consisted of nothing but porn sites and let them have unlimited access.
I'd also be thinking hard on how to instill a sense of humor into these goobers. That would involve the obvious step of keeping contact with holy men, even the ones we supply, to an absolute minimum. I'd have mandatory movie nites, probably starting with Charlie Chaplin, Keystone Kops, Harold Lloyd, and Buster Keaton, and then, once they were laughing seriously, I'd move them to the hard stuff: Albert Finney and Suzanna York in Tom Jones, the Japanese version of "Shall We Dance," and a thousand other movies that involve broad physical humor centering around a sympathetic hero's efforts to get laid. With repetition they'd start to get the idea, though hopefully by the time they're released they'll be too fat to put it into practice.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/11/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
Soccer! Ping-pong! Is there no end to this depravity?
Posted by: Mike ||
07/11/2005 7:09 Comments ||
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#2
I don't see is the need for translating Playboy and Penthouse in Arabic. The English version will do.
#3
Hmmmm... True. Hard to translate a picture, isn't it?
Posted by: Fred ||
07/11/2005 13:48 Comments ||
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#4
I've commented a few times before on my philosophy of how to turn these guys from their terrorist ways, or at least assure that they become ineffectual.
A bullet to the back of the head works. Use two and you're sure there aren't any odd survivals.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
07/11/2005 14:47 Comments ||
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#5
Turn them into Dickie-Do's.
Definition: His belly is so big, it sticks out farther than his dickie do.
KUALA LUMPUR, July 11 (Bernama) -- The Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) reaffirmed its steadfast support and commitment for the Palestinians in their quest to fully realise their inalienable rights, including their right to self-determination. NAM said it was gravely concerned that the Palestinian people continued to face unbearable hardship and suffering at the hands of the Israeli authorities in their valiant struggle to resist foreign occupation of their land.
'Non-Aligned'? Hardly.
Chairman of NAM's Ministerial Coordinating Bureau Datuk Seri Syed Hamid Albar said NAM also reaffirmed its position that the Separation Wall constructed in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including in and around East Jerusalem, was illegal, must be dismantled, and its further construction immediately discontinued.
"The wall is a visible and clear act of territorial annexation that gravely violates the Fourth Geneva Convention in that it involves the illegal, de facto annexation of substantial areas of Palestinian land and resources; the transfer or isolation of large numbers of Palestinian civilians; and the further deprivation of the human rights of the Palestinians resulting in dire humanitarian consequences among an already deprived people," he said.
The Foreign Minister said this in a statement to his Palestinian counterpart Nabil Shaath in conjunction with a meeting in Ramallah Monday to commemorate the first anniversary of the International Court of Justice's (ICJ) ruling against the building of the wall. Syed Hamid said the construction of the wall introduced a new dimension to the problem which could seriously endanger the prospects for peace in the region.
He said the wall also presented a major obstacle to the creation of a viable contiguous Palestinian state, thus diminishing the realisation of the two-state solution as envisaged in Security Council Resolution 1397 (2002).
"Today, under the guise of security and self-defence, Israel continues with the construction of the Separation Wall, blatantly ignoring the (ICJ's ruling) as well as Resolution ES-10/15 adopted by the General Assembly at its 10th Emergency Special Session on July 20 last year," he said.
Guess they forgot about about all those dead people when the Pals blew up buses and pizza parlors...
Resolution ES-10/15 demands that Israel, the occupying power, complies with its legal obligation as mentioned in the ICJ's ruling. Syed Hamid said all NAM member states and the international community, including the Security Council, must take all necessary measures to ensure Israel's compliance with the ICJ's ruling.
KUALA LUMPUR, July 11 (Bernama) -- The Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) reaffirmed its steadfast support and commitment for the Palestinians in their quest to fully realise their inalienable rights,
including the right to slaughter every last Jew in the Holy Land? The PA seems to consider that an obligation.
Russia is a likely partner in a plan envisaging construction of 20 nuclear power plants in Iran, a senior member of Iranâs parliament was quoted by Agence France Presse as saying. âA plan has been approved in parliament obliging the government to study the possibility of building 20 nuclear power stations ... Various countries, including Russia, can participate and we hope Russia will continue to cooperate with us on this question,â Kazem Jalali, head of the Iranian parliamentâs foreign affairs committee, said. Jalali was speaking during a visit by an Iranian delegation to the Russian capital aimed at developing economic ties between the two countries.
Russia is constructing Iranâs first nuclear reactor at Bushehr, part of a technological cooperation agreement with Tehran in 2002 that opened the way for construction of up to five reactors over the coming 10 years. Both the U.S. and Israel have objected to the building of the Bushehr reactor, which could be turned on next year, as they claim Iran is secretly trying to develop nuclear weapons and that having such a facility will be a proliferation risk.
Posted by: ed ||
07/11/2005 13:23 ||
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A new and ruthless cell with links to al-Qaida has grabbed a foothold in Somalia's capital, according to a report released Monday that dovetails with other analyses showing the lawless country could become a haven for international terrorists.
In its report, the International Crisis Group said the Mogadishu cell was led by a young Somali militant trained in Afghanistan, where al-Qaida was once based. The report said the group ``announced its existence by murdering four foreign aid workers in the relatively secure territory of Somaliland between October 2003 and April 2004.''
The Brussels-based group that tracks world conflicts said the threat of terrorism inspired by an extremist interpretation of Islam ``in and from Somalia is real.'' It added that al-Qaida contributed to attacks on U.S. and U.N. peacekeepers in Somalia in the early 1990s and used the country as a transit zone for attacks in neighboring Kenya and as a hiding place for some of its leading members today.
A new transitional government was formed last year during peace talks in neighboring Kenya, but the administration has failed to relocate to Mogadishu because the city is considered unsafe.
The government is also opposed by Islamic extremists and some of the dozens of warlords who control some of the 53,000 militias in the country.
In March, United Nations experts monitoring an arms embargo on Somalia reported that Islamic hard-liners, including a group with alleged ties to al-Qaida, was importing high explosives, mines, hand and rifle-fired grenades, anti-tank weapons and ammunition and anti-aircraft guns and ammunition.
The U.N. monitors said they had pictures and information that about 17 mobile military training camps have been established by the Islamic Somali group, Al-Ittihad al-Islami, which wants to use its military power against the new government to impose Islamic law on Somali society.
Al-Ittihad, listed by the United States as a terrorist group linked to al-Qaida, operates openly as a religious organization and is a powerful economic force in southern Somalia.
In the latest assessment, the International Crisis Group did not identify the Mogadishu cell, but said it is led by led by Aden Hashi Ayro. Its members had ``little or no religious authority ... (and) seem to be organized exclusively to conduct urban insurgency and terrorism operations without a clear political aim,'' the group said.
The International Crisis Group said Western governments, led by the U.S., were building up counterterrorist networks headed by Somali faction leaders and former military or police and by working with the security services in breakaway Somaliland and semiautonomous Puntland.
The strategy has netted at least one key al-Qaida figure, and as many as a dozen members of the new group are either dead or behind bars, according to the group.
In May, the then-commander of a U.S. counterterrorism task force for the Horn of Africa said Somalia has become a haven for terrorists in East Africa. Marine Maj. Gen. Samuel Helland said U.S. troops were working with Somalia's neighbors to improve their border security since pressure on the al-Qaida terror group in Pakistan and Afghanistan may force some members to seek refuge in East Africa.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/11/2005 16:21 ||
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#1
Two words: carpet bomb.
Posted by: Neutron Tom ||
07/11/2005 19:40 Comments ||
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nope...tactical nuke. there is little there worth saving.
Former Pakistan cricket captain Javed Miandad finally confirmed that his son Junaid will marry India's most wanted fugitive Dawood Ibrahim's daughter Mahrukh on July 23 in Dubai. Talking to an Indian TV channel, the former captain said, ''The marriage will take place in Dubai on July 23 and I urge all to bless the children. I have nothing to hide and I will invite as many friends and well-wishers as possible.''
Dawood, mastermind of the 1993 Mumbai blasts, is India's most wanted man. He features in the United States' global terrorist list for funding Islamic militants and is also suspected to have links with al Qaeda.
Both Junaid and Mahrukh study in London where they have been courting each other for quite some time. ''As parent, you have to marry off your children some day and we are no exception. I have nothing to shield from the people. I'm happy that my son is marrying. Lot of people have congratulated us on the occasion and all the rituals would take place as is the custom,'' he said. Miandad brushed aside claims that the marriage was advanced because of the growing fetus pressure.
Asked to name people who are expected to attend the occasion, Miandad evaded a direct answer and said, ''All my friends and relatives will be invited. We will soon send in the invitations and you would know yourself who are coming to attend the marriage.''
All we want to know is if her dad will be coming to give her away. We'd like to send a proper gift.
Asked why he chose Dubai as the venue of wedding, Miandad shot back ''I was thinking of hosting it in moon but did not get a land here.'' ''Actually Dubai is convenient place and hence we settled for that,'' he said.
"Plus, there's much less chance of an airstrike. I hope."
The marriage will be followed by a grand reception on August 4 in Karachi, Miandad said.
Ah, now I'll wager Dad will make that one.
''One should not make it a controversy and treat it as any other marriage,'' he said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/11/2005 12:52 ||
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July 11, 2005: SOCOM (Special Operations Command), the U.S. Army and the U.S. Marines are equipping their troops with wearable computers and âvideo eyewearâ so that troops can use video from UAVs, ground based vidcams or other sources, while they move around and fight. The video eyewear has been around for over a decade, but has gotten better over that time. The models the troops are now using provides 480x640 or 800x600 pixel displays that are flicker free, viewable in daylight and able to display 3-D images. The most common video eyewear used by the troops will cover only one eye, and have an integrated ear piece. The military version of civilian models (from suppliers like Icuiti Corporation), cost under a thousand dollars and are designed to take video and sound feeds from game consoles or PCs. The eyewear weighs about 3.5 ounces, and runs off an iPod size controller, which runs for about four hours on two AA batteries. The wearable computer, using eyewear for a display, will be used for things like controlling UAVs, fire control (for bombers or artillery) or linking into battlefield networks (using Internet type technology.) While laptops and PDAs have been on the battlefield for over a decade, these devices are often too awkward for troop use. They want a wearable computer, weighing only a few pounds, so their hands are free to use a weapon.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/11/2005 09:45 ||
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July 10, 2005: After sixty years of dominating U.S. Navy policy, the carrier admirals are getting some serious competition from what is coming to be called the âbrown water navy.â This is the gang that advocates more attention be paid to coastal operations against irregulars, terrorists and the sort of troublemakers peacekeepers encounter. The LCS (Littoral Combat Ship) was developed to deal with this sort of thing, and has become even more popular because of its low cost. At $250 million per ship, the LCS is showing up the more traditional ships, especially the carriers. So now the proposal has been made that the navy cut one carrier, but not its air wing, from the fleet. That would save $500 million a year in operating expenses, and the $8 billion cost of building a replacement carrier for one of the older ones due to retire soon. Keeping the air wing in service would make it possible to work the planes, and aircraft, harder, because there would be an additional air wing that could be used for relief (of air wings that were just worn out from a particularly intense operation). The annual, and one time, savings would allow the navy to build more LCS ships, and even smaller patrol craft that are so useful and necessary for these kinds of operations. What really gives the brown water crowd clout is the need for these smaller ships to help out in the war on terror. At the moment, itâs the only war we got. Moreover, the U.S. Army, to the great embarrassment of old navy hands, has but together a brown water force of small patrol boats for use in Iraq. During the Vietnam war, the navy supplied this force. Not this time around, and the navy is feeling the heat for it. A aircraft carrier may have to be sacrificed to make amends. Meanwhile, the navy plans to form a riverine unit by next year, with more to follow, including a battalion of ânaval infantryâ to serve with the brown water sailors manning the small boats to be used along coasts and up rivers. Civil Affairs and intelligence units are to be formed as well. Service in Iraq seems a strong possibility.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/11/2005 09:44 ||
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#1
Hmmmmmmm. Tough call. Right now, an LCS would probably be the better use of our limited funds. But, when if we end up fighting China, we will badly miss every CVA.
#2
I would agree with this. We can already dump 4 or 5 CVAs into the already crowded Tiawan strait and really don't need anymore. However, several small, fast gunboats with medium range anti-ship missles, linked to the JSTAR to go after the amphibious assault ships....Oh baby! I'm also for completely covering the China side of the Tiawan coast with large, radar guided guns. Say, oh, around 155mm or larger. 5,000 or so ought to do it. China can't destroy them all with missles, and our and Tiawan's aircraft keep them from attacking them as well. It would make an amphibious attack, difficult...
#3
Apropo of not much at all, does anyone remember a book called The Only War We've Got. It was like Catch22 written by a combination of HS Thompson and Tom Sharpe. Amazon doesn't recognize it. They have also completely expunged any reference to the Just William books which were my absolute favourites as a child, along with the Jennings books. I guess I am doomed to love the things that get edited out of history.
#4
The problem with the LCS, as I see it, is that there is still too much emphasis on quality over quantity. Imagine building ships that only cost $10M each. A simple, multi-purpose vehicle that just acts as a pad for a whole range of weapons: *either* 155 arty, rockets, SAMs, depth charges or whatever else you installed on it *that morning*. It doesn't have to do everything all at once, just one thing really well. Now consider that for the same price as a single LCS, you can build25 of these! By just pure numbers alone, it is obvious that you can do a heck of a lot more with such ships then you can with a single LCS. And while it might freak out some to think of the reduced "survivability" of such ships: they are expendable, granted; but match them against a single ship and THEY WILL WIN. So what does that have to say about survivability of a $250M LCS? As things stand now, it doesn't matter how an LCS is disabled; it is far too critical a loss. Lose a fleet of the cheaper ships and you might lose a battle. Lose a few of LCS's and you might lose the war.
#6
And while it might freak out some to think of the reduced "survivability" of such ships: they are expendable, granted; but match them against a single ship and THEY WILL WIN.
Never mind the cost in training and staffing all those ships, and the loss of all that investment when your disposable firecrackers go off.
Oh, and the larger supply needs of such a force. More fuel, more spare parts, more food, more water, more medical support, more mail, more harbor space, more more more.
Naturally, of course, once you've taken the "quantity over quality" route, you can't really divide your forces up (their combat ability depends on numbers, remember?), so you're stuck with the same strategic flexibility as you'd have with the smaller number of gold-plated ships.
So, what was the advantage, again?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
07/11/2005 12:39 Comments ||
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#7
Aircraft carriers are last century's weapons. They're huge targets. How do you kill an aircraft carrier whose defenses include 120 antimissiles? Fire 121 cruise missiles at it. The aircraft carriers were built to counter the Soviet threat, which no longer exists. I mean, don't get me wrong, aircraft carriers are nice, I like them, but it's time to shift our priorities elsewhere. Coastal operations are the wave of the future.
Naval Infantry is different from Marines. I don't remember how exactly, it has to do with the missions that they're tasked with. The Russians have always seemed to be big on Naval Infantry, for some reason.
#8
You guys may be missing the point. The LCS is a new concept in naval warfare. They are extremely fast and agile and can carry a variety of weapons. They can work as anything from a sub hunter/killer to a fast attack, first strike weapon. They are small enough to be hard to spot and track, but they are large enough to carry weapons that can sink a carrier. A swarm of these little fuckers would be the chinese fleets worst nightmare.
#10
I mean, don't get me wrong, aircraft carriers are nice, I like them, but it's time to shift our priorities elsewhere. Coastal operations are the wave of the future.
And the coastal operations will get their air cover from where, exactly?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
07/11/2005 14:29 Comments ||
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#11
phil_b, I believe the book The Only War We've Got was published in England and still available "used" through Amazon UK. Being a book it has no regional coding problems.
#12
I find it curious that no one is talking about naval equivalents of UAVs or autonomous vehicles. In several ways an unmanned marine vehcile is an easier problem than the aerial equivalent.
July 11, 2005: The U.S. Navy officially took possession of the first of a new class of ships; a Littoral Surface Craft (LSC) called âSea Fighterâ (FSF-1). This ship was originally intended as an experimental ship, to test out a number of new technologies. But the sea trials were so successful, that pressure is building to put this class into mass production. That wonât be hard to do. Sea Fighter took only twenty months to build, and cost only $50 million. Ships like this are meant for a new force, the "brown water (coastal) navy." The âbrown water sailors,â who are agitating for more emphasis on small ships, and operations in coastal waters, are no longer considered a fringe group. This is mainly because a larger brown water force would get the navy more involved with the war on terror. The navy has largely been left out of the war on terror, because of their emphasis on carriers and nuclear subs. Despite the usefulness of carrier aviation in Afghanistan, the navy hasnât had a lot to do since September 11, 2001. The army is getting most of the work, and a growing proportion of the defense budget. With the cost of traditional warships skyrocketing, the LCS (3,000 ton, $250 million Littoral Combat Ship) and the LSC look a lot more attractive. New destroyers will cost $2.5 billion each. That gets you ten LCSs, or fifty LSCs. New carriers cost over $8 billion each, which could built a fleet of brown water ships.
Whatâs so hot about the LSC? Itâs a 1,600 ton (full load) catamaran that is 262 feet long, 72 feet wide and can operate in as little as 12 feet of water. Top speed is about 90 kilometers an hour, which is a unique capability for U.S. navy ships (especially of this size) and a major advantage in coastal operations. Even in rough seas (with up to seven foot waves), the ship can do about 70 kilometers an hour. This is partly the result of using a T shaped hydrofoil. The Sea Fighter has a crew of only 26, and room below and on the deck for twelve cargo containers. These containers can are called "mission modules" and hold weapons, electronics or robotic air, surface or undersea vehicles for jobs like mine clearing, anti-submarine warfare, destroying surface ships or delivering commandoes. The deck is broad enough to handle two helicopters. There is a dock in the rear for launching boats. The ship can stay for sea about eight days at time. Cruising at 36 kilometers an hour, it can travel 7,200 kilometers using its diesel engines. The high speed comes from two LM-2500 gas turbine engines (generating 33,600 horsepower each). Inside, it looks more like a space ship, than a seagoing one. The ship is highly automated, and equipped to keep an eye on large chunks of coastline, and perform many different missions. The LSC hasnât got a lot of staying power, but itâs the kind of ship that can get things done in the war on terror. So can the larger LCS, and both can be kept at sea for months, getting refueled and resupplied at sea.
It remains to be seen if the other âunionsâ in the navy (carriers, subs or conventional surface ships) will be willing to give up one or more of their new ships to get the âbrown waterâ force of LSCs and LCSs going. People higher up in the Department of Defense may get the job done, as well as Congress itself, which has the last word on which ships get built. Congress has noted the navy's inability to do much along the coasts, despite navy calls for more capability in those areas. The brown water sailors have been letting Congress know about the new ship designs, and a bitter budget battle is looming.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/11/2005 09:39 ||
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#1
90 kph = 48.5 kts
70 kph = 37.75 kts
For a ship the size of a WW2 destroyer, that top speed is smokin' fast.
Posted by: Mike ||
07/11/2005 10:03 Comments ||
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#2
Hope they have a hell of a sonar rig. Running aground at 90 kph would be bad news.
Yes, but they are in a lot of countries with a coastline. That's the point of having small fast ships like this, they can operate in close.
Spend a billion finding technological ways to sniff/spectral analyses of explosives in cities.
What makes you think we can't do both. Besides, I don't want to hunker down and wait for them to bring explosives to our cities, I want to deliver explosives to theirs.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/11/2005 14:50 Comments ||
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#6
Why not build some of the PBRs used in Vietnam and link them up with larger ships for housing and resupply?
Realistically I just don't see 8 day cruises in brown water. I don't see such a boat going up a river. I see forays in to drop folks off and board potential smugglers. You need speed but how many boats can outrun a missile or two? How fast do you need to be?
I just don't think you need this fancy bad-boy-boat for that. Am I missing something about potential mission objects here?
July 11, 2005: Over the weekend, 22 soldiers and policemen were killed by groups of Taliban gunmen. Three Taliban were reported killed as well. Ten captured border guards were beheaded in the south. Since the cops and border guards were recruited from local tribes, this will, as it has in the past, trigger a revenge campaign by the victim's kin, against the Taliban. Eventually, there will be a bunch of dead Taliban, and protests from the Taliban that their brethren were killed in some barbaric way or another. This reminds us that the Taliban violence in the south is actually a tribal civil war, between factions that want to bring back hard core Islamic rule for the region, and eventually the entire country. The majority of the tribes, and tribesmen, want a less conservative lifestyle, and have to fight to the death with the hard core Taliban to settle the issue.
The government has won over most of the tribal leaders in the south, which has infuriated the remaining Taliban adherents. The Taliban factions have tried to persuade their fellow Pushtun tribesmen to get behind a Taliban comeback. That didn't work. So the Taliban have been trying terror. That hasn't worked. Now more of the Taliban are trying murder and mutilation (beheading and the like.) This is a desperate move that simply triggers a blood feud between the Taliban and the families of the men they kill.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/11/2005 09:36 ||
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(CNSNews.com) - Islamic schools, called "madrassahs," operate around the world, teaching children reading, writing, religion and, in some cases, how to participate in terrorist attacks. Madrassah means "center of learning" in Arabic. These schools traditionally prepare students for life as a cleric. But the nature of some madrassahs changed between 1979 and 1989, during the war between the Soviet Union and Afghan rebels, according to Ariel Cohen, senior policy advisor for the Heritage Foundation.
Madrassahs "provide much more than a religious education. They provide political ideology, and they also -- in many cases -- train for violence and war," Cohen told Cybercast News Service. He added that the U.S. government "doesn't see madrassahs as breeding grounds for terrorists, when in fact, they are factories of terror. They are seen only as religious establishments, which they're not." The U.S. Defense Department has noted that some madrassahs indoctrinate students and instill motives for terrorism.
In November 2003, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld talked about the scope of these schools. "There is no way to measure it because you don't know what's happening in each one of these radical cleric schools that are teaching people that. But we have to engage that battle of ideas, just as we have to engage terrorists where they are," he said.
According to the Defense Department, madrassahs operate on several continents. All madrassahs provide free education as well as room and board to students who come mainly from the poorer strata of society.
The U.S. State Department describes madrassahs "as an alternative to the public school system in many areas" but adds that "many madrassahs [have] failed to provide an adequate education, focusing solely on Islamic studies. "A few madrassahs, particularly in the Afghan border area, [have] reportedly continued to teach religious extremism and violence," according to the State Department.
While the exact number of madrassahs is unknown, they have a strong presence in Afghanistan and Pakistan. In April 2002, Mahmood Ahmed Ghazi, Pakistani minister of religious affairs, estimated that Pakistan had 10,000 madrassahs for 1.7 million students.
PBS's "Frontline" has reported that many of these schools are funded by Saudi Arabia. "Saudi Arabia has been the single biggest source of funding for fanatical interpretations of Islam, and the embodiment of that interpretation in organizations and schools has created a self-perpetuating institutional basis for promoting fanaticism across the Muslim world," Vali Nasr, an expert on Islamic fundamentalism and associate professor at University of San Diego, told the television program..
But Muslims defend the schools, pointing out that fanaticism is the exception to the rule. "I think there is the conception that there is hate being taught in these madrassahs, which may be the case in some, but I doubt that is the case for all," Rabiah Ahmed, spokeswoman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, told Cybercast News Service.
Ahmed added: "The majority of Islamic schools in this country and worldwide are just normal schools that teach about religion and about other subjects. People go to these schools and come out just fine, not crazed fanatics."
I guess that all depends on your definition of "crazed"
Posted by: Steve ||
07/11/2005 09:04 ||
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I read about madrassahs, oh - eight or ten years ago, in - of all places - The Readers Digest. But of course, no one paid attention.
Funded by Saudis, eh? Maybe we need to loan them some curriculum reviewers so they could be a bit more selective in their funding?
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/11/2005 10:10 Comments ||
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"'I think there is the conception that there is hate being taught in these madrassahs, which may be the case in some, but I doubt that is the case for all', Rabiah Ahmed, spokeswoman for CAIR, told CNS."
Such a statement of conviction.
"Ahmed added: The majority of Islamic schools in this country and worldwide are just normal schools that teach about religion and about other subjects."
It's nice to see that "other subjects" somehow make it into the Madrassah curriculum, too.
A prominent Somali peace activist has been shot dead by unknown gunmen at his home in the capital, Mogadishu. Through his Centre for Research and Dialogue, Abdulkadir Yahya Ali tried to resolve Somalia's 14-year civil war.
Well, we can't have that, can we?
Witnesses said about five attackers handcuffed his security guards, cut off the phone lines and shot him in front of his wife. The BBC's Mohammed Olad Hassan in Mogadishu says the killing has shocked the city's residents.
Somebody getting bumped off shocks Mogadishu residents? Which ones?
Switzerland-based charity Wartorn Societies Project International, which helped set up the Centre for Research and Dialogue (CRD), has downplayed any link between Mr Yahya's killing and a recent report, saying that Islamist terror groups were based in Mogadishu.
Of course that didn't have anything to do with it... Of couse... Really...
Reuters news agency reports that the CRD works closely with the International Crisis Group think-tank, which over the weekend said that a group linked to al-Qaeda was working out of Mogadishu. In its report, the International Crisis Group said the Mogadishu cell was led by a young Somali militant trained in Afghanistan, where al-Qaida was once based. They did not identify the Mogadishu cell, but said it is led by led by Aden Hashi Ayro. Its members had ``little or no religious authority ... (and) seem to be organized exclusively to conduct urban insurgency and terrorism operations without a clear political aim,'' the group said.
Nope. Nope. Nothing to do with it... Truly...
"Since 2003, Somalia has witnessed the rise of a new, ruthless independent jihadi network with links to al-Qaeda," the ICG report said.
So ruthless they'd bump a guy off in front of his wife if they thought he might be on to something... But certainly not in this case... Couldn't have been them...
It said the group was suspected of involvement in the apparent assassination of four aid workers and 10 former police or military officers in the past two years. "In the rubble-strewn streets of the ruined capital of this state without a government... al-Qaeda operatives, jihadi extremists, Ethiopian security services and Western-backed counter-terrorism networks are engaged in a shadowy and complex contest waged by intimidation, abduction and assassination," the ICG said.
But you're still downplaying any link, right?
Couldn't possibly have anything to do with them..
United Nations resident and humanitarian coordinator for Somalia, Maxwell Gaylard, expressed shock at Mr Yahya's death. "Yahya was a committed advocate for peace and reconciliation, and his optimism never faltered," Mr Gaylard said in a statement from Kenya.
... at least not until they were actually filling him with lead...
Notice how the UN coordinator for Somalia is living in Kenya, better hotels there I guess
Posted by: Steve ||
07/11/2005 08:36 ||
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He was probably a very lonely man in that pisshole. It figures that they'd whack somebody trying to advocate for sanity in Somalia. I guess the much touted tolerance thing called for them to do it in front of his wife. Charming scum being what they are, you think they would have made sure his children were around also.
A DIY video showing how to make a "suicide-belt" bomb for use on a crowded bus is being circulated among terrorist websites. The 26-minute tape gives a detailed, step-by-step guide on how to pack the belt with shrapnel and high explosive, and then detonate it on board for maximum loss of life.
In a grim reminder of the blast that devastated the Number 30 in London's Tavistock Place on Thursday, the film's final section shows the device being blown up in a specially arranged "test site", with rows of metal targets designed to simulate passengers on a bus. A voice-over explains exactly where the would-be bomber should sit on the vehicle in order to maximise the blast. A second test-bombing shows how the same bomb will impact on a crowd of people in a street.
The film, a copy of which has been obtained by The Sunday Telegraph, is among a wide range of terrorism training manuals available on internet message boards dedicated to supporting Islamic terrorism. Little is known about the film's origins, although it is thought to have been shot in the Palestinian territories, where Arab militants have frequently used suicide belts in attacks on Israeli citizens.
It has slick production values that give it the feeling of a corporate video. As music plays in the background, a voice in Arabic explains, Blue Peter-style, how to manufacture the belt with the help of household items such as glue and Scotch tape.
The video's availability on the internet was disclosed by the Washington-based Search for International Terrorist Entities (Site) Institute, a research establishment which monitors and analyses terrorist websites. It acts as a consultant to several Western intelligence agencies. "The quality of the video is unbelievable," said Rita Katz, Site's director. "It is more like a production from National Geographic. We think it is the work of Hizbollah from some years ago, but it is being circulated on message boards."
Scotland Yard has tried to play down speculation that Thursday's explosion on the London bus, in which 13 people died, was the work of a suicide bomber. However, detectives say they are keeping an open mind until a forensic analysis of the bus's wreckage is complete. Even if the inquiry rules it out, the fact that al-Qaeda has used such devices in the past means that it could be a tactic in any further attacks in Britain. The video gives a detailed demonstration of how to make the belt from start to finish, and has a single-minded emphasis to how to kill and maim as many victims as possible.
The voice-over notes: "When the person who will be wearing this explosive vest goes on the bus, and wants to blow himself up, he must be facing the front with his back toward the back. "There is a possibility that the two seats on his right and his left might not be hit with the shrapnel. However, the explosion will surely kill the passengers in those seats." The video is among dozens of terrorist self-teaching aids circulating on jihadi message boards and websites, alongside manuals on the manufacture of poisonous chemicals and bacteria, urban guerrilla warfare tactics, and the use of rocket-propelled grenades and missiles.
Posted by: ed ||
07/11/2005 07:15 ||
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The English have created a hell of a problem for themselves, the liberals must be loving this. We all know that they(libs) are more than willing to sacrifice a few citizens to get their agenda going. Much like the U.S. libs are happy to see war deaths so as to claim we are losing in Iraq. I wonder if England will make any real changes, or if they are to mired in liberalism and muslim strong-arming to quell this out.
#2
It depends on the will of the british politician. If they keep their backbone, the libs will stew, rant and make up lies, but at the end of the day, accomplish nothing. If the policitician's cave to the pressure, Britian will be another Spain. They will be hit again, no matter what. The sooner they realize it, the quicker they can work on a solution to the problems they face.
Right Wing News; hat tip Kathy "Relapsed Catholic" Shaidle. A great resource for combatting moonbattery. Not really possible to excerpt it and do it justice, but here's the 8 myths, in order of appearance.
1) George Bush lied about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
2) A study released in March of 2003 by a British medical journal, the Lancet, showed that 100,000 civilians had been killed as a result of the US invasion.
3) The Bush Administration claimed Iraq was responsible for 9/11.
4) The war in Iraq was actually planned by people like Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz back in 1998 at a think tank called the National Model Railroad Association Project for the New American Century. (Sorry, couldn't help myself.)
5) The war on terror has nothing to do with Iraq.
6) Saddam Hussein had no ties to terrorism.
7) Saddam Hussein had no ties to Al-Qaeda.
8) The Downing Street Memo proves Bush lied to the American people about the war.
Go read it now.
Posted by: Mike ||
07/11/2005 07:00 ||
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Comments have gone too far. To cast disparaging remarks against the National Model Railroad Association by associating them with Project ... is over the top. Can't remember the position of the NMRA on Iraq though.
Sudan's new presidency yesterday lifted the state of emergency in Sudan, except in the conflict-torn regions of Darfur and the east, a statement from the presidential palace said. One day after former southern rebel leader John Garang was sworn in as first vice president to head a new government as President Omar Hassan Bashir's deputy, emergency law giving authorities wide powers to detain without charge and to crack down on opposition forces was cancelled. The statement said Bashir had lifted the state of emergency, in force in Sudan since 1999, except in five states. They are the three states of Darfur and two states bordering Eritrea in the east, where a low intensity conflict escalated in recent months.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/11/2005 00:00 ||
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Pakistan Muslim League (Central) vice-president Syed Kabir Ali Wasti on Sunday condemned the proposed Hasba Bill as a Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) attempt to Talibanise society. âThe bill violates peoplesâ rights and will impose the MMAâs own interpretation of Islam,â said Wasti, about the bill being introduced by the North West Frontier Province government. He urged President Pervez Musharraf to prevent the provincial government from introducing the bill in order to save the country from the âdestructive course being pursued by the MMA.â
Wasti said the bill would create religious âmohtasibsâ (ombudsmen) at the provincial district, sub-district and council level. He said these ombudsmen would be helped by a âreligious policeâ reminiscent of Chinaâs Red Guards or Iranâs Pasbans, assigned to impose a particular moral code on people in the name of promoting virtue and preventing evil. PMLâs (Central) vice-president said the Constitution allowed freedom of choice to every citizen and did not empower anyone to impose their way upon others. He said, âThe system being introduced by the MMA government is intrusive and interferes in peoplesâ personal lives.â
Posted by: Fred ||
07/11/2005 00:00 ||
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JERUSALEM - Around a quarter of the Palestinian population of Jerusalem face being cut off from the rest of the holy city after Israelâs cabinet approved a new route for its controversial West Bank barrier on Sunday. Palestinians accused Israel of trying to shut down argument over the fate of occupied east Jerusalem.
By George I think they've got it.
The revised route of the barrier will mean that some 55,000 residents of east Jerusalem, which was captured and annexed by Israel in 1967, will no longer be able to travel freely throughout the holy city. Around 230,000 Palestinians live in the city. It will cut now through the Palestinian neighbourhoods of Shaufat and Akab as well as the Qalandiya refugee camp on the eastern outskirts of the city.
Olmert insisted that citizens who found themselves outside the route of the barrier would not lose access to services. âThey will continue to be the beneficiaries of the social and municipal services which they are entitled to as holders of residency cards,â Olmert said, adding that building work around Jerusalem should finish in September. Construction has been slowed down in the Jerusalem area following recent rulings by the Israeli Supreme Court that said the fundamental rights of some civilians were being infringed.
The status of Jerusalem has long been one of the thorniest issues of the Middle East conflict. While Israel regards Jerusalem as the undivided capital of the Jewish state, the Palestinians want to establish the capital of their promised future state in the east of the city.
Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas said that the move would undermine the peace process.
Which otherwise is moving by leaps and bounds.
âI do not believe this is helpful either to the peace process or to Israeli security,â Abbas told reporters. âIt will put obstacles in the way of peace.â
Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat told AFP that the move âhas the potential to destroy the entire peace processâ as it appeared that Israel was trying to impose its own solution on the status of Jerusalem. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has made no secret of his intention to cement control over parts of the occupied West Bank, especially on the outskirts of Jerusalem, in exchange for a voluntary withdrawal from Gaza.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/11/2005 00:00 ||
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The wall can go anywhere the Isreali courts will let it. The status of Jersalem is that is the Capitol city of Isreal. If the Paleos don't get it by now they should have let sleeping dogs lie back in the 1960's.
While the Paleos have been pissing in their beer and continuing a war and aggression against Isreal, Isreal has built a modern nation. What the hell have the Paleos built?
#2
Around a quarter of the Palestinian population of Jerusalem face being cut off from the rest of the holy city after Israelâs cabinet approved a new route for its controversial West Bank barrier on Sunday.
What's the matter? The parts of Jerusalem they already have not good enough for them?
The Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar, the highest Sunni authority in Egypt, said that the new political practice law, passed by Parliament last week contradict Shariah law. Muhammad Saied Tantawi said that the new law should have included a provision on Shariah law similar to that contained in the old law and that the new bill angered many top clerics in the country. âI totally reject the new law since Egypt is an Islamic and Arab country, and so do many members of the Council for Islamic Scholars who wanted to submit a memorandum to Parliament objecting the law,â said Tantawi. âBut Al-Azharâs opinion is only consultative, not legislative so I refused to send this memorandum in order not to get into problems with the government and Parliament,â he added.
A member of Parliamentâs religious affairs committee, Abdel Moaty Bayoumi, said the committee had not been given the law to review. He said that under the new law âwe may see parties that call for things that are incompatible with Shariah in their platforms.â According to the new legislation, no license is granted to parties formed on a religious basis, a move that does not give the Muslim Brotherhood a chance to be officially recognized. The new political law sparked several debates in Egypt.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/11/2005 00:00 ||
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Judge Judy could kick the crap out of this wanker.
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.
Four mosques in separate English cities have been damaged slightly by fires set deliberately since London was hit by terrorist bombings, police said Sunday. 
"If you bomb our cities," Osama bin Laden said in a recent videotape, "we will bomb yours."' It was clear Britain would be a target ever since British Prime Minister Tony Blair decided to join President Bush's "war on terror" and his invasion of Iraq. We had, as they say, been warned. The G-8 summit was obviously chosen, well in advance, as Attack Day. It's no use Blair telling us, "They will never succeed in destroying what we hold dear." They are not trying to destroy "what we hold dear." They are trying to get public opinion to force Blair to withdraw from Iraq, out of his alliance with the United States, out of his adherence to Bush's policies in the Middle East. The Spanish paid the price for their support for Bush -- and Spain's subsequent retreat from Iraq proved that the Madrid bombings achieved their objectives -- while the Australians were made to suffer in Bali.
Three members of the Irish Republican Army convicted of training leftist rebels in Colombia may be hiding in Cuba, said an Interpol official in Colombia. 
The U.S. says North Korea is a sovereign state, and does not intend to attack it, the US Secretary of State said in Beijing this Sunday. According to Condoleezza Rice, Assistant U.S. Secretary of State Christopher Hill confirmed this position at talks with North Korea's Deputy Foreign Minister Kim Gye Gwan on Saturday. 
Thousands of people protesting at the site of the planned new headquarters for the U.S. military in South Korea clashed Sunday with police. Some 7,000 demonstrators threw steel pipes and stones at about 10,000 police guarding Camp Humphreys in Pyongtaek, about 50 miles south of Seoul. Some demonstrators were seen bleeding but the number of injured wasn't immediately known. "The government made an agreement with the United States without consensus from the residents," said one protester, Oh Jeong-sun, 56. The U.S. military in South Korea is now headquartered at Yongsan Garrison in Seoul, but is set to move its entire command to Pyongtaek by 2008 as part of plans to consolidate bases and reduce the number of U.S. troops.
Germany's opposition aims to oust Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder with a program to boost Europe's largest economy and "reinvigorate" relations with the United States, according to a draft obtained Sunday by The Associated Press. The program, to be formally endorsed Monday by the Christian Democratic Union and its Bavarian sister party, includes an increase in sales tax and looser rules for companies to hire and fire staff. It also rules out Turkish membership in the European Union.
July 11, 2005: Over the weekend, 22 soldiers and policemen were killed by groups of Taliban gunmen. Three Taliban were reported killed as well. Ten captured border guards were beheaded in the south. Since the cops and border guards were recruited from local tribes, this will, as it has in the past, trigger a revenge campaign by the victim's kin, against the Taliban. Eventually, there will be a bunch of dead Taliban, and protests from the Taliban that their brethren were killed in some barbaric way or another. This reminds us that the Taliban violence in the south is actually a tribal civil war, between factions that want to bring back hard core Islamic rule for the region, and eventually the entire country. The majority of the tribes, and tribesmen, want a less conservative lifestyle, and have to fight to the death with the hard core Taliban to settle the issue. 
A prominent Somali peace activist has been shot dead by unknown gunmen at his home in the capital, Mogadishu. Through his Centre for Research and Dialogue, 
Sudan's new presidency yesterday lifted the state of emergency in Sudan, except in the conflict-torn regions of Darfur and the east, a statement from the presidential palace said. One day after former southern rebel leader John Garang was sworn in as first vice president to head a new government as President Omar Hassan Bashir's deputy, emergency law giving authorities wide powers to detain without charge and to crack down on opposition forces was cancelled. The statement said Bashir had lifted the state of emergency, in force in Sudan since 1999, except in five states. They are the three states of Darfur and two states bordering Eritrea in the east, where a low intensity conflict escalated in recent months.
The Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar, the highest Sunni authority in Egypt, said that the new political practice law, passed by Parliament last week contradict Shariah law. Muhammad Saied Tantawi said that the new law should have included a provision on Shariah law similar to that contained in the old law and that the new bill angered many top clerics in the country. âI totally reject the new law since Egypt is an Islamic and Arab country, and so do many members of the Council for Islamic Scholars who wanted to submit a memorandum to Parliament objecting the law,â said Tantawi. âBut Al-Azharâs opinion is only consultative, not legislative so I refused to send this memorandum in order not to get into problems with the government and Parliament,â he added. 
