[Khaama (Afghanistan)] A Saudi prince has been tossed in the clink Drop the heater, Studs, or you're hist'try! by police in United States on charges of sexual assault, it has been reported.
The 28-year-old Majed Abdulaziz Al Saud was arrested on Wednesday after he tried to force a worker at a Beverly Hills estate to perform oral sex.
Los Angeles police Officer Drake Madison quoted by local media said Al Saud was arrested on Wednesday afternoon but was released on a $300,000 bond the next day.
The Los Angeles Times and KCBS-TV reported that the prince did not have diplomatic immunity.
Numerous people were interviewed by police after a bleeding woman was seen by a neighbour screaming for help as she tried to scale the huge estate's surrounding wall.
The neighbour told the Times that the $37m property, in one of the most exclusive enclaves in the world, has been rented for weeks at a time by foreign nationals over the past year.
The Saudi officials have not commented regarding the incident so far as the prince is expected to be in court on 19 October.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/26/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
"Tossed in the Clink" > clearly must mean "Hoosegow".
"Undercover" is an understatement for the F-22A Raptor.
A point clearly illustrated by pilots of the 94th Fighter Squadron, who delivered an aerial sucker punch to the seasoned Red Force opponents during the F-22A's debut at Red Flag here Feb. 3 -16.
Among the Blue Force participants were foreign pilots from the Royal Air Force of England and Royal Australian Air Force, flying the GR-4 and F-111C respectively. In addition, the F-22s flew with the B-2 Spirit and F-117 Nighthawk, the aircraft that pioneered stealth.
Though better known for its stealth capability, the F-22 packs a list of surprises cherished by Raptor pilots and coveted by others. In addition to radar evasion, this fifth-generation fighter features unmatched maneuverability, surprising power (supercruise) and integrated avionics or sensor fusion (multiple displays combined into one). Even aircraft maintainers said they enjoy superior logistics such as computerized technical orders, reduced trouble shooting and faster remove-and-replace components, such as engine changes. These Raptor advantages were demonstrated and sharpened at Red Flag.
Fourteen Raptors and 197 people were present from the 94th FS. The F-22's debut at the Red Flag exercise is a significant milestone for the jet, according to Lt. Col. Dirk Smith, 94th FS commander.
The exercise is an advanced, realistic combat training exercise designed for fighter pilots, and conducted over the vast Nellis Range Complex, which measures 60 by 100 nautical miles. The training involves air-to-air engagements as well as engagement with ground targets, such as mock airfields, convoys, and other ground defensive positions.
Invisibility - even with eyes on
When the Raptor finds itself in a dogfight, it is no longer beyond visual range, but the advantage of stealth isn't diminished. It maintains "high ground" even at close range.
"I can't see the [expletive deleted] thing," said RAAF Squadron Leader Stephen Chappell, exchange F-15 pilot in the 65th Aggressor Squadron. "It won't let me put a weapons system on it, even when I can see it visually through the canopy. [Flying against the F-22] annoys the hell out of me."
Lt. Col. Larry Bruce, 65th AS commander, admits flying against the Raptor is a very frustrating experience. Reluctantly, he admitted "it's humbling to fly against the F-22," - humbling, not only because of its stealth, but also its unmatched maneuverability and power.
Turn and burn
Thrust vectoring, internal weapons mounting and increased power all contribute to the Raptor's maneuvering advantage. From the cockpit of the F-22, Capt. Brian Budde, 94th FS pilot, explained the F-22 is able to sustain more than nine Gs for much longer than the F-15, without running out of airspeed. From the pilot's perspective, the F-22 "is more power than you know what to do with," said Captain Budde. So much power, in fact, the F-22 enjoys capabilities alien to legacy fighters.
This boost of thrust enables the Raptor to take off with a full load of weapons and fuel. Furthermore, mach speeds are attainable without afterburners (supercruise) and coincidently, the F-22 features better fuel efficiency than legacy fighters. This increased fuel efficiency raises eyebrows considering the F-22 boasts 20,000 more pounds of thrust than the F-15 Eagle it's replacing.
Sensor Fusion: 'One display vs. many'
"The F-22 is an air-to-air machine compared to the legacy fighters [used today],"said Captain Budde.
One of the Raptor's prized novelties is sensor fusion, or integrated avionics. Tech. Sgt. Al Perkins, 1st Aircraft Maintenance Squadron F-22 specialist, explained sensor fusion, or integrated avionics, as a computerized gathering of all information from each avionics system and consolidating them on one display for the convenience of the pilot.
"[The F-15 pilot] has to gather his own data from different displays in the cockpit and draw his own conclusions about his situation, and then take action," said Sergeant Perkins. "But in the F-22, all the information is coordinated and available from a single source." He explained this capability frees the pilot from the tedious task of calculating and enables faster decisions making in the air.
Not surprisingly, the Air Force is convinced that the F-22's integrated avionics system is one of the key elements that will give the F-22 the tactical advantage against threats of the future.
Superior Logistics: A maintainer's friend
"I've been to Red Flag before as an F-15 crew chief," said Senior Airman Ryan Thomas, 94th Aircraft Maintenance Unit F-22 crew chief, "and it's fast-paced and full of long hours - 12 plus hours every day."
Not this time. For maintenance Airmen at Red Flag this year, shifts have eased back to less than nine hours a day. The reason: F-22 airframes are more "friendly."
"This jet was designed to be maintenance friendly," he said. Systems, like hydraulic lines, are more accessible and the airframe is brand new, which makes it less susceptible to problems associated with the 25-year old F-15s. Not only this, but the F-22 enables "the fastest engine change I've ever seen," added Airman Thomas. "We change this engine in less than two hours, compared to six-hour engine change on the F-15." Engine changes, however, were none existent for Airmen in the 94th AMU - the Raptors required none.
But perhaps the most obvious maintenance advantage utilized daily by crew chiefs is the Portable Maintenance Aide. This computer device keeps all the aircraft forms - electronically. The Raptor is a paper free airplane; they each have their own hard drive that stores computer-identified malfunctions and gives the crew chief an exact explanation of the problem.
When the 94th FS flew F-15s at past Red Flags, maintenance crews faced longer hours because their jets broke so often, said Tech. Sgt. John Ferrara, 94th AMU avionics specialist. Plus, every broken jet required hours of trouble shooting. The F-22 is different.
"This jet is diagnosing itself before it's breaking," said Sergeant Ferrara. "We're going right to the fix every time." Ironically, some maintainers feel the F-22 robs them of a challenge.
"This thing takes the fun out of being a crew chief," said Staff Sgt. Jason Kraemer, 94th AMU crew chief. "You're not even dirty when you go home."
At Red Flag, and at war, this advantage means a faster maintenance turnaround, and eventually faster engagement, said Airman Thomas.
The Challenge - 'This ain't your daddy's Red Flag anymore'
Despite the F-22's "unfair advantage," flying against the Red Force aggressors of the 414th Combat Training Squadron is no walk in the park, according to Colonel Smith. Aggressor pilots are made up of F-16 and F-15 pilots, specially trained to replicate tactics and techniques of potential adversaries said Maj. Bill Woolf, 57th Adversary Tactics Group assistant director of operations. In addition, he said the Red Flag is involved in a major reformation, designed to duplicate the world's most lethal threats.
"These scenarios are not made to be easy," said Colonel Smith. "The [Red Force] pilots are well trained and good at their job."
Also, Red Forces aren't limited to aggressor pilots. There is no shortage of ground threats at Red Flag. These include electronically simulated surface-to-air missiles, anti-aircraft artillery, communications jamming, Global Positioning System jamming and more said Major Woolf.
We're training now against emerging threats," said Major Woolf. "We need to understand what tactics are real-world threats, and duplicate them [for the Blue Forces]."
In fact, the Red Flag exercise is now so intense one 414th CTS critique quotes a squadron commander saying "This ain't your daddy's Red Flag anymore."
Thus it is understood the people of the Blue Forces, like those in the 94th, are pushed to the limit, working 12-hour days and fighting two "wars" in a 24-hour period. Colonel Smith added that humans still operate the F-22 - and the human mind is fallible.
The goal, he said, is sharpening the Air Force - and that involves grinding away imperfections. Is the exercise difficult for the F-22 pilots? "Yes," said Colonel Smith. "You bet it is. But [Peyton] Manning didn't make it to the Super Bowl by practicing against a scrub team."
Click link to see some cool pictures of the F-22 being right.
And some other links going into the details about why the F-22 is right.
As if they suddenly came to an epiphany, the United States Air Force brass is now admitting what many of us have been screaming about for so long. We didn't build nearly enough F-22s, and the F-35 will never be able to cannot simply pick up the slack. So why aren't those who pushed so hard to cancel the F-22 program held accountable?
By the mid 2000s, the F-22 was finally entering the fray as the world's first true stealth fighter, offering a quantum leap in capability and performance when compared with anything else on the battlefield. It was a thoroughbred weapon system meant to shape the battlefield by vanquishing anything in the skies and neutering enemy air defenses, so that less capable combat aircraft could survive over the battle space. It was a high-end door kicker, the ultimate "anti-access" fighter.
At the same time that the Raptor was coming online and proving itself, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, of both the Bush and Obama Administrations, was calling for the F-22's demise. This was said to be due to the aircraft cost and use as "only" an air-to-air, destruction of enemy air defense, and deep strike platform.
Gates's push for the Raptor's demise came at the same time as the cost of examples of the jet were rapidly dropping. For the last batch of 60 of the super-fighters, the unit cost per jet was $137 million, which is pretty close to the cost of an "affordable" F-35A today -- at a time when a similar number of F-35s have been built as F-22s, about 165 compared to the F-22's 187.
Costs were slated to have continued to drop if another lot of about 53 jets were built to meet the Air Force's stated minimum fleet size requirement of 243 airframes. But it never happened.
Instead the F-22 was cast off and all of the USAF's fighter chips were put into the very much unproven F-35 bucket. Gates justified chopping the F-22 as he wanted aircraft to "fight the wars we are in today, and the scenarios we are most likely to face in the years ahead." Considering air superiority and destruction of enemy air defenses is an absolute must for any conflict (aside for ones with totally permissible airspace), this was a very near-sighted evaluation, and as it turns out, prediction of the future.
Gates further rationalized his decision:
To sustain U.S. air superiority, I am committed to building a fifth generation tactical fighter capability that can be produced in quantity at sustainable cost. Therefore I will recommend increasing the buy of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.
A misleading statement if there ever was one, as it's impossible to build something in quantity at a sustainable cost when you're not willing to build it in great enough numbers so that a sustainable cost is achievable. It's a bit of a chicken-and-egg scenario, but at some point, the costs eventually balance out.
For the F-22, that point was rapidly approaching.
The F-22 was by many accounts on the verge of a cost breakthrough that would have sent its unit cost plunging well below the $100 million line. Gates later said:
We have fulfilled the program. It's not like we're killing the F-22. We will have 187 of them... The military advice that I got was that there is no military requirement for numbers of F-22 beyond 187.
Considering that the minimum the Air Force said they could operate with was 243, this statement seems less than true. And that number was last ditch compromise, the real bottom-line fleet size the USAF required of the F-22 was around 339 jets, which itself was dropped drastically from the original number of around 750 jets originally envisioned. At 339 examples it was hoped that the F-15C/D force could have been retired.
Yet Gates was not alone in the push to cancel the F-22. The Bush administration was guilty of it too, although they were able to punt the final decision to the Obama administration, who demanded it be cancelled with a sharp veto threat.
Key Congressional figures like Senator John McCain also wanted the Raptor line shutdown. Their justifications ranged from the program's expense, which was largely sunk costs for research and development over the aircraft's 30-year gestation period, to statements proclaiming that China would not unveil a stealth fighter until late in the next decade, with no chance of it being operational until the mid to late 2020s. Today, China has two stealth fighters flying, the first one, the J-20, getting airborne well before the last F-22 even left the production floor. The timing of the J-20's first flight also occurred while Secretary Gates was in Beijing meeting with top-level government officials. The event was a well planned propaganda affair that aimed to make Gates look bad for underestimating Chinese technological capabilities.
For F-22 supporters it was an unwanted vindication.
Another common argument against the F-22 was that the idea of America meeting Russian, or any near-peer state fighter aircraft, head-on in battle was a relic of the Cold War, and had no place in 21st century. Because of this, less potent, multi-role platforms were more of a necessity. Fast forward a half decade, and that statement is far from accurate. In fact, the F-22 just made its first deployment to Europe as part of a security package to deter Russian aggression and to reassure our NATO allies. The F-22 has also been regarded as a force multiplier in the air war against ISIS, itself attacking many targets with great precision from the first night of air strikes in Syria on.
Back in the Gates years, naysayers, like embattled Air Force Chief of Staff General Michael Mosley and Secretary of the Air Force Michael Wayne, both supporters of the F-22, were gotten rid of. Mosley has since reiterated his frustration with the F-22 decision, stating that the shutdown of the F-22 program "will prove to be one of the most strategically dislocated decisions made over the last 20 to 25 years."
He also said that follow-on batches of F-22s were quoted as costing well below $90 million per copy fly-away cost, which is about 25 percent less than the cost of an F-35A today.
Nowadays it seems that everyone laments the premature F-22 line shutdown, from late-to-the-scene defense commentators to those at the very top of the USAF, including Air Combat Command chief Herbert "Hawk" Carlisle, whoe was quoted in National Defense Magazine as saying:
"We don't have enough F-22s, that's a fact of life. We didn't buy enough; we don't have enough." However, the Air Force is going to make do with the Raptors it does have, Carlisle said. "You're going to need the Raptors" for a high-end fight, he said. "So you're still going to have to do that and we're going to do it with the 180 or so F-22s we have."
Because only 187 F-22s were built, with only about 125 of the jets setup for assignment to combat units at any given time, even fullfilling small detachments of F-22s to the Pacific, Middle East and European theater may be troublesome. As such, the F-15C/D force, which less than a decade ago was suffering from mid-air breakups resulting in a year-long grounding, has had to stay online to supplement the relatively tiny F-22 force.
At the time of the F-15C/D fleet's grounding, the talk was that the Eagles needed either deep and costly refurbishment or replacement. Now these jets are slated to serve for decades to come in an attempt to fill the gap left by a curtailed F-22 production run. In order to do so, the "Golden Eagle" fleet of around 200 aircraft will require billions worth of upgrades, including both structural and major capability enhancements.
With all this in mind, if we built enough F-22s to eradicate the enemy's defenses, both in the air and on the ground, and improved the aircraft over time, perhaps even stretching it into an FB-22 with F-35 like avionics, would the USAF need an F-35A at all?
Instead, the force could be filled in by other high-end capabilities currently in the works, like a new long-range stealth bomber, stealthy standoff weapons and unmanned combat air vehicles. On the low-end side of the equation, plentiful, relatively cheap and proven platforms, like the F-16 and A-10, among others, could be available once air dominance has been achieved, or for lower-end conflicts that do not require the F-22's high-end anti-access capabilities.
What makes things worse is that the floundering F-35 program has sucked funds for much needed upgrades on existing systems, including the F-22. In fact the F-22 lacks relatively standard technologies found on all of America's fighter fleet, thus needlessly handicapping America's "tip of the spear" fighter.
So what exactly happened here? If we clearly do not have enough F-22s today and it seemed nobody really thought we had enough at the time of its cancellation, aside from those with the power to kill the program, and the jet was passed over for the F-35, an aircraft that the USAF itself admits cannot fill the high-end role like the F-22, somewhere along the line disinformation was passed along to decision makers, or worse. So why don't we pull those key decision makers in and have them explain exactly how they understood the situation at the time, what information and intelligence were they going off of, and who gave them that information and when?
The F-35 is said to be the biggest weapons program of all time, literally a $1.5 trillion income proposition over its lifetime. As such, it has a tremendous amount of special interest, Congressional and corporate "momentum" behind it. During the period of the F-22's cancellation, the F-35's problems were just becoming so serious that they could no longer be denied. Any competition threatened its existence, including the F-22, Lockheed's own product. For the USAF, why dive into a pit of unknowns and cost and timeline overruns when you already had the best fighter in the world in production?
Yet given what we know now now publicly, the limitations of the F-35, especially in the air-to-air realm, could have made the decision to end the F-22 production much tougher. Especially as claims about the jet's maneuverability were far more exaggerated compared to reality. Which is something even the Air Force has admitted to now.
Since there appears to be little will in Washington to correct the error in judgement that ended the F-22 line by putting an improved F-22 back into production, we need to learn from this very expensive mistake. This is especially relevant considering nearly $30 billion of the F-22's nearly $70 billion program cost was spent to just develop the fighter. By better understanding what they knew and when they knew it, and above all else, where the information for their conclusions came from, we can at least try to avoid such procurement and strategy blunders in the future. I wonder how many Raptors we could have bought with the money we pi$$ed away on F-35 vaporware.
#1
Go back in time and remember the trials and tribulations of the F-22. Do you r ember the times it tried to suffocate the pilot? Cost over-runs, late. Sound familiar? Let's duplicate our mistake again and cancel the F/A-35 and maintain our A-10 fleet in top notch condition, cause the The Raptor don't play that CAS game. Link below might sound familiar.
#3
Considering the ass kicking the Raptors gave everyone in the recent Red Flag exercise and the fuckup the F-35 is, the fact the program was cancelled is bordering on treason.
#6
Nobody should expect a sport car to haul a trailer out of the mud anymore than a pickup can take a hairpin at 60.
What is ridiculous is we had a sport car which needed new air bags and hydraulics for the hatch, so we put it on blocks and bought a racer which makes Wimpy make a good sale.
"Housekeeping" Note: Fred Pruitt has a new novel available on Smashwords, his second. Since he has not announced it generally to anyone, I will. Fred didn't ask me to do this.
The Jon Ritzheimer Affair is a complete mess. Jon Ritzheimer of Arizona, of all places, decided to start trouble for US Senator Debbie Stabenow (Kommie-MI) because of her support of the Iran Nukular bill. Not surprisingly, the nexus between Ritzheimer and just another Constitution smashing commie senator is unclear. What is clear is that Ritzheimer is a member of Oathkeepers who is in the process of being booted out because of his threat to go to Michigan to arrest Stabenow. Oathkeepers characterized Ritzheimer's threat as a kidnapping. Remember that when you pay your Oathkeepers dues. The punchline is that several Michigan militia groups have stated their intention to protect Stabenow from Ritzheimer.
Fellas, listen to me: Stabenow has the entirety of the massively bloated federal security establishment on her side, locked and loaded and aching to put two into you on the orders of people such as Stabenow, a woman who would think nothing of supporting laws intended to remove your money and your life because of your political views. In fact, you seem to have forgotten the Michigan Hutaree Militias, members of which were arrested because of overrigid federal conspiracy laws, and all charges of which were dismissed except for federal firearms laws violations. I may be wrong, but didn't Stabenow not say so much as a syllable in your defense?
What is even more maddening than the Michigan militias circling the wagons around a Marxist politician, is Oathkeepers continuing to believe this is something other than an existential struggle for freedom. Oathkeepers have a long history of antagonizing militias in the US for their supposed lack of professionalism, so it is hard to believe they would be on the same side. Well, in this mess, they certainly deserve to be together. Militias must like it rough.
Even more maddening still is the absolute silence of conservatives over this incident. Not one single word or article I have seen addresses anything about this incident. It is like the Bundy Ranch Incident, when people on the right profess their undying support until Cliven Bundy shoots his mouth off in a gotcha interview. Then they scatter like cockroaches.
No one to date has even considered that possibility that people are being driven batty because of the shameful way foreign affairs, not to mention domestic affairs have been handled in Washington DC. Why not, conservative writers and bloggers, for once in your pampered, perfumed life, stick up for something because it is the right thing to do, please, for the love of all that's holy!
Loads.
Rantburg's summary for arms and ammunition:
Prices for pistol ammunition were steady while rifle ammunition prices were mostly steady.
Prices for used pistols and prices for used rifles were mixed.
Once again the AR-10 Pattern Rifle for the third consecutive time, has tested a new low average price at $829.
New Lows:
None
Pistol Ammunition
.45 Caliber, 230 grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (2 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Quality Made Cartridges, Store Brand, RNL, Reloads, .25 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: Quality Made Cartridges, Store Brand, RNL, Reloads, .25 per round (From Last week: Unchanged (4 Weeks))
.40 Caliber Smith & Wesson, 180 grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (3 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Mass Ammo, Sasquatch, FMJ, Reloads, .22 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: Ammo Mart, Store Brand, RNFP, Reloads, .21 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (4 Weeks))
9mm Parabellum, 115 grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (5 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Ammunition Supply Company, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Cased, .17 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: Homeland Munitions, Store Brand, FMJ, Reloads, .16 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (4 Weeks))
.357 Magnum, 158 grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (2Q, 2015)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: LAX Ammunition, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel cased, .28 per round
Cheapest Bulk: 1,000 rounds: Surplus Ammo, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel cased, .27 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (7 Weeks))
Rifle Ammunition
.223 Caliber/5.56mm 55 grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (3Q, 2015)
Cheapest, 20 rounds: Target Sports USA, Wolf Polyformance, Steel cased, FMJ, .24 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 1,000 rounds: Cheaper Than Dirt!, Wolf Polyformance, steel cased, .22 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (7 Weeks))
.308 NATO 150 grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (3Q, 2015)
Cheapest, 20 rounds: Ammunition Supply Company, Tulammo, steel cased, FMJ, .40 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: Cheaper Than Dirt!, Tulammo, Steel Cased, FMJ, .37 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (8 Weeks))
7.62x39 AK 123 Grain, From Last Week: -.01 Each After Unchanged (4 Weeks)
Cheapest, 20 rounds: Ammunition Depot, Wolf WPA, steel case, FMJ, .22 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: SG Ammo, Wolf WPA, steel case, .23 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (1Q 2015))
.22 LR 40 Grain, From Last Week: -.01 Each
Cheapest, 20 rounds (40 Box Limit): Glenn's Army Navy Store, CCI Blazer, RNL .07 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: Munire USA, CCI Raptor, RNL, .08 per round (From Last Week: +.02)
Guns for Private Sale
Rifles
.223/5.56mm (AR Pattern Semiautomatic) Average Price: $515 Last Week Avg: $515 (=) ($616 (24 Weeks), $486 (9 Weeks))
California (271, 278): Smith & Wesson M&P 15 Sport: $500 ($650 (34 Weeks), $400 (3 Weeks))
Texas (328, 322): Palmetto State Armory: $500 ($700 (29 Weeks), $350 (24 Weeks))
Pennsylvania (177, 178): Smith & Wesson M&P 15 Sport: $450 ($700 (23 Weeks), $300 (11 Weeks))
Virginia (205, 204): Palmetto State Armory: $625 ($750 (29 Weeks), $500 (33 Weeks))
Florida (392, 407): Professional Ordnance Carbon-15: $500 ($650 (14 Weeks), $450 (48 Weeks))
.40 caliber S&W (Glock or other semiautomatic) Average Price: $348 Last Week Avg: $348(=) ($368 (20 Weeks), $300 (46 Weeks))
California (95, 101): Smith & Wesson SW40VE: $350 ($425 (5 Weeks)), $250 (37 Weeks))
Texas (113, 113): Smith & Wesson SW40VE: $300 ($425 (41 Weeks), $275 (23 Weeks))
Pennsylvania (83, 81): Smith & Wesson SD40VE: $340 ($350 (12 Weeks), $250 (32 Weeks))
Virginia (82, 88): Glock 23: $400 ($450 (20 Weeks), $275 (36 Weeks))
Florida (173, 171): Ruger P94: $350 ($400 (30 Weeks), $200 (5 Weeks))
Used Gun of the Week: (Nevada) Izmash M91/30 Rifle Chambered in 7.62x54r
Chris Covert writes for Rantburg.com. He can be reached at grurkka@gmail.com and on Twitter
#1
It's pretty obvious to alot of people that Jon Ritzheimer is nothing more than a government run false flag operation. They were hoping to draw people out using him and instead it's so obvious they are getting the opposite reaction.
#3
It's pretty obvious to alot of people that Jon Ritzheimer is nothing more than a government run false flag operation. They were hoping to draw people out using him and instead it's so obvious they are getting the opposite reaction.
They must be laughing their asses off that militias decided to defend Stabenow.
#4
They may be laughing, maybe not. It doesn't advance their agenda though to have the militias offer to guard her. It doesn't make them look bad. We keep seeing these people pop up to try and cause an incident, I suspect due to the fact they had to back down at the Bundy Ranch. They won't be happy again til they get another Waco or Ruby Ridge to put the 'little militia people' in their place.
[NYTIMES] Burkina Faso ...The country in west Africa that they put where Upper Volta used to be. Its capital is Oogadooga, or something like that. Its president is currently Blaise Compaoré, who took office in 1987 and will leave office feet first, one way or the other... 's transitional president on Friday signed a decree to disband the presidential guard that staged a coup more than a week ago.
Interim President Michel Kafando also fired the commander of the presidential guard, Col. Boureima Kere, and the country's security minister, Col. Sidi Pare, according to the decree that was read on national television.
Burkina Faso's armed forces said in a communique that they have started disarming the presidential guard and there is an inventory of their weapons.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/26/2015 00:00 ||
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Air Force Global Strike Command has begun the conversion of a portion of the B-52H bomber fleet from a nuclear to a conventional only capability aircraft under the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START).
The 17 goals and 169 targets aim to end poverty, ensure healthy lives, promote education and combat climate change, at a cost of between $3.5 and $5 trillion per year until 2030.
[AlAhram] World leaders on Friday pledged to end extreme poverty in 15 years, launching an ambitious UN development agenda that sets priorities for trillions of dollars in spending.
Critics say the goals lack precise definition and point to a history of grand pledges at the UN -- without necessarily following through on them..
The 17 goals and 169 targets aim to end poverty, ensure healthy lives, promote education and combat climate change, at a cost of between $3.5 and $5 trillion per year until 2030.
The new UN agenda will replace the millennium development goals (MDGs) that expire this year, but its objectives are much more ambitious in scope.
UN Secretary-General the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon described the plan as a "to-do list for people and planet" that laid out a "universal, integrated and transformative vision for a better world."
Contrary to the MDGs, the new global goals apply to both developing and developed countries and negotiations were opened up to governments and civil society, not only to UN experts.
Billions of dollars in development aid will be redirected to meet the targets but the United Nations ...a formerly good idea gone bad... also wants to tap into local sources of financing through improved revenue collection.
The global goals call for improved transparency in oil-producing countries to clamp down on corruption and ensure that revenues from natural resources are used to improve the lives of citizens.
International financial institutions such as the African Development Bank and the World Bank will step up with financing support for major infrastructure projects that would have a knock-on effect in combating poverty.
Much attention has focused on ending extreme poverty for 836 million people still struggling on the margins of survival, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia.
The goals are non-binding, but the three-day summit that opened Friday at UN headquarters will allow leaders to publicly commit to achieving them.
Launched in 2012, negotiations on the new agenda sought to build on the success of the MDGs, which have helped reduce poverty rates while setting education and health targets, in particular for infant mortality.
But the new goals have come under criticism for being ill-defined in some instances and far too broad in scope, undermining prospects for achieving measurable success.
The United Nations is planning to roll out 300 indicators to measure progress by countries towards achieving the new goals and provide data on how governments are working to improve the lives of their citizens.
"The key missing ingredient is political will," said Jamie Drummond, executive director for global strategy at the ONE campaign. "We have a great history of promise-making at the UN, but the question is whether the promise is ever kept."
#2
Get rid of all the socialist/communist countries in favor of capitalism and you'll end poverty. There is no other way. No other system creates wealth, they all suck it up.
#4
1. You'll never end poverty. Personality archetypes are what they are. Some people won't work unless it's the only way to prevent starvation. Some people won't work EVEN IF it's the only way to prevent starvation. Simply giving money to these types will insure that they do not work. They will therefore be unproductive and not generate the money needed to have a society that will give money in the first place.
2. Define poverty as a lowest percentage and poverty will always exist unless everybody is made the same by "hatchet, axe, and saw", to quote Peart. Poverty must be defined by a specific number, not by how people are doing relative to the general population. This leads to having a dishonest notion of what "poor" means. It also pushes people to engage in notions of relative deprivation, instead of being honest about their level of material comfort.
3, Every society which has ever attempted to end poverty by massive government intervention has been a total failure. Every society which tries to end poverty by massive government intervention ends up being a brutal crusher of inalienable rights and liberties. There have been no exceptions to this, because that impulse is flawed, evil, and cannot be made to work, no matter who is in charge.
Posted by: no mo uro ||
09/26/2015 5:10 Comments ||
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#5
"Daar sal altyd arm mense in die land wees."
[There shall always be poor people in the land.]
Written a while back as I recall, and yet to be disproved. The facts will never stop lads like Ki-moon however. Poverty is an enterprise and a very profitable one at that.
#7
They have also pledged to power our electric flying cars on unicorn farts and to train monkey butlers to serve us margaritas while we enjoy a minimum wage of $10,000/hr.
Then they started ranting about alien bases on the moon and CIA plots to raise the aliens' property taxes. And then it got weird.
A bureaucrat's delight! We'll be eating shrimp cocktail for decades. Call a meeting, Smedley!
Interested in actual solutions? A rare gem amongst TED Talks (they tend towards hipster douchery) is this one by Niall Ferguson on the Six Killer Apps of Prosperity which explains why the West is doing so well. (no doubt you have noticed flocks of refugee/migrants streaming in a particular direction)
"He suggests half a dozen big ideas from Western culture — call them the 6 killer apps — that promote wealth, stability and innovation."
The unmentioned problem is that your Operating System (AKA your culture/society) may need an upgrade to be capable of running these apps.
#10
About ten years ago I went to Bangalore, India. I saw people living in corrugated metal shacks, that were next to a stream that was an open sewer. To those people, "poor" people in America are incredibly wealthy. Yet, liberals decry poverty in America.
As no mor uro pointed out, unless everyone has exactly the same wealth, there will always be poverty.
Posted by: Barbara ||
09/26/2015 20:45 Comments ||
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#12
Ted Talks...
I watched part of a Ted Talk the other day where some professor was suggestion we can end poverty by simply printing more money and giving it to the poor..
#13
Here is a solution to poverty: compute the median wealth of the world. For everyone who has more than that, seize the amount of excess and give it to everyone who has less than the median. That way, everyone will have exactly the same. This will end poverty, since everyone will be identically rich (or poor, depending on your point of view).
I didn't say that it was a GOOD plan.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
09/26/2015 23:14 Comments ||
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NASA will detail a major science finding from the agency's ongoing exploration of Mars during a news briefing at 11:30 a.m. EDT on Monday, Sept. 28 at the James Webb Auditorium at NASA Headquarters in Washington. The event will be broadcast live on NASA Television and the agency's website.
A brief question-and-answer session will take place during the event with reporters on site and by phone. Members of the public also can ask questions during the briefing using #AskNASA.
For NASA TV downlink information, schedules and to view the news briefing, visit:
#1
we are announcing that we will be announcing...
better be good eg - we found alien life
and not just exciting for nasa but boring for most people -- eg -- we discovered why our rover stopped working it was stuck on a rock but now it is working again
The U.S. Air Force's KC-46A refueling tanker made by Boeing Co. on Friday made its first flight in a historic milestone for the program that came after repeated delays.
"History in the making," Boeing employee Jerry Pham tweeted while sharing a picture showing the aircraft taking off near Seattle. "The KC-46 Pegasus, the future of aerial refueling, has made its first flight."
Boeing, the world's largest aerospace company, earlier this summer said the first test flight of the new refueling tanker, known as Pegasus and based on the 767 twin-engine commercial airliner, would be delayed until late September or early October. The event was previously scheduled for the spring.
The plane's fuel system is being fixed after workers mistakenly loaded a mislabeled chemical WTF? into it, among other problems -- work that's expected to cost more than $800 million, according to The Oklahoman, the largest daily newspaper in Oklahoma, one of the first three states where the airplane will be based.
#2
...How nice. The better part of twenty years to reproduce 50's technology and get it airborne, and then replace the ONE crew member who's indispensible to it with a glitchy, high-tech toy whose failure makes the entire airplane no more than a quarter-billion dollar static display.
I weep for My Beloved Service.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
09/26/2015 5:59 Comments ||
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#3
I just got word yesterday from a civilian employee at Fort Benning that large force structure cuts are looming for the Infantry.
Mike, is that you on the other end of the crying bench ?
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon
