EFL
President Bush and German Chancellor Angela Merkel stood together Friday in urging U.N. intervention if Iran does not retreat from a resumption of its nuclear program. The world needs to "send a common message to Iran that their behavior ... is unacceptable," Bush said. Was TGA there?
Merkel used similar words, and she also condemned statements by Iran's leader challenging Israel's right to exist. "We will not be intimidated by a country such as Iran," she said.
Bush assailed what he called Iran's efforts "to clandestinely develop a nuclear weapon, or using the guise of a civilian nuclear weapon program to get the know-how to develop a nuclear weapon."
Going through the motions of Taking the matter to the Security Council, as Germany, France and Britain recommended on Thursday, is the logical next step, Bush said. "We want an end result to be acceptable, which will yield peace, which is that the Iranians not have a nuclear weapon in which to blackmail and-or threaten the world," Bush said.
Both Bush and Merkel said they discussed Iran at length. In two years of difficult negotiations between European nations and Iran, "Iran refused every offer we made," Merkel said.
"It's very important for non-transparent societies to not have the capacity to blackmail free societies," Bush asserted.
Merkel took power last November after an extremely close and protracted race with Schroeder. Bush jokingly likened that race, which took almost two months to resolve, to his own victory in 2000 over Democrat Al Gore, which was decided only after weeks of suspense by a Supreme Court decision. "We didn't exactly landslide our way into office," Bush said.
Schroeder's opposition to the U.S.-led war that deposed Iraqi President Saddam Hussein so damaged the German's relationship with Bush that the president refused at times to speak to Schroeder on the telephone. Merkel, by contrast, is more in tune with Bush's conservative politics. Merkel also was to meet with members of Congress and planned to attend a ceremony at the newly renovated headquarters of the German Marshall Fund of the United States. Considering the Socialists have most of the important cabinet positions, I figured Merkel would be impotent to make any significant actions. I'm still skeptical, but maybe, just maybe...
Ten Australian terror suspects have gone on hunger strike because they are not allowed to pray together, their relatives have said. The men, who were arrested in November and charged with belonging to a terrorist organisation, are being held separately in a maximum security jail. Victoria's state prisons chief said he was not prepared to "compromise public safety" to meet the men's' demands.
The 10 men were among 18 arrested during raids in Sydney and Melbourne. They are being held in Barwon Prison in Melbourne, south-eastern Australia. According to the AAP news agency, they are being held in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day. They want to be allowed to pray together on Friday afternoons, and on special religious occasions, according to the Melbourne Herald Sun.
One of those on hunger strike, Ahmed Raad, said the group would continue their protest indefinitely until their conditions were improved, according to his wife. She said her husband also complained he and the others were not getting enough food.
Corrections Victoria Commissioner Kelvin Anderson said his hand would not be forced by the prisoners' action. "Prison authorities have worked closely with Muslim leaders so alleged terrorism suspects have special food, prayer times and places to pray," he said in a statement. "Individuals charged with terrorism offences have been separated from each other for security reasons. No religious festival could ever have priority over our risk assessment arrangements."
But their lawyer, Rob Stary, said they just wanted to be treated in the same way as other prisoners in the jail. "I understand they don't present as any disciplinary problem or any management problem," he told ABC radio.
Nine of the men, including Abu Bakr, the alleged leader of terror cells in both Sydney and Melbourne, were arrested in Melbourne on 8 November. Another was arrested in Sydney and transferred to Melbourne. They are due to appear in a Melbourne court on 11 April for a pre-trial hearing.
A map due to be unveiled in Beijing and London next week may lend weight to a theory a Chinese admiral discovered America before Christopher Columbus.
The map, which shows North and South America, apparently states that it is a 1763 copy of another map made in 1418.
If true, it could imply Chinese mariners discovered and mapped America decades before Columbus' 1492 arrival.
THIS IS AN OUTRAGE!
The map, which is being dated to check it was made in 1763, faces a lot of scepticism from experts.
Chinese characters written beside the map say it was drawn by Mo Yi Tong and copied from a map made in the 16th year of the Emperor Yongle, or 1418.
It clearly shows Africa and Australia.
The British Isles, however, are not marked.
Controversial claim
The map was bought for about $500 from a Shanghai dealer in 2001 by a Chinese lawyer and collector, Liu Gang.
According to the Economist magazine, Mr Liu only became aware of the map's potential significance after he read a book by British author Gavin Menzies.
The book, 1421: The Year China discovered America, made the controversial claim that a Chinese admiral and eunuch, Zheng He, sailed around the world and discovered America on the way.
When you are not distracted, discovery of other things becomes easy
Zheng He, a Muslim mariner and explorer, is widely thought to have sailed around South East Asia and India, but the claim he visited America is hotly disputed.
The map is now being tested to check the age of its paper and ink, with the results due to be known in February.
Even if it does prove to have been drawn in 1763, sceptics will point out that we still only have the mapmaker's word that he copied if from a 1418 map, rather than from a more recent one.
But for some, this would still not make the Chinese admiral the first modern discoverer of the Americas, as they believe that Viking Leif Eriksson sailed to north America in the year 1000.
L'Anse Aux Meadows - Viking Settlement
Newfoundland c.1000
#3
Did Zheng He take a dump in what is now Manhatten ?
Clearly, this land is historically Chinese territory and must be returned to the motherland. No yankee splittist plots will prevent this.
Posted by: john ||
01/13/2006 19:36
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#4
good thing they waited to build our railroads until we crackers got here, huh?
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/13/2006 19:46
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#5
I've said this repeatedly; The Chinese have maps showing just about every square inch of this planet, save Antarctica, as some sort of prior possession of China. A whole beachful of sand will have to be pounded up the communist Mandarins' @ss before they will finally STFU.
#6
Zheng He probably peed on the Antartic ice as well.
That land is also part of the motherland...
Posted by: john ||
01/13/2006 20:01
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#7
Yep, surprise surprise Sgt Carter Clintonian Fascist = Commie Amerika is in reality ancient Chinese territory, ergo China is "justified" in planning the extermination of 200 Milyuhn Zilyuhn Amerikans, including but not limited to the bulk ifff not all of the US Left. Besides, ala the US Ninth America is still an illegal and unconstitutional nation, whose decision is still legal but just no action being taken to immediately enforce it, thus the USA as a matter of NinthLaw cannot arrest, prosecute, or jail anyone from rapist US Dem Presidents to Saddam Hussein, etal. to ......OWG Chicoms engaged in "managed" planned lawful holocaust opon their own unannexed territory formerly known as America.
#9
Notice the map displays Antartica and the passage above North America facts that wouldn't become known for centuries later. Hitler's Diaries Part Duex. Yeah, I can wash some old parchment and create something 'new' on it. Doesn't pass the huh test.
#10
So what? A great many peoples had contact with the Americas over the centuries. They are now saying that the ancient Egyptians got tobacco from South America for use in mummification. What matters is who settled the land successfully, and that would be those who followed on Columbus' discoveries en masse: the Spanish to what is now the Hispanic-American countries, and the English to North America. You snooze, you lose, as it is said.
What was the topic? Something about the Middle Kingdom?
Fuck China. Fuck Islam. History's dustbin will greet them the same as Arabism, Mullahism, Nazism, Communism, Socialism, Maoism, Moonbatism, Trazism, OWG, AlleyOopism, Paleoism, Revisionism, and all the rest. Real no-shit Individual Freedom, once tasted, is the greatest, most addicting, thing since sex.
Australia is continuing to develop its over-the-horizon Jindalee radar network that will now play a major role in the U.S. ballistic missile defense network.
The Jindalee system is already up and running and covering the northern approaches to the continent, the Melbourne Age newspaper reported Saturday. The paper said U.S. scientists who had studied it were impressed by its range and capability and had confirmed that it could detect a missile launch far away in Asia.
Officials from the giant U.S. aircraft and weapons manufacturer Lockheed Martin told The Age that the Australian system, officially known as the Jindalee Operational Radar Network (JORN), would be a highly effective part of the global missile defence shield. They said it significantly increased the time available for a defence system to intercept missiles.
The scientists said Jindalee would be part of an electronic network, including spy satellites and yet-to-be built air warfare destroyers, able to pick up the launch of a missile and, by tracking it, work out its target. The ship or a land-based anti-missile system would then shoot the missile down.
Standard radar sends a signal along line of sight until it bounces off a target ship or aircraft. However, JORN bounces signals off the ionosphere, which lies above the stratosphere and extends about 600 miles above Earth. The signal then bounces down onto its target. In that way it can apparently pick up even sophisticated stealth bombers, which are virtually invisible to standard radar, The Age said.
In July 2004 Australia agreed to cooperate with the United States on missile defence and in early 2005, Lt. Gen. Henry "Trey" Obering III, director of the U.S. Missile Defense Agency, visited Australia for talks with government and defence officials involved in the Jindalee project.
The Australian government of Prime Minister John Howard plans to spend tens of billions of dollars over the next decade to develop the sophisticated military technology needed to intercept missiles capable of carrying nuclear, chemical or biological warheads.
The Howard government plans to buy three air warfare destroyers, to be equipped with the Aegis missile control system.
Syria fratricide update from trusted source. London and MI6 have hold of General Ali Dubah of the Syrian Air Force, who defected last week to give up the secrets of the al-Assads and to pose a deal for the regime change in Damascus. Ali Dubah offers Rifaat al-Assad, exiled brother of the dead king Hafez al-Assad. London favors this choice because it would team a restored Alawite regime with elements of the Sunni urban elite and also with the Druze of Lebanon and Syria -- the one constituency that London trusts in the region.
Paris and Saudi elements (ancient Crown Prince Sultan and his lean, hungry son Bandar) have a sharply different approach to regime change. They want Khaddim, the Paris-defected vice president who now routinely goes on French TV and rats out the al-Assads as the Macbeths of Damascus. Khaddim wants the crown for himself, and this would ally him with the Moslem Brothers (slaughtered by Rifaat al-Assad in 1982) and with the tribals of the Iraq border region. Khaddim would also continue the insurgency in Iraq in order to maintain the loyalty of the black marketeering tribals. The Saudi elements like this solution because it would keep Iraq in turmoil. Any stable democratic Iraq threatens the Arabian plutocrats.
Doomed, penniless Egypt likes a Sunni urban elite, tribals, Moslem Brother solution as well, but not with the regicidal traitor Khaddim. Hosni Mubarak wants to maintain the clumsy Bahsar al-Assad in power in order to demonstrate that a weakling son can succeed a bullying father, establishing an Ummah precedent for Hosni passing his throne to half-pint Jamal Mubarak without civil war on the Nile.
Iran has gory appetitites too, to maintain the insurgency and keep Iraq bootless; but Iran also worries about losing its access to Damascus and the HizbAllah Shiites of southern Lebanon, so Iran must make a deal with whoever wins in the Damascus daggerfest.
London versus Paris. MI6 versus Deuxieme Bureau. Cairo versus Riyadh. Iran vs. London, Paris, Riyadh. Cairo vs. Cairo. And the United States is completely beside the point, a non respected player, a muscle boy with might and fight but no harem spy cunning. These are the days of the secret war for Syria. Expect daggers, bombs, demarches, betrayals, and a fight to the finish of the brothers al-Assads.
Syria, and Lebanon, aren't falling because of London or Paris. WhoTheFuck do they think they are? We're cleaning up the fucking disasters they left behind post-WW-II now (Can you say Sykes-Picot?) Why would we trust these morons to "carve up" anything? Arrogant assholes.
#3
The assumption is a palace coup will determine the next leader of Syria, who will be Assad MKII. I'd dispute this assumption, not least because in modern times, I can think of an example of it happening, except perhaps in the darker parts of Africa (and excluding pure military coups). My analysis would have either a conventional military coup with promises of more democracy that might be fulfilled or a slide into disorder and a slow lose of control especially in the Kurdish North East, which we hear almost nothing about, yet must be full of weapons and men with Pergamesh training from Iraqi Kurdistan. My guess is large parts are already a no-go area for the Syrian military and the Kurds are biding their time.
#5
phil_b, that would be "Peshmerga". I hope that you are not being deliberately cryptic. ;-)
TW, that may be some kind of inference that Hafez acquired similar status like Elvis...with a difference that no one is claimimg about the first seeing him alive. ;-)
Citing Pak sources, don't know how reliable they are:
Today, according to Pakistani military sources, U.S. aircraft attacked a compound known to be frequented by high level al Qaeda operatives. Pakistani officials tell ABC News that al Qaeda leader Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's top lieutenant, may have been among them. U.S. intelligence for the last few days indicated that Zawahiri might be in the location or about to arrive, although there is still no confirmation from U.S. officials that he was among the victims. The attack took place early this morning Pakistan time in a small village a few miles from the border with Afghanistan. Villagers described seeing an unmanned plane circling the area for the last few days and then bombs falling in the early morning darkness.
Eighteen people were killed, according to the villagers who said women and children were among the fatalities. But Pakistani officials tell ABC News that five of those killed were high-level al Qaeda figures, and their bodies are now undergoing forensic tests for positive identification.
"Paging Dr. Quincy, we've got some deaders here."
Officials say Zawahiri was known to have used safe houses in this area last winter and was believed to be in the area again this winter. Zawahiri, who appeared just last week in a new videotaped message, had increasingly been taking the operational reins of al Qaeda, and is thought by U.S. officials to be the current true mastermind of the terrorist group.
Pakistani officials tell ABC News that the bodies of the five suspected al Qaeda figures will be recovered at first light in Pakistan, but it will still take a day or two for any kind of positive identification. U.S. officials in Washington did not provide a comment.
In the previous paragraph, they were already testing the dearly departed. This para sez they haven't even picked up the bodies yet. Sigh.
U.S. officials told NBC News on Friday that American airstrikes in Pakistan overnight Thursday were aimed at the No. 2 man in the al-Qaida terror organization â Ayman al-Zawahri. One official said intelligence indicated a strong possibility that Zawahri was in the Pakistani village at the time of the airstrike, but there is no confirmation that he was killed.
Pakistani officials say U.S. aircraft, apparently CIA Predator drones, fired as many as 10 missiles at the residential compound. Reports indicate as many as 30 villagers, including some women and children, were killed. The attack came in the Bajur region of Northwest Pakistan, along the Afghanistan border.
While some remains were reportedly recovered from the site of the attack, there was still no confirmation Friday night that Zawahri was among the dead. An intelligence official told NBC that it does have a sample of Zawahri's DNA. âAnyone who tells you there is clarity on whether he [Zawahri] was killed ... do not take what they are saying as gospel,â a senior U.S. official said.
#5
US has been striking inside Pakistan for sometime now, that's how we got Haitham al-Yemeni and Abu Hamza Rabia. The info is sourced to the ISI, however, which means that we have to apply the salt shaker until we get further confirmation. Ayman's been dead before, so we wait till we have a body to be sure.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/13/2006 19:00
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#6
(OK, so it's become the standard gag...)
And not just the host body; the symbiote as well.
Posted by: Phil ||
01/13/2006 19:10
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#7
I'd actually prefer to see him in golden chains, behind GWB's chariot, or beneath Selma Hayak's feet, like a dog
#11
MOSCOW (AFX) - Ayman al-Zawahiri, considered Osama bin Laden's top aide, has been killed in Afghanistan, Russia's ITAR-TASS news agency reported, citing informed sources.
In a report from Islamabad, the agency cited sources who said al-Zawahiri was not killed in fighting but in a special operation carried out by unidentified individuals.
It did not give the date of his death.
Zawahiri, an Egyptian physician and a leader of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, was said to be the number two in bin Laden's al-Qaeda network and its chief financier.
He is said to be bin Laden's mentor and one of the chief organisers of the Sept 11 terror attacks on New York and Washington.
The US has offered a 5 mln usd reward for information leading to his capture.
Posted by: john ||
01/13/2006 20:11
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#12
9 I'd actually prefer to see him... beneath Selma Hayak's feet, like a dog
I've often wished to see myself there as well.
Been watching Tarantino's From Dusk till Dawn?
Tarantino is such a perv. An entire movie created for one scene in which he licks whiskey running off Salma's toes.
Posted by: john ||
01/13/2006 20:14
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#13
You mean there are people who can watch Tarantino's movies all the way through?
Posted by: Phil ||
01/13/2006 20:23
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#14
Noticing that abc has this as "among the victims"
Z would be considered a victim?
"Just last week, the Arabic-language news network, Al-Jazeera, aired a videotape in which the al Qaeda operative called on President Bush to concede defeat in Iraq."
#18
Fox News web site is reporting the report. They say the Army is officially denying any attack, but an "unnamed Army official" is confirming a strike on a target.
#20
Though I'm sorely tempted to ululate, I'm with SPo'D. I wanna see a wooden stake driven through that empty heart cavity and DNA confirmation.
EPAMINONDAS - Lol, pretty crafty distraction there bringin up Selma. Your site indicates yet another (like myself) ex-Dhimmidonk (or nearly so?) who prefers Freedom to Tranzi / Dhimmi idiocy? Is this correct?
If so, join the multitudes who see the current malefactors running the Dhimmidonks for what they are - anti-American socialista Moonbats. And welcome to the 'Burg, heh.
If not, well - why not? Lol. There's no hope until they're thrashed into oblivion and shattered into a gazillion pieces. When someone who's got more to offer than wet-fingered / playing to our base (morons) idiocy steps forward and begins to put the pieces worth having back together, then we may return to a rational 2-party Nation. Until then, well, they deserve their fate.
Whether he did or didn't, we should be spreading the meme that he did. Get 'em all looking nervously at each other, wondering who's going to dime who next.
Posted by: Mike ||
01/13/2006 22:55
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#25
I'd like the corpulent viking lady diva, pretty please, if Ayeman is toed up, rather than that accordeon girl.
MURTHA: VAST MAJORITY OF U.S. TROOPS WILL BE OUT OF IRAQ BY END OF YEAR
Fri Jan 13 2006 17:14:15 ET
Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) believes the vast majority of U.S. troops in Iraq will be out by the end of the year and maybe even sooner. In his boldest words yet on the subject, the outspoken critic of the war predicts the withdrawal and tells Mike Wallace why he thinks the Bush administration will do it.
#3
WaPo (and the other "major" MSM Tranzi bitches) has "outsourced" their agenda, so their management are merely puppets. So I figure the concept is actually nothing new to them, lol. Worthless wankers.
Yah, sure. India has demonstrated such remarkable business acumen that they dwarf the US brand of capitalism - why just compare the economies and standard of living, woohoo! - so outsourcing management makes perfect sense, lol. Yewbetcha. Morons.
Nightline veteran and former WCBS anchor Dave Marash has signed on to be the Washington-based news anchor for Al Jazeera International, the network announced this afternoon....
"This is a real sort of marriage made in heaven in terms of journalistic ambition and interest," said Mr. Marash on the phone today.
Mr. Marash joins a number of other Western journalists, including Brit interviewer Sir David Frost and former CNN talk show host Riz Khan, in jumping to the upstart network, a sister channel to the controversial Arabic language version. Both channels are financed by the benevolent dictator of Qatar. Mr. Marash will anchor two and a half hours a day. He will also report stories around the world and moderate in-studio discussions, a la Koppel.
"Our niche, if you will, in the satellite news channel competition is to be the high end," Mr. Marash said. "It is to be the most sophisticated, the most nuanced and the most sort of information-filled, and that all sounds great to me." Ah, that old "nuance."
Mr. Marash said he first approached That's right, he went to them and not vice versa.Al Jazeera International shortly after May, 2005, when Mr. Koppel announced his intentions to leave ABC after a contentious few years with network brass. The International channel also approached Mr. Koppel, according to sources close to the anchor, but nothing came of the meeting.
Rebecca Lipkin, a former London-based Nightline producer who was among the first American journalists to switch to Al Jazeera, recommended the move.
"When she went and started talking to me about what she was doing, and the atmosphere and the ambitions there, I mostly just kvelled for her," Mr. Marash said. "But then, when it became clear my Nightline future was drawing to a close, she said, 'You oughta call them.' I did, and I found them very receptive."
Al Jazeera, which has made headlines recently as a possible one-time target of President Bushâs aggression (and bombs), is still in an uphill public-relations battle among Western audiences, distributers and journalists. Mr. Marash said he thought long and hard about that before signing with the channel.
"You'd have to be dumb and blind not to be thinking about these issues," he said. "The fact is, of course, that Al Jazeera has never aired any beheadings. Their news standards seem to me to be very similar to our news standards." Sure, they'll air the videos right up to the point just before the blade touches flesh. Sure they'll air tapes from Binny and his minions. Welcome to the propaganda machine, Dave. You tool.
DAKAR (AFP) - Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing gave four million US dollars to Dakar within hours of his arrival in Senegal, the latest west African country to have recently ditched Taiwan in favour of mighty Beijing. Hi! Hey! Anybody here in government want $4 million?
Li is the first high-level Chinese government official to visit Senegal, which switched ties to China on October 25. Beijing had severed diplomatic relations when Dakar recognized Taiwan nine years ago.
Shortly after arriving Li immediately met and signed the protocol agreement with his Senegalese counterpart Cheikh Tidiane Gadio. Who saw the light when Li opened the attache case.
Senegal will use 3.8 million dollars as it wishes while 200,000 dollars will specifically go to assist victims of floods that hit parts of the country mid last year. $500K for the floods and the rest for administrative overhead.
Li and Gadio also "spoke about the resumption of cooperation in the medical field, with a medical team expected to come to Senegal soon". Since relatively few doctors want to hang out in Senegal.
China will also help Senegal renovate 11 regional stadiums. A meeting was scheduled later Thursday with Senegalese Prime Minister Macky Sall before a dinner in Li's honour. French wine will be served, of course.
Before his departure for neighbouring Mali on Friday, the Chinese minister will officially open China's new embassy in Dakar. Better get with the CIA so we do not have a mistake hit like that in Serbia.
Beijing, in its bid to counter-balance Western influence among developing nations, has chosen Africa as its first port of call. Good luck t'ye in deepest darkest Africa. Buy some friends.
But will they stay bought?
Mainland China has in recent years aggressively intensified its diplomatic tug-of-war with the breakaway island of Taiwan. Attacking on all fronts.
Since the two were separated after China's civil war ended in 1949, Beijing and Taipei have been engaged in a battle to poach allies from each other with generous economic aid packages. In its first ever African policy document, published Thursday to coincide with Li's tour, Beijing said the "one China" policy remains "the political foundation for the establishment and development" of relations with African countries. Sing our tune and we will shower you with money. Sing another tune and you can FOAD.
"The Chinese government appreciates the fact that the overwhelming majority of African countries abide by the 'one China' principle, refuse to have official relations and contacts with Taiwan and support China's great cause of reunification," China states in the policy document.
China vows to "unswervingly" pursue its relations with Africa and foster new types of strategic partnership. "China will establish and develop a new type of strategic partnership with Africa which features political equality and mutual trust, economic win-win cooperation and cultural exchange," it said.
The foreign minister's trip, seen as a bid to bolster China's energy ties and forge stronger global political alliances to counterbalance US dominance, will also take him to Liberia, Nigeria and Libya. Better watch the Nigeria trip. Chinese are hungry for oil. Another significant market.
Senegal became the sixth country to defect to China since 2000, following Liberia, Macedonia, the Commonwealth of Dominica, Vanuatu and Grenada. The number of countries worldwide still maintaining links with Taiwan has dropped to 25, mostly small nations in Africa and the Pacific. Gambia and Burkina Faso are now Taiwan's sole partners in west Africa.
After its swing for Beijing, Senegal said it recognized that "China is the sole government legally representing all of China and that Taiwan is an integral part of Chinese territory." The decision "corresponds perfectly to the fundamental interests of our country and the spirit of the new global diplomacy serving our national interests," the Senegalese government said.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
01/13/2006
16:24 ||
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The decision "corresponds perfectly to the fundamental interests of our country and the spirit of the new global diplomacy serving our national interests," the Senegalese government said getting a buttload of moolah just for signing this silly little document.
Former Vice President Al Gore will attack President Bushâs domestic eavesdropping program at a Washington, D.C., speech on Martin Luther King Dayâwith a Republican by his side.
Gore is teaming up with former Rep. Bob Barr, a Republican, for the policy address, sponsored by the liberal MoveOn.org and libertarian Liberty Coalition. Barr is an outspoken critic of Bush on issues of national security. He led the drive to impeach President Bill Clinton, Goreâs partner in the White House for eight years.
"The speech will specifically point to domestic wiretapping and torture as examples of the administration's efforts to extend executive power beyond Congressional direction and judicial review," according to a MoveOn.org press release. "The extent of bipartisan concern over these issues is highlighted by former Republican Rep. Bob Barr's introduction of the Vice President and by the organizations cosponsoring the speech."
Goreâs speech marks the second time in two weeks he will make a sympathetic plea to Republicans. On Jan. 5, he appeared before a group of center-right activists at Grover Norquist's popular Wednesday Group meeting to talk about global warming.
MoveOn.org made a last-minute offer Friday for tickets to Gore's speech: "Don't worry if you get a waitlist ticket. We expect that everyone on the the waiting list will be able to get into the event, we just can't guarantee it."
The speech will be held at DAR Constitution Hall, the same location Gore used for a Nov. 9, 2003, speech that denounced Bush and then-Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft for their "assault on civil liberties." Actually, I think the democrats would have a winning election issue if they went whole hog for freedom and liberty: NO national ID card; NO US espionage except with a real, not secret, court order; abolish the RICO statutes; a national personal-information database control act; and reversal of a century of judicial precedent that has eroded civil liberties. They ain't gonna do it, though.
#1
can't wait to hear the pedantic "outrage bot" hissing his sibilant s's and flaming anything Bush has ever done. Obviously (just like his timing for global warming speeches) we did get Zawahiri and the DNA match will come during Gore's "speech". I am SOOOOOOOO glad he lost
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/13/2006 19:56
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From the Rantburg "Russia in deep Sh*t Desk.....
Riots are feared in Russia after a new law forced vodka distilleries to halt production.
Analysts predict trouble as shops begin to run out of the national tipple.
The new law, endorsed by President Putin on January 1, stipulates that every distillery must have computerised equipment for measuring alcohol levels. Leave it to the Soviet Russian government to screw up an national strategic industry through burearcratic stupidity.
The move caught the big distilleries by surprise and brought nationwide production to a standstill.
After two weeks of no vodka, even respected newspapers such as the economic journal Vedomosti have started to print panicky front-page headlines, such as 'The vodka is running out!' This looks like a wonderful opportunity for the Russian Mafia to step in and save the nation.
Some commentators fear a revolution as more and more Russians turn to violence on discovering empty supermarket shelves. Running out of food is one thing, but running out of vodka is like....running out of water.
The state is also suffering huge losses as it usually collects over £3.4 billion pounds in liquor taxes per annum, which works out at about £95m per day. This wouldn't happen in the old Communist system, by golly. Heh.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
01/13/2006
15:47 ||
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Didn't happen under the old system because they knew no one could live in Russia without revolution and riots unless they were drunk. I thought Putin was smarter than this.
#4
And it's remarkably similar to what's happening in Venezuela under Chavez, albeit with coffee. (I don't know how his attempted nationalization of Polar's facilities worked out... I haven't heard of any shortages in _that_... YET. If you don't know, it's the national beer in Venezuela, it's made from Yucca, and it's pretty good.)
I've been wondering lately whether Morales is really a CIA plant, whose job it is to do to Bolivian Cocoa production what Chavez has done to Venezuelan Coffee production, or Putin done to Vodka production.
Posted by: Phil ||
01/13/2006 18:27
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So why are they all suddenly on our side against the regime in Tehran? This is a huge turnaround from successful sabotage against the United States and the UK four years ago. The political calculations have changed. But why?
Hereâs a thought. The US has a big cache of documents showing that Chirac and de Villepin received Oil-for-Food moneys from Saddam, contrary to their own laws. So did Putin. So did the Chinese. The US could leak some interesting stories to the international press, probably enough to defeat de Villepinâs election run for president of France, and to embarass Putin in Moscow. Even Chinaâs corrupt politicians might get a little nervous. The Communist Party has been known to turn on corruption when it becomes too public.
The US has now had four years to study 2 million documents from Saddamâs secret archives. A lot of Baath Party torturers must have been eager to talk to the US, just as the Nazis were eager to cooperate after WWII. There must be thousands of Kurds and Shiites out there gunning for their old Baath enemies. So there must be a steady flow of intelligence about Oil for Food and a lot of other Saddam-era influence buying abroad. It defies belief to think that we just havenât asked anybody how Saddam managed to buy at least three of the five permanent members of the Security Council.
Would it be silly to think that we have the goods on Chirac and Putin? Do we know who was bought off by Saddamâs oil in Beijing? Has Dr. Rice been dropping quiet hints in her travels to those places?
Weâve all been wondering why George W. Bush has been so quiet, in the face of an endless barrage of screaming accusations from the Left. Maybe he doesnât care about all that. Maybe heâs onto bigger game â like knocking down the next most dangerous member of the Axis of Evil. And given the huge political corruption in France, Russia and China, maybe Bush-Cheney-Rice-Rumsfeld are just doing what adults sometimes have to: They are taking their lumps for the greater good. Maybe we are quietly twisting some arms.
#1
The political calculations have changed because in Iraq America took the lead, they knew America would see it through and they enjoyed bloodying our noses, especially since it might help prevent Oil for food from being uncovered.
In Iran the US said Europe can take the lead and things have gotten worse and worse and if the US doesn't bail them out they'll find themselves in range of Iranian nuclear tipped missiles before long.
Disclaimer: Rantburg, its owners, employees, and subsidiaries are not liable for any retinal damage or PTSD incurred by clicking this link. Photos possibly not safe for viewing by Bethnal Green & Bow residents. You have been warned.
The Government Chief Whip will today launch a petition calling on Big Brother contestant George Galloway to "respect his constituents, not his ego." The move comes after the politician took part in a degrading task in which he pretended to be a cat. The publicity-seeking Scot got down on all fours, licked the hands of fellow housemate Rula Lenska and rubbed himself up against the actress as part of his feline act.
The petition criticises the Bethnal Green and Bow MP for neglecting his constituents and taking part in the show while the House of Commons is sitting.
#3
The publicity-seeking Scot got down on all fours, licked the hands of fellow housemate Rula Lenska and rubbed himself up against the actress as part of his feline act.
Doing this with Rula Lenska was embarrassing but doing it with Saddam was not?
This follows an announcement by the South African National Blood Services that it would not accept donations from men who have sex with men. The Gay and Lesbian Alliance says its members would lie when asked the question: "Have you had male-to-male sex in the past five years?"
The Alliance claims members have already donated 120 units of blood. It aims to flood the blood services with 70,000 units. Alliance spokesman Juan Uys describes the question as "humiliating, offensive and an insult to gay men". He says all blood should be treated equally.
He says the SANBS has already admitted that it uses state-of the art equipment that ensures rigorous screening of donated blood, and therefore they should accept the blood from men who sleep with other men and subject it to the tests.
He is, of course, an idiot.
Mr Uys said the question of risk of HIV infection was no reason to discriminate against gay men. He says if people were discriminated against based on risk, then South African women between the ages of 18 and 24 should not be allowed to donate, as research shows that they are the group with the highest HIV infection rate in the country.
But the SANBS has described the Alliance campaign as idiotic "unfortunate". Spokeswoman Lanthe Exall says screening procedures are based on World Health Organisation guidelines. She urged the Alliance to reconsider its actions, which she said posed a risk to the lives of patients needing transfusions.
It is not clear what will happen to blood donated on Friday, as the SANBS will be unable to tell which blood came from Alliance members who lied. Ms Exall says though they do have the best testing systems in place, no machine in the world can detect the HI virus during the "window period" that follows the transmission of HIV.
It is not the first time that the SANBS has been hit by controversy. Last year it was forced to change its screening procedures when it was revealed that they destroyed blood donated by black people, because it claimed they were at a high risk of HIV infection. It emerged that President Thabo Mbeki's blood was destroyed because he was black and because his doctor had refused to complete the personal history questionnaire used to screen donors.
Mr Mbeki donated blood as part of a publicity campaign to persuade people to donate blood.
#1
Alliance spokesman Juan Uys describes the question as "humiliating, offensive and an insult to gay men". He says all blood should be treated equally.
"And therefore people with a need for blood transfusions must be placed in danger because it is, and forever shall be, all about MEEEEEEEEEE."
#2
Alliance spokesman Juan Uys describes the question as "humiliating, offensive and an insult to gay men". He says all blood should be treated equally.
"And therefore people with a need for blood transfusions must be placed in danger because it is, and forever shall be, all about MEEEEEEEEEE."
#5
Mr. Uys, who's probably also infected, should have his death hastened, publicly and brutally, as should any other knowingly-HIV blood donors. By donating, you are basically killing someone, their partners, possibly family members. ...just slowly
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/13/2006 16:52
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#6
If a single person gets HIV from a blood transfusion, I hope SANBS just sues the piss out of this Gay and Lesbian Alliance, collectively and individually.
#7
Alliance spokesman Juan Uys describes the question as "humiliating, offensive and an insult to gay men". He says all blood should be treated equally.
Yet, it is not humiliating or offensive to contract AIDS because some thin-skinned moron decides that lack of disclosure should take priority over protecting the purity of transfusion supplies?
The article mentioned the most critical "window" aspect of tainted blood in which the virus has not detectably expressed itself. However, there are many other risks such as accidental needle sticks by blood bank workers and other unanticipated vectors which represent avenues of death for even more innocent people.
What Juan Uys basically wants is for innocent people to die so that others who engage in exceptionally dangerous sexual practices can avoid any niggling questions about the wisdom thereof.
Between crap like this, the supposedly curative powers of having sex with a young virgin female and the incredible hypocrisy of infidelitous husbands having sex with whores while away from home - who then come back, infect their faithful wives and throw them on the street because they are infected.
All of this has brought me to the point where I await a significant meltdown of the entire sub-Saharan African continent. With HIV infection rates surpassing 50% in some regions, there is a massive die-off that has yet to occur. While I would not advocate withholding a functional vaccine, were one invented, if over half of the male population dies quite soon, I will regard it as being for the better.
The slaughter, abuse, corruption and general tyranny that are pandemic in Africa make me wish it could somehow be wiped clean and make a new start. AIDS may end up doing that. However brutal my opinion may seem, it will finally put a stop to some of the most hideous abuses on earth. As you can see, idiots like Juan Uys are merely speeding my solution on its way.
The leader of a large Shiite mosque in Queens has joined the new Iranian president in disputing the Holocaust, saying the Nazi massacre of an estimated 6 million Jews during World War II "has been exaggerated."
"The numbers which have been mentioned are too much," the spiritual leader of the Imam Al Khoei Islamic Center in Jamaica, Sheik Fadhel al Sahlani, told The New York Sun. Sheik al Sahlani, who said his mosque has a membership of about 3,000, said that the killing of innocent Jews during the war was "an injustice" but that the extent of Nazi persecution needed further examination. "The numbers, the reasons, we have to study more," he said.
In that light, Sheik al Sahlani voiced his support for Iran's proposal to hold a conference on the Holocaust in Tehran, saying there is "nothing wrong with studying more." The conference is likely to include scholars who deny that the Holocaust took place.
The sheik's skepticism about the Holocaust follows President Ahmadinejad's recent statements that the genocide of the Jews is a "myth" and that Israel should be "wiped off the map." Sheik al Sahlani said that the Iranian leader's call for an end to Israel was not practical, but added, "It is a kind of dream, but we have to be realistic. Even we have to accept a fact that we don't like."
Many Muslim leaders in New York are rejecting such fiery rhetoric about Israel and the Holocaust, saying the comments will not help defuse tension in the Middle East.
In a survey by the Sun of more than a dozen Muslim leaders across the city, only Sheik al Sahlani voiced agreement with Mr. Ahmadinejad's statement about the Holocaust. Most imams, mosque administrators, and officials at Islamic organizations strongly denounced the Iranian leader's comments. Some called the remarks "irresponsible" or "offensive," and others said they should not be taken seriously.
"For him to make stupid comments like that, I don't even think the Iranian people think like that," the president of Masjid Ar-Rahman at 80 Madison Avenue, Firoz Shaikh, said. He added that there is little doubt about the Holocaust in the Muslim community. "Of course it happened. It was atrocious."
The director of the Muslim Center of New York, Mohammad Sherwani, called the Holocaust the "greatest injustice" and suggested Mr. Ahmadinejad was "going bananas."
"How can he say that?" Mr. Sherwani said. "Nobody can deny who knows history that the Holocaust happened."
Other imams interviewed by the Sun professed to have little knowledge about the details of the Holocaust but did express skepticism that 6 million was an accurate figure for the number of Jews killed.
#4
I want this SOB deported so fast that there's a popping sound made by the air rushing back in to fill the space his body previously occupied. Other popping sounds more typically associated with muzzle discharges would be equally welcome.
#5
I'd choose to fill him with giggle juice, put him on the mind-bender diet, and torture him on the waterboard. But that's just me. I'm "inhumane" when it comes to people who are part of the "Kill the Infidels!" game. It stems from my infidel status, I guess.
#3
I'd love to see the United States send in all 36 of its remaining B-52s on a low-level conventional bombing mission through the heart of Khartoum, making sure all government buildings are in the target zone. I'm sure that would reduce the military tension in northeast Africa by about 300%. It would also put the rest of the $#^%$#$^% continent on alert that we're tired of the status quo, and we won't tolerate it any more. When Europe howls, leak the mission plans for similar runs over Paris, Brussels, etc. It's time the United States stopped being timid and use TR's Big Stick.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
01/13/2006 15:09
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#4
Doncha just hate it when you are trying to have a good old-fashioned genocide or some other atrocity and the damn US Marines show up! It's not like with the UN Peacekeepers with their little blue hats and shoot-me signs on their backs, who you can buy off with cash or sex. Those Marines are relentless. And when they shoot you, it hurts like a sonovabitch.
(AP) Bolivia's leftist President-elect Evo Morales extended a conciliatory hand to the United States on Wednesday, saying he forgives past humiliations and welcomes dialogue even as he believes U.S. officials may be plotting against him.
Bolivia's first elected Indian leader criticized Mexican President Vicente Fox, telling The Associated Press in an interview that Fox was hostile toward him and all indigenous peoples in the Americas, including those of Mexico.
Morales said he believes claims by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez that the United States is plotting to overthrow Morales, but welcomes reports that U.S. officials are interested in talks. "Any dialogue that is oriented to put an end to discrimination and poverty is welcome," he said in South Africa, where he arrived Tuesday on a tour that has taken him to Europe and China.
"I also forgive those in the White House for so many humiliations. I forgive because through dialogue we have to look for peace and social justice," Morales said. He didn't refer again in his news conference to humiliations except to claim that U.S. officials had described him as a "mafioso and a narcotrafficker."
Chavez said in a speech Tuesday that Venezuela's government will stand by Morales if any attempt is made to oust his friend and fellow leftist leader. He did not offer specifics to support his claim. The U.S. Embassy in Bolivia dismissed the accusation as ridiculous. Morales, who has spoken out against U.S. "imperialism" and its coca eradication policy in Bolivia, takes office on Jan. 22.
Morales' inauguration invitation to Mexico's Zapatista rebel group drew a protest Wednesday from Mexican Foreign Secretary Luis Ernesto Derbez. "There should be one invitation to the Mexican government, which represents the Mexican state," Derbez said in Mexico City. "Not to specific groups."
Morales also lashed out at Fox, who, apparently frustrated by long-delayed negotiations to import Bolivian natural gas, reportedly said that if the Bolivians would not export their petroleum products, they could eat them. Morales said his plans to nationalize his central American nation's natural resources involve increasing exports. "President Fox is mistaken," he told the AP. "I think the president has a problem with me and my country and most importantly with all indigenous peoples in the Americas, including those in his own country."
Morales came to South Africa to meet with business and political leaders who helped move the country from apartheid isolation to democratic prosperity. He met Wednesday with President Thabo Mbeki, describing his visit as "an encounter of two peoples who have been historically discriminated against." Morales also sought a meeting with South Africa's first black president, Nelson Mandela, but the anti-apartheid icon was out of the country until the end of the month.
The rise to power of the left-leaning ANC unnerved some observers in the same way that Morales's election set off alarm bells in boardrooms _ and in Washington. Morales, a former union leader who, like Mandela, has a warm relationship with Cuba's Fidel Castro, has pledged to nationalize his country's oil and gas resources. As he wrapped up a visit to China on Monday, he declared that country his ideological ally.
In Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium and France, Morales reassured political leaders and energy executives that his government will respect foreign capital. And he has found common ground with Bolivian business leaders, telling them he would work to attract foreign investment and create jobs.
Speaking after his half-hour meeting with Mbeki, Morales invited oil companies Wednesday to be "partners but not owners" in exploiting Bolivia's wealth. He said Bolivia would be renegotiating contracts with foreign energy companies to take account of the surge in international gas prices, but promised no privately owned infrastructure would be nationalized. "We will only own what is under the ground," he said. Morales flies Thursday to Cape Town before leaving South Africa for Brazil. Interesting comments about Fox.
#1
Fox is of the 'European' variety of Mexican. Talk about a class system. Its a carry over from the Spanish colonial period [yeah, I know that's a long time ago]. Spain limited immigration to the 'right' people. The English et al were happy to get rid of their 'wrong' people. Different cultural orientation. The Spanish kept their class system, the Anglo-Americans didn't have enough to have any class. Heh.
Interesting OT article I found via (amazingly) FARK..... EFL.
For "Stupid in America," a special report ABC will air Friday, we gave identical tests to high school students in New Jersey and in Belgium. The Belgian kids cleaned the American kids' clocks. The Belgian kids called the American students "stupid."
The Belgians did better because their schools are better. At age ten, American students take an international test and score well above the international average. But by age fifteen, when students from forty countries are tested, the Americans place twenty-fifth. The longer kids stay in American schools, the worse they do in international competition. They do worse than kids from countries that spend much less money on education.
In New York City, it's "just about impossible" to fire a bad teacher, says schools chancellor Joel Klein. The new union contract offers slight relief, but it's still about 200 pages of bureaucracy. "We tolerate mediocrity," said Klein, because "people get paid the same, whether they're outstanding, average, or way below average." One teacher sent sexually oriented emails to "Cutie 101," his sixteen year old student. Klein couldn't fire him for years, "He hasn't taught, but we have had to pay him, because that's what's required under the contract."
They've paid him more than $300,000, and only after 6 years of litigation were they able to fire him. Klein employs dozens of teachers who he's afraid to let near the kids, so he has them sit in what they call "rubber rooms." This year he will spend twenty million dollars to warehouse teachers in five rubber rooms. It's an alternative to firing them. In the last four years, only two teachers out of 80,000 were fired for incompetence.
When I confronted Union president Randi Weingarten about that, she said, "they [the NYC school board] just don't want to do the work that's entailed." But the "work that's entailed" is so onerous that most principals just give up, or get bad teachers to transfer to another school. They even have a name for it: "the dance of the lemons."
The inability to fire the bad and reward the good is the biggest reason schools fail the kids. Lack of money is often cited the reason schools fail, but America doubled per pupil spending, adjusting for inflation, over the last 30 years. Test scores and graduation rates stayed flat. New York City now spends an extraordinary $11,000 per student. That's $220,000 for a classroom of twenty kids. Couldn't you hire two or three excellent teachers and do a better job with $220,000?
Only a monopoly can spend that much money and still fail the kids.
If people got to choose their kids' school, education options would be endless. There could soon be technology schools, cheap Wal-Mart-like schools, virtual schools where you learn at home on your computer, sports schools, music schools, schools that go all year, schools with uniforms, schools that open early and keep kids later, and, who knows? If there were competition, all kinds of new ideas would bloom.
This already happens overseas. In Belgium, for example, the government funds educationâat any schoolâbut if the school can't attract students, it goes out of business. Belgian school principal Kaat Vandensavel told us she works hard to impress parents. "If we don't offer them what they want for their child, they won't come to our school." She constantly improves the teaching, "You can't afford ten teachers out of 160 that don't do their work, because the clients will know, and won't come to you again."
"That's normal in Western Europe," Harvard economist Caroline Hoxby told me. "If schools don't perform well, a parent would never be trapped in that school in the same way you could be trapped in the U.S."
Last week, Florida's Supreme Court shut down "opportunity scholarships," Florida's small attempt at competition. Public money can't be spent on private schools, said the court, because the state constitution commands the funding only of "uniform, . . . high-quality" schools. But government schools are neither uniform nor high-quality, and without competition, no new teaching plan or No Child Left Behind law will get the monopoly to serve its customers well.
A Gallup Poll survey shows 76 percent of Americans are either completely or somewhat satisfied with their kids' public school, but that's only because they don't know what their kids are missing. Without competition, unlike Belgian parents, they don't know what their kids might have had.
#2
Right. We're dumb. The Belgies are smart. Before they go to far with that, they maight want to consider what would happen if we weren't playing with one arm tied behind our back. But they've thought about that already, cause they're so smart.
#4
With all due repect, these comments miss the point. We DO have a crummy education establishment, and it has been poisoning our country for decades. Addressing this subject properly would take up too much of Fred's bandwidth, so I will keep this as short as I can.
My mother tried to teach in the Chicago Public schools for one year, after having taught in Wisconsin and Michigan before that. From the first, Chicago, like many other areas, abandoned any school that had even one black student. When she taught, nearly 50 years ago at the school that served the newly opened Cabrini Green complex, she had fifty-five first graders, 1/3 black, 1/3 Puerto Rican, and 1/3 Czech. The school was a firetrap (finally replaced several years later after the Our Lady Of Angels fire). The books were falling apart and the school had not seen scissors and paste in the supply room for two years. Teachers could get all the construction paper they wanted, but there were no scissors and paste.
The Chicago Teachers Union allowed senior teachers to bump junior teachers out of any position, at any time during the school year. As I grew older, living in the Chicago area, I saw all kinds of abuses perpetrated by political hacks in school administration. The system was determined to make life impossible for good teachers and keep the fools in cushy positions.
As the article "Stupid In America" points out, the Byzantine system that allows for stupidity to dominate school administration won't go away without some good, healthy competition.
Please note also that the report points out that the drop in achievement occurs between ages 10 and 15. A huge part of that drop is the middle school culture.
When I was working toward my teacher's certification course, the concept of Middle School was gaining popularity. After doing my practicum in a middle school, I came to the conclusion that Middle School is an invention of the Devil. A middle school keeps the same kids together all day, with no opprotunity for escape unless one is in band or orchestra. So take prepubescent hormones, and stick the kids in the same group from one end of the day to another, and you have the potential for some difficult class chemistry.
At the same time, kids are on their own more at this age, meaning they have less parental supervision. This is the age to which the advertisers of sleaze pitch their strongest appeals. So the combination of teen hormones, lack of supervision, and promotion of sex and irresponsible behavior combines to make the middle school age a minefield for kids.
I used to volunteer in a difficult neighborhood in Madison. I would see children who had the brains to run General Motors in 5th grade go to middle school, and suddenly abandon their schoolwork because achievement was uncool or acting white. You've heard of black students telling mixed race students they "aren't black enough." I saw it happen. I also saw the jerks drag down the smart students because achievement was "acting white."
I home schooled my daughters through middle school because the girls are vicious. My boys, because of their autism issues, have close staff supervision, so they are better protected. Even so, kids took advantage of my eldest and caused him a lot of trouble.
If the Belgians allow competition and choice among the schools, then they have an advantage over our system. Now if we could just get the socialist claptrap out of the teacher preparation courses (that's a different rant), we'd be doing our children a great favor.
#5
Yeah, yeah. Americans are dumb, everybody knows that.
What studies like this fail to reveal, because the authors never think in those terms, is the different aims of American and European educators. The various European education systems have the goal of turning out individuals who have a great deal of factual knowledge, but are completely responsive to their superiors about what to do with it. That is, when asked a question, they can provide the answer. However, it rarely occurs to these well schooled individuals to pose questions to themselves or others.
The American system, on the other hand, is oriented toward teaching the students how to think. Facts can be found easily, for those who know how to look; in my day we were taught how to find sources in the card catalog of the public library, and in encyclopedias, and to compare the results from various sources to winkle out the facts. Nowadays the kids learn how to do effective Google searches, and to sift the grain from the chaff. European students (those headed for university, at any rate) memorize reams of scientific information; American students learn to do laboratory experiments from the beginning of their formal education, and are expected to draw lessons from failing to attain the expected results (ie, accurate measurement of materials matters, order of addition matters, temperature matters, don't drop that bloody flask in the middle of an exothermic reaction!!!, etc). So American students come out knowing much less in the way of raw facts, but able to wrestle areas of ignorance into actionable information on short order. European students do well on these kinds of tests, but don't realize that they can question , let alone that they should. (This used to drive Mr. Wife crazy when we lived in Europe -- especially his German colleagues, who while otherwise delightful, didn't even know what they knew until he asked them a question; and who used to write him memos full of masses of raw data, unsummarized and unanalyzed, because the sheer number of numbers was more important in demonstrating their cleverness than actually pulling something useful, let alone actionable, out of the unorganized mess.)
#6
I have three teenagers in three different high schools, two public and one private. All have good teachers and poor teachers, but it's the principal that really runs the show.
When my private-schooled son's new Spanish teacher turned out to be a total loss, I met with the principal twice, was properly received each time, and in a few weeks the teacher was replaced.
When my public-schooled daughter's teachers decided to take the kids out to a movie (Zorro) and lunch on a school day (to reward them "for their good work"), I complained to the principal in writing about the wasted school day and never even got an acknowledgement. That's in a moderately-affluent, suburban school district where 11th graders are getting sub-standard scores in math.
I don't expect every teacher to be a star, but I do expect that the principal will not let the slacker teachers set the agenda. If I had it to do over again, my daughter would not be in that public school.
#7
And yet, tw, when I was a kid in the Cincinnati public school system, we were told at the end of fourth grade that our fifth grade math books would be omitting punctuation. In order to save money on ink.
#8
My niece was told, in 4th grade that "Handwriting isn't important because in the future everyone would be using keyboards.". As a result, at 23, she has the handwriting of a 4th grader (oh and no job...).
Teachers (and unions who often are the ones who really call the shots) should be held responsible for their student scores.
#9
Lots of valid complaints to be made about the schools but there's another important point to remember when seeing these international comparisons - most other countries "divert" their less academically promising (is that sensitive enough?) students out of the academic education system to parallel systems where they are often not included in these studies. The overwhelming majority of American kids stay in the main system all the way through to 18 and skew the sample in studies like this.
#10
CF as much as I agree with your implications, the fact is that the "using keyboards" is just about right. I have 3 sons, 30+, 24 & 20. They all have terrible handwriting despite my wife's and my best efforts. The 24 & 20 basically print. BUT, I don't think any of them have actually hand written anything longer than a Xmas card in years.
The 24 year old is a VP in real-estate and does everything on his blackberry or computer, the 30+ year old is a free lance writer who works and corresonds via PC, the 20 year old is in school and everything is done on the laptop.
I wish they could write, but it's hard to prove that it matters anymore.
(Personally I learned to type 40+ years ago cause I physically hate writing so much)
#11
I can't help you with that one, Seafarious. There are idiots everywhere. But you seem to have learned to think effectively despite a temporary lack of punctuation marks.
British scientists are seeking permission to create hybrid embryos in the lab by fusing human cells with rabbit eggs. If granted consent, the team will use the embryos to produce stem cells that carry genetic defects, in the hope that studying them will help understand the complex mechanisms behind incurable human diseases.
The proposal drew strong criticism from opponents to embryo research who yesterday challenged the ethics of the research and branded the work repugnant.
Repugnant? I guess that is what you call it. This is a family newspaper..
Plans for the experiments have been put forward by Professor Chris Shaw, a neurologist and expert in motor neurone disease at King's College London, and Professor Ian Wilmut, the Edinburgh University-based creator of Dolly the sheep, as a way of overcoming the shortage of fresh human eggs available for research.
"The fertility of rabbits is legendary," said Prof Shaw. "The most important thing is that with animal eggs, we have a much better chance of generating stem cells and if we wait for human eggs, it's going to be maybe a decade before we can do this. If we can use animal eggs, we could maybe have stem cells within one or two years," he added.
The fertility of rabbits is legendary-So did Bill Clinton donate the human cells so we could have a rapid results...
"Come here Monica, I need you!"
Scientists use eggs in research to create cloned embryos, from which they harvest stem cells. By producing stem cells that carry the genetic defects of diseases, researchers believe they will be able to unravel how a cell's molecular machinery goes wrong, potentially leading to new cures for disease. But the research is progressing slowly, hampered by a severe shortage of "spare" eggs donated by couples undergoing fertility treatment.
Prof Shaw's team will need a licence from the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority before they are allowed to pursue the research. "As with all research involving human embryos, the research team would have to show that the research is both necessary and desirable, and that any embryo created could not be allowed to develop for longer than 14 days or be implanted in a woman," said Dr Chris O'Toole, head of research regulation at the HFEA.
If the researchers are granted consent, they will not be the first to fuse human cells with rabbit eggs. In 2003, Huizhen Sheng at Shanghai Second Medical University published work in which she claimed to have extracted stem cells from hybrid embryos made from rabbit eggs.
Live action sentient Bugs Bunny - will say as his first words to the research head be, "What's up Doc?"
To make a hybrid embryo, a human skin cell would be taken from a person with motor neurone disease and injected into a hollowed-out rabbit egg. The resulting embryo would contain only a tiny amount of rabbit DNA in a microscopic structure that generates energy in the cell. The rest of the DNA would be human. If the experiment is successful, within a week, the egg will have divided to form a tiny ball of a 200 or so cells, from which stem cells could be extracted.
The embryos could not legally be implanted into a woman's womb and the stem cells would not be safe to implant because they would be rejected by the immune system. "They will never grow beyond the 200 cell stage and they will have no human features," said Prof Shaw.
The proposal exposes a grey area in British regulation, however, as officials at the HFEA admitted it was questionable whether the resulting embryo was human. "That's the question and it's for the government, the HFEA and lawyers to work out," said Prof Shaw.
Grey area - Bugs is grey
Josephine Quintavalle of the lobby group Comment on Reproductive Ethics said: "There is a lot of innate wisdom in the yuk factor, or repugnance as it is also known. My question is: what will they actually create? It is simplistic or deliberately deceptive to say they are simply making stem cells. In order to obtain stem cells they surely have to go through the blastocyst stage; they have to create a 'something' from which to derive the new cells. What is this something? It must be human to be of any use to researchers."
Professor Sir John Gurdon, a Cambridge University researcher, already uses similar technology to investigate how eggs appear to be capable of converting adult cells into stem cells that can potentially grow into any tissue in the body. His experiments have so far focused on injecting DNA from human cells into frog eggs.
He said: "I don't see there's any ethical problem with what they are proposing. I don't see it as a human embryo, but it all comes back to the question of when you think life begins. Scientifically, though, I'm not persuaded it will work. If you put cells from one species into the egg of another, the egg may divide, but you could get a lot of genetic abnormality that won't lead to good quality stem cells."
Genetic abnormality?... What about the researchers?... No, I won't go there!
#4
First, you make the sentient rabbits. Then, when they've bred into over 1.2 billion of them, you realize that you need smarter carnivores. So, you breed sentient wolves and leopards.
That would be the end of Humanity. I'm going to start collaborating now and beat the rush.
EFL HUNDREDS of foreign Islamic fighters are gathering in Afghanistan ahead of the deployment of 4,000 British troops to the country in the spring.
British intelligence sources have told The Scotsman Islamic radicals sympathetic to al-Qaeda see Afghanistan as their new frontline and are starting to shift the focus of their anti-western campaign from Iraq. Does this mean they see themselves as having lost the battle for Iraq?
The fighters, including Jordanians, Yemenis, Egyptians and Gulf Arabs, stepped up their campaign two months ago with a series of suicide bombings against NATO peacekeepers, United States troops and Afghan government leaders.
"Attacks in Afghanistan are now running at more than 500 a month - it's getting as dangerous for westerners as Iraq in some places," said a British officer involved in planning the NATO peacekeeping mission in the south-west of the country.
Particularly worrying for British troops has been a spate of battles over the past month in the area where paratroopers of 16 Air Assault Brigade are due to deploy from April on peace-keeping and anti-drug duties. US special forces teams patrolling Helmand and Uruzgan provinces called in air support on five occasions over the past three weeks. RAF Harriers based in Khandahar joined in two of these incidents, in which large groups of insurgents openly battled with US troops and allied Afghan forces.
Teams of suicide bombers are reported to be active in Kabul and several other major towns, according to British sources. Groups of insurgents regularly mount raids from mountain hideouts against US patrols and units of the Afghan army. In rural areas, insurgents are becoming increasingly proficient in the use of improvised roadside bombs, many of which are similar to those that have taken such a heavy toll on coalition forces in Iraq. Are they getting help from Iranian bomb specialists?
The foreign fighters are making common cause with remnants of the Taleban regime hiding in southern Afghanistan and with local tribesmen who resent efforts by the Kabul regime, backed by the US and Britain, to clamp down on the drugs trade. Washington's decision to pull out 4,000 troops from south-west Afghanistan, ahead of the NATO deployment, has emboldened insurgents, who claim it is the start of a complete defeat of US troops who have patrolled the country since late 2001.
British intelligence officers say the drugs trade and the growing Afghan insurgency are inextricably linked with the dramatic increases in heroin exports, allowing pro-Taleban groups to buy in supplies of weapons and fund foreign fighters.
#1
"Washington's decision to pull out 4,000 troops from south-west Afghanistan, ahead of the NATO deployment, has emboldened insurgents, who claim it is the start of a complete defeat of US troops who have patrolled the country since late 2001. "
Why did we do this?
Less PR problems for AQ in Afghanistan. They migh wind up killing muslims, but they won't be Arab muslims, which helps greatly with fundraising.
#2
The British military establishmen used to be pretty stoic. During the Napoleonic Wars, WWI and WWII, they took their lumps and kept on swinging at their adversaries without panicking. These days, they're like the pretty co-eds in horror movies, screaming at the top of their lungs at the slightest unexpected noise or movement.
#3
I believe the reason we are pulling US ground troops demonstrates that the islamo-cockroach problem in Afghanistan is a world problem and not a US-9/11 problem.
#5
It is probably a combination of the discontent among certain farmer groups, and the withering of Iraq as a viable front, that has Al-Q moving back to Afghanistan. Also, the Iraqi military and police are rapidly becoming very effective and killing the foreigners in good numbers. Plus, Afghanistan has always been a loosely-governed and loosely-policed area, which makes operations easier for Al-Q.
Republican National Committee member has gathered enough signatures to engineer a party vote next week on a resolution that calls for tougher immigration and border enforcement and opposes a guest-worker plan in what could be a head-to-head showdown on President Bush's signature immigration proposal.
#1
I'm not against a guest-worker program. I am against using a "guestworker" program as a back-door amnesty. I think it would be a good idea to have a large number of Mexican citizens in good standing sign up for guest worker visas that would allow them to enter the US to pick fruit and vegetables, to do other seasonal work, and to even fill long-term jobs where there's a demand. There are several ways to handle it, though, and neither party has made any real attempt to define the program. With current computer capabilities there's no reason we cannot create a national database of APPROVED guest-workers, especially those that have entered the US before, then gone back to Mexico once their work was done. I think such a program would help reduce the number of illegals considerably, and give the US a better handle of who's in the country. It would also reduce the incentive for people to hire human smugglers, and make it easier to pot the bad guys who violate our border for criminal reasons (fewer "civilian" casualties when we do get nasty). It's going to take compromise, ingenuity, and initiative to develop a border policy that works. Right now, neither side is actually working to make things better.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
01/13/2006 18:59
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#2
Guestworker program OK, AFTER the border's sealed and secured and the program works as OP sez above. VFox and Friends can blow himself if he doesn't like it
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/13/2006 19:41
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His conclusion (in an op-ed in the New York Times, no less!). go read the whole thing -- it isn't very long.
There is, of course, still much to be done. American troops and Iraqis continue to die battling criminal elements of the Saddam Hussein regime and Qaeda terrorists. President Bush has correctly identified Iraq as the central front in the war on terrorism, as Osama bin Laden himself acknowledged when he told his followers "the third world war has begun in Iraq" and that it would "end there in victory and glory, or misery and humiliation."
Despite these enormous stakes, some Americans have called for setting a timetable for our withdrawal or even pulling out now. This would be a historic mistake: a betrayal of the sacrifices Americans and Iraqis have made; a victory of the terrorists everywhere; and step toward a more dangerous world.
#1
Why didn't Bremer leak this shit to NY Slimes "reporters"? Furkristsake
Posted by: Captain America ||
01/13/2006 17:17
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#2
Excerpt from Bremer's book at the National Review: âGiving Birthâ
In this excerpt, Ambassador Bremer recalls Sunday, July 13, 2003, when the Iraqi Governing Council met the press for the first time.
Posted by: ed ||
01/13/2006 17:47
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Phones Can Be Difficult or Impossible to Track; Large Quantities Purchased in California, Texas
Federal agents have launched an investigation into a surge in the purchase of large quantities of disposable cell phones by individuals from the Middle East and Pakistan, ABC News has learned.
The growing use of the throwaway cell phones has been cited by President Bush as an important justification for expanding the wiretap laws under the Patriot Act. Buried deep in the text, but too important to leave there ;-)
"There's very little audit trail assigned to this phone. One can walk in, purchase it in cash, you don't have to put down a credit card, buy any amount of minutes to it, and you don't, frankly, know who bought this," said Jack Cloonan, a former FBI official who is now an ABC News consultant.
In one New Year's Eve transaction at a Target store in Hemet, Calif., 150 disposable tracfones were purchased. Suspicious store employees notified police, who called in the FBI, law enforcement sources said. Thank goodness for suspicious store employees!
In an earlier incident, at a Wal-mart store in Midland, Texas, on December 18, six individuals attempted to buy about 60 of the phones until store clerks became suspicious and notified the police. A Wal-mart spokesperson confirmed the incident.
The Midland, Texas, police report dated December 18 and obtained by ABC News states: "Information obtained by MPD [Midland Police Department] dispatch personnel indicated that approximately six individuals of Middle-Eastern origin were attempting to purchase an unusually large quantity of tracfones (disposable cell phones with prepaid minutes attached)." At least one of the suspects was identified as being from Iraq and another from Pakistan, officials said. "Upon the arrival of officers, suspects were observed moving away from the registers â appearing to evade detection while ridding themselves of the merchandise."
Other reports have come in from other cities, including Dallas, and from authorities in other states. Authorities in Pennsylvania, New York and other parts of Texas confirmed that they were alerted to the cases, and sources say other jurisdictions were also notified.
The Midland, Texas, arrest report police also identified the individuals as linked to a terror cell. "Evasive responses provided by the subjects, coupled with actions observed by officers at the onset of the contact prompted the notification of local FBI officials to assist in the investigation," the report said. "Upon the arrival of special agents, and as a result of subsequent interviews, it was discovered that members of the group were linked to suspected terrorist cells stationed within the Metroplex. In addition, special agents reported that similar incidents centering on the large-scale purchases of tracfones had been reported throughout the nation â identifying individuals of Middle-Eastern descent as the purchasers."
"Upon conclusion of the initial investigation, three of the suspects were taken into custody on immigration violations, with one individual arrested for possession of marijuana â the drug having been discovered during the search of the group's vehicle. Also found within the green 2002 Kia van were additional cell phones, the total believed to be approximately 60."
FBI officials told ABC News that while the cases may wind up in the hands of Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, the FBI would benefit from any intelligence gleaned and would take the lead if a solid terrorist connection emerged. Deport the fools! They don't deserve to live here.
#1
Let's see the NY Slimes article on NSA was published in the December 16, 2005, front-page article.
The first mass purchase was on December 18th.
Could it be the terrors are readers of the NY Slimes?
Me thinks so.
Posted by: Captain America ||
01/13/2006 17:06
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#2
Heh, CA - spot-on. They represent the "new subscribers" to the Flagship Paper of Dhimmitude, Tranzi kow-towing, and Kool Aid. Pinch, baby, you're fortune is slowly toasting. Hope you hang on til you're totally broke.
And I salute and thank the employees of these places where their suspicions were aroused enough to report them! Thanks! They, obviously, don't read the NYT, lol.
EFL
Yuma Sector Border Patrol agents caught a California homicide suspect Wednesday morning after they pulled over a suspicious-looking vehicle driving on Interstate 10 near Blythe, according to a Border Patrol news release. He was taken into custody at the Blythe station, where agents routinely scanned the suspect's fingerprints by pressing them against a computer touchscreen. The computer system then ran the detainee's prints through a national database, Yuma Sector spokesman Michael Gramley said. They found he was wanted in connection with a homicide in San Joaquin Valley, Calif. The suspect was turned over to Riverside County Sheriffâs Office for extradition on the warrant, according to a Border Patrol news release.
The fingerprint database that the agents used to match the suspect with his warrant is called the Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System, the release said. "It's a computer that scans all 10 fingerprints of subject and compares them to fingerprints on file in a national database," Gramley said.
Since Oct. 1, 2005, CBP agents nationwide have used IAFIS technology to help identify more than 30,000 subjects involved in crimes, including 114 homicide suspects, according to Border Patrol statistics.
Coinciding with increased tensions with Iran over the resumption of illicit uranium enrichment, the U.S. Air Force has dispatched additional warplanes to the region in a not-so-subtle sign, military sources say.
An entire wing of F-16s, the Air National Guard's 122nd Fighter Wing based in Fort Wayne, Ind., left for a base in southwest Asia on Tuesday. A wing is usually about 72 aircraft and several hundred support personnel.
F-16s and support personnel from the 4th Fighter Squadron of the 388th Fighter Wing based at Hill Air Force Base, Utah, also deployed recently to Iraq. The squadron has 12 F-16s.
Both units' F-16s could be used in any military operation to take out Iranian nuclear facilities.
A spokesman for the U.S. Central Command Air Forces, which runs air operations in the region, said the F-16 deployment of about 80 jets is part of a rotation and is not related to Iran's uranium reprocessing.
This story from back in December validates the claim that the wing was scheduled to deploy now - or at least was so planned a few weeks prior to Iran's breaking of the IAEA seals. No word, one way or the other however, on whether the unit they are replacing is returning right away or hanging around in-theater for a while.
#4
If things get hot, I would expect a wing like this one to be patrolling places like the Syrian border rather than into Iran itself. That would free up newer planes, including the strike eagles, to escort stealthed bombers into the places they need to go.
If we have any marines reading this thread - don't you all also practice rapid insertion of small inspection teams right after raids, to verify complete destruction of the target? Do you do that using F-16s or other airframes?
#7
Agreed that it's BDA, Besoerker. Just wondered what airframe was favored for team insertion in circumstances like this - assuming it isn't done by SOCOM instead.
#8
Gun cams or UAV's would be safest alternative to potentially costly team insertions. Insertion or infiltration (INFIL) is usually pretty simple. One must remember that Murphy is always along for the ride, and it's the exfiltration (EXFIL) that can get badly buggered up. We've been down both roads in Iran, i.e., pre-UAV Desert One and other locs. I'm a UAV fan myself.
#9
Hard to fly 'em into those tunnels, unless it's the backpack Ravens or such -- and that means a team nearby .... Ditto for the robots the Army sends into caves in Afghanistan.
#11
I wonder if they will announce some "pre-planned deployments" of heavy bombers today to arrive in theater next week.
I wonder if there have been any basing changes since we deployed 15 F-117 Nighthawks from the 49th bomber wing to So. Korea a year ago and some B-2s to Guam a year before that ...
#13
Understood. But those deployments were announced by DOD at the time. They were INTENDED to be public - as the bitter reaction out of Pyongyang proves. The NORKs weren't happy one little bit about those deployments and said so loudly at the time.
#14
From a June 02, 2005 Korea Times article I printed, but can't find the URL for:
US Deploying 15 Stealth Fighters to S. Korea
By Jung Sung-ki
Staff Reporter
The Pentagon is deploying 15 F-117A Nighthawk stealth fighters and 250 airmen this week from its air force base in New Mexico in the U.S. to the Korean Peninsula, the U.S Forces Korea (USFK) said Wednesday.
The 49th Fighter Wing at Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico Monday announced the deployment of about 250 air crew and support personnel, along with the stealths, and the USFK said.
The F-117A Nighthawk stealth fighters are expected to be deployed to either U.S. air bases in Osan or Kunsan, said Kim Yong-kyu, a public relations official at the USFK.
``The current deployment of the stealths is not related to the current situation surrounding Pyongyang's nuclear threat, Kim quoted USFK spokeswoman MaryAnn Cummings as saying. ``This is a routine deployment of a U.S. air force unit for training and familiarization.
However, the U.S. move drew attention as it came as tensions are continuing to escalate over the communist regime's possible nuclear test, worsening prospects of an early resumption of the six-party talks on the North Korean nuclear weapons program.
``The deployment is part of an ongoing measure to maintain a credible deterrent posture and presence in the region,'' said a news release from the air force base.
Speculations over a possible contingency plan against the North by the U.S. have arisen since the U.S. military is beefing up its military capabilities in the Pacific region, by repositioning its sophisticated fighter jets and Navy vessels.
Last February, the U.S. deployed B-2 Spirit stealth bombers and F-15E fighter jets in Guam, the range to strike North Korea's nuclear facilities in case of an emergency, according to the Stars and Stripes, a U.S. army newspaper published in Seoul.
got the date wrong in the previous comment - it was June of last year for the Nighthawks and one year ago for the B-2s.
#15
Hard to fly 'em into those tunnels, unless it's the backpack Ravens or such -- and that means a team nearby ....
Hmmmmm....
A heavier UAV that carriers a parachute-equipped rover. The UAV drops the rover near the target structure, then orbits high, acting as a comm relay.
You may not be able to retrieve the rover, but you could use something cheap and simple so you don't really care. Make them light enough, and the UAV could carry more than one, either to let you look in different areas or as a reserve.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
01/13/2006 14:04
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#16
Haven't followed the details of recent equipment, but the earlier cave exploration bots were teleoperated via cables IIRC due to radio reception problems inside all that granite.
Similar issues likely to be true in shielded tunnels ....
#17
LTOP - that's why I am lobbying for rabid ferrets and snakes...
They can soften it up prior to actual action and operate quite well in caves without operators.
#18
What about those glow in the dark Korean pigs?
A question: If Iranians' nuke facilities are blasted, wouldn't any bomb assessment team be at risk of exposure to massive amounts of radioactive material?
#19
..The unit you want to keep an eye on is the 20 FW at Shaw AFB, SC - they are the 'Wild Weasel' units for the Persian Gulf. If they go - in squadron strength or more - fight's on.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
01/13/2006 17:13
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#20
Unfortunately, I doubt they in particular would depart which much fanfare, so unless you stumble on some local news item...
#22
It would be a great signal to the world for the US to take Iran down with the National Guard. I think it would be the first case in American history of a Guard unit Destroying a country, and a nice payback for the guards efforts in WOT.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
01/13/2006 20:26
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#23
49 Pan, you have a vicious sense of.... I'm not sure what. Well said!
French authorities reportedly knew of fraud being committed by government officials involved in the oil-for-food program.
The allegation was made by Didier Houssin, a high-level French official connected to the program, during questioning before an investigative magistrate, Le Figaro newspaper reported Thursday.
Now, according to the newspaper, Judge Philippe Courroye is trying to find out if the French administration covered up the fraud.
A series of investigations in France and in the United States have implicated French politicians and businessmen in a web of kickbacks connected to the oil-for-food program.
Established in 1996 by the United Nations, the program allowed Iraq to sell its oil on the world market in exchange for food, medicine and other humanitarian aid. At the time, there was an international embargo against the regime of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
A number of international figures are accused of profiting from the kickbacks, including former French Interior Minister Charles Pasqua.
The French justice system is also investigating the alleged involvement in the scandal of two former foreign ministry officials, Jean-Bernard Merimee and Serge Boidevaix.
According to Le Figaro, both Houssin and another French official, Dominique Maillard, told judge Courroye they were aware as of 2001 of overcharges made by French companies involved in the oil-for-food program. Both men said they did not raise the alarm, however, because it wasn't their business to question the U.N. program.
Both men occupied senior government positions dealing with energy resources at the time.
Posted by: too true ||
01/13/2006
12:03 ||
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#1
Non!
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
01/13/2006 12:12
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#2
Now, according to the newspaper, Judge Philippe Courroye is trying to find out if the earth is indeed round, French administration covered up the fraud.
#7
What will be interesting to watch in countries like France, we already know what will happen in PuttyPutzLand - nothing, is if the people will be outraged, angry, demand a housecleaning, realize the implications (especially regards the propaganda campaign of anti-Americanism, Iraq, etc.), et al. If they "get it" then, perhaps, they will stage a comeback. I've said it before, and received mainly deafening silence in response to the point, the ex-Allies have suffered from exceptionally egregiously moronic leadership. Yeah, they voted 'em in, but people can be fooled - especially if you play to their pre-existing fears. We came terrifyingly close in 2000 and 2004 to making the same mistake. A moment of pause should be, IMHO, in everyone's feedback loop before bashing...
So we'll be watching - and I'll be hoping - that they'll realize what BS they've been fed, how corrupt and crass and craven their leadership has been, and take steps to clean it up and come out of the Kool Aid pool.
#2
Plants and animals have been at war for millions of years. Whether the physical defenses of cactus thorns or the chemical weapons of poison ivy and broccoli, it has been a constant arms race, a running battle between offense and defense
This is just the latest in their phyto-treachery.
Iran has alarmed the international community by removing the seals at its nuclear fuel research sites - but experts say it is several years away from being capable of producing a nuclear bomb.
There are two routes to producing an atomic weapon: using either highly enriched uranium, or separated plutonium, and Iran could pursue either or both routes. Regarding uranium, Iran has already embarked on the first step of the purification process necessary to ultimately produce weapons-grade material.
It has produced reconstituted uranium - what is known as "yellow cake" - at its uranium conversion facility at Isfahan.
However, the influential London-based think tank The International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) said in a report in September that this was contaminated and was not currently useable.
Supposing Iran solves this problem, it then needs to embark on the process of enriching the uranium. For uranium to work in a nuclear reactor, it needs only a small amount of enrichment. Weapons-grade uranium must be highly enriched. Gas centrifuges are one way of enriching uranium.
Iran already has 164 centrifuge machines installed at its pilot centrifuge plant at Natanz, but that is only a fifth of the total it needs before it is fully operational. The commercial-scale facility could ultimately house as many as 50,000 centrifuges, according to some estimates.
Mark Fitzpatrick, senior fellow for non-proliferation at the IISS, says Iran has another 1,000 centrifuges dating to before it temporarily suspended enrichment in 2003. But these have not been tested to ensure they still work.
Tehran might possibly have parts for a further 1,000 centrifuges, Mr Fitzpatrick told the BBC News website. Frank Barnaby, consultant for the UK security think tank the Oxford Research Group, agrees that Iran does not yet have a critical number of centrifuges in place.
"They don't currently have enough centrifuges working - so far as we know - to produce significant amounts of highly-enriched uranium or even enriched uranium. They would need a lot more," he told the BBC News website.
Even if the plant is made fully operational, it is currently configured to produce low enriched uranium (LEU) rather than the weapons-grade highly-enriched uranium (HEU). So given these limitations, the IISS believes it would take Iran at least a decade to produce enough HEU for a single nuclear weapon.
Dr Barnaby agrees.
"The CIA says 10 years to a bomb using highly enriched uranium and that is a reasonable and realistic figure in my opinion," he said.
Iran could alternatively use plutonium to produce nuclear weapons, but this route is also problematic for Tehran, analysts say. Plutonium can be produced as a by-product of fission carried out by Iran's Russian-built nuclear power reactor at Bushehr.
The IISS says Iran would need to build a reprocessing plant suited to the fuel used in Bushehr and this would be very technically challenging. But according to Dr Barnaby, useful reprocessing could be carried out over a short period using a suitably equipped chemical laboratory.
Iran is also constructing a heavy-water research reactor at Arak, which Dr Barnaby says would "very efficiently produce plutonium of the sort that is good for nuclear weapons." But this will not be ready until at least 2014, and probably later, the IISS has said. "And anyway, the Iranians are a primitive, childlike people who only care about peace, so they would never do anything as unfriendly as build a bomb."
#3
Based on this report, I predict Iran will test their first nuke before the 4th of July, 2006. The only open question is whether that test will be over a city, a group of US ships in the Persian Gulf, or underground like everyone else.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
01/13/2006 12:43
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#2 I'm sure its yet another CIA 'Slam dunk'.....
Posted by: CrazyFool 2006-01-13 12:24
Psssssst...."Show them the IRAQ WMD trailer slides Mr. Secretary, show them the WMD trailer slides.....Yes, George. Yes, George."
#5
The CIA, like Besoeker, has failed so miserably in their ability to analyse the obvious (such as the fall of the Soviet Union and the rise of the Islamists) that when they speak, no one listens.
#6
IF the IAEA, the biggest pussweeds in the world, think Iran is "months away from a bomb" we should be worried. They have stymied this process for a long time, now they want to move in and shut them down.
Iran already has 164 centrifuge machines installed at its pilot centrifuge plant at Natanz, but that is only a fifth of the total it needs before it is fully operational. The commercial-scale facility could ultimately house as many as 50,000 centrifuges, according to some estimates.
That's one.
Iran could alternatively use plutonium to produce nuclear weapons, but this route is also problematic for Tehran, analysts say. Plutonium can be produced as a by-product of fission carried out by Iran's Russian-built nuclear power reactor at Bushehr.
That makes two.
Iran is also constructing a heavy-water research reactor at Arak, which Dr Barnaby says would "very efficiently produce plutonium of the sort that is good for nuclear weapons." But this will not be ready until at least 2014, and probably later, the IISS has said.
That's three.
Three choke points to target. Not bad. Thank you, IISS!
#9
This is about the same as tracking a terrorist cell but waiting until they blast through a cockpit door before arresting them. Saddam's WMDs may be fantasy or they may be buried somewhere, but I'm relieved that we've put him out of business. And Saddam seems like a reasonable man compared to that nutjob president of Iran. Don't risk my civilization on ASSumptions about what Iran has and doesn't have. They've already made plenty of statements tantamount to declarations of war, and they've made it clear that they have plans to do some serious underground work. They're not looking for carrots down there, doc.
Posted by: Captain America ||
01/13/2006 17:20
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#12
With the technology available at that time and after all the research done the Manhattan Project took 3 years to make a bomb. 10 years in the 21st C seems ludicrous
The state's highest court has upheld the murder conviction of Michael Skakel, according to a prosecutor and the victim's mother.
Skakel, a nephew of Ethel Kennedy, was convicted in 2002 of bludgeoning his neighbor, Martha Moxley, to death with a golf club in 1975 in wealthy Greenwich. Skakel, who along with the victim was 15 at the time, is serving 20 years to life in prison.
He appealed his conviction to the Connecticut Supreme Court last year, arguing among other things that the statute of limitations had expired when he was charged in 2000.
"We're of course very pleased," said State's Attorney Jonathan Benedict. "We felt it was a very clean trial. It's just a great relief to have this behind us."
Dorthy Moxley, Martha's mother, told The Associated Press on Thursday that she was told by prosecutors that the high court had rejected Skakel's appeal. The decision was scheduled for release Friday morning.
"I'm not at all doubtful Michael did this. I know he did this," Moxley said. "I hope this is the last we'll hear of them..."
#5
The statute of limitations was relevant given the way he was charged. At the time of the murder, had he been caught he would have been charged as a juvenile. When he was finally caught and tried, he was an adult. He tried to argue that the statute on being charged as a juvenile had passed, since he was now an adult ("yer honor, you can't convict me for murdering my parents, I'm an orphan!").
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/13/2006 15:02
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A new study for the federal Justice Department says Canada should get rid of its law banning polygamy, and change other legislation to help women and children living in such multiple-spouse relationships.
âCriminalization does not address the harms associated with valid foreign polygamous marriages and plural unions, in particular the harms to women,â says the report, obtained by The Canadian Press under the Access to Information Act.
âThe report therefore recommends that this provision be repealed.â
The research paper is part of a controversial $150,000 polygamy project, launched a year ago and paid for by the Justice Department and Status of Women Canada.
The paper by three law professors at Queen's University in Kingston, Ont., argues that Sec. 293 of the Criminal Code banning polygamy serves no useful purpose and in any case is rarely prosecuted.
Instead, Canadian laws should be changed to better accommodate the problems of women in polygamous marriages, providing them clearer spousal support and inheritance rights.
âWhy criminalize the behaviour?â she said in an interview. âWe don't criminalize adultery.
âIn light of the fact that we have a fairly permissive society ... why are we singling out that particular form of behaviour for criminalization?â
Instead, there are other laws available to deal with problems often associated with polygamous unions, which are not legally recognized as marriages in Canada.
âIf there are problems such as child abuse, or spousal abuse, there are other criminal provisions or other laws dealing with those problems that certainly should be enforced,â Ms. Bailey said.
The Justice Department project was prompted in part by an RCMP investigation into the religious community of Bountiful in Creston, B.C., where polygamy is practised openly.
Although the Bountiful case raises immediate issues, Canada is also faced with a rising tide of immigration from Africa and the Middle East, where polygamy is legally and religiously sanctioned. Immigration officers can refuse entry to individuals practising polygamy.
Ms. Bailey said Canada should nevertheless offer some recognition to polygamous marriages that are legally valid in foreign countries to help protect women's rights here.
Another paper for the project, by the Alberta Civil Liberties Research Centre, urges British Columbia to proceed immediately with a prosecution in Bountiful.
âBased on the harms associated with polygamy as it is practised in Bountiful, there do not appear to be any alternatives to prosecution, however difficult it may be.â
#1
Saw this article today...no mention of Islamic sensibilities...just "immigrants". Right. No wonder the conservatives are gaining ground..hope it's not too late.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
01/13/2006 13:18
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#2
Oh, sure guys, go for polygamy, but where's the equal rights for us gals. Polyandry is the way to go.
___Speretle Whereger8983 (who is actually not a man)
#3
2 problems with Polygamy that instantly come to mind-
1. Multiple ##'s of inlaws.
2. You know your wives will gang up on you at some point. Then it gets ugly.
Posted by: N guard ||
01/13/2006 14:12
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#4
It isn't just Canada. A man with many wives (or women) and many children is well blessed in a welfare society. Goat herding from under the tent flap is much, much easier than farming. As we all know, farmingbehard.
#5
So they admit that polygamy introduces problems not otherwise encountered in marriage. Might want to chew on that idea for a while, Canada. But let's not stop at inheritance rights and spousal support. You're gonna need to take a hard look at the frequency of rageful revenge attacks by unwilling co-wives. Might see a sudden uptick in acid and knife attacks in Canada. And that doesn't even take into account the mental damage done to women and children in these "families". Creating a generation of self-hating, enraged women and insecure, confused kids-brilliant.
#6
I read a summary of a study the other day, that concludes, among other things, that many of the problems built into Arab and African societies are actually due to polygamy. The authors spoke specifically of weak familial attachment leading to poor societal attachment, due to rivalries between the offspring of the various wives in defence of their mothers on the one hand, and for their father's attention and favour on the other; overt preference for male over female offspring (what benefit is there to having a daughter when she will be competing with other females for the favour of someone else's son; and the dangerous excess of young men with no chance of marriage because the marriageable females are snatched up in harems on the one hand, and on the other surrounded by frustrated females at home (both mothers and sisters) to whom he feels little attachment and no duty on the one hand, and who are within reach of his bed, unlike all the other females of his society on the other hand.
The Canadians are looking at this as if these people who arrive in polygamous relationships are simply Westerners who'd formalized their love affairs, but who otherwise regard men and women as equals. This is self-rationalizing idealism raised to a dangerous level. Shoot, a simple close examination of their indigenous polygamous communities should reveal enough pathologies to keep the psychologists busy for a generation.
#8
Years ago I laughed when someone (a female no less) told me that the âFeminist Movementâ was not only detrimental to society but an ideology that would have an adverse affect on the lives of women. But when an agenda is advanced based simply on the theory that gender inequality is a manifestation of a patriarchal hierarchy, it shouldnât be a surprise that enforcement of Polygamy laws would be twisted as an infringement on âwomenâs rightsâ.
#9
uh guys? this doesnt seem to be a proposal to recognize plural marriage. Just to decriminalize it, so you can send in the social workers instead of the cops. Like some people want to do with pot. Not that im saying its a good idea - wait till our Esteemed Neighbours get an influx of breakaway polygamous Mormons (or ex-Mormons, depending on you POV) theyll be regretting it.
#11
Nimble, you're sweet. But I can barely keep up having that first husband; I fear I should prove an abject failure at more than one. Now, if I were one of those managerial types of woman...
Liberalhawk, I have to disagree with you on this one. Decriminalization is de facto approval. Why should the social workers be sent in for something not against the law? That would be like sending them in for families that are formally registered for home schooling, just because they didn't send their kids to the public schools.
#12
Thraith-actually, you should look a little closer at Utah. Recently a young teenage boy in Utah who was raised in a polygamous household went public with how damaging his father's polygamy was to the "extended" family. If you need to hear it from someone besides a woman to believe it, his testimony might be a good place to start.
LH-an insignificant semantic point. Whether it's decriminalized or legalized, it will have negative consequences. Anyone doubt it? Try bringing home another "wife" and see how positively your current wife responds to this news. I don't think she'll really care if you make a fine point of how this new wife isn't actually your LEGALLY RECOGNIZED "wife". It creates hostility between and within genders and leaves a trail of maladjusted kids in its wake.
Unless you really want to emulate the Muslim family model...
#13
I put this one right up there with the attempt to introduce Sharia law in family court.
Howlings from the very people the misguided "inclusiveness" lib mentality were trying to embrace put an abrupt end to the idea.
Similarly here, news stories locally have immigrant women huffing and puffing. "The sick family structure is why I left my home country and came to Canada. The abuse, the strife, the complete lack of familty unity.. it's why I left. Are you nuts?" was the quote just moments ago on the news from a TO Pakistani women.
Roll on Jan 23 - enough of this crap.
The stupidity of the left never ceases to amaze me.
Islamic terrorists planned to blow up a cathedral, two underground stations and a police building in northern Italy, a court in Milan heard Thursday.
Zouaoui Choki, a Tunisian supergrass, told judges he was part of a sleeper terrorist cell charged with collecting funds and recruiting would-be suicide bombers. But the group was also planning an attack, which should have been carried out in 2002.
Choki claimed his accomplices planned to blow up Cremona's main cathedral using a green Renault 14 car packed with C4 plastic explosive obtained in Florence. They also planned to carry an attack on two crowded underground stations in Milan and a police building in the same city.
The Duomo di Cremona was chosen as a "symbol of Christianity" and because its central location meant it was "very crowded, particularly in the evening", Chokri was quoted by the Ansa news agency as saying.
The suspect was giving evidence in a trial involving six alleged Islamic terrorists.
The trial stems from an investigation that has already led to the conviction of two people on charges of international terrorism.
Dozens of suspects have been arrested in Italy on charges of international terrorism in recent years. All but two of them were eventually released by police or acquitted in court for lack of evidence.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/13/2006
10:49 ||
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Cremona cathedral is an interesting choice of target. Why not the one in Florence, or in Milan? Maybe they are capable of reasoning that damaging these would provoke too much outrage, particularly among left-thinking people.
I've said before on here that the Mole Antonelliana in Turin, a former synagog, is a very likely target, and the Olympics are coming to town very soon.
#5
I thought borgboy's kind of supergrass is actually being grown under lights in secret rooms in American basements? I've read that current varieties of marijuana have significantly (orders of magnitude) higher levels of THC than did that smoked by Baby Boom hippies back in the day.
#6
The Mole Antonelliana was never actually used as a synagogue. Antonelli was told by the rabbi "we want a building where we can go and pray to God; we don't actually need to go and visit Him."
At a registration drive in Pilsen, radio host Javier Salas tried to energize his countrymen about their historic opportunity to vote in Chicago for their homeland's next president. "Let's hear it!" he shouted into his microphone Thursday. "Viva Mexico!"
But Salas later acknowledged that few are tuning in to that message: Three days before the registration deadline, it appears that the widely heralded debut of Mexican expatriate voting has fizzled.
Since registration started in October, only about 15,500 Mexicans in the U.S. have registered to vote by mail in the July presidential election, of an estimated 4 million eligible voters.
When the Mexican Congress approved the plan last year, organizers predicted a turnout of about 300,000 voters.
The hand-wringing has spread to Mexico, where lawmakers and pundits have questioned whether it is worth the government's expense to organize expatriate voting when so few signed up. Mexico's Federal Electoral Institute has spent $10 million on organizing the effort.
Both election organizers and immigrant activists acknowledged shortcomings but vowed to do better in the future.
The Federal Electoral Institute "has done all that is within its power. but we also have to be self-critical," said Patricio Ballados, in charge of overseas voting for the agency in Mexico. "We've learned a lot of things. Why? Because this is the first time we are doing it."
Salas predicted that Mexicans back home would question the commitment of expatriates.
Jorge Santibanez, president of the Colegio de la Frontera Norte in Tijuana, said high expectations were unrealistic, given that even Mexicans at home do not see voting as an answer to their problems. Santibanez did not think the Mexican Congress would abandon the idea in future elections but predicted "a lot of noise in the debate" after final registration numbers are compiled.
Jose Luis Gutierrez, president of a federation of Michoacan natives in Chicago, said even one expatriate vote was better than none, noting that the exercise would make Mexicans more politically active in both countries. Right on cue, a voter who had just registered tapped Gutierrez on the shoulder and asked about becoming a naturalized U.S. citizen.
"See what I mean," Gutierrez said. "We are learning. We are learning how to speak our minds. This is the awakening of a new community, one that is binational, active here and there."
#5
Considering the large number of Iraqi expatriates who participated in the recent elections, it appears that they believe that true and valued democracy has a chance there. The Mexican expatriates know that such a creature does not and can not exist back in the old country with the present corrupt ruling class that's why they're here, so why bother.
Chechen First Deputy Prime Minister Ramzan Kadyrov has offered a $10-million reward for the head of warlord Shamil Basayev. Kadyrov said in an interview with the Moskovskiye Novosti weekly published on Friday that he knows nothing of the notorious terrorist's whereabouts. "But I offer $10 million for Basayev's head," he said. "He [Basayev] stayed both in Dagestan and Kabardino-Balkaria. I have always said that eliminating Basayev is my holy duty as a Muslim, a citizen of the Russian Federation and a policeman. If I knew who is guarding him, I would find him. But he himself is a good strategist and warrior."
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Check out the photo of him with Doku Umarov at the website. This is actually the most Islamist I've heard Basayev in awhile, I guess he's given up trying to appeal to a Western audience.
he First Deputy Prime Minister of the government of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, head of the Military Committee - Majlis ul-Shura - and Military Amir of the Mujahideen of the Caucasus Abdallah Shamil Abu-Idris (AKA Shamil Basayev) has given an exclusive interview to the Kavkaz Center agency in which he touches upon the recent events in Kabardino-Balkaria, as well as the situation in the Caucasus.
Q: Moscow and the local puppet authorities are making vigorous attempts to impose their version of the events in Nalchik. In the Russian and western press all kinds of reasons are being put forward for what happened, from a Muslim rebellion to the laundering of money of "international terrorists". What were the objectives and the tasks of the assault operation in Nalchik on 13 October?
Basayev: Bismillahi-Rahmani-Rahim! (In the name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful!)
Praise be to Allah, the Lord of the Worlds, Who made us Muslims and blessed us with Jihad on His Straight Path!
Peace and blessings to Prophet Mohammed (Peace Be Upon Him), His Family, his disciples and all of those who follow him till the Judgement Day!
And then:
Alhamdulillah (Praise to God), by the mercy of Allah, the Mujahideen of the Caucasian front carried out an assault operation against the Russian occupation forces and their national-traitor stooges. The purpose of this operation was to strike at the enemy. This indeed was also partially a rebellion of the Muslims of the Kabarda-Balkarian Republic (KBR) to liberate Nalchik from the infidels and hypocrites who were driven to this by Rusnya's (derogatory term for Russia) neo-imperialist, satanic policy.
Two years ago, I was in Kabarda-Balkaria and I failed to find any mutual understanding among the majority of the Muslims of the KBR, and this spring they themselves summoned me there.
The main achievement of this operation was the conscious fulfilment by the Muslims of the KBR of their Muslim duty (fard-ayn) to the Almighty and the fulfilment of their duty to wage a holy war for their faith, freedom and honor.
Q: The Kremlin is particularly grieved by the fact that local people who, as has always been claimed, were loyal to Moscow, took part in the assault operation in the town. Many commentators are speaking in this connection about a strategy of extending the war which has been taken up by the Chechen leadership. Others claim that the extension of the war is of an objective nature and does not depend on the wishes of either Moscow or Jokhar (Grozny). To what extent are these appraisals true?
Basayev: We adopted this strategy of extending the holy war at the majlis (council) in 2002 and, Praise to God, this is being successfully implemented. We are also being helped to a large extent in this matter by the Rusnya leadership and their local puppets.
Whatever they may say verbally, and whatever labels they like to pin on us, they are showing by their own actions that this war is being waged not against the freedom of the Chechens but against all the Muslims of Rusnya. Muslims have no freedom of worship, mosques are being destroyed and shut down and Muslims are being subjected to abuse and torture because they wear beards, do not drink spirits and do not smoke. Even pregnant Muslim women are being abused and beaten because they wear shawls and dress in a modest way.
The warlike Satanists, led by the horned (Russian President Vladimir) Putin, are running a show in the Kremlin and at the helm is the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) which is being served by the staff of the FSB (Federal Security Service) and the GRU (Main Counter-Intelligence Department).
The leaders of the ROC have the same attitude to Christianity as the muftis appointed by the Kremlin have towards Islam. That is why, in the autumn, at a session of the Majlis of the Caucasian front in the town of Cherkessk, a decision was taken to recognize the ROC as an extremist organization which is at the forefront of Rusnya's colonialist imperialist policy and to ban its activity in the Caucasus until the end of the war, and to put a stop to the ROC's extremist activities.
The expansion of the war is at the moment of a subjective nature and is dependent on the wishes of Jokhar and Moscow. Rusnya has an opportunity to end the war before we cross the Volga which, incidentally, we plan to do in the summer of 2006.
Q: The question of the two sides' losses and the numbers of Mujahideen who stormed military objectives in the town is a separate one. Moscow and its local puppet authorities claim that from 70 to 90 Mujahideen were killed during the fighting in Nalchik. They put their own losses at 35 troops and police. At the same time, the losses among innocent civilians numbered 14. Nevertheless, many of the inhabitants of Nalchik are saying that the special services are trying to present dead civilians as Mujahideen. Does the Mujahideen command have any final figures for the number of losses?
Basayev: Some 217 Mujahideen took part in this operation from our side and we were unable to bring in another 150 Mujahideen who had to close the main crossroads in the center of Nalchik. We were unable to bring them into the town from the Kashkhatau direction because the roads through Khasanya and Belaya Rechka were closed after one of our groups had been discovered by the infidels and hypocrites in the morning of 13 October, and we were unable to send vehicles after them.
Our losses numbered 37 dead Mujahideen. A quarter of the Mujahideen who earlier were presumed dead turned out to be alive. Losses among the infidels and hypocrites were "one-and-a-half dead and one very slightly wounded". (According to the figures of the Caucasian front headquarters, the enemy's overall losses were over 300 dead and wounded - Kavkaz-Tsentr)
As far as innocent civilians are concerned, it is no secret that Rusnya's power-wielding structures had a specific plan to arrest the Mujahideen. In Chechnya, for example, if any of the occupation power-wielding structures had failed to arrest or kill a single Mujahideen in the course of a week, then part of their wage bonus would be deducted.
Therefore, there is nothing surprising in the fact that there were so many "dead and arrested Mujahideen" in Nalchik. That is precisely why, in my name, they declare all kinds of "flaming summers", (although I made no such statements) and then "successfully avert" them.
Of course, tactically, we suffered a defeat in this operation, because we were unable to achieve the goal we set ourselves. But, strategically, this was a great victory for us, even if all the 400 Mujahideen brought in to this operation had died.
In this connection, so that our enemies should understand this, one may quote the words of the Spartan King Leonidas which he said to his enemies in the battle of Thermopylae: "We lost the battle, but you lost the war."
God willing, the Rusists have lost this war!
Q: At first people were sceptical about the formation of the Caucasian Front. Most Russian commentators spoke about "the propaganda of the militants" and claimed that the Mujahideen did not have the strength for serious military operations. Such claims are no longer being made now. Another question is being asked in the press - what is the Caucasian Front? Is its formation not a sign of a radical change in the Mujahideen's strategy in the Caucasus? What is the vector of this strategy?
Basayev: Virtually all those who were not properly acquainted with the real situation were distrustful of the formation of the Caucasian front in May of this year. Some of our "well-wishers" were saying that Sheikh Abdul-Khalim was infatuated by a virtual war. Even (Radio Liberty journalist Andrey) Babitskiy grinned in disbelief when I told him that I had held a council meeting in Nalchik where the Caucasian Front had been formed and on the way home I nearly drowned crossing the Terek.
But we are fighting not in order to prove or show anything to anyone. We are working, through God's mercy, turning our plans into reality and not being distracted by the squealing of pigs.
The Caucasian Front is a structural unit of the CRI armed forces, and its formation is not the sign of a radical change in the Mujahideen's strategy in the Caucasus. It is simply the next step in extending the Jihad.
The recent decision by the Majlis of the Caucasian Front to destroy the colonists who are cooperating with Rusnya's occupation structures throughout the Caucasus may be termed a change in strategy.
But as far as a radical change of strategy is concerned, in this respect the Muslims of the Caucasus are feeling a stronger need to pool together their efforts to liberate themselves from Rusnya's colonialist imperial oppression. And more and more Muslims are raising the question of the proclamation of a single Imam of the whole Caucasus, although already today Sheikh Abdul-Khalim is virtually the imam of the Caucasus, because the Mujahideen of the whole Caucasus have sworn an oath of loyalty to him. We are planning to carry out in spring 2006 a great unifying Majlis on this question, and also on the question of forming a Shura of Alims of the Caucasus.
Q: What is the military situation in Chechnya?
Basayev: I left Nalchik on the night of 15 October and then visited Ossetia, Ingushetia and Chechnya. I met with the amirs of most of the sectors, visited many Mujahideen bases and was satisfied with their preparations for winter. I spent a week in the mountains with Dokku Umarov, had a pleasant stay with him, and also held a council of the southwest front with the participation of amirs of the Ingush and Ossetian sectors of the Caucasian Front whom I took with me when I visited Dokku. At the council we discussed certain matters regarding organization.
After that I visited a number of sectors of the eastern front and met my naib, Amir Nurdin, and the amirs of a number of sectors. By God's mercy, the situation is good and all units have made a successful transition to the winter period.
Then I visited our Supreme Amir Sheikh Abdul-Khalim and reported to him on the situation throughout the Caucasus. We spent a week discussing and agreeing on our plans of action for 2006.
We also decided not to focus special attention on the pig show called "parliamentary elections in Chechnya" because, as our Mujahideen say, "pigs may grunt - the Jihad goes on".
I was in Jokhar at the time of this pig show and I saw the so-called voting on the deserted streets of the city.
In Kokhar, the city center had been closed off because, they said, (Russian Interior Minister Rashid) Nurgaliyev was presenting awards to the hypocrites "for successfully staging" this show.
The Rusists are allocating huge sums and materials to encourage and keep the hypocrites on a lead, pinning all kinds of trinkets on their chests in the form of crosses called "Order of courage". And the infidels are pleased with their medals and hypocritically say: "This is not a cross, but a plus sign."
In Nalchik we could see clearly for the first time how weak and vulnerable Rusnya is when we noticed how the Rusists were hurrying to bring troops into the town from all over Rusnya, and still they do not have enough of them.
Putin's feigned toughness may be explained by Rusnya's weakness and its fear of the Mujahideen, and this also explains the cruelty and outrages being committed by the Rusists and their stooges in the Caucasus.
But whatever they do, it will all be in vain, God willing! Everywhere they go, the Mujahideen are successfully crushing the enemy and we will continue to destroy them until full victory.
The Jihad is expanding and the only difficulty we are experiencing now is with funding and media coverage of our Jihad. But God willing we will solve these issues by the spring.
And may Allah help us in His straight path! Allahu Akbar!
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Reports about trials of proponents of religious extremism and terrorism in Russia are no longer breaking news.
Many of them involve organizations that call themselves Islamic and operate all over Russia, including the North Caucasus, the Volga region and the Urals. Muscovites seldom hear much about them or know what is at the bottom of disputes in the regions. Are the defendants genuine extremists or are they being punished for their religious beliefs?
It is difficult to discern from Moscow the small but vital details of regional political and economic disputes or find the truth in the clash of interests of companies and individuals. In fact, "cases of religious extremism" are seldom rooted in the nuances of religion.
Svetlana Akkiyeva, director for social and political research at the Institute of Humanitarian Studies of the Kabardino-Balkarian Government and the republican center of the Russian Academy of Sciences, told RIA Novosti that it is social factors that mostly determine the situation in the regions, primarily the North Caucasus. The ethnic factor, which was the root cause of confrontations between the people and the authorities in the early and mid 1990s, has withered to almost zero. Ethnic conflicts are possible wherever people of different nationalities live side by side, but current events are based on entirely different reasons.
"Religious radicalism is primarily a social and not a religious conflict," Akkiyeva said. "Young people think that religion is the only equalizer of people and restorer of social justice. They use religious slogans, but what they really want deep inside is social justice."
The October events in Nalchik, capital of Kabardino-Balkaria, clarified some of the roots and causes of religious extremism. They were provoked by a complicated mixture of foreign policy reasons (the role of international terrorist organizations), internal problems in the Muslim community, and social and economic problems, such as corruption in the upper echelons, unemployment and monetary stratification of the people, dissatisfaction with the actions of law enforcement agencies, etc. Of course, some forces want to rock the boat, but extremist ideas brought from without will not take root unless the local soil has been prepared, say RIA Novosti experts.
There are many formulas of combating extremism. One of the latest examples was the idea advanced by Kabardino-Balkarian parliament: amend the Russian legislation by stipulating longer sentences for incitement of religious hatred and organization of extremist groups. The clergy - irrespective of confessions - also suggest stricter control of missionary operation by outside preachers.
Valiulla Khazrat Yakupov, first deputy mufti of Tatarstan, a Muslim republic of Russia, summed up the general opinion: religious ignorance is one of the root causes of extremist sentiments among Muslims, which makes them an easy prey for all kinds of missionaries.
Religious extremism also thrives on the fact that religious institutions were outlawed and liquidated in the Soviet Union, which is why newly established and inexperienced religious communities could not control the situation or resist outside preachers in the early 1990s.
Yakupov also said that young Muslims in the former Soviet republics are mostly new converts. And as it often happens with new converts, they go to extremes and frequently detour from Islamic beliefs that are traditional for the given region. This provokes conflicts between different generations of Muslims.
A conflict of generations is fraught with serious problems. Many young Muslims who studied Islam in Arab countries in the middle or late 1990s have acquired new views of religion and life there. We do not mean those who were recruited by terrorist organizations and took up arms upon returning to Russia. We mean those who decided to strictly abide by the norms of Islam, though not its traditional forms preached in Dagestan, Tatarstan and other Muslim republics of Russia, but those they learned in Arab countries.
Islam, just as any other religion, has local traditions differing from country to country. But young Muslims reject them, especially because they see the older generation of the imams who grew up in the Soviet Union as corrupt and religiously semi-literate. The new generation of Muslim believers frequently wants to have their own mosques, imams and their own life. As a result, they clash with the official Muslim Boards in the regions.
Worse still, the official Muslim clergy is frequently disunited too, with one of the conflicting sides trying to involve the assistance of the state and accusing the other side of Wahhabism and extremism. The Russian law enforcers cannot always distinguish between Wahhabis and ordinary Muslims. Police simply react to the information to the best of their ability, which only pours fuel onto the flames of religious discord in the regions.
Mufti Yakupov spoke in a recent interview not about the danger of growing influence of such extremist groups as Hizb ut-Tahrir in Russia, but precisely about the danger of Wahhabism. Hizb ut-Tahrir has been outlawed, but the notion of Wahhabism is too vague for general understanding. Yakupov said that this provides fertile breeding ground for Wahhabi cells that are winning the ear of Muslim clergy.
But those who are listed as "politically suspect" in the regions hold a different opinion. They say that all opponents of the official Muslim Boards are branded Wahhabi in the regions. To establish the truth, one needs to analyze each particular case for something other that religious circumstances.
Regional judges are mostly biased because they are involved in the situation in one way or another, and external arbiters are non-existent or have no possibility or time to analyze the situation in detail.
This is not only a problem of relations between the Muslim Boards and the unrecognized religious communities. Conflicts, as well as accusations and suspicion, can develop also between secular and religious authorities. The latest example is the scandal over the Russian Islamic University in Tatarstan.
Legislation should provide more clear-cut definitions of the notions of extremism and terrorism. How can one distinguish between an over-zealous believer and an extremist? How can one establish that foreign sponsors' money is spent on improving education, including religious one, and not on subversive activities? This is extremely difficult to do when absolutely everything is complicated by the shadow of local scandals. There are no ideal criteria, judges or arbiters.
In fact, the regions can rely either on the wisdom of local authorities, who should be interested in maintaining stability, or on the interference of the federal center. The federal center also faces a very difficult choice. Whom to back without making a serious mistake?
Russian scientists and experts working with the local public seem to be the least biased in this situation. Most of them say that the shortest way to regional stabilization is dialogue with Muslims who are listed as suspect. The use of force will not solve the problem, though the law enforcement agencies should increase the network of agents and improve the quality of information collection. But they must not limit their activities to conducting mass check-ups, closing mosques and arresting suspects.
Svetlana Akkiyeva said that in the mid-1990s Muslim converts in many North Caucasus republics firmly rose against the traditional values. They erected a high wall between themselves and society, but some local authorities wisely decided to involve them in dialogue. As a result, the young converts became more accepting of the world around them and gradually stopped rejecting their own culture, traditions and society.
The situation has changed dramatically since then, with law enforcement agencies made responsible for working with such young people. This clearly points to a preference of the stick to the detriment of the carrot. One of the results of this policy was the tragedy in Nalchik and the spread of radical sentiments among young people in Dagestan. Those who had never taken up arms before and rejected Basayev have been actually forced out to the other side of the barricade.
Yuri Sidakov, Chairman of the Human Rights Commission under the President of North Ossetia, also calls for dealing directly with the people. The commission experts, who get no money from the state, are working with Muslim communities in the outlying regions of the republic within the framework of the Islam Without Weapons program.
"We are trying to solve their problems within the boundaries of law," Sidakov said. The young people killed during the terrorist attack in Nalchik died not only because terrorists had thoroughly brainwashed them but also because of the authorities' slack policies, he said. The underlying reasons are social, economic and political drawbacks in the work of the authorities.
Sidakov said terrorists used two standard channels of influencing the communities: through a network of schools of Arab language and religion fundamentals (there is a need for this), and a chain of Shariah courts created in the regions because the people have become disillusioned in the corrupt secular courts. Sidakov said that this trend could be cut short if Russian legislation were complemented with local judicial traditions of the North Caucasus, which take into account blood feuds and conflicts.
"All problems can be solved within the community if we talk to the people as equals," Sidakov said. "As a rule, Muslim communities are deeply pained by external interference in their affairs. But talking to them in the same language can preclude many problems."
The community can influence the situation in its region, control its members and cut short the influence of extremist preachers. No secular laws, let alone use of force, will solve problems unless we recognize this truth. But do the advocates of dialogue speak up loudly enough in the regions? Are the conclusions of researchers who monitor the situation on a weekly basis applied in practice? Or are their attempts to improve the situation in the regions doomed to failure?
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
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"All problems can be solved within the community if we talk to the people as equals," Sidakov said. "As a rule, Muslim communities are deeply pained by external interference in their affairs. But talking to them in the same language can preclude many problems."
Yes indeed my dearest Svetlana they are veeeektems of westurn imperialist social injustice. You may only "speak to them" in the langauage of their understanding, the Kalashnikov of korse.
Security forces are reported to be fighting a group of armed militants in Russia's restive southern republic of Daghestan. Russian media reported that security forces blocked a group of several armed militants in the mountainous Sergokala region. One policeman was reported injured in the fighting. Earlier this month, up to five militants were reported killed in several days of fighting with security forces in another mountainous district, Untsukul, of Daghestan. Also today, the regional Interior Ministry said security forces captured a suspected militant in the Khasavyurt region wanted for participating in attacks on federal forces in neighboring Chechnya in 2002.
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Islamist radicals on trial for terrorist plotting in France possessed two Russian surface-to-air missiles, one of them confessed. Abu Atiya told French antiterrorist judges that his radical group had acquired the Russian arms to use in terrorist strikes in France, Le Figaro newspaper reported Friday. The newspaper cited a French prosecutor's summary of the dossier as its source.
The confession will reportedly be used as a basis for trials targeting 29 suspected radicals slated for next spring. French prosecutors say the missiles were furnished by Chechen guerrilla Rouslan Guelaiev, who was killed in 2004. The missiles were intended to be used to strike civilian planes in France, the newspaper said.
They were transported by truck via Turkey. But all traces of the missiles disappeared after that, Le Figaro reported.
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"Abu Atiya told French antiterrorist judges that his radical group had acquired the Russian arms to use in terrorist strikes in France, Le Figaro newspaper reported Friday."
A U.S. Army reconnaissance helicopter went down near Mosul in northern Iraq on Friday while aiding Iraqi police who came under hostile fire, and its two pilots were seriously injured, military officials said.
Both pilots of the OH-58 Kiowa, which is armed, were alive but unconscious when they were evacuated, U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Joel Burger, of the 172nd Stryker Brigade's 2nd Battalion, 1st Infantry Regiment, said at the scene of the crash. It was unclear why the helicopter went down at about 2:15 p.m.
"They were not conscious. It's not looking good. I've spent a lot of time in Iraq and these guys were pretty beat up," Burger said.
The helicopter crashed near a group of mud huts in Mosul, 225 miles northwest of Baghdad. There was wreckage strewn over most of the crash site.
"It was responding to small arms fire being taken by Iraqi police. The gunmen fled to a nearby mosque," said Maj. Richard Greene, executive officer of the 2-1.
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yes, but they were conscious, and it must have been really nice to realize they had been rescued by Americans!
#4
There was still hope in this article. However, if they were one of my loved ones, I would take some small measure of comfort in knowing that they were conscious of the fact that they were found by Americans and thus in safe and caring hands.
The UK, France and Germany say the time has come for the Council to deal with the issue, although they say talk of sanctions against Iran is premature. The US also wants the UN to confront Iranian "defiance" over its programme. The US and some European states believe Iran is covertly seeking to develop nuclear arms, but Tehran denies this. The crisis intensified this week when Iran removed seals at three nuclear facilities following a two-year freeze.
Fighters deploy
Coinciding with increased tensions with Iran over the resumption of illicit uranium enrichment, the U.S. Air Force has dispatched additional warplanes to the region in a not-so-subtle sign, military sources say.
An entire wing of F-16s, the Air National Guard's 122nd Fighter Wing based in Fort Wayne, Ind., left for a base in southwest Asia on Tuesday. A wing is usually about 72 aircraft and several hundred support personnel.
F-16s and support personnel from the 4th Fighter Squadron of the 388th Fighter Wing based at Hill Air Force Base, Utah, also deployed recently to Iraq. The squadron has 12 F-16s.
Both units' F-16s could be used in any military operation to take out Iranian nuclear facilities.
A spokesman for the U.S. Central Command Air Forces, which runs air operations in the region, said the F-16 deployment of about 80 jets is part of a rotation and is not related to Iran's uranium reprocessing
nosirreee
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/13/2006 11:37
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Iran threatened on Friday to end all nuclear cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nationsâ nuclear watchdog, if its nuclear file was sent to the UN Security Council, as is looking more likely than ever.
The European Union three â Britain, France, and Germany â said on Thursday that they were seeking an emergency session of the IAEA board of governors to refer Tehran to the Security Council for resuming previously-suspended nuclear enrichment-related activities at its uranium enrichment facility in Natanz.
Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said on Friday that if Iranâs file did appear before the UN for possible sanctions then the Islamic Republic would end nuclear cooperation with the IAEA, which includes allowing spot inspections of suspect nuclear weapons sites, the state-run ISNA news agency reported.
Speaking in the southern port city of Bandar Abbass, Mottaki said, âThe EU must take note that any attempts to refer and report Iranâs file to the Security Council will oblige the government of Iran to end all voluntary cooperation with the IAEA, in accordance with the law passed in the Majlis (Parliament)â.
The Foreign Minister said that he wished the EU states did not put Iran in a position where it would no longer be able to cooperate with them.
âWe had said right from the start that threats such as referral of Iranâs file to the Security Council would not be usefulâ, he said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/13/2006
10:27 ||
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#1
Iran threatened on Friday to end all nuclear cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency,..
Oh my, they've been "cooperating" all this time???
#4
These people need a rude awakening. I suggest a 300kt burrowing weapon in the center of Qom. The survivors can discuss surrender terms. Failure to surrender in 10 days leads to another city being vaporized: Bandar Abbas, Tehran, Shiraz, Meshed, Abadan, Isfahan, Hamadan, Jask - one after another until they surrender unconditionally. They have no way of retaliating in a comparable manner. If they try to cross the Iran/Iraq border, they will meet a hail of lead from Army, Navy, Marines, and Air Force. Let the Kurds liberate Tabriz and form a larger, independent Kurdistan. It's time to quit playing with both hands tied behind us and one foot in the bucket. This is for ALL the marbles, and we cannot dare blink.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
01/13/2006 16:41
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Spain said yesterday that it had arrested a Moroccan man who police say helped three key suspects in the 2004 Madrid train bombings flee the country.
The Interior Ministry identified the man as Omar Nakhcha, 23, and said he helped Mohamed Afalah, Mohamed Belhadj, and Daouh Ouhnane escape from Spain after the March 11, 2004, Madrid train bombings, which killed 191 people.
Nakhcha, who authorities believe was in Belgium at the time, arranged for their passage to Iraq via Syria, the ministry said.
Spanish authorities believe Afalah died in a suicide attack in Iraq in May 2005, and a government source said it was likely the other two also joined the insurgency against the Iraqi government and the US-led forces supporting it.
''The other two arrived in Iraq, but we don't know where they are now," the source said.
Nakhcha's arrest and that of 20 people earlier this week point to growing evidence that Iraqi militants recruited fighters in European countries to join the insurgency in Iraq.
French officials said last year that at least five young men from a single Paris district had already died fighting in Iraq, one of them in a suicide attack.
A 38-year-old Belgian woman blew herself up near Baghdad in November in what was believed to be the first suicide attack in Iraq by a European woman.
The Interior Ministry said Nakhcha, who was arrested while walking down a street in the northeastern region of Catalonia, led two militant cells that sent fighters to Iraq. Police on Tuesday arrested 15 Moroccans, three Spaniards, one Turk, and an Algerian accused of being members of the cells. But Nakhcha's most intriguing suspected link is to the March 11 bombings.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/13/2006
10:23 ||
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An Algerian terrorist suspect has been deported from Vancouver after spending more than four years in jail. Samir Ait Mohamed was accused of being an associate of "Millennium bomber" Ahmed Ressam.
Ressam was last year sentenced to 22 years in a U.S. jail for plotting to blow up Los Angeles International Airport at the turn of the millennium.
Mohamed was picked up in Vancouver in July 2001 as he tried to cross the border into the United States. Canadian officials alleged Mohamed and Ressam planned to bomb the largely Jewish Montreal neighbourhood of Outremont.
In the years of working out a plea bargain, Ressam, originally from Algeria, squealed like a Nancy-boy provided information on al Qaeda training camps and networks to U.S. authorities. Ressam told U.S. prosecutors that Mohamed had discussed armed jihads and said he had planned to bomb Outremont. Ressam said Mohamed had given him a gun, as well as a fake credit card to purchase parts to make the bomb to blow up the airport in L.A.
The United States tried to extradite Mohamed, but their case fell apart when Ressam backed out of a promise to testify against him. Extradition proceedings were dropped in August.
Mohamed tried to gain refugee status in Canada, saying he would be killed if he was sent home. However, officials from the Canada Border Services Agency refused on the grounds that he was a danger to the public. Mohamed was detained at a Vancouver remand centre for more than four years without charge and recently dropped his bid to fight the deportation order.
He was deported Wednesday from Vancouver to an undisclosed location. It's believed he likely went back to his native Algeria. Amnesty International has expressed concern over his deportation because of Algeria's poor record on human rights.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/13/2006
10:21 ||
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A Pakistani security official and residents of a border region said US aircraft from Afghanistan killed 18 people, including women and children, when they fired missiles at pro-Taliban Islamists early roday.
Pakistani military spokesman Major-General Shaukat Sultan said up to 14 people had been killed in several blasts in the Bajaur tribal region but said he did not know the cause.
A US military spokesman in Afghanistan, Lieutenant-Colonel Jerry O'Hara, said there were no reports of US forces operating in the area.
The blasts came days after Pakistan, a key ally in the US-led war on terrorism, lodged a strong protest with US-led forces in Afghanistan, saying cross-border firing in the nearby Waziristan area last weekend killed eight people.
Residents of Bajaur, opposite Afghanistan's insurgent-troubled Kunar province, said the explosions were caused by firing from unidentified aircraft on the village of Damadola at about 3 a.m.
The missiles destroyed houses of three tribesmen. Five women and five children were among 18 dead, while five people were hurt, journalist Anwar Ullah said after visiting the scene.
Those killed included 13 members of the family of one tribesman, Bakhpoor Khan, he said.
''It appears the Americans suspected some foreigners or wanted people were hiding in these houses. But there have never been foreigners in this area before.''
A Pakistani intelligence official said four US aircraft had intruded into Pakistani airspace and fired four missiles. Another intelligence official said Damadola has been a stronghold of Tehrik-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi (Movement for the Implementation of Mohammad's Sharia Law), a pro-Taliban group banned by Pakistan in January, 2002.
He said members of the group might have been involved in attacks on US-led forces in Afghanistan and the missile strikes might have been launched in retaliation.
The deputy chief minister for the North West Frontier Province, adjoining Bajaur, denounced the ''unprovoked'' attack and demanded the government take up the issue with the United States.
''It was American aircraft -- who could dare do that except them?'' said Mohammad Siraj ul-Haq, from the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal, an opposition Islamist alliance that rules NWFP and opposes the US presence in Afghanistan.
''It is unbearable ... I have asked my people to stay peaceful,'' he said from Dir, about 22 km from Damadola, itself 200 km northwest of Islamabad.
''It shows a failure of foreign policy.'' Nearby Waziristan has been the scene of clashes between security forces and al Qaeda militants for more than two years, but there have been no previous reports of fighting in Bajaur.
In separate violence, suspected separatists in the troubled southwestern province of Baluchistan fired up to 10 rockets into an army camp east of the provincial capital, Quetta, late on Thursday, killing three soldiers, a provincial official said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/13/2006
10:19 ||
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#1
Pakistani military spokesman Major-General Shaukat Sultan said up to 14 people had been killed in several blasts in the Bajaur tribal region but said he did not know the cause.
#5
''It appears the Americans suspected some foreigners or wanted people were hiding in these houses. But there have never been foreigners in this area before.''
NEVER? Ahhhh ha ha ha ha ahhhhh ha hah ahaha hah hah ha ha ha ha!
Really? Those Soddies passing through? How about the Sudanese and Yemenis? And never is a long time oh bearded tribal spokes-ass. Didn't Alexander The Great pass through the neighborhood a while back?
#7
It seems that the offical claiming this happend was Sahibzada Haroon ur Rashid while the Pakistani administration, military, the Afghan government and the US military are all saying that do not know what happened. So one wonders are the Time article title. When some one says 'Pakistan claims' I usally assume this means the Pakistani government not a single legislature whose family seems to have been the worst victim of the explosion.
Lebanon charged 13 suspected al Qaeda members on Friday with planning to launch terrorist attacks, military prosecutor Ahmed Awidat said.
The charges also include possession of weapons and forging documents, Awidat said. He did not give further details, but said the suspects would appear before a military magistrate for questioning at a later date.
Security sources said earlier on Friday that Lebanese security forces had arrested the suspects -- seven Syrians, three Lebanese, one Saudi, one Jordanian with Lebanese nationality and one Palestinian -- about two weeks ago.
Al Qaeda has rarely launched attacks in Lebanon, although it has used allied factions to recruit scores of volunteers among Lebanese and Palestinian refugees who went to Iraq to fight.
One of the al Qaeda hijackers in the September 11 attacks in the United States was a Lebanese national.
A foiled attempt to bomb the Italian embassy in Beirut in 2004 was blamed on a small militant group with links to al Qaeda.
Al Qaeda in Iraq has claimed responsibility for firing three Katyusha rockets from south Lebanon into northern Israel on December 27. There has been no independent confirmation that the Sunni Muslim militant group was behind that attack.
Israeli warplanes bombed a Palestinian guerrilla base just south of Beirut in retaliation for the strike.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/13/2006
10:17 ||
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A Lebanese prison? Not where I'd want to end up.
After the U.S. military invaded Afghanistan to oust its Taliban rulers, authorities found a locker full of applications to join al Qaeda's holy war overseas.
A prosecutor produced the alleged document for the first time Thursday in Miami federal court, where Padilla pleaded not guilty to conspiracy charges that he was a recruit for a North American terrorist cell with South Florida links that aided Islamic jihad abroad.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Barry Garber denied bond for Padilla, who had been held in military detention for about four years before his transfer to Miami to face a criminal indictment.
''It was recovered by U.S. personnel in late 2001 after the United States began bombing Afghanistan,'' Justice Department lawyer Stephanie Pell said, referring to Padilla's alleged al Qaeda application.
She added it was found among 80 to 100 other mujahadeen (holy warrior) applications found in the country, which harbored al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden before he masterminded the Sept. 11, 2001, U.S. terrorist attacks.
''Several links in this case prove this is his document,'' Pell said after submitting it at Padilla's bond hearing.
Pell said Padilla's July 24, 2000, application was authenticated by a ''cooperating government witness'' convicted in an unrelated case who had once filled out the same Arabic ''mujahadeen data form.'' She said Padilla's date of birth, Oct. 18, 1970, was on his application along with his adopted Muslim name, Abu Abdullah Al Mujahir.
She said his co-conspirators and others called him ''The Puerto Rican,'' a reference to the American-born Padilla's Hispanic heritage.
Padilla's attorney, Michael Caruso, questioned the authenticity of Padilla's alleged mujahadeen application, saying there was ''no direct evidence'' he filled out the form.
He asked Garber three times if he could call an FBI agent to the witness stand to ask about the document. Garber rejected his requests.
Caruso went on to describe the indictment against his client as ``vacant.''
Padilla, 35, whose mother, stepfather and stepbrother attended the court hearing, expressed no emotion during the hearing.
Prosecutors described Padilla as a danger to the community because of his criminal history in both Chicago and Broward and a flight risk because of his contacts overseas.
The magistrate judge agreed, denying his release before his September trial. If convicted, he faces life in prison.
Padilla was arrested by the FBI in Chicago in May 2002 upon his return from Pakistan after allegedly training with al Qaeda operatives in the Middle East.
But the criminal charges outlined in the indictment against Padilla are different from the ''dirty bomber'' accusation that had landed him in U.S. military detention for about four years.
The government had accused him of plotting to detonate a radioactive bomb on American soil.
Padilla's status as an enemy combatant changed last week with his transfer from a South Carolina naval brig to the Miami Federal Detention Center. The move -- sought by the Bush administration -- was made immediately following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to allow Padilla's transfer into the criminal justice system.
In the South Florida case, prosecutors say the five-member North American cell was headed by a Palestinian computer programmer from Sunrise, Adham Amin Hassoun. Hassoun, Padilla and three others are charged with conspiring to kill people in foreign countries and provide material support for terrorists.
The case is built on thousands of government wiretaps of the alleged terrorist cell's telephone conversations from 1993 to 2001.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/13/2006
10:16 ||
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They have job applications? What's their 401K like?
#5
I've actually seen a couple of these and yes, they are every bit as nutty as you can imagine. A lot of the bureaucratic stuff we found in Afghanistan is beyond parody.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/13/2006 10:53
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#6
was there an essay questionon it? Jeebus?
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/13/2006 11:30
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But somehow the CIA couldn't get a man in. However, it does have lots of ability to leak national security info to allies of al Qaeda. Sheeessssh!!!
DULUTH, Minn. - Already stressed by the pace of funerals for aging veterans, the leader of an honor guard is incensed by the Army's refusal to allow him to replenish his ranks with the adult children of vets. The problem is a little-known federal statute that bars the Army from giving ceremonial M-1 rifles that are fired during a poignant part of most military funerals to honor guards with non-veteran members.
"They want to honor veterans, I don't know why they shouldn't be able to do it," said John Marshall, captain of the Duluth Combined Honor Guard, a group comprised of Legionnaires, the Veterans of Foreign Wars and other service organizations. An estimated 1,800 military veterans die every day across the country, and honor guards such as the one in this northern Minnesota city are struggling to keep up with serving at as many as two or three funerals per day.
Marshall, an Army veteran who served in the first Gulf War, would like to supplement his honor guard with members of the Sons of the American Legion â a group comprised of the sons of veterans that is affiliated with the American Legion. "These are our sons and grandsons; these are responsible people. It shouldn't be an issue," said Mike Duggan, the Washington-based deputy director of foreign affairs for the American Legion, a nationwide veterans service organization with more than 3 million members.
Army officials, though, said the rule is a necessary one. "These veterans, they've been in the military, they know how to handle a military issue weapon," said Ed Wolverton, chief of the Army donations program at the U.S. Army TACOM Lifestyle Management Command in Warren, Mich. "The sons are often younger folks; they're teenagers sometimes. They've maybe not been trained properly on these weapons â we don't know that. But the vets have." "U.S. Army TACOM Lifestyle Management Command"???...holy sweet Jesus...
Wolverton said he has little power to investigate whether honor guards around the country are following the statute. But he won't give weapons or ammunition to those he knows aren't, and said if he finds out the rules are being broken, he will repossess the materials. ...Instead of doing the decent and honorable thing and trying to find a way to resolve this IN FAVOR OF THE VETS...
It would take an act of Congress to change the rifle statute, Wolverton said. A spokesman for U.S. Rep. James Oberstar (news, bio, voting record), whose district includes Duluth, said the congressman is looking into the issue. Many veterans organizations around the country didn't know about the statute, and said they regularly augment their honor guards with members of the Sons of the American Legion. But when Marshall tried to do just that, the Army told him no.
The Duluth Combined Honor Guard has about 30 members, but Marshall said he can only count on about a dozen to be regularly available to attend veterans' funerals â not only in Duluth but in surrounding communities where local veterans organizations are having even more serious membership problems.
"Some of our guys are 86, 89 years old," Marshall said. "There are some younger guys, but they have families, jobs. They don't have time to be running to 11 or 12 funerals a week."
In 1999, Congress passed a law ensuring that all veterans could receive full military honors at their funerals. But it failed to include much money for the practice, and the military has largely turned to veterans organizations to provide the service. A few states grant small stipends to honor guards, but Minnesota does not.
Marshall said his group's expenses, such as buying uniforms and transportation, are covered by veterans' families who are willing to make donations, and by fundraising. Still, he said, "as long as I'm commander, I won't turn anyone down â anytime, anywhere." Somebody make sure Mr. Marshall gets a serious "thank you" for that.
Pat Hogan, commander of the American Legion Post in Keokuk, Iowa, said he regularly augments his honor guard with Sons of the American Legion members â and didn't know it was against the rules. "It should be up to us to take care of our own," Because at the end of the day, nobody else will.
Hogan said. "I don't think these guys going to their final rest would mind at all."
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
01/13/2006
09:45 ||
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In 1999, Congress passed a law ensuring that all veterans could receive full military honors at their funerals. But it failed to include much money for the practice
One root of the problem.
Don't know much about all this other than that I think M-1s require a special background check to buy from the feds or through the civilian marksmanship program. FWIW
#2
"Power to investigate" Weapons and ammo repossession indeed, what an arsss. A typical DA civilian bureaucratic, no-can-do answer, thanks Ed you dick. Kind of flies in the face of the Army "Train the Trainer" philosophy. I say Let the older ones train the younger ones. The manly art of "M1 Thumb" avoidance can be easily trained in about 3-5 minutes. The manual of arms takes a bit longer. I'm sure the Vets will do a fine job of training and not permit the FNG to let them down. Appears we're guarding our own borders, maybe we'll have to buy our own burial detail Garands and ammo as well. My humble opinion as a Life VFW member.
#3
And on an individual basis to boot. IIRC the law that allows the M-1s to be sold controls their resale to some degree .... my sig other has one bought directly from the govt a number of years ago.
#4
M1s (either carbine or Garand) should be no harder to buy than any other rifle. They are semi-auto with an 8rd clip so don't fall a foul of all those nast assault weapon issues.
#5
Back in the 70s when the Army had 1 million under arms, the supporting installation would provide honor guards if the funeral was a days drive [to and back, and on exceptional grounds - i.e. CMH, further]. The reg's called for provided free ammo [Krag-Jorgensen's from the Spanish American War!] to vet organizations [VFW, AL] upon request. Two demographic lines intersected in the early 90's. One they more than half'ed the Army while not cutting back on missions and the WWII population started arriving in large numbers to the funeral homes. Something had to give. To support veterans funerals would have taken literally a couple of battalions worth of troops out of the system nationwide just to handle the demand. Didn't we just get through the whining and chest thumping about not having enough troops to accomplish the military commitments in the ME? To the point that Congress had to authorize another 20,000. Congress engages in another round of unresourced mandates when it declares that all veterns should have military honors [by the way, does that include people like Tim McVey?]. Looks good back home, doesn't do squat for anyone when its all show and no meat. Go hammer your Congressperson, they pass the statutes.
#7
This is just one more area where a national militia, fully-trained and equipped, could make a big difference. These "Sons of the American Legion" and any other group, properly organized, should be immediately recognized as a militia organization under the Second Amendment, and not only "allowed" to be armed, but actually given weapons and ammunition for thier various self-assigned or directed missions. The problem is, the Donkeycrats don't want ANY armed Americans, no way, no how. We really need to change the mentality of people in Washington. Unfortunately, I don't think it's possible without manually ejecting about 40 senators and 125 congresscritters - preferably from 40,000 feet without a parachute.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
01/13/2006 18:50
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#9
I was wrong above. No restrictions were put on reselling Garands bought under the civilian marksmanship program - only the presale background check was required.
PixelOptics has announced that it will receive $3.5 million from the Defense Department to develop SuperVision, a technology that enables our military men and women to have better than 20/20 vision.
"SuperVision is intended to provide the U.S. military forces with a competitive combat advantage and reduce the number of friendly fire incidents," said Dr. Ron Blum, President and CEO of Pixel. "Senator John Warner is to be commended for his leadership in seeking the highest level of innovation for the safety of the women and men who serve our country," Blum continued.
Dr. Dwight Duston, Pixel's Executive Vice President of Research and Development and Military Programs and program manager for the project, stated: "Certain nonuniformities within the human eye are the cause of most vision deficiencies. Conventional aberrations, such as nearsightedness (myopia) and farsightedness (hyperopia), can be corrected with normal spectacle lenses to give 20/20 vision.
The spatial density of light receptors in the retina, however, is enough to allow human eyes to see better than 20/20, perhaps as well as 20/08. However, higher-order aberrations in the eye prevent us from attaining this "SuperVision" (the ability to have optimized vision better than 20/20). Rest at link.
Posted by: ed ||
01/13/2006
09:39 ||
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....Not currently available for military retirees under Tricare Prime.
#2
I'm waiting for it to make it Pearle Vision Centers with the See Through Clothes Radar option.
Posted by: ed ||
01/13/2006 9:49
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#3
Since the correction is dynamic, the lens should also be able to adjust focus for distance. Include a range finder and the glasses should be able to compensate for presbyopia.
Another technological solution would be direct laser scanning onto the retina. By reflecting laser light off the retina back to the laser source, the optical distortion can be measured. The laser scanning could then be adjusted to eliminate that distortion. Any optical system, including infrared, telescopic, or microscopic, could provide the optical imput to the laser scanning system.
#4
YES!
I have been waiting to see this technology developed.
Anonymous5032 - the technique you mentioned is involved.
What Supervision is can be stated this simply.
1) Lasik without cutting a flap and using lasers transparent to the material that makes up the flap but not the next layer.
2) Where a typical lasik treatment involves less that 20 or 30 bursts this involves thousands or tens of thousands of microbursts
3) It involves a feedback view of the eye and retnia after each burst so near perfect corrections can be made.
4) with this technique you should be able to recognize somebody on the torch of the statue of liberty from either shore!
5) Pixel comes into the name as it is such high resolution that the brain might well receive a pixelated view.
When I had my Lasik I was at 20/15-10 now I am 20/20 but as the laser burst creates planes instead of perfectly optically smooth surfaces I sometimes need to slightly adjust my head for a good view. With this method you would not have that kind of artifact.
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/13/2006 16:46
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3dc, what you describe sounds very interesting. My own sight would greatly benefit from such an operation. However, this text from the linked article describes a different technology:
âPixel's lenses dynamically alter the focus in ways not possible before. By adjusting the refractive index of an array of transparent pixels contained within the lens, it is possible to correct for the higher-order aberrations. This optimizes one's vision, in many cases, beyond how one sees today."
Bill Kokonaski, Chief Technology Officer of Pixel, noted: "Higher-order aberrations of the human eye are dynamic, not static. Conventional refractive error such as myopia (nearsighted), hyperopia (farsighted) and regular astigmatism are static. However, higher-order aberrations change depending upon many factors, including the environment. Pixel's patented technology allows for a dynamic solution to a dynamic problem.â
This is basically how some modern telescopes function. The reflective surface is made of many small mirrors whose surfaces can be dynamically changed to compensate for atmospheric distortion. A laser is aimed in direction of the target object. Laser light reflects off atmospheric layers and is distorted by atmospheric variations. The mirrors can be adjusted to compensate for the measured atmospheric distortions.
I expect these lens work in a similar manner except they compensate for dynamic changes in the eye lens and structure.
#1
Lol. If Jackson calls her "Sister Maryam", well, that's the kiss of death. Hard to begrudge State with getting one right, given how much festering puss-filled disease they've spread in my / our name, but it certainly sounds like they did. I'd like to thank the anti-American Moonbats who endorse this group - they certainly helped clarify the issue for me.
Thx for the post, CU - I've had some doubts and you've helped me put them to rest with this article. ;-)
Israeli military planners have more confidence in the success of an attack on Iran's nuclear weapons facilities and have already begun sending signals to Tehran that it will not be permitted to threatened the Jewish state with annihilation, reports Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin today.
The new government of acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert also wants the mullah government in the Islamic republic to understand that the incapacitation of Ariel Sharon will not leave Israel in any less state of military readiness, G2 Bulletin sources say.
Yesterday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice expressed strong U.S. support for a European move to take the issue of Iran's nuclear program to the U.N. Security Council. The secretary accused Iran of deliberately escalating the confrontation over the issue, but said the United States still hopes for a diplomatic solution.
The secretary of state endorsed the European decision in a statement to reporters, saying "provocative" Iranian actions in recent days had shattered the basis for further talks between Iran and three European nations.
The U.S. is certain that Iran's "civilian" nuclear program conceals an ambitious secret weapons effort.
The secretary said it was premature to talk about possible U.N. sanctions or whether permanent Security Council members Russia and China, which have extensive commercial dealings with Iran, could be persuaded to support them.
She plans to speak with Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing as part of a far-reaching U.S. diplomatic push on the Iran issue.
The secretary said since he came to power last year, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has done nothing but confront the international system on the nuclear issue with outrageous statements, the likes of which, she said, "have not been made in polite company" in many years.
Ahmadinejad has called for Israel to be wiped off the face of the earth and suggested that the Jewish state be moved to Europe. He also denied the Holocaust ever happened.
Israel has no illusions about the U.N. solving the crisis.
G2 Bulletin sources say a recent statement by the Israeli military chief of intelligence, Gen. Aharon Zeevi-Farkash, that March 1 would be the time limit for diplomatic means to deter Iran's plans was actually an implied warning to Iran.
Sources in Tel Aviv and in several European capitals, say Zeevi's remarks were based on a military-planned timetable and a possible D-Day to take the Iranian military nuclear plant out of the picture.
Gen. Dan Halutz, Israel's chief of staff and former air force commander, intentionally selected to be the first chief of staff to come from the air force, last week said there are several military means to deal with the problem.
Although his statement was somewhat vague, Halutz is known for his verbal restraint. Sources say he is certain the Israeli military machine would be as effective against the Iranian project as it was in 1981 against the Iraqi Ossiraq nuclear site.
Sources in Israel also believe public disclosures about the Israeli air force's "anti-aircraft imaging unit" are significant. The Israel air force magazine re-published a story in December 2005 under the title: "Know Thy Enemy." It dealt specifically with the anti-aircraft missile threat, which could be the major obstacle in taking out the Iranian system. The special unit's existence was until recently classified as top secret.
Since 1996, the air force and the Rafael Weapons Development Authority have been jointly operating a unit of Soviet anti-aircraft systems similar to those in service in the Middle East. The unit, based on thorough knowledge of Russian-made systems, is instrumental in the training of Israeli air force fighter pilots on how to survive anti-aircraft and radar threats, sometimes thousands of kilometers away from base. The unit also operates weapon systems captured from Arab armies, undisclosed purchased equipment and secret computer developments of systems identical to anti-aircraft systems used by Iran, and even systems directly ordered by Iran from the Russians to protect their nuclear assets, G2 Bulletin reported.
The Israelis have also received help from former Soviet or Russian anti-aircraft officers who immigrated to Israel.
The air force also chose to reveal details of its cooperation with the Turkish air force including the deployment of Israeli fighter jets in Turkey and Turkish squadrons in Israel as part of a joint training program. Even Greece, which for years rejected any cooperation with Israel, recently announced its air force is also fully cooperating with the Israeli air force.
This cooperation with regional air forces, especially with Turkey, which borders Iran in the east, is highly significant when mentioned in uncensored air force publications, reports G2 Bulletin.
#2
my faith in this issue being resolved peacefully is still almost nothing, the EU three as they call themselves have been absolutly blagged by Iran on this nuclear problem and havn't got a chance of getting anywhere with the mad Mullahs in terms of sorting this out. Its very disturbing that even someone such as myself with zero qualifications and no job can figure out that Iran have been blagging the world all along and have no intention of cooperating with the rest of the world on this issue, just how the hell can the worlds suppossedly smartest goverments not see this for what it is???? Incomptetance on a level and scale far beyond what was seen during the pre World War Two days when it comes to dealing with this problem. Every single lesson that should have been learnt by the Euros after World War Two has been completely and utterly trashed. I see no peacefull outcome to this thanks to this bumbling incompitance/appeasement by the world and i just hope that Israel has the courage to go through with an attack regardless of what the 'UN' or 'EU' say should be done. Time is running out rapidly, i personally can't beleive how fast the last few years watching this has past and while the T.V camera's and 'journalists' along with alot rantburgers have been transfixed on Iraq the real big challenge is only just coming to the attention of the worlds media and its mainstream viewers. The media war is in my opinion already lost thanks to the medias stunningly bad and unfair portrait of the Iraq war and thier general fawning for dictators/nut job leaders. where does that leave us then? well i think Israel will do it with overflight rights from turky and the unoffically Iraq with US permission and support, possibly operating out of forward operating bases hastily set up in the deserts and unpopulated Iraqi regions for several days to increase the tempo of operations, US eagles could secure Irqi airspace im sure from any Iranian air intruders,Israeli subs may also provide a fair few large warheads to add to the attack, perhaps hitting Iranian targets in the furthest of place,i've no idea what the missile resupply rate for the subs are but im sure they wouldnt be a one shot asset. Maybe throw in some specforces stuff on the ground front and in several days maybe a week Irans program can be put back several years if not a decade,if they retalitate then hit their Oil industry hard in a few key places and knock out all thier power too,ah while your at it kill off the goverment too. Just how far do Israel need to escalate this, to the point of wiping out the whole of Irans military or just a campaign against the nuclear facilities? that is now my biggest question.
Posted by: Shep UK ||
01/13/2006 9:16
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#4
Eventually, after all is said and done, I again foresee a Middle East Common Market, with Turkey and Iraq as its anchor states. As ridiculous as it sounds now, Israel could also be part of this economic confederation.
As more and more countries in the region become true and stable democracies, the advantages of joining such an organization become irresistable.
Posted by: Red Dog ||
01/13/2006 9:38
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#6
Gen. Dan Halutz, Israel's chief of staff and former air force commander, intentionally selected to be the first chief of staff to come from the air force, last week said there are several military means to deal with the problem.
Although his statement was somewhat vague, Halutz is known for his verbal restraint. Sources say he is certain the Israeli military machine would be as effective against the Iranian project as it was in 1981 against the Iraqi Ossiraq nuclear site.
#7
Olmert may be even more likely to do it, to prove his cojones for the coming elections...
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/13/2006 10:20
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#8
Security comes from having ones offenses prepared.
Confidence comes from also having your defenses prepared.
Since Iran can only attack with missiles and aircraft, if Israel can defeat those, the *worst* that could happen for them is a stalemate.
And since they *can* inflict serious damage on Iran, even if they can't completely obliterate their nuclear program, they still win. Remember that all they are trying to do is "setback" the nuclear program by a year or two--not an impossible goal to meet.
So, bet on Israel to win.
Iran's goals, and their strategy to meet those goals, are far more difficult. To the point where several plans *must* work, or they lose. This is an invitation to defeat.
#9
With all of the stories swirling lately about potential strikes against Iran, I think the fog of pre-war (speculation, disinformation, ignorance, wishful thinking) is often worse than the fog of actual war. As formidably ignorant of military logistics as I am, I certainly can't cut through it.
I just trust that the people who can actually do something about Iran are doing their homework and won't be taken in by international or domestic political considerations.
#10
just how the hell can the worlds suppossedly smartest goverments not see this for what it is????
Shep, a large part of it is simply, MONEY. Much of Europe continues to sell commodities and technology to Iran. Given America's prohibition of exporting to this oil-rich nation, it leaves a mountain of petro-dollars to be spent elsewhere.
To date, Europe has rarely shown any compunctions with respect to taking up slack with pestilential regimes like Saddam's. I refer you to the Oil for Palaces scandal for a solid object lesson. Similarly, Russia and China are so dependent upon Iran for the hard currency (or oil) they crave that, they too, think nothing of sacrificing regional (if not global) security for the sake of the BILLIONS that flow into their coffers.
While China may be, to an extent, more immune to the burgeoning terrorist threat, Russia is most certainly NOT (see Beslan). Yet, both of these countries' economys are so pressed for hard cash that they cheerfully overlook the destabilizing ramifications of Iran's nuclear aspirations.
Europe is pretty much the same story. They are also blinded by their own self-acclaimed prowess at "nuanced negotiation" which, as you have clearly noticed, is worth squat. Still, between the hard cash and their overweening desire to play a superpower role in resolving perpetuating this crisis, they too, are entirely ineffectual in bringing any resolution.
Finally, the prolonged dithering has shown itself for the intensely damaging diplomatic boodoggle that it really is. As always, WMDs have changed the political landscape forever. The old price of temporary military buildups, to be cured by subsequent conflicts, no longer applies.
While the Europeans still rely upon this outmoded model of conflict resolution, rogue nations like Iran go about assembling a nuclear arsenal that will pose an incredible threat to the entire region. This fazes the Europeans not a whit because their own political models do not even predict the sort of mayhem that Iran promises to bring to the table.
The cash continues to flow and everyone remains fat and happy until the warheads begin to rain down. This has been Europe's old model and not much seems to have changed except for how dire the consequences of their inaction are.
#11
good post, Zenster. Isn't it interesting how history repeats itself? Russia assists the buildup of an enemy, that even a blind sheik can see they will eventually need to face (must be that ridiculous "give your an enemy a knife so he won't get a gun" philosophy that someone shared with us previously). Europe talks of appeasement and dithers, wasting the opportunity act in a position of power. Africa is used to flank the greater powers. etc.
Americans offer asstance, but then someone strikes at our homeland for assisting our allies. Then we get mad and round up a posse and hunt them down and hang em' high until Main Street is peaceful once again.
#13
Isn't it interesting how history repeats itself?
Thank you, 2b. One of my closing points is that WMDs have changed the political landscape in ways that Europe simply seems unwilling or unable to comprehend. In reality, history is not repeating itself. While previous arms build-ups were solved by large-scale conflicts, this sort of conflict resolution no longer applies in an age of WMDs.
One single nuclear assault can do so much harm that even vanquishing the aggressor does no good to repair the devastating damage done. Allowing inevitable conflict to occur no longer acts as a pressure vent valve. We have migrated into an age of pre-emption.
Countries that do not have the foresight or contingency planning to understand and act against the threat of rogue regimes and nuclear proliferation will be laid to waste. Europe is so blinded by its own presumed diplomatic brilliance that it cannot see what awaits at the end of this blind alley they are navigating.
Each year draws these procrastinating nations into a decision-tree whose branches decrease exponentially. The alternatives slam shut with alarmingly greater frequency as one progresses down this futile avenue of negotiation from a position of increasing weakness.
Europe simply does not comprehend this and it will be their doom. Societal disruption, car-b-ques, skyrocketing rape statistics, terrorist atrocities all provide ominous portents of what is soon to come. Still, none of this is taken seriously because last century's negotiating strategies have yet to be exhausted.
Iran has ZERO interest in pursuing negotiating strategies, save towards the end of being a delaying tactic. Europe refuses to admit this, as it would invalidate its precious self-image. Ergo, we have the gruesome spectacle of a continent willingly bending its neck to the sword.
Worst of all, America absolutely cannot permit Europe to surrender to the Islamists. The existing nuclear arsenals alone prohibit this. The economic imbalances and potential for crimes against humanity also preclude it as well. Should we be forced, FOR A THIRD TIME, to rescue Europe from itself, I will advocate restoring it as a protectorate of America without any say in its government until pervasive democracy is put in place.
At some point the insanity has to end. Ahmadinejad has provided a plethora of reasons why it is Iran's aspirations that must be vanquished. Just because Europe cannot realize this is no reason to restrain ourselves from halting a disaster in progress.
Well, NS, how about it? Are you unable to sufficiently assess the situation whereby conclusions can be drawn? Are you?
Here's a few to consider:
A) Is it even likely the entire European continent would willingly convert to Islam?
B) Is it more likely some attempt at forcible conversion might be imposed?
C) Is simple demographic displacement going to succeed as a means to hijack long standing national governments in the region?
D) Are sundry European nations eventually going to understand what awaits complaisance and, instead, begin to resolve the threat to their sovereignty by mass expulsions or deportations?
E) Will Islam finally manifest as such a dire global threat that so huge a body of its Middle Eastern (or South Asian) followers are incinerated, whereby its diaspora finally comprehend the criticality of peaceful assimilation?
Answers:
A) Not too likely. Retention of previous religions and the penalties of dhimmitude, which become increasingly capricious in proportion to Muslim power, would most likely be too onerous.
B) Possible, but such a naked display of force would also justify third party (American) intervention.
C) This option remains as one of the only viably "peaceful" means. Review Israel's own "redistricting" (Gaza withdrawl), so as to understand this issue. Immigration quotas, more liberal deportation criteria and highly restrictive naturalization requirements will likely be brought into play to prevent such over-running of host nations.
D) An increasing sense of empowerment within Muslim factions consistently manifests in expanded illegal or contralegal activity. This lack of restraint is one of the most persistent shortcomings of Islamic radicals. Such overstepping of bounds (as seen in Scandinavia) will sow the seeds for mass expulsions and deportations.
E) This horrific scenario becomes increasingly more probable as radicals like Ahmadinejad continue to provoke even the most sedentary opponents (i.e., Europe). Quite possibly, even a single nuclear terrorist attack could trigger a Muslim holocaust. The genocidal nature of radical Islam literally guarantees this final and most gruesome alternative.
So, NS, do you have any observations to contribute or does heavy lifting give you hives? I'm certainly interested in your take, .com.
#17
option E with heavy BBQ sauce. - the tech edge will make a "final solution" almost a real possibility this time, even given muslim numbers, if there's nobody to say: stop!
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/13/2006 19:17
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#18
interesting posts.
An increasing sense of empowerment within Muslim factions consistently manifests in expanded illegal or contralegal activity. This lack of restraint is one of the most persistent shortcomings of Islamic radicals. YES! Their bravado is what has gotten them as far as they have come, but as always, one's greatest strength is one's greatest weakness.
I think it will be a combination of this and the tech edge. Also, I think that we will start to see the mythical moderate Muslims in Muslim countries, fighting the Islamists. When all is said and done, this IS about power - not religion.
C. As their population ages and they need more young to empty their bed pans the Euros are going to have a harder time kicking their Arab habit than we will our Mexican. And they have no experience assimilating.
A. The entire continent, no. But you have much more confidence in the rationality of the Euros than I. I see them as the people who brought you the French Revolution, National Socialism and Soviet Communism. They have a disproportionate share of wackos because the ones with sense migrated here. Their adoption of nihilism will leave them searching for the meaning to life. Islam will provide the answer for too many.
B. When does dhimmitude turn to forced conversion? It is such a nuanced transition that the Euros will not make it clear.
As to D & E, you're an optomist. Perhaps we will save the Euros before it's too late. But in any event they no longer have the will to save themselves.
I expect the process to be completed by the end of the century. I don't expect it to happen with a big bang, but slowly with barely a whimper. The future of the U. S. will be in the Pacific. Why will the U. S. waste time defending a Europe that is no longer worth saving because it no longer exists? You may not like the ending, Zenster, but that doesn't make it less likely.
#20
It is sad to see the old homelands (for most Americans) in Europe walking down this road to oblivion. So much history and glory, and pain. Europe is the starting location that led to our civilization, to where it is today. Here is the USA.
I truly hope the US changes our immigration policies from an anti-white posture (made possibly by Ted. Really) and point it to Europe. I am sure there are 10 million good, stalwart Europeans who would love to move here if only given the chance. Think of the many European scientists and engineers who would love to innovate, which according to a study I read about today, the USA is 50 years ahead of Europe.
Let is work to open the gates to Europe, get those Dassault engineers and Porsche designers here. Those with a good future and high value. Those who can appreciate all American has to offer.
The hard part of this might be the lone 'holdouts' who resist dhimmitude. I am thinking UK and ...Denmark. The UK is easier with it's island status as long as there is any steel left in the British spine.
Denmark is much more precarious. Virtually surrounded by countries in advanced states of d'tude (dhimmi-like behaviour), they have just begun to say "Hey, wait a minute! This is Denmark, our ancestors were Vikings and we bow to no one (well, except Germans), especially such brutal savages. Now STFU and be gone". Well, maybe not that strongly, but at least they had some cartoons which upset the always-critical muzzies. Sheesh. I just hope we get all the cool Danish furniture designers and they move to North Carolina, sparking a new age in American chairs.
#21
In instance "C", I envision a more refined revolving door, much like with some portion of Hispanics in the United States whereby individuals gain fast access but are also ejected and do not obtain permanent status.
As for "A", Europe's admitted propensity for nihilism may not entirely allow them to abandon strongly entrenched state (yes, state) religions. This is why I mention the onerous and quickly abused nature of dhiummitude. A whole continent is not about to drop centuries of religious practice. Let's pause to ponder just what would happen if French Islamists tried to turn Notre Dame Cathedral into a mosque. Can you say world-wide uproar?
And "B". While the perceived transition between dhimmitude and actual conversion may seem imperceptible to you, please read up on dhimmi status and experience in ancient Spain. This is why I made specific mention of how empowered Muslims trend towards gratuitous displays of dominance. Once a chain of submission is initiated, it is doubtful in the extreme that Islamists could contain themselves and patiently await voluntary conversion. Zeal is everything to the Islamists and coercion would instantly accompany the slightest wavering.
It is these precise weaknesses of Islam that make me wonder just how well they could peaceably manage the large scale conversion of a continent long accustomed to other worship. I also think that at some point, non-Muslim nations would make a point of going in and crippling the nuclear arsenals of any countries submitting to Muslim domination. Pakistan is the poster child for what to expect vis Islamic nuclear weapons and the proliferation of said technology.
#22
Aw shit, Zen. Saw this too late to make a decent reply with any depth... and leave any time for feedback.
Quickie response - and a rather different take than you may have expected, lol...
I believe, I truly do, that some of Europe will awaken from their Nanny State soma and begin resisting - adequately - to stave off a takeover. There are mixed signals from each country, but some are encouraging.
Oddly enough, I think economics will be the key, the clarion call that has the greatest effect. The European slide will do as much as anything. They have a huge guilt deficit over, well, about many things: anti-Semitism, repeated American assistance, and so on. They can ignore it short-term, cuz they're flush with EU twits and leaders telling them what they want to hear: everything that's wrong is somebody else's (usually those damned Americans) fault. This has always, and will always, sell well. That they lack a strong sense of survival is my greatest worry.
Immigration will exacerbate the economic slide and will become the linchpin. You see it in microcosm now, but the guilt trip has held back the tidal wave, so far, as racism is the label successfully applied to any effort to shut it off. Sounds familiar, doesn't it, lol. Since we will overcome it - the idea that it isn't the knee-jerk of racism, but common sense and a prophylactic against institutional suicide will take root "over there", too, IMHO.
Some will capitulate because it's the easiest route and because they've let the game run too long. No way out. I see your option C as their fate - and it will be ugly - ugly enough to accelerate defenses against it in other places. Once a weak-sister domino or two falls, I suggest that it will serve notice to all the others - who you can bet will be watching very very closely.
Eventually, I expect that Islam - the ideology - will be seen for what it is: a blatant world dominion cult. It will become as reviled as Nazism. It will have to drastically reform to survive a global purge. Everywhere that there is bloodshed - that hasn't been there for generations - is, by and large, the handiwork of Islam. It can be curtailed. It should be exterminated if it will not reform so that it can co-exist peacefully. At present, it cannot. It deserves eradication. I do not believe time is on anyone's side in this - they won't get it soon enough to save themselves.
Just my 10-minute type-fest take. Sorry I couldn't be more specific regards your points. Tying yours and mine (which has been brewing for some time, now) together, which I believe is not only possible, but straight-forward, would have taken another hour, lol. :-)
Posted by: ed ||
01/13/2006
07:55 ||
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#1
Thanks for posting this, ed. A Cambodian lad, whose family was killed by the Khmer Rouge, joined the American Army because of his appreciation for the country which took him in. Not only joined the Army, but has spent 15 years in the Special Forces. And considers himself just an ordinary man, nothing special, not like his sergeant, whose parents he has to tell about the hero's death of their son. What a country this must be, to earn the loyalty of men like him!
Muntasir Abdul Baqi may have a thankless job for most of the year, but during Haj there are more fruits to his labor. The middle-aged Sudanese plumber is one of the men in Makkah that help keep the municipalityâs sewage system working. During the annual pilgrimage, he says plumbers find all sorts of lost items beneath the many toilets at the holy sites.
âMy friends and I have found gold in underground places in Mina,â said Baqi. âI have personally found many cell phones, gold bracelets, rings, watches and other interesting goods that are just laying there in the dark.â
Every toilet in Mina lays over a large room that connects to the main sewage system. Human waste falls into these rooms and flows to the pipes that connect to the sewage network. During Haj, millions of people use these toilets, and many lose items into what they must perceive as virtual black holes where all that enters is lost forever. âWhen people go to the toilet, it is quite often that they drop some of their belongings. Due to their weight these items donât flow into the pipes,â said Baqi. âEach season we go to clean the sewage rooms underneath each camp and we find a wealth of goods.â
Since people have already left for their countries, and there is no one to whom to return these items. In most cases they are considered one of the few bonuses of a dirty but necessary job. âAll plumbers in the area fight each year to get the chance to clean the sewage in Mina,â said Baqi, who estimates that thousands of riyals worth of lost items can be found by plumbers who clean these sites.
Khaled Saeed, a camp operator, said that once his phone fell into the toilet. He called one of workers in the camp and offered him SR300 to go down and retrieve the lost item. âWhen the man emerged from the sewers, he had four different phones including mine,â he said. âWith the thousands of toilets in Mina, the amount of goods that can be found must be worth a fortune.â
Baqi agreed. âIâve been working as a plumber in Mina for four years and I donât want to leave this job any time soon,â he said. YJCMTSU.
#5
When the fellow standing next to me at the urinal is discussing dinner menus with his wife or girlfriend on his cell, I always try to crack a nice loud one off... just for polite measure. Happens to me at airports all the time. Appropriate porcelainic decorum of course.
Pilgrims slaughtered over one million sheep, cows and camels in Mina to mark the successful completion of the Haj. An additional 42,000 beasts were slaughtered in Makkah abattoirs as of Wednesday, official sources said.
The Kingdom launched a program for the optimal utilization of the sacrificial meat in 1983. Under the Project for the Utilization of Sacrificial Animals During Haj, managed by the Islamic Development Bank (IDB), pilgrims can purchase coupons and delegate the bank to sacrifice an animal on their behalf. The project is designed to make use of the meat by distributing it to the poor and needy in the Kingdom and abroad.
Most pilgrims who choose not to perform the sacrifice personally purchase the coupons, which cost around SR450 this year. Subsequently, they never experience the hassle of slaughtering and distributing millions of animals on their behalf.
This year the IDB sold 700,000 sacrificial coupons. It purchased 650,000 sheep, and a large number of camels and cows. Slaughtering this many animals over three days is an awesome task that requires highly sophisticated facilities and substantial resources. In 2001, Saudi Arabia built the worldâs biggest slaughterhouse in Mina at a cost SR470 million ($125 million). This correspondent toured the huge complex on Wednesday and witnessed the arrival of animals in large numbers, their slaughtering and processing of the carcasses.
This state-of-the-art facility sprawling over a 500,000 square-meter area can slaughter 200,000 sheep a day utilizing some 10,000 workers. They work in two 12-hours shifts.
Ameen Idrees, a mechanical supervisor who has been working at the abattoir for the last four years, said there was a wrong perception among people who have not visited the slaughterhouse that âthe slaughtering is done by machines. As a matter of fact it is done manually by the employees conforming to all Islamic requirements.â
The animals are brought one by one to the floor of the slaughterhouse from an adjacent facility. The floor is a lattice of steel that allows the blood to drain through. After the animal is slaughtered there by knife, the carcass is hooked to a conveyer that takes it to the upper floor where they are skinned, disemboweled and vitals removed and thrown into designated baskets linked to another chain. Refuse is sent directly to dumping trucks parked outside, said Jamal Moussa, a Sudanese worker at the slaughterhouse.
After cleaning, sheep carcasses are cut up into quarters while camels and cows are cut up into suitable parts and then distributed through the distribution channels in Mina and Makkah, Idrees said.
âAn amount of sacrificial meat is sent to a charity in Makkah, where it is cooked for feeding pilgrims. Meat is delivered to various charity organizations in Makkah and Madinah as well as other Saudi cities for distribution among the poor and the needy. Excess sacrificial meat is transported, either by land, sea or air to Muslim countries for distribution among the poor,â Idrees said.
Outside the slaughterhouse the scene was entirely different. Some came to offer the sacrifice personally. Others came from nearby cities of Makkah, Jeddah and Taif to collect sacrificial meat.
There were still others who came to buy cheap meat from a large number of Africans who were selling carcasses they received as âsadaqaâ from the pilgrims. Over a billion served, every year.
-alMcDonalds
#2
"Most pilgrims who choose not to perform the sacrifice personally purchase the coupons..."
Ahhh, about $100 and you're absolved from the messy details of the faith. I doubt that's the way Mo intended it.
#3
Anything to separate the faithful from their money is just fine by the holy men and the royals...it keeps them in bejewelled turbans and curly toed slippers for another year.
Personally, I don't care for the Eid ritual, but I don't see it as being substantially different from our annual turkey slaughter at Thanksgiving or pine tree slaughter at Christmas.
#9
There were still others who came to buy cheap meat from a large number of Africans who were selling carcasses they received as âsadaqaâ from the pilgrims.
Mmmmmm ... bush meat. Just don't ask what it actually is.
#10
"This year the IDB sold 700,000 sacrificial coupons. It purchased 650,000 sheep, and a large number of camels and cows."
I'm thinking I smell an new internet business for me...! But without all that messy slaughtering. Let's start sending em internet solicitations...We could call em something like "Chicago Letters" similar to the Nigerian scam letters.
Posted by: Mark E. ||
01/13/2006 17:01
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India has said it will expand its nuclear industry in an attempt to reduce pollution rather than agree to cuts to greenhouse gases imposed by the Kyoto Protocol.
Speaking after the first meeting of a climate change group created by six of the world's biggest polluters in Sydney, A Raja, the Indian environment minister, said his country would accept help to reduce emissions but would not be forced into cuts.
"Neither the Kyoto Protocol nor this partnership can stipulate anything upon the government of India to reduce emissions," he said.
Asia's third-largest economy has signed the Kyoto Protocol, which obliges about 40 developed countries to cut their emissions by an average of 5.2 per cent below 1990 levels by 2008-2012. But it is exempt from the mandatory cuts itself because, like China, it is considered a developing nation.
India is also part of the new Asia Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate that met in Sydney. It was joined by China, the US, Australia, South Korea, and Japan. The group hopes to tackle climate change without hindering economic growth.
Own agenda
Environment ministers from around the world agreed in Montreal in December to a plan to extend the Kyoto climate pact beyond 2012 and to start new, open-ended world talks on ways to fight climate change that will include Kyoto outsiders such as the US and developing third-world nations.
But Raja was adamant that India would not agree to binding cuts.
"We are developing countries, we have our own agendas for our development activities, so we cannot give any promise, any commitment to reduce further our emissions," he said.
The two-day Asia Pacific Partnership gathering ended on Thursday with the participants pledging a multi-million-dollar fund to develop clean energy, but they said fossil fuels would continue to be central to their economies for generations.
India is mainly dependent on coal for its energy, but has about 15 nuclear power plants and is under pressure to increase energy production to meet a furious pace of industrialisation.
Growing problem
In July 2005, the US signed a deal to give India access to nuclear technology, including fuel and reactors, that it had previously been denied for 25 years.
In 2001 only two per cent of India's energy demands were satisfied by nuclear energy. A report released by the Australian Bureau of Agriculture and Resource Economics (ABARE) on Thursday forecast this figure to increase to 16 per cent by 2050.
While Indian cities suffer from choking pollution, the country's per-capita carbon emissions are low, less than a quarter of the world average and many times less than those of the United States.
But ABARE also said India's total contribution to global emissions would rise to 9.4 per cent by 2050 from 5.4 per cent in 2001, while its contribution to global emissions from electricity generation would rise to 10.3 per cent by 2050 from 6.2 per cent in 2001.
Reuters
Posted by: john ||
01/13/2006
06:23 ||
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#1
Ignorant headline writer. "India ignores Kyoto demands" is not true -- India signed on because Kyoto makes no demands of India.
And even if it did, it wouldn't stop global warming.
Kyoto with all signatories behaving would slow global warming by a paltry 3 months.
That never makes the headlines. The UN glosses over that.
Kyoto DOESN'T FIX THE PROBLEM.
NOTHING can fix climate change.
The planets climate has always changed, sometimes fast sometimes slow.
This is a colossal waste of money. The archetypal UN junket feeding a pile of corrupt bureaucrats who jet about and stay in 5 star hotels living off crap like this.
If you wanna make a quick buck off the madness of crowds, go start up a climate change consultancy. Jet about charging the UN $2000 an hour to educate Guatemalans on global warming.
Get paid for your hot air!!
trade in carbon credits: now there's a first.
invent a shonky technology that can pass as removing carbon from the atmosphere and sell your services for carbon credits.
Doesn't matter that it doesn't work because even if you stop all emissions now global warming will NOT stop.
#3
A DoD study some years back found it fesible to dump iron and fertlizer in patchs of the southern oceans to create huge carbon sinks. The tests worked and it wasn't that expensive.
#4
It's also a very bad idea to start messing with chaotic systems you don't fully understand. It has a way of biting you on the ass, and THAT'S the trufe.
Abu Hamza, the Muslim preacher, was heard calling for the "blood and destruction" of non-believers at the Old Bailey yesterday and describing Britain as a country "like the inside of a toilet".
The jury at his trial on nine counts of soliciting to murder, four counts of using threatening, abusive or insulting behaviour and two further counts of possessing abusive recordings with a view to distribution and possession of a document useful to preparing terrorism heard the former imam of Finsbury Park, north London, speak for the first time in two videos made by his followers.
In the recordings, each more than two hours long, Hamza was also heard accusing the Prime Minister of killing Muslim children. The first video, called the "Holy Way to Khilafa" (Muslim nationhood), showed Hamza seated at a table with a banner which read "Al-Jihad" during a meeting in Whitechapel, east London, in 1997 or 1998.
He told the unseen audience that living in Britain was like the "inside of a toilet" and added: "We are all under the heavy boots of the kufr (unbeliever)." "This is why they talk of the Khilafa now," he added. "Some talk of it as the drug which they need to vent themselves, others they talk about it as the only solution."
Quoting the prophet Mohammed he added: "The blood and destruction is the destruction upon you kaffirs."
He said democracy was crumbling and laid out a two-stage plan to replace it with a Muslim nation. The first he said meant "bleed them from their sides, their heads, their economy, everything until they surrender." The preacher went on: "Like you imagine you have only one small knife and you have a big animal in the front of you, the size of the knife you can't slaughter him with this.
"You have to stab him here and there until he bleeds to death, until he die, then you cut his meat the way you like it or leave it for the maggots." After that he claimed: "The people who called you terrorist before, they will call you khalifas (Muslim rulers) and the scholars who used to call you khawarij (rebels against Islam) yesterday, they will write poems about you."
The second stage involved taking control of the whole world, he added. "Don't be a shield for the kufr because we will get you," he added. "Even if you are not a target and you are in the target area. If you fear them, you should fear Allah more. It's a bloody way."
Hamza told his followers they would eventually see a Muslim ruler in the White House and added: "The whole earth, it will be for Muslims, this is a promise from Allah.
"Go and fight, light and heavy, rich and poor, sick and healthy," he told his followers and identified targets as every court, interest-charging banks, video shops which sell "naked" videos and brothels.
"You have to bleed the enemy, whether you work alone, you work with a group or you work with your own family, work has to be done.
"Tease them, make them afraid, show their humiliation." Hamza added: "Anybody he sees a deficiency and an enemy of Islam, just go and kill him."
Laughing when a woman asked him whether she could join the holy war, Hamza told her to tell her children, if they were aged 10 or 12, to "go with their father for training . . . make sure he shows them videos about Jihad ideas, bring them up for Jihad."
In the second video, filmed in September 1999, Hamza described Britain as a kaffir (unbeliever) country which does not apply Shariah law and is therefore at war and accused Tony Blair of killing "many of our children". He added: "Most of them are pagans; preachers have become homosexuals; churches have become places of dancing, iniquity, business, black magic, you name it."
#1
Captain Hook wasn't too proud to collect UK "dole" (welfare) and accept a free vehicle from the government, he being handicapped and all. And he lied about losing a limb in the Afghan conflict. He was photographed with limb intact, after that war ended. He lost same after a trip to Yemen. That government has wanted to talk to him ever since. The coddling of that animal should disgust everyone.
Posted by: Red Dog ||
01/13/2006 8:58
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..and the scholars who used to call you khawarij (rebels against Islam) yesterday, they will write poems about you."
The once was an iman from Finsbury Park,
whose brain was decidedly dark.
He brandished his hook
gave it a look,
and jammed it right up his A**.
#9
He told the unseen audience that living in Britain was like the "inside of a toilet" and added: "We are all under the heavy boots of the kufr (unbeliever)."
Coming from a society where defication in public streets and alleys is commonplace, his debt of knowledge of indoor plumbing is indeed impressive. I'd recommend leaving the UK at once.
#11
So far they can "bleed" the infidels at will, cos' nobody is really trying to fight back the hard way (even the dreaded, imperialist, USA took kid's gloves in Iraq and still push the war according to the book, and Israel is still fighting back as a democracy, far from the islamoleftist blood libels).
Question is : how would (will???) the Lions of islam fare if/when the infidels would fight back *seriously*, for example by mass expulsions of muslims or WWII militarization of their society? Would they still want to fight? Would they still brag with impunity?
I've said it before, and I believe it : it's true so far they are winning, but it's only because we pretend there is no islamic agression against Us, only because we let ourselves be put into dhimmitude (this is *especially* true about Europe, but therer are some seeds in the USA too), trapped by our marxist-induced self-hatred and multiculturalism.
No wonder they see us as weak and unmanly, in our shoes, with our ressources, they would have annihilated such an impotent, delusional, hateful ennemy, and would feel good about it.
WEST Australian police have added turbans and hijabs to their list of accepted uniform items in an effort to encourage more Sikh and Muslim people to join the force.
At today's launch of the additions to the traditional blue uniform, police commissioner Karl O'Callaghan said the innovation was a milestone in the 152-year history of the WA force.
"The police have always been pretty rigid as far as their uniform regulations go. We are relaxing those, we are changing those and we are now allowing people to join and wear culturally appropriate clothing," Dr O'Callaghan said.
"This directive is a step forward for WA police in embracing Western Australia's diverse and multicultural society."
The new directive allows police officers who have genuine religious or cultural requirements to adapt their uniform to meet these needs.
The items of cultural clothing, including turbans and hijabs, will correspond with the blue of the WA police service and will include the chequered hatband and badge. Beards worn on religious or cultural grounds will also be acceptable.
Suresh Rajan, of the WA Police ethnic advisory committee, said the uniform change would make a difference.
"It makes the service far more relevant, as people from these communities can look at the people in the police service representing them and feel some sort of affinity," Mr Rajan said.
Satwant Singh, of the Sikh Association of WA, said he hoped the initiative would encourage more ethnic communities to consider joining the police.
"What this has done is open the general mainstream community, to say to them there are other communities that are part and parcel of Australia," Mr Singh said.
In the midst of Iraq's violence, Ali Allawi, Iraq's Finance Minister, is starting to impose order on Iraq's chaotic finances. In the latest milestone, most of the nation's largest corporate creditors, dating back to before the 1990 invasion of Kuwait, have accepted a deal to swap the bulk of Iraq's commercial debt -- nearly $14 billion -- for new dollar-denominated notes. The notes will have a face value of 20% of what the companies are owed. "This will make it easier for Iraq to start getting the type of credits it needs for trade and business," says William Rhodes, senior vice-chairman of Citigroup (C), which arranged the debt deal together with J.P. Morgan.
The pact gives Iraq an important shot at rebuilding credibility in global financial markets at a time when the U.S. is expected to begin trimming its aid for the Iraqi economy. The securities, which will have a coupon of 5.8% per year, should start trading Jan. 19. They're expected to be in demand, in part because they're backed by the world's second-largest oil reserves.
The bond issue is just Iraq's most recent move to shore up its finances. When Saddam Hussein was ousted in early 2003, Iraqis were left with an estimated $130 billion in debt. Iraqi officials have been hacking away at it ever since the U.S. led coalition handed power over to a local government in 2004. Early on, they cut a deal with government creditors such as France, Italy, and the U.S. to reschedule some $40 billion.
Under the terms of this deal, 80% or more of the debt is likely to be written off if Iraq continues economic reforms. Iraq doesn't want to continue in "a financial twilight zone," Allawi says. It also pays 5% of its oil revenues, budgeted at $30 billion for 2006, to pay off reparations to Kuwait and other entities damaged by the 1990 invasion.
Though numbers are smaller, restructuring Iraq's private-sector debt is even more critical for restoring its reputation in the international business community. At first glance, private companies balked at the prospect of getting no more than 20 cents on the dollar for the money owed them. But nearly all of them have knuckled under, concluding it was likely the best deal they would ever get.
How the new Iraqi notes trade will be an important indicator of the country's world standing. The companies that receive the securities are expected to begin selling them to financial players, including emerging-markets funds and hedge funds. Market participants think they'll find takers, especially since the notes will probably trade at a discount and thus yield 10% or so. "We expect a lot of interest from Arab funds, Europe, and the U.S.," says Mike Noone, head of sovereign research at Exotix, a London brokerage.
The risks are substantial. No amount of restructuring will make much difference unless Iraq's political turmoil stabilizes and the violence calms down. Still, unless Iraq collapses completely, its financial leaders should be able to keep edging the country's finances in the right direction.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/13/2006
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Good. Another quiet step toward the establishment of the rule of law, this time on the financial side. And that this was undertaken by the Iraqis themselve, not by the Americans on their behalf, bespeaks a certain maturing of Iraqi society. Not that Iraq is yet anywhere near America-lite, but they are definitely climbing the learning curve.
Posted on the off-chance that Europe still matters. Hat tip to Orrin Judd.
The European Unionâs record on innovation is so poor that it would take more than 50 years to catch up with the US, according to a survey presented by the European Commission on Thursday.
The Innovation Scoreboard compares the performance of the 25 EU countries with the US, Japan and several other nations, and ranks them according to factors such as the number of science and engineering graduates, patents, research and development spending and exports of high-tech products. The survey finds that only four EU countries â Sweden, Finland, Denmark and Germany â can compete with the US and Japan in terms of their innovative abilities.
âThe innovation gap between the EU25 and Japan is increasing and the one between EU and US is close to stable,â the report notes. It adds that it would take more than 50 years to close the gap between the average EU performance and the current US level.
Commission officials said the innovation ranking was important because it looked beyond R&D spending to analyse the ability to transform basic research into marketable products â and therefore into jobs and economic growth. GÃŒnter Verheugen, the EU industry commissioner, said: âThe Innovation Scoreboard clearly shows that we have to do more for innovation. There is clear evidence that more innovative sectors tend to have higher productivity growth rates.â
The EUâs âdisappointingâ performance masks striking differences between the 25 member states: the Commission ranks Sweden, Finland, Denmark and Germany as âleading countriesâ and states including the UK, France and Italy as âaverage performersâ. Portugal, the Czech Republic, Greece and others are âcatching upâ, while states Spain and Poland are âlosing groundâ. Switzerland, which is not an EU member, comes second overall â ahead of both Japan and the US.
The UK and Ireland â which have recently boasted high economic growth rates, low unemployment and which regularly score highly in surveys examining countriesâ economic competitiveness â have both performed worse than in previous scoreboards. Germany, despite its status as an âinnovation leaderâ, and a strong record for lifelong learning receives poor marks for its dearth of science and engineering students and for its comparatively poor levels of youth education.
The EUâs largest economy is also chided for its populationâs reluctance to embrace innovative products and services.
If the State can't provide it, it's not worth having.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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I'm not sure what the point of this survey is, except to come up with new ways for the EU bureaucracy to throw its weight around to "fix" these things. Most of the things they cited are not things the government can fix. Far better to deal with the barriers to business formation and tax structures. But that's not what these bureaucrats are talking about. And that is why this survey is a complete farce.
#2
ZF, to me they are finally admitting that their way isn't perfect. It MIGHT be an opening to them realizing how bad their situation is. We can opnly hope this is the first incident showing they have received a good hit from the cluebat.
#3
I hope for Brett's opinion to win out in the EU, but I think Zang's is the one that will win out over their. Remember, "If an impotent, bloated bureaucracy can't solve it, pass more bloated legislation!"
#4
Yo Mediocrestan25: If EU want to ram your own ship into the Socialist iceberg, fine. Good luck.
Just kwitcherbitchen about the USA.
(though we might say "Thank EU" for such a clear example of failure, many Americans haven't awoken to the fact that "calitalism plus entitlements = socialismo")
Sen. Edward M. Kennedy belongs to a social club for Harvard students and alumni that was evicted from campus nearly 20 years ago after refusing to allow female members.
According to the online membership directory of the Owl Club, the Massachusetts Democrat updated his personal information -- including the address of his home that is in his wife's name -- on Sept. 7. The club has long been reviled on campus as "sexist" and "elitist" and, in 1984, was booted from the university for violating federal anti-discrimination laws, authored by Mr. Kennedy.
Regardless of one's own political beliefs, we can all agree that it's best not to mix women and Kennedys.
Mr. Kennedy has spent much of this week's Senate Judiciary Committee hearings interrogating Supreme Court nominee Samuel A. Alito Jr. for his ties to the Concerned Alumni of Princeton, a group that is critical of admissions quotas but was formed in the early 1970s in opposition to the admission of women.
Mr. Kennedy's spokeswoman, Laura Capps, said there is "absolutely no comparison" between the Owl Club, a social group, and an organized effort to "exclude women from getting an education" at Princeton. But the university views organizationssuch as the Owl -- called "final clubs" -- quite differently from fraternities and sororities, which are considered a form of housing and therefore not coeducational. Student opposition to the Owl Club -- even after it had been expelled from campus -- was so strong that involvement in it was fodder for scandal.
Come now, we don't need to stoop to a book club to find a scandal on a Kennedy.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/13/2006
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This guy had his day, now he's just an old man that does not have the US's best interest at heart. It's time Mass votes him out and gets with the program.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
01/13/2006 7:28
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#2
Not gonna happen unfortunately. In this loony tune state he's been getting away with his "do as I say, not as I do" act for 40+ years and will continue to do so. He'll die in that job.
#3
Tu, For Americas sake I hope your wrong. Unfortunately You are probably right.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
01/13/2006 7:48
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Ted came by it honestly. A bit on papa Joe and the theater business:
-On August 9,1929 in Pantages's flagship theater, the Beaux Arts in downtown Los Angeles, an hysterical lady in red emerged from the janitor's broom closet on the mezzanine screaming: "There he is, the Beast! Don't let him get at me!" She pointed to the silver-haired Greek owner, Alexander Pantages in the office next to the broom closet.
- The girl, Eunice Pringle of Garden Grove, California, told police that she had come to Pantages looking for work as a dancer. Instead of offering her a job, he had pushed her into the broom closet, wrenched her underwear loose and raped her. Pantages insisted that he was being framed, and that the young woman had torn and ripped her own clothing.
- Poor Pantages was convicted and sentenced to fifty years, but the verdict was overturned on appeal, on the basis that it was prejudicial to Pantages to exclude testimony about the morals of the plaintiff. The court found her testimony "so improbable as to challenge credulity."
-At the new trial, Pantages' lawyers reenacted the alleged rape and showed that it could not have occurred in the small broom closet the way Pringle had described it. The jury was also shown how athletic Pringle was, casting doubt on her claim that she could not fight off advances by the slightly built Pantages.
- The second jury acquitted Pantages, but because of the notoriety, his business had plummeted. After numerous refusals to sell to Kennedy, a few months after Kennedy's final offer of $8 million, Pantages was forced to sell out to Joe's RKO for $3.5 million.
#10
How long do we have to endure the Kennedys? The only thing that they have ever had going for them is dishonest ruthlessness and a great PR firm that can make the stink on their poop smell like a cross between apple pie and Camelot's perfume. Personally - that smell makes me gag.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/13/2006
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Redacted by moderator. Comments may be redacted for trolling, violation of standards of good manners, or plain stupidity. Please correct the condition that applies and try again. Contents may be viewed in the sinktrap. Further violations may result in banning.
Posted by: Bird Dog ||
01/13/2006 16:10
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#2
Awwwwwww. Is Ray Gunn dead? Pity. We hardly got to know him.
Why don't you go over and comment on the "Stupid in America" post. We'd appreciate your expertise.
Redacted by moderator. Comments may be redacted for trolling, violation of standards of good manners, or plain stupidity. Please correct the condition that applies and try again. Contents may be viewed in the sinktrap. Further violations may result in banning.
Posted by: Bird Dog ||
01/13/2006 16:19
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#4
Go whine somewhere else bird dog. There is no freedom of speech in someone else's house. You gave up the right to be treated with respect when you started posting with a bunch of pseudonyms.
We listened to what you have to say, and we still disagree with you. I even read your crap when it hits the sinktrap. You lack facts, and your arguments have been found to be unpersuasive. Be civil and/or go away.
Posted by: Mark E. ||
01/13/2006 16:22
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#5
" President Bush Attempts To Shore Up Iraq Support"
By Jim Malone
Washington
13 January 2006
President Bush continued his efforts this week to rebuild public support for his handling of Iraq with speeches this week in Washington and Kentucky. But, those Democrats who oppose him on Iraq are not backing down.
Iraq figures to be a major issue in the November congressional elections, and Mr. Bush is trying to improve Republican prospects by convincing the public that the United States must stay in Iraq and finish the job.
But the president also had words for Democrats who oppose him on Iraq, warning them not to engage in what he called irresponsible debate in the months ahead.
"But one way people can help as we are coming down the pike in the 2006 elections is to remember the effect that rhetoric can have on our troops in harms way and the effect that rhetoric can have in emboldening or weakening an enemy," he said.
Democrats remain split on Iraq but many of them disagree with the president's suggestion to tamp down the debate over Iraq.
Democratic Congressman Jim Moran of Virginia discussed the issue during a recent town hall meeting with some of his constituents.
"There is nothing more patriotic, nothing more American than engaging in a debate, even an intense, heated, contentious debate over the future our nation should take," he said."
Something very interesting happened in this site yesterday. An article similar to the one I posted above listed President Bush as making the almost the exact same quote in paragraph#3 of this post.
I made the point that I thought that the quote was politically motivated and the basis of it
is unproven in regards to Iraq. I asked Bush supporters in this site to "prove" what Bush was saying was true. In other words provide surveys, or statistics that show that there is a connection between anti war rhetoric/criticism and events covered in the MSM and "embolding the
enemy" in surges of violent attacks on the U.S. military and Iraqi coalition supporters in Iraq. I also asked for documented"proof" that anti-war critism/rhetoric is indeed as Mr. Bush proclaims is "demoralizing the troops in harms way".
To me these are two very simple logical questions challenging President Bush's assertions.
What I got in rebuttal in this website was a two long ago instances in Germany and Vietnam that were supposedly similar to what is going on in Iraq and also a discredited letter from Al Qaeda
in Iraq leader Ayman Al Zawahri.
I dismissed all of this so called "proof" on the grounds that all of it was flawed. I asked specifically about what is going on in Iraq currently NOT what happened in Germany and Vietnam. The Al Zawahri letter was discredited in the very article the rebuttal poster listed.
What followed was a flurry of ad hominen attacks
on me by the regular posters in this site with my rebuttal post being "redacted" by the "neutral" site moderator.
I as well as some of my democratic associates who monitor this site all shook our heads in disbelief
and amazement at the responses. Apparently this site has a double standard for posters. If you agree with the proprieter of this site and his
viewpoints you are free to "troll", use inflammatory language and profanity and call people names as long as it's against the people he views as the "enemy". If you do it in oppositon you are labeled a "troll" have your
post dedacted and are threatened with being banned. Evidently the regular posters and the proprieters of this site are only interested in
dialogue with people that agree with them.
Civlized discourse is definitely NOT what is
happening in here for sure.
Posted by: Bird Dog ||
01/13/2006 16:10
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#6
stupid in america..?
what did the british healines say when bush was re-elected?
"How could 50 million+ Americans be so STUPID?"
LMAO
Posted by: Bird Dog ||
01/13/2006 16:19
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The Dutch coastguard found several kilos of cocaine on board one of its own ships, the Tjerk Hiddes, while it was patrolling the Caribbean for drug smugglers, the military police said yesterday.
Ooops.
A spokesman, Lieutenant Colonel Rick Hirs, said no arrests had been made. "I'm not going to speculate about how the drugs got there, or who put them there, that's all part of the investigation."
In 1999 two marines were sentenced to nine years for trying to smuggle 125 kg of cocaine on a Dutch navy plane that had returned from combating drug trafficking in the Netherlands Antilles.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/13/2006
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Sound like a 70s "touch and go" exercise for a MAC plane to Mexico.
At least 10 persons were injured in a clash between supporters of the ruling BNP and the Awami League in the Char Milpara area under Kushtia sadar on Sunday morning.
Local sources said a group of BNP activists of Char Milpara kidnapped Aminur Rahman alias Aku, a supporter of the Awami League. Consequently, Akuâs relatives beat Shafiqul, a follower of the BNP. After the incident, the two groups were locked in an hour-long clash brandishing sharp weapons and exploding at least 20 hand-made bombs when 10 persons were injured.
Good time was had by all, except for the ones who were injured.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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KATMANDU, Nepal - Nepalâs army killed at least 10 communist rebels during a gunbattle in the fiercest fighting since the guerrillas ended a cease-fire earlier this month, a defense ministry spokesman said on Friday.
The rebels were killed in the clash Thursday at Chitre area, about 200 kilometers (125 miles) west of the capital, Katmandu, Defense Ministry spokesman Bhupendra Poudel said. A large number of arms and ammunition were recovered after the gunfight, Poudel said.
Comment from the rebels wasnât immediately available, and it wasnât possible to independently confirm the armyâs version of events.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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CAIRO - An official from Egyptâs Suez Canal Authority denied a French aircraft carrier heading to a scrap yard in India would be prevented from crossing the waterway, Egyptâs official news agency reported on Thursday.
The comment came after another official told Reuters the vessel would not be able to cross the canal because it was leaking toxic waste. âAn official source at the Suez Canal Authority denied reports that Egypt had not allowed a French aircraft carrier to cross the Suez Canal today on its way to India,â the Middle East News Agency (MENA) reported.
The report made no mention of toxic waste. The French Defence Ministry said there was no leak coming from the ship.
The decommissioned Clemenceau set sail from France in December for the massive Alang ship-breaking yard in Gujarat. Earlier this month, the French Defence Ministry said the Clemenceau was still in the Mediterranean and would take two months to reach India.
MENA quoted the official as saying Egypt had not prevented the crossing but required ships bearing scrap to fulfill internationally agreed conditions to safeguard the environment. The official who previously said the ship would not be allowed to cross the Suez Canal had said the decision was taken after Egyptâs environmental agency said the vessel could harm the canalâs environment and the Egyptian coastline.
Greenpeace has been behind this: I'm waiting for a final airstrike by the Clemenceau on a Greenpeace trawler.
Environmental group Greenpeace has also urged Paris and New Delhi not to allow the Clemenceau to reach the scrap yard without first being 98 percent decontaminated in France.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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Earlier this month, the French Defence Ministry said the Clemenceau was still in the Mediterranean and would take two months to reach India.
Two months! Hell, Clipper Ships would do 90 days around Africa. And the carrier is taking a shortcut through the Suez canal.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
01/13/2006 0:26
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A two-mont transit would the vessel isn't under its own power, though I don't know for sure.
#4
All hail Greenpeace !
They are saving the world from the Clemenceau which has a billion tons of asbestos on board.
They are saving the Indian slave workers of Alang scrapyard, caught from their idealic villages by evil white men with nets and forced to break ships.
After breaking ships for decades, these dumb Indians still don't know how to handle asbestos...
Posted by: john ||
01/13/2006 6:34
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New Delhi, 12 January, 2006: Greenpeace activists intercepted and boarded the French aircraft carrier, the Clemenceau, on Thursday raising the stakes in the international row over the decommissioning of the French aircraft carrier Clemenceau, which has been sent to India for decommissioning despite widespread outrage at the high levels of asbestos and other hazardous materials it contains.
At 12.00 hrs this morning, two activists boarded the carrier 50 nautical miles from the coast of Egypt in international waters. They are currently on the shipâs mast with banners declaring âASBESTOS CARRIER: STAY OUT OF INDIAâ.
2 months to India, kids. On an asbestos laden ghost ship.
Enjoy the cruise...
Fifteen people were killed in clashes on Wednesday night between Pakistani security forces and Bugti tribesmen in Balochistan. âTwelve tribesmen were killed and three security men lost their lives, Abdul Samad Lasi, the regionâs police chief, said yesterday. The clashes between Bhambore Rifles, a wing of the Frontier Corps, and the tribesmen began after the authorities took over a building located in Sui gas field. The building belonged to the Pakistan Petroleum Limited but was leased out to Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti who renamed it âBugti Houseâ. The authorities initially detained 11 tribesmen and recovered from them huge quantities of arms and ammunition.
On Wednesday evening, a vehicle of the Frontier Corps was hit by a land mine. Two security men were killed instantly and an undisclosed number of soldiers injured. Men of Bhambore Rifles later took control of the hills surrounding Dera Bugti. They were fired upon around midnight. The security men retaliated and killed at least 12 Bugti tribesmen. In the heavy exchange of fire, two security men were injured. They later died in a Frontier Corps hospital.
Early yesterday, a powerful explosion ruptured a section of a state-owned gas pipeline, briefly disrupting supplies, but injuring no one, police said. No group claimed responsibility for the attack in Kundkot. An area police chief, Mazhar Shahab, said engineers had started repair work. He blamed tribal militants for the attack, although he did not offer any evidence.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/13/2006
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A court in Kerala has acquitted all 16 accused in the Calicut ice cream parlor sex scandal
Kinky!
that forced top Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) leader P.K. Kunhalikutty to resign as industries minister a year ago.
Got caught with his pants down, did he?
Assistant Principal Sessions Judge LR. Sathyan acquitted the defendants, including the former ministerâs driver Aravindakshan and two former leftist city mayors, for lack of evidence. The judge observed that the prosecution had failed to prove the charges framed against the defendants. He, however, posted for hearing on Jan. 30 a petition for investigation into mass retraction of statements by the victims.
Mass retraction of statements, was it? Wotta coincidence that they all decided to clam up at once...
The case was based on a complaint filed by womenâs activist K. Ajitha in August 1997 that the girls employed at the ice cream parlor run by one of the accused, C. Sreedevi, were being sold to high and mighty, including Kunhalikutty.
Sold, rather than rented?
Although Kunhalikuttyâs name figured in the case diary, police did not press charges as the victims later retracted their statements. Womenâs activists even sought a Supreme Court directive to the state police for framing charges against Kunhalikutty, but without success.
"Big Mukkerjee! Go and have a . . . little talk wit' them babez!"
Posted by: Fred ||
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mass retraction of statements by the victims
Mass retractions after repeated insertions. A likely story!
Ehud Olmert, Israel's acting prime minister, has told George Bush, the US president, that there could be no progress in the Middle East peace process if Hamas enters a Palestinian government.
On Thursday, in their first telephone conversation since Ariel Sharon was admitted to hospital, Olmert updated the US president on Sharon's health. The leaders also discussed this month's Palestinian parliamentary election which is being contested by the Islamist movement Hamas, the prime minister's office said. Olmert told Bush that Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian leader must "take steps against terrorism and disband the terrorist organisations because otherwise there can be no progress with an administration in which there are terrorist organisations as members".
Hamas is contesting the parliamentary elections for a first time on 25 January, giving the ruling Fatah faction the first real run for its money. A statement said: "Acting Prime Minister Olmert said that the Israeli people appreciated US President Bush's determination to fight terrorism and not compromise with it. The US president replied there can be no differentiation between kinds of terrorism and said that there can be no peace with terrorist organisations. He emphasised that the Palestinian Authority had to prove that it was able to act against terrorism and added that the US is working to establish democratic institutions in the PA that will advance peace and not terrorism."
Posted by: Fred ||
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Taking down Iran will help this. Iran funds large segments of Hamas. Cut the Iranian funding and they will dry up.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
01/13/2006 7:31
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Amen, 49pan. Funding is the nexus that allows the assholes to play jihadi.
On Monday, an Iranian military plane crash killed eleven top commanders in Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Gen. Ahmad Kazemi, the commander of IRGC's ground forces, died in the crash. The dead also included a number of other military notables whose names were released by the Islamic Republic News Agency, including the commander of Rassoulollah Army Division 27, the deputy commander of ground forces for operation affairs and the official in charge of information for ground forces.
While a spokesman for the IRGC has blamed bad weather and dilapidated engines for the crash, my sources are convinced that this was an act of sabotage. Stratfor has weighed in with its analysis of the crash, noting that while "[i]t is entirely possible that the plane crashed due to technical difficulties," there are reasons to suspect foul play:
Though maintenance negligence offers a plausible explanation for the crash, the death of several of Iran's senior IRGC commanders comes at a particularly interesting juncture in Iran's political history. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's election was not fully endorsed by the entire Iranian political spectrum. His firebrand antics, though coming in pursuit of a strategy to raise the Islamic republic's profile in the Muslim world, have stirred up noticeable hintes of dissent within the ruling regime. One of Ahmadinejad's top security guards in the Ansar al-Mahdi Corps, a unit of the IRGC responsible for the personal security of senior Iranian officials, died Dec. 14 in an ambush on the presidential motorcade in Iran's lawless Sistan and Balochistan province.
Considering that the Falcon was carrying one of Iran's most elite IRGC commanders, and would thus undergo thorough tests for technical issues before flight, the crash could also indicate foul play aimed at undermining Ahmadinejad's power base and influence.
Stratfor also states that in the wake of the plane crash, "Ahmadinejad's power base has been severely threatened."
While the Iranian regime would never publicly admit that this was an act of sabotage, the situation bears watching. If sabotage occurred, observers believe that it was either a product of the "mullah wars," in which Iran's mullahs have been clashing with president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, or else was orchestrated by members of the IRGC who are sympathetic with the opposition to the regime and stay in the IRGC to harm it from the inside. My sources believe that the former is more likely.
Amir Taheri has described the clash between Ahmadinejad and the mullahs. This clash is rooted in both Ahmadinejad's investigation of the Iranian political establishment's corruption and also an honesty about the goals of the Islamic revolution that conflicts with the dissimulation of other Iranian politicians. Even Ayatollah Khamenei, who helped to bring Ahmadinejad to power, may feel threatened by the new president as it is widely believed that Ahmadinejad would like to replace Khameini as supreme leader with his closest clerical ally, Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi.
If the military plane crash is an act of sabotage, that shows how severe the fissures within Iran have become. Even while pursuing the UN Security Council as one option for dealing with the Iranian nuclear program, the U.S. needs to carefully follow, and be willing to exploit, the power struggle within Iran.
Two masked gunmen killed the Muslim sultan of Maguindanao and wounded his brother in an ambush in the southern Philippines, police said yesterday, warning of a potential clan war in the area. Local police chief Inspector Rick Masla said Datu Amir Baraguir and his brother, Andy, were walking home on Wednesday evening in Sultan Kudarat town when two men on a motorcycle shot them with pistols.
If he and his brother Andy were walking home, he doesn't sound like your run-of-the-mill Muslim potentate...
âThe sultan did not reach the hospital alive,â said Masla. âWeâre still trying to investigate the motive for the shooting. Weâre hoping the sultanâs death would not stir up a clan war.â
If anything does, I'd it expect this to be it...
Baraguir, 45, ascended a year ago to the Sultanate of Maguindanao, one of several Muslim royal houses in the troubled south. Police said Baraguir was known as a moderate Islamic leader and an advocate of self-determination for Muslims in the south of the mainly Roman Catholic country, supporting proposals to revise the constitution and move to a parliamentary system. Before he was enthroned as the 25th sultan, Baraguir wrote a newspaper column and hosted a community radio program promoting peaceful coexistence among Christian, Muslim and mountain tribes on the island of Mindanao.
That's always a good way to get yourself assisted from the gene pool when there are turbans around...
His columns and radio commentaries attacked extremist Muslim groups, earning the ire of separatist Islamist guerrillas seeking an independent state.
Now, let's think real hard and guess who dunnit...
Posted by: Fred ||
01/13/2006
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#1
If he and his brother Andy were walking home, he doesn't sound like your run-of-the-mill Muslim potentate...
They were walking through Sultan Whosis Town. I read that as along the lines of Versailles. In other words, they were strolling around their property of an evening, possibly going to pick up the evening newspaper the paperboy tossed onto the bottom of the driveway (because his throwing arm wasn't strong enough to get it onto the front porch). For perspective, a few years ago I joined Mr. Wife at a company offsite meeting in Malaysia -- in Kuantan, where one of their sultans lives. A sister of the sultan lived down the street from the palace, in a nicely finished, possibly 1000 square foot house on stilts, with naked toddlers and chickens running through the bare dirt front yard (I've seen proper English gardens -- this was not one). The sultan's palace itself, seen through the wrought iron gate, wasn't honestly much bigger than the house of the retired CEO of Mr. Wife's employer, and the grounds didn't appear as extensive as the property on which the trailing daughters' elementary school was built (something under 20 acres), into which was fitted the quarter mile of train track for the sultan's pet railroad, and the substantial stables. I think most sultans and such-like potentates are not fabulously wealthy as portrayed in the storybooks, despite having life and death power over their subjects. Owning the entire substance of some villages of farmers, fishermen, and hunters-in-the-jungle is not like having a controlling share in Microsoft, or in a couple of oil wells.
#2
Here is more information about the sultan's region, gleaned from Living in the Phillipines (the CIA Factbook had nothing useful, at first glance):
MAGUINDANAO
The province of Cotabato, which used to be the largest province in the Philippines, was divided into three provinces on November 22, 1973 by Presidential Decree 341. One of these new provinces was Maguindanao. The province of Maguindanao is supposed to be the home for the Muslim Maguindanaos also called the âPeople of the foot plainsâ, because of the rich fertile river valleys where they have settled. The Maguindanaos, who survive on agriculture, fishing and weaving, are known to be the largest group of Muslims in the south. Other major tribes which have settled in the area are the Muslim Iranons and the animistic Tirurays.
Former Name: None
Land Area: 5,474.1 square kilometers
Capital: Maganoy
Population: 536,546 (1980)
Principal Dialects: Maguindanao, Hiligaynon, Cebuano and Tiruray Income Classification: Fourth Class Province No. of Cities: 1 (Cotabato)
No. of Municipalities: 17 (Ampatuan, Barira, Buldon, Buluan, Datu Paglas, Datu Piang, Dinaig, Kabuntalan, Maganoy, Matanog, Pagalungan, Parang, South Upi, Sultan Kudarat, Sultan sa Barongis, Talayan, and Upi)
No. of Municipal Districts: None
Topography: At the center area of the old Cotabato Province is a large river valley traversed by the tributaries of Mindanao River. Maguindanao is a large lowland of Mindanao.
No. of Principal Rivers: 1 (Mindanao)
No. of Mountains: 2
Climate: Characterized by a more or less even distribution of rainfall throughout the year, the coldest months in the province are December and January. The warm season is from March to June.
Average Annual Rainfall: 34.35 inches
Principal products/crops: Rice, corn, peanuts, vegetables and fruits
Industries: Hog and poultry raising, fishing and logging
Mineral Resources: Copper
Forest Resources: Timber
Tourist Attractions: Cotabato City
Governor: Zacaria Candao
Congressmen: Michael O. Mastura, Guimid Matalam
#6
Cotabato and the area aroud it is controlled by MILF. Just north of Cotabato is the JI camps we read about here on RB. My friends there relayed it was a tribal issue that got him killed. He was a lot like father Nacrda on Basilan island, always preaching peacefull coexistance. From what I hear Datu was one of the good guys there.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
01/13/2006 10:26
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#7
Gosh, thanks, Red Dog! Now I can have my brain scanned while eating eggs -- life is good. ;-)
I don't know if anyone's noticed but me, but the war against al-Qaeda and its hydra-headed affiliates seems to have entered into a phase of relative quiet. Corpse counts seem to be down, and the contents of Page One are more concerned with actions that fit the more traditional mold of international relations. It's likely we're going to end up at war with Iran somewhere down the line, which will strike a blow at the junior nexus of terrorism, but al-Qaeda seems to have had it for now.
Despite the claims of a resurgence of violence in Afghanistan, the Taliban is pretty much powerless. I think Afghans realize they're an idea whose time has gone. The country can develop â or not, depending on its elected politicians â without much danger of Mullah Omar resuming his position as potentate.
Pakistan is going through internal trouble, with rebellion in Balochistan and its own Taliban running amok in Waziristan. They're negotiating with India over Kashmir, and the daily booms that were the rule a couple years ago have receded into the background noise. It's still a country with a culture of violence, but they're welcome to kill each other as far as I'm concerned. Binny hasn't been heard from, and Michael Ledeen says he heard that he's dead, buried in Iran.
Indonesia and the Philippines are also relatively quiet, despite the continuing stories about Jemaah Islamiyah having big plans in the works. Dulmatin and Noordin Mohammad Top are still at large, but it looks like the organization might be broken. Violence in southern Thailand seems down, too.
The Soddies seem to be mopping up their domestic al-Qaeda, though they still haven't chopped off the heads of any holy men. The Aden-Abyan Islamic Army and its successors in Yemen have pooped out. Jordan has declared its own War on Terror, and maybe they'll even clean out Zarqa and Maan. With the Syrians gone, the Lebs are starting to look askance at Hezbollah and ask each other why Paleos should be allowed to run around their country waving guns and shooting the occasional meter reader.
In Iraq they've had their elections, they've got a constitution, and even the domestic Sunni tough guys seem to be falling out with Zark's international adventurer corps. Sammy's on trial and Tariq Aziz is on his death bed. We're talking about troop reductions and withdrawals, while the Iraqi army and cops take on more of the load and the Brits bitch about the way we do things.
GSPC has been clobbered in Algeria, with three of its biggest boys being taken into custody with a wad of cash the other day. Morocco's version of GSPC seems to have been stillborn.
Turkey's attempt at Qaeda-style terrorism doesn't seem to have come to much. The Euros, especially Spain, keep reeling in hard boyz. Yasser's dead and the Paleos are shooting each other up in Emma Goldmann-style anarchy.
There will be another boom in a little while. Dan says the latest Zawahiri video could be the signal for a new major attack, maybe in Italy. Zark keeps trying for ever higher stacks of deaders in Iraq and to export the carnage to neighboring countries. Chechnya seems to be transforming into something larger and more dangerous, and the Russers are incompetent to stop it. The Soddy preachers keep trying to whip up the rubes, and I'm sure the money's still flowing from the princes. But at this point it looks like we've passed the peak. Unless the bad guyz manage to go nuclear â at which point all bets are off â if we just keep doing what we're doing they're beaten.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/13/2006
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#1
Fred, it would seem so, at least as the locations you've mentioned are concerned. We may end up we a relatively calm and manageable ME, but I think that the focus of islamists will shift to Europe. It's the area of the lowest resistance in their view. Perhaps for some time, the modus operandi would be a low level of terror--like in some cities de facto taken over by muslim immigrants, spiked once a while by a boom here and there. But it is a waiting game and in five years or even sooner, the daily news from Europe would be rather depressing.
#3
I'm with pappy: they're on the run, religiously incapable of admitting real defeat, so they're declaring a hudna that the left will spin as a "humanitarian" truce, and build themselves back up for the next battle. If they REALLY had any sense, they'd lay low until Shrillary got elected on the basis of, "Bush did good, we won, now let's pounce on business and divvy up the goodies from the boom".
#4
I am here in Iraq advising an Iraqi unit and if they can get the supply issue squared away and the old guys at higher HQs out of the way, these guys will open up an even larger can of ass whipping on the bad guys. We may have a long way to go but I agree we got over the peak.
DimmiCraps seem to be the largest threat in the WOT.
The media and elites are in full gaga over Shrillary, but I have faith that she'll never make POTUS if we remain vigilant and stick together.
thank you Rantburg U and all the critters here and a special thanks to our Soldiers, Marines, Airmen, Navy and Coast Guard.
Posted by: Red Dog ||
01/13/2006 7:30
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#7
The last half of a war like this will be the toughest, politically. Dems will want to stop our advances and reach for peace with the enemy. We must chase them to the ends of the earth and destroy them or we will be destine to fight them again.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
01/13/2006 7:42
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#9
"Dems will want to stop our advances and reach for peace with the enemy. We must chase them to the ends of the earth and destroy them or we will be destine to fight them again."
Yep. And once we're done with the Dems, then we can get busy and do the same to the terrorists.
Yeah, I know I'm being a smartass, but Red Dog is right: the left-liberal establishment and particularly the Democratic party-- through stupidity, dishonesty, cowardice and faithlessness-- are a major barrier standing between us and victory over the Islamic menace.
And I'm no longer confident we can win against the latter, without destroying or at least crippling the former.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
01/13/2006 8:17
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#10
Pappy's correct, Hudna. Fred has listed the status of action on all the hot fronts, but they are not the decisive fronts. Europe continues to flail. Zappy looks more like Allende daily, the Dutch don't want to send their contribution to Afghanistan, Merkel seems tepid, God knows what the French and Italians will do, will Britain return to old labour after Blair goes (about this I am least worried) and when will Europe's population turn majority Islamic?
Likewise, the domestic situation, the most important front, is worrisome. Everyone can see the situation as Fred has described it, especially with MSM help, and the donks can say, "Mission Accomplished, let's pull out now to save the lives of our boys." Victorius interruptus. And they will. If this message wins in 2008, the terrs will get the breathing room they need to regroup, reorganize and rebuild.
Right now the biggest problem is Iran. If Bush wants to do something about it, he has done little to prepare the public. The donks will say he is getting us into another war that isn't justified, that we don't need to be in, just like Iraq. Why do we have to have these adventures to enrich Halliburton and KBR? And that message will resonate because the people have not been properly prepared to support action against Iran.
China is still out there, ready to play with anybody who will make a problem for us, Iran, Pakistan, Norks, Venezuela, Cuba, France.
Tactically, things are going well on the fronts DoD is addressing. At the next level of geo-political strategy, I'm not so sure.
#11
I'd like to remind everybody that not one war is still in progress, but two. The SOCOM shadow-war, operating on the four corners of the world, yet hidden from sight, has long been producing major victories that never see the light of day.
These victories are not one-shots, either. Often they involve the setting up and management of long-term intelligence and espionage networks, cultivating sources and field operatives, and creating immense databases to unmask entire enemy networks. Operations that may last 20 years.
About two years ago, perhaps, it was let slip that well over 200 such operatives had been killed in the line of duty. No mention since. But since it can be assumed that few of these gentlemen go into that night gently, they must have taken a hellacious number of enemy with them.
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Posted by: Ray Gunn ||
01/13/2006 10:01
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#14
So it's Ray Gunn today? Slick...
Thought you were done here?
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/13/2006 10:13
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#16
Keep in mind that the Italian attack may already have been thwarted by the GSPC attacks in Europe. I doubt that most people really have any idea about all of the hard work being done on both sides of the Atlantic that has kept Europe and the US from experiencing more terrorism. With Iran, the problem, as Nicholas Burns noted some time ago, is that the remaining al-Qaeda leadership is still there, regardless of Binny's status, and in Pakistan the LeT training camps are still operating. You kill those two nodes, take out their equivalents in SE Asia, and decapitate the Golden Chain, and I'll say that once that happens we'll have very much achieved our objective of defeating al-Qaeda with only the mopping up in places like Algeria, Bangladesh, and the Caucasus to keep us occupied.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/13/2006 10:15
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#17
It's a lull while the remnants regroup.
I suspect that Israel will decapitate and de-nuke Iran -- soon. I'm hoping that will be a tipping point in which the Iranian survivors in power will decide that backing al-Qaeda, meddling in Iraq, and supporting terrorism is not the path to a greater Iran. I'm also hoping that it will be a shock and awe display involving at least one nuke so that Israel's foes will be forever reminded that they can be reduced to a glassy plain if they can't get past their scheming and seething and start minding their own business. The bigger the blow, the better the lesson.
#18
The world stage is a Go board to Chinese and US leaders - each advancing his white or black stone into the other's zone of influence, planning to encircle the other before being encircled themself. It is a rational process. Islamo-fascism is the third player whose only goal is to flip the board over. The US is distracted from the Go game as it works to keep the Mad Mullahs at bay. For some reason China seems unconcerned, even encouraging and sometimes supporting the MMs. They may feel their willingness to be ruthless will allow them to repel Islamo-fascism once China has achieved dominant position on the Go board. Are they overconfident? Between their western frontier issues and their neighbors to the south and east, they would seem to be asking for trouble - time will tell.
Through it all Europe, including Russia for the most part, just sits by, like college Go kibitzers stoned to the max, comprehending nothing.
#19
I'd like to remind everybody that not one war is still in progress, but two. The SOCOM shadow-war, operating on the four corners of the world, yet hidden from sight, has long been producing major victories that never see the light of day.
Agreed. The question, however, was what 'terror' groups were doing at this point. They have been thrown off-balance. Unfortunately they are adaptable. Hence my opinion that it's a hiatus.
While it has been highly effective, there are limitations to what can be accomplished on the 'second war-front'. Most critical - intelligence, data and espionage networks require constant maintenance and are subject to political pressure. One merely need look at the Cold War history for that.
#20
It's a lot like bailing hay. At times we'd have to stop when a summer shower would come along. We'd maybe eat lunch, take a break, hiatus, whatever. But then when the rain stopped we'd be back out picking up bails until none remained in the field. It was hard work but we were committed to getting the job done. It's the American way.
#21
Islamo-fascism is the third player whose only goal is to flip the board over. Well said!
Excellent post, Fred. I wish these victories were better known to the American public. History shows that the battles never end and there is always another Iran on the horizon, but the "war" organized by Binny's little band of international thugs is scattered and disoriented.
Fighters deploy
increased tensions with Iran over the resumption of illicit uranium enrichment, the U.S. Air Force has dispatched additional warplanes to the region in a not-so-subtle sign, military sources say.
An entire wing of F-16s, the Air National Guard's 122nd Fighter Wing based in Fort Wayne, Ind., left for a base in southwest Asia on Tuesday. A wing is usually about 72 aircraft and several hundred support personnel.
F-16s and support personnel from the 4th Fighter Squadron of the 388th Fighter Wing based at Hill Air Force Base, Utah, also deployed recently to Iraq. The squadron has 12 F-16s.
Both units' F-1Coinciding with 6s could be used in any military operation to take out Iranian nuclear facilities.
A spokesman for the U.S. Central Command Air Forces, which runs air operations in the region, said the F-16 deployment of about 80 jets is part of a rotation and is not related to Iran's uranium reprocessing.
Let's enjoy the quiet moment before the next noisy bit. Tea, anyone?
#24
Just a caution about interpreting the deployment of the 122nd wing.
This is an Air National Guard wing equipped, if I read their website correctly, with older models of the F-16. The deployment was announced late in December as part of a normal rotation. Could be that is because of the rising aggressiveness of Iran or just as part of rotations planned for a while. A whole airwing is a big deployment.
What is not said here (one way or the other) is whether the unit they are relieving is rotating home immediately or hanging around in theater for a while -- which would indeed mean the forces there have been augmented. This ANG wing is manned at a 900+ person level, according to the Dec. story, and so a count of 70+ aircraft sounds about right ....
#27
keep an eye on the USS Reagan strike group - left last week for a WesPac tour... if they cross into the Indian Ocean and there's no typhoon humanitarian crisis, wellll... :-)
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/13/2006 13:12
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#28
Fred,
As a PK I grok religion and am very troubled that nothing has been done to help the Soddy firebrand mullahs on to the next plain. It's a major missing element. That Friday sermon will continue to incite the fodder until the drift and tone are too dangerous to be spoken aloud.
#30
Agree on the Navy. And as I posted in the new thread on the air wing deployment, while these are older aircraft and less experienced pilots, they could do a fine job patrolling, say, the border with Syria while the F15e Strike Eagles escorted B2s or Tomahawks found selected targets.
#32
until the holy men lose their heads or islam reforms.
very true. But neither of those things are going to happen any time soon. The former because it would create absolute havoc among the billions of members of unreformed Islam. And since Islam hasn't reformed itself for thousands of years, chances are it won't be graduating from rehab anytime soon.
If I can't cure cancer, I'll settle for reducing its symptoms to the point where old age is poses a greater threat.
#33
Through it all Europe, including Russia for the most part, just sits by, like college Go kibitzers stoned to the max, comprehending nothing.
Russia is in a complete and coordinated strategic alliance with China -- or atleast I've never once seen a single time in the last ten years (atleast) where their interests, methods or even their rhetoric have caused consternation or opposition in the other.
The global anti-democratic axis being formed, the one whose satellite states go from North Korea to Belarus and all the way to Venezuela and Bolivia (most recent acquisition of said axis) -- it has atleast as much Russian involvement as Chinese one: and I'd say even more so.
People underestimate Russia because of its bad economy and declining population -- but it's a diplomatic superpower and it has vast natural resources; and as such it wields an energy grip on the whole of Europe as it recently most eloquently demostrated (which it also augments with military threats, as seen in Ukraine).
#34
Unfortunately, suppressing islamofascism is like kneading dough - you push down here, and it pops up over there. While Fred's assessment is excellent, there are a couple of points left out. Number one is the rise of islamofascist groups in southern Africa, from Kenya to the Congo, south to South Africa. There's also the rising arrogance of Sudan that needs to be dealt with. Somalia continues to be he$$ in a handbasket, although the northern portion seems to be developing quite well.
We also have to look at the Pentagon assessment that states the problem is Islam, not rogue elements. That really put the cat among the canaries. Now we know that either Islam must reform to accept the right of others to worship as they please, or it must be eradicated as a cancer that will destroy everyone's freedom. The United States has never fought a religious war before, but we're in the midst of one now, without accepting that fact. Iraq seems to be going in the right direction - a secular government that allows all religions to worship without fear, but still predominately a Muslim nation. Turkey was more or less the same, but we see that such secularism cannot be maintained in the face of strong religious aggression.
I would say that the current conditions are neither lull, haitus, or victory, but merely AQ shifting to another battle front. The victory won't be ours until there are no more fronts for AQ to shift to.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
01/13/2006 14:59
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#35
The United States has never fought a religious war before, but we're in the midst of one now, without accepting that fact.
plain direct and elegant.
Posted by: Red Dog ||
01/13/2006 15:03
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#36
Now we know that either Islam must reform to accept the right of others to worship as they please, or it must be eradicated as a cancer that will destroy everyone's freedom.
Well, it can't be eradicated, so option b is definitely out. Even if you nuke into glass the whole of the Middle East (and presuming you could stomach such a "solution", which I can't), that still won't eradicate Islam. Even if you could create (which you can't) a global totalitarian state that pursues with hatred every single expression of Islamic belief, that's still not any more likely to succeed than the Roman emperors were in destroying Christianity.
So why don't we stop talking about the fairy fantasies that perhaps make some people look macho (or ridiculous, depending on perspective) but accomplish little else?
As for imposing a reformation upon Islam, how is that likely to happen either? As far as I know there has never yet been a successful external imposition of reform to a religion either. In truth the West treats the idea of religion (and thus the whole idea of blind faith) with too much respect for that to happen. If Christians have people preaching that contraception is a sin (and that religious concept must supposedly be respected rather than mocked and insulted to its face as an insult against people's reproductive and sexual freedom), how are you gonna convince Muslims that a woman revealing her hair or speaking to a man *isn't* a sin? We can't battle Islamic unreason with Western reason, because frankly the West suffers from too much unreason of its own.
So, with either imposed reform or imposed eradication being difficult-to-the-point-of-impossibility what else remains? The only thing that remains is something that has actually been accomplished already in several places: namely, the strict and absolute separation of mosque and state. Not a war of Christianity against Islam, not even a war of moderate Islam against strict Islam, but rather a war of secularism against the interference of religion in politics.
Christianity itself only truly reformed once it had been removed from secular power, with actions such as that of the French Revolution and the abolition of the Papal states.
Only *then* will Islam reform itself - if it finds itself bereft of secular power.
One good step would have been if the new Iraqi constitution had forbidden clerics to take political posts or maintain militias. The Iraqi constitution should also have placed *secularism* itself (not just "religious freedom") as being of the highest importance -- instead it declares that no law can violate the principles of Islam.
#37
Problem is, Aris, the Qu'ran doesn't have a phrase similar to this:
âRender unto Caesar the things which are Caesarâs, and unto God the things that are Godâs.â
That's the justification in the Bible for separation of church and state. While we're all supposed to have faith in our hearts, the affairs of state may be managed without overt religious reference.
Islam doesn't have that, and considers secularism to be apostasy. I frankly don't see how your suggested remedy could be implemented.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/13/2006 16:17
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#38
That's the justification in the Bible for separation of church and state.
Steve White, this "justification" was largely ignored for about 1800 years or so, until the Church was placed in a sufficiently weak (in secular terms) position that it was *forced* to care about it, because it had no other way.
That's my very point -- that the Christian church was eventually *forced* to embrace the separation of church and state.
Islam doesn't have that, and considers secularism to be apostasy. I frankly don't see how your suggested remedy could be implemented.
Remove clerics from power. The offensive against Iran should have started because the West can no longer tolerate religious regimes, not because we can not stand WMDs. Whenever a former regime is toppled, the new Constitution must pronounce secularism as a fundamental value or else Western aid and support will be immediately withdrawn from the new regime.
#39
I have U.S. money in my pocket that says "In God We Trust" on it. But that's the God that values individualists and women and children and says "Love thy neighbor". It's not the god of Islam ("submission") that values clerics, treats women and children as property, and says "Kill the infidels". My ancestors fought in the Crusades and then moved on to higher values. Islam is insisting on more crusades. If you don't believe that this is religious war, then you are not listening to the enemy. It's radical Islam against the world, and they'll tell you so.
Aris, Naziism can be snuffed out -- why can't radical Islam?
#40
You keep bringing up a false equivalency between Christianity and Islam in these discussions. A thought occured to me the last (or second or third to last) time before this you brought it up, but I wasn't able to talk about it, the thread had already expired by the time I got home.
The Fourth Crusade which sacked Byzantium was (for that and many other crimes) excommunicated by the Pope Innocent III.
But as far as I know, no Moslems were ever declared apostate by whoever the authorities of the day were for conquering Constantinople in 1453. In fact, as far as I can tell, by being the prevalent military power of the day in the Islamic World Mehmed was automatically the religious authority and beyond that sort of thing.
While I'm at it, I'd like to say that I find the Albigensian Crusade types here (and do I have to explain that phrase?) to be rather irritating. But at the same time I find your insistance that the conflict eventually breaks down into the good guys vs. the non-atheists just as stupid and naive as the people who say there are no "Moderate Moslems."
Posted by: Phil ||
01/13/2006 16:53
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#41
Or to put it another way, telling them their choices are between following Osama or joining the church of Richard Dawkins is going to produce the same wretched result that telling them their choices are between following Osama or the Pope will.
Posted by: Phil ||
01/13/2006 16:59
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#42
It is ingorant to imply that the Christian church was eventually *forced* to embrace the separation of church and state. The early Christian church was formed completely 100% outside of the Government. Christians who were caught being Christians were, with Government approval, thrown to lions for entertainment or were martyred.
#43
I have U.S. money in my pocket that says "In God We Trust" on it. But that's the God that values individualists and women and children and says "Love thy neighbor".
Your second sentence indicates that you've made a moral judgment on your God's commands, rather than merely put your trust in him --- which is what any suicide bomber can do.
Do you truly believe in God issuing commands? And how can you convince another person that it's *your* perceived commands that God is issuing, and not the Quran's?
Aris, Naziism can be snuffed out -- why can't radical Islam?
Nazism wasn't snuffed out (no ideology can), it merely lost its hold on power with the fall of its promoting regimes (aka Nazi Germany and allies), which is what I say we do for Islamofascism also. Defeat the Islamofascist regimes.
Namely I'm arguing from moving the fight from the amorphous and impossible ("We need to reform Islam! No, we need to eradicate it!") to the specific and possible (combatting the Islamofascist regimes.)
Once Islamofascist regimes have been defeated, Islam will itself find its way to moderation. But to talk about combatting Islam as a whole is similar to starting arguments in 1939 about battling the whole of the idea of nationalism when it's specific Nazi regimes that are now launching their war.
Sure: Islamofascism sprang from Islam which sprang from theism, same as Nazism sprang from nationalism which sprang from tribalism (in the loose sense).
I think that all the above six are negatives. But first things comes first. To try and fight the amorphous and widespread, before fighting the acute and concentrated is to doom yourself to failure.
#44
The United States has never fought a religious war before, but we're in the midst of one now, without accepting that fact.
Let's see, 1940 we get into a war that Eisenhower called a "Crusade for Europe" to defeat the most evil man and regime in history, 1860 we get into a war that inspires "The Battle Hymn of the Republic", "As he died to make men holy, let us die to make men free." Before that 1780 the War of Independence didn't have an overtly religious theme, though slavery to KG was a big issue, 1700 King Phillip's War, proportionately the bloodiest war in American history against the heathen Indians, 1640, our colonial founders compatriots conduct a civil war with certain religious overtones in the old country.
#45
Phil, there are plenty of radical Moslems who would declare that there are no "Moderate Moslems" -- that Jordanian homicidal maniac in Iraq that is killing innocent Iraqi Moslems daily is one example and that equally insane Iranian president is yet another.
#46
It is ingorant to imply that the Christian church was eventually *forced* to embrace the separation of church and state. The early Christian church was formed completely 100% outside of the Government. Christians who were caught being Christians were, with Government approval, thrown to lions for entertainment or were martyred.
But once the Christian movement became powerful enough to take control of the state, they forgot all thoughts of separation of church and state. Christian Emperor Theodosius massacred thousands of polytheists for example.
My point remains that Christianity willingly separated itself from the state only in its weakness -- in its first infancy, and now in its old age.
The Fourth Crusade which sacked Byzantium was (for that and many other crimes) excommunicated by the Pope Innocent III.
Phil, so? The Pope may have excommunicated many people whose actions displeased him, but the question is whether the Church willingly abandoned secular power or whether it was forced to do so.
#47
Phil, there are plenty of radical Moslems who would declare that there are no "Moderate Moslems" -- that Jordanian homicidal maniac in Iraq that is killing innocent Iraqi Moslems daily is one example and that equally insane Iranian president is yet another.
And I hope you're not going to go to them for theological advice.
Posted by: Phil ||
01/13/2006 17:25
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#48
My point remains that Christianity willingly separated itself from the state only in its weakness -- in its first infancy, and now in its old age.
You're missing vast parts of the middle ages when the Church, although more powerful than today, was not an arm of the secular authority the way it was in the time of Theodosius. In fact, it wasn't until around 1500 or so that the pendulum swung back towards stronger intermingling of religious and secular authority, partly because of the Protestant Reformation; every two-bit kingling and dukedom between Austria and the Norwegian part of Lapland wanted its own little captive state-controlled church, and things went downhill from there... many of the large Catholic regimes of the time decided in reaction they needed authority over the branches of the Catholic Church in _their_ land to keep up.
A lot of people don't know that the Spanish Inquisition, for instance, was subordinate not to the Catholic Church but the Spanish Crown (which got the confiscated property of those declared apostate).
A lot of the Founders who helped establish formal separation-between-church-and-state in the US weren't "radical freethinking atheist Dawkinists" or anything of the sort, or adherents of Voltaire and Rousseau; a lot of them were Quakers or Congregationalists or Anglicans reacting against the excesses of Cromwell and the Puritans (not to be confused with the Pilgrims).
Posted by: Phil ||
01/13/2006 17:55
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#49
the excesses of Cromwell and the Puritans
and James and Charles and Mary and Henry and on and on.
#50
My point remains valid. Islam from its inception is the government. Christianity is not an institution, or a government, but a spiritual faith about the values of faith, hope, charity, forgiveness. Christianity, as taught by it's "founder" Christ, has zero, nil, nada interest in the government or controlling the lives of others - except to share the Gospel and a better way than live than is the normal human condition which, without being taught to the contrary will seek to deal with life's trials through blame, revenge, greed, etc.
That Churches have been abused through out history to collect followers and money has but has never had any relationship to Christianity itself.
Martin Luther King talked about civil rights. Many of the institutions claiming to be civil rights organizations today are corrupt. They are actually just vehicles to collect followers and money and have values that are the antithesis of Martin Luther's ideals. But the fact that some of them are corrupt does not mean that teaching the values of civil rights is the cause of their corruption.
You can point at some churches that had to be forced to separate church from state - but then they weren't really Christian churches, now were they?
#54
Yes, I agree. The democrats are a traitorous, treasonous, cowardly bunch who want to appease the enemy with their limpwristed legalistic approach to the WOT. We must hunt the enemy out
and kill them before they kill us.
The anti-Iraq war of rhetoric democratic leaders and that of the anti-war movement emboldens the enemy and is demoralizing our troops. These people are aiding and abetting the enemy.
President Bush is constitutionally correct to wiretap anyone in the U.S. who he believes has connections with to Al Qaeda. More than likely,
many within the Anti-Iraq War Movement have ties with terrorist organizations and are purposely
drumming up opposition to President Bush's GWOT
policies with the goal of weakening our resolve
to quit fighting before victory is achieved.
Yes, the Democrats, the Anti Iraq-War movment in the U.S. and the terrorist in Iraq should all be considered as one: The enemies of the U.S.
Posted by: Ray Gunn ||
01/13/2006 10:01
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A completely disorganized effort to annoy hyper-sensitive Moslems is called the "Making Fun Of Mohammed Cartoon Contest".
Put simply, many non-Moslems who write about Islam, or make drawings of Mohammed, are threatened. But nobody and nothing should be "above being made fun of". So the way to help them overcome their hyper-sensitivity is to overwhelm them with so many objectionable works that they chill out, or at least get more entertaining with their seething.
Since they will sometimes threaten the lives of authors and cartoonists, publishers and web servers, it behooves those who want to Make Fun Of Mohammed to be anonymous.
The Internet provides the solution with Peer-to-Peer file transfers. Virally-spread anonymous cartoons, whose filenames are all prefixed "MFOM - (whatever).jpg", are now being disseminated.
Anyone who wants to can create an MFOM - xxxxx.jpg (or something), being utterly blasphemous about Mohammed or Islam.
And the best part is that since few people have much artistic talent, they can just take an existing cartoon, say Doonesbury, or the one written by Ted Rall, erase whatever dialogue is in the balloons, and replace it with something very offensive to those who get offended far too easily. Not a cartoonist you like, though, as it might get him in trouble.
As long as you don't sign the cartoon, there is no practical way to trace its origin. The winners of the cartoon contest are those whose cartoons are eventually discovered and result in maximum seething and empty threats--a fine prize indeed, putting the creator on a par with Salman Rushdie, albiet anonymously.
Of course, if some ignorant Imam wants to threaten Ted Rall, well, that would be unfortunate, wouldn't it?
In any event, just whipping out a cartoon in a few minutes and putting it in the upload area of your P2P software is all it takes.
Perhaps we could even start the hunt for the "Best Mohammad Joke Ever", like the "Best Blonde Joke Ever" that Donald Sensing so helpfully points to. (Damn him! I'm still chuckling...)
#2
Fact: Muslims want us to enforce their perverse sharia, and succeed in doing so when we bend to their crude pressure. Professor Pipes publicized this case of dhimmi injustice:
http://www.ontariocourts.on.ca/decisions/2001/december/hardingC35767.htm
Muslims can be trusted as far as you can spit against a hurricane. They don't want to coexist with us; they want to eliminate our existence.
#4
"They don't want to coexist with us; they want to eliminate our existence."
I believe that statement to be an accurate assessment. However, to be more specific they want to eliminate your existence. To be clear, when I say âyourâ, I refer to those that advocate their genocide and ethnic cleansing as a solution.
#5
Incomplete, DepotGuy. They are pretty keen on eradicating my personal existence, and that of the trailing daughters as well. We are Jewish, female, educated, opinionated, and Jewish. Oh, and my father has a medal from the Haganah (and the double taxation that goes with it). They are pretty keen on wiping him out, too. In fact, they aren't nearly as interested in CaziFarkus as they are in me and mine.
#6
Depot G, are you planning on being the last one 'eliminated'? Good luck. YOU are on their list. Seems you are misreading those that only read one book.
Israel's right-wing Likud party will face fresh turmoil before the forthcoming general election as cabinet ministers rebel against an order from their leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, to quit the country's coalition government. Israeli media reports suggested that the four ministers - Silvan Shalom, the foreign minister, Limor Livnat, responsible for education, Yisrael Katz, the agriculture minister and the health minister, Danny Naveh - were to defy Netanyahu.
Netanyahu was elected as Likud leader last month after Ariel Sharon, who helped found the party, split it by leaving to form his own centrist party, Kadima. He had been frustrated by criticism from the right of the party over his withdrawal from Gaza. The walkout had been planned for earlier in the week but was postponed out of respect for the prime minister who suffered a stroke last week and is now in a critical condition in hospital. Netanyahu ordered the ministers to tender their resignations from the government on Thursday morning, shortly before voting begins to determine the list of Likud candidates to run in national elections on 28 March. Reports on Israeli radio on Thursday said that the ministers refused to comply and instead said that they would resign only on Sunday.
One unnamed minister was quoted by the YNETnews website as saying: "We won't obey [Netanyahu's] orders to resign." The order was issued by Netanyahu on the eve of Likud's primary elections. The aim was to pressure ministers to follow through on his instructions or risk not winning a place on the party ticket.
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Oily preacher Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson has sent a letter apologizing for suggesting that Ariel Sharon's massive stroke was divine punishment for pulling Israel out of the Gaza Strip.
Pat Robertson is an affliction sent by God to punish American Christians for something or other...
Robertson's comments drew widespread condemnation from other Christian leaders, President Bush and Israeli officials, who canceled plans to include the American evangelist in the construction of a Christian tourist center in northern Israel.
"Avner, that man is a dipshit. Are we sure we want him in our consortium?"
In a letter dated Wednesday and marked for hand delivery to Sharon's son Omri, Robertson called the Israeli prime minister a "kind, gracious and gentle man" who was "carrying an almost insurmountable burden of making decisions for his nation. My concern for the future safety of your nation led me to make remarks which I can now view in retrospect as stoopid inappropriate and expensive insensitive in light of a national grief experienced because of your father's illness. I ask your forgiveness and the forgiveness of the people of Israel."
We're waiting for the next outburst of theological insight for Reverend Pat. They seem to come every six months or so. It's sort of like religious Tourette's.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
He's pretty amazing, in that he can still manage to speak clearly.... even with both feet in his mouth, all the way up to the ankles.
#2
What's NOT said is that yesterday Israel told Pat Robertson that the multi-million dollar religious complex that he wanted to build was denies, halted and scrapped because he slammed Ariel Sharon.
This is nothing more than "Save your Ass" and would never have been said without this denial by Israel to build his self-promoting Palace.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
01/13/2006 8:19
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#3
Israel said "thanks but no thanks - get out....apology not accepted since it's not sincere"
Pat does have a use - a white Sister Souljah
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/13/2006 10:18
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#4
He's an old white man like me. Just have to forgive him and move on.
#5
The position of Israel's Minister of Tourism, which has been working with Robertson on the project:
The contract is still open - just not with Mr Robertson. If there are other Christian leaders, they are most welcome to sign a contract to bring Christian tourists to the State of Israel.
We want to see who in the group supports his (Robertsonâs) statements. Those who support the statements cannot do business with us. Those that publicly support Ariel Sharonâs recovery are welcome to do business with us.
#6
Call me cynical, but I suspect Pat's abrupt climb-down has more to do with economics and lost contributions than with regret over intemperate remarks.
#8
3dc:
Because he's an idiotarian and a self-proclaimed Christian. So they can say "See, Christians are just as stupid and bigoted as, um, well, we can't insult moslems..." Just as David Duke was brought onto shows as to argue against racial quotas and set-asides. "See, if you are against us, you must be like him."
At least nine Sri Lankan sailors have been killed in a landmine attack by suspected Tamil Tiger rebels, the military says. The sailors were travelling in a convoy of several vehicles as they returned to their posts after a vacation, an official says, adding 13 other sailors escaped with injuries. "Eight sailors were killed on the spot and 14 others escaped with injuries and one of them died on the way to hospital," an official in the northern town of Vavuniya said. The incident is the fourth of its kind in the past three weeks. Thirteen sailors died in a similar ambush on December 23, and another 12 died in a mine attack four days later. On Saturday, 15 sailors died in a suicide attack which sank their gun boat in the north-eastern port district of Trincomalee.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Radical cleric Abu Hamza al-Masri urged followers to "bleed" the enemies of Islam and train their children for violence, according to videotaped sermons that were played at his trial in a London court on Thursday. The fiery preacher blamed British and American politicians for the deaths of thousands of Iraqi children and called in his sermons for the destruction of the "enemies of Allah." Al-Masri, 47, faces a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted of inciting murder and stirring racial hatred in speeches recorded on nine video and audio tapes made for supporters.
"Imagine you have only one small knife," he said in one of the tapes, which were played for jurors at London's Central Criminal Court. "You have to stab him here and there until he bleeds to death, until he dies." The two-hour speech was delivered in late 1997 or early 1998, prosecutor David Perry said.
Al-Masri said all Muslims should train to carry out violence and said believers must monitor "targets who are enemies of Islam." He said that from the age of 10 or 12, children should be encouraged to attend mujahedeen-style training sessions to prepare them for future violent struggle. Parents should "show them videos about jihad ideas" and "bring them up for jihad," or holy war. Prosecutors say al-Masri possessed a 10-volume terrorism "manual" which advised attacking targets such as Big Ben, the Statue of Liberty and the Eiffel Tower.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
Prosecutors have forgot the WTC which was attacked. "Play the video tell the jury this is what he encouraged in his sermons."
I really have not faith the UK justice system is going to do anything about this waste of skin.
#2
Me neither, SPoD, me neither. Cop killers are doing less than ten years in the UK - he'll get a year tops and be out due to the time he's spent on remand.
Posted by: Howard UK ||
01/13/2006 5:13
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United Nations investigators probing the killing of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri cannot meet Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Syrian Information Minister Mahdi Dakhl-Allah said on Thursday.
"Nope. Nope. Can't do it. He's washing his hair that day... And he'll be out of town... His... ummm... grandmother died..."
Asked if Syria rejected holding a meeting between Assad and the investigators, Dakhl-Allah told Egyptian radio: "Certainly, because the issue is related to Syria's sovereignty."
"Y'can't be sovreign if yer gonna have people askin' you all sorts of questions!"
The team conducting an inquiry into Hariri's death in a Beirut bomb blast on Feb. 14 has been trying to interview Assad. Diplomats had said previously the Syrian leader had refused. "Syria is committed to its independence and sovereignty. This is a red line that cannot be crossed," Dakhl-Allah added.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
Cooperation == full access, not picking and choosing who can be talked to and who can't.
So the question is, are they going to cooperate, or are they not? If not, lower the boom on 'em.
The US military predicted yesterday that violence would increase around Iraq as final results from last monthâs elections are released and political groups forge ahead with forming a new government. Brig. Gen. Donald Alston, spokesman for the US-led coalition force, said in Baghdad that a series of âhorrific attacksâ that left at least 500 people dead since the Dec. 15 elections were an indication that insurgents were trying to take the opportunity of the transition to a new government in an effort destabilize the democratic process. âAs democracy advances in the form of election results and government formation, and as the military pressure continues, and the pressure generated by political progress increases, we expect more violence across Iraq,â he said at a news briefing.
Final election results are expected to be released early next week. Alston said that as a new government starts coming together âthose committed to seeing democracy fail will see this time of transition as an opportunity to attack the innocent people of Iraq.â
Posted by: Fred ||
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Iraq's former deputy prime minister, Tariq Aziz, may have less than a month to live after suffering a cerebral embolism, his lawyer has said. Badie Arif Ezzat told the Al-Hayat Arab newspaper on Thursday that Tareq Aziz, one of the most recognisable figures from Saddam Hussein's deposed regime, is "in agony and I do not expect him to live more than a month" following the cerebral embolism and heart problems.
Anyone tell Pat Robertson?
A cerebral embolism occurs when a blood clot creates a blockage in an artery in the brain and is a common cause of a stroke. Ezzat did not say when Aziz, 69, had been struck by the illnesses but noted that the deterioration was apparent when he visited several of his clients to mark the Muslim Eid Al-Adha festival which started on Tuesday.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
I should have read the article first. I thought maybe there was no point in a trial, they were just going to string him up.
#2
in agony and I do not expect him to live more than a month
I can live with that. But put the bastard on trial now, and convict him quickly, so that his death sentence steals the last few minutes from his life as he enabled life to be stolen from others. Let him face the judgement of his god after he faces that of those he wronged. Vengeance may be claimed by God, but Man is perfectly capable of justice untempered by unjustifiable mercy.
#3
Security guards surround Iraqâs Deputy Prime Minister Tareq Aziz (C) as he arrives at Rome's Fiumicino Airport on Thursday. "Iraqi missiles are within the limits set by the United Nations," Aziz said, dismissing suggestions that Baghdad's rocket programme was in breach of UN resolutions. â Reuters photos
Sudanese troops are disguising themselves as African peacekeepers to launch surprise attacks on rebels in Darfur. In a report to be submitted to the AUâs Peace and Security Council yesterday, AU Commission Chairman Alpha Oumar Konare said the Sudanese troops were painting their vehicles white, the color of AU peacekeepersâ vehicles âto disguise their identities and launch surprise attacks on their opponents.â Sudanese Foreign Minister Lam Akol said his military hires vehicles and helicopters that are painted white for transportation, but said the vehicles were never used in combat. âGovernment troops do not need to disguise their vehicles by painting them white to fight the rebels,â he said in the Ethiopian capital.
But it was not the first time the AU has accused Sudanese forces of disguising themselves as peacekeepers. The AU had said in October that in a September attack on civilians in a Darfur town and adjacent camp for those displaced by the war, Sudanese forces used government vehicles painted AU white. âThis new development threatens to undermine the credibility of (the African Union peacekeeping mission) and draw the mission into the conflict,â Konare said in his report yesterday.
He said three government vehicles and a helicopter gunship had been spotted painted white. âThe government should ensure that no white colored vehicles are used for military operations. The government should stop using white aircraft and vehicles for any security related activity,â Konare said. A 6,964-strong African Union military and police force has been struggling to stabilize Darfur, saying it needs more financial and other support from the international community.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
Redacted by moderator. Comments may be redacted for trolling, violation of standards of good manners, or plain stupidity. Please correct the condition that applies and try again. Contents may be viewed in the sinktrap. Further violations may result in banning.
Posted by: AU commish ||
01/13/2006 9:55
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#2
Any bets on how long that pic will remain posted, whahahhahahaaa.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/13/2006 10:03
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#4
haven't a clue as what was objectional about that comment???
LOL, unless it was something in the mind of the observer to begin with. :)
Posted by: AU commish ||
01/13/2006 10:39
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#5
AU Commish, if you aren't being facetious, you're right, you don't have a clue. Get one. If you are being facetious, it falls flat. It's the 21st century, not the 19th. Grow up.
It was a blatantly racist pic, and no, it's not in my mind.
Don't do this sort of thing; it's not the image or reputation we want for Rantburg.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/13/2006 10:44
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#7
Wew! I'm exhaused, those Aunt Jemima pancake syrup labels were an absolute bitch to get off, but now I'm clean, my mind is right once again (hope I can avoid the camps) thanks to the Burger fellows.
Redacted by moderator. Comments may be redacted for trolling, violation of standards of good manners, or plain stupidity. Please correct the condition that applies and try again. Contents may be viewed in the sinktrap. Further violations may result in banning.
Posted by: Red Dog AU commish ||
01/13/2006 11:44
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#9
Redacted by moderator. Comments may be redacted for trolling, violation of standards of good manners, or plain stupidity. Please correct the condition that applies and try again. Contents may be viewed in the sinktrap. Further violations may result in banning.
Posted by: Red Dog ||
01/13/2006 11:45
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#10
Sudan Troops Disguising as Peacekeepers in Darfur
shhhhh they're watching us
Posted by: AU commish ||
01/13/2006 9:55
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#11
Hokay evil Me
I surender
Posted by: Red Dog AU commish ||
01/13/2006 11:44
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#12
as per usual:
surrender
Posted by: Red Dog ||
01/13/2006 11:45
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Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah made a phone call to Bahrainâs King Hamad and offered his condolences over the death of his son. King Hamad thanked King Abdullah for his brotherly feelings. King Hamadâs 14-year-old son was killed in a car accident yesterday in Manama, Bahraini officials said. Sheikh Faisal ibn Hamad Al-Khalifa, the youngest of kingâs six sons, was killed in a âregretful accident late yesterday,â according to a statement by the royal court published by the state news agency BNA. He will be buried early today, it said.
Earlier, an Information Ministry official told AFP that Sheikh Faisal was killed when the car he was in collided with a bus in the southern part of the capital, Manama. The official, who did not wish to be identified, said the teenager had been with a number of bodyguards, one of whom was driving the car.
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The three major European powers and the US say the time has come for Iran's nuclear activities to be dealt with by the United Nations (UN) Security Council. The calls follow a storm of international criticism after Iran broke the seals at three nuclear plants to resume uranium enrichment research. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has accused Iran of a "deliberate escalation" of the dispute, saying it is in "dangerous defiance of the entire international community". She says the Security Council should "call for the Iranian regime to step away from its nuclear weapons ambitions".
After holding talks in Berlin, the foreign ministers of Britain, France and Germany made a joint statement saying two-year negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program had reached a dead end. They described Iran as having a record of concealment and deception and said its government was not interested in better relations with the international community. British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said, "Iran has decided to turn its back and these negotiations have reached an impasse".
He says it is time for Europe to act. "I think we have no alternative but for the decision at which we have reached to call for an emergency meeting of the board of governors of the Atomic Energy Agency, with a view to the involvement then of the Security Council," he said. The ministers have called for an emergency session of the UN's nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which can refer Iran to the Security Council where it could face trade sanctions.
But UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has been speaking with Iran's chief nuclear negotiator. He says he has been told Iran still wants what it calls "serious and constructive negotiations" on the nuclear issue but within a time frame. Mr Annan has asked the Iranians to come back to the negotiating table. "Basically, I called him to urge him to avoid any escalation, to exercise restraint, go back to give the negotiations a chance and that the only viable solution remains a negotiated one," he said.
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#1
Kofi Annan is obvioulsy not intelligent if he actually believes Iran really wants to sincerely negotiate.
#2
"But UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has been speaking with Iran's chief nuclear negotiator."
The staff administrator at the UN thinks he's a sovereign, a Head of State. Certainly he's earning every dime the MMs funnel to him - and none of what he's paid to manage the UN.
Enough. Enough of the IAEA, the UN, the MMs. Enough of this fool Annan.
A Palestinian man has blown himself up and Israeli forces have killed two others during clashes in the town of Jenin in the West Bank, security sources and Palestinian witnesses say. Aljazeera's correspondent in Jenin reported that the bomber blew himself up near a group of Israeli soldiers who were carrying out an operation against Palestinian resistance fighters. Israeli forces had surrounded a building in which activists from the al-Quds Brigades, the armed wing of Islamic Jihad Movement, were taking shelter. More than 30 military vehicles and a bulldozer were involved in the Israeli operation. An Israeli source said the bomber detonated an explosives belt after refusing to surrender.
It doesn't sound like he actually managed to take any Zionists with him, or al-Jizz would be trumpeting that...
Another Palestinian fighter in the house was shot and killed by the Israeli soldiers, according to witnesses. Another Palestinian was reported killed during a separate clash with Israeli forces in Jenin. In the city of Ram Allah, violence flared up when armed men opened fire on the home of Nasser Yousef, the Palestinian Interior Minister. Yousef, who was home at the time, was unhurt, but three gunmen were wounded, one critically. Yousef's bodyguards returned fire and wounded three of the gunmen, who were taken to hospital. One was in critical condition with a neck wound, medics said.
"You shot me! You shot me in the neck!"
"He's right, Ari. You screwed up. Next time, aim 4 inches higher."
A fourth gunman escaped in a car, prompting Palestinian security forces to set up roadblocks in the West Bank city. It was not immediately clear which of the many armed Palestinian factions the gunmen belonged to or what prompted the attack. In a seperate incident, gunmen also shot at the offices of Ahmed Qureia, the Palestinian prime minister. There were no reported injuries.
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#1
Not well written. Clearly there were a number of attackers on the Minister's house (three, I think), who opened fire. Then there were the bodyguards, who fired back. But it isn't clear to me whether there were additional gunmen inside the house, three of whom were wounded by the attackers' bullets, or if those bullets hit nothing important and only the three attackers were wounded -- by bullets fired by the bodyguards.
Of course, Al Jazeera is a spin-off from the BBC, so I don't expect the kind of clear thought leading to clear writing that I find here.
The former US governor of Iraq has condemned Spanish troops for their 'idiotic' conduct in Iraq. Paul Bremer claimed they "did nothing" as a battle between Shi'ite militia forces and coalition troops went on around them in the Iraqi city of Najaf in 2004. In his memoirs, Bremer wrote: "They are sitting in tanks doing nothing", quoting from notes he made at the time. "It is a perfect outrage â I call it the 'coalition of the not-at-all- willing'."
Bremer's book, 'My year in Iraq: The struggle to build a future of hope', challenges the version given by the Spanish military of the Najaf uprising in April 2004. The rebellion took place just days before Spanish troops were due to be withdrawn from Iraq by the newly-elected Socialist government which won a general election weeks earlier. Bremer claims Spanish troops deployed five kilometres from Najaf refused to help US marines and troops from Latin American countries who were fighting insurgents. The defence ministry of the present Socialist government and the Popular Party, which first deployed Spanish troops when it was in power, defended Spanish troops. "There is no reason to doubt their work," a defence ministry spokesman told the Spanish daily El Pais.
#1
Then it was a good thing they left Iraq. Good job Zappy. Although I suspect a lot of the other nation's troops, including staunch allies like Japan, would do the same. But at least they're not stationed in sensitive areas like Najaf.
#4
The Salvadoran troops loathed the Spanish troops - interviews made it clear that the Salvadorans felt the Spanish were the worst Coalition troops to have as backup, and that the Spanish were responsible for the deaths of several wounded Salvadorans since they did not provide any help with medavacing the wounded.
#9
Lol, tw - too true! I hear personal experience speaking!
BTW, O/T note - check out this site: http://www.coffeebeandirect.com/
Bulk coffee and tea - and I mean bulk, lol. I bought 2lbs of Irish Breakfast - and it's good stuff - and 2lbs of a flavored tea (orange spice) - and didn't like it cuz it was over-flavored. I haven't tried the coffees, yet, but will. You won't believe the prices. Apologies for O/T bandwidth. ;-)
A Danish Army captain and four military police officers were found guilty yesterday of breaching human rights conventions in interrogations of detainees in Iraq. The Copenhagen City Court said Capt. Annemette Hommel and the four co-defendants violated the rights of the detainees by forcing them to kneel in uncomfortable positions during questioning in March 2004.
The court declined to issue sentences because of extenuating circumstances, saying the defendants had not received clear guidelines from the Danish military. The five defendants had pleaded innocent in what was Denmarkâs first trial related to its 530-strong contingent in the port city of Basra, 400 kilometers southeast of Baghdad. All five immediately appealed the verdict to a higher court. Hommel, 38, told reporters the verdict was âtotally not in lineâ with her values. âI think the court opted for an unnecessarily hard line,â Hommel said as she rushed out of the courthouse with her parents. The case, which followed prisoner abuse scandals involving US and British troops, was partly based on allegations by civilian interpreters used by the Danish military.
The court said Hommel and the four officers, who cannot be named under a court order, violated Danish military laws by breaching the Geneva Conventions on the humane treatment of prisoners. However, it acquitted the defendants on several counts of mistreatment citing lack of evidence, including charges that they denied the detainees water and verbally insulted them during questioning. The court said military authorities failed to give Hommel clear instructions on how to conduct interrogations, despite her repeated requests for guidance. The three Iraqi detainees, members of the Al-Sadr militia that has battled US and British troops, had been brought to the Danish Camp Eden for questioning on suspicion of setting up illegal road blocks and rioting.
During the trial, which started May 2, Hommelâs defense lawyer, Ebbe Mogensen, said there was no evidence that his client had done anything criminal while questioning the Iraqi detainees. He lashed out at Denmarkâs military command for sending Hommel to Iraq with inadequate interrogation training and said key witness testimonies against her were contradictory and unfounded. Denmarkâs defense chief, Gen. Hans Jesper Helsoe, said in a statement he would not comment on the case until it has been settled by the appeals court. The trial was conducted in a civilian court because Denmark has no military courts.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/13/2006
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#1
...even softer power dhimmitude...
The Danes will become very familiar with the "uncomfortable" kneeling position.
#2
kangaroo??? Ah....kangaroo court. I get it! If I had any photoshop skills, I'd photoshop a tennis racquet in his right hand and a tennis ball in his left.
EFL
Alberta's oilsands could become the single biggest contributor to the world's supply within 10 years, says a report released Wednesday by CIBC World Markets. That would mean a global shift in oil dominance from Saudi Arabia and the Middle East to Canada.
The main reason is most of the new oil coming on line this year will simply offset older oilfields being depleted in the North Sea and Kuwait, said Jeff Rubin, Chief Economist at CIBC World Markets. Rubin suggested global conventional oil production peaked in 2004. New supply in 2007 is expected to grow by less than 1.5 million barrels per day and will fall to less than one million barrels per day in 2008, the report says. "All of the net increase in oil production this year is expected to come from non-conventional sources. While deep-water oil is the primary source today, we forecast that Canadian oilsands will become the single biggest contributor to incremental global supply by 2010."
Rubin also noted Canadian oilsands would also be one of the few remaining oil developments still open to private investment. Oil prices are expected to average more than $70 US per barrel this year. Warning: the Canadian stock market is a wild and woolly place where scams abound, and the odds are high that the small investor will have to pay for the priviledge of having lost his shirt.
Question: what impact would Canada's newfound popularity have on relations with the U.S.? On its actions vis a vis the War on Terror? Discuss.
#4
Well, let us suppose that the Canadian tar sands are bought up by China.
Since oil is sold in a global market, and is largely fungible, that would simply mean that there'd be less demand for Middle Eastern or African oil.
The only way that Chinese control of Canadian oil matters, is if the global supply of oil suddenly shrinks - but even then, as phil b points out, there are over a trillion barrels of oil that could be tapped in the U.S.
They're just not as cheaply recoverable as is Middle Eastern or even Canadian oil.
Posted by: Michael Herdegen ||
01/13/2006 3:30
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#5
I think youâre overstating the âindependenceâ movement up here. Iâm an American living in Canada (Alberta). While there is a lot of disgruntlement over getting screwed by the federal government from the oil revenues, most people up here wouldnât want to separate and form their own country. It gets more media attention than it deserves and the movement is not as organized nor as deep as it is in Quebec. Not to mention, this sentiment exists only the rural areas of Southern Alberta. You donât hear much about it in the big cities. Albertans donât think of themselves as âAlbertansâ, but more as âCanadiansâ.
I also think this âallegianceâ with the US is overstated. Thereâs a lot of anti-Americanism in Alberta (and I canât stress this enough). I see it everyday at work. Granted, I live in Edmonton, which is decidedly more left-wing than the rest of the province, but still. Alberta isnât THAT right-wing; there was a recent poll on which American party Albertans would support and over 60% supported the Democrats.
As for the Chi-coms buying out the oil here, itâs all talk. I donât think their offers come close to what American firms offer. Once in a while, Paul Martin while whine and moan about Canada-US trade issues (to score political points with the anti-Americans and unionists, who are also anti-American) and threaten to seek other export âmarketsâ, but this is just talk. I donât think he is that stupid (though the way heâs running his reelection campaign here is making me wonder) and he knows Canada needs the US export market to survive and that China has never really honored any trade agreements.
The one I would worry about is Jack Layton, who leads the socialist NDP party. He would probably cut the supply to the US and sell to China. Heck, it was one of his campaign promises if the US didnât fix the softwood lumber issue. But I think heâd do this mostly because he sees the PRC as an ideological ally. The chances of him getting elected this time are very, very slim, though.
And while they are improving techniques to extract oil from the tar sands, itâs still a very expensive and time-consuming process. Not to mention, the quality of the oil just isnât all that good compared to the black gold in the Middle East. Unfortunately, weâll all have to depend on Middle Eastern oil for a long time.
#7
Why are'nt we subsidising this form of oil production. If these places were able to go on line in one year (I know that can't happen now), Venazaula, and the Middle East would be hurt almost instantly. We could punish them without sending our best to stop them. Seems that subsidising would be the cheap way.
Recovery from tar sands requires very large capital investment that is repaid over a very long time. In order to make the investment pay off, the price must consistently remain above some floor level at which it makes a profit.
The current oil market is very volatile. The price can crash or skyrocket in a matter of weeks.
In order to provide the minimum return the market requires, we should not subsidize oil developers, but assure that oil prices do not fall below a floor at which they can make a profit through an import duty. If the tar sands can be developed at a profit when the price is $50 per barrel, we should put a duty on imported oil that brings its price to $50. If the oil is purchased for $35 per barrel, the duty is $15. If the price is $55, the duty is $0. This would assure that the tar sands were developed using investor greed instead of the corruptible government largesse of subsidies.
#10
massive build out of wind, solar and nuclear plants, increased ethanol production and flex-fuel supercharged plug-in hybrids would eliminate the need for importing oil. Could be done in less than 10 years.
#12
Nimble Spemble, great point. But I don't think you even need to do that... the tar sand people could do it themselves by shorting oil futures and lock in their returns. No need to get the gov't involved... free market is fully equipped to handle volatility in pricing.
#15
How long before it begins to affect price though. Venzauala, Saudi Arabia, Iran, are only able to do as they please because of oil. They have no other real export of much value other than illegal product (illeagal in the west)
#16
If we could stop the envirowackos from shutting down US exploration, we could be energy-indepentent in two years. That's the major problem, not a lack of resources. There are enough coal seams in the Rocky Mountains to supply LPG to every customer in the United States for the next 80+ years. The recovery technology is in place, and we're already producing. There are dozens of really DEEP oilfields that aren't being produced because the expense is too high at the moment, but $60/bbl will change that - IF the price stays that high long enough. A friend of mine developed a technology to extract oil from oil shale for $45/bbl, but it took too much water - water that couldn't be supplied then, and really isn't available now. Shipping oil shale to somewhere else where there IS water is expensive.
We need three things to increase US energy independence: modernization of existing facilities (refineries, oil pipeline networks, power lines, rail links, ports, harbors, etc.), development of both new facilities (refineries especially) and alternative facilities (nuclear, nonconventional, etc.), and restructuring and reducing the financial and legal tangle to provide better incentives for both traditional and non-traditional energy production. There are dozens of allied groups doing everything possible to sabotage all three programs. We, the people that are most affected by all this, need to put a stop to their sabotage, and hold them accountable. That includes hanging a former impeached president and his co-conspirator.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
01/13/2006 18:42
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#17
"the tar sand people"
Good name for a band. Adjustments req'd for an SUV name, though.
#1
I see Kim's point: the second amendment should allow inidividual citizens to arm themselves like an individual soldier. Higher levels of organization, and weaponry, are reserved for state and federal armies.
One Canadian, in a discussion about the Pentagon's plans for invading Canada, warned us about their snipers. While any sort of "resistance" Canada would put up if we were motivated enough to invade them, would be laughable, BUT I would count on a way higher body count than Iraq solely because of those snipers. Thus, I heartily agree with Kim's suggestion that citizens be allowed to own sniper-worthy weapons: I think it would be possible for Vidalia, Georgia, to field more snipers, albeit not as good, as the Canadians. Multiply that by all the cities and towns in the United States with populations of at least 10,000, and you'll see a situation where nobody would even THINK of trying to invade North Dakota.
US soldiers battled with a group of insurgents south west of Baghdad on Wednesday, killing six and wounding a seventh who was later detained, the military said. âWhile conducting an air-insertion mission, Task Force Ironhorse soldiers killed several insurgents, detained one and discovered a significant weapons cache today,â it said in a statement released from Baghdad late on Wednesday. The statement did not specify where the fight took place and a military spokeswoman yesterday would only say it occurred âsouth west of Baghdad.
Posted by: Fred ||
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France got its clearest look yet at the man who would be its next president, as Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy called Thursday for sweeping changes in the way France — and the European Union — operates. Stopping short of announcing his candidacy for next year's presidential election, the ambitious interior minister said his aim was to "embody the future." He marked a clear break with President Jacques Chirac's style of governance, asking whether the presidency had become "archaic." He held up a vision of a re-styled seat of power to narrow the credibility gap between old guard polticians and the people.
I'm waiting for comments from our readers who actually know something about La Belle France...
The 73-year-old Chirac, in his second term, has been the leading force on the conservative right for three decades, the official bearer of the Gaullist legacy. However, as president since 1995, Chirac has often confined his public role to affairs of state. Increasingly aloof, he took 11 days to respond to three weeks of rioting last year in France's depressed suburbs. Corruption scandals have weakened his authority and fed disenchantment with the political class. "The future president can only be different from those who preceded him," said Sarkozy.
"Things have got to get better. They can't get much worse."
The suburban riots reflected "the extent of the failure of our public policies over 30 years," Sarkozy added — referring to a period that coincides with Chirac's preponderant role on the political right. Sarkozy proposed a maximum of two five-year terms for presidents. He added, in an apparent swipe at Chirac: "When one's energy goes to lasting, one no longer thinks of doing." There is currently no limit, meaning Chirac could theoretically run for a third term in 2007.
... when he will be 186 years old.
Sarkozy, who turns 51 later this month, heads Chirac's UMP party, but has positioned himself as a political rival with the man who once was his mentor. His feisty nature, straight-talk and policy proposals have set him apart from the mainstream left and right.
"Garcon! There is substance in this mush! Take M. Sarkozy away!"
Sarkozy says the French economic model no longer works;
... and probably never did.
he champions strong policing and tougher immigration controls; he opposes Turkey's aspirations to join the European Union; he says France must adjust its secular foundations to better integrate its 5 million Muslims.
He may even think hard about deporting some of them...
widely regarded as Chirac's protege, in the party's January vote for a presidential candidate.
His poufy hair would stand him in good stead when negotiating with Kim Jong Il...
Sarkozy's proposals Thursday for making the president more accountable and parliament more powerful were radical. The prime minister would be reduced to the role of coordinator. Sarkozy argued for a "president-leader who is engaged" not only in the larger issues but also in the "daily life of the French."
Wrong way, Corrigan. La Belle France would probably be better off with the gummint spending less time messing with the daily lives of its citoyens.
Sarkozy ventured far beyond his portfolio as interior minister in his remarks Thursday. He said major European powers should have the lead role in European Union decision-making — and not be held back by smaller countries. Aside from Bulgaria and Romania, which hope to join the 25-member EU in 2007, no more members should be admitted until institutions are reformed, he said. Long opposed to allowing Turkey to join the EU, he stressed that "Europe needs frontiers."
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
making the president more accountable and parliament more powerful were radical. The prime minister would be reduced to the role of coordinator.
Sounds suspiciously like the American system to me.
#3
JFM is more savy and credible than me in political analysis (I don't vote because I'm fed up with all theses inept liars, I just started back voting against the Eu constitution), but...
I don't like Sarko, he's part and parcel of the system, and he's a double-talker from my pov.
Also, IMHO, he's very pro-islam, that may have changed, as the climate is into "islamophobia" on the french street, I'd say.
Sarko IS ambitious... true, he's more "free market" and atlantist than the rest of the "conservatives", not hard, (there are simply no conservative mvt in France, after all, its head for the last 30 years has been Yaouled Shiraq, a crypto-leftist who only acted like a rightwinger when it suited him), but when in was industry minister, he was a colbertist, not a free-market proponent (prices control isn't exactly free-market).
Apparently, he's accepted the "inevitable" mutation of France into a multiculturalist country with several "communities", Ã la USA, and hope to use this to enable him to be president.
On one hand he's flirting with the Le Pen's electorate, on the other he's hoping to get the muslim vote. Fat chances, after the "Sarkozy sale juif!" of november, and the "racaille" (scum) libel (he didn't actually say it, it was a tv edit, either on behalf of Galouzeau "de Villepin", or because of the channel's bias against him... after all, he's what passes for rightwing in this country).
That's my take on him.
In 2007, I guess I'll most probably vote for Philippe de Villiers (conservative christian who openly talks about the rapid islamization of France), though I'm not even sure he's truly divorced from the Establishment. Not even my first choice...
If nothing else, I'll vote for Le Pen, but while I kinda like the character (he's the useful scapegoat of the french political landscape, used by Establishment pols to legitimate their power, he's a tool, and he knows and profits from it... but he's also a Loki-like "trickster" entity), I really disagree with his statist proposals (his tax cuts are good, though) and many of his opinions (like antisemitism).
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.
ABCNews is reporting a strike in Pakistan by 
Chechen First Deputy Prime Minister 
Security forces are reported to be fighting a group of armed militants in Russia's restive southern republic of Daghestan. Russian media reported that security forces blocked a group of several armed militants in the mountainous Sergokala region. One policeman was reported injured in the fighting. Earlier this month, up to five militants were reported killed in several days of fighting with security forces in another mountainous district, Untsukul, of Daghestan. Also today, the regional Interior Ministry said security forces captured a suspected militant in the Khasavyurt region wanted for participating in attacks on federal forces in neighboring Chechnya in 2002.
An Algerian terrorist suspect has been deported from Vancouver after spending more than four years in jail. Samir Ait Mohamed was accused of being an associate of "Millennium bomber" Ahmed Ressam.
Muntasir Abdul Baqi may have a thankless job for most of the year, but during Haj there are more fruits to his labor. The middle-aged Sudanese plumber is one of the men in Makkah that help keep the municipalityâs sewage system working. During the annual pilgrimage, he says plumbers find all sorts of lost items beneath the many toilets at the holy sites. 
Pilgrims slaughtered over one million sheep, cows and camels in Mina to mark the successful completion of the Haj. An additional 42,000 beasts were slaughtered in Makkah abattoirs as of Wednesday, official sources said.
Sen. Edward M. Kennedy belongs to a social club for Harvard students and alumni that was evicted from campus nearly 20 years ago after refusing to allow female members. 
The Dutch coastguard found several kilos of cocaine on board one of its own ships, the Tjerk Hiddes, while it was patrolling the Caribbean for drug smugglers, the military police said yesterday.
At least 10 persons were injured in a clash between supporters of the ruling BNP and the Awami League in the Char Milpara area under Kushtia sadar on Sunday morning.
KATMANDU, Nepal - Nepalâs army killed at least 10 communist rebels during a gunbattle in the fiercest fighting since the guerrillas ended a cease-fire earlier this month, a defense ministry spokesman said on Friday.
CAIRO - An official from Egyptâs Suez Canal Authority denied a French aircraft carrier heading to a scrap yard in India would be prevented from crossing the waterway, Egyptâs official news agency reported on Thursday.
A court in Kerala has acquitted all 16 accused in the Calicut ice cream parlor sex scandal 
On Monday, an Iranian military plane crash killed eleven top commanders in Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Gen. Ahmad Kazemi, the commander of IRGC's ground forces, died in the crash. The dead also included a number of other military notables whose names were released by the Islamic Republic News Agency, including the commander of Rassoulollah Army Division 27, the deputy commander of ground forces for operation affairs and the official in charge of information for ground forces.
Two masked gunmen killed the Muslim sultan of Maguindanao and wounded his brother in an ambush in the southern Philippines, police said yesterday, warning of a potential clan war in the area. Local police chief Inspector Rick Masla said 
Israel's right-wing Likud party will face fresh turmoil before the forthcoming general election as cabinet ministers rebel against an order from their leader, 
At least nine Sri Lankan sailors have been killed in a landmine attack by suspected Tamil Tiger rebels, the military says. The sailors were travelling in a convoy of several vehicles as they returned to their posts after a vacation, an official says, adding 13 other sailors escaped with injuries. "Eight sailors were killed on the spot and 14 others escaped with injuries and one of them died on the way to hospital," an official in the northern town of Vavuniya said. The incident is the fourth of its kind in the past three weeks. Thirteen sailors died in a similar ambush on December 23, and another 12 died in a mine attack four days later. On Saturday, 15 sailors died in a suicide attack which sank their gun boat in the north-eastern port district of Trincomalee.
Radical cleric 
United Nations investigators probing the killing of former Lebanese Prime Minister 
The US military predicted yesterday that violence would increase around Iraq as final results from last monthâs elections are released and political groups forge ahead with forming a new government. Brig. Gen. Donald Alston, spokesman for the US-led coalition force, said in Baghdad that a series of âhorrific attacksâ that left at least 500 people dead since the Dec. 15 elections were an indication that insurgents were trying to take the opportunity of the transition to a new government in an effort destabilize the democratic process. âAs democracy advances in the form of election results and government formation, and as the military pressure continues, and the pressure generated by political progress increases, we expect more violence across Iraq,â he said at a news briefing. 
Iraq's former deputy prime minister, 
Sudanese troops are disguising themselves as African peacekeepers to launch surprise attacks on rebels in Darfur. In a report to be submitted to the AUâs Peace and Security Council yesterday, AU Commission Chairman 
Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah made a phone call to Bahrainâs King Hamad and offered his condolences over the death of his son. King Hamad thanked King Abdullah for his brotherly feelings. King Hamadâs 14-year-old son was killed in a car accident yesterday in Manama, Bahraini officials said. Sheikh Faisal ibn Hamad Al-Khalifa, the youngest of kingâs six sons, was killed in a âregretful accident late yesterday,â according to a statement by the royal court published by the state news agency BNA. He will be buried early today, it said.
The three major European powers and the US say the time has come for Iran's nuclear activities to be dealt with by the United Nations (UN) Security Council. The calls follow a storm of international criticism after Iran broke the seals at three nuclear plants to resume uranium enrichment research. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has accused Iran of a "deliberate escalation" of the dispute, saying it is in "dangerous defiance of the entire international community". She says the Security Council should "call for the Iranian regime to step away from its nuclear weapons ambitions".
A Palestinian man has blown himself up and Israeli forces have killed two others during clashes in the town of Jenin in the West Bank, security sources and Palestinian witnesses say. Aljazeera's correspondent in Jenin reported that the bomber blew himself up near a group of Israeli soldiers who were carrying out an operation against Palestinian resistance fighters. Israeli forces had surrounded a building in which activists from the 
The former US governor of Iraq has condemned Spanish troops for their 'idiotic' conduct in Iraq. 
A Danish Army captain and four military police officers were found guilty yesterday of breaching human rights conventions in interrogations of detainees in Iraq. The Copenhagen City Court said Capt. Annemette Hommel and the four co-defendants violated the rights of the detainees by forcing them to kneel in uncomfortable positions during questioning in March 2004.
France got its clearest look yet at the man who would be its next president, as Interior Minister 
