July 2009 Archives

Pirates? In Viking territory?

From the basic reports, and this is only one of them, follow the link for more, this sounds more like organized crime. Either way, this is strange to have been found in the civilized European waters! Next thing, they might find a Conservative up there and really throw things out of whack.

http://www.eaglespeak.us/2009/07/pirates-in-baltic-sea.html

A ship was hijacked in Swedish waters early Friday morning last week, news wire TT reports. The boat was sailing between the islands of Öland and Gotland when the hijacking occurred.

Arriving in a boat with "police" painted on the side, a group of masked men searched the Malta-registered timber boat after tying up the crew, which was Russian.

The Swedish police only got word of the hijacking when the Russian Foreign Ministry called the Swedish police to ask why they acted in that fashion. But the Swedish police had never boarded the boat.

Ingemar Isaksson, who is heading the police investigation, said on Thursday that the hijackers spent more than 12 hours on the ship. Though it's not completely clear what the English-speaking hijackers were after, the police suspect they were looking for drugs.

"This is the first time that I've heard about something like this happening in Swedish waters," Ingemar Isaksson told TT.

Swedish police started investigating the case on Wednesday, but they have still haven't come into contact with the ship, which apparently continued its normal route after the attack.

The heat! AHHH! Break out the jackets its so hot!

If you feel like reading for the Liberal/Media spin on this it is worth the laugh. Basically, it is cooler because the air is hotter. Or something like that. I still believe the science that shows we are entering an ice age. It makes more sense than the babble of the politically correct fools who believe otherwise.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/01/nyregion/01hot.html?_r=3&hp

But this summer has been conspicuously different in New York City. Not one 99-degree day in Central Park. Not a single day that the temperature even approached 90. For just the second time in 140 years of record keeping, the temperature will have failed to reach 90 in either June or July.

The daily average this month has been at or below normal every day but two. The temperature broke 80 on 16 days in New York -- one more day than in Fairbanks, Alaska. Depending on Friday's high, this will be the second or third coolest June and July recorded in New York. If August follows the same pattern -- and the latest forecast through midmonth predicts that it will -- this could be the coolest summer on record.

The result: relief, lower electric bills, spared lives and undisturbed slumber.

But this being New York, New Yorkers have also recalibrated their threshold for heat complaints. This summer, 85 is the new 95.

"There's no doubt there's a tendency to acclimatize to a weather pattern," said Fred Gadomski, a Pennsylvania State University meteorologist. "This summer, we've had so many relatively cool days that even if it gets a little warm people are reacting to it as if it's a very hot day."

In the end, this will have been the coolest June and July since either 1903 or 1881, when sweltering New Yorkers grumbled about a sudden early August heat wave.

"There were warmer days during last summer," The New York Times reported on Aug. 6, 1881, "but men and women became accustomed to the unexampled heat of that unexampled season and did not mind it so much."

This has been the sixth coolest July on record. The high was 86 on July 17. For June and July, the average as of Thursday was 70.6, the third coolest. As of the end of the day Thursday, the average temperature in July was 72.6, nearly four degrees below normal.

"A monthly departure of four degrees below normal is very significant," said Gary Conte, a National Weather Service meteorologist.

This is totally cool! Way to go!
I met many Irish lassies and laddies when I was stationed in Cornwall and found them to be some of the nicest people in the world. If this couple ever comes my way, I offer them free beer now.

http://ace.mu.nu/archives/290359.php

The Irish Know How to Throw a Party

Via the Corner, an Irish couple invites 300 stranded U.S. soldiers to their wedding:

The 300 troops were stranded in Shannon last weekend after their Iraq-bound plane was grounded.

As luck would have it, they were booked into the same hotel as the wedding party for Amelia Walsh and Sean O'Neill.

And so the 300 troops were invited to join the festivities at the Clare Inn in Newmarket-on-Fergus.

The groom's uncle, Joe O'Neill said: "It didn't take long before the combat fatigues were manoeuvring to the strains of 'The Walls of Limerick'."

The happy couple posed for pictures with the troops earlier in the day and Eamon Walsh, the father of the bride, said the couple were "proud" to have the soldiers at their function.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article6733161.ece

The surge in British casualties in Afghanistan has left military surgeons so exhausted that a US surgical team has been drafted in to help.

The British doctors have also been overwhelmed with casualties from other nations, including US Marines, Afghan troops and civilians.

Extra British plastic surgeons have had to be sent to the field hospital at Camp Bastion in central Helmand along with additional X-ray technicians and specialist nurses.

The Ministry of Defence revealed that 57 soldiers had been wounded in action in the first two weeks of this month, the worst casualty figure since British troops deployed to Helmand province in 2006. The previous highest toll of those injured, 46, was in June -- but that was for the whole month. In the same two-week period, 15 soldiers were killed.
Related Links

* MoD promises better compensation for soldiers

* Chilcot can end bitterly divisive chapter

* Ainsworth applies some much-needed logic

Of the 57 wounded in action, nine were categorised as "very seriously injured" with life-threatening wounds, and seven were "seriously injured".

In one week alone this month, 157 wounded people were brought to the Bastion field hospital for treatment, although they were not all British. The toll was recorded during Operation Panther's Claw, launched on June 19 to sweep the Taleban out of central Helmand.

Surgeon Rear-Admiral Lionel Jarvis, Assistant Chief of Defence Staff (health), said: "Because of exhaustion among our surgeons and the very long hours that they were working, we talked to our coalition colleagues and a surgical team from one of the US facilities has moved temporarily down to reinforce the facility in Bastion."

http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=51759

The House health-care reform bill proposes to decrease hospital visits by establishing a "medical home pilot program" for elderly and disabled Americans.

Such a medical home would not require a physician to be on the staff, and therefore could be run solely by nurse practitioners and physician assistants. Medical homes also would practice "evidence-based" medicine, which advocates only the use of medical treatments that are supported by effectiveness research.

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/nilegardiner/100005208/general-dannatt-is-right-%E2%80%93-britain-is-at-war/

There is much to commend in General Sir Richard Dannatt's address on Thursday to The International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), his last speech before stepping down as Chief of the General Staff of the British Army. General Dannatt, who has been an outspoken critic of defence cuts and the Labour government's chronic underfunding of overseas military operations, delivered one of the most important speeches on British strategic thinking in the post 9/11 era.

It is not hard to see why Dannatt was ousted by a Prime Minister who has done more to weaken Britain's armed forces than any leader in modern times. His IISS speech contained none of the Miliband-like weak-kneed talk of cutting deals with the Taliban, or flowery discussion of how Britain should be advancing a ludicrous European defence identity with Brussels. Instead he offered a frank assessment of Britain's current military requirements if it is to retain its position as a global power as well as a strong reaffirmation of the Anglo-American Special Relationship. Refreshingly he didn't even mention the European Union once.

General Dannatt urged the forthcoming Strategic Defence Review to be "underpinned by a clearly defined view of Britain's global interests and our future global role":

I have smelled some horrible perfumes over time. But having one so bad that the Haz Mat team has to come and clean up after it is horrible!

Can you imagine the reaction of the team to find that it was toxic perfume they were required The thought is crazy!

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,535501,00.html?test=latestnews

At first, fire officials suspected that carbon monoxide or some other toxic fumes had sickened almost 150 people at a Texas bank call center.

It turned out that perfume was to blame.

MedStar ambulance spokeswoman Lara Kohl says 34 people were taken to hospitals, 12 by ambulance, after reporting dizziness and shortness of breath Wednesday at a Bank of America call center in Fort Worth. An additional 110 were treated at the scene.

Fort Worth fire Lt. Kent Worley says the incident started with two people complaining about dizziness after a co-worker sprayed perfume. Others reported being sick when an announcement was made that anyone with similar symptoms should exit the building.

Investigators do not know what type of perfume was sprayed.

I have a cure for this dispute. Convert all the Arabs to the religions that existed before Islam. Then they can stop this religious war and return it to a tribal war. Much simpler to contain.

http://www.jcpa.org/JCPA/Templates/ShowPage.asp?DRIT=1&DBID=1&LNGID=1&TMID=111&FID=442&PID=0&IID=3056&TTL=The_U.S.-Israeli_Dispute_over_Building_in_Jerusalem:_The_Sheikh_Jarrah-Shimon_HaTzadik_Neighbo

Israel's Right to Build in Its Capital

An Israeli plan to build 20 housing units in the Shepherd Hotel compound in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of Jerusalem has added a new dimension to an already complex dispute between the Obama administration and Israel over continued construction in eastern Jerusalem.1 Washington is insisting that Israel freeze all building in Sheikh Jarrah, as it occasionally has done in the past regarding other areas in the eastern part of the city. Israel, however, refuses to waive the Jewish people's historical and legal right to live in all parts of Jerusalem, the capital of the State of Israel.2 In eastern Jerusalem, i.e., north, south and east of the city's 1967 borders, there are today some 200,000 Jews and 270,000 Arabs living in a mosaic of intertwined neighborhoods.3

Disagreements between the U.S. and Israel over building in eastern Jerusalem are not new. In the 1970s, the U.S. expressed dissatisfaction with the construction of the Pisgat Ze'ev neighborhood, and in the 1990s it opposed the construction of a large neighborhood on Har Homa and a smaller one in Ma'ale Hazeitim near Ras el-Amud.

This time Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has made it clear that Israel's right to continue building in its capital is not a matter for negotiation, and is separate from the debate with the U.S. about the extent of building in the West Bank.4 On June 22, 2009, State Department Spokesman Ian Kelly had stated, in answer to a question, that the Obama administration's demand that all settlement activity - including natural growth - come to a halt also applied to Jerusalem neighborhoods over the 1949 armistice line.5

http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2009/07/muslim-professor-charged-with-deadly-french-synagogue-bombing-returns-to-teching-post-at-university.html

An Ottawa university professor charged in the deadly terrorist bombing of a French synagogue nearly 30 years ago is expected to resume teaching this week.

Hassan Diab, who is charged with murdering four people in the 1980 bombing, will begin teaching a part-time introductory sociology course at Carleton University two days a week until the middle of August.

Diab, whose strict bail conditions prevent him from leaving the house alone, will be required to travel to and from the university with his common-law spouse Rania Tfaily, an Ottawa court heard Monday.

But once at the university, Diab will no longer need an escort.

Diab's lawyer, Rod Sellar, told an Ottawa court Monday Diab will be at Carleton teaching and meeting with students between 1:30 and 5:30 p.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but the course may require him to go to the university almost daily.

Lin Moody, a spokeswoman for Carleton University, confirmed Monday that the school has hired Diab to teach for few weeks this summer. He was given a contract, she said, because of "an unforeseen leave" taken by the instructor who had originally been hired to teach the introductory sociology course.

http://www.stratfor.com/analysis/20090727_mexico_security_memo_july_27_2009

U.S. Border Patrol agent shot to death

U.S. Border Patrol agent Robert Rosas died late July 23 near Campo, Calif., when he was shot multiple times while pursuing several suspects in a rural area by himself. He was found with gunshot wounds in the head and abdomen and with some of his equipment missing. Blood traces from someone other than Rosas reportedly were found at the scene with Rosas' body, leading investigators to suspect that at least one of his assailants had been wounded, perhaps by gunfire.

Later, on July 24, authorities in the nearby Mexican town of Tecate, Baja California state, detained a suspected alien smuggler, who they said was in possession of a pistol issued by the U.S. Border Patrol. Four other suspected members of the smuggling organization were arrested the following day, though Mexican officials have not stated how they might have been involved with Rosas' death.

Based on the information currently available, it appears that Rosas was killed when the alien smuggling suspects he was chasing fired at him, perhaps at close range or during a struggle. This case is a reminder of the potential for Mexican organized crime-related violence on the U.S. side of the border, as well as the specific threat to law enforcement in the United States. STRATFOR has mentioned before that members of Mexican organized crime groups have demonstrated a willingness to engage police in the United States.

Although Rosas' murder was the first shooting death of a Border Patrol agent since 1998 and it is concerning from an officer-safety perspective, his death does not appear to mark a new or elevated threat to law enforcement in the United States. For example, there is no indication that his death was a planned or targeted killing, or that his attackers were armed with the powerful military ordnance characteristic of the violent nature of Mexican drug traffickers and other criminals. To be sure, an officer being shot while pursuing armed suspects is always tragic and a clear reflection of Mexican smugglers' willingness to use violence against police if threatened. But it is still a far cry from a criminal organization in Mexico regularly ordering and carrying out targeted assassinations of police officers in the United States -- something the cartels do daily in Mexico. In the meantime, such deaths in the United States can be considered almost inevitable, especially considering that authorities report nearly 50 Border Patrol agents were fired on during 2008.

http://www.eaglespeak.us/2009/07/brilliant.html

Sometimes you have to judge a man by the size of the opponent he picks.

This is very true. The President refuses to speak ill of any thug or tyrant, apologizes to them for the things they think America did to them, insults our allies, accuses doctors of illegal or unethical behavior, accuses cops of being stupid, and then feels like a man. He is such a waste of oxygen. Can Al Gore please talk to him about a serious reduction in his CO2 creation?

I think I can answer this question: Venezuela is giving weapons to the FARC guerrillas. Duh. I know that it will be reported as stolen, but only people who believe that the CIA created AIDS to exterminate the black race will believe that.

I find that the easiest explanation is the easiest. And the most believable.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jgmUhszbB9C53sLHMP2Pea4c9CfQ

Sweden called on Venezuela Monday to explain how Swedish-made weapons sold to the South American country ended up in the hands of Colombian FARC guerillas.

"We have asked the officials of the government of Venezuela to give us information on how they believe this material was found in Colombia," said Jens Eriksson, a political advisor to the Swedish ministry of commerce.

"We have it confirmed that a small amount of (defence) material made in Sweden has been found in a FARC camp," Eriksson said, stressing that no Swedish company had ever been granted a permit to sell to Colombia.

Later on Monday, Colombian Vice President Francisco Santos said a number of anti-tank weapons had been seized from FARC rebels, adding that they had been purchased by Venezuela in Europe.

"In several operations in which we have recovered weapons from the FARC, we've found powerful ammunition (and) powerful equipment, including anti-tank weapons which a European country sold to Venezuela and which turned up in the hands of the FARC," Santos told Colombia's Caracol radio.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,534935,00.html??test=faces

The typical cop car isn't born--it's slapped together. Traditionally, this involved taking a production vehicle, bolting on a reinforced bumper and adding some lights and a divider between the front and back seats.

But as law enforcement agencies update their fleets, the police car is evolving. The Ford Crown Victorias of the past half-century are losing ground to more powerful models, like the Dodge Charger. (Dodge was in financial limbo at press time, but we're not giving up on the Charger just yet.) And these cars are being outfitted with gadgets that add extra eyes and ears to a policeman's arsenal.

http://www.imao.us/index.php/2009/07/job-security/

Now, there's an Impeach Obama movement. Google it; you'll get 2,210,000 results. At Bing, not as many, but still 217,000 results.

Let me state right now, in case you somehow missed it over the last several months, I think that Barack Obama is an incompetent oaf. He's not qualified to work the cash register at Hardee's, much less occupy the Oval Office. But impeach him?

Consider what would happen.

On the upside, we'd be rid of him. That's a pretty big upside.

The downside? Who's next in line? That's right, Joe Biden. For crying out loud, no rational person would want him in the White House.

So, could they both be removed from office at one time?

Look what happens then: the Speaker of the House assumes the presidency. That's Nancy Pelosi! Again, no rational person would want that.

Who's next? The President pro tempore of the Senate, Robert Byrd.

Okay, it's a mass impeachment then. It removes the president, vice-president, Speaker of the House, and the President pro tempore of the Senate. Who assumes the presidency then? The Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton.

Next? Secretary of the Treasury, Timothy Geithner.

Then?

* Secretary of Defense: Robert Gates
* Attorney General: Eric Holder
* Secretary of the Interior: Ken Salazar
* Secretary of Agriculture: Tom Vilsack
* Secretary of Commerce: Gary Locke
* Secretary of Labor: Hilda Solis
* Secretary of Health and Human Services: Kathleen Sebelius
* Secretary of Housing and Urban Development: Shaun Donovan
* Secretary of Transportation: Ray LaHood
* Secretary of Energy: Steven Chu
* Secretary of Education: Arne Duncan
* Secretary of Veterans Affairs: Eric Shinseki
* Secretary of Homeland Security: Janet Napolitano

See what I mean? Remove one, another takes over. Okay, maybe Gates isn't that bad. But the only other Republican, LaHood, ain't no prize.

What then?

Nothing. We're screwed.

Until the 2012 election.

The Tolerance of Islam is well known. they are the Religion of Peace and send Peaceful squads of goons out to enforce modesty. Just think of how Peaceful it will be when a goon squad approaches an immodest woman with hair showing! As is seen in other countries with Sharia law, the morality police can rape women they find non-compliant and blame it on the woman. The Joy of Islam.

http://www.debka.com/index1.php

Hamas obliges all Gazan women to wear headscarves

DEBKAfile Special Report

July 26, 2009, 10:19 PM (GMT+02:00)

The Palestinian Islamist Hamas rulers of the Gaza Strip have enacted a new law obliging all women to cover their hair with the Muslim hijab. Sunday, July 26, "modesty patrols" were out on the streets and beaches of the Gaza Strip enforcing the new edict. They also inspected cars to ascertain that unmarried couples were not alone together. Female attorneys were earlier ordered to wear dresses in court.

The Gaza Strip's slide into sharia law emphasizes its separation from the West Bank where secular modes are tolerated, further distancing the extremist Hamas from Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah which rules the West Bank.

It coincides with a British parliamentary group's advice to Gordon Brown's government to seek ways of engaging Hamas "moderates."

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20090725/D99LM2A80.html

"Companies will need to convince Mr. Feinberg that they have struck the right balance to discourage excessive risk taking and reward performance for their top executives," a Treasury spokesman said Saturday. "That process is just beginning now, and Mr. Feinberg has begun consulting with those firms about their compensation plans. We are not going to provide a running commentary on that process, but it's clear that Mr. Feinberg has broad authority to make sure that compensation at those firms strikes an appropriate balance."

Some of the banks that received government loans, including JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc., already have paid back their debt, and are no longer subject to compensation oversight. Those firms are able to offer lucrative deals to entice employees away from other banks.

That leaves banks like Citigroup scrambling to retain the talent they need to turnaround their operations. Among the hardest hit by the credit crisis and recession, Citi has reported six straight quarterly losses totaling nearly $30 billion. The bank, which will soon be 34 percent-owned by the government, has reduced staff and sold assets to streamline operations and return to profitability.

To keep vital personnel from decamping to other firms, Citi in April asked the Treasury to free the highly profitable Phibro unit from federal compensation limits and last month said it would boost the base salaries of many employees - reportedly by as much as 50 percent for some workers - as it restructures their compensation amid government restrictions on bonuses.

"Retaining and attracting the best talent is very important to the success of Citi and all its stakeholders," Citigroup spokeswoman Danielle Romero-Apsilos said in a statement Saturday, while declining specific comment on Hall's contract. "Citi continues to examine ways to ensure its employee compensation practices are competitive in this very challenging market environment."

The Treasury spokesman noted that Feinberg's task is to ensure that companies "strike the right balance around their need to retain talent, reward performance, and protect the taxpayers' investment."

http://www.homeland1.com/homeland-security-products/bio-agent-identification-monitoring/articles/399027-protecting-law-enforcement-in-chemical-biological-radiological-and-nuclear-incidents/

Attacks or accidents involving chemicals, biological agents, or radiation are some of the most dangerous challenges public safety officers will ever encounter. As a result, protective equipment the officers rely upon in such incidents must meet the highest standards.

Existing performance standards for such equipment serve other members of the response community well, but a law enforcement officers role requires different performance requirements for chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) protective equipment.

In response, the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) embarked on the difficult task of developing a standard specifically for CBRN protective equipment to be used by law enforcement officers. The standard will focus on protective ensembles which are designed to provide fullbody protection against exposure to CBRN hazards.

NIJ organized a Special Technical Committee comprised of subject matter experts, many of whom are members of the law enforcement community. Other agencies represented include the National Sheriffs' Association, the National Fire Protection Association, the Department of Homeland security, the Department of Defense, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and organizations that test and certify equipment.

The Committee will identify the specific needs and requirements of law enforcement, identify shortfalls in existing equipment standards and test methods, address these shortfalls, determine compliance and conformity assessment requirements, and generate a new CBRN Ensemble standard.

http://islammonitor.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2604&Itemid=96

Outbreeding the Kuffar
Written by Dan Zaremba
Friday, 24 July 2009

Bigamy is still illegal in Australia for as far as we know, the 1961 Marriage Act has not been superseded by Shariah yet.

94 Bigamy
(1) A person who is married shall not go through a form or ceremony of marriage with any person.
Penalty: Imprisonment for 5 years. (source)

If you are a Muslim however you do not have to worry about possible bigamy charges.

A Muslim woman phoned in during Jon Faine's legal advice segment on 774 ABC Melbourne today and asked what she could do about her husband who, she said, has married another woman in Pakistan and returned to Australia with his new wife.
The answer from the radio station's regular legal expert David Whiting amounted to: not much, short of divorce.
No Australian law prevents this practice it seems. (source)

If the flash player doesn't work downoald and listen to the recorded broadcast {LINK}

Please note what the lady said to Jon Fain - Imams encourage bigamy in mosques during official sermons.

As long as a Muslim male does not intend to live with all his spouses under one roof the law enforcement agencies cannot do much at all to prevent it.

Why would an intelligent Muslim do it anyway if he can "set up" all his wives in separate Housing Commission units and on single mum pensions with all the spare time to procreate?

The Kuffar (us) will pay for the sacred Muslim right to multiple marriages and for their offspring's food, accommodation as well as for building multiple madrassahs where the young Muslims will be taught to despise us.
Comments (12)add

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1202192/Muslims-refuse-use-alcohol-based-hand-gels-religious-beliefs.html

Some Muslims have refused to use alcohol-based hand gels to combat the spread of swine flu because they claim it is against their religion.

Some of those employed by St Albans Council in Hertfordshire have complained about the antibacterial lotion, which is considered a key strategy in containing the virus.

Officials were concerned because the Koran bans Muslims from consuming alcohol, so council chiefs issued them with non-alcohol hand gels, which studies have shown to be less effective in killing bugs.

But Muslim leaders criticised the council's decision to change the gel, pointing out that Islamic teachings allow Muslims to use alcohol for medicinal purposes.

http://www.terrorismawareness.org/campus-news/374/georgia-tech-jihadist-guilty/

The guilty verdict on the terrorism conspiracy charge against his son was expected, Syed Riaz Ahmed said Wednesday. But Ahmed said his son, Syed Haris Ahmed, never harmed anyone and only expressed thoughts that he never acted upon. "You think something and you're guilty," Syed Riaz Ahmed said, standing outside a federal courtroom shortly after hearing his son pronounced guilty. "He's not guilty of any crimes in the eyes of Allah. He's guilty of U.S. laws." Syed Haris Ahmed was misled into his extremist thoughts by propagandist Web sites, his father said, adding that he believed his son never would have followed though on any plans to engage in terrorism. Ahmed, a 24-year-old former Georgia Tech student, was convicted of conspiring to provide material support to terrorists. During his trial last week, prosecutors introduced into evidence e-mails and Internet chats during which Ahmed said he wanted to engage in violent jihad.

http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/2009/07/ap_marines_afghanistan_drugs_072609/

Marines and Afghan forces have found and destroyed hundreds of tons of poppy seeds, opium and heroin in southern Afghanistan this month in raids that a top American official said show the new U.S. counter narcotics strategy in Afghanistan is working.

U.S. and NATO troops are attacking drug warehouses in Afghanistan for the first time this year, a new strategy to counter the country's booming opium poppy and heroin trade. NATO defense ministers approved the targeted drug raids late last year, saying the link between Taliban insurgents and drug barons was clear.

U.N. officials say Taliban fighters reap hundreds of millions of dollars from the drug trade each year, profits used to fund the insurgency.

The U.S. announced last month it would no longer support the destruction of individual farmers' poppy plants, and instead would increase attacks on drug warehouses controlled by powerful drug lords -- a wholesale change in strategy.

Marines, British troops and Afghan forces supported by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration have increasingly targeted drug warehouses in Helmand and Kandahar provinces -- the largest opium poppy growing region in the world.

http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/2009/07/army_monti_update_072409w/

Sgt. 1st Class Monti, 30, was assigned to 3rd Squadron, 71st Cavalry, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division, when he was killed.

He will become the sixth service member to receive the Medal of Honor during operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and the first soldier to receive the nation's highest award for valor in Afghanistan. Navy Lt. Michael Murphy is the only other service member to have received the award for actions in Afghanistan.

All of the awards have been given posthumously.

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20090726/D99LQDSG0.html

In a statement posted Friday on The Root, a Web site Gates oversees, the scholar said he told Obama he'd be happy to meet with Crowley, whom Gates had accused of racial profiling.

"I told the president that my principal regret was that all of the attention paid to his deeply supportive remarks during his press conference had distracted attention from his health care initiative," Gates said. "I am pleased that he, too, is eager to use my experience as a teaching moment, and if meeting Sergeant Crowley for a beer with the president will further that end, then I would be happy to oblige."

It was a marked change in tone for Gates, who in the days following his arrest gathered up his legal team and said he was contemplating a lawsuit. He even vowed to make a documentary on his arrest to tie into a larger project about racial profiling.

In an e-mail to the Boston Globe late Friday, he said: "It is time for all of us to move on, and to assess what we can learn from this experience."

In a statement to The Associated Press, Gates promised to do all he could so others could learn from his arrest.

"This could and should be a profound teaching moment in the history of race relations in America," Gates said. "I sincerely hope that the Cambridge police department will choose to work with me toward that goal."

Gates, 58, did not say in his statement if he planned to file a lawsuit.

UPDATE:
http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-11685-Ada-County-Conservative-Examiner~y2009m7d25-Not-quite-ready-for-postracial-politics

Since the government sent two honorable agents to prison for long sentences for the "crime" of shooting an escaping drug dealer in the butt, I wonder what they will do for criminals who shot an agent to death? Based upon the way this Administration is trying to appease the criminals of the world, I am guessing they will give them money and an apology for the rude behavior of the agent.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,534761,00.html

CHULA VISTA, Calif. -- Federal investigators are combing hospitals along the U.S.-Mexico border for at least two suspects who may have been injured in gunfire that killed a Border Patrol agent in Southern California.

Law enforcement agencies were pursuing "a number of leads" in the United States and in Mexico but no one had been arrested or charged with killing Agent Robert Rosas, the FBI said late Friday.

Investigators said they have notified hospitals on both sides of the border to be alert for patients with suspicious or unexplained injuries.

The Los Angeles Times reported that police in Tecate, Mexico, said Friday they had arrested an injured man walking near the crime scene with a Border Patrol-issued weapon shortly after the shooting. The man, Ernesto Parra Valenzuela, 36, was taken to a hospital, according to a news release.

Sending troops into combat on US soil is illegal. Except when fighting foreign troops. Trained terrorists could easily be considered trained and foreign and troops, if they wore uniforms during the attack.

When dealing with armed and trained foreign terrorists, having the military on standby in case the law enforcement units are out gunned or led into a trap is not a bad idea. I know that most SWAT style units can handle most situations. However, police are chronically underfunded and often out gunned. The military, especially the elite units, does not have that problem.

One of the issues I see with this is that it is also using the police as bait. If they are killed, then the military gets to do its work. But who wants to see the dead bodies that the military will have to walk over to get to the terrorists?

I know many cops. Most of them would rather send in a SEAL team to deal with terrorists than go in themselves.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/elections/2009/07/24/paper-bush-considered-sending-troops-new-york/?test=latestnews

The Bush administration in 2002 considered sending U.S. troops into a Buffalo, New York, suburb to arrest a group of terror suspects in what would have been a nearly unprecedented use of military power within the United States, The New York Times reported.

Vice President Dick Cheney and several other Bush advisers at the time strongly urged that the military be used to apprehend men who were suspected of plotting with Al Qaeda, who later became known as the Lackawanna Six, the Times reported on its Web site Friday night. It cited former administration officials who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The proposal advanced to at least one-high level administration meeting, before President George W. Bush decided against it.

The six young Yemeni-American men from Lackawanna were arrested in September 2002 after investigators learned they received military-type training at Usama bin Laden's al-Farooq training camp in Afghanistan. All pleaded guilty and received sentences between seven and 10 years.

Dispatching troops into the streets is virtually unheard of. The U.S. Constitution and various laws restrict the military from being used to conduct domestic raids and seize property.

Good for the Commander. When I read the headline, I was irritated. When I read the article, I became even more irritated, but in a different way.

These Media types who hate the military and live as elitists are so irritating. They get under my skin like so few others ever can. Where do they find these vulgar slime bags anyway?

http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowlDC/newspapers/man_bites_dog_us_navy_commander_files_sex_complaint_against_female_miami_herald_journo_122619.asp

The Commander claims that Rosenberg said to members of the press and enlisted military men and women: "Seeing him [Gordon] topless in tent city was the most repulsive sight I've ever seen in my life." Most recently, while walking to court, Gordon says that Rosenberg obstructed an AP pool photographer from taking his picture, saying "Well, I know you like to have your picture taken to show people you are actually working down here, but guess what, not today..."

Gordon, who also serves as the Pentagon Spokesman for Western Hemisphere and Guantanamo issues also accuses Rosenberg of "bullying" reporters from various outlets including New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, Fox News, CBC, Der Siegel and Al Jazeera. He claims that over the years, Rosenberg has labeled her peers in the press and Gordon's colleagues "bitches," "stupid," "lazy," "incompetent," "Nazis," and "Saddam Hussein-like."

A full copy of Gordon's complaint here.

*The Miami Herald was not available for comment when FishbowlDC contacted them. We'll continue to update as this story unfolds.

This is too important to ignore!

It is about time that another soldier got honored for bravery. This war is being fought by small units and when they get in trouble they drop a few bombs for so far over head that the plane is almost invisible.

Congratulations and condolences to the family of this true Hero.

http://www.blackfive.net/main/2009/07/sfc-jared-monti-medal-of-honor-afghanistan.html

SFC Jared Monti - Medal Of Honor (Afghanistan)
Posted By McQ

[Bumped up due to announcement in an update below]

Greyhawk brings us the news that SFC Jaren Monti of Raynham, MA has posthumously been awarded the Medal of Honor for conspicuous valor above and beyond the call of duty.

On 21 June 2006, SFC Monti, then a staff sergeant, was the assistant patrol leader for a 16-man patrol tasked to conduct surveillance in the Gowardesh region. The patrol was to provide up-to-date intelligence, interdict enemy movement and ensure early warning for the squadron's main effort as it inserted into the province. As nightfall approached, the patrol was attacked by a well organized enemy force of at least 60 personnel.

Outnumbered four-to-one, SFC Monti's patrol was in serious danger of being overrun. The enemy fighters had established two support-by-fire positions directly above the patrol in a densely wooded ridgeline. SFC Monti immediately returned fire and ordered the patrol to seek cover and return fire. He then reached for his radio headset and calmly initiated calls for indirect fire and close air support (CAS), both danger-close to the patrol's position. He did this while simultaneously directing the patrol's fires.

When SFC Monti realized that a member of the patrol, Private First Class (PFC) Brian J. Bradbury, was critically wounded and exposed 10 meters from cover, without regard for his personal safety, he advanced through enemy fire to within three feet of PFC Bradbury's position. But he was forced back by intense RPG fire.

He tried again to secure PFC Bradbury, but he was forced to stay in place again as the enemy intensified its fires. The remaining patrol members coordinated covering fires for SFC Monti, and he advanced a third time toward the wounded Soldier. But he only took a few steps this time before he was mortally wounded by an RPG.

About the same time, the indirect fires and CAS he called for began raining down on the enemy's position. The firepower broke the enemy attack, killing 22 enemy fighters. SFC Monti's actions prevented the patrol's position from being overrun, saved his team's lives and inspired his men to fight on against overwhelming odds.

Go on over to Mudville and read the whole thing.

You can go here to Pundit Review Radio (AM680 WRKO) and hear McQ talk about SFC Monti as Someone You Should Know. After McQ's tribute, they are joined by SFC Monti's father.

Update from Blackfive:

The White House just announced it. It's official (even if they botch his rank).

THE WHITE HOUSE

Office of the Press Secretary
_______________________________________________________________________________________

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 24, 2009

On September 17, President Barack Obama will award Staff Sergeant Jared C. Monti, U.S. Army, the Medal of Honor for conspicuous gallantry. Staff Sergeant Monti will receive the Medal of Honor posthumously for his heroic actions in combat in Afghanistan. He displayed immeasurable courage and uncommon valor - eventually sacrificing his own life in an effort to save his comrade. Staff Seargent Monti's parents, Paul Monti and Janet Monti will join the President at the White House to commemorate their son's example of selfless service and sacrifice.

PERSONAL BACKGROUND:

Jared C. Monti was born on September 20, 1975. He was a native of Raynham, Massachusetts. He graduated from Bridgewater-Raynham High School. He enlisted in the United States Army in March 1993. He attended Basic Training and Advanced Individual Training at Fort Sill, Oklahoma.

His military decorations include: the Bronze Star, Purple Heart, five Army Commendation Medals, four Army Achievement Medals, three Good Conduct Medals, three National Defense Service Medals, to name a few.

He is survived by his Father, Paul Monti, his Mother, Janet Monti, his Sister Niccole Monti, his Brother, Timothy Monti, and his Niece, Carys Monti.

He was posthumously promoted to Sergeant First Class.

This story still irks the heck out of me. How is it a coup when the Supreme Court and the Congress order the arrest of the President for criminal activities?

To me, allowing this wanted criminal back is wrong. It sends the message that being the President overrules the laws. Which, naturally, appeals to the many Leftists and power hungry thugs who rule the majority of countries. Could you imagine allowing Leftist leaders to be deposed for violating the Constitutions they swore to uphold? It would cause chaos!

Speaking of which, when is violating the 10th Amendment in the US going to be illegal?

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,534763,00.html?test=latestnews">http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,534763,00.html?test=latestnews

Zelaya said soldiers were preventing many of his supporters from reaching the border. Some of his backers made their way on foot after bus drivers refused to risk the trip.

National police director Manuel Escoto told CNN the security was to keep the peace.

Zelaya has urged soldiers to ignore orders to arrest him and lower their weapons when they see him.

All governments in the Western Hemisphere have condemned the coup, in which soldiers acting on orders from Congress and the Supreme Court arrested Zelaya and flew him into exile. Nations on both sides of the political spectrum say Zelaya's return to power is crucial to the region's stability.

Washington and the Organization of American States have asked Zelaya to be patient and not return on his own, fearing it could plunge the country into chaos.

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D99KVTB00&show_article=1

KENNER, La. (AP) - A mystery substance found in a truck that authorities believe was hauling narcotics has sickened numerous law enforcement officers in Louisiana, and at least 18 have been quarantined as a precaution.

Roberto Bryan Jr., a spokesman for the Drug Enforcement Administration, says 18 DEA agents, Louisiana State Police troopers and Jefferson Parish Sheriff's deputies have been quarantined at East Jefferson General Hospital until the substance is identified.

State police Lt. Doug Cain says several officers were overcome with nausea and dizziness as they searched a suspicious 18-wheeler that had been taken to police headquarters. Officers found several bricks of white powder among the truck's cargo of limes.

What depravity! Hindus are so backwards, asking the gods to provide rain. Everyone knows it is government that does that, right Obama? Of course, parading naked girls around is a good way to attract the attention of politicians, right Hillary and Teddy?

I wonder if this will have a web feed for mortal interests?

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,534753,00.html?test=latestnews

Indian farmers -- desperate for rain -- have asked their unmarried daughters to plow dry fields naked, in a bid to spark interest from the weather gods, and bring some badly needed monsoon rain.

The nude girls in the eastern India state of Bihar chanted hymns as they plowed the fields, asking for rain, witnesses told Reuters.

"They (villagers) believe their acts would get the weather gods badly embarrassed, who in turn would ensure bumper crops by sending rains," Upendra Kumar, a village council official, told Reuters.

"This is the most trusted social custom in the area and the villagers have vowed to continue this practice until it rains very heavily," she told Reuters.

I think it is crazy interesting to think that protesting against the invasion and take over of part of their country is provoking the thugs who captured it. I guess that the best way to not provoke the military that occupies half your country is to bend over and take it in the butt. Did the people in Georgia give up all the rights to their country just because Russia has claimed part of it?

The Russian invasion was illegal but allowed because no one wants to confront the emerging Soviet return. President Bush might have at the beginning of his term, but he was so worn out by the constant attacks on his character that he had given up being the boss and trying to improve things by the time the Soviet Army rolled across the Georgian border. President Obama would rather perform oral sex on Putin than offend the Soviets by standing up to them. Sick freak.

Georgia: Planning 'Provocative Incidents'?

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin said July 23 that Georgia was planning on staging "provocative incidents" on the border with the breakaway province of South Ossetia. Karasin has linked these plots (which include both civilian and military participation) to the Georgian leadership, specifically President Mikhail Saakashvili. Such accusations from Russia have intensified as the first anniversary of the August 2008 war between Russia and Georgia approaches.

The main event Russia has said could create mass disruptions is a planned march, which could include thousands of Georgians, from Georgia to the South Ossetian capital of Tskhinvali. South Ossetia has been virtually sealed off from Georgia since Russia recognized its independence and sent in more than 3,000 troops to hedge against any further Georgian designs to recapture the region. Georgia has planned a similar march in the past but was unable to get the momentum for it to materialize; indeed, Karasin reportedly said the upcoming planned march had been canceled. However, the anniversary of the Russo-Georgian war could provide a jolt to make it happen this time around.

One of the few good things to come from 9/11 was the realization that communications between responders is/was horribly difficult. In a mass disaster scenario, a lack of communications means a loss of life. The Dept of Homeland Security is providing small and limited grants to assist cities to upgrade to 21st century systems that work significantly better. This allows smaller departments to upgrade to retired systems from the bigger cities that can still suit the needs of the smaller environment.

One of the major difficulties in upgrading is costs. Two cities getting new communications is $20! I do not think that is very affordable and is one of the reasons that upgrading all the regions of the country is taking so long. Having the Feds give money is not really saving any money, because this allows the companies to maintain prices despite increased demand for lower prices.

I wonder if there is a really good way to save the money. Where I live there are constant discussions about how to fund a new communications system, but it has been almost impossible to find a system that fits the local needs and still fits in the budget.

http://www.homeland1.com/homeland-security-products/communications-headsets/articles/509873-ill-emergency-radio-systems-are-shutting-down-when-they-need-them-most/

AURORA, Ill. -- Aurora's aging emergency radio system has shut down seven times in the last three years.

Officers were unable to communicate with dispatchers for several hours in some cases while the city arranged to borrow replacement parts from other suburbs because the manufacturer no longer makes them. Though the outages have not had serious consequences, the city did not want to take any more chances.

So ater this year, Aurora and Naperville will spend more than $20 million converting their analog radio systems to ones that use digital technology. The new radios will be more reliable and authorities say they will also provide better service from inside buildings and allow all emergency responders to communicate with each other instead of through a dispatcher.

But critics said the new system could hamper radio communication with other agencies and make it difficult for people outside the system to monitor radio traffic. Plus, there have been problems with the system elsewhere in the country.Naperville and Aurora decided to buy the new M/A-COM system together because the neighboring departments often back each other up in emergencies. Naperville is paying $10.1 million for its share, most of which is coming from capital expenditures and bonds. Aurora will pay between $10 and $15 million for its share, depending on bids out for its radio towers, said Lt. Rusty Sullivan.

http://www.debka.com/headline.php?hid=6191

DEBKA-Net-Weekly: Obama disappointed in ME advisers, mulls reshuffle

DEBKA-Net-Weekly Exclusive

July 21, 2009, 4:17 PM (GMT+02:00)

US president Barack Obama is seriously weighing a reassessment of his Middle East policy approaches and changing around his key White House and National Security Council advisers. DEBKA-Net-Weekly reveals he feels his initiatives, particularly in Iran and the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, have fallen flat and is ready to step back for a fresh approach.

Working with Emergency Management specialists means I have responded to, read about and/or studied many natural disasters. This is the not the first time I have read about major damage from a rain storm, however, less than a half millimeter is not usually considered to be a major storm! This is a great example of how nature does what it wants. This is important for all responders to remember when they are learning about weather. Right Mikey?

http://www.homeland1.com/business-continuity/articles/509587-Drizzle-causes-emergency-in-Chilean-desert-city/

Drizzle causes emergency in Chilean desert city

SANTIAGO, Chile -- In one of the driest regions on earth, even a drizzle can cause an emergency.

Less than 100th of an inch (about 0.2 millimeters) of rain fell on the Chilean port city of Iquique Monday afternoon, accompanied by moderate winds of about 10 mph (17 kph), according to the country's weather service. That was enough to knock out power to several neighborhoods and to damage the roofs of 4,000 houses, said Gov. Miguel Silva.

Schools were closed Tuesday so that officials can repair the damage.

The city of 170,000 people in northern Chile is in the heart of the barren Atacama Desert, squeezed between the Andes and the Pacific Ocean. It averages about 0.02 inch (0.6 millimeter) of rain a year, according to University of Chile meteorologists.

Houses in the region are not built to resist rain and their roofs often have no slope for runoff.

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=104674

Federal gun regulators have written to gun dealers around Tennessee, dropping the hammer on a new state law that exempts weapons made, sold and used inside the state from interstate regulations.

The letter, dated just days ago, was distributed to holders of Federal Firearms Licenses.

In it, Carson W. Carroll, the assistant director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, told dealers the Tennessee Firearms Freedom Act, adopted this year, "purports to exempt personal firearms, firearms accessories, and ammunition manufactured in the state, and which remain in the state, from most federal firearms laws
and regulations."

The exemption is not right, the federal agency letter contends.

http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htmurph/articles/20090721.aspx

The F-22 is still moving down the maturity cost curve (getting more reliable and cheaper to maintain as it accumulates more flight hours), and doing so on schedule. Comparing the F-22 in this phase of its life, to the fully mature F-15, is inaccurate. In fact, the history of fighter development over the last sixty years shows aircraft getting more expensive, but more capable and reliable. The problem with the F-22 is that it is way ahead in performance, and cost. The argument against the F-22 is that it provides more performance than the air force can afford. Now, when it comes to performance, fighter pilots feel "too much ain't enough." But to the air force commanders who must plan and conduct the battles and campaigns, too much performance in too few aircraft can be a losing proposition.

Islam is one very weird religion. The only way to kill a woman legally is to rape her first? Remind me, why it is that Islam is the Religion of Peace and Tolerance?

http://foxnews.mobi/content.html?contentId=44043

Report: Iran Guards Marry, Rape Virgins Before Executions

Members of Iran's feared Basij militia forcibly marry female virgin prisoners the night before scheduled executions, raping their new "wives" and making it religiously acceptable to execute them, a self-professed member of the paramilitary group said.

The anonymous militiaman told the Jerusalem Post that at age 18 he was "given the 'honor' to temporarily marry young girls before they were sentenced to death."

In the Islamic Republic of Iran it is illegal to execute a woman if she is a virgin, the former guard told the newspaper. So the government arranges "wedding" ceremonies to be conducted the night before executions, and prisoners are forced to have sexual intercourse with a guard.

Raped by her new "husband," a female prisoner is now fit to be put to death.

"I regret that, even though the marriages were legal," said the militiaman, who told the Jerusalem Post he had just been released from prison himself after freeing two teenagers rounded up during post-election protests.

Some of the prisoners in his care were drugged with sleeping pills to make them docile, as the girls in their custody always fought back, he said, fearing the night of the rape more deeply than their executions the following day.

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=104381

A groundbreaking advance in medicine announced this week promises to dramatically reduce the number of people who would be killed in a nuclear war due to radiation
poisoning with simple injections administered within three days of exposure.

Funded by the Pentagon, Professor Andrei Gudkov, chief scientific officer at Cleveland BioLabs, developed the preventative drug - it's not a vaccine - based on research he began in 2003 using protein produced in bacteria found in the intestine to protect cells from radiation, reported Israel's YnetNews.

Cells exposed to large doses of radiation die, scientists have found, when the cell's "suicide mechanism" is activated. The new medication based on intestinal bacteria works by suppressing the mechanism that causes cells to die and allows them to recover.

More than ever before, we need to think about the unthinkable and not depend on government to protect us from harm. Get "Survival: How a Culture of Preparedness Can Save You and Your Family from Disasters" to learn how you can protect your family.

Gudkov's hunch paid off in early mice studies.

"We exposed both groups to lethal radioactive radiation," he told YNetNews. "All the mice in the control group died within a short period of time. A few days later, when I approached the cage with the mice that received the protein, I could see that they're OK, that they're alive. They survived. It's hard to describe the joy all of us felt. We realized that finally, after so many years and so many experiments and frustrations, we made a breakthrough that may save the lives of millions."

Those results were published in the journal Science, but the discovery of the injectable medicine is only now being revealed following two tests that showed the drug's effectiveness in protecting monkeys and its safety for humans.

I love guns and toys. Here is an article that talks about both! I want half of these toys. Anyone willing to help me buy them? Yeah right!

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2009/07/gun-accessories/

The technology for actually firing a bullet has evolved relatively slowly over the years, but the accessories that can be mounted on guns themselves are a different story.

Advanced optics and ballistic computers are changing the way that soldiers take aim, and silencers have become a hot commodity for civilian marksmen. Even iPhone and beverage holders are available.

Read on for some of the most high-tech and surprising gun accessories we could find. Have your own favorite? Let us know in the comments.

I love Miss Linda and her insights. She has a knack for finding things that I do not find else where either, which is both wonderful and irritating. I hate being beat to the punch. At least with her I can handle it.

Anyway!

Prof. Plimer is a rational geologist who understands climate change, because the changes are integral to his work. He studies it, loves it, revels in it. Any moron can understand that there have been ice ages and hotter ages and most of them were well before any humans existed. I bet AlGore tells his kids that the 'Ice Age' movies are based on mythological weather conditions created by right wing extremists to give us a justification to drive cars and pollute. I despise morons.

Thanks for finding this Miss Linda

http://www.lindasog.com/archives/2009/07/meet_ian_plimer.html#comments

Meet Ian Plimer

He's an Australian geologist, and the man who has exposed the great climate change con trick:

The hypothesis that human activity can create global warming is extraordinary because it is contrary to validated knowledge from solar physics, astronomy, history, archaeology and geology,' says Plimer, and while his thesis is not new, you're unlikely to have heard it expressed with quite such vigour, certitude or wide-ranging scientific authority. Where fellow sceptics like Bjorn Lomborg or Lord Lawson of Blaby are prepared cautiously to endorse the International Panel on Climate Change's (IPCC) more modest predictions, Plimer will cede no ground whatsoever. Anthropogenic global warming (AGW) theory, he argues, is the biggest, most dangerous and ruinously expensive con trick in history.

The "Most Transparent President Ever" is still hiding his past. Anyone who asks questions is attacked, smeared and slandered and now fired. He hides his records, distorts the ones that do manage to reach the light of day, and is working incredibly hard to bull through laws that would never be passed if anyone could read them before they are voted upon. Not that it matters, because when he is proved to be illegitimate then all the laws he has signed will be illegitimate also. No wonder he is keeping his past so well hidden.

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=104044

... among the documentation not yet available for Obama includes his kindergarten records, his Punahou school records, his Occidental College records, his Columbia University records, his Columbia thesis, his Harvard Law School records, his Harvard Law Review articles, his scholarly articles from the University of Chicago, his passport, his medical records, his files from his years as an Illinois state senator, his Illinois State Bar Association records, any baptism records, and his adoption records.

Now that criminals are so dedicated to killing the police and the Left is encouraging this attitude, police work is getting more dangerous.

Criminals have always fought against law officers when they were cornered, but it is getting some what extreme now that criminals have more advocates than the law enforcement officers do. Or the victims.

Can I advocate a 72 hour window to kill all criminals? Please declare it at the last minute, but only dead innocents will be charged. To the full extent of the law. But if you know someone is a criminal and getting away with it, then you can legally kill them. I would love to reduce the criminal population! Just walk down the street in the crime areas and kill the pushers, pimps and politicians. What a wonderful idea.

http://www.myfoxny.com/dpp/news/local_news/new_jersey/090716_police_officer_shot_in_wild_shootout_in_jersey_city

JERSEY CITY, N.J. - Five police officers and two suspects were hit in a wild shootout in the area of Bergen Avenue and Reed Street on Thursday morning. A total of eight officers were injured.

One police officer was shot in the face. Another was shot in the neck and chest. Another was shot in the arm. The officers are expected to survive. The extent of the other officers' injuries is unclear. The officers are being treated at Jersey City Medical Center.

The two suspects were killed in the gun battle.

The incident started unfolding at 5 a.m. Police were watching a car they believed to have been used in an armed robbery.

SHOTGUN ATTACK AT OIL CHANGE FACILITY ON JUNE 18TH POSSIBLY CONNECTED TO TODAY'S SHOOTING

A person came to the car and officers moved in.

Police say the suspect opened fire with an illegal pump shotgun and ran back into the apartment building.

Police Chief Thomas J. Comey said, "This individual came fully ready to go to war with us."

Jersey City and Port Authority of New York and New Jersey police officers responded.

When the SWAT team attempted to enter the building, the suspects started firing through the door and wall. Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy called the exchange, "a terrible gun fight."

http://www.news24.com/Content/Africa/News/965/f4de6b8e7c2040a8b5cde66ee12dfc6c/15-07-2009%2007-07/Army_warns_poll_candidates

Bissau - Guinea-Bissau's powerful army on Wednesday warned the candidates in the heated second round of the presidential election to stop "verbal assaults" which could trigger disorder and instability.

"The armed forces, as an institution of the Republic, are worried about the verbal assaults by the politicians" on the campaign trail and in the media, the army said in statement.

It told the two candidates "to abstain from making speeches that could provoke disorder" and warned it would not "tolerate any acts that put at risk" the peace and stability of the former Portuguese colony of 1.3 million people.

Guinea-Bissau voters go to the polls on July 26 to choose a new president between Malam Bacai Sanha and Kumba Yala, both former heads of state.

The army's warning came after Yala on Tuesday accused his opponent's ruling party of causing the country's problems, including the recent assassination of the president.

Joao Bernardo Vieira, who ruled Guinea-Bissau for much of the past quarter century, was killed by soldiers on March 2 in an apparent revenge for the death of army chief, General Batista Tagme Na Waie, in a bomb attack.

Yala's time in office between 2000 and 2003 was marked by wide fiscal mismanagement and sweeping arrests of opposition figures until he was brought down in a coup.

I could care less about the color of this guys skin, and I think most incumbants need to be kicked out of office. What gets to me is that this guy ran on a platform of lies about spending tax money for things the town can't afford. What an inspiration! Lies like a politician, he'll do well in his new career.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/crossingamerica/5810701/Down-the-Mississippi-delta-town-elects-first-black-mayor.html

In a shock result in Alligator (population 220), Tommie "Tomaso" Brown, 38, defeated Robert Fava, the mayor since 1979, owner of the general store and once his opponent's boss, by 37 votes to 27.

Mr Brown's surprise victory was a milestone for Alligator, which is named after the curving lake nearby rather than the alligators that once occupied it. Although the only three businesses in the shrinking, tumble-down town are run by whites, three-quarters of the population is now black.

"They wanted a black mayor," said a philosophical Mr Fava, 71. "Another Obama - I think that's what brought it on. I ran on '30 years of dedicated service' and he ran on 'Change'. He promised a swimming pool and a recreation centre, which he can't do.

"He beat me by 10 votes because he had enough family folks to put him in. But we get along good. He used to work here at the store and there ain't no problems between us. They were ready for a change and I was too - it's a weight off my mind."

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D99DP70O0&show_article=1&catnum=0

NEW YORK (AP) - Combining its century-old mission of fighting for equality with the instantaneous reach of modern-day technology, the NAACP has launched a program that lets people use their cell phones to report incidents of police misconduct.

The "rapid response system" was officially launched Monday as part of the annual convention for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. This year, the organization is marking the centennial of its founding in New York City in 1909.

The system allows people who capture photos or video of incidents of alleged police misconduct on their cell phones to send it through a Web browser to the organization or upload it through a computer. A form will then be transmitted to the sender, who can use it to provide more information about an incident.

"Technology has basically put a video camera in the pocket of every child in this country over the age of 12 and most grown-ups as well," said Benjamin Jealous, president and CEO of the NAACP.

He said the information gathered would be used in several ways. Some video could be used immediately, to present footage for a situation the organization wants to highlight. Another purpose would be to compile a database of incidents that could show a history of discriminatory patterns and practices in particular law enforcement jurisdictions--information the group could take to the Justice Department.

The head of the Justice Department, Attorney General Eric Holder, praised the NAACP's dedication to championing equality but acknowledged the work left to be done.

Mr Yon's travels are always interesting. In the latest essay I had to take the lead photo and use it for my computer's background. Wonderful picture!

This is not to take away from the rest of the essay! I read the whole thing and loved the stories and pictures. It is great to see the people of the world and what they are really like. The Media never discusses the people, just how horrible the Americans are.

http://www.michaelyon-online.com/searching-for-kuchi-finding-lizards.htm

The wake-up alarm sounded at 0345, and by 0430 the Lithuanian soldiers were ready to roll. The Lithuanians had always arrived early, prepared for action before every mission, but this time we relied on an Afghan guide. The first part of the mission was to find the Kuchi. Normally, Lithuanian soldiers perform a reconnaissance before a mission, but they decided to skip the recon to find the Kuchi nomads because, well, they are nomads. Even if the recon were to locate the camel caravan in a specific location, the Kuchis would likely have moved by the time we got there. So we were relying on the local guide who had a cell phone number for the Kuchis. He was 21 minutes late and held up the mission by 27 minutes. One guy holding up about three dozen soldiers and a mission should be flogged.

The base at Chaghcharan sits at nearly 7,500 feet above sea level, so at night the Milky Way hovers in magnificence above the clean, dry air. But come morning, the stars fade as the sun rises with blinding vengeance.

As we rolled to find the Kuchi nomads and their camels, the six vehicle convoy kicked up "moon dust," which reflected the bright sun, causing instant blindness as if driving through white clouds. The convoy had to space out, else the vehicles would be driving dangerously close through the arid fog of dust. As we passed villages made of stone, mud, and straw, the white smoke from their cooking fires hung low, just above the villages, lightly blanketing their dwellings, as farmers were already heading to the fields. The Afghans are a hard-working lot. The cruel mountains must have killed off the lazy ones a long time ago.

http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/2009/07/ap_marines_afghan_police_071309/

AYNAK, Afghanistan -- Afghan villagers had complained to the Marines for days: The police are the problem, not the Taliban. They steal from villagers and beat them. Days later, the Marines learned firsthand what the villagers meant.

As about 150 Marines and Afghan soldiers approached the police headquarters in the Helmand River town of Aynak, the police fired four gunshots at the combined force. No larger fight broke out, but once inside the headquarters the Marines found a raggedy force in a decrepit mud-brick compound that the police used as an open-pit toilet.

The meeting was tense. Some police were smoking pot. Others loaded their guns in a threatening manner near the Marines.

The U.S. troops ousted the police two days later and installed a better trained force they had brought with them on their recently launched operation into southern Helmand. The original force was sent away for several weeks of training the U.S. is conducting across Afghanistan to professionalize the country's police.

But the encounter, witnessed last week by The Associated Press, highlights one of the largest problems facing the international effort to stabilize Afghanistan in the face of an increasingly violent Taliban insurgency: the need for competent, trustworthy police. What many villagers see now is the opposite -- a pot-smoking, ragtag, thieving force that makes the Taliban look disciplined in comparison.

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/blogs/index.php/hazony/73031

Abbas Goes to Eleven
David Hazony - 07.13.2009 - 12:25 PM

One of the clearest indicators as to whether you are negotiating with someone who actually wants to reach a deal, or alternatively has no intention of closing but is negotiating for other reasons, is how your partner responds to concessions on your part. Let's say you're trying to buy a baseball card for five dollars, and the seller wants ten. If you up your offer to seven, and he really wants to cut a deal, then he might lower it to nine. If he insists on sticking to ten, it probably means that either he's a tough negotiator, or he thinks he can get ten from someone else.

But what if he responds by raising the price? What if he, to quote a great movie, "goes to eleven"?

Crazy as it sounds, this is what often happens in negotiations between Israel and its neighbors. According to widely held rumors, the main reason Netanyahu did not succeed in cutting a deal with Syria on the Golan during his previous term of office was that each time the Israelis raised their offer, the Syrians raised their demands, with the definition of the "Golan" moving increasingly West until it hit the Sea of Galilee. With Jordan and Egypt, however, it was the opposite: An agreement could be reached because both sides wanted it.

So, what about the Palestinians? All too often it seems as though the more Israel gives, the greater the demands. Everyone seems to think that the final outcome of the deal will be somewhere between what Netanyahu is saying and what Obama is saying: A sovereign Palestinian state taking up between 97 and 100 percent of the West Bank and Gaza, maybe some part of Jerusalem, and some kind of formula invented to deal with the "right of return," the unity of Jerusalem, and so on.

http://www.homeland1.com/Public-Health/articles/507913-U-S-prepares-mass-vaccinations-to-curb-pandemic-school-age-kids-to-be-focus/

WASHINGTON -- School-age children will be a key target population for a pandemic flu vaccine in the fall, and they may get their shots at school in a mass vaccination campaign not seen since the polio epidemics of the 1950s.

The federal government should get about 100 million doses of vaccine by mid-October, if the current production by five companies goes as planned. However, enough vaccine for wide use by the 120 million people especially vulnerable to infection with the newly emerged strain of H1N1 influenza virus won't be available until later in the fall.

Those were among the messages administration officials delivered to about 500 state, territorial, city and tribal health officials Thursday at a "flu summit" held at the National Institutes of Health's Bethesda, Md., campus.

President Barack Obama, speaking by audio link from the G8 summit in L'Aquila, Italy, urged the audience to take "complete ownership" of preparations for what he termed a "significant outbreak" of H1N1 flu in the next six months.

http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/2009/07/kooks-to-left-of-me-kooks-to-far-left.html

Barack Obama's "Science Czar" John Holdren, whom Barack Obama has recently appointed Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, Assistant to the President for Science and Technology, and Co-Chair of the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology co-authored a book in 1977.
In the book Holdren wrote that:

** Women could be forced to abort their pregnancies, whether they wanted to or not
** The population at large could be sterilized by infertility drugs intentionally put into the nation's drinking water or in food
** Single mothers and teen mothers should have their babies seized from them against their will and given away to other couples to raise
** People who "contribute to social deterioration" (i.e. undesirables) "can be required by law to exercise reproductive responsibility

http://www.worldviewtimes.com/article.php/articleid-5110/Brannon-Howse/William-J-Federer

In his speech in Cairo, Egypt, June 4, 2009, President Obama stated:

"As a student of history, I also know civilization's debt to Islam. It was Islam that carried the light of learning through so many centuries, paving the way for Europe's Renaissance."

Civilization is indeed indebted to Islam for Europe's Renaissance, but the President's speech was conspicuous in its omission of certain details.

The Renaissance was a revival of interest in Greek art, architecture, sculpture and philosophy, brought about by Greeks fleeing the Islamic invasion of the Byzantine Empire.

It began in the year 1071, when Turkish Muslims defeated the Byzantine army at the Battle of Manzikert and proceeded to invade the Byzantine Empire, which is today Turkey.

First Muslim Seljuk Turks, followed by Muslim Ottoman Turks, turned Byzantine Churches into mosques, melted church bells into cannons, leveled cities, dug up remains of Christian Saints and gave them to dogs.

http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/ten-days-that-shook-honduras/

Ten Days that Shook Honduras

A recap of the events in Honduras and the Obama administration's curious response.
July 9, 2009 - by Jim Hoft

Day One: The Coup that Wasn't

On Sunday, June 28, before dawn, more than a dozen Honduran soldiers surrounded the residence of President Manuel Zelaya. They arrested the controversial president and disarmed his security guards. Zelaya was escorted from his home outside the capital, Tegucigalpa, to the airport and expatriated to Costa Rica.

The local news media immediately reported that Zelaya had been sent into exile. Zelaya supporters called it a coup and protested at the presidential palace. The international media called it a coup. Venezuelan Marxist Hugo Chavez released a statement in support of Zelaya saying, "This coup will be defeated and it will be defeated by the people of Honduras and through its will."

By 11:50 that morning, President Barack Obama released a statement in support of the exiled Leftist Zelaya. The U.S. president called on all sides in Honduras to respect democracy and the rule of law. Obama said, "Any disputes must be settled peacefully through negotiations that are free from outside interference." This was a strange response considering President Obama initially remained silent during the slaughter of democracy protesters in Iran and refused to denounce the brutal regime. He even announced that he would not meddle in Iran as the "debate" for the future of the country was in progress.

At 3:15 on Sunday Hillary Clinton said the action taken against Honduras' president should be condemned by everyone.

The Dems understand that bills are to be passed, not read or understood. Why can't the Republicans understand this simple fact of life?

Dems are slaves to the Party. They are not allowed to think. The fact that they refuse to allow anyone to read these bills they are forcing through helps to prove that. If free willed people happened to read these bills, they would be allowed to think and that can NOT be allowed in the Liberal Congress.

If you want to know how uneducated the average Liberal is, just ask them what the top three achievements of Barack Obama are when he was in Congress. Either Congress. Think any of them know about the first one?

That is just one of the many questions that no one can answer. For another example, who knows where Obama was born? Now that the hospital he claims to be where he was born has denied it, maybe he can finally admit the truth. Not that he ever will. He has too much personal wealth riding on his deceits.

Go ahead and laugh. Nero fiddled while Rome burned. The Dems are cackling while America burns.

http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=50677

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said Tuesday that the health-care reform bill now pending in Congress would garner very few votes if lawmakers actually had to read the entire bill before voting on it.

"If every member pledged to not vote for it if they hadn't read it in its entirety, I think we would have very few votes," Hoyer told CNSNews.com at his regular weekly news conference.

Hoyer was responding to a question from CNSNews.com on whether he supported a pledge that asks members of the Congress to read the entire bill before voting on it and also make the full text of the bill available to the public for 72 hours before a vote.

In fact, Hoyer found the idea of the pledge humorous, laughing as he responded to the question. "I'm laughing because a) I don't know how long this bill is going to be, but it's going to be a very long bill," he said.

http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/dems-to-reveal-how-theyll-pay-for-healthcare-2009-07-06.html

House Education and Labor Chairman George Miller (D-Calif.) will brief on Tuesday. And Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) speaks Friday. Rangel and his committee are in charge of finding the cuts and tax increases needed to pay for the bill.

Leadership aides stress that no final decision has been made on how to pay the tab. The Democrats on Rangel's committee will hold a marathon meeting all day Tuesday where healthcare and the "pay-for," as it's called, are sure to come up.

A large portion is expected to come from reductions in Medicare and Medicaid. But that won't pay for the full overhaul. As for raising money, ideas have included a national sales tax, taxing soda and a "surtax" on people making more than $250,000.

In addition to that, House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.), Caucus Chairman John Larson (D-Conn.) and Vice-chair Xavier Becerra (D-Calif.) will hold six "listening sessions" that break rank-and-file members out by region. The three leaders will take concerns and ideas from the sessions' members back to the leadership in preparation for markup next week.

Obama is now demanding that Federal inspectors have the right to enter our homes for any reason they can make up. If you doubt this, just read this section of the cap and rob bill. Notice the highlighted portion.

This constant drift to communism is making me sick. This is all UNCONSTITUTIONAL!

http://www.americanissuesproject.org/blogs/aip/archive/2009/07/08/if-you-don-t-hate-the-cap-and-trade-bill-let-me-show-you-section-304.aspx

Performance Labeling Program". It's section 304 of the bill and it says, basically, that your house belongs to the state. See, the Federal Government really wants a country full of energy-efficient homes, so much so that the bill mandates that new homes be 30 percent more energy efficient than the current building code on the very day the law is signed. That efficiency goes up to 50 percent by 2014 and only goes higher from there, all the way to 2030. That, by the way, is not merely a target but a requirement of the law. New homes must reach those efficiency targets no matter what.

But what does that have to do with current homeowners like you? Well, I'm glad you asked. You're certainly not off the hook, no way, no how. Here's what the Democrats have planned for you. The program requires that states label their buildings so that we can all know how efficient every building (that includes residential and non-residential buildings) is and it requires that the information be made public. To that end, the bill suggests a number of circumstances under which the states could inspect a building, including:

(A) preparation, and public disclosure of the label through filing with tax and title records at the time of--

(i) a building audit conducted with support from Federal or State funds;

(ii) a building energy-efficiency retrofit conducted in response to such an audit;

(iii) a final inspection of major renovations or additions made to a building in accordance with a building permit issued by a local government entity;

(iv) a sale that is recorded for title and tax purposes consistent with paragraph (8);

(v) a new lien recorded on the property for more than a set percentage of the assessed value of the property, if that lien reflects public financial assistance for energy-related improvements to that building; or

(vi) a change in ownership or operation of the building for purposes of utility billing; or

(B) other appropriate means.

Pay close attention to (iii), (iv), and (vi) because those hit you right where you live. What that's saying is the state will be empowered to inspect your home if you want to 1) renovate your house in any way that requires a building permit, 2) sell your house, or 3) change the name of the person responsible for any utility bill.

I thought this story was really sick. Now that the details are sneaking out, despite the lack of Media coverage, it gets even sicker.

So, this already disgusting perv likes to adopt little black kids for his perversions? He likes to sodomize black kids and then get sodomized by any adult that is willing.

Where are the Reverends Wright, Jackson and Sharpton? They were all quick to condemn the Lacrosse players.

Where are the Leftist professors that are usually so quick to condemn any hint of rape why a white? Of course, blacks are expected to rape because they are not as human as white people, right Lefties?

All I can say is: anyone who does not condemn this well documented behavior is almost as disgusting as the pervert is. The fact that this fag is racist just makes his perversions worse.

Who is willing to defend this guy? Will the Duke faculty condemn him? Or is it wrong to condemn Liberals in this? If it is, then I will never be able to support the already blackened college. And I lived in North Carolina for years and loved Duke! I was sad to swear off them for a few years and will hate to hate to drop them completely if they can not treat this guy AT LEAST as bad as they treated the Lacrosse team.

I assume that I will be not watching anymore Duke. Cowards.

http://townhall.com/columnists/MikeAdams/2009/06/28/little_boy_blue_devil?page=full&comments=true

So it will be interesting to see how Duke faculty members respond to Frank Lombard. Because he is white, Lombard is fair game at Duke, isn't he? But Lombard is also gay, so will that complicate things?

Unfortunately for Frank Lombard, the affidavit in support of his arrest warrant shows that this second Duke rape case will also have a strong racial component. According to a confidential source (CS) a man using the user name "cooper2" or "cooperse" logged onto an internet-based video chat room. CS saw him perform oral sex on an African-American child under the age of ten. He also performed other acts on the child, which are too obscene to be described in this column.

The user name "cooper2" has now been linked to Frank Lombard, the associate director Duke University's Center for Health Policy. A second source has now alleged that "cooper2" has confessed to being "into incest" and that he has adopted two African American children.

Horrible stuff that the Government is forcing down our throats.

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YTc1MmVhMGYxY2UzNzAwMTJlODBjZjg2NDJjNmM2MWE=&w=MA==

The stimulus bill was the legislative equivalent of the famous cantina scene from Star Wars, an eye-popping collection of the freakish and exotic, gathered for dubious purposes. The Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill, known as ACES (the American Clean Energy and Security Act), is more like the third panel in Hieronymus Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights -- a hellscape that disturbs the sleep of anybody who contemplates it carefully.

Two main things to understand about Waxman-Markey: First, it will not reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, at least not at any point in the near future. The inclusion of carbon offsets, which can be manufactured out of thin air and political imagination, will eliminate most of the demands that the legislation puts on industry, though in doing so it will manage to drive up the prices consumers pay for every product that requires energy for its manufacture -- which is to say, for everything. Second, it represents a worse abuse of the public trust and purse than the stimulus and the bailouts put together. Waxman-Markey creates a permanent new regime in which environmental romanticism and corporate welfare are mixed together to form political poison. From comic bureaucratic power grabs (check out the section of the bill on candelabras) to the creation of new welfare programs for Democratic constituencies to, above all, massive giveaways for every financial, industrial, and political lobby imaginable, this bill would permanently deform American politics and economic life.

http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/

The great physicist Niels Bohr (1885-1962), who pioneered the study of sub-atomic or quantum physics, was fond of saying, "If someone says that he can think about quantum physics without becoming dizzy, that shows only that he has not understood anything whatever about it."

The

Alice-in-Wonderland
quality of sub-atomic physics is called quantum weirdness. It was in response to such weirdness that Bohr's contemporary scientist J.B.S. Haldane (1892-1964) claimed "the Universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose."

Today, however, the concept of quantum weirdness seems also to apply to politics in America.

Clearly, we are no longer living in a world of normal reality. For the first time in US history, we have a president who hates his own country. A president who is on the side of America's enemies, not on the side of America.

(The latest example, explained this week by Jack Kelly, regards Honduras.)

We have a media who reveres and worships as a demi-god a president who hates his, and their, country.

We have a government spending trillions of dollars it does not have in a seemingly determined effort to destroy everyone's life savings via inflation.

We have a Congress that passes the largest tax increase in the history of the world (literally) via a 1,300 page Climate Bill that no one has read and based on utterly fraudulent science.

We have a governor who goes so around the bend that he trashes his wife, four children, his career and life for some broad in Argentina.

We have a people who go completely bananas with grief over the suicide of a washed-up pedophilic fruitcake ex-rock star.

This is societal quantum weirdness, a dissociation from normal reality, of which additional examples could be endlessly provided. Yet extreme, unhinged, over-the-top weirdness is normally what you get when you get close to a tipping point, close to the bursting of a bubble.

Madnesses of crowds are most often economic, such as the dotcom craze or the housing bubble. A lot of folks lose a lot of money, and that's it. But when such a madness pervades an entire society, the consequences can be far more dramatic. Such a madness is often the runup to a revolution.

I just found this new blog while looking for more information about the situation in Honduras. It is worth a look to see what the Media and the Leftists don't want you to see happening.

Besides, this Blogger is almost a brother to me.

http://hondurasabandoned.blogspot.com/

20 Armed Nicaraguans Detained at Protest Conclusion, Claims Military Officer
As reported yesterday from the perspective of the participants in the demonstration against the new government and for the return of Manuel Zelaya, it was said that the military initiated the conflict with the demonstrators. Recently I interviewed a high ranking Honduran military officer in Tegucigalpa, and he tells a different story than what is being officially reported.

The officer claims that protesters had wire cutters (I did see protesters with wire cutters) and began cutting the chain link fence and ripping it down. The crowd convened onto the fence, ready to rush onto the tarmac at the airport. Shots were fired from the military, however as of right now it is uncertain whether the casualties were the result of a military issued weapon.

The blatant disregard of international norms by the Jews is so ...

What? This wasn't the Evil Juice?

Oh! I had to reread that! It was the European supported Palestinian Authority that was violating the civilized norms. I wonder why the Euros have not condemned either the original torture or the harassment of the Media, or the destruction of evidence? I guess the Europeans support torture after all. As long as it is not by someone who loves the West.

http://blog.camera.org/archives/2009/07/forces_at_west_bank_checkpoint.html

Recently, a Palestinian TV crew was stopped at a checkpoint in the West Bank, where soldiers confiscated a tape and erased its content. This incident hardly received any coverage in the mainstream media in the US and Europe.

The reason? The perpetrators were not IDF soldiers, but Palestinian Authority security officers. And the checkpoint did not belong to the IDF; it was, in fact, a Palestinian checkpoint.

The story of the detention of the TV crew -- which, by the way, belonged to Al-Jazeera and the erasure of the footage did not make it to the mainstream media even after Reporters Without Borders, an organization that defends journalists worldwide, issued a statement strongly condemning the assault on the freedom of the media.

"Journalists must be able to work freely," Reporters Without Borders said. "The erasure of this video footage proves that the Palestinian security forces try to cover up their human rights violations. This incident should be the subject of an enquiry by the Palestinian Authority."

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20090705/D998CS1O0.html

The country's new government has vowed to arrest Zelaya for 18 alleged criminal acts including treason and failing to implement more than 80 laws approved by Congress since taking office in 2006.

Large crowds of Zelaya's critics have staged their own daily demonstrations to back Micheletti, the congressional president who was named by lawmakers to finish out the final six months of the Zelaya's term.

Most of the ousted leader's supporters come from the working and middle classes of this impoverished nation, while his opponents are based in the ranks of the well-to-do - although the increasingly leftist approach of the wealthy rancher had eroded his popular support.

The military ousted Zelaya with the backing of Honduras' political establishment, including the Supreme Court, Congress and Zelaya's own party. He was insisting on following through with a referendum on constitutional change that the Supreme Court ruled illegal.

But by sending soldiers to shoot up the presidential residence and fly Zelaya into exile, the Micheletti government has brought itself universal condemnations from the United Nations and OAS. No nation has recognized the new government; U.S. President Barack Obama has united with conservative Alvaro Uribe of Colombia and leftist Hugo Chavez of Venezuela in criticism.

Blackfive has the Declaration of Independence, the basis of my favorite holiday. I have cut out and highlighted some of the sections that I think the modern Government would do well to remember and reflect upon.

http://www.blackfive.net/main/2009/07/our-lives-our-fortunes-and-our-sacred-honor.html


First, This section is something that the Government needs to reflect upon. After centuries of being a Federation, America has lost its way and needs to be reminded of its roots. Keep the Government out of our lives!

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.

Boy does this sound familiar! How many times have the courts been using foreign laws to decide cases lately? If the case is not covered by US law, then German or Saudi laws are NOT allowed to be used to create a law and make something legal or illegal. "pretended Legislation" indeed!

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

Taxes. Grrr. I believe that no one should have to pay more than 10% of their income to the government. Maybe with exemptions allowed for periods of declared war that must be renewed yearly by the Congress.

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

There is so much more. If you do not have your own copy of the Declaration, go to Blackfive and print this off. You need it!

I have read this before and think it is great to share yet again.

Happy Fourth of July!

http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/archives/198075.php

Independence Day

It was a glorious morning. The sun was shining and the wind was from the southeast. Up especially early, a tall bony, redheaded young Virginian found time to buy a new thermometer, for which he paid three pounds, fifteen shillings. He also bought gloves for Martha, his wife, who has ill at home.

Thomas Jefferson arrived early at the statehouse. The temperature was 72.5 degrees and the horseflies weren't nearly so bad at that hour. It was a lovely room, very large, with gleaming white walls. The chairs were comfortable. Facing the single door were two brass fireplaces, but they would not be used today.

The moment the door was shut, and it was always kept locked, the room became an oven. The tall windows were shut, so that loud quarreling voices could not be heard by passersby. Small openings atop the windows allowed a slight stir of air, and also a large number of horseflies. Jefferson records that "the horseflies were dexterous in finding necks, and the silk of stocking was nothing to them." All discussion was punctuated by the slap of hands on necks.

On the wall at the back, facing the President's desk, was a panoply-consisting of a drum, swords, and banners seized from Fort Ticonderoga the previous year.

Ethan Allen and Benedict Arnold had captured the place, shouting that they were taking it "in the name of the Great Jehovah and the Continental Congress!"

http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/2009/07/ap_marines_helmand_070309/

"They waited for the local and village elders," outside Khan Neshin and "with their permission they went in and now are engaged in talks," Pelletier said.

As the Marines in the village of Nawa sat for a meeting with a group of 20 Afghan men and boys who were squatting on dirt ground, they listened as a list of their concerns came in a form of questions.

"Are you going to enter our houses?" asked 25-year old Mohammad Nabi, who was there with five of his younger brothers. "We are afraid that you will leave, and the Taliban will come back," he said. And they all described the police as predatory thieves not to be trusted.

Marine officers tried to reassure those around them they would not enter their homes and that they are here to stay throughout their deployment.

In a display of deep misunderstandings that any foreigner is at pains to overcome, an elder with a gray beard asked the Marines whether they will stop them saying prayers.

In describing the Taliban, they compared them to Americans.

"They spend one night in the village and then move onto another village, just as you guys," Nabi said.

I have asked this same question many times, no one has a good explanation.

http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/2009/07/why-are-there-still-refugee-camps-in-pa.html

The question that no one asks is - why are there still any "refugee camps" in areas administered by the PA? They have been effectively under PA authority for well over ten years now. In that time period, real villages and towns could have been built. Businesses could have started. Plans could have been made to move camp residents out into the many West Bank cities and villages and eliminate these bizarre, decades-old anachronisms.

The truth is that the population in the West Bank camps has increased by over 33% since 1997.

If the Palestinian Authority wants to truly govern their people, why do they allow these semi-autonomous camps to exist? Why aren't they working overtime to give their people the dignity of living on their own?

The reason is that the PA has no intention of building a nation. Its leaders have no sense of responsibility. They don't care about their people. And, even more importantly, the camps are a symbol of Palestinian Arab suffering that they do not want to lose.

Once there are no camps, how can Palestinian Arabs claim that their lives are so terrible? The camps are emblems of suffering and they must remain forever as long as Israel exists. The PA makes a false impression that Israel is responsible for any Palestinian Arabs who are in dire straits today and the camps are their Exhibit A.

There is another side of the equation. Entire generations of Palestinian Arabs have been brought up in these camps with the mentality that the world owes them, and this week's strikes in Nablus prove it again. When people think that way they are not likely to want to actually work to make their lives better. There is nothing stopping UNRWA camp residents from moving out on their own - many have over the decades. The people that remain in the camps are the ones who are the laziest and most likely to be radicalized.

These camps have been there for sixty years. Where is the plan, drafted by UNRWA and the PA, to get rid of them? There is none, and won't be one, as long as the camps fulfill the dysfunctional yet real wishes of the PA and of their residents.

This is a very stupid policy that can only be thought up by a bleeding heart Liberal. This completely violates public safety and OUR right to be safe. These idiots all need to be placed in locked homes with the criminals they love and protect.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1197226/Government-says-prisoners-run-named-case-breaches-right-privacy.html

Escaped prisoners who are on the run will not be named in case it breaches their right to privacy, civil servants have ruled.

The edict has been made even though many convicts are fully identified with photographs sent out by police at the time they go on the run.

Ministry of Justice officials say the Data Protection Act means they are unable to confirm the names of escaped prisoners still at large.

Justice Secretary Jack Straw is being urged to investigate the ruling amid fears it could undermine public appeals to track down escaped prisoners.

The policy was revealed when the ministry refused a Freedom Of Information request to name inmates on the run from Holleseley Bay prison near Woodbridge, Suffolk.

This article brings such great signs of hope to me. I love that the Afghans really want to improve despite the slander of the Left who think that just because life is different in that part of the world it needs to be either left as it is or brought all the way to a Western standard.

I actively attempt to find Afghan goods to purchase. I want the people and the country to succeed.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,529966,00.html?test=latestnews

"The Commandos are rock stars among the Afghan populace," said a Green Beret who has watched the fighting force progress.

And they look the part. Commandos wear Oakley sunglasses, dark gloves, Western-style boots, pristine bright green uniforms and a blood-red beret. Thanks in part to the American taxpayer, they get paid twice as much as ANA soldiers. They are armed with American M-4 rifles, not the AK-47s their grandfathers fired and the ANA soldiers still use. The M-4 can coordinate with a lot of high tech upgrades, and laser telescopic sights and night vision goggles are quickly becoming standard issue.

Where most Afghans will never get the chance to drive, the Commandos roll in armored gun and cargo trucks, sometimes bouncing drivers off the road in Kabul.

They are a source of pride for the Afghan population, and men from all backgrounds can join. "At every selection we make sure there are this many Pashtuns, Hazara, Uzbeks, and Turkmen," said Zabihullah. "Ethnicity is finished once they become Commandos. They are all Afghans. There's only one tribe, the Commando Tribe."

Zabihullah believes the Commandos represent a new future for the Afghan military -- and for their country. He says he felt a glimpse of his nation's potential and the role of his elite troops when he graduated from the Marine Corps basic school.

"I held up the Afghan flag during the graduation ceremony. It was the proudest moment of my life," he said.

Israel is the land of miracles! Rising from the dead is something miraculous! I wonder if Jesus was wandering by at the time?

Welcome back, sir. Is this your Easter?

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1097286.html

An 84-year-old man gave emergency personnel a shock Wednesday when he came back to life after being pronounced dead by paramedics at his Ramat Gan home.

A Magen David Adom ambulance crew was dispatched to the man's house in response to a distress call. After finding no pulse and ascertaining that he was not breathing, the man was pronounced dead.

A short time later, however, a police officer noted that "the corpse is moving his hand."

http://www.blackfive.net/main/2009/07/hopey-changey-and-the-strike-of-our-sword-1.html

Asmall force of Afghan soldiers accompanying the Camp Pendleton-based Marines got into several scraps with an insurgent force of about 20 fighters. The fire came from a mud-brick compound, and the Marines, the Afghan soldiers and their British advisers surrounded the compound on the east and the south.

Before the mission, Schoenmaker, the company commander, said he would practice "tactical patience" as a way to avoid civilian casualties-- an issue newly arrived Gen. Stanley McChrystal has underscored in recent weeks. Though troops in many similar circumstances have called in airstrikes on such a militant-controlled compound, Schoenmaker did not.

"We made the decision to isolate the compound and not destroy it because we couldn't confirm if civilians were inside," he said. The militants were believed to have escaped out the back.

What a beautiful picture.
Semper Fi.

Happy Birthday America!

http://www.blackfive.net/main/2009/07/military-motivator-independence-day-part-1.html

Military Motivator - Independence Day (Part 1)

casualties happen during wars. it is a fact of war. Suffering less casualties than during a Championship Basketball riot is not a big deal. Not to diminish the pain of the families and friends, just diminish the crazy whining about one dead Marine.

Semper Fi, guys! Kill all the terrorists you can. Just remember that if they are dead, you don't have to read them their Miranda rights.

http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/2009/07/marine_meb_070109w/

NAWA, Afghanistan -- Marines suffered their first casualties of a massive new military campaign Thursday as they engaged in sporadic gunbattles along 55 miles of Taliban-controlled heartland in southern Afghanistan.

One Marine was killed and several others were injured or wounded on the first full day of the assault, the largest military operation in Afghanistan since the fall of Taliban government in 2001.

The offensive will test the Obama administration's new strategy of holding territory and letting the Afghan government sink roots in Helmand province. The insurgency has proven particularly resilient in this area, where foreign troops have never before operated in such large numbers.

President Barack Obama told The Associated Press in an interview Thursday that he has a "very narrow definition of success when it comes to our national security interests" in the region. "And that is that al-Qaida and its affiliates cannot set up safe havens from which to attack Americans."

"I think we can measure it by whether or not they've got training camps where people are coming in and getting trained in explosives, being sent out and directed in carrying out terrorist activity," Obama said in Washington.

http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htintel/articles/20090629.aspx

Girls With Guns Get It
June 29, 2009: In both Iraq and Afghanistan, the U.S. Army and Marines found it useful to send a female soldier along on raids, as it was less disruptive to have a woman search the female civilians. There was no shortage of volunteers for this duty. The marines, as is their custom, saw more opportunities in this. Thus the marines began sending a team of women on such missions.

Now, by law, women are not allowed to participate in combat. But it's also understood that this only serves to keep women out of the combat arms (infantry, armor, artillery), but not out of combat itself. This was particularly true in Iraq, where non-combat troops were constantly attacked as they drove trucks in supply convoys. These convoys quickly acquired more weapons and combat training, and the women remained. The MPs (Military Police) are not considered a combat arm, even though MPs are trained as light infantry, and expected to serve close to the fighting. MPs were in charge of convoy security, and often a female NCO or officer was in charge. Women had no problem with this, and some female MPs won awards for valor under fire.

The marines have a different attitude towards this. As they put it, "every marine a rifleman." In practice, this means that the majority of marines, who have combat support jobs, continue to get infantry training. So the marines in Iraq called these all-female teams (3-5 women) Lionesses. Again, no shortage of volunteers, as female marines, even more than their sisters in the army, were eager to get into the fight. But that's not what the lioness teams were created for. What the marines had also noticed was that the female marines tended to get useful information out of the women they searched. Iraqi women were surprised, and often awed, when they encountered these female soldiers and marines. The awe often turned into cooperation. Most Iraqi women are much less enthusiastic about fighting the Americans than their men folk (who die in large numbers when they do so.) Being a widow is much harder in the Arab world than it is in the West.

The marines also noticed that the female troops were better at picking up useful information in general. This is something Western police forces noted, in the last few decades, as women were allowed to work in all areas of police work, including detectives and crime scene investigators. Iraqi men were also intimidated by female soldiers and marines. In the macho Arab world, an assertive female with an assault rifle is sort of a man's worst nightmare. So many otherwise reticent Iraqi men, opened up to the female troops, and provided information. Women also had an easier time detecting a lie (something husbands often learn the hard way.)

The lioness teams proved capable in combat, as sometimes these peacekeeping missions ran into firefights or ambushes. But the main advantage of having a team of women along was the greater amount of intelligence collected. In addition, the female marines also made it easier to establish friendly relationships in neighborhoods and villages. This provided a more long term source of information.

I have been reading about some of the insane things that the Dems have hidden in this incredibly convoluted and destructive piece of legislation.

What happened to The One's promise to let America review all legislation for a business week before it gets signed? Putting 300 pages of crap in at 3am is not an example of openness.

It is past time to hold the crooks accountable. It was bad enough under Bush and the horrible spending, this new tyrant is completely out of control. Impeach the entire government and only replace about a third of them. There are too many politicians and bureaucrats trying to control our lives. Make them get real jobs.

http://iowahawk.typepad.com/iowahawk/2009/07/virginamericans-vow-fight-against-capandtrades-blood-sacrifice-amendment.html

The 87,492 page bill -- official designated as the American Patriotic Renewal Act of 2009 for Carbon Reduction, Energy Independence, Heathy Climate, Sustainable Job Growth, Adorable Puppies, and Earthly Paradise -- is a keystone in President Obama's first year legislative agenda, and was originally anticipated to get swift congressional passage. Instead, it faced a unexpectedly tough vote in the House last week after coal state Democrats complained it would place an unfair economic burden on their home districts.

"I am as interested in reversing global climate change as anyone, but I fail to see how increasing taxes and random machete attacks on Ohio coal producers alone will solve the problem," said Marcy Kaptur (D-OH). "Come on people, there are plenty of other industries who deserve machete attacks too."

In order to secure the votes of wavering Democrats, House leaders Nancy Pelosi and Henry Waxman inserted several last minute amendments to the legislation, including provisions for national oxygen rationing, witch burnings, dousings, and phrenology research. But the one that has seemingly stoked a grassroots backlash is the controversial Sexually Inexperienced Citizen Environmental Volunteer Amendment. The wording of the amendment calls for all American virgins over the age of 21 to register with the Selective Sacrifice Board, for possible use as victims in nationally televised vivisections intended to "supplicate the Earth-Spirits."

I love Gov. Palin and after reading this article, it has nothing to do with the pictures!
The Gov is hot and smart. She is almost the perfect woman. Not as good as my wife, but still good.

http://www.runnersworld.com/photo/sarahpalin/slide7.html

"It doesn't matter your background, your demographics, your race, your political affiliation, it's such a uniting, healthy, fun, awesome activity. It cracks me up going to some running event and seeing some dude who campaigned so hard against me, or a lady who's been blogging some mean comments about me. But we're all there together and we're smiling and we're having a good time because we're going to do something healthy and active. We need more of that."