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Area: WoT Operations    WoT Background    Non-WoT        Politix   
US ignores Turkey’s objection, approves arming Kurdish forces in Syria
Today's Headlines
Headline Comments [Views]
Page 4: Opinion
5 20:11 JohnQC [9] 
2 17:09 charger [7] 
10 18:20 JohnQC [8] 
10 19:36 phil_b [8] 
1 18:11 JohnQC [11] 
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3 08:42 Frank G [7] 
Page 1: WoT Operations
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2 12:51 Raj [11]
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1 19:49 JohnQC [10]
4 15:41 Pappy [6]
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1 09:00 Richard Aubrey [2]
2 12:10 Skidmark [4]
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2 10:34 Bright Pebbles [5]
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5 15:09 magpie [6]
Page 2: WoT Background
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1 22:29 chris [9]
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7 17:53 newc [6]
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1 19:16 NoMoreBS [9]
2 11:10 AlanC [5]
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Page 3: Non-WoT
5 21:41 SteveS [9]
3 13:31 Bright Pebbles [3]
1 15:09 Skidmark [2]
6 12:15 Skidmark [6]
16 20:15 Blossom Unains5562 [10]
6 21:28 Crusader [9]
4 23:25 Zenobia Floger6220 [10]
3 12:33 Deacon Blues [6]
11 20:09 JohnQC [8]
1 15:15 Skidmark [9]
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4 15:18 Skidmark [4]
8 18:29 JohnQC [3]
3 11:09 DarthVader [4]
2 10:59 Bertie and Company1511 [5]
3 20:25 phil_b [8]
Page 6: Politix
1 10:52 Abu Uluque [7]
15 20:28 JohnQC [12]
15 16:01 Raj [4]
3 18:05 JohnQC [4]
19 20:23 trailing wife [11]
6 20:12 JohnQC [7]
10 12:06 Anguper Hupomosing9418 [5]
-Land of the Free
Greenfield: Kommie perfessers leave Kansas U over Gunz
The 2nd Amendment doesn't just deter criminals. It also gets rid of leftist college professors.

If only conservatives had known this all along, the NRA would have gotten twice as much support. Over at the University of Kansas, some leftist profs are leaving in a huff. "You won't have us to kick around America for your impressionable teenagers anymore."

The effect may not be what they intended.

More at the link
Posted by: badanov || 05/10/2017 00:00 || Comments || Link || [8 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Alice Lieberman, a professor of social welfare

A professor of social welfare? Is that even a thing?
Posted by: SteveS || 05/10/2017 0:42 Comments || Top||

#2  Bend over and go "Wonk !, Wonk !"
Posted by: Omusoque Spolutch1486 || 05/10/2017 5:29 Comments || Top||

#3  "Faster, please."
Posted by: Glenmore || 05/10/2017 7:06 Comments || Top||

#4  and the downside of this is?
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 05/10/2017 8:12 Comments || Top||

#5  and the downside of this is?

She's not in "sciences"
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 05/10/2017 10:43 Comments || Top||

#6  A professor of social welfare? Is that even a thing?

Uh, yeah, strange as it may seem.

Posted by: Abu Uluque || 05/10/2017 11:11 Comments || Top||

#7  Of course, one of her "teaching interests" is diversity.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 05/10/2017 11:12 Comments || Top||

#8  Which will land you a job as a dishwasher on Mass Street.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 05/10/2017 16:12 Comments || Top||

#9  Sanctuary city, only immigrants need apply for dishwashing jobs.
Posted by: bman || 05/10/2017 16:20 Comments || Top||

#10  Repeat it in all other campuses. Can we be certain these lefty professors are really leaving? The lefty Hollywood crowd always threatens to leave the country when things don't go their way but they never do.
Posted by: JohnQC || 05/10/2017 18:20 Comments || Top||


China-Japan-Koreas
A North Korean Nuclear EMP Attack? … Unlikely
[38North.org] Size Matters
Therein lies my insignificance.
This is an instance where size does matter: the larger the nuclear explosion, the larger the affected area. While technical reports and papers on EMP from nuclear detonations are mostly classified, there is a paper by D. Hafemeister of California Polytechnic Institute that provides sufficient detail to derive a simple rule of thumb on the relationship between affected distance and nuclear device yield. The paper makes some simplifying assumptions:
  • The detonation is spherically symmetric (which may not always be the case);

  • The Earth’s magnetic field is not accounted for;

  • Prompt gamma rays account for 0.3 percent of the total energy of the explosion and are emitted within the first 10 nanoseconds of detonation;

  • About 0.6 percent of the prompt gamma rays produce relativistic electrons that constitute the E1 component of the EMP; and

  • The electric field damage threshold is 15,000 volts/meter or higher in the E1 component.

Plugging in the numbers and presuming these assumptions are appropriate, the rule of thumb is surprisingly simple: D = Y, where D is the maximum damage distance expressed in kilometers and Y is the yield of the blast in kilotons. So, a 20 KT bomb detonated at optimum height would have a maximum EMP damage distance of 20 km; a 1 MT (1,000 KT) bomb would damage out to 1,000 km. The largest North Korean test to date has been estimated to be about 20 KT.

Conclusions
Considering the physics behind EMP and the status of North Korea’s nuclear program to date, doomsday headlines in the press regarding the North’s potential EMP threat are grossly overstated.[4] North Korea’s nuclear tests have not yet demonstrated sufficient yield to cause damage to large areas through EMP. Moreover, with only a limited arsenal, it would not make sense for the North Koreans to conduct nuclear tests simply to develop EMP weapons.
Dunno.
Posted by: Blossom Unains5562 || 05/10/2017 00:00 || Comments || Link || [8 views] Top|| File under: Boko Haram (ISIS)

#1  See Starfish Prime blast for EMP effects
Posted by: Skidmark || 05/10/2017 1:57 Comments || Top||

#2  But Fake News sells!
Posted by: Procopius2k || 05/10/2017 8:57 Comments || Top||

#3  EMP ? Bring it. Perhaps they will finally resume the proper motoring speed and stay in their lane. I survived Y2k, Michael Jackson, Starbucks, and Barry Soetoro. I am determined to survive NORK EMP.
Posted by: Besoeker || 05/10/2017 9:06 Comments || Top||

#4  More likely an "unsourced"ground level bomb will destroy a city somewhere, maybe even Beijing.
Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 || 05/10/2017 9:07 Comments || Top||

#5  Miniaturization is the key. Our nuclear capable Samsung Galaxy S8+ app could take out an entire first floor Nordstrom's men's section and neighboring Starbucks.
Posted by: Besoeker || 05/10/2017 9:20 Comments || Top||

#6  "Hacking" into our infrastructure with Chinese assistance is more of a real threat than this. Its easier, quiet, deniable, cheaper and gets the job done.
Posted by: Yosemite Sam || 05/10/2017 10:12 Comments || Top||

#7  @#3: Nice pic. You are totally doable.
Posted by: Spike Elmoth6259 || 05/10/2017 14:03 Comments || Top||

#8  Detonation in a seaport, probably underwater to kick up the most radioactive crud, on the Pacific coast scares me a Lot more than the EMP-Godzilla that keeps returning from oblivion every few years.
Posted by: magpie || 05/10/2017 15:01 Comments || Top||

#9  Absolutely right, Magpie.
Prepositioned atomics in the bay at Busan, home of the ROK navy and US Navy command
can compromise a US carrier group, the ROK Navy, poison South Korea's second largest city
and will severely impede deployment and resupply logistics for the US Forces SK.
Seoul is the imagined strategic first strike but it can be taken out with artillery.
The gateway to the world port of Busan feeds and defends the nation.
Posted by: Skidmark || 05/10/2017 15:44 Comments || Top||

#10  Underwater nuke at the entrance to Puget Sound, and the tsunami would create one hell of a mess.
Posted by: phil_b || 05/10/2017 19:36 Comments || Top||


Europe
Yes, Marine Le Pen's Party Is Bad, But Islamization Is Worse
h/t Instapundit
...my concern isn't with supporting populism per se. I am no fan either of the National Front (FN) or of Ms. Le Pen. My overwhelming interest is, quite simply, in standing up against the Islamization of Europe.

Yes, I wish Le Pen had more sensible views on the French welfare state; I wish her party didn't have such an ugly history. But there were two choices in this run-off election, and only one of them was promising to strive to keep France from becoming overwhelmed by Islam.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 05/10/2017 10:48 || Comments || Link || [7 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Young women, stand up to that statue
And "fascists" who try to un-hat you!
Because you're empowered
And never a coward,
You'll smirk as the Muslims dispatch you.

Because you'll definitely stand up to them when the time comes... right? Cue Ben Franklin.
Posted by: Zenobia Floger6220 || 05/10/2017 14:33 Comments || Top||

#2  Michael Van Der Galien (who wrote the column that inspired Bawer's response) is a Muslim convert who never chooses to share that fact with his readers.

How taqiyah.
Posted by: charger || 05/10/2017 17:09 Comments || Top||


Fifth Column
At its worst, however, Left Forum is Comic Con for Marxists‐Commie Con, if you will‐and an absolute shitshow of nerds and social rejects.
[TheBaffler.com] A few weeks back in Manhattan, hundreds of socialists, communists, anarchists, and even few decent “small-d” democrats shuffled into the unlikely venue of the John Jay College of Criminal Justice (ironically, best known as a “cop school”) for Left Forum 2015. If you aren’t up on your radical political symposiums, Left Forum evolved out of the now-defunct Socialist Scholars Conference, which was re-founded in 1981 after the original Socialist Scholars Conference petered out in the 1960s. The SSC grew into the largest, most prominent leftist summit in the United States, though nationwide university cuts eventually curtailed both budget and staff for the event. By 2004 it was renamed Left Forum, and it still commands a big draw: This year’s confab boasted 1,300 speakers and four hundred events under the salient title of “No Justice, No Peace: Confronting the Crises of Capitalism and Democracy.”
Yeah, because democracy is a crisis. Jesus.
At its best, Left Forum remains a reassuring beacon of cameraderie and ambition. In addition to seasoned journalists, organizers and academics, it usually snags a few big public intellectuals, like Noam Chomsky, David Harvey, and Angela Davis, while also peppering the bill with high-profile activists like Harry Belafonte and Michael Moore. The organizers sometimes even lure the odd political success story, most recently Kshama Sawant, Seattle City Council member and open socialist. Generally, both speakers and attendees are smart, friendly, and often quite young and good-looking (if I do say so myself).

At its worst, however, Left Forum is Comic Con for Marxists—Commie Con, if you will—and an absolute shitshow of nerds and social rejects. There are bitter old codgers that will harangue you about a thirty-some-years-old internecine grudge, and there are politically unsophisticated kids with Che Guevara t-shirts and Adbusters subscriptions. There are sanctimonious Trotskyists, ridiculous Maoist Third-Worldists, condescending horizontalist anarchists, smug social democrats and a glut of ardent adherents to similarly esoteric ideological traditions, all competing for the title of Most Insufferable Anti-Capitalist. Left Forum is notorious for grueling Q&A sessions, often with nary a “Q” to be found. People like to demonstrate how many books they’ve read (or worse, have written and self-published) in embarrassing displays of pretension and/or machismo, and cynicism is frequently substituted for insight.

But the grumps and the brats, the blowhards and the sectarians, the narcissists and the pessimists—all of these people are bearable to me, some even charming. No, the worst part of Left Forum is the crackpots, the paranoiacs, the hysterics, and all the other truly dysfunctional personalities attracted by the conference’s most infamous policy: no panel submission will be rejected.
It's good to know that the Left has problems, too.
Posted by: Anguth Ebbitle2872 || 05/10/2017 00:00 || Comments || Link || [7 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Is this an opportunity for Chelsea, perhaps? She could benefit from the coverage.
Posted by: Omusoque Spolutch1486 || 05/10/2017 5:27 Comments || Top||

#2  Leftism does seem to be based on NPD.
The idea that you can benefit people better than they can themselves is the height of arrogance and a total impossibility.
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 05/10/2017 8:23 Comments || Top||

#3  a few big public "intellectuals"

/gotta make the "air quotes" signal as well
Posted by: Frank G || 05/10/2017 8:42 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
POTUS: People will thank me for firing Comey when things calm down
[Washington Examiner] President Trump said Wednesday that people will thank him for firing former FBI Director James Comey, because Comey had ruined the FBI's reputation.

"Comey lost the confidence of almost everyone in Washington, Republican and Democrat alike. When things calm down, they will be thanking me!" Trump tweeted.
Posted by: Besoeker || 05/10/2017 14:00 || Comments || Link || [9 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Yes. Democrats are caught in a "You killed the rabid dog that mauled my child, you bastard" loop.
Posted by: M. Murcek || 05/10/2017 14:58 Comments || Top||

#2  I'm thanking him now.
Posted by: Skidmark || 05/10/2017 15:19 Comments || Top||

#3  Why wait?
Posted by: Iblis || 05/10/2017 16:00 Comments || Top||

#4  I watched those testimonies. This last one this week, he was twisted into a pretzel and appears to have bitten off more than he should chew.

Basic things you do not do in this branch, he did.

Posted by: newc || 05/10/2017 17:51 Comments || Top||

#5  Thank you DJT.
Posted by: JohnQC || 05/10/2017 20:11 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Rape and ordinary men
[DAWN] "YOU can’t clap with one hand," one of the rapists in the notorious Delhi gang rape case had famously said after being convicted of rape and murder. This man, along with five others, had been found guilty of taking a young woman to the back of a Delhi bus one night in December 2012. The men raped the young woman inflicting injuries that were so terrible that the doctors, including those in Singapore, where she was sent for treatment, could not save her. A few weeks after the incident -- after she had identified her assailants and given her statement -- she succumbed to her injuries.

Last week, the Supreme Court of India upheld the death sentence handed out by a lower court to five of the men who had raped her. (One escaped the sentence as he was a juvenile at the time of the crime. He spent three years in a correctional facility.)

It was an unusual move, according to experts; lower courts in India routinely hand out death sentences but many if not most are overturned on appeal based on some technicality such as shoddy investigation by the law-enforcement authorities. So it was expected it would be the same in this case, some detail or procedural provision invoked to show ’mercy’ to the men. The fact that this did not happen signifies that the highest court in India saw it necessary to uphold the worst possible punishment in a case so grotesque that it saw hundreds of protests across India and headlines around the world.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred || 05/10/2017 00:00 || Comments || Link || [11 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan

#1  Thought these guys would be hung by now. The hanging was supposed to be "immediate", i.e. without delay.
Posted by: JohnQC || 05/10/2017 18:11 Comments || Top||


What’s behind the ‘deal’?
[DAWN] WHO fits the definition of ’jet-black’ terrorist better than Ehsanullah Ehsan
...formerly the front man for the Pak Taliban, now the lips and tongue of the Jamaatul Ahrar splinter group in Mohmand Agency...
, the former spokesmen and a key commander of the Tehrik-e-Taliban
...the Pashtun equivalent of men...
Pakistain, and subsequently of the TTP splinter group Jamaatul Ahrar
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred || 05/10/2017 00:00 || Comments || Link || [9 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan



Who's in the News
32[untagged]
8Islamic State
6Govt of Pakistan
5Taliban
4al-Shabaab (AQ)
2Govt of Iran
1Govt of Syria
1Jamaat ul-Ahrar
1Pirates
1Sublime Porte
1al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent
1Boko Haram (ISIS)

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Two weeks of WOT
Wed 2017-05-10
  US ignores Turkey’s objection, approves arming Kurdish forces in Syria
Tue 2017-05-09
  Egypt issues life sentence for Muslim Brotherhood chief
Mon 2017-05-08
  Confirmed: Head of ISIS In Afghanistan Killed In Raid By 50 U.S. Special Ops, 40 Afghan Commandos
Sun 2017-05-07
  Ismail Haniyeh elected new head of Hamas
Sat 2017-05-06
  New Jersey Man Charged With Attempting to Support ISIS, Planning NYC Bombing
Fri 2017-05-05
  US drone strike leaves 7 ISIS-K militants dead in East of Afghanistan
Thu 2017-05-04
  Kurd, Turkish army troops fighting near Rojava
Wed 2017-05-03
  Taliban kill 27 ISIS militants in East of Afghanistan
Tue 2017-05-02
  FBI translator married ISIS terrorist she was supposed to investigate: report
Mon 2017-05-01
  Al-Qaeda ready to join forces with Saudi-led groups to fight ‘Houthi Shia’ in Yemen
Sun 2017-04-30
  Jaish Al-Islam executes Al-Qaeda commander as rival jihadists slaughter each other in Damascus
Sat 2017-04-29
  ISIS on its last legs as the Syrian Army imposes full control over gas field in east Homs
Fri 2017-04-28
  Fighting between Kurds and Turkish troops continue in Northern Syria
Thu 2017-04-27
  Damascus airport rocked after 'Israel air strike' on arms depot
Wed 2017-04-26
  Abu Sayyaf beheads captive Philippine soldier


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