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44 Indian security personnel killed in held Kashmir attack
Today's Headlines
Headline Comments [Views]
12:41 8 23:49 trailing wife [10] 
08:06 18 23:48 Anguper Hupomosing9418 [4]
08:02 1 14:49 Woodrow [9]
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04:07 1 10:26 Bobby [1]
03:55 1 14:46 Abu Uluque [12]
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03:44 1 19:12 M. Murcek [5]
03:35 1 08:33 Besoeker [6]
03:26 3 13:01 M. Murcek [5]
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Home Front: WoT
Maricopa County releases 'knife to a gunfight' cam footage (video)
[FOX] A man who pledged allegiance to the ISIS terror group was shot by an Arizona police officer in January after the terrorist-wannabe charged the cop with a knife, newly released bodycam footage shows.

Maricopa County Sheriff’s Sgt. Brandon Wells responded to the scene after Ismail Hamed called dispatchers, committed to the ever-shrinking militant network and asked for a police officer to be sent so he could "deal with them," police said. Hamed also reportedly told dispatchers he wanted to talk to police about the suffering of Palestinians and issues regarding the Middle East.

"My name is Ismail Hamed," he told 911 operators, according to The Arizona Republic. "I live in Fountain Hills, and I'm owing my allegiance to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. I just want a cop to come real quick and I want to deal with them."
Alaaah be praised, Ismail's wish was granted.

[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] Provided by our own TW.
Moment Arizona cop shoots 'ISIS-supporting terrorist' after the 18-year-old charged at him with a knife

WARNING: GRAPHIC but thoroughly enjoyable IMAGES

Authorities on Thursday released video of the January 7 confrontation between suspect Ismail Hamed and a sergeant at a police station in Fountain Hills, Arizona

  • Police say Hamed had 911 and asked to speak with a law enforcement officer

  • A sergeant responded to the call and his body camera recorded the incident

  • Hamed threw rocks at the sergeant before approaching him with a knife

  • The officer fired two shots at Hamed after he ignored multiple warnings

  • who was born in the US, was described by police as a violent extremist

  • He was taken to a hospital and charged with aggravated assault the next day
  • Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 12:41 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [10 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State

    #1  Hat tip to the calm, professional Maricopa County Sheriff’s Sgt. Brandon Wells who successfully controlled the use of loud abusive language and the rather strong urge to burst into uncontrolled laughter.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 12:57 Comments || Top||

    #2  Suicide by cop.
    Posted by: Glenmore || 02/15/2019 12:58 Comments || Top||

    #3  Suicide? Ah no. jihad against cop. Moohamhead goes down. Fitting.
    Posted by: Woodrow || 02/15/2019 14:41 Comments || Top||

    #4  Yeah, okay. The cop shot the muzz, but the guy lived! What BS is that? The perp should be having tea with allah.
    Posted by: Tyranysaurus Clavith3514 || 02/15/2019 15:19 Comments || Top||

    #5  Moved to Page 1: War on Terror under the Home Front: WoT heading. Just because it wasn’t organized by the home office by properly trained cadre members doesn’t mean it isn’t an intentional part of the war. Especially since various Al Qaeda branches as well as ISIS have for years been pushing locals outside the Ummah via on-line magazine articles as well as videos and personal grooming to carry out lone wolf actions in order to terrorize the unbelievers, softening them up for the coming conquest.

    Well done, Besoeker. Thank you for being on top of this for us.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 16:28 Comments || Top||

    #6  "No Soup Virgins for you!"
    Posted by: Frank G || 02/15/2019 18:19 Comments || Top||

    #7  Sand chigger...
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 21:25 Comments || Top||

    #8  I would dearly love to know where Mr, Hamed’s parents are from, which mosque he goes to, and who his friends and relations are. It’s very odd that for two days I have not been able to find any of this information.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 23:49 Comments || Top||


    Economy
    Progressive lawmakers cheer Amazon's HQ2 reversal
    [New York Post] Opponents of Amazon’s plan to come to Queens were popping the champagne corks Thursday after the company announced it was backing out of the deal, with some calling it a major victory for the progressive movement.

    Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez called the decision a victory over "corporate greed" and over the retail giant’s billionaire founder, Jeff Bezos.

    "Anything is possible," the Bronx/Queens Democrat tweeted. "Today was a day a group of dedicated, everyday New Yorkers & their neighbors defeated Amazon’s corporate greed, its worker exploitation, and the power of the richest man in the world."

    She later incorrectly claimed the $3 billion in subsidies that would have gone to Amazon could be used to hire teachers, fix the subway and "put a lot of people to work."
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 08:06 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [4 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  Hopefully Bezos won't move the new location to Toronto.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 8:10 Comments || Top||

    #2  Who wants $150,000/year jobs when you can flip burgers and make change for $10, $12, $15/hour?
    Posted by: Glomogum Angusogum9874 || 02/15/2019 11:13 Comments || Top||

    #3  From "You didn't make that," to "We aren't going to let you make that." Next up, abortion prior to conception...
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 11:23 Comments || Top||

    #4  Neurosurgeon making the same as a janitor will work like a janitor. Dedication has nothing to do with it.
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 11:24 Comments || Top||

    #5  Should we have stocked up on popcorn for this?
    Posted by: Abu Uluque || 02/15/2019 11:25 Comments || Top||

    #6  "Let's really rub Amazon's nose in it. We'll go on strike from the jobs we didn't get. That'll show those evil capitalist bastiges we can't be bullied."
    Posted by: SteveS || 02/15/2019 11:55 Comments || Top||

    #7  Turn about is fair play. Bezos gets screwed by his own politics.
    Posted by: warthogswife || 02/15/2019 12:01 Comments || Top||

    #8  Bezz-OS. The operating system that reboots just before the payoff...
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 12:39 Comments || Top||

    #9  When the revolutionaries become the counter-revolutionaries, they must be smashed.
    Posted by: swksvolFF || 02/15/2019 12:41 Comments || Top||

    #10  When they drive out all the businesses, only then will they find they have no more power.

    Then they will ask for a government bailout.
    Posted by: DarthVader || 02/15/2019 12:50 Comments || Top||

    #11  I seem to remember. A culture built on cheap (er, basically free slave labor) lost out to a culture that was industrialized.
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 12:53 Comments || Top||

    #12  History was never the strong suit with this group, MM.
    Posted by: Mullah Richard || 02/15/2019 14:03 Comments || Top||

    #13  Cuomo is really P.O.ed at AOC. I anticipate bad mojo is sent AOCs way by some on the now conflicted leftist camp, Stalin Style.
    Posted by: Ebbavirt Clunk4147 || 02/15/2019 14:25 Comments || Top||

    #14  Cuomo is really P.O.ed at AOC. I anticipate bad mojo is sent AOCs way by some on the now conflicted leftist camp, Stalin Style.

    Might not be a bad idea to assign some very discreet Secret Service people to watch over AOC. Be a shame if someone were to be apprehended (and thoroughly interrogated) attempting to do her harm.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 14:49 Comments || Top||

    #15  Uh oh; a Trotskyite?
    Posted by: swksvolFF || 02/15/2019 16:35 Comments || Top||

    #16  ...they'll try to tag it on the Trumpsters.
    Posted by: Procopius2k || 02/15/2019 20:08 Comments || Top||

    #17  "So how'd it happen Chief?"

    "Well, there she was waiting in line for the grand re-opening show of Rent when two white males with red hats attacked, screaming 'This is MAGA country!'"

    "Bet they had a pickup truck too Chief."

    "Yes they did. Yes they did."
    Posted by: swksvolFF || 02/15/2019 20:25 Comments || Top||

    #18  I saw a new meme on the internet today: "MABA: Make Alexandria a Bartender Again"
    Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 || 02/15/2019 23:48 Comments || Top||


    -Lurid Crime Tales-
    'Attempted coup d'etat': Trump cites Alan Dershowitz in effort to discredit McCabe
    [Washington Post] Alan Dershowitz, the lawyer and professor emeritus at Harvard Law School, assumed his standard role Thursday in the feedback loop connecting conservative cable news and President Trump’s Twitter pronouncements.

    Dershowitz joined Fox News host Tucker Carlson to denounce purported discussions within the Justice Department about using the 25th Amendment to remove the president. The talks were confirmed by Andrew McCabe, the former acting FBI director, in an interview with "60 Minutes" set to air in full this weekend, CBS journalist Scott Pelley said Thursday, when a clip from the interview was released. The amendment, which creates a process for the vice president and Cabinet to declare a president unfit, was apparently explored by top Justice Department officials in May 2017 as they became alarmed by the president’s decision to fire James B. Comey, the former FBI director.

    The advance clip does not include talk of the 25th Amendment but rather focuses on McCabe’s decision to authorize a probe into Trump’s possible ties to Russia out of fear that he would soon follow Comey in being dismissed.

    Trump earlier on Thursday had launched a general attack on McCabe, impugning his personal character.

    After watching Carlson’s show on Fox, his criticism became more specific. He quoted Dershowitz’s denunciation of the alleged consideration of the 25th Amendment as a means of removing the 45th president.

    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 08:02 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [9 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  Actually treason since they collaborated and depended on a foreign agent.

    Treason, a capital offense.

    With the hardcore leftists now running Fox I doubt we will be hearing the term 'Attempted coup d'etat" from anyone else on the once good American channel.
    Posted by: Woodrow || 02/15/2019 14:49 Comments || Top||


    -Land of the Free
    Nevada Senate Passes Bill to Criminalize Private Firearms Transfers
    [Guns America] This week the Nevada Senate passed SB143 by a vote of 13 to 8. The bill, known as "The Background Check Act," would require any unlicensed parties who wish to transfer ownership of a firearm to first both appear before a licensed firearm dealer so that a background check can be completed.

    Anyone who does not comply with the act would face criminal charges. The first offense would be a misdemeanor and any second and subsequent offenses could be charged as felonies.

    The bill, if ultimately passed by the state Assembly, would apply to any transactions between unlicensed parties including transactions at gun shows. The bill would not require a background check for law enforcement transfers or transfers between immediate family members. The bill would not apply to antique firearms.

    After the Senate passed the bill, Nevada’s GOP Chairman, Michael McDonald, released a statement.

    "The process behind this sweeping gun grab measure has been flawed from the start," McDonald said. "Our party attempted to fix this broken piece of legislation . . . [but] Democrats find it more important to do it their way, and punish law abiding citizens, than to do it right."

    Prior to coming before the Senate for a vote, public testimony was taken and the bill was debated in committee hearings. One woman, Jenny Heyman, testified in favor of the bill, having lost her son to a man with a gun during a road rage incident.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 07:51 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [5 views] Top|| File under:


    Home Front: Politix
    Castro-Loving Congresswoman Signs On as California Co-Chair for Kamala Harris
    [Free Beacon] The Kamala Harris campaign announced Thursday that Rep. Barbara Lee (D.), a far-left California congresswoman known for her relationship with deceased Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, would be its co-chair.

    The endorsement from Lee, who has represented one of the most liberal districts in the country for the last two decades, is seen as a big win for Harris and her effort to win support from the liberal base of her party, CNN reported on Thursday. Lee has previously held leadership roles on both the Congressional Black Caucus and Congressional Progressive Caucus.

    The Oakland congresswoman was also one of the leaders in the push to normalize relations with Cuba and Fidel Castro, a brutal communist dictator whose 2016 death she mourned.

    "I was very sad for the Cuban people," Lee said. "He led a revolution in Cuba that led social improvements for his people."

    Lee has been cultivating her relationship with Cuba since her first trip to the Communist island in 1977 and eventually won the praise of Castro himself. In a 2009 memo titled "Reflections by Comrade Fidel," he praised Lee's "political courage," not just for her efforts to reach out to him but also for being "the sole vote against Bush’s genocidal war in Iraq."

    "It was unbeatable proof of political courage," Fidel wrote in the memo, which Lee gave to the San Francisco Chronicle for a piece on her relationship with Castro. "For that, she deserves every honor."

    Lee once praised Castro for rationing access to gasoline, arguing that it forced his people to increase their use of bicycles, and "their rates of diabetes and high blood pressure went down."

    Lee's reaction to Castro's death was out of the ordinary for members on either side of the aisle including her Democratic colleague Nancy Pelosi, who represents Lee's neighboring district in San Francisco.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 07:45 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [19 views] Top|| File under: Commies

    #1  Lee once praised Castro for rationing access to gasoline, arguing that it forced his people to increase their use of bicycles, and "their rates of diabetes and high blood pressure went down."

    Something we can look forward to in the U.S.A, right Kamela?
    Posted by: Bobby || 02/15/2019 11:34 Comments || Top||

    #2  "Bush’s genocidal war in Iraq"

    Funny guy.
    Posted by: Don Vito Phort8015 || 02/15/2019 17:44 Comments || Top||


    Mathew Continetti: 'What to Do About the Rebirth of Socialism'
    [Free Beacon] "The most important political event of the twentieth century," wrote Irving Kristol in 1976, "is not the crisis of capitalism but the death of socialism." Plenty of self-described Marxist and socialist regimes existed throughout the world, Kristol recognized. It was rather the ideas behind such regimes that had reached a moral and intellectual endpoint. Nor was this passing away entirely to be cheered. "For with the passing of the socialist ideal," Kristol went on, "there is removed from the political horizon the one alternative to capitalism that was rooted in the Judeo-Christian tradition and in the Western civilization which emerged from that tradition."

    The inheritors of the socialist ideal were totalitarian states on one hand and stagnant social democracies on the other. By the end of the twentieth century, these too had passed. China (and later Vietnam) decided that to get rich is glorious, the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact states collapsed into squabbling nationalities and kleptocracies, the socialist autocracies that had depended on Moscow for support receded into irrelevance. What Kristol called "a dwindling band of socialist fideists" remained behind, the last remnant of a dwindling faith. "People who persist in calling themselves socialist, while decrying the three quarters of the world that has proclaimed itself socialist, and who can find a socialist country nowhere but in their imaginings‐such people are anachronisms."

    Not any more. If the death of the socialist idea was the most important political event of the last century, then the rebirth of this ideal must rank high in significance in the current one. Just as nationalism has reasserted itself on the political right, socialism has grown in force on the left. In the twenty-first century the two ideologies are estranged and antagonistic twins, paired in Occupy Wall Street and the Tea Party, Jeremy Corbyn and Brexit, Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump. The Democratic victory in 2018 has elevated socialism to a height it has not reached in the United States in more than a century. Only in recent weeks, however, have defenders of democratic capitalism become aware of how great the socialist challenge really is. Only now are we beginning to formulate a response.

    Take your pick of the headlines. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is the most talked-about Democrat in the country. Her fellow member of the Democratic Socialists of America, Rashida Tlaib, opened the 116th Congress by saying, "Impeach the mother—." Their comrade Ilhan Omar apparently wants to offend every Jewish American by the end of her term. The Green New Deal, Medicare For All, eliminating employer-based health insurance, marginal tax rates of upwards of 70 to 90 percent, requiring corporations above a certain size to obtain a federal charter, the expropriation of wealth, heavy inheritance taxes, free college, universal basic income, abolish I.C.E., the anti-Semitism that has long been socialism's fellow traveler—what was once radical and marginal is now embraced and celebrated by a large and vocal part of the Democratic Party.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 07:32 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [13 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  Only thing really to do is start looking ahead, expect the worst, discover forms of liquidity that will insulate what you have earned as best as possible.
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 11:21 Comments || Top||

    #2  Much like its collective brothers Fascism and National Socialism (Nazi-ism), Socialism and its believers and acolytes must be removed or eradicated, root and branch, to where there is no trace left of their existence in our society and nation. This must be done without anger, without pity, without regret, without exceptions, and with the cold clinical seriousness, aggressiveness, and thoroughness with which one removes a deadly cancer.

    And it needs to start soon.
    Posted by: Boss Spoper5850 || 02/15/2019 11:25 Comments || Top||

    #3  the west's elites replaced large chunks of capitalism for neo-feudalism at the death of socialism.
    Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 02/15/2019 13:21 Comments || Top||

    #4  A) Lock and Load, B) Learn about Bitcoin.
    Posted by: Cesare || 02/15/2019 13:59 Comments || Top||

    #5  Bitcoin, where if the owner of the server on which the information is stored dies, and no one else knows his password, the bitcoin owners’ accounts are forever after lost as if the money had been thrown into a volcano?
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 18:10 Comments || Top||

    #6  if the owner of the server on which the information is stored dies, and no one else knows his password, the bitcoin owners’ accounts are forever after lost as if the money had been thrown into a volcano

    Yes. It's *very* secure.
    Posted by: SteveS || 02/15/2019 19:17 Comments || Top||

    #7  Money should be hard. Once tomahawks, blankets, rifles and pelts were money. Tobacco was money too. The smoke however was not...
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 20:51 Comments || Top||

    #8  Americans used to value "God and Country". But then God was booted out, Therefore socialism is 110% a sure bet.
    Posted by: Ebbavirt Clunk4147 || 02/15/2019 23:32 Comments || Top||


    Iraq
    The War Between Iran and Israel Moves to Iraq
    [Free Beacon] Tehran has begun redeploying its military assets in Syria toward the Iraqi border.

    Israel's campaign of airstrikes against Iranian military targets in Syria has led Iran to move the bulk of its soldiers and bases away from the Israeli border, according to intelligence assessments by the Israeli military released Wednesday. While some pro-Iranian forces remain in southern Syria on the border with Israel, Iran is redeploying most of its assets to eastern Syria and Iraq.

    Iran's actions should not be construed as Tehran giving up its efforts to entrench itself in Syria to open up another front to attack Israel. In fact, the intelligence assessments say that Iran appears to be adopting a more aggressive posture toward the Jewish state‐last month, for example, Iranian forces launched a missile at the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights. Iran is simply changing its methods for achieving the same vision, the Israel Defense Forces believes.

    Iran now seeks to entrench itself in Iraq, setting up missile launchers there to threaten Israel. Reuters reported last year that Iran had also given ballistic missiles to Shi'ite proxies in Iraq and that it is developing the capacity to build more there with the ranges to threaten both Israel and Saudi Arabia. Furthermore, Iranian-backed militias are expected to base themselves in western Iraq, awaiting orders to cross the border into Syria to target the Jewish state. Parts of Iran's elite Quds Force also appear to be leaving Syria to enter Iraq.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 04:37 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [8 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Iran

    #1  Ipricks can fight it out among themselves while IAF practices precision bombing runs. Bring it.
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 13:04 Comments || Top||

    #2  "Iran's elite Quds Force"

    Have they actually done anything elite?
    Posted by: Beau || 02/15/2019 13:17 Comments || Top||

    #3  'Legend In Their Own Minds', Beau.
    Posted by: Mullah Richard || 02/15/2019 13:59 Comments || Top||


    -Lurid Crime Tales-
    Ex-Obama border patrol chief says it's 'absolutely false' to say walls don't work
    [The Hill] Former border patrol chief during the Obama administration, Mark Morgan, on Wednesday said on Hill.TV on that it is "absolutely false" to say that walls do not work along the border.

    "There's so much false information that's being provided out there, and they're misleading the American people, so I'm just trying to do my best," Morgan told hosts Buck Sexton and Krystal Ball in an appearance on "Rising."

    He was asked to specify what false information he has seen spread in the immigration debate.

    "One of the best ones is walls are ineffective," he said. "2006, the bipartisan Secure Fence Act. 2013, the Senate passes a bipartisan immigration bill with $8 billion dollars included in a fence, and just last year, there was money for fencing and barriers," he continued.

    Morgan said Yuma, Ariz., is an example of a city that has seen illegal immigration drop as a result of a border barrier.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 04:34 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [6 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  The Donk's opposition to walls isn't because they don't work, it's because they do.
    Posted by: ed in texas || 02/15/2019 12:39 Comments || Top||


    China-Japan-Koreas
    Hong Kong snares record haul of rhino horns from South Africa
    HONG KONG (Reuters) - Hong Kong customs seized a record 40 kg (88 pounds) of rhino horns worth around HK$8 million ($1 million) from Johannesburg en route to Vietnam, the latest bust for authorities trying to tackle the rising volume of endangered species trafficked through the Chinese territory.

    The seizure came less than one month after customs busted a massive smuggling operation from Africa, seizing a record quantity of pangolin scales, along with more than 1,000 ivory tusks.

    Customs said the rhino horns were found in two check-in carton boxes, destined for Ho Chi Minh City. Two men were arrested, they said in a statement on Thursday, adding it was a record haul for airline passengers.

    "It’s shocking to us that today’s 40 kg rhino horn seizure equates to about 20 percent of the total amount of rhino horn seized in Hong Kong from 2013 to the end of October 2018," conservation group WildAid said.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 04:25 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [5 views] Top|| File under:


    Britain
    Third suspect in Skripal poisoning is Russian GRU agent: Bellingcat
    LONDON (Reuters) - A third man suspected of involvement in the nerve agent poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal in England last year is a high-ranking Russian military intelligence agent, the investigative website Bellingcat said on Thursday.

    Skripal, a former officer in Russian military intelligence who betrayed dozens of spies to MI6, and his daughter Yulia were found slumped unconscious on a bench in the southern city of Salisbury in March 2018 after being poisoned with the Novichok military-grade nerve agent. Both later recovered.

    A police officer was also sickened, and a woman who lived nearby died after her partner brought home a fake perfume bottle with what police say was the poison, discarded by the attackers.

    Britain has accused two Russian GRU military intelligence officers of carrying out the attack and Bellingcat said it had identified a third Russian agent who was also in Britain at the time and was suspected of being involved.

    "Bellingcat can now reveal the true identity and background of this GRU officer, who operated internationally under the cover persona of Sergey Vyachaeslavovich Fedotov," it said.

    "In fact, this person is Denis Vyacheslavovich Sergeev, a high-ranking GRU officer and a graduate of Russia’s Military Diplomatic Academy."

    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 04:23 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [12 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  Both later recovered got better.

    Posted by: Jumbo Platypus2111 || 02/15/2019 19:25 Comments || Top||


    Home Front: Politix
    Pres. Trump Frees Up $8 Billion To Build Wall
    [Daily Caller] President Donald Trump has freed up $8 billion from various government agencies to build the wall, according to Fox News’ Brian Kilmeade.

    Trump announced earlier on Thursday that he plans on signing a bipartisan congressional bill that provides limited border wall funding and declaring a national emergency at the southern border.

    "Of course today was dominated by many stories, one of which was the bipartisan budget bill for border security. And the big number is‐that the president was not happy with‐was $1.375 billion to build a border barrier. He could do whatever he wanted with it," Kilmeade began. "The question was, ’Would the president add something with that? Would he declare a national emergency?’ I just got off the phone with Mick Mulvaney, chief of staff, and the answer is a resounding ’Yes.’ Now for the first time, you will hear how much it is and where the money is coming from."

    "It’s going to be about $8 billion. He had the $1.3 [billion], then $600 million will come from the Treasury, the Treasury forfeiture front. $2.5 billion out of [Department of Defense]. They consulted with Mick Mulvaney and the White House over the last few months on what they could actually do and they are going to use some money they feel they can spare on the drug interdiction account," he continued. "Then they came across with $3.5 billion for the military, the military construction budget." (RELATED: Trump Says DACA For Wall Deal ’Highly Unlikely’)

    Kilmeade added, "They feel they can help in that respect. And then, of course, they have additional money. It all adds up to $8 billion. So the $1.375 [billion] not enough for the president. He wanted $5.7 [billion]. He walks away at the end of the day with $8 billion and, of course, the Democrats and some Republicans are upset about that."

    The president’s decision to declare a national emergency for the wall was not unexpected. During the speech Trump gave late last month, where he announced he was going to end the government shutdown, he also explained that he would go down this route if Congress could not come up with a deal within a three-week period, which would have expired Friday.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 04:07 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  So he telegraphed his plan to allow the lawfare folks time to prepare.

    I hope that wasn't a mistake.
    Posted by: Bobby || 02/15/2019 10:26 Comments || Top||


    Home Front: Culture Wars
    From the Victory Girl's Bookshelf: The Diversity Delusion
    [VG] The prolific and highly readable Heather MacDonald has produced another incisive examination of American culture. The Diversity Delusion examines a cultural upheaval that eschews excellence for bean-counting. The American university system has been especially hit hard and it does not bode well for American innovation and advancement.

    DIVERSITY FRAUD FUELS BUREAUCRACY
    In 288 packed pages, MacDonald provides fact upon fact of a massive fraud. Using the University of California system as an example, she outlines the radical growth of non-teaching bureaucrats. The vast majority being dedicated to all manner of administrators to various diversity based student programs.
    From 1998 to 2009, as the UC student population grew 33 percent and tenure-track faculty grew 25 percent, the number of senior administrators grew 125 percent ...

    MacDonald goes on to give a more detail example from UC Davis where the Diversity mission yielded 28 departments ...
    not academic departments, but bureaucratic and identity based ones such as the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Intersex, Asexual Resource Center; the Center for African Diaspora Student Success; the Native American Academic Student Success Center; the Middle Easter/South Asian Student Affairs Office; the Woman’s Resources and Research Center; the Undocumented Student Center; Retention Initiatives; the Office of Educational Opportunity and Enrichment Services; and the Center for First-Generation Student Scholars
    It should be noted that UC tuition is northwards of $12,000 per year and, pleading poverty, the UC system has a tough time providing enough actual classes so students can graduate within four years. Yet it pours millions of dollars, with no signs of abating, into the expanding black hole of diversity bureaucracy.

    STEM IS NOT IMMUNE FROM DIVERSOCRATS
    Probably the most startling thing I read was how the hard sciences are being bullied and threatened for not being "diverse enough". Like the witch-prickers of the 17th century, today’s diversity bureaucrat can find "systemic bias" in any department whose membership doesn’t reflect whatever demographics are chosen on the pricker’s whim. No excuse is accepted for a science department pleading cannot find enough qualified "diversity hires". Such failure is taken as proof that science itself is to blame, it’s "hierarchical nature ... exacerbates gender bias and stereotypes".

    FROM UNIVERSITY TO CULTURE
    MacDonald also covers how this fraudulent ideology has spilled out of the campuses into culture. She covers the James Damore affair at Google and Google’s toxic identity-politic culture. Also, how UPenn law professor Amy Wax and USD law professor Larry Alexander were burned at the stake, not for what they actually wrote, but by how the leftwing crybullies interpreted their writings.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 03:55 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [12 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  It should be noted that UC tuition is northwards of $12,000 per year and, pleading poverty, the UC system has a tough time providing enough actual classes so students can graduate within four years.

    You can only get half the classes you need in one year and yet you have to pay the full year's tuition. It is a scam.
    Posted by: Abu Uluque || 02/15/2019 14:46 Comments || Top||


    Syria-Lebanon-Iran
    Suicide attack kills 27 members of Iran's elite Revolutionary Guard
    [France24] A suicide bomber killed 27 members of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards on Wednesday, state media said, in a southeastern region where security forces are facing a rise in attacks by militants from the country’s Sunni Muslim minority.

    The Sunni group Jaish al Adl (Army of Justice),
    ...the successor organization to Jundullah. On the Pakistani side of the border they hang out with the Taliban and Al Qaeda...
    which says it seeks greater rights and better living conditions for the ethnic minority Baluchis, claimed responsibility for the attack, the semi-official Fars news agency reported.

    The heavy losses among Iran’s premier military force prompted a senior Revolutionary Guards commander to issue a warning to the country’s foes.

    "Our response in defence of the Islamic Revolution will not be limited to our borders," Ali Fadavi was quoted as saying by Fars.

    "The enemies will receive a very firm response from the Revolutionary Guards like before." He did not specify which enemies or what actions Tehran would take.

    In the past Iran has accused its regional rival, Sunni Arab Saudi Arabia, of supporting Sunni separatist groups who have attacked its security forces. Riyadh has denied the charges.

    Iran’s Shi’ite Muslim authorities say militant groups operate from safe havens in Pakistan and have repeatedly called on the neighbouring country to crack down on them.

    A suicide bomber driving a vehicle laden with explosives attacked a bus transporting members of the Guards, the force said in a statement. Thirteen people were wounded.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 03:48 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [21 views] Top|| File under: Jundullah

    #1  Moar Puhleez!
    Posted by: Frank G || 02/15/2019 7:04 Comments || Top||

    #2  Seems some of that game in Iraq is coming to roost in the home of the perps. Pass the popcorn.
    Posted by: Procopius2k || 02/15/2019 7:10 Comments || Top||

    #3  We can have both sides lose!! Popcorn!!!
    Posted by: DarthVader || 02/15/2019 9:57 Comments || Top||

    #4  Brings a smile to my face.

    The comments, of course, not the tragedy of the suicide or related fatalities.
    Posted by: Bobby || 02/15/2019 10:47 Comments || Top||

    #5  Bobby, I respect your sentiment, and in this day and age we all do have to cover our a$$e$. However: They picked their side, and if their family couldn't talk hem out of that, or worse, encouraged it, they bought in and they get the dividend they deserved.

    If Iraqis rid themselves of Saddam, if the Iranians rid themselves of the mullahs, if the Afghans rid themselves of the taliban... I could go on but I think the point is made clear.
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 11:13 Comments || Top||

    #6  The comments, of course, not the tragedy of the suicide or related fatalities.

    But it isn’t a tragedy, Bobby. It is an act of war between combatants, where both parties are fighting on the side of evil. Different evils, to be sure, but this is a smaller version of Nazis vs. Soviets.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 11:17 Comments || Top||

    #7  After 9-11, some muzz luminary said "there are no civilians." Hokay!
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 11:40 Comments || Top||

    #8  If there is another revolution in the USA, suicide bombing will be part of it because drones and infrared will make small group warfare almost suicide. Robots will put many people out of work in the near future and the elites do not care. People who cannot support their families will revolt. France is the first indication of this!
    Posted by: Waldemar Flavise2828 || 02/15/2019 13:55 Comments || Top||

    #9  I was thinking more along the lines of -

    One death is a tragedy;

    {however, Joe Stalin said] one million is a statistic. /joseph_stalin_137476
    Posted by: Bobby || 02/15/2019 16:34 Comments || Top||

    #10  Oh, well if you’re going to quote the Classics, Bobby, there is nothing more to be said. ;-)
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 18:24 Comments || Top||


    Home Front: Culture Wars
    Abortion Extremism Comes to Rhode Island
    [National Review] In Rhode Island, legislators are considering a bill to put their state on par with New York by repealing nearly all existing protections for unborn life. It is part of a national campaign by Democrats to use deceptive marketing to enshrine a regime of elective abortion through all nine months of pregnancy.

    The Reproductive Health Care Act (RHCA) allows abortion for any reason before fetal viability and stipulates that the state may not restrict abortion after that point "when necessary to preserve the health or life of that individual." Like the Reproductive Health Act in New York and the recently defeated abortion expansion in Virginia, the bill carefully avoids defining "health." This language is an unenforceable limitation and essentially amounts to a legalization of abortion up to the point of birth for any reason.

    The bill is already cosponsored by more than half the members of the Rhode Island house. Democratic governor Gina Raimondo, a self-professed moderate, has vowed to sign it, writing of the bill, "I believe that no one should get in the middle of a decision between a woman and her doctor and that no woman should have to [choose] between health care and making ends meet."

    The bill’s supporters say it would merely codify Roe v. Wade, spin included in the bill text. Too few voters realize that the Supreme Court’s precedents effectively create a right to late-term abortion. But as expansive as the Court’s rulings have been, the bill goes further. The Court has allowed states to ban partial-birth abortion and to declare that life begins at conception; the bill removes both of these provisions from state law. The Court allows states to refrain from subsidizing abortion, too, but the bill can be read to require state funding for elective abortions.

    A second bill, the Reproductive Privacy Act (RPA), is being promoted as a more limited abortion law. But it too protects abortion at all stages of pregnancy, allows partial-birth abortion, prevents meaningful regulation of abortion facilities, and arguably requires taxpayer funding of abortion.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 03:44 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [5 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  If this is the liberal version of "Hold my beer..." I'm happy to watch.
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 19:12 Comments || Top||


    Home Front: Politix
    Beto says YES, he would tear down the existing El Paso border wall [VIDEO]
    [Right Scoop] This guy is such a loon.

    To his credit, MSNBC’s Chris Hayes actually posed Dan Crenshaw’s question to Beto, asking him if he’d tear down the existing wall.

    And Beto says yes he would. No kidding. Watch:
    Beto O'Rourke when asked, since Rep. @DanCrenshawTX asked on Twitter, if he would tear down the walls that are already in place: Yes and I think a referendum to do so would pass. pic.twitter.com/ENZuYvdqEa

    ‐ Julio Rosas (@Julio_Rosas11) February 15, 2019

    Here’s the original question posed by Crenshaw:
    .@BetoORourke should answer a simple question tonight with respect to the border debate:

    If you could snap your fingers and make El Paso’s border wall disappear, would you?

    Because this DHS graph shows that when the wall was built, illegal crossings dropped significantly. pic.twitter.com/JgquXfw2Ee

    ‐ Dan Crenshaw (@DanCrenshawTX) February 11, 2019

    Notice how significantly the illegal crossings dropped. And yet Beto would undo this? Dude is lawless!

    Democrats used to hide the fact that they were open borders in past decades, but these newer Democrats don’t even bother. It’s insane!
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 03:35 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [6 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  Yes, a "loon" and a classic jhagopf who happened to marry into money. Most of us have seen similar stories. They seldom end well.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 8:33 Comments || Top||


    The media has started backing away from the Russia collusion hoax. Many seem to know a reckoning is coming.
    [The Federalist] In episode 171 of "Seinfeld," George Costanza makes up a story about having a house in the Hamptons in order to avoid attending an event with his dead fiancée’s parents, the Rosses. He soon learns they know of his deception but the Rosses nevertheless accept an invitation to the fictitious house.

    George picks them up and begins driving towards a house that doesn’t exist. Both the Rosses and George maintain the pretense until George drives to the end of island past the last house in the Hamptons. George silently pleads for the Rosses to put an end to the charade. The lie’s momentum took on a life of its own as the players all continued acting their parts long after the truth was known.

    The episode comes to mind as the media has started backing away from the Russia collusion hoax. Like Costanza, many of the media perpetrators seem to know a reckoning is coming. Politico warned Trump haters, "Prepare for disappointment." Other examples of expectation managing can be found, such as here, here, here, and here. Mueller’s longtime top deputy at the FBI recently warned, "A public narrative has built an expectation that the special counsel will explain his conclusions, but I think that expectation may be seriously misplaced."
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 03:26 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [5 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  Fake News. Own it.
    Posted by: Procopius2k || 02/15/2019 7:08 Comments || Top||

    #2  "A narrative many wanted to believe but most savvy analysts rejected..."
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 13:00 Comments || Top||

    #3  "we at MSLSD wish Rachel a speedy recovery from her fentanyl overdose and fall from a 20 story balcony..."
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 13:01 Comments || Top||


    -Lurid Crime Tales-
    Fentanyl deaths from 'Mexican oxy' pills hit Arizona hard
    [AP] TUCSON, AZ ‐ Aaron Francisco Chavez swallowed at least one of the sky blue pills at a Halloween party before falling asleep forever.

    He became yet another victim killed by a flood of illicit fentanyl smuggled from Mexico into the Southwest -- a profitable new business for drug gangs that has pushed the synthetic opioid to the top spot for fatal U.S. overdoses.

    Three others at the party in Tucson also took the pills nicknamed "Mexican oxy" and police flagged down by partygoers saved them by administering naloxone overdose reversal medication. But the treatment came too late for Chavez, who died at age 19.

    The four thought they were taking oxycodone, a much less powerful opioid, investigators believe. The death of Chavez and many others, officials said, illustrate how Arizona and other southwestern states bordering Mexico have become a hot spot in the nation's fentanyl crisis. Fentanyl deaths tripled in Arizona alone from 2015 through 2017.

    "It's the worst I've seen in 30 years, this toll that it's taken on families," said Doug Coleman, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration special agent in charge of Arizona. "The crack (cocaine) crisis was not as bad."

    With plenty of pills and powder sold locally out of the arriving fentanyl shipments that are also distributed around the U.S., the drug that has surpassed heroin for overdose deaths has touched all Arizona demographic groups. Chavez' family says he was working at a restaurant as a prep cook with dreams of becoming a chef and trying to turn his life around after serving prison time for a robbery conviction.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 03:19 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [12 views] Top|| File under: Narcos

    #1  Bad business for pushers - killing off the host.

    Anybody think a tight border would reduce such tragedies?

    Comments, Speaker Pelosi?
    Posted by: Bobby || 02/15/2019 10:46 Comments || Top||

    #2  Prefer to decriminalise and make it criminal to be high in public (outside border controlled drug-use zones)
    Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 02/15/2019 10:51 Comments || Top||

    #3  Anybody think a tight border would reduce such tragedies?

    Sadly, we may never know. Trump is the first president we've ever had who is serious about our country's drug problem but the Democrats seem to have a vested interest in it and they resist any effort to secure the border with all they've got.
    Posted by: Abu Uluque || 02/15/2019 15:13 Comments || Top||

    #4  Democrats seem to have a vested interest in it

    Their lives are not blighted by either drug use or drug dealers in the neighbourhood, and in fact those who indulge enjoy the experience while those who do not refuse to Puritanically sit in judgement on a minor pleasure of their peers, Bobby. And it must be pointed out this attitude is not completely party-aligned — plenty of Republicans, including plenty of Rantburgers, take a libertarian approach to the subject. We’ve had some battles royale here on the subject, and arguments about the destructive impact of drug sales and drug use on poor neighbourhoods are very much discounted.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 17:42 Comments || Top||


    Home Front: Politix
    Stacey Abrams, poster girl for Democrats' version of fiscal responsibility
    [American Thinker] Last week I wrote here questioning the Democrat leadership's political wisdom in picking Stacey "Tank" Abrams, their recently defeated Georgia gubernatorial candidate, to deliver the party's rebuttal speech to Donald Trump's State of the Union address. I pointed out that Abrams is no poster child for responsible behavior, especially when it comes to her finances ‐ she's a tax attorney turned tax evader who has run up huge balances on her credit cards and may be a deadbeat on her college student loans.

    Today I discovered, thanks to an article by Jason Hopkins, writing at the Daily Caller, that Ms. Abrams has other financial issues that I failed to discover. He writes:
    Third Sector Development, a nonprofit started by Abrams that focuses on registering black voters, was hit with three separate tax liens in the past year for failing to pay state unemployment tax, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported Tuesday. The three tax liens, filed by Georgia state regulators, total roughly $3,500.

    This isn't the first time state regulators have targeted Abrams' organization. The Georgia Department of Labor issued four tax liens worth $13,000 against Third Sector Development between 2014 and 2016, also citing unpaid employment contributions.

    What is even more interesting was that Abrams had been generously compensated by Third Sector Development, which she founded and headed, as well as another get-out-the-minority-vote non-profit, also an Abrams creation, the Voter Access Institute, to the tune of almost a half-million dollars in a three-year period. That hefty salary was funded out of $12.5 million in donations from sources Abrams refuses to reveal, a quite unusual stance for non-profits to take when their operations are aboveboard.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 03:08 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [4 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  Well, yeah. "I can consume it faster than you can deliver it." Old story...
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 11:59 Comments || Top||


    Home Front: Culture Wars
    Leftism Is Like the Cult of Cthulhu
    h/t Instapundit
    [AmericanGreatness] The most merciful thing in the world, I think," wrote the American horror writer H. P. Lovecraft in the opening to The Call of Cthulhu, "is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents." In the Lovecraftian mythos, this refers to the occult world of the Great Old Ones, eldritch gods from outer space, as old as time itself who lie beyond our ken, dead but still dreaming. If we could only grasp their existence and see how fragile our imaginary world really is, we would go mad. Thus, we go on believing in an illusion and subconsciously hope Cthulhu and Azathoth never show us their true faces.
    Does that makes The Orange man our Agent Franks?
    The secret to being a successful leftist is very similar. Like Lovecraft’s narrator, they are unable‐certainly unwilling‐to correlate the contents of their minds; thus, they are able to hold two or more antithetical bits of information in their minds and discount or ignore any bit of evidence that does not conform to their theoretical worldview. In Through the Looking-Glass, the White Queen tells Alice that she can believe as many as six impossible things before breakfast. Leftists have her beat many times over.

    A prime example came this past week, when the Democrats, who now appear to be the personal party of a small child from the Bronx named after a city in Egypt, rolled out their "Green New Deal"‐which implicitly called for, among other inanities, high-speed trains to Europe and the reconstruction of every building in America‐at the same time that the newly installed governor of California, Gavin Newsom, was aborting his predecessor Jerry Brown’s high-speed train to nowhere, a $77-billion exercise in fruitlessness that marks, to date at least, the high-water mark of liberalism’s inability to correlate any of the contents of its largely empty heads.

    Anyone, including this semi-native Californian, could see there was no market for a bullet train from Bakersfield to Fresno to Merced to Erewhon, especially one that had already busted its budget many times over‐a great gobbling maw worthy of Cthulhu himself that, in true pagan god fashion, would and could never be satisfied no matter what or whom was sacrificed to it. But liberal gods are insatiable; too much is never enough for them. And so "progressives" keep on feeding the beast, in the belief that it will eat them last.

    In the meantime, they feel free to indulge their wildest fantasies and darkest desires. Infanticide‐one of the surest signs of a pagan culture‐came out of the closet in New York (where it is now the law of the former Empire State) and in Virginia, where it was turned back legislatively but no doubt will return with its governor’s blessing, if he lasts that long. The fact that Cardinal Timothy Dolan has not summarily excommunicated the notional Catholic, Governor Andrew Cuomo, speaks volumes about the impotence of the modern Catholic Church.

    In the Senate, the Spartacan walk-on also known as Cory Booker‐whose veganism is possibly a contributing factor to his lack of mental acuity‐bravely launched an attack on meat and cheese, neither of which he eats. As is typical of proto-fascists everywhere, Booker has personalized his dietary preferences and then universalized them on a crusade to‐you guessed it‐save the planet by punishing the rest of us.

    ...Because, in the end, even the craziest Leftist must, in his darkest moments, paradoxically have a moment of clarity, when all of the conflicting impossibilities inherent in his world view suddenly, briefly, become visible. And then Cthulhu and Dagon and Shub-Niggurath and Nyarlathotep appear, and the contents are finally correlated in a blaze of mad glory.

    Let’s just hope they don’t take us with them when and wherever they go.
    Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 02/15/2019 01:54 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [12 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  But does Cthulhu demand millions of baby sacrifices?
    Posted by: Glenmore || 02/15/2019 9:35 Comments || Top||

    #2  the entire article about cognitive dissonance doesn't mention CD?
    Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 02/15/2019 10:52 Comments || Top||

    #3  And so "progressives" keep on feeding the beast,

    BECAUSE it's ultimately funds the people who pull their strings.
    Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 02/15/2019 10:54 Comments || Top||

    #4  Keep promoting abortion and we won't have any more people to worry about. Maybe then Cthulhu fhtagn.
    Posted by: Abu Uluque || 02/15/2019 14:58 Comments || Top||

    #5  I put a Yog-Sototh 2024 sticker on my car...
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 18:32 Comments || Top||

    #6  ^ Hastert the Unspeakable 2006! Too late?
    Posted by: Thart Shainter7702 || 02/15/2019 20:19 Comments || Top||


    India-Pakistan
    Two suspects get bail in terrorism case
    [Dawn] PESHAWAR: The Beautiful Downtown Peshawar
    ...capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa administrative and economic hub for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan. Peshawar is situated near the eastern end of the Khyber Pass, convenient to the Pak-Afghan border. Peshawar has evolved into one of Pakistan's most ethnically and linguistically diverse cities, which means lots of gunfire.
    High Court has granted bail to two former ’missing’ persons, who were convicted by the administration of Khyber tribal district for waging war against the state by joining a banned turban outfit.

    In one of the two cases, a bench consisting of Chief Justice Waqar Ahmad Seth and Justice Mohammad Ayub Khan granted bail to Amjad Khan of Bara tehsil in Khyber district on the condition of furnishing two surety bonds of Rs500,000 each.

    The convict has moved the court challenging his conviction by an assistant political agent under the erstwhile Frontier Crimes Regulation (FCR) in 2018. He sought bail as interim relief until the conclusion of hearing.

    Also, another high court bench consisting of Justice Mussarat Hilali and Justice Ishtiaq Ibrahim granted bail to Akhtar Nawaz of Bara asking him to furnish two surety bonds of Rs500,000 each.

    The convict has challenged his conviction by an APA Bara through a petition.

    Shabbir Hussain Gigyani, lawyer for the petitioners in both cases, said his clients were illegally detained for many years before they were handed over the administration by security forces.

    He said the APA had conducted the ’so-called’ trial under Section 11 of the FCR and sentenced Amjad Khan to 14 years imprisonment under sections 121 and 122 of the Pakistain Penal Code, which dealt with the waging of war against the state.

    The lawyer said the APA had pronounced the order on Oct 13, 2018, and by that time, the FCR was repealed through the Fata Interim Governance Regulation (FIGR) and therefore, the APA had no authority to convict a person under the abolished law.

    He said the APA had acknowledged in its order that the petitioner was taken into custody by security forces in 2011 over his alleged connection with the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban
    ...the Pashtun equivalent of men...
    Pakistain and was handed over to the administration of Khyber tribal district in 2017.

    The lawyer said his client didn’t undergo a fair trial and had remained in illegal detention for many years.

    He said after the merger of Fata with Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa through the Constitution (Twenty Fifth Amendment) Act, 2018, there was a legal vacuum in tribal districts as no appellate forum was available there for the petitioner to get relief and therefore, he had moved the high court.

    The lawyer said his other client, Akhtar Nawaz, was taken into custody by security forces in 2014 on the charge of links with the TTP and waging of war against the state.

    He said the petitioner had remained missing before he was handed over to the administration in 2017.

    The lawyer said a ’so-called’ council of elders was constituted under Section 11 of the FCR and that his client was convicted by the APA.

    He added that the petitioner was sentenced to 14 years imprisonment though there existed no evidence of his involvement in the said offence.

    The lawyer wondered how a person could illegally detained for many years before being tried on ’vague and ambiguous’ charges.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:25 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [15 views] Top|| File under: TTP


    -Short Attention Span Theater-
    In Smolette case, Persons of Interest are being questioned
    [DEADLINEHOLLYWOODNEWS] Police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi tweeted shortly after Jussie Smollett's GMA appearance this morning that through a "meticulous investigation," detectives "have identified the persons of interest in the area of the alleged attack of the Empire cast member. These individuals are not yet suspects but were in area of concern and are being questioned. Investigation continues."
    rumor: these guys are extras on Empire, were friends of Smolette and purchased clothesline from Ace Hardware a day before the 'crime', also they took Lyft to downtown Chicago a few hours before the 'crime'
    Posted by: lord garth || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [7 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  From what I've read, part of that 'meticulous investigation' involved taking the redacted phone log they got from the 'victim' and comparing it to the cell tower dump. The missing names became the Persons of Interest.

    Looks like my guess that the alleged victim fell on the ice and made up a story was wrong. What we have here is a plan so cunning you could pin a tail on it and call it a weasel. Aside from the overall improbability of it all, I mean.
    Posted by: SteveS || 02/15/2019 0:34 Comments || Top||

    #2  So are they going to admit that juicy is a liar, or are they going to frame somebody?
    Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 02/15/2019 1:00 Comments || Top||

    #3  So they faked a crime in a city covered in surveillance cameras and witnesses but did it on a night so cold the witnesses were inside and did it in a spot the cameras didn't see.

    This is sounding like it could be a pretty funny episode of a crime show.
    Posted by: rjschwarz || 02/15/2019 10:17 Comments || Top||

    #4  Two Nigerian Brothers:
    Two Nigerian brothers identified as “persons of interest” in the alleged hate attack on Jussie Smollett could face criminal charges Friday, according to their lawyer.

    It’s unclear what the men could be charged with, however, their attorney, Gloria Schmidt, told CBS News.

    “They are baffled about why they are people of interest,” Schmidt told the network. “It’s an awful thing that happened to Jussie, but it’s not my guys.”

    She said the men, who have not been identified, worked with Smollett on the set of his hit TV show “Empire” and worked out with him at the gym.
    Posted by: Frank G || 02/15/2019 10:27 Comments || Top||

    #5  So are they going to admit that juicy is a liar, or are they going to frame somebody?

    All the perps/co-conspirators are black. You can't charge a black person for a hate crime. It just isn't done.
    You can't charge Juicy for filing a false report because that will "discourage future victims from coming forward".
    Prediction: Juicy will be hailed as a hero for bravely calling attention to the epidemic of hate crimes in America.
    Posted by: SteveS || 02/15/2019 10:41 Comments || Top||

    #6  It is still a hate crime just not the kind the mainstream media likes.
    Posted by: Airandee || 02/15/2019 10:53 Comments || Top||

    #7  Best snark ever from Gates of vienna blog

    "If his story turns out to be false, can we say it was #FakeNoose?"
    Posted by: Warthog || 02/15/2019 15:05 Comments || Top||


    Afghanistan
    CEO Claims Taliban Leaders Are Based In Pakistan
    [ToloNews] Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah
    ... the former foreign minister of the Northern Alliance government, advisor to Masood, and candidate for president against Karzai. Dr. Abdullah was born in Kabul and is half Tadjik and half Pashtun...
    said in response to a planned meeting between the Taliban
    ...the Pashtun equivalent of men...
    ’s negotiating team and Pakistain Prime Minister Imran Khan
    Continued on Page 49
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [7 views] Top|| File under: Taliban

    #1  That's as unlikely as finding bin-laden there.
    Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 02/15/2019 13:31 Comments || Top||


    -Land of the Free
    Lou Dobbs Says Democrats Literally Want To Overthrow The Government
    [Huffpoo] Settle down Lou. In a conversation on his Fox Business show Wednesday, Lou Dobbs accused Democrats of wanting to overthrow the government. As in "carry out an actual coup d’etat."

    Guest Byron York of The Washington Examiner told the host that House Democrats could not rely on special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation to provide the basis for impeaching President Donald Trump.

    In a bit of a stretch, Dobbs replied that Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), the House intelligence committee chairman, said Mueller should be investigated for his probe. (Schiff actually questioned whether Mueller’s probe is going deep enough into Trump’s ties to Deutsche Bank.)

    "They have realized they’ve gotta do it themselves," York said of the Democratic lawmakers. "They cannot depend on Mueller but they want to keep pursuing the president."

    "No, they want to destroy the man," Dobbs replied in the exchange shared by Media Matters, above. "They want to subvert his administration. They would love to carry out an actual coup d’état."

    Dobbs has used the c-word previously to describe Democratic opposition to the president, like here and here.

    But apparently, it never gets old.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [6 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  Well, yes? That's what Mueller is all about? I'm sure Trump would have been assassinated long ago if not for his connections to DeVos/Blackwater.
    Posted by: Herb McCoy || 02/15/2019 0:44 Comments || Top||

    #2  As a minimum, rip up the Constitution. Commies got to do what commies got to do.
    Posted by: Procopius2k || 02/15/2019 7:01 Comments || Top||

    #3  Yes, 'Hope and Change" Part-2. That ole Lou, ya gotta love him. Mind like a steel trap.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 8:45 Comments || Top||

    #4  DB is dodgy but for other reasons.

    Odd that Trump has ties to DB, but DB is just an arm of Merkel's derp-staters trying to keep the Euro plates spinning.
    Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 02/15/2019 10:48 Comments || Top||

    #5  You mean like McCabe and Rosenstein trying to get Pence and enough cabinet members to invoke the 25th Amendment? You mean like FISA warrants obtained by fraudulent means to investigate a crime that never happened? That kind of a coup? Sounds to me like Dobbs is right on the mark. Oh, but I see the source of this article is Huffpoo. They huff a load of poo, don't they?
    Posted by: Abu Uluque || 02/15/2019 11:37 Comments || Top||


    Economy
    Amazon cancels Big Apple expansion plans and blames local political opposition
    Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [4 views] Top|| File under: Commies

    #1  Bezos: "No HQ for you!"
    Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 || 02/15/2019 2:44 Comments || Top||

    #2  Amazon just accelerated the inevitable of moving out of the high tax state once the subsidies expire.
    Posted by: Airandee || 02/15/2019 6:48 Comments || Top||

    #3  AOC and her cronies are celebrating their big victory over big business.
    Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 || 02/15/2019 10:24 Comments || Top||

    #4  In a year, AOC will be running ion her 'record' for another term.

    I'm buying popcorn futures.
    Posted by: Bobby || 02/15/2019 11:36 Comments || Top||

    #5  Perhaps the anti-Amazon politicians oppose this because the subsidies granted would open up 25,000 jobs. These politicians know that their constituencies don't want to work. They would rather have the subsidies turned into more fungible financial vehicles with which to bribe, er, ensure their reelections.
    Posted by: warthogswife || 02/15/2019 12:19 Comments || Top||

    #6  + You always call them socialists, but (IMO) they are nihilists.
    Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 02/15/2019 12:29 Comments || Top||

    #7  The millennium socialists are on the move. The rest of the Party seems to be giving tacit support for their goofy ideas.

    Occasional Cortex studied economics in college. She really thinks the $3 billion of tax breaks for Amazon is going to be available for socialist causes now that Amazon pulled out. She ought to sue her college for false advertising.
    Posted by: JohnQC || 02/15/2019 13:24 Comments || Top||

    #8  Nihilists. Say what you want about the tenets of National Socialism, at least it's an ethos.
    Posted by: swksvolFF || 02/15/2019 13:28 Comments || Top||

    #9  She ought to sue her college for false advertising.

    It does seem like there should be some liability if you come out stupider than you went in.
    Posted by: SteveS || 02/15/2019 13:30 Comments || Top||


    Home Front: Politix
    Ilhan Omar Arrested in 2013 For Trespassing, Booked At Hennepin County Jail
    [AlphaNewsMN] State Rep. Ilhan Omar was arrested in 2013 for trespassing and booked at Hennepin County Jail "to prevent further criminal conduct," according to a newly uncovered police report.

    The incident took place on January 18, 2013 following an event at the Minneapolis Convention Center featuring former Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud. The Somali president was set to stay the night at the Hotel Ivy, causing large groups of Somalis to follow the presidential convoy to the hotel, including Omar.

    According to the police report, hotel staff requested police assistance in clearing the lobby, saying that anyone without a hotel room key was not welcome on the premises and needed to leave immediately. The officer handling the incident said the majority of people who were asked to leave were compliant. However, Omar, when approached, was "argumentative" and refused to leave.

    "As she stood her ground and refused to leave I took hold of her left elbow to escort her from the lobby. Omar then pulled away from me stating, ’Don’t put your hands on me!’ Others in her group complied and began walking toward the front entry/exit door as I ordered and I managed to coax Omar out with them," the police report reads.

    Ten minutes after the original encounter, the officer reports finding Omar seated in a different area of the lobby. According to the officer’s account, Omar "remained defiant" as he informed her that she would be arrested for trespassing if she didn’t leave.

    Since she refused to comply with orders, the officer arrested Omar. The officer reached for Omar’s left arm to get her to stand so she could be handcuffed, but she pulled away. The officer handcuffed her while she stayed seated in the hotel lobby chair.

    "Omar was booked at [Hennepin County Jail] as I felt it was likely that she would fail to respond to a citation and she also demonstrated that she was going to continue her criminal behavior," the officer wrote.

    View the police report below:
    Go figure.
    Posted by: Anomalous Sources || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [6 views] Top|| File under: Moslem Colonists

    #1  Was this before or after she married her brother?
    Posted by: SteveS || 02/15/2019 0:37 Comments || Top||

    #2  Omar's civil marriage to Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, at the time a British citizen, was in 2009 (at the time Omar was also married to Ahmed Hirsi). Said Elmi was naturalized as a US citizen based on the marriage to Omar and then enrolled at North Dakota State U where Omar was also enrolled. Omar says that she had a religious (apparently not civil) divorce from him was in 2011. He graduated from ND State U in 2012.
    Posted by: lord garth || 02/15/2019 8:06 Comments || Top||

    #3  Street cred operation. Ben Smith has a boner...
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 21:34 Comments || Top||


    Iraq
    Four ISIS militants killed in Mosul
    [Rudaw] At least four ISIS turbans were killed in two operations in djinn-infested Mosul
    ... the home of a particularly ferocious and hairy djinn...
    provinces, the Iraqi army said.

    The army said it carried out raids against the turbans based on an intelligence tip on their location.

    "A joint force of Nineveh police and the Iraqi army carried out a security operation based on intelligence information indicating that there were gunnies hiding in tunnels in the plains of southwest Mosul," Alaa Othman an Iraqi army official said in a presser in Mosul on Wednesday.

    Othman explained that the army had sealed off the area to prevent any escape and subsequently killed all four turbans who wore boom belts.

    The army did not suffer casualties, he said.

    Iraqi and Kurdish military leaders warn that ISIS is making a stealthy comeback in parts of the country and carries out daily attacks against the Iraqi army, particularly in Nineveh and Diyala.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [4 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State


    Syria-Lebanon-Iran
    Russian Army patrol enters Turkish-held area near Manbij (video)
    [AlMasdar] For the first time during this eight-year-long conflict, the Russian Army has entered a Turkish military zone in northern Syria.

    According to Russia Today’s Arabic language channel, the Russian military police began conducting patrols in the Turkish-held areas around the strategi city of Manbij.

    Later in the day, Turkish military units entered the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) areas around Manbij to conduct their joint patrols with the Russian police.

    The Turkish military was spotted near the positions of the Kurdish-led People’s Protection Units (YPG) in the towns Maranaz, Ayn Daqna, Kafr Khasher and Mennagh.

    Below is the video of the joint patrols in Manbij this week:
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [17 views] Top|| File under: Sublime Porte

    #1  "Let's you and him fight"
    Posted by: Frank G || 02/15/2019 10:00 Comments || Top||


    -Lurid Crime Tales-
    Rosenstein Rejects Andrew McCabe's Statements, Calls Him a Liar
    [Breitbart] Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein rejected allegations made by former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe to CBS News that he and other officials discussed removing the president via the 25th amendment after he fired James Comey, according to a Department of Justice (DOJ) statement.

    Follows is a portion of an analysis on this article by commenter 'Incurablewound' and a must read:
    Incurablewound:
    Continued on Page 49
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [7 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  Either the Deputy AG or the former Deputy Director of the FBI is lying about something rather significant. That is disturbing, regardless of which one.
    Posted by: Glenmore || 02/15/2019 1:26 Comments || Top||

    #2  Prisoner's dilemma in action
    Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 02/15/2019 1:34 Comments || Top||

    #3  Once again, what was the motivation? I doubt it was political.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 7:25 Comments || Top||

    #4  Glenmore, I embrace the power of 'and'.
    Posted by: AlanC || 02/15/2019 7:49 Comments || Top||

    #5  Once again, what was the motivation? I doubt it was political.

    Of course it was political - it's a class war: the new class will fight to the death to protect its (unearned) privileges.
    Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 02/15/2019 8:13 Comments || Top||

    #6  Possibly a matter of semantics g(r)om. I tend to believe they were 'covering' for the illegal activities of Clinton and Bath House Barry.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 8:18 Comments || Top||

    #7  I believe you could find a 100 more corruption affairs, maybe not as weighty, on every level of the new class - that's what I mean by their privileges.
    Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 02/15/2019 8:27 Comments || Top||

    #8  Yes, it's pretty obvious the laws of the "Forgotten Man" do not apply to the beltway vermin.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 8:31 Comments || Top||

    #9  Beltway , shmeltway. Every member of teachers union and every DMV clerk is part of the new class.
    Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 02/15/2019 8:54 Comments || Top||

    #10  The gang that thinks shooting is icky and straight is a hate posture.
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 11:32 Comments || Top||

    #11  HRC was supposed to win. Trump's winning shook and threatened the Deep State to its core.

    Lock her up. Looks like that needs to be changed to "Lock them up."

    McCabe and Rosenstein sh*t show. Pot and kettle.
    Posted by: JohnQC || 02/15/2019 13:19 Comments || Top||

    #12  Rodless Rosenstein, reminds me of weasel. Nothing more.
    Posted by: Woodrow || 02/15/2019 14:44 Comments || Top||


    International-UN-NGOs
    EU adds Saudi Arabia, other jurisdictions including Afghanistan to dirty-money blacklist
    [ToloNews] The European Commission has reportedly added Soddy Arabia
    ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face...
    and other jurisdictions including Afghanistan to a blacklist of nations that pose a threat to the block because of lax controls against terrorism financing and money laundering.

    Inclusion in the blacklist of ’dirty-money’ not only results to reputational damage but would also complicate financial relations with the European Union
    ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing...
    The move oblige European banks to apply tighter controls on transactions with customers and institutions which have been included in the list.

    Khalil Seddiq, the governor of the Central Bank of Afghanistan called the inclusion of Afghanistan in the list a hasty move by the European Union.

    Mr. Seddiq told Khaama Press that the banking system of Afghanistan is organized in line with the standard international banking systems which has operations perfectly and in coordination with the law preventing money laundering and terrorism financing.

    The previous list included 16 jurisdictions but the latest additions have increased the number to 23 with Libya, Botswana, Ghana, Samoa, the Bahamas and the four United States territories of American Samoa, U.S. Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico and Guam being the newcomers to the list.

    Afghanistan, North Korea, Æthiopia, Iran, Iraq, Pakistain, Sri Lanka, Syria, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia and Yemen
    ...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of. Except for a tiny handfull of Jews everthing there is very Islamic...
    are among the other jurisdictions which have also been included in the list.

    The list will be forwarded to 28 EU members for endorsement to be endorse in a month with the deadline for the endorsement likely to be extended to two months.

    According to reports, the Afghanistan Central Bank was notified regarding the inclusion of the jurisdiction of Afghanistan in the list.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  Yeah, the EU definition of bad money: "Go get, just don't get caught..."
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 11:17 Comments || Top||


    Home Front: Politix
    William Barr Confirmed by Senate to Become Next Attorney General
    Good luck, sir. And happy hunting.
    [MEDIAite] William Barr has secured the Senate votes he needs to become the new Attorney General of the United States.

    With a 54-45 vote, Barr has obtained enough votes from Republicans and some Democrats to obtain a simple majority. The news means Barr will take up the AG position after he previously held the job under George H.W. Bush’s presidency.

    Once he’s sworn in, Barr will take Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein’s place in supervising Robert Mueller’s ongoing investigation. Several lawmakers opposed to Barr’s confirmation have said they’re concerned by his lack of commitment to publicly release Mueller’s findings, even if he does think the investigation should be allowed to run its course.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [6 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  Several lawmakers [are]concerned by his lack of commitment to publicly release Mueller’s findings

    Apparently, there are still some Dems who thing there is something of substance in the report.

    Perhaps they intend that the volume of the report will 'prove' Trump's malfeasance?
    Posted by: Bobby || 02/15/2019 10:43 Comments || Top||

    #2  The special council statute is specific on reporting. Most of the dems complaining about it right now weren't around to vote on the law back in the day. Now they want it to be whatever they want it to be.
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 11:19 Comments || Top||


    Afghanistan
    Germany To Extend Afghanistan Military Mission
    [ToloNews] German Chancellor Angela Merkel
    ...chancellor of Germany and the impetus behind Germany's remarkably ill-starred immigration program. Merkel used to be referred to by Germans as Mom. Now they make faces at her for inundating the country with Moslems ..
    's Cabinet has decided to extend the military mission in Afghanistan for another year, Deutsche Welle reported, adding that a leaked document showed government expressing doubts about the prospects of peace in Afghanistan.

    According to the report, this comes a day after an internal strategy paper showed Germany had offered to host another peace conference, this time with an extra invitation for the Taliban
    ...mindless ferocity in a turban...
    Germany’s Bundeswehr currently has around 1,200 soldiers stationed in Afghanistan, part of NATO
    ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. It's headquartered in Belgium. That sez it all....
    's Resolute Support mission.

    In December, reports emerged that the US President Donald Trump
    ...New York real estate developer, described by Dems as illiterate, racist, misogynistic, and what ever other unpleasant descriptions they can think of, elected by the rest of us as 45th President of the United States...
    was planning to withdraw around half of the US military's 14,000 troops in Afghanistan. However,
    there's no worse danger than telling a mother her baby is ugly...
    no confirmation or details have yet been announced.

    In fact, the US Special Envoy for Afghanistan Reconciliation Zalmay Khalilzad said recently that recent agreements reached with the Taliban during Doha talks were around a peace agreement and not a troop "withdrawal agreement".

    Deutsche Welle meanwhile reported that an internal document leaked to German weekly Der Spiegel on Tuesday (and released on Wednesday) showed the government expressing doubts about the prospects of peace in Afghanistan and apparently criticizing any potential US withdrawal plans as naive and overly hasty.

    The report stated that in a strategy paper addressed to selected Bundestag members, the government said Washington was making an effort to find a political solution quickly in order to pave the way for a military withdrawal. But experience had shown that "such a process can last several years without decisive breakthroughs," especially "in the face of the complex inner-Afghan and international negotiating position."

    Deutche Welle reported that the document, which was signed off by Angela Merkel's office, the Defense Ministry, and the Foreign Ministry, added: "Should the US withdraw its military engagement significantly, the government will thoroughly reassess its actions in Afghanistan."

    The news report stated that Foreign Ministry front man Rainer Breul played down the significance of the 11-page dossier at a regular presser on Wednesday, pointing out repeatedly that the US had not yet communicated any concrete withdrawal plans.

    "This is not a document about the USA, it's about Afghanistan, and our thoughts for a grinding of the peace processor and how we can support it, either militarily, or on a civilian level, or on development cooperation," he said.

    Breul also said that the mooted peace conference, mentioned in passing in the paper, was merely the reiteration of an offer Germany had made many times before. "Our line remains very clear, that we need an inner-Afghan grinding of the peace processor, that we would support if it is desired, no more and no less," he said.

    Germany first hosted an Afghanistan peace summit at the Petersberg castle, outside Bonn, in December 2001. The resulting "Bonn Agreement" laid the foundations for the NATO-backed state-building efforts in Afghanistan following the alliance's invasion of the country.

    This week's document, however, expressly mentions that the Taliban should be invited, though it added that such a conference should only take place at "an appropriate stage of the negotiations."

    However,
    there's no worse danger than telling a mother her baby is ugly...
    according to Deutsche Welle, government representatives were silent on Wednesday on exactly how long the Bundeswehr intended to stay in Afghanistan.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [5 views] Top|| File under:


    Home Front: Politix
    5 insane provisions in the amnesty omnibus bill
    Posted by: newc || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [6 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  So why on Earth would Trump say he will sign this?
    Posted by: gorb || 02/15/2019 6:50 Comments || Top||

    #2  I don't know the full picture here (its beyond any one person's grasp anyway) but the limiting provisions of this bill probably do not apply to funds authorized by other acts or maybe only apply in narrowly defined areas. Similarly, future authorizations would not, unless specific to the legislative language, affect the limitations of this 'compromise' bill. Furthermore, the limiting language may not be as limiting as it seems. For example, requiring consultation does not mean the same thing as requiring agreement.
    Posted by: lord garth || 02/15/2019 9:55 Comments || Top||

    #3  I hope we'll see how it fits into his plan. I hope.
    Posted by: Bobby || 02/15/2019 10:37 Comments || Top||

    #4  He vetoes it. It gets overridden. Who owns it?
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 13:09 Comments || Top||


    Syria-Lebanon-Iran
    U.S.-Backed Syrian Forces Clearing IS Remnants from Villages
    [AnNahar] U.S.-backed Syrian forces were clearing two villages in eastern Syria on Thursday of remaining Islamic State
    ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems....
    hard boyz who are hiding among the local population, and detaining others attempting to flee with the civilians, the U.S.-led coalition said.

    The coalition said the clearance operations were taking place in the villages of Shajalah and Baghouz, near the border with Iraq.
    Continued on Page 49
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [14 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State


    India-Pakistan
    44 Indian security personnel killed in held Kashmir attack
    [Dawn] Over 40 personnel of India’s paramilitary Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) were killed in a fedayeen-style strike in India-held Jammu and Kashmire on Thursday, reports said.

    Indian minister says New Delhi will retaliate; FO rejects insinuation that seeks to link the incident with Pakistan.
    Rooters said 44 men were killed as a jeep with 350kg of explosives rammed a bus in a large security convoy at Pulwama in the disputed Himalayan region.

    Indian reports claimed that Jaish-e-Mohammad
    Continued on Page 49
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [14 views] Top|| File under: Jaish-e-Mohammad

    #1  "We have always condemned acts of violence anywhere in the world," the FO spokesperson said.

    Then his lips fell off
    Posted by: Frank G || 02/15/2019 10:10 Comments || Top||


    Home Front: Politix
    GOP/Dem Spending Deal Provides Amnesty Pipeline for MS-13 Gang
    [Breitbart] A Republican-Democrat spending bill being offered to President Trump provides a de facto amnesty pipeline for all illegal alien household members of MS-13 gang members who arrive in the United States as "Unaccompanied Alien Children" (UACs).

    As part of a bipartisan "compromise" spending package, lawmakers included provisions that prevent federal immigration officials from deporting anyone who has close contact with UACs who are readily resettled throughout the U.S. with so-called "sponsors" after being trafficked across the southern border.

    These sponsors are often times illegal alien relatives, in many cases parents, of UACs. Federal officials have repeatedly noted how the UAC program has been widely used by the MS-13 gang to import more gang members into the country.

    Last year, New York City Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) official Angel Melendez said there are roughly 22,000 UAC "potential recruits" who are resettled across the country every year out of about 40,000 total UACs. These are mostly young men trafficked across the southern border from Central America, especially El Salvador.

    The Trump administration has cracked down the UAC program slightly, often detaining and deporting illegal aliens who file to sponsor the young migrants.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [5 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  So again, why would Trump sign this bill? Is this article an overreaction?
    Posted by: gorb || 02/15/2019 6:59 Comments || Top||

    #2  Well FBI, CIA feel they are autonomous. Trump could declare ICE is the same...
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 13:28 Comments || Top||


    Southeast Asia
    Philippine soldier killed, three hurt in Sulu
    [Mindanao Examiner] Abu Sayyaf rebels killed a Philippine soldier and injured three more in a firefight Thursday in the southern town of Patikul. The clash lasted over 20 minutes, but there was no immediate report of enemy casualties. At least 30 insurgents fought with troops in Igasan village.

    The Western Mindanao Command did not issue any press release on the latest fighting and had not given reports since the deadly twin suicide bombings on the cathedral in Jolo town on January 27.
    Posted by: ryuge || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [8 views] Top|| File under: Abu Sayyaf (ISIS)


    Iraq
    Roadside bomb kills 8 militia fighters north of Baghdad
    [IsraelTimes] An Iraqi security official says a roadside kaboom has went kaboom! north of Baghdad, killing eight fighters from a militia headed by an influential Shiite Moslem holy man.

    The ambush has been confirmed by a front man with the Peace Brigades, or Saraya al-Salam militia, which is commanded by Moqtada Tater al-Sadr
    ... the Iranian catspaw holy man who was 22 years old in 2003 and was nearing 40 in 2010. He spends most of his time in Iran, safely out of the line of fire, where he's learning to be an ayatollah...
    . They both spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media. The militia front man said among those killed was a militia commander, Hussein Attiyeh.

    The ambush occurred west of the holy city of Samarra, some 60 miles (96 kilometers) north of the capital Baghdad.

    There is no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack. al-Sadr’s political coalition came first in last year’s May elections.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [3 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Iran Proxies


    Afghanistan
    7 Taliban militants killed, wounded in a premature IED explosion
    [[KhaamaPress] At least seven Talibs were killed or maimed in an kaboom triggered by an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) in eastern Nangarhar
    The unfortunate Afghan province located adjacent to Mohmand, Kurram, and Khyber Agencies. The capital is Jalalabad. The province was the fief of Younus Khalis after the Soviets departed and one of his sons is the current provincial Taliban commander. Nangarhar is Haqqani country..
    province.

    The 201st Silab Corps of the Afghan Military in the East in a statement said the incident took place on Tuesday in the vicinity of Khogyani district.

    The statement further added that the incident took place while a group of Talibs who were looking to plan an Improvised Explosive Device in Zawi area of the district.

    According to 201st Silab Corps, at least 4 murderous Moslems were killed in the kaboom and three others were maimed.

    The anti-government armed murderous Moslems including Taliban
    ...Arabic for students...
    have not commented regarding the incident.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [7 views] Top|| File under: Taliban

    #1  'Red Wire/Green Wire' doesn't work well if all you have is 7th century 'Black Wire' to use.
    Posted by: Mullah Richard || 02/15/2019 13:58 Comments || Top||


    Olde Tyme Religion
    In clip leaked by Netanyahu’s office, Arab ministers seen defending Israel, attacking Iran
    [IsraelTimes] At Warsaw Mideast summit, Bahraini FM says confronting Tehran more urgent than solving Paleostinian issue; UAE top diplomat says Israel has right to attack Iranian targets in Syria. Saudi Minister of State for Foreign Affairs argued that Iran’s belligerent activities destabilize the region, thus making Israeli-Paleostinian peace impossible to achieve.

    Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office on Thursday leaked a video in which the foreign ministers of three Arab countries can be seen harshly attacking Iran and defending Israel, and in one case saying that confronting the Islamic Theocratic Republic is more pressing than solving the Israeli-Paleostinian conflict.

    The 25-minute YouTube clip, a link that the PMO sent to several Israeli news hounds, showed a segment from a panel discussion at the opening gala of the Warsaw Middle East conference, which was closed to the press.

    The comments made by the foreign ministers widely confirmed what Netanyahu told Israeli news hounds during a briefing earlier in the day, when he described at considerable length the Arab ministers’ positions.

    Less than 30 minutes after news hounds published the clip, the PMO removed the video from its YouTube channel.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [5 views] Top|| File under:


    -Lurid Crime Tales-
    TX police find 4 malnourished children -- 2 of them locked in a dog crate (opens to video)
    [CNN] A mother and her boyfriend were arrested after police responding to a domestic disturbance call in Texas found four malnourished children in a home -- two of them locked in a dog crate, authorities said.

    Police discovered the children Tuesday in clutter and filth, with two in a crate placed in a barn converted into living space, Wise County Sheriff Lane Akin said.

    The three boys and one girl range in age from 1 to 5, and didn't say much when police arrived at the home near Rhome, authorities said. They were hungry and thirsty, and covered in feces, Akin said.

    CNN affiliate KTVT reported that the two oldest children, ages 5 and 4, were the ones locked in dog crates.

    "Our deputies and our lieutenant fed and gave water to those children. And due to the malnourishment and other concerns, EMS was called; emergency medical was called," Akin said.
    Paige Harkings is the biological mother of the children and her boyfriend, Andrew Fabila, is the biological father of one child, according to authorities.

    They were arrested on four counts of endangering a child, and Harkings faces an additional charge of one count of aggravated assault causing serious bodily injury, Akin said.
    The domestic disturbance call was a result of a fight between the two, and Fabila had several abrasions on his face when police arrived, according to authorities.

    They're being held at the Wise County jail.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [6 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  And that's is why I'm not opposed to the idea of abortion - cannibal organizations like Planned Parenthood to the contrary.
    Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 02/15/2019 1:05 Comments || Top||


    Africa Subsaharan
    187 ex-jihadists surrender in Cameroon
    [AlAhram] Nearly 200 Cameroon
    ...a long, narrow country that fills the space between Nigeria and Chad on the northeast, CAR to the southeast. Prior to incursions by Boko Haram nothing ever happened there...
    ians who were members of Nigeria's Boko Haram
    ... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. The Nigerian version of al-Qaeda and the Taliban rolled together and flavored with a smigeon of distinctly Subsaharan ignorance and brutality...
    jihadist group have returned home and surrendered to the authorities after breaking with the organization, the government said Thursday.

    A total of 187 former jihadists from the district of Mayo-Sava, in Cameroon's Far North province, gave themselves up, many of them returning from Nigeria on foot, provincial governor Midjiyawa Bakari said.

    After surrendering to the authorities in the towns of Kolofata and Meme, they were enrolled in a programme to reintegrate them into society, he said.

    They were taken on Wednesday to a base of the Multinational Joint Task Force (MMF), an anti-Boko Haram force combining soldiers from Chad, Cameroon, Niger, and Nigeria, he said.

    "They don't represent any danger or any risk -- quite the opposite, everything will be put in place for them to resocialise, learn the spirit of patriotism and public duty," Bakari said.

    About a thousand former jihadists, including children under 15, had already joined the reinsertion programme.

    After being assessed to establish that they have definitively broken with Boko Haram, ex-fighters are taken to Mowoure, also in the Far North, where they are given farmland with which to earn a living.

    Boko Haram's nearly 10-year insurgency is epicentred in northeast Nigeria
    ... a particularly crimson stretch of Islam's bloody border...
    , but spilled over into Niger and Cameroon as well as the Far North province.

    It has left more than 27,000 people dead and about 1.8 million others homeless.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [8 views] Top|| File under: Boko Haram (ISIS)


    Afghanistan
    ISIS-K militants kill 2 Taliban group memebers in Laghman province
    [KhaamaPress] The ISIS Khurasan (ISIS-K) hard boyz have killed two group members of Taliban
    ...Arabic for students...
    in eastern Laghman
    ...It has a population of about 445,600, which is multi-ethnic and mostly a rural society. During the invasions of Alexander the Great, the area was known as Lampaka, wich is apparently Olde Macedonian for Laghman.The city of Mihtarlam serves as the bucolic capital of the province. The population is half Pashtun, the remainder Tadjik and Pashai. It had a repution for great wealth until it was conquered in the tenth century by Abu Mansur Sabuktigin.
    He conquered it and set fire to the places in its vicinity which were inhabited by infidels, and demolishing the idol-temples, he established Islam in them, He marched and captured other cities and killed the polluted wretches, destroying the idolatrous and gratifying the Musulmans. After wounding and killing beyond all measure, his hands and those of his friends became cold in counting the value of the plundered property.
    After that it was mostly notable for the production of dirt, rocks, and holy men.

    province of Afghanistn, the Afghan Miliray said Thursday.

    According to a statement released by 201st Silab Corps of the Afghan Army in the East, the two Taliban group members were killed in Alingar ditrict on Wednesday.

    The statement further added that the slain Taliban group members have been identified as Abdul Mateen and Abdul Muqeem who were killed by ISIS-K hard boyz in Saw Dara area of Alingar.

    The 201st Silab Corps in another statement said two ISIS-K hard boyz identified as Ziaullah and Aziz Khan also surrendered to the Afghan forces in Noor Lam Dara area of the district on Wednesday.

    The anti-government armed hard boyz including Taliban and ISIS Khurasan have not commented regarding the incident so far.

    Laghman is among the relatively calm provinces in East of Afghanistan but the anti-government armed hard boyz including Taliban and ISIS-K have been attempting to expand their foothold in this province during the recent years.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [8 views] Top|| File under:


    Home Front: Culture Wars
    Not The Onion: Gavin Newsom wants California to be its own nation-state in the Trump era
    [SFChronicle] Just five weeks into the job, Gov. Gavin Newsom has crystallized his vision of what California will look like in the Trump era: It won’t just be the hub of the resistance against the president; it will be its own nation-state.

    But before Newsom can create a country-within-a-country, he had to defuse two multibillion-dollar grenades that his predecessor, Gov. Jerry Brown, left in his in-box: high-speed rail and the delta tunnels project. In proposing Tuesday to scale back both of Brown’s unpopular legacy projects, Newsom hopes he can preserve enough political capital to get his own legacy projects on the fast track.

    If he can do that, he can lead California down its own path for as long as Trump is president. California must go it alone, because Trump’s portrait of America is "fundamentally at odds with California values," the governor said Tuesday in his first State of the State speech.

    Newsom said the president has "described a country where inequality doesn’t seem to be a problem, where climate change doesn’t exist, and where the greatest threat we face comes from families seeking asylum."

    So California, as the world’s fifth-largest economy, is going to be a counterweight, a West Coast enclave built on its own values and funded, in part, by an anticipated $21.6 billion surplus.

    So while the White House is "laser-focused on destroying the Affordable Care Act," as Newsom said Tuesday, he proposes that California offer its own health-insurance subsidies to families earning up to $150,000. He wants to expand Medi-Cal coverage to all Californians, including undocumented immigrants, until they are 26.
    The United States Constitution. Article III, section 3 reads as follows:

    "Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. [emphasis on topical legal premise added]. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.

    “The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted [sic]."

    I lived in CA during "Fruit and Nuts." Great weather, laid-back lifestyles (for some, anyway) and South America wasn't using it as a magic ticket dispenser feeding the American Dream Nightmare. It's morphed into a place I cannot visit.
    Posted by: Anomalous Sources || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [14 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  Well, bye! Go be your own nation-state. No more federal money for you!
    Posted by: SteveS || 02/15/2019 0:26 Comments || Top||

    #2  California is engaging in rhetoric and action that would make John Calhoun's heart swell with pride for its open defiance of federal policy.
    Posted by: Herb McCoy || 02/15/2019 0:43 Comments || Top||

    #3  As I understand it, most of their water and electricity comes from other states.
    Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 02/15/2019 0:58 Comments || Top||

    #4  Nothing stops you and your henchmen/women in Congress from submitting a Constitutional Amendment to make the separation legit. I suspect some flyover states would be more than happy to accommodate.
    Posted by: Procopius2k || 02/15/2019 7:03 Comments || Top||

    #5  Victor Davis Hanson wrote about this very topic back in 2003.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 7:23 Comments || Top||

    #6  Or we can declare them in a state of rebellion and cut off all the water, power, food and money the other states ship them.

    The interior counties would be against the government in Sacramento furthering the loss and lack of food and water in the cities.

    After a few months, the situation would resolve itself.
    Posted by: DarthVader || 02/15/2019 9:27 Comments || Top||

    #7  Rebrand to Califuela?

    Except wind power extraction "giant".
    Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 02/15/2019 10:15 Comments || Top||

    #8  My sister lives in California. I'm always asked when I'm coming to visit. Can't say it outright, sis, but your state already made choices that are costing me too much. I'm not bringing any money in by flying there...
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 11:27 Comments || Top||

    #9  I hope he makes his move while Trump is still president because future presidents may not have the balls to send federal troops to arrest Newsom and put a stop to this insurrection.
    Posted by: Abu Uluque || 02/15/2019 11:31 Comments || Top||

    #10  In a long and rambling speech this morning, painfully obviously without the aid of a teleprompter, Trump announced that he will sign an emergency declaration to build a wall.

    He rambles. He looks and sounds bedraggled and defeated in this speech. I'm afraid that Chuck and Nancy are wearing heavily on him. He talks about crime, drugs and gangs as if those are the only reasons to build the wall. He does not state the obvious which is the impact that illegal aliens from the Third World are having on our democracy. I suppose he can't talk about that without being accused of racism. Likewise, Chuck and Nancy can't say what the real reason is for their implacable opposition to the wall, which is that they need those Third World voters (and possibly the cartel graft as well).

    So we have these two opposing parties talking past each other and it's no wonder a lot of citizens across the country don't understand what the real problem is.

    Maybe you think I'm rambling here but my point is that Gavin Newsom is a product of this whole scheme the Democrats have to gain complete control over this country's political processes, to gain the absolute power they need to turn the United States into a socialist police state that would make Oceana look benign.

    I've told you people before that California used to be a red state. We gave you leaders like Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, two of your greatest presidents ever. Today, neither one of these good men could get elected to any state wide office in California. That's because illegal immigration has turned the state blue.

    Newsom is a creep and a thief. I say thief because he wants to take money that citizens of this state pay in taxes and give it to people who should not be here instead of using it only for the good of the citizens who pay those taxes. That way he hopes to win the favor of those Third World types and gain their votes so he can perpetuate and enlarge on his power play.

    My only hope is that somehow Trump can put a stop to Newsom's scheme but my hope is wearing thin. It might be too late.
    Posted by: Abu Uluque || 02/15/2019 12:08 Comments || Top||


    Britain
    Police 'unintentionally' shoot man after captive woman call
    [BBC] A man was accidentally shot by police as they investigated reports of a woman being held by armed men in a south-east London pub.

    The Met responded to a call shortly before 04:00 GMT which reported a woman was being held against her will at the Anchor Pub in Lewisham.

    Officers stopped a car near the pub and a gun was "unintentionally discharged" injuring a man, police said.

    He and another man in the car, along with five others, have been arrested. The five men were all arrested at the pub where a search was carried out, although police could not find a woman.

    Police have not confirmed what the men have been arrested on suspicion of.

    Det Ch Insp James Stanyer said officers "are working hard to fully understand this incident" and appealed for the woman who originally called 999 to contact them.
    Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [10 views] Top|| File under:



    Syria-Lebanon-Iran
    HTS attempts change image by removing extremist banners (photos)
    [AlMasdar] Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham
    launched a new campaign this week to remove their bad boy banners from the Idlib Governorate.

    According to reports, Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham began removing banners calling for jihad, calling Shiites their enemy, and enforcing the compulsory hijab.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [8 views] Top|| File under: al-Nusra


    Down Under
    Try not to laugh reading this inverted interpretation.
    [PHYS] Male teachers are most likely to rate highly in university student feedback.

    That's the take home message from a new and comprehensive analysis of student experience surveys.
    Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [5 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  Not a laughing matter. IMO, a lot of the decline of the Western education is due to hiring thousands of AOC lite to teaching and academic positions.
    Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 02/15/2019 1:17 Comments || Top||

    #2  Wow. The study did not fit our preconceived wisdom, so it's proof of bias.

    Reminds me of Hillary's book and the global warmers.
    Posted by: Bobby || 02/15/2019 10:41 Comments || Top||

    #3  The students didn't give the correct answer, so now they will disregard the student's input. Very progressive indeed.
    Posted by: Almost Anonymous5839 || 02/15/2019 11:09 Comments || Top||


    Home Front: Culture Wars
    Covington Kids Cleared
    [The Hill] An investigation into the viral encounter between students from Covington Catholic High School and a Native American man found the students' accounts to be largely accurate, according to findings released Wednesday.

    Greater Cincinnati Investigations issued a report dated Feb. 11 that found no evidence that students from Covington Catholic made "offensive or racist" statements to either Black Hebrew Israelites or Native American tribe members gathered on the National Mall.

    "The statements we obtained from students and chaperones are remarkably consistent," the investigators said. "And, the statements are consistent with the videos we reviewed."

    The Bishop of the Covington Diocese, Roger Foys, welcomed the report as vindication of the students' behavior, despite the diocese's initial condemnation of the events.
    Other 'apologies' will, no doubt, follow.
    No doubt. The article contains a link to the investigative report, at the end of which is the point that most of the boys wearing MAGA hats had bought them in Washington, just as in previous years they had bought Obama-supporting HOPE hats. Meanwhile, back in Cincinnati another Covington Catholic boy and his family have been making a difference despite the hate:

    Doxxed Covington Catholic senior helped raise $21K for nonprofit refuge: 'I'm going to be optimistic'

    [CincinnatiEnquirer] Strangers identified a Covington Catholic senior's dream and mobilized to dismantle it.

    Michael Hodge had applied to Cincinnati State, drawn to the school's culinary arts program. A mob, angered by videos showing Hodge's classmates chanting around a group of Native Americans on the National Mall, found a scapegoat in Hodge.

    Hodge was 500 miles away when his classmates joined the March for Life event and afterward encountered Native Americans and a reported hate group. Hodge had remained in the Cincinnati area for his older brother's wedding. But he was mistakenly identified as another CovCath student, Nick Sandmann.

    Police officers escorted Hodge to school those first few days back.

    What the strangers didn't know: Hodge's passion for the culinary arts had led him last summer to prepare and serve meals to food-insecure individuals at Mary Rose Mission, a Catholic nonprofit in Florence.

    And about six years earlier, Hodge's father, John Hodge, had offered engineering and architectural advice and a free inspection through his company, Century Construction Inc., to Mary Rose during the renovation of a 100-year old structure.

    The Hodges mulled creating a fundraiser for Mary Rose, to channel the attention away from hate. They feared it would create more unwanted attention, but ultimately decided to go through with it. With donations made by check and through GoFundMe, the family raised more than $20,000. The Hodges made a $250 anonymous donation themselves and later donated $600 more to offset a GoFundMe service fee.

    On Friday, the family presented a $21,170 check to Carris and Mary Rose.

    Carris said the money will likely help defray costs associated with purchasing a new facility to serve as a temporary refuge for people in need. The refuge would offer warm beds and opportunities, Carris said.

    Michael Hodge said Cincinnati State officials assured him that the doxing won't affect his application. He's awaiting a response and applying for scholarships.

    He said the atmosphere at Covington Catholic has mostly returned to normal.

    "I'm going to be optimistic," he said. "Just with anything, good can come out of it."

    Mary Rose offers free meals every day of the year from 4 to 5:30 p.m. at 272 Main St. in Florence. All are welcome.
    Posted by: Bobby || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [7 views] Top|| File under:


    The Grand Turk
    Turkey Media Publish Image of 'Local Collaborator' in Khashoggi Killing
    [AnNahar] Ottoman Turkish media on Thursday published images of a so-called "local collaborator" who allegedly helped the Saudi hit squad dispose of the body of murdered journalist Jamal Khashoggi,
    ...who was simultaneously a very well paid Washington Post columnist and a long time propagandist for the Muslim Brotherhood and Al Qaeda — most recently for Qatar, but in the past at the behest of Saudi Arabia’s intel chief, Prince Turki al-Faisal...
    citing Istanbul police.

    The dissident journalist and Washington Post contributor was dismembered after being killed on October 2 at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul but his remains have not yet been found.

    CCTV images leaked previously showed a Saudi agent leaving the consulate after the murder wearing Khashoggi's clothes, who was identified as a "body double".

    At one point, a hooded man was seen walking alongside him, who was identified in an Istanbul police report as a "local collaborator, the private NTV television reported.

    After weeks of denial, Soddy Arabia
    ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face...
    admitted that Khashoggi had been killed after entering the consulate to obtain the paperwork necessary for his upcoming marriage to a Ottoman Turkish woman called Hatice Cengiz.

    The Sick Man of Europe Turkey
    ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire....
    says he was killed by a team of 15 Saudis who strangled him, and Ankara has repeatedly asked Riyadh to identify the local who allegedly helped them dispose of the body.

    The police report also said that after the murder, the hit team ordered a large quantity of meat which was then delivered to the Saudi residence near the consulate where there was a large industrial oven.

    Several Ottoman Turkish media outlets speculated whether the oven may have been used to dispose of the dismembered corpse.

    "Was barbecuing meat... one of the previously made plans?" wondered the police report, which was published by the state-run Anadolu news agency.

    The murder sparked international outrage and hurt the kingdom's image.

    Riyadh tossed in the calaboose
    I ain't sayin' nuttin' widdout me mout'piece!
    a number of senior Saudi officials allegedly involved in the murder.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [10 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Saudi Arabia

    #1  *Yawn*
    Posted by: Frank G || 02/15/2019 10:11 Comments || Top||

    #2  He's getting more after death press coverage than Elvis and JFK combined.
    Posted by: jpal || 02/15/2019 11:04 Comments || Top||


    Syria-Lebanon-Iran
    Russia to Turkey: You can't have Syrian safe zone without Assad's consent
    [AlAhram] Russia told The Sick Man of Europe Turkey
    ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire....
    on Thursday it had no right to create a "safe zone" inside Syria unless it sought and received the consent of Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad
    Terror of Aleppo ...
    , signaling tensions as a three-way summit on the Syrian conflict began.

    President Vladimir Putin
    ...President-for-Life of Russia. He gets along well with other presidents for life. He is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from poisoning by polonium or other interesting substance. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to him. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead from poisoning by polonium or other interesting substances...
    , one of Assad’s closest allies, was hosting the summit in the Black Sea resort of Sochi to discuss the future of Syria with Ottoman Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.

    All three countries have forces on the ground in Syria where they have coordinated their efforts despite sometimes differing priorities and interests.

    But a planned withdrawal of US forces from Syria, announced by President Donald Trump
    ...New York real estate developer, described by Dems as illiterate, racist, misogynistic, and what ever other unpleasant descriptions they can think of, elected by the rest of us as 45th President of the United States...
    in December, has engendered new tensions between Moscow and Ankara in particular.

    Turkey wants to set up what it calls a safe zone in northeast Syria, parts of which are now controlled by US forces, and for the area near the Ottoman Turkish border to be cleared of the US-backed Kurdish YPG militia.

    But, speaking ahead of the start of the Sochi summit on Syria, a Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said Ankara would need Assad’s green light to create any safe zone inside Syrian borders.

    "The question of the presence of a military contingent acting on the authority of a third country on the territory of a sovereign country and especially Syria must be decided directly by Damascus," Maria Zakharova said in answer to a question about the Ottoman Turkish safe zone plan.

    "That’s our base position." But that is likely to be an unappealing prospect for Erdogan, who has called for Assad to step down after years of civil war that has shattered his country.

    IDLIB PRESSURE
    The Kremlin on Thursday also made clear that its patience with Turkey over a joint deal to enforce a demilitarized zone in the northwestern Idlib region was running short.

    Moscow and Ankara brokered the deal in September, saying they wanted the region free of heavy weapons and jihadists. The agreement helped avert a government assault on the region, the last major bastion of Assad’s opponents.

    But Moscow has since complained that Islamist forces of Evil who used to belong to the Nusra Front group are now in control there and wants military action to drive them out.

    Ankara is less keen as it is concerned about potential refugee flows from Idlib in the event of a military operation, and wants to retain its influence in a region on its border.

    It also does not want developments in Idlib to distract from its plan to set up a safe zone in the northeast.

    Kremlin front man Dmitry Peskov said Moscow wanted action on Idlib, referring to the "continued presence there of terrorist groups."

    "... Implementing the decision on Idlib is one of the overall components in our policy to stabilize Syria to definitively create the conditions for things to move onto a political settlement," said Peskov, who made clear Putin would press Erdogan on the subject later on Thursday.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [10 views] Top|| File under: Sublime Porte


    Africa North
    U.S. Targets Al-Qaida in Libya Air Strike
    [AnNahar] The US carried out an air strike against Islamist group al-Qaeda in southern Libya on Wednesday night, Tripoli
    ...a confusing city, one end of which is located in Lebanon and the other end of which is the capital of Libya. Its chief distinction is being mentioned in the Marine Hymn...
    's UN-backed Government of National Accord said.

    The strike near the town of Ubari, some 900 kilometres (550 miles) south of the capital, was coordinated with the GNA, said President Fayez al-Sarraj's front man.

    It targeted "a number of members of terrorist organization al-Qaeda", Mohamad al-Sallak said in a statement, giving no further details.

    Libya has been wracked by violence and torn between rival administrations since the NATO
    ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions...
    -backed overthrow and killing of dictator Moamer Qadaffy in 2011.

    The GNA was formed following a UN-backed deal in December 2015, but it has struggled to impose its power across the country.

    The US military regularly carries out air strikes in Libya against al-Qaeda and the Islamic State
    ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems....
    group.

    Last year in August it said it had killed an IS member described by a source as a former local leader of the jihadists.

    In June the US said it had killed four members of an IS affiliate near the northern town of Bani Walid, while in March the Pentagon confirmed a senior al-Qaeda operative and another jihadist died in a US air strike.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [10 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda in North Africa


    Home Front: Politix
    Andrew McCabe Says DOJ Seriously Discussed Assembling Trump's Cabinet to Remove President From Office
    [MEDIAite] Former Deputy Director of the FBI Andrew McCabe sat down with 60 Minutes host Scott Pelley for his first public interview since getting unceremoniously fired by the Trump administration.

    "There were meetings at the Justice Department at which it was discussed whether the vice president and a majority of the cabinet could be brought together to remove the president of the United States under the 25th Amendment," Pelley said of his conversations McCabe.

    A short clip of entire 60 Minutes segment aired Wednesday on CBS Morning, but the more interesting part came in the panel discussion afterward, in which Pelley described what he found to be the "most illuminating and surprising thing" they discussed: the eight days that followed President Donald Trump's firing of then FBI Director James Comey.

    Pelley shared how McCabe explained what was happening behind the scenes at the highest levels of the FBI and Department of Justice in which serious discussions of invoking the 25th amendment to remove a sitting president.

    "They were counting noses" Pelley explained, adding "Not asking cabinet members whether they would vote for or against removing the president. But they were speculating, this person would be with us. That person would not be, and they were counting noses in that effort."

    McCabe also told of how he feared his immediate firing and hurried to start an investigation so that even if he was dismissed, an investigation would continue.

    I was very concerned that I was able to put the Russia case on absolutely solid ground, in an indelible fashion. That, were I removed quickly, or reassigned or fired, that the case could not be closed or vanish in the night without a trace." McCabe said.

    "I wanted to make sure that our case was on solid ground and if somebody came in behind me and closed it and tried to walk away from it, they would not be able to do that without creating a record of why they made that decision," McCabe added.

    McCabe is a life-long civil servant who was fired just days before he reached his full pension-earning retirement term. He has also received voluminous criticism from right-of-center opinion media and conservative politicians who believe that he is a significant player in the "deep state" conspiracy that has polluted airwaves for the past two and a half years.
    Posted by: Beavis || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [5 views] Top|| File under:

    #1  Thats a coup. He had no authority, no crime, and was talking about removing the president by fiat, strong arming others into acting.

    He should be kicking at the end of a noose.
    Posted by: Injun Bucket8891 || 02/15/2019 0:21 Comments || Top||

    #2  If you strike at the king, you must kill the king.

    There is no try.

    He has also received voluminous criticism from right-of-center opinion media and conservative politicians who believe that he is a significant player in the "deep state" conspiracy that has polluted airwaves for the past two and a half years.

    It seems they were correct all along.
    Posted by: Procopius2k || 02/15/2019 7:07 Comments || Top||

    #3  More importantly, what was their motivation? I cannot believe it was simply politically inspired or a fear of Trump's inability to lead. Perhaps VDH was right when he recently opined that these vermin and their deeds would be revealed.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 7:14 Comments || Top||

    #4  One of the sworn law enforcement officers in the room should have stood up, drawn his weapon and arrested them all for treason, the fact it did not happen, means they are ALL guilty of treason. Hang them after their convictions on the white house lawn. Let them rot for a week or two as an example.
    Posted by: Silentbrick || 02/15/2019 7:52 Comments || Top||

    #5  Hang them after their convictions on the white house lawn. Let them rot for a week or two as an example.

    Melania would never allow this, 'brick.
    Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 02/15/2019 8:15 Comments || Top||

    #6  Fine fine, they can hang in Pelosi's yard then.
    Posted by: Silentbrick || 02/15/2019 9:49 Comments || Top||

    #7  VDH is usually right
    Posted by: 746 || 02/15/2019 11:15 Comments || Top||

    #8  7 Days in May, minus serious, charismatic people believable actors.
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 11:30 Comments || Top||

    #9  Sedition and treason come to mind. A small cabal of non-elected apparatchiks decided that the people's duly elected POTUS should be deposed before he even took office for no cause and in violation of our Constitution.
    Posted by: JohnQC || 02/15/2019 13:28 Comments || Top||

    #10  We should attempt to discover if assassination was ever discussed.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 14:45 Comments || Top||

    #11  Dershowitz on Tucker last night nailed it, the 25th amendment is about the physical and mental capacity of the President, it has nothing to do with any crimes or policy he chooses. By his own admission, McCabe essentially admitted they were conspiring to use the 25th amendment illegally to remove a duly elected President because they didn't like him. This is the essence of a seditious conspiracy and should be treated as a criminal act! Deep State before your eyes openly revealed.
    Posted by: NoMoreBS || 02/15/2019 17:00 Comments || Top||


    Syria-Lebanon-Iran
    Turkey is doing everything possible to prevent attacks on Russian airbase: Erdogan
    [AlMasdar] The Sick Man of Europe Turkey
    ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire....
    is doing everything possible to prevent bully boy attacks on the Russian military base in Syria’s Hmeymim, President Sultan Recep Tayyip Erdogan the First
    ... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him. It's a sin, a shame, and a felony to insult the president of Turkey...
    said Thursday.

    "We are making all efforts to prevent any attacks on Russia’s Hmeymim military base. Our military agencies act in a coordinated way", Erdogan said before starting talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin
    ...President-for-Life of Russia. He gets along well with other presidents for life. He is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from poisoning by polonium or other interesting substance. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to him. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead from poisoning by polonium or other interesting substances...
    He said Ottoman Turkish drones "did not detect any hardware in the area".

    The statement addresses reports about the al-Nusra
    ...formally Jabhat an-Nusrah li-Ahli al-Sham (Support Front for the People of the Levant), also known as al-Qaeda in the Levant. They aim to establish a pan-Arab caliphate. Not the same one as the Islamic State, though .. ...
    Front* terror organization that had attacked Syrian army positions in the Idlib de-escalation zone earlier in January.

    According to Moscow, the situation in the zone could pose a serious danger to Russia’s Hmeymim airbase, as well as to civilians and Syrian troops in the area.

    Russia also reported about numerous drone attacks on the airbase last year.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [7 views] Top|| File under: Sublime Porte

    #1  As was said; You and Him fight.....I'll make the pop-corn.
    Posted by: AlanC || 02/15/2019 11:49 Comments || Top||


    Home Front: Politix
    House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D., S.C.) Praises Omar: ‘Incredible Young Lady' With a ‘Tremendous Future'
    [Free Beacon] House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D., S.C.) praised new Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (D., Minn.) on Thursday after she was embroiled in another anti-Semitic controversy this week, calling her an "incredible young lady" with a bright future.

    Omar was forced to apologize on Monday by Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) and some of her Democratic colleagues after claiming pro-Israel politicians are paid off by the lobbying group AIPAC. A supporter of the anti-Israel BDS movement, which has been called anti-Semitic by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.), Omar also recently said she used "unfortunate" language in a 2012 tweet where she said Israel had "hypnotized the world."

    "I wish we would just go on and stop beating up on people when they make a mistake," Clyburn said on CNN. "All of us have misspoken at one time or another. All of us have to learn the processes up here. I think she's an incredible young lady who has a tremendous future in politics, and I'm going to be as supportive as I possibly can of her, and I wish we would just go on and put this behind us."

    Clyburn said he had a "very long talk with her" about her recent remarks and called her "very sincere" in her apology. Omar tweeted she was "listening and learning, but standing strong." She said "I unequivocally apologize" but added AIPAC was among the lobbysists playing a "problematic role in our politics."

    President Donald Trump called on her to resign for her tweets, or at the very least be kicked off the House Foreign Affairs Committee, leading her to retort he had "trafficked in hate his whole life." Omar also put up a fundraising page after Trump's comments.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [8 views] Top|| File under: Moslem Colonists

    #1  One racist bigot supporting another. No surprise.
    Posted by: Injun Bucket8891 || 02/15/2019 0:18 Comments || Top||

    #2  Birds of the feather
    Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 02/15/2019 1:33 Comments || Top||

    #3  Jim's IQ continues to hover around the octane levels of the old Phillips-66 gasoline.
    Posted by: Besoeker || 02/15/2019 8:28 Comments || Top||

    #4  House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D., S.C.) Praises Omar: ‘Incredible Young Lady' With a ‘Tremendous Figure'

    Fixed it.
    Posted by: jpal || 02/15/2019 9:03 Comments || Top||

    #5  Ugh! jpal..threw up in my mouth a little bit.
    Amazing how a vile inside poisons the outside..in my mind at least
    Posted by: Warthog || 02/15/2019 9:50 Comments || Top||

    #6  Everyone should refer to her as "Madame Brotherf*cker, with all due respect"
    Posted by: Frank G || 02/15/2019 9:59 Comments || Top||

    #7  Liberal blacks in Congress realize that soon muzz and hispanics will call the non-white tune. Hispanics may be sort of conservative when they are actually seeing money in their pockets and they won't have any white guilt. So. Blacks will have to side with muzz. The blacks aren't smart enough to know muzz consider them subhuman, so they will go all in.
    Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/15/2019 12:50 Comments || Top||

    #8  Sub-freezing IQ.
    Posted by: SR-71 || 02/15/2019 17:26 Comments || Top||


    Africa North
    A jihadist hotbed days ago, Libya's Derna now dreams of a better future
    [AlAhram] With artillery fire rumbling in the distance, residents of Derna gathered in a streetside cafe on Saturday to discuss the future of their city, long a jihadist hotbed in eastern Libya.

    Libya National Army (LNA) soldiers did not declare final victory until the following day over the Islamist holy warriors whose rules had determined life in the city since strongman Muammar Qadaffy
    ...The late megalomaniac dictator of Libya, admired everywhere for his garish costumes, funny hats, harem of cutie bodyguards, and incoherent ravings. As far as is known, he is the only person who's ever declared jihad on Switzerland...
    was toppled in 2011.

    But for owner Saif and his cappucino-drinking customers, the talk was already all about what should happen next with more jobs, above all to keep youngsters out of the bad boys' clutches, the top priority for many.

    "Seventy percent of residents are unemployed," he said. "We need an economic programme."

    In a city notorious for having sent Islamist holy warriors to Afghanistan and Syria and where citizens were prevented from voting in the 2014 national election, public services have been deteriorating for years.

    "We want better state services, health and schools," said Hafez, who runs a workshop.

    Derna has had just one small hospital since 2011 and supplies are limited.

    "We only have 120 beds instead of the 520 in the old hospital," said its assistant director, Adel Adwal, during a tour of the building. Only one, old X-ray machine is still functioning, but "it can break down any moment," he said.

    Libya's eastern government, which oppose the internationally recognised administration in Tripoli
    ...a confusing city, one end of which is located in Lebanon and the other end of which is the capital of Libya. Its chief distinction is being mentioned in the Marine Hymn...
    , has allocated 100 million dinars ($72 million) to restart public services, said city mayor Abdelmoneim Gheithi.

    He was appointed by the LNA, which supports the eastern government.

    Much of Derna's old city, where the holy warriors made their last stand and a source said the Red Islamic Thingy found 35 bodies, has been reduced to rubble.

    In the newer part of the city, which Rooters was able to visit, life appeared to be returning to normal. But appearances were in part deceptive.

    Hundreds of families have fled to western Libya, residents say, fearing presecution after being accused of having supported the Islamists.

    The U.N. said it was monitoring closely reports of summary executions. It had also heard of arbitrary detentions, with 2,000 people said to be held in one prison alone.

    The eastern army's chief of staff, Abdel-Razeq Nathouri, rejected that figure, but said any soldiers who had committed crimes would face trial.

    Another resident said the LNA had acted to prevent abuses such as lootings blamed on auxiliary tribal forces but reconciliation would take time as some wanted Dire Revenge for having suffered under the Islamists.

    "There are some violations going on but state bodies such as criminal police and intelligence have arrived at the old city so hopefully things will calm down," he said, asking not to be named.
    Posted by: trailing wife || 02/15/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [6 views] Top|| File under:



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      Deir Ezzor: Nearly 70 human shields killed, US demands ISIS pay 40 tons of gold
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