[US Immigration and Customs Enforcement] MCALLEN, Texas ‐ Six Texas residents pleaded guilty Wednesday before U.S. District Judge Guillermo Garcia to a human smuggling operation.
These guilty pleas were announced by Acting U.S. Attorney Abe Martinez, Southern District of Texas. This case was investigated by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI).
On Dec. 4, the following defendants pleaded guilty to the smuggling charges: brothers Lucio Segundo, 31, and Christopher Segundo, 23, of Giddings, Texas. On Monday, four others entered their guilty pleas: Francisco Segura, 29, also of Giddings; Alex De La Rosa, 23, of San Marcos, Texas; Jesus Perez, 24, of La Grange; and David Cedillo, 46, of Austin.
During this conspiracy, the defendants at times smuggled illegal aliens in the trunks of rental vehicles. More often, however, the smuggled aliens were transported in trailers that had been specifically modified with false bottoms under vehicle floorboards. As many as a dozen illegal aliens could be transported at one time lying down in those false compartments. Construction materials were placed on the trailers to make it appear that the trailers were carrying legitimate loads.
Various drivers were recruited to transport these smuggled aliens northbound from Laredo through the CBP Border Patrol checkpoints between Nov. 1, 2015, and July 1, 2017.
All six defendants remain in custody pending their sentencing hearings, which will be set in the near future before U.S. District Judge Diana Saldaña.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Bukiewicz and Alfredo De La Rosa, Southern District of Texas, are prosecuting this case.
[FoxNews] A senior Justice Department official was demoted this week amid an ongoing investigation into his contacts with the opposition research firm responsible for the anti-Trump "dossier," the department confirmed to Fox News.
Until Wednesday morning, Bruce G. Ohr held two titles at DOJ: associate deputy attorney general, a post that placed him four doors down from his boss, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein; and director of the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (OCDETF), a program described by the department as "the centerpiece of the attorney general's drug strategy."
Ohr will retain his OCDETF title but has been stripped of his higher post and ousted from his office on the fourth floor of "Main Justice."
Initially senior department officials could not provide the reason for Ohr's demotion, but Fox News has learned that evidence collected by the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI), chaired by Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., indicates that Ohr met during the 2016 campaign with Christopher Steele, the former British spy who authored the "dossier."
Later, a Justice Department official told Fox News: "It is unusual for anyone to wear two hats as he has done recently. This person is going to go back to a single focus‐director of our organized crime and drug enforcement unit. As you know, combating transnational criminal organizations and drug trafficking is a top priority for the attorney general."
Additionally, House investigators have determined that Ohr met shortly after the election with Glenn Simpson, the founder of Fusion GPS – the opposition research firm that hired Steele to compile the dossier with funds supplied by the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee. By that point, according to published reports, the dossier had been in the hands of the FBI, which exists under the aegis of DOJ, for some five months, and the surveillance on Carter Page, an adviser to the Trump campaign, had started more than two months prior.
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/07/2017
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#1
It is a reasonable strategy to isolate and sequester enemies where they can do little harm. Kind of like the Pacific WWII campaign where some occupied islands were cut off and bypassed.
The article is in French and has a lot more but this paragraph caught my eyes.
[Challenges.fr] Incidents, which have remained confidential, have already been identified in recent years. In France, the military intelligence that has the GRAVE radar for space observation, developed by Onera, has for example noted the repeated maneuvers of a machine, officially dedicated to Russian civil telecommunications, near Intelsat satellites and Eutelsat. Events analyzed as probable trainings to inspection operations and digital intrusions. In Paris, the challenge for the Ministry of Defense is today to develop, with allies such as Germany, a watchful capacity to identify these equivocal postures or threatening. This objective was taken into account for the first time by the strategic defense and national security review presented last October.
#2
The Air Force began in one of its bases in Colorado, December 4, an extensive exercise of protection of telecommunication satellites in orbit against hostile actions. A first while a real arms race in space is looming in the next decade.
Allied countries were invited to these confidential jobs that will last until the end of the week. France has thus sent a strong delegation outcome of ICE (the Joint Space Command, under the direct supervision of the Chief of Staff of the army, General Lecointre). Private and parastatals, as Eutelsat and SES PanamSat were also invited as observers.
By 2022, Washington wants to be able to meet this challenge will be the rapid identification of an intrusion against a satellite and its protection. While the 1967 Treaty governing the use of outer space is no longer able to regulate these situations, the Pentagon also reserves the right to attach these defensive procedures of a retaliatory capability against a possible aggressor. For this, laser firing tests to the space include conducted from ground stations.
Incidents, remained confidential, have been identified in recent years. In France, the military intelligence who has the space observation radar GRAVE, developed by Onera, noted for example the repeated maneuvers of a craft, officially dedicated to the Russian civil communications, near Intelsat satellites and Eutelsat. Events analyzed as probable workouts to inspection operations and digital intrusions. In Paris, the challenge for the Ministry of Defense is currently developing, with allies like Germany, a standby capacity to identify these ambiguous or threatening postures. This objective was included for the first time by the strategic review of defense and national security presented in October.
#1
When alarmists in charge of surface temperature datasets make dishonest adjustments to exaggerate the appearance of global warming, it looks like corruption.
When alarmists in the entirely separate field of sea level measurement make precisely the same sort of dishonest adjustments in order to accord with the same global warming narrative, it starts to look like a conspiracy.
Nah, just group-think, like lemmings over the cliff. Combined with Stalin-like crushing of opposing views. Plus 'education' about 'feeling good'.
But not a secret-meeting conspiracy. Somebody'd squeal.
Posted by: Bobby ||
12/07/2017 16:56
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Just because it's not happening doesn't mean it's not happening. And we have the data to prove it!
A federal judge on Thursday asked Argentina's Senate to allow the arrest of former President Cristina Fernandez on a charge of treason for allegedly covering up the role of Iranians in a 1994 bomb attack on a Jewish center.
Judge Claudio Bonadio asked lawmakers to remove Fernandez's immunity from arrest, which she gained when she was sworn in as a senator last week. She was president from 2007 to 2015.
The judge also ordered the arrest of several aides and allies of Fernandez, including former presidency Secretary Carlos Zannini and activist Luis D'Elia on the same charges. Former Foreign Minister Hector Timerman was ordered held under house arrest due to health issues.
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/07/2017
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[DailyMail] Britons who have joined the Islamic State militant group in Syria and Iraq should be hunted down and killed, Britain's new defence minister said.
Gavin Williamson said that Britons who had gone to Syria or Iraq to fight for
Islamic State hated what Britain stands for, and that air strikes could be used against the estimated 270 British citizens who are still out there.
"Quite simply my view is a dead terrorist can't cause any harm to Britain," Williamson told the Daily Mail in an interview published late on Wednesday.
"We should do everything we can do to destroy and eliminate that threat," he said, adding that he believed any British fighters who joined Islamic State should never be allowed to return to the United Kingdom.
Williamson, 41, has been defence minister for little over a month, replacing Michael Fallon after he quit in a sexual harassment scandal.
Posted by: Skidmark ||
12/07/2017
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[Breitbart] Obama’s National Security Council allegedly leaked information about former Navy SEAL and Blackwater CEO Erik Prince to the liberal press after they put him under "illegal" surveillance during a foreign trip, according to testimony Prince gave the House Intelligence Committee back in November.
The transcript, released Wednesday, indicates Prince believed that surveillance to be "illegal." In response to a question from Rep. Tom Rooney (R-FL), Prince discussed his belief American intelligence agencies surveilled him while he spoke in a hotel bar in the Seychelles with Russian businessman Kirill Dmitriev in January of 2017.
The investigation, supposedly about Trump-Russia ties, later was used by the Washington Post in a piece about Trump ally Prince’s connections to Russia. The Post alleged he was trying to set up a "back channel" between Trump and Putin.
Prince told Rooney:
What really bothers me and what I would hope the intelligence committee is doing is question why Americans that were caught up in the waves of signals intelligence, why on Earth would the Washington Post be running an article on any meeting that a private citizen, me, was having in a foreign country?
"That’s illegal. That is a political abuse of the intelligence infrastructure," Prince said. "And that is really dangerous, especially as this committee and the Congress thinks about reauthorizing very wide-ranging intelligence authorities to dig into private Americans’ electronic communications of any sort."
#3
Multicultural bilingual social justice priority over basic reading, writing and arithmetic. Insty is correct, sending your kid to public school probably is child abuse.
Since the unionization of the state teachers association, the trend line on literacy, math, and science in California have fallen off the table. That is the reason the tech industry wants to import workers from India, China, and Japan. The state of California spends a staggering 20K per student on education which is almost 10x Japan and India and can't teach kids how to do math or read a book.
The educators need to quit playing games with "new and innovative" techniques to teach reading and math. They obviously don't work. They need to dust off those old methods the ones used when California had one of the best school systems in the nation and get on with really teaching. Kids in Harlem, the Bronx, and St. Louis score higher on achievement tests than kids in SD, LA, and SF. And teachers in California are among the highest paid.
#5
Ya get what you want and work for from schooling. My three kids attended public schools in east San Diego (redneck imagery) County.
My oldest (daughter) is a Real Estate Agent, my oldest son did 5 years in the Army and is a Senior in Criminal Justice at SDSU (Dean's list), and my youngest works for a software company.
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/07/2017 12:40
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I cannot see the disparate trendlines of coastal and fly-over country culture continue without a great, violent fracturing, or a very ugly purge of the vanquished. One or two decades at best before the great boiling-over......
h/t Instapundit
[DonSurber] Don't feud with Donald Trump. Too many have and wound up worse for wear. I gave 26 examples. No. 27 may be Robert Mueller, who has wasted the last seven months trying to frame President Trump.
Mueller has nothing -- and is losing his reputation.
Trump cannot fire Mueller. That would make him a martyr.
...On July 21, I wrote:
President Trump needs to fire Robert Mueller -- but in a manner in which his enemies in Congress do not turn around and hire the Big Leak back.
Trump has to make Mueller too toxic to touch. The plan is to investigate the investigator. Destroying Mueller is not just a matter of USA internal politics - other world leaders (the grown up ones) are reluctant do deal with POTUS beset by internal problems. And still others, like Pudgy, simply don't understand democracy, and therefore incapable of taking threats from a leader who cannot "deal" with internal opposition, seriously.
#3
As far as those who seek trouble with The Donald, I can but quote again, 'He's smarter than you, he's luckier than you, and whatever you think is going to happen the exact opposite is what will actually happen.'
#4
If you put enough blood and chum in the water, the sharks go into a feeding frenzy and eat each other. The media and the rest of the lefties are eating each other these days.
Hopefully, this fake news crap will get a lot of stuff out on the table.
If it wasn't for the Mueller investigation witch hunt I don't think a lot of us, including Congress would have heard of Uranium One. And this latest gig with the FBI anti-Trumper has the fact that the Hillary email investigation was a sham.
#5
Judge Napolitano seems to think Mueller is in a good position now to bring Trump down - that the obstruction of justice charge could stick and be impeachable if Trump knew of Flynn's lies to the FBI before he fired Comey, as his recent tweet seemed to indicate. Both branches of the Uniparty want him gone and only need an excuse, plus impeachment does not require the legal rules of evidence be followed.
#6
If they think Trump is bad, imagine the civil war they get when they do it. There's alot of 'discussion' about 4th generation guerilla warfare, which would mean targeting of politicians and policy makers as well as their lackeys in the agencies as opposed to fighting police and military.
Much as I think government needs to be cut to 5% of it's current size, maybe we need a new department or agency whose sole task it is to investigate and prosecute government officials like Comey and Mueller who abuse their positions. A few of them hung on the white house lawn after their trials for treason might instill the proper attitude toward government employees doing the work they are supposed to do instead of attempting to overthrow the government.
#10
It seems there other members of Mueller's team that are compromised including Mueller. This low-hanging fruit needs to be picked-off. The team needs to be dismantled as the faked dossier was bought by Hillary and used as a basis for FISA warrants and illegal unmasking and spying.
h/t Instapundit
[Ricochet] When Pravda-on-the-Hudson and Ronan Farrow at The New Yorker broke the Harvey Weinstein story, they seem to have had Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in their sights, as I suggested in an earlier post. Pravda certainly sought a purgation. Its editors bluntly demanded that the two Democratic standard-bearers repudiate one of their most generous donors; and this, with evident reluctance, they did.
I doubt, however, very much whether anyone involved in breaking this story thought that theirs was the first salvo in what would turn into an exposé of the prattling class as a whole ‐ including not only our entertainment elite but also our media and political elite. But this is what happened ‐ and there is hardly a single left-liberal institution that has thus far emerged unscathed. A venerable Congressman has been driven from office. It looks as if a celebrity Senator will soon follow suit, and leading figures at NBC, CBS, NPR, and Pravda itself have been suspended or given the boot.
[Wash Times] Illegal border crossing tumbled to a 45-year low and interior arrests of illegal immigrants soared in 2017, according to data released Tuesday that showed President Trump’s enforcement crackdown netted tangible results during his first year on the job.
The numbers, released by the Department of Homeland Security, reflected a stunning turnaround from the nearly nonexistent interior enforcement of immigration laws under President Obama.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection reported 310,531 apprehensions nationwide in fiscal 2017, which ended Sept. 30, a decline of 25 percent from a year earlier and the lowest level since 1971.
Nearly all of the Border Patrol arrests ‐ 303,916 ‐ were along the southwestern border, which the agency said underscored the need for a security wall that Mr. Trump wants to build.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, who are responsible for capturing and deporting illegal immigrants, made 110,568 arrests ‐ a 40 percent increase from the previous year.
The agency said interior removals ‐ people deported after being arrested away from the border ‐ jumped 25 percent to 81,603.
#2
I want to see a contiguous 750 mile piece of wall by this time next year so we can bring illegal border crossings closer to a 240 year low. I'll even go back on my original design criteria in that it look like the wall around Manhattan in Escape from New York in order to see this done.
[Khaama Press] At least twenty five bully boyz affiliated with 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.... of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) terrorist group were killed in the latest Arclight airstrikes conducted 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 of Afghanistan.
According to the officials of the 201st Silab Corps of the Afghan army in the East, the latest airstrikes were carried out on Tuesday in the vicinity of Achin district.
The officials further added that the bully boyz and their hideouts were hit during the raids in Mamand Shin area, leaving twenty of the loyalists of the terror group dead.
According to Silab Corps officials, the civilians and military personnel did not suffer any casualties in the airstrikes.
The anti-government armed myrmidon groups have not commented regarding the report so far.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
12/07/2017
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[Khaama Press] The Taliban ...the Pashtun equivalent of men... group has reacted at the killing of a top al-Qaeda leader in a joint Afghan and US forces operation in Afghanistan.
The group’s front man Zabiullah Mujahid issued a statement calling the killing of the bully boyz in ZZabul, Ghazni, and Paktia a propaganda.
Mujahid further added that no foreign or local bully boyz were killed during the operations in the three provinces as claimed by the security institutions.
This comes as the Afghan security authorities said Tuesday that a top leader of the al-Qaeda terrorist network has been killed along with at least 80 other bully boyz during the operations of the Afghan and US forces. The Afghan Intelligence, National Directorate of Security ...the Afghan national intel agency... (NDS), the bully boyz were killed during the operations conducted in Ghazni, Zabul, and Paktia provinces.
According to NDS, the senior al-Qaeda leader killed during the operation has been identified as Omar Khetab who was also famous was Omar Mansoor. Khetab is among the several top al-Qaeda network leaders who have been killed during the counter-terrorism operations so far.
A U.S. counter-terrorism Arclight airstrike conducted March 19 in Paktika ...which coincidentally borders South Wazoo... Province, Afghanistan, resulted in the death of Qari Yasin, a well-known al Qaeda terrorist leader responsible for the deaths of dozens of innocent victims, including two American service members.
According to Pentagon, Yasin, a senior terrorist figure from Balochistan ...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it... , Pakistain, had ties to Tehrik-e Taliban and had plotted multiple al Qaeda terror attacks, including the Sept. 20, 2008, bombing on the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad that killed dozens of innocent people, among them U.S. Air Force Maj. Rodolfo I. Rodriguez and Navy Cryptologic Technician Third Class Petty Officer Matthew J. O’Bryant.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
12/07/2017
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#1
According to NDS, the senior al-Qaeda leader killed during the operation has been identified as Omar Khetab who was also famous was Omar "Kandahar Kid" Mansoor.
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/07/2017 15:36
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[Khaama Press] The Pak officials have offered condition support to help end the cross-border attacks in Afghanistan by the gunnies using the Pak territory.
The officials have reportedly offered the support during a meeting with the US Secretary of Defense James Mattis during his visit to Islamabad.
Islamabad would only guarantee no attacks from its soil if the US special forces erect a fence along Pakistain-Afghan borders and also repatriates all the Afghan migrants.
A Pak official privy of the development has told the local newspaper, Pakistain Today, that Islamabad would only guarantee no attacks from its soil if the US special forces erect a fence along Pakistain-Afghan borders and also repatriates all the Afghan migrants colonists.
"The US policy of whipping Pakistain for every issue it faces should come to an end. We are not ready to be blamed for the failure of the US in Afghanistan anymore," the official said.
This comes as Islamabad is under pressure to act against the myrmidon groups using the Pak soil to carry out attacks in Afghanistan, with Washington demanding particular steps against Haqqani network and the Taliban ...Arabic for students... group leadership.
The Afghan and US officials are saying that the leaders of the two groups continue to reside in Pakistain, have freedom of action, and plan and coordinate attacks in Afghanistan.
The Department of Defense said Tuesday that the Secretary of State during his meeting with the Pak officials emphasized on the vital role that Pakistain can play in working with the United States and others to facilitate a grinding of the peace processor in Afghanistan that brings stability and security to the region.
"The Secretary reiterated that Pakistain must redouble its efforts to confront gunnies and hard boyz operating within the country," Pentagon said.
[Khaama Press] Pak officials are saying that the country’s military has taken actions against all terror groups including the notorious Haqqani terrorist network.
According to the officials familiar with the recent meeting with the US defense secretary James Mattis, Islamabad has also shared information with the US delegation regarding the counter-terrorism steps in this regard.
A Pak official speaking on the condition of anonymity has told the Pak Today newspaper that Secretary Mattis inquired regarding the Haqqani terrorist network during his meeting with the Pak officials.
"Pakistain submitted details of some of its recent actions against the hard boyz of all hue and colour, telling the US officials that no terrorist would be spared under Pakistain’s policy of indiscriminate action against terrorists," the official said.
The official further added that "We told the US officials that around 70,000 Afghans cross over through nine border crossings on a daily basis, which makes it impossible to identify each and every individual crossing the border."
[Texas Tribune] U.S. Rep. Al Green's effort to push the U.S. House to vote to impeach President Donald Trump quickly died Wednesday under bipartisan criticism for the Houston Democrat's move.
Hours after he stood in front of a nearly empty House chamber to introduce articles of impeachment, Green sat alone in the middle of the chamber as the House voted 364-58 on a "motion to table" the resolution, effectively killing it.
Democratic Texans largely joined their Republican colleagues in supporting the motion to table Green's resolution. Of 36 Texans in the U.S. House, only Lloyd Doggett of Austin, Filemon Vela of Brownsville and Sheila Jackson Lee of Houston, all Democrats, joined Green in voting against the measure to table. U.S. Reps. Marc Veasey, D-Fort Worth, and Joaquin Castro, D-San Antonio, were among four House members who voted present.
Green’s articles of impeachment accused Trump of committing "high misdemeanors" while in office and asserted he is "unfit to be President." Yet his resolution did not touch on Russia or that country's potential interference in the 2016 elections, the issue that some Democrats have argued could warrant an impeachment vote in the future following the conclusion of an ongoing investigation by U.S. Special Counsel Robert Mueller.
#2
He got his moment of notoriety. Now go get us sammiches, bitch
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/07/2017 7:17
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#3
As long as the market is booming it will be very difficult to garner support for an impeachment. Like the rest of us, sleazy politicians have to put there money somewhere. Killing the goose that lays the golden eggs is not really a sound business decision.
#4
Democratic Texans largely joined their Republican colleagues in supporting the motion to table
In the resurgence of the post Civil War period, the party of the Klan refused to provide the Army funding for nearly a year, till the Apaches hit Texas again, and suddenly them Texas Donks needed to protect their phoney baloney jobs. The Army got funding. Going after Trump would dump the market and hammer businesses that are enjoying a prosperity they haven't seen in over 8 years. Its' the economy stupid.
#6
Green is grandstanding and engaging in political harassment. Unless the Dems take control of the House or they could get enough Rinos to go along with them, this had zero chance of going anywhere.
Green has had a sexual accusation by a staffer (Lucinda Daniels) in his background. Could be others?
#8
It's the Fourth Turning, it is a painful transition for good or ill but will be resolved. We have to go through this, and other countries are in the same boat.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
12/07/2017 20:19
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[Daily Caller] The Justice Department is sifting through 10,000 text messages involving the FBI agent who was kicked off of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation for making anti-Trump comments.
Fox News reports that the bureau is reviewing "several months" worth of messages that the agent, Peter Strzok, exchanged with Lisa Page, an FBI attorney with whom he was having an affair.
The Justice Department is searching the texts before turning them over to the House Intelligence Committee, a process which could take "weeks."
The Justice Department’s inspector general discovered over the summer that Strzok and Page exchanged anti-Trump and pro-Clinton text messages last year. After the watchdog informed Mueller’s office, Strzok was "immediately" removed from the Russia investigation, a spokesman for Mueller said over the weekend.
Details of Strzok’s removal were kept secret for months. ABC News reported back in August that Strzok had been demoted from Mueller’s team to the FBI’s human resources division. Attempts to find out the rationale were met by "no comments" from Mueller’s office.
#1
who was kicked off of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation for making anti-Trump comments
I get the impression that he was "kicked off" for sleeping with a married coworker, not for hating the deplorables' POTUS - which is normal in his circles.
#2
Well, whenever you decide to compare notes, I already have convictions as do many of OUR Citizens of this Mis-feasance. Or worse.
All that money for a political smoke-screen and yet I have balance sheets and more implicating the FBI heads in scandal after scandal.
It is much more than some journal entries, guys. This is is political corruption golden corral type.
I have half of one party on corrupt all out and another 1/3.
If you could not see this open source or by media reports alone, you are no detective.
Feel free American Public to put this balance sheet together that incriminates the clintons and the rest of that corrupt "government" sauce factory has wrought you.
#3
Strzok had been demoted from Mueller’s team to the FBI’s human resources division.
HR in D.C.? I'd prefer firing of such employees but as someone here said, that is difficult to do in government. In lieu of firing, how about a different assignment overseas?
#10
I watched Wray being interviewed by the House Oversight Committee. One thing that frosts me is how much officials claim they can't reveal something because it's the subject of an ongoing investigation, it's classified or that it's under review by an Inspector General. A great disservice is being done to the American people. That disservice is that we are being kept in the dark about things we should know about to make "informed" decisions and to be able to participate in the political process. Another reason is to provide citizen oversight to ensure an uncorrupted process. Secrecy should only be invoked under unusual conditions such where life might be endangered, developing policy might be threatened, technical secrets might be divulged or a few other unusual situations. Transparency works to make better government; not worse government.
Diyala (IraqiNews.com) A policeman was shot dead by a sniper while on duty in a border area between Diyala and Salahuddin, a local source told Alghad Press.
“A police officer stationed at a security checkpoint at Albu Eissa area between Diyala and Salahuddin provinces was shot dead by a sniper,” the source said on Wednesday.
“The body of the slain policeman was moved to the forensic medicine department,” the source said, adding that a manhunt was launched for the assailant.
Diyala (IraqiNews.com) Intelligence services in Diyala have managed to kill the Islamic State’s commando chief in the province, a municipal official was quoted saying Wednesday.
Alsumaria News quoted Sadeq al-Husseini, head of the province council’s security committee, saying that an intelligence team managed to infiltrate the Hamreen Mountains area (55km northeast of Baqubah, ambushed the militant and killed him.
Hamreen has been a hotspot for Islamic State militancy between Diyala and Salahuddin, with the area’s tough geography serving as a suitable haven for the group.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
12/07/2017
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Mosul (IraqiNews.com) People in Mosul have found six Islamic State militants’ corpses buried under their houses, security sources were quoted saying on Wednesday.
Alghad Press quoted a source at Iraqi Federal Police saying that “people who returned to clean up their houses in Mosul’s Old City found three corpses of Daesh (Islamic State) militants under debris”. The source did not specify the neighborhood were the dead bodies were discovered.
As Iraqi forces gradually took over in Mosul, relief teams regularly ran into dead bodies of civilians buried under wrecks of homes devastated by the encounters between Iraqi forces and militants.
More than 25000 IS members were estimated to have been killed during the campaign for Mosul.
Nineveh (IraqiNews.com) Seven persons were killed and injured during the blast, which took place in a refugee camp, southeast of Mosul, a security source from the province said on Wednesday.
Speaking to Shafaq News, the source said, “a victim and six wounded people is the preliminary estimates of the blast in the camp of Turkish Kurds, in Makhmur town, southeast of Mosul.”
The source indicated two stories behind the blast. “The first one is the presence of a booby-trapped vehicle and the second is a blast from a weapon stash inside the camp,” he said.
Makhmur refugee camp hosts around 2700 families, estimated at 12,500 persons, who were displaced from Turkey. They are supporters of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). They resorted to Kurdistan since mid-nineties.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
12/07/2017
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Kirkuk (IraqiNews.com) A policeman was killed in a drive-by shooting in Kirkuk city on Wednesday, a security official told Shafaq News.
"Unidentified button men driving an Opel car shot up Major Samer Abdel Nabi Jassam at a Kirkuk neighborhood," front man for Kirkuk provincial police Colonel Afrasiau Kamal said.
"Major Jassam breathed his last immediately after he was admitted into the hospital," Kamal said, adding that the assailants expeditiously departed at a goodly pace into an unknown location.
Iraqi forces took over Kirkuk in mid October as a response to an independence referendum Kurdistan Region held in September for independence from Iraq. Kirkuk is one of the areas where Baghdad and Erbil dispute illusory sovereignty.
Iraqi forces took over oil and military facilities in the province from Kurdish troops. The takeover was mostly peaceful but some fatal festivities occurred.
Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) Iraq is getting millions more of euros and pound sterlings from the European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... and the United Kingdom for reconstruction and demining purposes as international donors continue efforts to address the dilemma of millions displaced by the war against 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.... Iraqi Planning Minister Salman al-Jumaili said he signed Wednesday with European Union representatives an agreement for EU funding of reconstruction and demining projects worth EUR60.4 million. He said in a presser following the signature of the deal that the projects aim at restoring stability and the repatriation of civilians at areas recaptured from Death Eaters.
"The European Union, with the contribution of a number of donors (Denmark, Finland, Italia, Japan, Estonia and the United Kingdom) will provide a financial grant worth EUR60.4 million for the implementation of those two projects".
The package includes EUR50.4 million for reviving economic activity, rehabilitating infrastructure and supporting small-sized enterprises at liberated areas, said the minister. The remaining EUR10 million will address explosives contamination at those areas, he added.
In a separate declaration, the UK embassy in Iraq said "Next year the UK will provide £30 million to help restore livelihoods, essential infrastructure and basic services in Iraq, including to support displaced communities to return safely to liberated areas".
It added that at least £20 million will also be provided in humanitarian aid "to help deliver urgent life-saving assistance like food, shelter & access to clean water, taking the UK’s total humanitarian contribution in Iraq to £229.5 million since 2014.
It is not, however, clear whether the amounts announced by the embassy were separate from the EU grant. Signed with the government.
Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) A policeman was seriously injured in a shooting incident west of Baghdad on Wednesday, a security source told Baghdad Today.
“Unidentified gunmen in a car opened fire at a police officer of the Justice Ministry’s prisons protection sector in the area between Ghazaliya and Abu Ghraib neighborhoods west of Baghdad, leaving him in a pool of blood,” the source said.
The injured cop was carried to a nearby hospital, sustaining severe injuries, the source added.
Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) Five people were injured in a bomb blast in Baghdad on Wednesday, a security source told Baghdad Today.
“An explosive charge planted near a market at al-Wehda (unity) district south of the Iraqi capital went off in the wee hours of Wednesday, leaving five people injured,” the source said.
“Security forces cordoned off the blast site and a probe was launched to gather information about the bombing,” the source said.
The injured were carried to a nearby hospital for treatment, he added.
[Free Beacon] A former intern for outgoing Rep. John Conyers says the Michigan Democrat propositioned her, and when she rebuffed his advances, he brought up a Washington, D.C. intern who had mysteriously disappeared.
Courtney Morse, now 36, told the Washington Post she was a 20-year-old student when she accepted an internship with Conyers' office. One night, he offered to drive her home, and once they arrived, he "wrapped his hand around hers as it rested in her lap, and told her he was interested in a sexual relationship."
Morse reports that when she declined, Conyers suddenly brought up a then-unsolved disappearance of federal intern Chandra Levy. At the time, police believed Levy's disappearance may have been tied to an affair with Democratic Rep. Gary Condit. Condit was ultimately cleared after authorities charged a suspect with the intern's murder.
"He said he had insider information on the case. I don't know if he meant it to be threatening, but I took it that way," she told the Post. "I got out of the car and ran."
Matthew Salomon, a member of the family Levy was staying with at the time, backed up Morse's version of events. He told the Post he approached Conyer's car to confront him, but the congressman drove away.
Conyers announced his immediate retirement Tuesday after the reemergence of multiple accusations of sexual harassment from former staffers. In his speech, Conyers insisted his "legacy can't be compromised or diminished in any way."
#1
Part of why I think that Fred was wrong to criticize the networks for paying attention to the Chandra Levy case. You're not going to win a war, even against non-technological savages, with a political class who gets its rocks off by offing their cute 20 year old interns. You just get a greater chance of becoming a non-technological savage yourself.
(This computer's seven years old. I don't know where to buy a modern current one that isn't made in a foreign dictatorship).
#2
(This computer's seven years old. I don't know where to buy a modern current one that isn't made in a foreign dictatorship).
You can't. The closest you can come is building your own from components. Source your motherboard from Taiwan by buying an ASUS MB. Building a computer is not hard and very rewarding.
After Jerusalem recognition, Trump signs waiver delaying embassy move
[IsraelTimes] US president renews 6 month deferment of diplomatic mission's relocation, but has instructed State Department to begin preparations. US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said work on moving the embassy would start immediately. However the move could take years to actually complete.
UN Security Council to hold emergency session on Jerusalem
[IsraelTimes] Friday meeting, at the request of 8 nations, will deal with Trump's globally panned decision to recognize city as Israeli capital. Bolivia, Britain, Egypt, France, Italy, Senegal, Sweden and Uruguay requested the talks. They have also asked UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to open the meeting with remarks.
After Trump’s announcement, Guterres said Jerusalem’s final status could only be resolved through direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.
I understand Egypt & Senegal, I can even understand the Brits - who are sore loosers - and the French - who are, ahem, French - but what the fuck we ever did to Italy (except helping them achieve the Renaissance) and Sweden?
#4
And what about Uruguay? They got into the World Cup next summer (easy three games in Group A, I might add), so they should be happy about that and STFU here.
#5
The Brits, the French and the Swedes all have large, unassimilated and excitable Muslim populations who are becoming quite problematic. No idea what is up with the Italians.
#7
I don't think it's entirely fair, Seeking.
(i) Italy is Catholic the way Britain is Anglican.
(ii) Historically, the Church wasn't particularly anti-Semitic - not exactly philosemitic, but it didn't go out of it's way to make trouble for the Jews.
(iii) On the other hand, under the current managment, Catholic Church hates Trump, and everything he stands for...
#11
UN Security Council to hold emergency session on Jerusalem
Excellent. Use the emergency session to announce our withdrawal from the Useless Nations, our confiscation of the land currently occupied by the UN, and the eviction of all UN diplomats and foreign staff.
All effective immediately.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
12/07/2017 18:39
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[Ynet] The following is the text of an address made by President Donald Trump announcing the recognition by the United States of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
The eleven minute video can be seen at the link, for those who prefer to watch and listen.
Thank you. When I came into office, I promised to look at the world’s challenges with open eyes and very fresh thinking. We cannot solve our problems by making the same failed assumptions and repeating the same failed strategies of the past. Old challenges demand new approaches.
My announcement today marks the beginning of a new approach to conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.
[ALMASDARNEWS] Iraqi counterterrorism units launched a massive security operation in djinn-infested Mosul ... the home of a particularly ferocious and hairy djinn... city yesterday aimed at cracking on ISIS cells and hideouts dispersed around the ancient city.
After compiling matching information from several Iraqi intelligence departments, a joint force was established consisting of the Iraqi Intelligence, National Security Department, Hawks Intelligence unit, Military Intelligence, a detachment from the Iraqi Army, and a detachment from the Nineveh Guard to accomplish the assigned mission.
The aforementioned force surrounded all the areas where ISIS cells were reported whether in the houses of the operatives’ relatives or mosques in the districts of Sumer, al-Wahda, Paleostine, and Yaremja arresting 220 wanted figures and deporting them to Baghdad for further interrogation.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/07/2017
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[ALMASDARNEWS] ISIS made a major push in Hama’s northeastern countryside on Wednesday when it captured half a dozen of villages from its radical adversary Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS).
The seizure of Anbar, Abu Khanadiq , Rasm Abu Kursi, Abu Hayyeh and Rasm al-Ahmar positions the terrorist group in Idlib’s southernmost provincial boundary for the first time since its expulsion from the province after the massive intra-jihadist civil war in 2013-2014.
With the latest advance, ISIS has become a considerable force in Hama and Idlib with dozens of villages and strategic high points under the holy warrior group’s dominion. Recent report suggest that supporters have been rallying from all over the province to fight alongside the terrorist faction.
Unless HTS and its allies manage to thwart this expansion in its early stages, the rebel forces will likely witness a scenario similar to that of the ISIS-pledged Jaish Khalid Ibn al-Walid in the Yarmouk Basin of southern Syria- a threat which rebels are still struggling to contain.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/07/2017
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[ALMASDARNEWS] Since the beginning of 2017, thousands of people have been rounded up and recruited by the US-backed ’Syrian Democratic Forces’ as the Kurdish-led militia looks to beef up its manpower by enrolling local combat-ready men and women.
With large swaths of northern Syria under its control, a batch of 228 fighters joined the predominately Kurdish group on Wednesday morning.
The recruits graduated from the so-called ’Martyr Faysal Abu Layla Academy’ and had received ideological and military training before swearing an oath of allegiance to the SDF. All new SDF conscripts were men originating from the northern countryside of Raqqa.
SDF commander Mihemed Îmad attended the ceremony and spoke fondly of the SDF’s role on the battlefield as a leading counter-terrorism contingent, emphasising its fight against ISIS as well as what he called "Ottoman Turkish-backed gangs".
Although repeatedly denied by the SDF leadership, the group has been accused of forcibly recruiting people in areas under its control with multiple reports of underaged fighters joining the YPG as well.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[DAWN] A second polio ...Poliomyelitis is a disease caused by infection with the poliovirus. Between 1840 and the 1950s, polio was a worldwide epidemic. Since the development of polio vaccines the disease has been largely wiped out in the civilized world. However, since the vaccine is known to make Moslem pee-pees shrink and renders females sterile, bookish, and unsubmissive it is not widely used by the turban and automatic weapons set... case within three months has emerged in the city, this time in a five-month-old baby, setting off alarm bells and exposing the fact that authorities in the metropolis have yet to eradicate the crippling disease, officials said on Tuesday.
"The second case, too, involves an Afghan family. A five-month-old boy has fallen prey to the virus in UC-4 of Gadap," said a bigwig in the Sindh health ministry.
Officials said the child had duly been administered with anti-polio drops during frequent campaigns. However, a good lie finds more believers than a bad truth... they blamed "low immunity" in the child’s body because of malnutrition that failed to save him.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[DAWN] The security forces on Wednesday claimed to have killed two "wanted terrorists" during an intelligence-based operation (IBO) in Jahan Abad area of Swat, the military’s media wing reported.
The Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said both the suspects ‐ Asad alias Anas and Wahab ‐ were being traced for their previous alleged involvement in terrorist activities in Malakand Division.
The ISPR said that the security forces received accurate actionable information about the suspects "crossing over from Afghanistan and entering Swat ...a valley and an administrative district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistain, located 99 mi from Islamabad. It is inhabited mostly by Pashto speakers. The place has gone steadily downhill since the days when Babe Ruth was the Sultan of Swat... Valley for a possible terrorist activity".
"Due to the effective security in place, both were traced to a hideout [in Jahan Abad, Swat] and subsequently killed during an encounter [with the security forces]," read the ISPR statement.
Moreover, two controllers of the dear departed suspects have also been apprehended, the ISPR added.
In a remote-controlled blast in Swat Valley in October, at least one person was killed and two others injured.
Police had said the blast targeted a family member of a Village Defence Committee (VDC) member, Ahmed Zeb, in the Ghat area of Malam Jabba.
Zeb's father was killed and two others maimed, police officials said.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[All Africa] Zim-bob-we's ex-foreign minister, Walter Mzembi, who was expelled from Zanu-PF over his alleged links to Grace Mugabe, has spoken of his future under President Emmerson Mnangagwa.
Mzembi was promoted to foreign minister in a cabinet reshuffle in October widely seen as strengthening the hand of the G40 faction loyal to the former first lady. It was that cabinet reshuffle, and the later sacking of Mnangagwa as vice president, that triggered the army intervention last month.
But in an interview with the private Daily News, Mzembi denied being a Grace Mugabe ally, and suggested Mnangagwa, though reserved to the point of "aloofness" has "bottled up ideas and refreshing thoughts that are only coming out now".
"He has said all the right things so far and is on track. He is carrying the cross as our leader but he needs all of us to achieve his vision and mission for a prosperous Zim-bob-we," said Mzembi.
Mzembi, who has a reputation for hard work and was respected in his former role as tourism minister, said he might give politics a break.
He and other alleged G40 members were expelled from Zanu-PF in the wake of the military takeover on November 15.
Asked by the interviewer what his final word was, Mzembi responded: "Hail the new president... It is time to move on for everyone, time for healing, for forgiveness, time to love, to smile, to laugh, time to live."
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
"Hail the new president... It is time to move on for everyone, time for healing, for forgiveness, time to love, to smile, to laugh, time to live."
TRANSLATION: "Don't hurt me."
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
12/07/2017 4:51
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#2
Mzembi, who has a reputation for hard work and was respected in his former role as tourism minister, said he might give was told to politics a break.
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/07/2017 9:19
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#3
DOH! "told to give"
I need more covfefe, stat!
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/07/2017 9:20
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...the America-born Afghan-American known wolf who loved every jihadi group he read about and was a regular at the gay bar he shot up. Despite having the attention of the FBI for several years, he was licensed as an armed security guard. For amusement he beat his first wife until she divorced him, then took up the hobby with the one about to stand trial...
the gunman who killed 49 people at an Orlando nightclub last year in the name of ISIS, will stand trial in the Florida city, a judge ordered Wednesday.
Noor Salman’s
...the pretty Palestinian-American who fell for the wrong man, then didn’t get out...
attorneys had filed a motion in September to have her trial moved to another city, claiming that media coverage of her husband’s attack and remarks from Orlando Police Chief John Mina wouldn’t allow her to have a fair trial, according to WESH.
Salman has been charged with providing material support to a terror organization and obstruction of justice, the Orlando Sentinel reported.
Salman’s husband, Mateen, killed 49 people and wounded almost 70 others when he opened fire at Pulse nightclub on June 12, 2016 in one of the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history.
The gay bar on the night of the shooting was packed with more than 300 people. Mateen called 911 when he was pulling off the attack to pledge his allegiance to ISIS, and was shouting “Allahu akbar” while engaging officers, law enforcement sources told Fox News around the time of the attack.
Salman knew about her husband's plan before the shooting and how he pledged allegiance to the Islamic State terror group, prosecutors said. She shopped with her husband the night before the attack when he bought five containers of ammunition, a source close to the investigation told Fox News.
The judge’s order quoted a U.S. Supreme Court ruling which said, “prominence of media coverage does not necessarily produce prejudicing and juror impartiality does not require ignorance,” WESH reported.
Salman’s trial is scheduled for March 1.
This article starring:
Omar Mateen
Posted by: Bright Pebbles ||
12/07/2017
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#1
So, this doesn't look like a Federal charge. Hope they have Old Sparky in Tallahassee...
[All Africa] The Theatre Commander, Operation Lafiya Dole, Attahiru Ibrahim, has been removed from that position.
Mr. Ibrahim's redeployment comes three days after 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... hard boyz carried out one of the deadliest attacks on Biu town in Borno where at least 18 people were killed and 52 others seriously injured.
Mr. Ibrahim, a major general, took over the command of the ongoing counterinsurgency operations in the North-east in May 2017. The former occupant of that position was Lucky Irabor who was redeployed to coordinate the Multi-National Joint Task Force, MNJTF.
Boko Haram attacks appear to have increased since Mr. Ibrahim assumed duties with scores of suicide kabooms, mostly by teenage girls, occurring between May and December.
The Chief of Army staff, Tukur Buratai, apparently unimpressed with the way the operation was going, had in August issued a rare ultimatum of '40 days' for the theatre commander to arrest the Boko Haram leader, Abubakar Shekau ... the lunatic leader of Boko Haram who has been reported dead at least eleven times, pledged his body and soul to ISIS, told his fighters to hang it up once or twice, and been fired by the Caliph and refused to step down ... , and put an end to the incessant Boko Haram attacks. Neither was achieved.
The hard boyz continued to stage daring attacks including on military formations.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[IsraelTimes] Army says 'a number of battalions' to be deployed, including specialized intelligence units; protesters march in several West Bank cities shuttered by general strike.
The Israel Defense Forces on Thursday said it was deploying battalions to the West Bank as reinforcements, as festivities and scuffles broke out across the West Bank and East Jerusalem in anger over 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... ’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
Paleostinian were fuming over Trump’s Wednesday speech, in which he defied worldwide warnings and insisted that, after repeated failures to achieve peace, a new approach was long overdue. He described his decision as an acknowledgement of reality, as Jerusalem is the seat of Israel’s government.
Trump also revealed he had instructed the US State Department to prepare for moving the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
Paleostinians marched in several West Bank cities and threw rocks and Molotov cocktails at troops in some places. Scuffles were also reported at the Damascus Gate in East Jerusalem.
In Gazoo, at least two Paleostinians were reported injured by Israeli fire.
Hamas, a contraction of the Arabic words for "frothing at the mouth", terror group leader Ismail Haniyeh ...became Prime Minister after the legislative elections of 2006 which Hamas won. President Mahmoud Abbas dismissed Haniyeh from office on 14 June 2007 at the height of the Fatah-Hamas festivities, but Haniyeh did not acknowledge the decree and continues as the PM of Gazoo while Abbas maintains a separate PM in the West Bank... on Thursday called for a new Paleostinian intifada, or uprising. The Paleostinian Authority also canceled classes for its West Bank school system for Thursday, in an apparent attempt to get more young Paleostinians to clash with Israeli troops.
In light of a "situational assessment by the IDF General Staff," that army said it "decided that a number of battalions will reinforce the area of [the West Bank], as well as combat intelligence and territorial defense units."
The military would not specify the number of additional battalions being sent in the West Bank as reinforcements.
As of Thursday morning, the army had not called up reserve units, which would have indicated an expectation of greater violence.
On Wednesday, the Israel Police also announced that it would be deploying officers widely throughout the capital, including sites where violence is regularly expected.
"The Israel Police is prepared for an immediate operational response to a wide range of scenarios if necessary," a police spokesperson said.
Outside the Old City of Jerusalem, small demonstrations ‐ nonviolent, as of Thursday afternoon ‐ were taking place between local residents and Border Police troops.
Paleostinian leaders in the Fatah-controlled West Bank responded to Trump’s speech with outrage, declaring that the United States could no longer serve as Middle East peace broker.
Paleostinian Authority President the ineffectual Mahmoud Abbas ... a graduate of the prestigious unaccredited Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow with a doctorate in Holocaust Denial... called the change in longstanding US policy "deplorable."
Schools and shops were closed in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, as Paleostinians protested Trump’s recognition and political groups called for protest marches in West Bank town centers at noon.
Several thousand Paleostinians marched in the Hamas-run Gazoo Strip on Wednesday night and Thursday morning, burning US and Israeli flags and chanting "Death to America" and "Death to Israel."
#4
In the Gaza Strip, Hamas’ leader Ismail Haniyeh called on Palestinians to launch a new intifada, or uprising, against Israel on Friday.
“The American decision is an aggression on our people and a war on our sanctuaries,” Haniyeh said in a speech, urging supporters “to be ready for any orders.”
“We want the uprising to last and continue to let Trump and the occupation regret this decision,” he said.
The Israeli military said two rockets were fired from Gaza but fell short, landing in Palestinian territory. There was no immediate claim of responsibility.
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/07/2017 12:12
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[ARABNEWS] The doctrine of the Moslem Brüderbund is far closer to the krazed killer ideology espoused by ISIS than the religious mainstream, said a report released today.
The Moslem Brüderbund’s "use of scripture, scholarship, and content is demonstrably distant from mainstream Islam," said the "Struggle Over Scripture" research study released by the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change.
Using natural language processing tools, expert analysis and machine learning techniques, the study scanned over 3,000 documents from krazed killer and mainstream Moslem sources, including brochures, books and articles by scholars.
It found that only eight percent of the 50 most quoted Koranic verses in what was described as "Salafi-jihadi" material used by extreme groups, were prevalent in mainstream texts.
Milo Comerford, who co-authored the report with Rachel Bryson, said that Death Eaters were "much more likely" to quote parts of the Qur’an that centered on the "creation of a caliphate and rally for military jihad" than mainstream Moslems.
Comerford told Arab News: "The Moslem Brüderbund and ’ISIS’ both view Islam through a political lens. They share an ideology that promotes Islam as an exclusive guider. The idea of a caliphate appears in both ’ISIS’ and Moslem Brüderbund texts."
Dr. Emman El-Badawy, head of research, Tony Blair Institute for Global Change, said: "The ideology of the Moslem Brüderbund and other Islamist groups directly undermines efforts of the mainstream majority to assert a positive and peaceful Islam, at ease with the modern world."
She added: "The politicized Islamism of such groups projects a sense of division, anger, sectarianism and conflict. The vast majority of Moslems who worship freely in the West or happily mix with those of other religions in Moslem majority countries, totally reject this extreme interpretation of their faith."
El-Badawy continued: "The evidence now shows that there is considerable ideological overlap in how Islamic scripture is used by Islamists, like the Moslem Brüderbund, and violent jihadists, such as ISIS and al-Qaeda.
"The fact remains that krazed killer voices have had an impact on Islam that is wildly disproportionate to their numbers, and their distortions as traced in this report, must be uprooted."
The report found that religious "counter-narratives" are currently failing to tackle the key arguments peddled by krazed killers, only taking on 16 percent of the scriptural references prominently used by "Salafi-jihadis."
Extreme interpretations of scripture are completely at odds with mainstream Islamic readings ‐ and central mainstream tenets, such as fasting, prayers, and preaching, are relegated in krazed killer texts in favor of violence, it said.
The report recommended that policy makers should robustly affirm universal values such as pluralism, the rule of law, religious freedom, and gender equality that are under attack from krazed killers. This will ensure that the battle against krazed killer ideas is not against mainstream religious belief, it said.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/07/2017
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#2
"Content is demonstrably distant from mainstream Islam?" I'm calling complete BS on this arabnews article. Pure flagrant whitewashing of Islamic fundamentalism.
2 side notes: Twin Cities Channel 9 last night decided to quote the Muslim Brotherhood child CAIR over the Donald's Israel capital announcement. Something Channel 5 has been doing for several years.
Also all of a sudden google dome chrome is marking CAIR as misspelling of CARE. Hum.
[ChicagoBusiness.com] American democracy is fragile, and unless care is taken it could follow the path of Nazi Germany in the 1930s.
It’s funny — my mother, who grew up under the Nazis in Gremany and Holland, is so unworried about this possibility that she still has not registered to vote since she moved to the retirement home near me, though she used to vote religiously.
Mixed in with many softer comments, that was the somewhat jaw-dropping bottom line of Barack Obama last night as, in a Q&A session before the Economic Club of Chicago, the Chicagoan who used to be president dropped a bit of red meat to a hometown crowd that likely is a lot closer to him than the man whose name never was mentioned: President Donald Trump.
Obama's comments came after a series of playful questions from moderator and Ariel Investments President Mellody Hobson‐in the great Batman vs. Superman debate, for instance, we learned Obama sides with Batman‐before she eventually asked him what he's learned as a world citizen of sorts.
One thing he's learned is that "things don't happen internationally if we don't put our shoulder to the wheel," Obama said, speaking of the U.S. "No other country has the experience and bandwidth and ideals. . . .If the U.S. doesn't do it, it's not going to happen."
...
Obama moved from that to talking about a nativist mistrust and unease that has swept around the world. He argued that such things as the speed of technical change and the uneven impact of globalization have come too quickly to be absorbed in many cultures, bringing strange new things and people to areas in which "people didn't (used to) challenge your assumptions." As a result, "nothing feels solid," he said. "Sadly, there's something in us that looks for simple answers when we're agitated."
Still, the U.S. has survived tough times before and will again, he noted, particularly mentioning the days of communist fighter Joseph McCarthy and former President Richard Nixon. But one reason the country survived is because it had a free press to ask questions, Obama added. Though he has problems with the media just like Trump has had, "what I understood was the principle that the free press was vital."
The danger is "grow(ing) complacent," Obama said. "We have to tend to this garden of democracy or else things could fall apart quickly."
That's what happened in Germany in the 1930s, which despite the democracy of the Weimar Republic and centuries of high-level cultural and scientific achievements, Adolph Hitler rose to dominate, Obama noted. "Sixty million people died. . . .So, you've got to pay attention. And vote."
Obama said his greatest "regret and disappointment" was the failure to enact tighter controls on gun possession. Though the issue resonates in far different ways with different parts of the population, "something is broke," Obama said, his own voice breaking, as he talked about 6-year-old girls shot to death at Sandy Hook, girls not too different in age from his own daughters.
But the rejection of his proposed gun laws, so beautiful in his eyes, is exactly an expression of that democracy. The vast majority of voters simply don’t buy what President Obama was selling.
Posted by: Vast Right Wing Conspiracy ||
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#1
Shut up Obama, you democratic Socialist NAZI.
NAZI.
The biggest piece of shit communist to take America.
NAZI.
#3
...that was the somewhat jaw-dropping bottom line of Barack Obama
While I don't speak for everyone here, I don't think a single one of us think this is a jaw-dropping line from Obama. It's been his M.O. all of his adult life. The only thing that surprises me is that he waited so long to say it - I would have expected it after a few months.
#4
"Sixty million people died. . . .So, you've got to pay attention. And vote."
While I'm no hard-core WWII buff, weren't Germany and Japan the major Axis powers in that war (I'll ignore the Wops for now)? It's like he's trying to lay 60 million deaths solely on Adolf Hitler.
#9
My mother-in-law who was a Jewish teenager in Nazi-occupied Poland during WWII was worried about the similarities between the Obama admin. and Nazi Germany. Hasn't said much about the Trump admin. but I think she voted for him.
[ARABNEWS] Yemeni militias on Wednesday dispersed a protest in Sanaa staged by dozens of women demanding the handover of the body of slain former President former President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh ... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower, but he didn't invite Donna Summer to the inauguration and Blondie couldn't make it... for burial.
"There is no god but Allah and the martyr is a friend of Allah," the women shouted in front of the Saleh Mosque, named after the former president, and the largest in the capital.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
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#5
When will fear of “racism” lose its power to override common sense. There are no partitions in upscale neighborhood because liquor stores are rarely robbed weekly. If blacks want less stigma of protective measure in commercial establishments stop robbing them and help police arrest those that do
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Libya’s anti-crime department has published the confessional video of Hisham al-Awkli, known as the "dinosaur" among Libyans for being among ISIS holy warriors who brutally murdered 21 Egyptian Coptic Christian in Sirte.
During the video, Awkli admitted that he was one of the individuals involved in the 2015 massacre that shocked the world.
He said he participated in "slaughtering and burying of 21 Egyptian Copts of, in addition to Christians of African nationality," adding that those who supervised the massacre were a Tunisian, a Senegal ... a nation of about 14 million on the west coast of Africa bordering Mauretania to the north, Mali to the east, and a pair of Guineas to the south, one of them Bissau. It is 90 percent Mohammedan and has more than 80 political parties. Its primary purpose seems to be absorbing refugees... ese and two Libyans.
The killings, documented in a grisly video released online by the Death Eaters, shocked Egypt and led it to launch punitive Arclight airstrikes.
Awkli explained that he travelled from Sirte to Derna to participate in the slaughter near the Mahari Hotel, adding that the operation was supervised by Abu Ubaid Aziz Anbari, head of the video team that used cameras and modern equipment purchased and smuggled by Abu Abdullah Ahmed Hamali from The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... through the Maitika airport 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... The ISIS holy warrior confirmed that the Copts’ corpses were eventually taken to southern Sirte and were buried inside an abandoned building belonging to a private company.
Awkli said that massacre was ordered in response to what he said was the killing of an Egyptian Copt named Camilia, who converted to Islam and was allegedly killed by Copts in Egypt. He said that it came in response to "the contamination of the sea by the blood of the late Osama bin Laden ... who is now neither a strong horse nor a weak horse, but a dead horse... Hundreds of ISIS forces of Evil are believed to have fled Sirte into the Libyan interior after their defeat last year by militias loyal to a UN-backed government in Tripoli, the capital.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/07/2017
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[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] The powerful exiled son of Yemen’s slain ex-president former President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh ... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower, but he didn't invite Donna Summer to the inauguration and Blondie couldn't make it... vowed on Tuesday to lead a campaign against the Houthi ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The Yemeni government has accused the Houthis of having ties to the Iranian government, which wouldn't suprise most of us. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is God is Great, Death to America™, Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews ... movement that killed his father after he switched sides in the civil war.
The intervention by Ahmed Ali Saleh, a former leader of the elite Elite Republican Guard once seen as a likely successor to his father, gives the anti-Houthi movement in Sanaa a potential figurehead, after a week of fighting that saw the Houthis rout Saleh’s supporters in the capital.
In a statement sent to Rooters by an aide, his son said his father was killed at "the hands of the enemies of God and the country". Ahmed Ali said he would "confront the enemies of the homeland and humanity, who are trying to obliterate its identity and its gains and to humiliate 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... and Yemenis".
In an earlier statement carried by Saudi state media, Ahmed Ali said he would lead "the battle until the last Houthi is thrown out of Yemen ... the blood of my father will be hell ringing in the ears of Iran."
Saleh had helped the Houthis win control of much of the country’s north including Sanaa, and his decision to switch allegiances and abandon the Houthis in the past week was the most dramatic change on the battlefield in years. But the Houthis swiftly crushed a pro-Saleh uprising in the capital and shot him dead in an attack on his convoy.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
And I hope he gets it - because I'm a sentimental fellow.
#2
It takes some combination of balls and stupidity (I'm gonna guess 10% / 90% here) to talk smack like this after daddy got whacked and you got your ass ran out of town.
[ALMASDARNEWS] The battle to liberate the entire province of Deir Ezzor from the so-called 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.... (IS) is nearly finished; however, a large chunk of northwest Syria is still controlled by jihadist groups like Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham and Harakat Ahrar al-Sham ...a Syria jihadi group made up of Islamists and salafists, not that there's that much difference, formed into a brigade. They make up the main element of the Islamic Front but they don't profess adoration of al-Qaeda and they've been fighting (mainly for survival) against the Islamic State. Their leadership was wiped out at a single blow by a suicide kaboom at a crowded basement meeting in September, 2014... .
With Idlib almost entirely controlled by the jihadist rebels, the Syrian Arab Army’s (SAA) High Command has made the decision to redeploy their elite Tiger Forces division to the neighboring Hama Governorate.
Backed by the Qalamoun Shield and 4th Division, the Tiger Forces will make a big push from the northern Hama town of Ma’an in order to capture nearby Abu Dali, which has an important crossroad located inside of it.
Once Abu Dali is recaptured, the Tiger Forces will advance towards the strategic Abu Dhuhour Military Airport in the eastern countryside of Idlib.
The Abu Dhuhour Military Airport was seized by Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (previously Jabhat 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 .. ... and Jabhat Fateh al-Sham ...formerly al-Nusra, the current false nose and mustache of al-Qaeda in the Levant, now something else... ) during a large offensive in 2015; it has become the jihadist group’s most important base in eastern Idlib.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
[ALMASDARNEWS] 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.... forces of Evil in Syria and Iraq are beginning to withdraw in great numbers from Syria and Iraq to Egypt and other North African countries following a series of major defeats throughout the Levant which has seen them lose their core territorial base.
Over the last several days, both Ottoman Turkish and Kurdish media outlets and social media sources have begun reporting that Islamic State Death Eaters are making their way across Syria with the aim of reaching North Africa.
Naturally, both Ottoman Turkish and Kurdish media blames the other side for this event.
Whilst there can be no doubt that ISIS fighters are being covertly assisted by outside powers and/ or other gangs in Syria, who is responsible for this is no longer relevant at this point.
That both Ottoman Turkish and Kurdish sources ‐ inherently opposed on geopolitical matters and constantly trying to contradict the claims of one another ‐ report that ISIS has begun such move most likely means that it is in fact taking place.
The reports coincide with an alleged statement by Islamic State leader His Supreme Immensity, Caliph of the Faithful and Galactic Overlord, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi ...the head of ISIS, or what remains of it, and a veteran of the Abu Graib jailhouse. Looks like a new messiah to bajillions of Moslems, like just another dead-eyed mass murder to the rest of us. So far he has been killed at least four times, though not yet by a stake through the heart... from about one week ago whereby he called on his fighters to gather in southern Libya and prepare to attack countries throughout North Africa in order to make up for Islamic State territorial losses in the Levant.
North Africa would appear to be the most logical regrouping point for Middle East-based ISIS forces of Evil who wish to continue fighting, considering its proximity to their current battlegrounds, the geopolitical climate of the region which is highly susceptible exploitation by non-state gangs and the existence of long-standing underground infrastructures that can assist them getting there.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Top|| File under: Islamic State
[RADIOSHABELLE] Al-Shabaab ... the personification of Somali state failure... has claimed to have killed at least four Somali government soldiers in a landmine kaboom occurred on the outskirts of Beledweyne in central Somalia.
A local resident who asked not to be named told Radio Shabelle that a remote-controlled roadside blast has destroyed a military vehicle at La-jecley village near Beledweyne.
The resident did not give further details on the casualties.
Somali military officials in the region have not commented on the attack and the claim of Al-Shabaab of killing the soldiers.
This incident came a day after murderous Moslems fired mortar rounds at AMISOM base in the west of Beledweyne, the regional capital of Hiiraan region, and no casualties reported.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Top|| File under: al-Shabaab (AQ)
[MPRNEWS.ORG] A Democratic official who has spoken to Al Franken and key aides says Franken will resign his Minnesota Senate seat on Thursday, the official tells MPR News.
The official spoke to Franken and separately to Franken's staff. A staff member told the official that Franken had gone to his Washington home to discuss his plans with family.
MPR News agreed to withhold the official's name because the official wanted to give Franken the chance to talk about his decision in his own words.
Franken faced a cascade of calls Wednesday from fellow Democrats and other political allies to leave office in response to multiple allegations of sexual harassment.
After MPR News reported the planned resignation, a tweet from Franken's official account said it was "not accurate."
"No final decision has been made and the senator is still talking with his family," the tweet read.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
Franken was denying it (the resignation) around 5:30 yesterday afternoon. I'm hoping Trump shitcans Mueller just to make it an interesting news day later today, and I bet Franken is as well, should he resign, to take some heat off of him.
#2
And Gov. Dayton will just appoint an even more socialist person in his place. Saw a post over at PowerLine that names a few candidates.
Stuart Smalley wouldn't be resigning if the Gov. was a 'R'.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
12/07/2017 8:26
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#3
And Gov. Dayton will just appoint an even more socialist person in his place
Please note well those who feverishly want to repeal the 17th Amendment. Senators would represent the 'party' not the state. Modify the election process where each sub political district (county or parish) gets one electoral vote. That would represent the state not a major metro area.
#7
My guess is that Schumer and Pelosi think they can establish a moral equivalence between Franken and Moore. They think their demand for Moore's ouster will have greater force because they were willing to get rid of Franken. One problem with that logic was highlighted by #2 Mullah Richard who notes that Minnesota's governor will appoint an even more radical socialist than Franken to fill the seat while Moore's replacement would most likely be someone who is acceptable to the Deep State. Another problem is that Franken has all but admitted his guilt while Moore continues to issue strong denials of his guilt. That doesn't matter though, because the Deep State is more than willing to abandon the concept of innocent until proven guilty.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
12/07/2017 11:13
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#8
My guess is that Schumer and Pelosi think they can establish a moral equivalence between Franken and Moore
That's exactly why they flipped their support of Franken last week, Abu. Had nothing to do with 'conscience'.
They saw that Moore still had a chance to win and would do anything to spike it somehow.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
12/07/2017 12:10
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#9
Al has just tesigned.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
12/07/2017 12:15
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#10
His speech was defiant and unapologetic. He's an asshole
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/07/2017 12:36
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#11
Per the NYT, he said he would resign "in the coming weeks."
Here's hoping there are a whole lotta weeks coming. As he has always been, Al is such an unmitigated putz that he damages whatever he is affiliated with.
[REUTERS] Large military drills being carried out by the United States and South Korea and U.S. threats of a preemptive war against Pyongyang have made the outbreak of war on the Korean peninsula "an established fact", North Korea’s foreign ministry said.
A front man for the North’s foreign ministry also blamed "confrontational warmongering" remarks by U.S. officials for pushing the peninsula to the brink of war.
"The remaining question now is: when will the war break out?" the front man said late on Wednesday in a statement carried by North Korea’s official KCNA news agency.
"We do not wish for a war but shall not hide from it," he said.
Tensions on the Korean peninsula have risen markedly in recent months after North Korea’s latest missile and nuclear tests, conducted in defiance of international pressure and United Nations ...an organization which on balance has done more bad than good, with the good not done well and the bad done thoroughly... resolutions.
North Korea said last week it had tested its most advanced intercontinental ballistic missile yet, which was capable of reaching the United States.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
Seems like KCNA Guy's been a lot more subdued recently, with the notable absence of the 'sea of fire' and other over the top rhetoric. Can't have anything to do with Trump threatening to kick the shit out of them, can it?
[All Africa] William Masvinu won the Mr Ugly contest on Sunday night. Mr Ugly is an annual contest that seeks to celebrate beauty in ugliness, according to organisers.
Scores of people attended Zim-bob-we's Mr Ugly 2017 to see William Masvinu clinch the title for the third time in five competitions.
Masvinu, who comes from Epworth, edged off competition from four other contestants including close rivals Fanuel Musekiwa and Maison Sere at the braai fest held at Mutangaz Hideout in Goromonzi on Sunday night.
Masvinu walked away with $500 and a cow, with Musekiwa earning $200 and Sere $100 for second and third position respectively.
Masvinu expressed his happiness in winning the title.
"No one can dispute that I am the ugliest person in Zim-bob-we. I now want to take my ugliness outside the country. If there is Mr Ugly World, I am confident I will bring the crown to Zim-bob-we," he said.
Mr Ugly World will be held in South Africa in 2018.
In 2015, Masvinu lost the title to Sere amid complaints that Sere's ugliness was only based on his missing teeth.
"Last time, complacency cosy me a lot but this time I came well prepared for the contest and I am happy I have reclaimed my trophy," he added.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[ARABNEWS] There are fewer than 3,000 ISIS group fighters clinging on in the remnants of its self-styled caliphate in Iraq and Syria, the US-led coalition battling the jihadists said Tuesday.
ISIS is currently fighting for survival in the handful of sparsely populated pockets of territory it still holds, a far cry from the vast swathes of ground it captured in 2014.
"Current estimates are that there are less than 3000 ISIS fighters left ‐ they still remain a threat, but we will continue to support our partner forces to defeat them," coalition front man Ryan Dillon wrote on Twitter.
Iraqi government troops backed up by air strikes from the US-led coalition are pressing an offensive to wipe out the jihadists’ last foothold in the desert.
In Syria ISIS have faced separate onslaughts by forces backed by Russia and the US in Deir Ezzor province and now control just a tiny sliver of the region along the Euphrates river.
The US has already begun winding down its forces deployed to fight ISIS, with the coalition saying at the end of November that more than 400 Marines who helped in the recapture of Syrian city Raqqa were being withdrawn.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Despite the din and bustle of Houthis celebrating the death of former President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh ... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower, but he didn't invite Donna Summer to the inauguration and Blondie couldn't make it... , leader of the General People’s Congress in Yemen, the consequences will not be in favor of the Houthi ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The Yemeni government has accused the Houthis of having ties to the Iranian government, which wouldn't suprise most of us. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is God is Great, Death to America™, Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews ... militias.
Continued on Page 49
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[Jamestown.org] Based on the words of the Russian leadership and the actions of local officials, the country has entered a new stage of confrontation with the West and now has to prepare for looming war. Speaking, on November 22, at a meeting of defense ministry leaders and the heads of defense-sector firms, President Vladimir Putin focused on the theme of "mobilization preparations." Notably, he declared that one of the main goals of the Zapad 2017 military exercises (September 14‐20), which provoked a sharp negative reaction from member states of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), was to check "our mobilization readiness and ability to use local resources to meet troop requirements. Reservists were called up for this exercise, and we also tested the ability of civilian companies to transfer their vehicles and equipment to the armed forces and provide technical protection to transport communications" (Kremlin.ru, November 22).
Until recently, Moscow repeatedly argued that the scale of Zapad 2017 was restricted to participation of only 12,700 Russian troops. Nothing was ever officially mentioned about practicing mass mobilization of reservists; this aspect only featured occasionally, in fragmentary reports. Local press reported, in particular, about mobilization being done in complete secrecy in the Kaliningrad region‐reservists had to sign a non-disclosure agreement (Novyi Kaliningrad, August 30; see EDM, September 18). Some hazy reporting on "mobilization actions" in Kursk region also appeared (Seim, August 18). The call-up of reservists was supposed to replace the need for transferring troops from elsewhere in the country. However, while addressing the defense ministry, Putin noted that these mobilization activities during the Zapad exercise were unsuccessful and will need to be corrected (Kremlin.ru, November 22).
A bit later in his speech, Putin made a second notable announcement: "I want to say that the economic ability to increase the production of defense products and services quickly is a vital element of military security. All strategic and simply large companies, regardless of the type of ownership, must be able to do this" (Kremlin.ru, November 22). Such a policy would imply the government intends to return to the Stalinist-era model of a mobilization economy. In accordance with Joseph Stalin’s industrialization plans, every enterprise producing civilian goods‐even pasta or baby toys‐had to switch to military production quickly during a prewar period.
That mobilization concept allowed the Soviet Union to dramatically raise military production during World War II. But the same concept ultimately played a crucial role in the collapse of the Soviet economy in the 1980s. "Civil" enterprises were forced to create and maintain parallel redundant production lines and hire excessive workforces. Moreover, industry had to unify all main components to suit both military and civilian production. Huge reserves of strategic materials had to be kept stockpiled for industry during wartime. All this created massive imbalances in the economy, and the cost of military production was included in the price of already-produced civilian goods. One of the most important functions of the Gosplan (the Soviet state planning commission) was to artificially balance prices to achieve some semblance of profitability, burdened by the "mobilization task." As a result, in the period before the collapse of the Soviet Union, industry regularly produced thousands of tanks, aircraft and missiles, but the government could no longer pay for these weapons (see EDM, September 29, 2016). Much more at the link.
#5
It is a flying iPhone that is basically a platform for a logistics software that became the tail wagging the dog.
Instead of perfecting its capabilities as a tactical fighter they spent most of their time working on this vast real time maintenance and repair software. Truth be known, the techies forgot what they were supposed to be doing, i.e., they forgot it was an airplane and not a computer.
The development that was directed by the program office spent billions on the logistics software.
I have no doubt that in the right hands, the F-35 can be a fine tactical aircraft.
I just don't like how much money was wasted on software when the aircraft was supposed to be where the money was spent.
#9
Woodrow, the whole "dogfighting" report was due to slanted reporting about some flight tests that weren't supposed to be dogfights in the first place and involved a test airframe where the engine throttle and angle of attack were limited in software. (Facts that were not only left out of the report, but where they tried very hard in the report to imply that this was not the case). Every time I point this out, noone actually replies to me, but they go away and then come back later with the same argument.
If they were being honest, they wouldn't have a need for such tactics.
#10
I'd include links, but I think I lost them in the past year and a half of broken computers and hospital stays. I'm better now, but y'all still shouldn't be trusting wosshisname over at War Is Boring.
#11
It is a semi-stealthy F/A fighter bomber design. So saying it is inferior to an F-16 is akin to that story (Saburo Sakai) about how a Chinese biplane drove a group of Japanese pilots flying Claudes nuts with his aerobatics -- they still shot him down.
It would be more fruitful to argue whether we need more "pure" fighters.
#12
I suspect part of the problem is that software developers are paid bonuses or even just paid (get to keep their jobs) based on how many lines of code they write in some time frame.
I read a while ago that some brass was bragging that there were several million lines of code in some small function on the F-35.
I would rather brag about how few lines of code there is, leading to rapid response.
Most of the code is likely mostly garbage code, written solely for the purpose of meeting some performance goal and doesn't do anything except slow down the function its supposed to do, it just there to take up space.
That may be part of the problem, IMO, the best code is to write as few lines of code as possible to get the job done elegantly.
This is what happens when management gets involved in the design and construction of a project.
#15
And if you've never developed, tested and deployed the kinds of real-time, high performance extensible code that exists in all 3 of those planes, you really, really, really aren't in a position to judge its success.
What you are complaining about is the core concept of that plane, not (primarily) its execution to date.
And yes, I've been involved in such things. And no, I don't have any work of my own in this one to defend.
#16
I have been highly critical of the F-35 and have not been a huge fan until I could see it in action.
Now that it actually has gone force on force with other planes from several countries I am happy to start embracing the fighter. Used in conjunction with our F-22, F-15s and 16s it is a lethal beast. Being able to communicate with pretty much anything we have and being able to transmit a "God on High" to all allied forces, while staying hidden and able to pick targets off on its own is a real game changer.
While far from a perfect weapons platform, it is an almost perfect information sharing platform for a mobile and chaotic air/ground battle space. A true fighter for the information age.
I hope the people that plan and buy equipment learned a lesson in this expensive and painful development and apply it well to the B-21 that is being developed and from the limited info we have heard, they are.
Next step is unmanned fighter swarms with manned aircraft, like the F-35 directing the action.
[ALMASDARNEWS] The Lebanese Army tossed in the calaboose ... anything you say can and will be used against you, whether you say it or not... an infamous member of the so-called 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.... (IS) on Tuesday after receiving a tip from the locals in the Beqa’a Governorate of eastern Leb.
According to military communique, the intelligence branch of the Lebanese Army apprehended Hussam Fawaz Huseiki near the Syrian border on Tuesday morning.
Huseiki is a Syrian national that fought with the Islamic State during their campaigns against the Lebanese Army in mid-2014.
He is also accused of detaining a number of army men during the attack on Arsal Technical Center.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[Daily Mail, Where America Gets Its News] Two men charged over an alleged Islamist plot to blow up the gates of Downing Street and assassinate the Prime Minister have indicated they will deny terror charges.
Naa'imur Zakariyah Rahman, 20, and Mohammed Aqib Imran, 21, were driven into Westminster Magistrates' Court in a security van this morning after being charged with planning terror attacks yesterday.
Investigators suspect the pair wanted to detonate a bomb hidden in a bag in Whitehall before using a boom jacket, pepper spray and knife to attempt to kill Theresa May.
No formal pleas were entered at a court appearance this morning, but magistrates heard the men intend to deny charges when they are brought before the Old Bailey later this month.
Rahman, from north London, is accused of planning to bomb Downing Street's security gates and then attack the Prime Minister in the ensuing chaos.
He was allegedly caught with two IEDs when police swooped in west London last week.
He gave his nationality as Bangladeshi-British and appeared in court wearing a grey tracksuit, with long hair this morning.
He has been charged with preparing acts of terrorism and appeared in court alongside Mohammed Aqib Imran, 21, who is accused of trying to join ISIS.
The security service and police have thwarted 22 terrorist plots in the past four years and there are more than 500 live investigations ongoing.
Police chiefs are struggling to handle more than 3,000 subjects of interest, along with a growing pool of more than 20,000 individuals identified during terrorist inquiries.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
Replaced her tea with no name sugar store no name brand and bulk short bread cookies!
[RADIOSHABELLE] A senior Puntland ...a region in northeastern Somalia, centered on Garowe in the Nugaal province. Its leaders declared the territory an autonomous state in 1998. Puntland and the equally autonomous Somaliland seem to have avoided the clan rivalries and warlordism that have typified the rest of Somalia, which puts both places high on the list for Islamic subversion... Police officer was killed on Wednesday in a boom-mobilekaboom occurred in Galkayo town located in Somalia’s central conflict-torn Mudug region.
Ali Ibrahim Ali, who was in charge of the city’s Police died after an bomb hidden in his car went kaboom! while driving to his workplace in the early morning.
Al-Shabaab ... the Islamic version of the old Somali warlord... has grabbed credit for the car kaboom, according to a statement posted on its affiliated media outlets.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[Breitbart] Jeannie Rhee, another lawyer hand-picked by Special Counsel Robert Mueller to serve on the Russia probe, is coming under scrutiny for her pro-Hillary Clinton bias, after two others were forced to leave the team for the same reason.
Rhee represented Obama Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes during Congress’s investigation of the 2012 Benghazi terrorist attack, while she was an associate at Mueller’s law firm, Wilmer Hale, according to congressional records.
This affiliation, pointed out by Fox News host Laura Ingraham on her show Ingraham Angle Tuesday night, is yet another data point of evidence that Mueller’s team ‐ whose members have donated overwhelmingly to Democrats and Clinton herself ‐ is heavily biased.
"What Mueller did was hire a pedigree team of obvious partisans," Ingraham said. "They should all step aside ... including Bob Mueller."
Rhee also represented the Clinton Foundation against a racketeering lawsuit brought by a conservative legal activist in June 2015, and donated $5,400 to Clinton’s political action committee in 2015 and 2016. She also represented Clinton herself, in a lawsuit seeking access to her private emails, according to CNN.
#1
This very partisan and pro-Hillary team needs to be ended. The counsel was formed based on a lie.
Moreover, illegal "unmasking" was used to justify this counsel. You can't break the law to prosecute the law. No useful purpose has been accomplished in over a year. They have found nothing. The Dems and Rinos don't like the outcome of the election and are trying everything they can to overturn a duly elected Potus. They are trying to nullify our votes.
#2
Indeed JohnQC. This is an attempt at a deep state coup d'etat and classifies as treason and sedition. Trying to remove a sitting president without the appropriate Constitutional methods is nothing less. We should be very afraid of this and fight it to the necessary degree.
They seek to nullify our soapbox and now our ballot box. It might just be time for us to resort to the cartridge box I'm sorry to say.
[LancashireTelegraph] A MAN has appeared in court accused of helping would-be snuffies prepare attacks, including by sharing a photo of Prince George and his school address on social media.
Husnain Rashid, 31, allegedly made the post about the four-year-old prince on messaging app Telegram, along with other posts which allegedly could help others identify UK targets such as stadiums.
Prosecutors at Westminster Magistrates' Court on Wednesday also alleged that he planned to travel to Syria to join 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.... as the Lion of Islam group fights to retain a foothold in the country.
Rashid, who appeared in the dock wearing a grey tracksuit and glasses and spoke only to confirm his name and address, is charged with one count of preparing acts of terrorism and one count of assisting others to prepare acts of terrorism.
The British national, of Leonard Street, Nelson, was jugged Maw! They're comin' to get me, Maw! on Wednesday November 22 by officers from Lancashire Police and Counter Terrorism Policing.
Chief magistrate Emma Arbuthnot remanded balding Rashid, who had a large beard, in jug to appear at the Old Bailey on December 20.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
12/07/2017
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[PRESSTV] Iran has strongly condemned 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... ’s decision to move his country’s embassy in Israel to Jerusalem al-Quds, saying the measure will ignite a new Paleostinian Intifada (uprising).
In a Wednesday night statement, the Iranian Foreign Ministry said Washington’s recognition of Jerusalem al-Quds as Israel’s capital is a "blatant violation of international resolutions."
"The Islamic Theocratic Republic of Iran has always stressed that the most important reason behind instability and insecurity in the Middle East is [Israel’s] continued occupation, the US’ relentless support for the Zionist regime, and denying the oppressed Paleostinian nation the right to establish an independent state with al-Quds as it capital," the statement said.
Describing the US move as "provocative and unwise," the Iranian Foreign Ministry warned that "recognizing al-Quds as the Israeli regime’s capital" will "provoke Moslems and inflame a new Intifada and intensify extremism and violent behavior for which the US and the Israeli regime will be responsible."
The statement also called on the international community to pressure the US not to go through with the embassy move or the recognition of Jerusalem al-Quds as the Israeli regime's capital.
The statement was issued shortly after Trump officially declared the disputed city of Jerusalem al-Quds as Israel's capital, despite warnings from around the world that the measure risks triggering a fresh wave of violence in the Middle East.
In a speech at the White House earlier in the day, Trump said his administration would also begin a years-long process of moving the American embassy in Tel Aviv to the holy city.
The announcement was a major shift by Washington that overturns decades of US foreign policy.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/07/2017
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
A federal judge on Thursday asked Argentina's Senate to allow the arrest of former President Cristina Fernandez on a charge of treason for allegedly covering up the role of Iranians in a 1994 bomb attack on a Jewish center.
[Wash Times] Illegal border crossing tumbled to a 45-year low and interior arrests of illegal immigrants soared in 2017, according to data released Tuesday that showed President Trump’s enforcement crackdown netted tangible results during his first year on the job.
[Ynet] The following is the text of an address made by President Donald Trump announcing the recognition by the United States of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
...Poliomyelitis is a disease caused by infection with the poliovirus. Between 1840 and the 1950s, polio was a worldwide epidemic. Since the development of polio vaccines the disease has been largely wiped out in the civilized world. However, since the vaccine is known to make Moslem pee-pees shrink and renders females sterile, bookish, and unsubmissive it is not widely used by the turban and automatic weapons set...
[FoxNews] The wife of 
... 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...
... the lunatic leader of Boko Haram who has been reported dead at least eleven times, pledged his body and soul to ISIS, told his fighters to hang it up once or twice, and been fired by the Caliph and refused to step down ...
[IsraelTimes] Army says 'a number of battalions' to be deployed, including specialized intelligence units; protesters march in several West Bank cities shuttered by general strike.
...became Prime Minister after the legislative elections of 2006 which Hamas won. President Mahmoud Abbas dismissed Haniyeh from office on 14 June 2007 at the height of the Fatah-Hamas festivities, but Haniyeh did not acknowledge the decree and continues as the PM of Gazoo while Abbas maintains a separate PM in the West Bank...
...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...
...formerly al-Nusra, the current false nose and mustache of al-Qaeda in the Levant, now something else...
...the head of ISIS, or what remains of it, and a veteran of the Abu Graib jailhouse. Looks like a new messiah to bajillions of Moslems, like just another dead-eyed mass murder to the rest of us. So far he has been killed at least four times, though not yet by a stake through the heart...
the personification of Somali state failure...
[MPRNEWS.ORG] A Democratic official who has spoken to Al Franken and key aides says Franken will resign his Minnesota Senate seat on Thursday, the official tells MPR News.
North Korea
[All Africa] William Masvinu won the Mr Ugly contest on Sunday night. Mr Ugly is an annual contest that seeks to celebrate beauty in ugliness, according to organisers.
the Islamic version of the old Somali warlord...
