What do you tell soldiers who are risking their lives on Middle East battlefields about the people they are fighting for and against simultaneously? That's a tough task. And now we have a fascinating picture of how it's done.
"Arab Cultural Awareness" is a 73-page text by the Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence. It's easy to make fun of some things in it. Yet how can one briefly explain a complex, different society riddled with exceptions to soldiers who have other concerns, little knowledge, and no experience with it?
Remember, we're talking about a text whose first section is, "Where is the Arab World?" followed by "What is an Arab?" I think they did a conscientious and honorable job, avoiding prejudice without generally creating a fantasy image, and doing a reasonable job of explaining Islam and social customs.
But here's what makes this text especially interesting to me: It was published in January 2006, after September 11 and the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan made this information vital but before hard-core "Political Correctness" set in to freeze American brains. I'm certain this book couldn't be written today because it is too honest.
#1
What is an Arab warrior? A man from a culture that considers themselves tone great warriors yet prize sneak hit and run tactics and sneaky stuff. A man from a culture whose greatest warrior (Saladin) was actually a Kurd.
#1
FTA: Once the state gets into the business of conferring monopoly power on its favorite wards, the level of discretion it exercises becomes subject to powerful political influences.
That has been, is, and will be a problem in any political organization, whether it's a monarchy, dictatorship, republic, or fraternal organization. It is not a modern problem.
#1
Hope the leader has a good life insurance policy....
Posted by: Barbara ||
03/06/2012 19:17
Comments ||
Top||
#2
Nah, the community doesn't play by those rule. Now his credit rating, bank account, public records are possibly dog chow. He could have securely backed that up with a Carbonite account. Oh, wait, never mind.
A band of tribal elders and militia leaders in Libya declared the country's oil-rich east a semi-autonomous federal region, defying the central government and raising concerns about a possible break-up of the country.
Hundreds of Libyans gathering near the eastern city of Benghazi formally laid out a proposal for the establishment of the federal region of Cyrenaica, the name of one of three Roman provinces that eventually became modern Libya.
The gathering declared Ahmad al-Zubair al-Senussi, a member of Libya's governing National Transitional Council and the great-nephew of the country's last king, head of a governing council of a region that encompasses all of Libya from the Gulf of Sirte to the Egyptian border
"Also known as Pentapolis in antiquity, it was part of the Creta et Cyrenaica province during the Roman period, later divided in Libia Pentapolis and Libia Sicca. During the Islamic period, the area came to be known as Barqa, after the city of Barca.
#2
From 1927 to 1943 it was known as Italian Libya.
Now it's starting to make sense. They probably think of themselves as having somewhat more European tastes and sensibilities. This is common in northern Africa.
In those days they probably became quite fond of things Italian.
Posted by: Barbara ||
03/06/2012 19:13
Comments ||
Top||
#4
Whatever they call themselves, they see themselves as being different, and a different nation, than Tripolitania (the western half of Libya). This will be a test of the new world order.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/06/2012 19:46
Comments ||
Top||
#5
I can live with the division, we might even see the old Libyan royal family make a comeback in an Italian sort of royal family way: there to have palaces and grand parties, and to promote tourism. That part of Libya has the best Roman ruins and historic sites in it, anyway.
An official of Saudi Embassy in Dhaka was shot dead some 30 yards off his house in Gulshan area of the capital early Tuesday. Khalaf Al Ali, a Saudi national who joined the embassy about two years ago, was shot once in the left chest, Nurul Alam, assistant commissioner (Patrol) of Gulshan Division, told The Daily Star.
Saudi Ambassador to Bangladesh Dr Abdullah Al Bussairy identified the slain officer as a diplomat. But acting Foreign Secretary Mustafa Kamal said al Ali was on the non-diplomats' list of the foreign ministry.
This is for the first time in Bangladesh's history that a foreign embassy official in Dhaka was killed.
Julfiker Ali, a security guard of House 19/B, and Rabiul Islam, a security guard of House 20/A, told The Daily Star that they heard a gunshot around 1:15am and rushed out to see the Saudi official lying on the road in front of House 19/B.
"We immediately rang siren from our house," Julfikar said.
Hearing the siren, a patrol team of police rushed to the spot and took the bullet-hit Saudi official to United Hospital where doctors declared him dead.
#1
Tennessees Middle District, Ed Yarbrough, told the newspaper that Somalis have a cultural thing about testifying against each other.... Thats what Ive been told.
Shocking, shocking I tell you! I for one demand Ed Yarbough APOLOGIZE immediately for that obviously racist comment!
#5
It will be very interesting to see what penalties they are facing, along with witness tampering and intimidation, which is the only one mentioned.
Of the 30 arrested, it is also important to note, none of them have turned to testify against the others, as they are believed to be members of the same gangs.
If the government wants to, it can utterly nuke them. Federal anti-slavery, racketeering, RICO criminal, and there are even state charges for slavery which in many cases are more severe than the federal charges.
#7
There's a few towns in Tennessee you can move the trial to and never hear about this group again. They certainly would never trouble anyone for sure.
Posted by: Silentbrick - Halliburton Lost Drill Bit Division ||
03/06/2012 22:10
Comments ||
Top||
The body of Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden was not buried at sea, according to leaked emails of intelligence firm Stratfor, as revealed by WikiLeaks.
Stratfors vice-president for intelligence, Fred Burton, believes the body was bound for Dover, [Delaware] on [a] CIA plane and then onward to the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology in Bethesda [Maryland], an email says.
#4
This actually strikes me as more realistic. A sea burial is just too simple, old-fashioned, clean. We don't do that anymore. I'm sure there would be a point to an autopsy - but what? Sure, to confirm that it was really OBL and not a double, but to whom would the evidence mean anything? The good guys trust the SEALs who whacked him, and the bad guys will believe whatever they want.
#5
this was a "belief" by some Stratfor source, not a fact. It will, however, get some good guys killed by the seething rage of the 7th century subhumans
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/06/2012 11:05
Comments ||
Top||
#6
Coming soon to a theater near you. "The Takedown"
Real bullets, real helo-crashes, real SEALS, real Al-Qaeda, real Osama Bin Laden.
#14
Instead we get contardictory tales of his death (hid behind his wife/died heroically) and now about his burial (at sea/not at sea) guaranteed to spark the legend.
Posted by: Barbara ||
03/06/2012 16:06
Comments ||
Top||
#16
They wanna find out if he had AIDS.
No. They wanna find out if it's the same strain as Arafat's. Also to determine who was the top and who was the bottom, and who said "I love you" first.
#18
I think his death should not have been announced. Think of the knot that would have put in the Pakistanis' turbans.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
03/06/2012 18:43
Comments ||
Top||
#19
No, the "leaked" information said that a Stratfor member suspected that Osama had not been buried at sea, etc.
It's a Debka hypothesis, with extra salt.
Don't hitch your wagon to this one.
The businessman who blew £203,948 on bubbly in a single night as he entertained celebrity guests at a top hotel was a 23-year-old City whizkid.
Young financier Alex Hope splashed out £125,000 alone on a giant bottle of one of the worlds most exclusive champagnes.
He also popped the cork on lots more vintage fizz for guests including Manchester City footballers Joe Hart and Adam Johnson and Man United star Wayne Rooneys wife Coleen.
He flashed the cash at the Playground Club in Liverpools Hilton Hotel, which is owned by wealthy pal George Panayitou.
#1
Heh, I've been around money-splashers in China before. Everyone crowds around and takes the free drinks, all the while thinking "what a jerk" but it's all smiles when the host comes by.
Bashar is still far short of what his father Hafez achieved thirty years ago this month in Hama; but he is making valiant efforts to catch up. It is sobering to think that Rabin almost gave up the Golan Heights to Syria.
Thirty years ago this month, the decades-long conflict between the Muslim Brotherhood and the Syrian Army reached its climax. The city of Hama, the third-largest city in Syria, had long been a stronghold of the Muslim Brotherhood which, as Sunnis, had historically regarded the Alawites as heretics, little better than Jews or Christians.
When the Alawite Hafez al-Assad took control of Syria in 1970 and his Alawite cronies instituted a brutal dictatorship, the Sunni majority was viciously repressed, and the Muslim Brotherhood -- the only organisation that dared to challenge Alawite tyranny -- became the heroes of the general population.
International hacker group Anonymous released a video this week coinciding with the annual America Israel Political Action Committee Policy Conference in Washington, vowing to make AIPAC "pay for their crimes."
Anonymous is a loosely organized group of hackers that released a similar YouTube video last month, vowing to launch an internet crusade against Israel, who it accused of committing "crimes against humanity." The group was also allegedly behind the stealing of millions of emails from the US-based global security analysis firm, Startfor, which were published by whistleblower website WikiLeaks in February.
Pakistani authorities on Tuesday posted a summons demanding that former military ruler Pervez Musharraf return from exile and appear before the country's top court on March 22.
The notice was glued to the gate of Musharraf's farm house on the outskirts of Islamabad after he failed to respond to repeated calls to appear over the December 27, 2007 murder of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto.
Musharraf, who has lived in self-imposed exile in London and Dubai since stepping down in 2008, delayed plans to return home this year indefinitely after the government warned he would be arrested upon arrival.
"Yes, I can confirm that a notice has been pasted on the main gate of Musharraf's farm house," Sheikh Naeem, a senior police official, told AFP.
The notice asks Musharraf to appear in the Supreme Court on March 22 with documents proving his identity as a Pakistani citizen.
Bhutto was killed in a gun and suicide attack after an election rally in Rawalpindi, the headquarters of Pakistan's army. Her party won elections two months later and her widower, Asif Ali Zardari, is president of Pakistan.
Had he been speaking Hebrew in a dramatic TV broadcast back home, parts of Benjamin Netanyahus fire-and-brimstone speech Tuesday night might have been mistaken for the words of an Israeli prime minister about to launch a fateful war. He painted Irans nuclear program as an apocalyptic extermination threat redolent of the Nazi Holocaust, stressed Israels power and responsibility to prevent a repeat of the greatest trauma in Jewish history, and vowed that As Prime Minister of Israel, I will never let my people live under the shadow of annihilation.
But Netanyahu was speaking in English, to the America Israel Public Affairs Committees annual policy conference in Washington D.C. a forum whose raison detre is to leverage Israels cause in U.S. domestic politics. His purpose there was clearly to rally his considerable bipartisan support on Capitol Hill and beyond to maintain pressure on the Obama Administration to move closer to Israels red lines, timelines and perspective for action to stop Irans nuclear program. For now, however, the Administration has resisted his pressure.
Weve waited for diplomacy to work, he told the assembled Israel partisans at AIPAC, which included three quarters of members of Congress. Weve waited for sanctions to work. None of us can afford to wait much longer.
#1
Over at FREEREPUBLIC, Dave Cameron says Iran is working on both NucBombs, + reliable LRBMS = ICBMS to deliver 'em, but also urges Israel to give sanctions a chance.
E.g. pre, post-911 support for Radical Islamism widin both the Pakistan Govt. + Armed Forces; + historical support given to Militant-Terror Groups by Muslim Govts. during the Cold War. WHAT MAKES POLITICOS, ETAL. IN THE US-WEST THINK THAT RADICAL ISLAMIST MILTERR GROUPS WILL NOT DIRECTLY ANDOR INDIRECTLY CONTROL NUCLEAR ARSENALS [Nukes-WMDS]???
Moreso per the Globalist precept of a DIVERSE, EQUALIST "MULTIPOLAR" WORLD UNDER OWG-NWO, which in the minds of many Muslims, Islamists, + even non-Muslim/Islamist Third Worlders means or infers that its okay in the US-West for them to have potent NucWeapons???
The United States ambassador to Spain recently met with a group of Muslim immigrants in one of the most Islamized neighborhoods of Barcelona to apologize for American foreign policymaking in the Middle East.
U.S. Ambassador Alan Solomont told Muslims assembled at the town hall-like meeting in the heart of Barcelonas old city that the United States is not an enemy of Islam and that U.S. President Barack Obama wants to improve Americas image in the Middle East as quickly as possible by closing the dark chapters of the U.S. invasion of Iraq and the war in Afghanistan.
There are things that the United States has done badly, Solomont said at the February 28 gathering organized by a non-profit organization called the Cultural, Educational and Social Association of Pakistani Women. But now the Obama government wants to improve relations with Muslims, he promised.
During the one-and-a-half-hour question-and-answer session, Solomont asked those in attendance simple rhetorical questions, including: Did you know that the United States sends a lot of money to Pakistan? and Did you know that the decision to destroy Osama bin Ladens house was made by the United States?
After responding to queries about the Talibanization of Pakistan due the war in Afghanistan and the demonization of Islam in the West, Solomont said Obama wants to end the long-time American practice of establishing alliances with dictators in the Middle East, a strategy which he said has failed to prevent the rise of the bearded ones [radical Islamists], this according to the Barcelona-based newspaper La Vanguardia, which also interviewed Solomont on the sidelines of the event.
#2
Gruth----because direction comes from the top of the food chain.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
03/06/2012 10:30
Comments ||
Top||
#3
From Wik with line through addies.
Yet another "moderate Islam" apologist and Russian surrender monkey person.
Alan D. Solomont (Boston, 1949[citation needed]) is the current United States Ambassador to Spain and Andorra. Selected by President Barack Obama, he was confirmed by the United States Senate on December 24, 2009. And patted on the back repeatedly by a fawning elderly long-term care advocate Nancy Pelosi.
Active for many years in the Democratic Party, Solomont served as money changer National Finance Chairman of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) in 1997, raising over $40 million which qualified him for ambassadorial appointment. In 2000, he was appointed by President Clinton to the Board of Directors of the Corporation for National and Community Organizing Service, which oversees three national service initiatives: AmeriCorps, the National Senior Service Reverse Mortgage Corps and Learn & Serve America.
Alan Solomont serves as a Jewish community organizer on the boards of numerous organizations including the Boston Private Bank & Trust Company, Angel Healthcare Investors, LLC, Boston Medical Center, The Jewish Fund for Justice, The New Israel Fund, Israel Policy Forum, Jewish Community Housing for the Elderly, and the WGBH Educational Foundation. He chairs the Board of Combined Jewish Philanthropies of Greater Boston. He received an honorary degree from the University of Massachusetts Lowell.
Alan earned a B.A. from Tufts University in 1970.[1] He pursued independent studies abroad as a Thomas J. Watson Fellow and later earned a B.S. in Nursing Homes from the University of Massachusetts Lowell. He was elected to the Tufts Board of Trustees in 1999.
Background of company.
A lawsuit alleges that members of a prominent Tijuana family are "defraud[ing]" American military personnel going to and from the wars in Afghanistan.
During the past four years, roughly 800,000 members of the American military have passed through the airport in Leipzig , Germany--a popular refueling stop for soldiers going to and from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Members of the armed forces who want to call home can use a pay phone service in the airport's secure military lounge. But those calls may have been costing the service members dearly: according to a recent class-action lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Waco, Texas, the Switzerland-based company that runs the pay phone service--and its sister firm in California--have been "rigg[ing]" the phones to sometimes charge more than $40 for a call lasting mere seconds.
#2
I think I know this company. A phone call from Bellingham to Lynnwood WA (about 50 miles) for about 30 seconds cost about $40. Pissed me off so much I lodged a complaint with the FCC. Their claim was that I accepted the charges w/o question (it was automated - no option to ask about the charges). They ended up dropping the charges.
#2
Debka.com argues that the Parchin site has been already cleaned of all incriminating evidence of military nuke development for almost ten days before they agreed to allow inspectors in there.
For good reasons I tend to believe Debka on this.
Posted by: Elder of Zion ||
03/06/2012 12:40
Comments ||
Top||
#2
The Ritters, who bought their house for $1.29 million with almost no money down, are hardly representative of the vast majority of Marylands distressed homeowners.
One person died and seven others were wounded after a bomb exploded near a busy market in Tak Bai district, in Narathiwat province yesterday. The bomb tore through a roadside shelter where a 12-man patrol was resting about 10:30 a.m.
The blast seriously injured Sanadi Doloh, who later died in Narathiwat hospital. The bomb also injured four soldiers including the patrol commander and three civilians, one of whom was Malaysian.
Police investigators said the bomb was placed on the roof of the shelter and detonated by remote control.
In Pattani, two men were gunned down near Baan Khao Din. The gunmen planted fake bombs on the road leading to the crime scene to help their getaway. After giving the all clear, police found the bodies of two men, later identified as Suan Chansri and Somnuek Somdaeng, in a pickup truck. Police suspect the incident is related to the ongoing jihad insurgency.
Andrew was a delightful, thoughtful, mile-a-minute guy who didn't harm anyone.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/06/2012 7:46
Comments ||
Top||
#3
he did discomfort those who would lie cheat and steal for political power on the left: Acorn, Democrats, Obama,....
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/06/2012 8:02
Comments ||
Top||
#4
While waiting for lunch and the Running Chef on a demo range many years ago, the old NCO instructor lapsed into a short Latin American Mobile Training Team (MTT) story. If the old hombre's recollections are accurate and I suspect they were, Dr. White's comment is correct. The NCO said he still had a pocket ripped form Che's fatigues or shirt, I cannot recall which, as a souvenier.
#5
Breitbart gave everybody a start. Dollard, huffpo, crowder, everybody. He was the real deal and had been on both sides of the tracks. Sorely missed he shall be.
#2
A martyr (Greek: μάρτυς, mártys, "witness"; stem μάρτυρ-, mártyr-) is somebody who suffers persecution and death for refusing to renounce, or accept, a belief or cause, usually religious.
In its original meaning, the word martyr, meaning witness, was used in the secular sphere as well as in the New Testament of the Bible.[1] The process of bearing witness was not intended to lead to the death of the witness, although it is known from ancient writers (e.g. Josephus) and from the New Testament that witnesses often died for their testimonies.
During the early Christian centuries, the term acquired the extended meaning of a believer who is called to witness for their religious belief, and on account of this witness, endures suffering and/or death. The term, in this later sense, entered the English language as a loanword. The death of a martyr or the value attributed to it is called martyrdom.
The early Christians who first began to use the term martyr in its new sense saw Jesus as the first and greatest martyr, on account of his crucifixion.[2][3][4] The early Christians appear to have seen Jesus as the archetypical martyr.[5]
So the nasty Assad killed them just because they wanted to be Christians. Isn't that nice?
But Islam says apostates should be put to death. So as Christians they go to heaven but as Muslims they go to hell.
Just hope St Peter can work all this out. But it looks like no self renewing virgins for them either way.
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/06/2012 11:00
Comments ||
Top||
#4
See BHARAT RAKSHAK > BRITAIN [+ West] TOO CAUTIOUS [guarded] IN ARMING SYRIAN REBELS, SAYS EXILED OPPOSITION LEADER [Burhan Balioun].
Too slow + not enuff.
versus
* TOPIX > [Russia Today] STRATFOR LEAKS: NATO COMMANDERS IN ALLEGED SPECIAL OPS IN SYRIA, conducting Recce Missions + advising, training the anti-Assad Opposition.
* IIRC SAME > CAN ASSAD DEFEAT THE SYRIAN REBELS/UPRISING - YES, HE CAN!?
#5
OOOOPPPSIES, forgot NEWSMAX > LIGNET: FIVE REASONS WE WON'T BOMB SYRIA.
Aka the Russian Mediterranean Fleet based in Tartarus [ + expanding] has absolutely positively categorically undeniably .... @etc. nuthin to do wid anything!
Social Affairs Minister Wael Abou Faour said around 2,000 people entered from Syria into Leb on Sunday, escaping the deadly crackdown by the regime of Syrian Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Leveler of Latakia... on protestors.
"Around 2,000 people entered Lebanese territories yesterday. Ten percent are families while the rest are youth," Abou Faour told An Nahar daily published Monday.
"This will lead to some confusion in dealing with them," he said.
Abou Faour stressed that his ministry can't take care of the refugees unless they move from the Bekaa valley to northern Leb because the cabinet hasn't tasked it with providing assistance to them in the East.
A large number of the refugees will return as soon as the security situation in their towns and villages improves, he said.
There are now over 7,000 Syrian refugees registered with the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees and the Higher Relief Council in northern Leb.
The movement of refugees came as the Lebanese army set to sit in solemn silence in a dull, dark dock, in a pestilential prison with a life-long lock a group of Syrian gunnies who had entered Leb through the border town of al-Qaa and seized a large cache of weapons.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[6 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
#1
"This will lead to some confusion in dealing with them,"
Laughing hystericly.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
03/06/2012 2:09
Comments ||
Top||
[An Nahar] The Arab League ...an organization of Arabic-speaking states with 22 member countries and four observers. The League tries to achieve Arab consensus on issues, which usually leaves them doing nothing but a bit of grimacing and mustache cursing... on Monday named Paleostinian diplomat Nasser al-Qudwa to serve as former UN chief Kofi Annan's deputy in his role as international envoy to conflict-stricken Syria.
Arab League chief Nabil al-Arabi said that Qudwa, a former foreign minister, had agreed to take on "this very difficult mission during a critical time for Syria."
Qudwa was selected in consultation with U.N. chief the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon ... of whom it can be said to his credit that he is not Kofi Annan... and Annan, who was named international troubleshooter to Syria on February 23, Arabi said in a statement.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[6 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
EL-ARISH, Egypt: Egyptian security officials say militants have again blown up a gas pipeline in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula that transports fuel to neighboring Israel. The attack on the pipeline is the 12th since the popular uprising that ousted longtime Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak last year. Another source sez 13, but who's counting?
Police officials said gunmen attacked the pipeline in the north Sinai city of el-Arish on Monday. There were no details on the extent of damage. Previous explosions have shut down gas flow for days or weeks.
Previous bombings of the pipeline have been blamed on Islamist militants who have stepped up activity in the Sinai, taking advantage of a security vacuum caused by a thin police presence in the post-Mubarak era.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
That'll have as much effect as the words of American intellectuals...
Opposition is growing within China against the forced repatriation of North Korean defectors who were arrested there, with columnists, novelists and other intellectuals posting comments on the social media criticizing Beijing's policy.
They called on the Chinese government to deal with the North Korean defectors under humanitarian principles.
Some comments on Weibo, the Chinese version of Twitter, directly criticized Beijing. One survey on the site conducted by a user in Shanghai showed that 75 percent of respondents were against sending the North Koreans back.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
[An Nahar] The hunt was on Monday for a penguin that scaled a prehistoric cliff sheer rock face to escape from a Tokyo zoo, and was last seen swimming in a river in the Japanese capital.
The one-year-old Humboldt penguin was snapped bathing in the mouth of the Old Edogawa River, which runs into Tokyo Bay, after fleeing its home in the east of the city in an echo of the hit animated film Madagascar.
Takashi Sugino, an official at Tokyo Sea Life Park, said the 60-centimeter bird appeared to have got itself over a rock wall twice its size and made a run for it.
"We first noticed the penguin might have decamped when the director of a neighboring zoo e-mailed us Sunday, with a photo," said Sugino.
A second picture provided by a visitor allowed keepers to identify the errant bird as one that hatched last January.
Sugino said it was not entirely clear how the creature had managed to get out of the enclosure it shares with 134 other Humboldt penguins.
"Of course it can't fly,
Oh no, of course not, perish the thought...
... and yer damned lucky it can't...
but sometimes wildlife has an 'explosive' power when frightened by something. It's all that fish. Gives me gas, too.
Maybe it ran up the rock after being surprised," he said.
In the 2005 computer animated film Madagascar, penguins are among a group of animals that mount an escape as they are being transported.
Zoo officials were Monday scouring the area where the Tokyo penguin was last spotted in the hope of recapturing it.
"It's a bit of a struggle to catch it when it is swimming, because it swims at a tremendous speed," Sugino said. "We are hoping to catch it when it climbs up on land to sleep."
Did you check Antarctica?
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[6 views]
Top|| File under:
[An Nahar] An official history of the Australian military in the Vietnam War says alcohol abuse was a significant problem for troops who at times were supplied with the equivalent of more than five cans of beer per soldier daily. Five cans of beer? Breakfast, lunch, tea time, dinner and a midnight snack. Wossamotta dat?... Oh. I see. It was only "at times."
Some Australian commanders regarded beer as a lesser evil than the illicit heroin and marijuana gaining popularity with allied U.S. troops fighting in the conflict. Beer=a lesser evil than heroin addiction. Really.
That's according to the third and final volume of the official history of the Australian Army in Vietnam. It will be published Tuesday. Probably to gales of laughter within Australian vets' circles...
Australian troops were barred from drinking during combat operations. We were all barred from drinking during combat operations. Which isn't to say it didn't happen...
But binge drinking was a popular form of relaxation when troops returned to bases at Nui Dat and Vung Tau. Define "binge."
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
#3
Vietnam is a bit of a trap. Nothing like sitting on the wide, French themed footpaths of New Cholon in Ho Chi Minh city and drinking Heineken at 80c a bottle and being waited upon by beautiful ao dai clad waitresses.
#4
My father's division was originally assigned to the Canadian Corps when they went into the line in Holland, which was part of Montgomery's army. My dad met a lot of Brits and Imperial troops. Respected them greatly.
A US sergeant was reputed to have said his ideal replacement was a hung over Aussie with the clap and an empty rifle.
But drink? Are we all shocked?
Posted by: Richard Aubrey ||
03/06/2012 7:46
Comments ||
Top||
#5
If the troops (and contractors) could have had a beer ration in Iraq and Afghanistan and could let off a little steam, laugh a bit, perhaps the suicide rate might have been lower. I'd appreciate Dr. White's comments on this.
#11
Many of us have fond memories of Carling. It would sit on the dock for months before finally being distributed. When opened it could be drunk from the can for one of the most unique beer flavors ever invented. Or you could pour it into a glass and watch the oil puddle on top, where the foam was supposed to be.
Truly a taste treat that couldn't be beat.
But the Vietnamese beer gold standard was "33" (ba muoi ba) drunk over ice. It didn't get any better than that.
Really.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012 16:19
Comments ||
Top||
#12
Aussie beer cans are only coke-can sized! 5 would be a light warm-up for the stronger stuff. 5+ pints of "stella" and a few chasers might make it a night.
#13
I'm not sure about the 'Nam Era Aussie peasant swill, but the "33" on a bottle of "Rolling Rock" from Latrobe, PA, signified the year that Prohibition was repealed; 1933. They had such an acute awareness of where they stood in US history in those days. I adored at least being perched on the buffeting trailing edge of that sublime airfoil, just prior to the electronic desensitization of human-kind. Everything sucks now.
[An Nahar] Top Republican Senator John Maverick McCain ... the Senator-for-Life from Arizona, former presidential candidate and even more former foot soldier in the Reagan Revolution... on Monday called for U.S. air strikes on Syrian forces to protect population centers and create safe havens for opponents of the regime.
McCain, who lost to President Barack Obama This is a teachable moment... in the 2008 election, said while the White House "deserves a lot of credit" for helping to build global efforts to isolate Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Before going into the family business Pencilneck was an eye doctor... , it was time for a "new policy."
The speech by McCain came as Syrian forces bombarded the city of Rastan, pursuing a deadly crackdown on anti-regime protesters that erupted a year ago, and which the United Nations ...an organization which on balance has done more bad than good, with the good not done well and the bad done thoroughly... says has claimed more than 7,5 00 lives.
"Time is running out," McCain -- a hawk on both Syria and Iran -- said in remarks on the floor of the Senate.
"Providing military assistance to the Free Syrian Army and other opposition groups is necessary, but at this late hour, that alone will not be sufficient to stop the slaughter and save innocent lives," he said.
"The only realistic way to do so is with foreign air power," he said, urging the United States to join with Arab countries, as well as willing partners in the European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... and NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. It's headquartered in Belgium. That sez it all.... , especially Syria's neighbor Turkey.
At the request of the Syrian opposition, McCain said, "the United States should lead an international effort to protect key population centers in Syria, especially in the north, through air strikes on Assad's forces."
"To be clear: This will require the United States to suppress enemy air defenses in at least part of the country."
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[7 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
#2
Sorry, I'm not convinced. More evidence is indeedn needed. Senator, hands-on fellow that you are, I suggest you fly a solo test flour bag bombing sortie, and then get back to us with your post mission report and analysis.
#3
That McCain file photo cracks me up every time I see it.
Don't offer him the chance to do another bombing run, Besoeker, he might take you up on it, bad arm and all.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
03/06/2012 12:24
Comments ||
Top||
#4
Sure let's bomb anyone we think is nasty. I'll agree to bombing Syria right after you start bombing China to protect the Uighers and Tibetans. Also we need to bomb most of Africa on that basis...and Saudi Arabia and Belarus and Turkey to protect the PKK.
#6
McCain is off his nut. No way we should get within 100 miles of Syria. It is bad now and is going to be worse when Assad is overthrown. This kind of talk is also not going to be helpful to the Republican nominee.
#8
No way to bombing Syria - Predators with Hellfires and Javelins doing selective strikes on Syrian artillery and armor is a different story, however. If a Predator is shot down, it is just some money lost; no freaking way to sending manned aircraft in to do a drone's job.
[Tripoli Post] The Libyan interim government strongly condemned the actions by unidentified persons that resulted on the desecration of tombstones of foreign WWII soldiers who fallen in Libya including British and Americans.
A statement issued last week by the government said "the government condemns in the strongest and abhors the attack directed at non-Moslem graves of British and Italians in the city of Benghazi, by subversive elements who do not respect religion, custom and international law."
"This action is contrary to the values of our Islamic religion and the principles of Shariah, which are based on the love of human beings of each other and on the respect of man's dignity live or dead or alive, such action is considered immoral and irresponsible by the government," the statement added.
The government pledged to bring the perpetrators to trial in accordance with Libyan law which criminalizes these acts.
The government reassures that such acts do not reflect the Libyan people's beliefs or their aspirations. These acts, the statement said, were in to the values of tolerance and respect of others in which the Libyans believe.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[1 views]
Top|| File under: Arab Spring
#2
Why I plan on cremation and scattering the ashes on my land.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
03/06/2012 1:59
Comments ||
Top||
#3
The Libyan interim government strongly condemned the actions by unidentified persons
Here's a video of the perps that should mean that you will have no trouble tracking them down,
While your about it you might check out the other desecrations as well.
We'll see that the funds that the stupid kuffars send you do nor dry up.
You're welcome!
#5
What other religion teaches hatred of non believers?
Oh, maybe The Left(tm), as its agents and adherents had no problem defacing similar cemeteries in France around April 2003. For them, there is only one true god, themselves.
[Dawn] The issue of disenfranchisement of women once again surfaced during the by-elections in several constituencies on Feb 25.
According to media reports, women were barred from voting in some areas of Mardan and Mianwali through agreements reached on local level between representatives of different political groups. The Free and Fair Election Network (Fafen) in its initial report stated that its observers had reported incidents of bar on women voting in NA-9 (Mardan) and PP-44 (Mianwali II) constituencies.
It also called upon the Election Commission to withhold results in the constituencies where women were barred from voting.
This issue often comes to limelight in every general and by-elections in different constituencies especially that of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa ... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central... and Federally Administered Tribal Areas.
So far successive governments have not taken any steps for proper legislation to check such practices. Whether it is local or general elections the practice of holding jirgas and barring women from casting votes remains a regular phenomenon.
Presently, there is no specific provision in the Representation of People's Act (RPA), 1976, dealing with the issue of disenfranchisement of women.
There are few indirect provisions which could be used for tackling this matter. Under Section 78 (2) of the RPA it amounts to corrupt practices if a person is found guilty of exercising undue influence.
Similarly, Section 81 (1) provides that a person is guilty of undue influence if he induces or compels any person to vote or refrain from voting. The RPA states that any person guilty of corrupt practice shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend up to three years or with fine or both.
In 2004 the Beautiful Downtown Peshawar High Court pronounced that the practice of barring women from voting was unconstitutional. The court in four identical petitions had declared that barring women from political participation was against the fundamental rights, illegal and criminal.
The petitions pertained to disenfranchisement of women from the local government elections in different districts, especially Swabi.
Though the high court had dismissed the four petitions on March 17, 2004, on constitutional technicalities regarding its jurisdiction, it had clearly pronounced the practice as unconstitutional.
The petitions were filed by Ms Bakht Zarina and others in various union councils during local government elections of 2001.
The high court's bench comprising Justice Shahjehan Khan and Justice Ejaz Afzal had ruled that every citizen who was registered as a voter regardless of gender has a right to exercise their vote.
The court had observed that all such means and devices were repugnant to fundamental rights enshrined in the Constitution, void, illegal and even criminal. A former attorney general for Pakistain Qazi Mohammad Jamil had represented the petitioners in those cases.
"There was no cavil with the preposition that every citizen of the country has a right to form or be a member of political party as enshrined in Article 17(2) of the Constitution, which included the right to contest and participate in election.
There is also no cavil with the preposition that every citizen who is registered as a voter regardless altogether of gender has right to exercise his or her vote," the bench had observed.
The court had ruled: "There is also no cavil with the proposition that this right being inherent in every registered voter can be exercised by him or her alone and thus cannot be forgone and forsaken by an agreement entered into by any person how high-so-ever he may be, therefore, no means or devices including threats of dire consequences or agreements amongst the candidates for election to an office can curb, curtail or fetter it."
It had ruled that employment of such means by any person irrespective of his status and stature in the society would be illegal and punishable under the law.
A Berlin-based organization, Democracy Reporting International (DRI), has last year compiled a report "No Voice: the exclusion of women from voting" in which the issue was discussed and several recommendations were made for checking it.
The DRI proposed that the law could explicitly require the ECP to annul polling station and entire constituency results where there was evidence that attempts had been made to dissuade women from participating. It recommends that the law could explicitly provide for tribunals to disqualify a returned candidate if there is evidence that the candidate or their election agent or any other person with their connivance participated in preventing, or attempted to prevent women from voting.
The organization further suggests that the law could state that where female turnout is below a certain percentage, election results will be annulled. Similarly, it is added that the provinces could review their legislative frameworks for local government elections to consider incorporating similar measures in their respective drafting and reform processes.
Legal experts believe that parliament should legislate on this women-specific issue. Moreover, the role of ECP and civil society groups is also important in creating awareness among people of those areas where women are normally barred from casting vote.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[5 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
#1
Old Joke
Lord why did you make women so beautiful,
Ans, So you would love them.
Lord why did you mane them so stupid,
Ams, So they woukd love you.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
03/06/2012 10:57
Comments ||
Top||
RIYADH: Saudi Arabia yesterday urged the UN Security Council to shoulder its moral responsibility toward ending the bloodbath in Syria, being perpetrated by the regime of Bashar Assad. The Kingdom appealed to the UN to take immediate steps to provide medical and humanitarian assistance to civilian victims.
The Council of Ministers, chaired by Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah, also welcomed the UN decision to hold a humanitarian forum in Geneva on Thursday to estimate the relief requirements of the Syrian people.
The council reiterated its call for the Security Council to exercise its legitimate role and shoulder its moral responsibility by taking initiative to call for an end to violence and put an end to the killing of Syrian people, Culture and Information Minister Abdul Aziz Khoja said.
Shoura Council Chairman Dr. Abdullah Al-Asheikh, meanwhile, told a conference of Arab parliamentarians in Kuwait City yesterday that Saudi Arabia was following the situation in Syria with deep concern as a result of growing violence in the country.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[10 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
That's what we do, isn't it? Fight wars for Arabs?
#2
Actually, the Saudis have the money and the contacts to cost Assad Syria if they choose to get involved. This is not about the Arabs he is slaughtering in Syria, this is about him being a solely owned and operated subsidiary of Iran and the Shite Ayatollahs.
[Las Vegas Inc] Like a gunfighter with no bullets, Las Vegas copyright company Righthaven LLC no longer has any copyrights to sue over.
A federal judge in Las Vegas on Monday stripped Righthaven of whatever interests it has in its 278 federal copyright registrations as well as its trademark. Judge Philip Pro ordered that the copyrights and trademarks be transferred to a court-appointed receiver so they can be auctioned to cover some of Righthaven's debts.
Most of the copyrights to be transferred under Pro's order of Monday cover material assigned to Righthaven for lawsuit purposes by the Review-Journal and the Denver Post. Some exceptions include some sports betting material that Righthaven used in its single lawsuit that didn't involve newspaper material.
Other exceptions include two porn movies -- Ebony Amateurs Vegas Edition #10 and Ebony Princess #3 -- and a document called "The Righthaven Philosophy" that apparently spells out the company's failed plan to make money by suing over copyright infringements.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[1 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Good. It was politically charged frivolous campaigning that was hurting good people.
#4
They know that the average American can't afford to go to Motions courts every couple of weeks, so they proffer five figure settlements, regardless of the merit of their original claims. Yah, they leverage something for nothing.
Vexatious purpose? They could drag out that issue for years. Bar associations are supposed to prevent violations of "profession ethics."
Solution? Legislative remedy requiring impartial and objective bar association investigations where a target claims bankruptcy harassment.
FYI motions (or chambers) hearings are conducted during daytime, Monday to Friday. So most targets have to seek time off work. Without reference to this mass derogation of procedural rights, a criminal organization could run a racket using similar tactics.
I once counted 42 chambers applications contested in a single case. Fees may vary, but these usually cost $500 to $1000 for court time, then there is affidavit fees, lawyars fees (sometimes for all parties), motions fees. Yah, trivial matters can incur several thousands in costs. Then there is interlocatory appeals, which could go to SCOTUS.
Your legislators need to know that there will be political costs if they permit quasi-extortion, in the name of justice.
You could fit the number of honest lawyers in a phone booth.
#5
Way too many occupations use the term 'profession' instead of accreditation. A real profession has an active mechanism of 'house cleaning' that has a discernible amount of turn-over and doesn't require outside prodding to act.
Posted by: Barbara ||
03/06/2012 19:20
Comments ||
Top||
#8
strip these bastards of their law license and bar them from practicing . Every cent I contributed to you Fred was to keep the site running. You did that. Even if we don't get our money back, I don't regret one bit of it
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/06/2012 20:22
Comments ||
Top||
[Dawn] The incidents of kidnapping for ransom and other heinous crimes in 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... have been increased; DawnNews reports on Monday that in the past three months, 53 people have been kidnapped from only three districts.
Interior ministry of Balochistan revealed that in the districts of Sibbi, Makran and Qalaat, 42 people have been recovered out of 53 kidnapped while the other are still in the custody of the kidnappers.
Nineteen people have been placed in long-term storage for the alleged kidnapping and other related charges.
Earlier this week the government official revealed that 23 members of the Hindu community were kidnapped from the province over a period of several months.
The rise in kidnapping had forced the Hindu community to migrate from Balochistan to other parts of the country.
Provincial Home Secretary Naseebullah Bazai informed DawnNews on Saturday that 70 people were kidnapped from the Quetta Division alone during the last three months.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[5 views]
Top|| File under:
[An Nahar] U.N. humanitarian chief Valerie Amos said Monday that Syria has approved a visit to the conflict-stricken country this week.
Following widespread U.N. and Security Council complaints about Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad One of the last of the old-fashioned hereditary iron-fisted fascist dictators... 's refusal to let her in, Amos said she would arrive in Damascus ...The City of Jasmin is the oldest continuously-inhabited city in the world. It has not always been inhabited by the same set of fascisti... on Wednesday and leave on Friday.
"The Syrian authorities have confirmed that I can visit Syria this week. I will arrive in Damascus on Wednesday March 7 and leave on Friday March 9," Amos said in a statement.
"As requested by the secretary-general, my aim is to urge all parties to allow unhindered access for humanitarian relief workers so that they can evacuate the maimed and deliver essential supplies," she added.
The United Nations ...aka the Oyster Bay Chowder and Marching Society... is not yet sure whether Amos will be allowed to travel outside Damascus during her stay, her spokeswoman, Amanda Pitt, told Agence La Belle France Presse.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[5 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
OTTAWA: Canada imposed fresh sanctions on Syria on Tuesday, banning all dealings with the central bank and seven cabinet ministers as part of a campaign to stop President Bashar Assads crackdown against rebels.
The measures also prohibit the provision or acquisition of financial or other related services to or from anyone in Syria or those acting on Syrias behalf.
The continuing, appalling violence perpetrated by the Assad regime on the people of Syria compels us to again tighten the vice on those responsible ... Our message remains clear: Assad must go, Foreign Minister John Baird said in a statement.
The sanctions are the sixth round imposed by Ottawa on Damascus.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
[An Nahar] Police in Jordan's southern city of Tafileh fired tear gas on Monday to disperse angry unemployed demonstrators who demanded that the authorities make good on their promise of jobs.
"Scores of unemployed youth demonstrated in Tafileh, throwing stones at the governorate building as well as police, who had to fire tear gas to break up the protest," the state-run Petra news agency reported.
"They also blocked roads leading to the governorate building and other government departments."
Petra said the protest, the sixth since last year, "came after the government failed to meet its promise to create jobs for hundreds of youths in the city."
"Tear gas has been used during all these demonstrations to disperse the protesters," the agency said.
Jobless people staged a similar demonstration in January, when Tafileh governor Hashem Sehiem said that finding them work "takes time."
While Jordan's official unemployment rate stands at 13 percent, unofficially it is closer to 30 percent.
Jordanians have been protesting since January last year demanding sweeping political and economic reforms and an end to corruption.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[1 views]
Top|| File under: Arab Spring
[Dawn] A Sri Lankan man has died while trying to set a record for the longest time spent buried alive, police said Monday. Yeah. People are lining up to try and beat that one.
Police said Janaka Basnayake, 24, buried himself over the weekend with the help of family and friends in a trench sealed with wood and soil in the town of Kantale, about 137 miles (220 kilometers) north of Sri Lanka's capital, Colombo. A local newspaper reported that the trench was 10 feet (3 meters) deep. What's a cubic meter of earth weigh? Times about two, if it was six feet long...
Basnayake was buried at around 9:30 a.m. Saturday. Police said that when he was brought to the surface at 4 p.m., he was unconscious and was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead. He's dead, Jim! on arrival. Kinda makes you wonder what was going through his mind about the time he realized he wasn't gonna break the record...
Dr. D.G. Costa of the Kantale hospital said a post-mortem could not determine the cause of death and further medical investigations are being conducted. "How about suffocation, Dr. Quincy?"
"Oh, c'mon, Sam! Don't be ridiculous... Oh. Well. Maybe."
Basnayake's mother, L.D. Leelawathi, said her son had enjoyed performing unusual acts since his childhood --a liking that grew after watching movies, the Lankadeepa newspaper reported. "Yes. He once drove a nail through his arm, right between the ulna and the radius."
"Really? What happened?"
"It hurt."
It quoted her as saying that her son had been buried alive on two previous occasions --for two and a half hours and six hours respectively. "He was a veteran suffocator."
"Good Gawd! The depravity!
It was unclear whether there is an official world record for the longest time buried alive. I think that record kinda just naturally runs into the record for the longest time buried dead. He's gonna have a hard time catching up to Lucy for that one.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
I wouldn't mind dying,
Po' Lightnin' would just have to lay dead so long
Wouldn't mind dying,
but I'd have to lay dead so long
That I wouldn't have a chance to come back here and tell my friends,
No nobody, what is going on.
-Lightnin' Hopkins "Lonesome Graveyard"
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
03/06/2012 1:04
Comments ||
Top||
[An Nahar] Syrian forces on Monday bombarded the city of Rastan for a second straight day, monitors said, as former U.N. chief Kofi Annan and other world envoys prepared a diplomatic drive to end the bloodshed in Syria.
U.N. humanitarian chief Valerie Amos, meanwhile, said Syria had finally approved a visit, which she would make from Wednesday to Friday, following widespread complaints about Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Oppressor of the Syrians and the Lebs... 's refusal to let her in.
And the Red Thingy negotiated for a fourth day with Syrian authorities to be allowed to deliver aid and evacuate the maimed from the battered Baba Amr rebel district of the city of Homs in central Syria.
Rastan, which activists expect to be the next target of a drive by regime forces to expel rebels who have regrouped from Homs, 20 kilometers (12 miles) away, came under renewed shelling, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
It said seven civilians, including four children, were killed on Sunday in shelling of the city, which like Homs sits on the main highway linking Damascus ...The City of Jasmin is the oldest continuously-inhabited city in the world. It has not always been inhabited by the same set of fascisti... to northern Syria.
On Monday, security forces killed at least six people across the country, including two teenagers, according to the Britannia-based Syrian Observatory.
An activist was killed in the early hours of the day while he was filming fighting that erupted in the southern city of Daraa, cradle of the anti-regime revolt, the Observatory said.
"A civilian died after being tortured by security forces" in Mleiha al-Gharbiya near Daraa, it added.
A 14-year-old boy was killed by sniper fire in Saraqeb in the northwestern province of Idlib, and a civilian was killed when the army stormed the town of Yabrud in the province of Damascus.
A 13-year old girl was also killed by sniper fire in Homs province and a civilian was killed in Aleppo ...For centuries, Aleppo was Greater Syria's largest city and the Ottoman Empire's third, after Constantinople and Cairo. Although relatively close to Damascus in distance, Aleppans regard Damascenes as country cousins... province.
The security forces conducted a campaign of arrests in the Jobar neighborhood of Homs.
In Syria's second city Aleppo, police dispersed a demonstration and tossed in the slammer three students at the university.
In Cairo, Arab League ...an organization of Arabic-speaking states with 22 member countries and four observers. The League tries to achieve Arab consensus on issues, which usually leaves them doing nothing but a bit of grimacing and mustache cursing... chief Nabil al-Arabi told news hounds that Annan, who has been named special envoy to Syria for the United Nations ...an organization whose definition of human rights is interesting, to say the least... and League, is to travel to Damascus on Saturday.
He will be accompanied by his deputy, former Paleostinian foreign minister Nasser al-Qudwa, a nephew of Yasser Arafat, on their first trip to Syria, where state media said Damascus welcomed the mission.
Annan and Qudwa are due to arrive on Wednesday in Cairo where the pan-Arab organization is based and to hold talks with Arabi on Thursday before flying to Damascus on Saturday, the League chief said.
The two envoys are to serve under a mandate set out by a U.N. General Assembly resolution passed last month and Arab League resolutions on the crisis in Syria.
The General Assembly resolution demands that Damascus "cease all violence and protect its population," free everyone jugged in connection with the unrest, withdraw troops from urban areas and guarantee freedom of demonstration.
Echoing resolutions passed by the League, it insists on "full and unhindered access and movement" for Arab League monitors and international news media "to determine the truth about the situation on the ground."
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, meanwhile, said he was to meet on Saturday in Cairo with his Arab counterparts to discuss Syria.
"Considering the urgency of the Syria issue, when collective approaches for a settlement need to be found, we view this as a valuable and important format," Lavrov said of the Cairo meeting.
Moscow and Beijing have since October twice wielded their Security Council veto to block U.N. action on the crisis.
In Beijing, foreign ministry front man Lu Weimin said that China's former ambassador to Damascus, Li Huaxin, would travel to Syria on Wednesday for meetings with the government and other parties.
"Although the situation is complex and tense, China still thinks that the political resolution of the Syrian issue is the fundamental way to solve the crisis," he said.
In New York, U.N. humanitarian chief Amos said the aim of her visit to Damascus would be "to urge all parties to allow unhindered access for humanitarian relief workers so that they can evacuate the maimed and deliver essential supplies."
The moves came as the International Committee of the Red Thingy said Monday it had still not been granted permission to enter Baba Amr, the rebellious district of Homs overrun four days earlier by regime forces.
"Negotiations are still ongoing," ICRC front man Saleh Dabbakeh told Agence La Belle France Presse, amid mounting international outrage against President Bashir al-Assad's regime for its crackdown which the U.N. says has cost at least 7,500 lives since last March.
And days after Britannia and La Belle France joined the United States in closing their embassies in Damascus over security fears, Air La Belle France canceled its Monday flight to the Syrian capital, citing the unrest sweeping the country.
Rebel fighters decamped Baba Amr last Thursday in the face of a ground assault by regime forces following a month-long shelling blitz which the U.S.-based Human Rights Watch ... dedicated to bitching about human rights violations around the world... said had killed some 700 people.
The ICRC and the Syrian Arab Red Islamic Thingy Society have sought in vain permission to enter Baba Amr with a seven-truck aid convoy.
The authorities say the relief agencies are being barred for their own safety due to the presence of bombs and landmines. But anti-regime activists say authorities are keeping the groups out to buy time to hide their "crimes."
The ICRC said on Sunday it delivered relief supplies in a nearby village to refugees who had decamped Baba Amr.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[8 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
[Dawn] A percussion bomb went kaboom! near the Turkish prime ministry building in the capital Ankara on Monday, about an hour before a cabinet meeting was due to be held there, and one person was slightly injured, state TV said.
Police were searching the area where the kaboom took place, in a car park for both the prime ministry and the Appeals Court.
Percussion bombs make a loud noise, but cause little if any damage.
The blast follows a remote-controlled kaboom in Istanbul on Thursday last week which maimed 15 coppers and one civilian.
Kurdish separatists, Islamist hard boyz -- including al Qaeda -- as well as groups on the far left and right have all carried out kabooms in Turkey, but there was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast.
A group connected to the separatist krazed killer Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) grabbed credit for a car boom that killed three people in Ankara in September and threatened more attacks on Turkish cities.
The Kurdistan Freedom Hawks (TAK) said at the time the capital was the "beginning of a series of attacks" and said it was behind a previous attack in Antalya, on the Mediterranean coast, where several tourists were maimed by a small kaboom on a beach.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[2 views]
Top|| File under:
For a map click here For a map of Tamaulipas click here
A total of ten unidentified individuals were wounded in a grenade attack at a Walmart store in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas Sunday night, according to Mexican news accounts.
Reports say firefights erupted between local drug gangs -- probably Los Zetas and Gulf Cartel shooters -- in the city Sunday. Nuevo Laredo is considered to be a Los Zetas controlled river crossing into the US.
The attack took place just outside the store at around 2200 hrs on Avenida Reforma. Several more individuals who were hurt in the attack went to get medical help on their own.
The Secretaria de Defensa Nacional (SEDENA), the controlling agency for the Mexican Army also told Mexican press that additional troops from Nuevo Leon would be redeployed to the city in the wake of the new attack.
In a related development, military authorities say that a top Los Zetas operative in Nuevo Laredo was killed in last Thursday's encounter between a Mexican Army detachment on patrol and an armed group travelling en convoy.
Gerardo Guerra Valdez AKA El Guerra was killed in the same gun battle that claimed the lives of 13 Los Zetas operatives. To read the Rantburg.com report on the March 1st firefight that killed 13 drug cartel operatives, cick here
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[2 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Happy Birthday/Daily Gam Shot
Connie Britton aka Dr. Gwen Holbrook in "A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)" aka Sharon Gaines in "Friday Night Lights (2004)" aka Nikki Faber in "Spin City (TV Series 19962002)" aka Doris in "Women in Trouble (2009)" aka Kate Crowley in "The Next Big Thing (2001)" aka Abi in "Special Ed (2005)" (age 45)
[Dawn] Dozens of gunnies, some dressed in army uniforms, killed 26 coppers in a wave of coordinated attacks on checkpoints and officers' homes across the western Iraqi city of Haditha on Monday, police said.
The assault, launched at 2:00 am (2300 GMT on Sunday), saw beturbanned goons dressed in military uniforms and riding in stolen army vehicles simultaneously attacking two checkpoints in the east and west of Haditha before storming other security posts and raiding the homes of two officers.
"They then entered the city and were distributed throughout Haditha, where other gunnies were waiting for them in civilian cars," said police Lieutenant Colonel Owaid Khalaf, who said he was involved in some of Monday's firefights.
Khalaf said the attackers also targeted two senior coppers' homes, Colonel Mohammed Shauffeur and Captain Khaled Mohammed Sayil. They killed three bodyguards at each of the officer's houses, and kidnapped both.
Shauffeur's body was found in a Haditha marketplace and Sayil was discovered in an alleyway, blindfolded with fatal gunshots to the head.
"Right now, police, army and forces from the rest of Anbar are searching the entire city, and a curfew has been imposed," Khalaf said, referring to the province where Haditha lies.
"A total of 26 coppers were killed, including a colonel and a captain, and three others were maimed when several gunnies wearing security uniforms and carrying forged arrest warrants attacked several checkpoints," said Haditha police front man Major Tareq Sayeh Hardan.
"Al-Qaeda is responsible for this," Hardan said, noting that Sherlocks found Al-Qaeda literature in a vehicle that the attackers left behind.
The attack in Haditha, 210 kilometres (130 miles) northeast of Storied Baghdad ...located along the Tigris River, founded in the 8th century, home of the Abbasid Caliphate... , is the first major instance of violence in the town since a jacket wallahwent kaboom!" inside a bank, killing nine people, including three police, and wounding eight others on March 3, 2011.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[1 views]
Top|| File under: al-Qaeda in Iraq
SANAA: Sneaking across the desert behind army lines, Al-Qaeda militants launched a surprise attack against military bases in south Yemen, killing 107 soldiers and capturing heavy weapons they later used to kill more troops, officials said on Monday.
Military officials said the militants' surprise attack outside Abyan's provincial capital Zinjibar also led to the capture of 55 soldiers. The captives were paraded on the streets of Jaar, a nearby town that, like Zinjibar, has been under Al-Qaeda's control for about a year.
At least 32 of the militants were killed in Sunday's fighting in Abyan province, and scores were wounded on both sides, officials said. Medical officials in the area confirmed the death toll figures. They said the poor services in local hospitals accounted for the death of many soldiers who suffered serious wounds but could have survived had they been given better medical care.
The death toll among the troops is believed to be the highest on record in battles fought by the army against Al-Qaeda militants, who have been emboldened by the political turmoil roiling the impoverished Arab nation for more than a year.
The militants' attack appeared to be Al-Qaeda's response to a pledge by Yemen's newly inaugurated President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi to fight the Yemeni branch of the terror network, believed to be the world's most active.
Hadi repeated that pledge on Monday during talks with a visiting British diplomat.
"The confrontation will continue until we are rid of the last terrorist, whether in Abyan or elsewhere," local Yemeni media quoted him as saying.
The military officials said the militants' surprise attack outside Abyan's provincial capital Zinjibar also led to the capture of 55 soldiers. The captives were paraded on the streets of Jaar, a nearby town that, like Zinjibar, has been under Al-Qaeda's control for about a year.
The battle in Abyan province shows how militants have taken advantage of the turmoil created by the yearlong uprising against then-President Ali Abdullah Saleh. The scale of Sunday's attack also points to the combat readiness of the militants as they launch more attacks in a region that the United States considers a key battleground in the war on Al-Qaeda.
Militants seized control of Zinjibar in May and Jaar the month before as Yemen security officials were focused on putting down a popular uprising against Saleh's regime.
The Al-Qaeda attack led to demonstrations on Monday by thousands of university students in the coastal city of Aden, Yemen's second largest after Sanaa. The demonstrators demanded that Maj. Gen. Mahdi Maqoula, commander of an armored battalion deployed outside Zinjibar, be put on trial for suspicion of collaboration with Al-Qaeda.
The military officials said the militants were able to seize armored vehicles, artillery pieces, assault rifles and rockets from the stores of an army base they attacked. Some of the heavy weapons were later used against the troops, causing most of the casualties. The weapons were captured from Maqoula's 31st armored battalion, according to the military officials.
A Defense Ministry statement on Sunday said the fighting began when militants detonated "booby trapped vehicles" at an army base in the region of Koud near Zinjibar. The wording of the statement suggested that the base had been occupied by the militants before army forces regrouped and took it back. The fighting lasted the whole day.
[An Nahar] Troops in Nigeria's northern city of Maiduguri on Monday rubbed out three suspected members of the Islamist Boko Haram ... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. Currently wearing a false nose and moustache and answering to Jama'atu Ahlus-Sunnah Lidda'Awati Wal Jihad, or Big Louie... sect as they allegedly tried to burn down a school, the army said.
"Around 3:00 am (0200 GMT) today, men of the JTF interrupted five suspected members of Boko Haram trying to burn down a school in the heart of Maiduguri metropolis," Lieutenant Colonel Hassam Mohammed told Agence La Belle France Presse by telephone.
"Three of the suspects were rubbed out while two others were shot and injured. They are now in our custody," said the Joint Task Force (JTF) front man.
A number of homemade explosives which they allegedly intended to use in burning the primary school in the Lamisula district of the city were recovered, he said.
In less than two weeks, at least a dozen public and private schools in restive Maiduguri city, hotbed of Boko Haram, have been burnt by members of the sect.
The Islamist Boko Haram, whose name translates to "Western education is sin", had said it was behind some previous attacks, saying the act was in response to "raids" by soldiers on an Islamic seminary in the city.
A purported front man of the group, Abul Qaqa, on February 26 after the bombing of a church in the central Nigerian city of Jos, said the school attacks were over the "indiscriminate arrests of students of Koranic schools by security agents".
Sect leader Abubakar Shekau had issued a threat in January in an audio message in which his group grabbed credit for a January 20 attack in the northern city of Kano that killed 185 people.
The sect, blamed for a wave of attacks mainly in northern Nigeria, had over the past two-and-half years targeted mostly the police and other symbols of authority in Africa's most populous nation.
It has lately added churches on its list of targets.
Although its specific aims remain largely unclear, violence by the sect since mid-2009 has claimed more than 1,000 lives, including more than 300 this year alone, according to Agence La Belle France Presse and rights groups.
Last month, Nigeria's military chief said the sect has ties to al-Qaeda, the first time a top security official has publicly drawn such links.
"We have been able to link the activities of the Boko Haram sect to the support and training the sect received from AQIM (Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb)," Air Chief Marshal Oluseyi Petinrin said, without giving further details.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[8 views]
Top|| File under: Boko Haram
#1
It's a start....
Posted by: Barbara ||
03/06/2012 21:27
Comments ||
Top||
CAIRO Former UN chief Kofi Annan, who has been named special envoy to Syria for the UN and Arab League, will head to Damascus on March 10, Arab League chief Nabil al-Arabi told reporters on Monday.
And you guys will be in big trouble then...
Annan will be accompanied by his deputy, former Palestinian foreign minister Nasser al-Qudwa, on their first mission to Syria, where a government crackdown on dissent has left thousands dead in a year.
The pair are due in Cairo on Wednesday for talks the following day with Arabi, and will fly to Damascus on Saturday, the Arab League chief said.
Annan was last month chosen as international troubleshooter to try to end the conflict. Qudwa was named as his deputy earlier on Monday. Annan and Qudwa are acting under a UN General Assembly mandate as well as Arab League resolutions on the crisis in Syria.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[10 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Kofi is there to advise the Syrian Government on how to optimize their body counts and maximize collateral damage.
After his tenure in Rwanda, he's an expert on mass murder and will be of great assistance to Pencilneck.
If I were a rebel in Syria, I would either beat feet for Turkey or wait for the good old UN Incompetence Syndrome to kick in.
Posted by: Bill Clinton ||
03/06/2012 10:06
Comments ||
Top||
ARSAL, Lebanon: Braving Syrian army patrols and treacherous winter weather, hundreds of people fled into Lebanon in the last 24 hours to escape the heaviest shelling of their border towns in a year-long crackdown on protests against President Bashar Assad.
Could be worse, they could be fleeing to Yemen. Or Mauritania...
In the hillside town of Arsal in Lebanons Bekaa Valley, residents say between 100 and 150 families arrived from Syria on Sunday one of the biggest refugee influxes so far.
A dozen families spent Sunday night in a three-story apartment block in Arsal after fleeing what they said was a sustained army attack on the Syrian town of Qusair with tanks, rocket-propelled grenades and helicopters. Families trekked on foot through snow-capped hills to safety, but many others were caught as they tried to flee, one refugee told Reuters in Arsal.
Although Arsal is only 10 km (six miles) from the Syrian border, the young mans family had to walk 40 km through valleys, he said, as the mountain route was cut off by snow.
Only a few families, of roughly 2,000 people who fled Qusair, made it across the border without being stopped by Syrian troops.
Most refugees said they would not return until the Syrian government fell. But one, a rotund middle-aged man, said he was a fighter with the Free Syrian Army who had traveled to Lebanon just to bring his family to safety.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[8 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Out of the frying pan, into the fire.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
03/06/2012 2:02
Comments ||
Top||
#3
I look for Iran and Syria to become chummy. Iran needs Syria should any war start in this area. What is happening in Iraq. Why aren't they fleeing there. Karzai knowing how vulnerable he is could reach out to Iran. I believe Iran would welcome the gesture as would Syria's Assad. Now with Putin in charge I believe this area will be of great interest. The situation provides opportunity.
Lebanon is considerably richer and more peaceful than the Last Ba'ath Paradise. IIRC, Beirut was full of Syrian expat workers even back before the troubles began.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
03/06/2012 12:29
Comments ||
Top||
[Dawn] Pakistain Mohammedan League-Nawaz on Monday elected Shahbaz Sharif as a president of its Punjab chapter, DawnNews reported.
"I don't find myself capable enough for the job, but I will try my best to perform my job in best possible way," Sharif said after he was elected for the post.
The meeting of general council of the party was held here during which party officials were selected.
A five-member committee presided by Ghaus Ali Shah announced the results.
The party chief Nawaz Shairf while addressing the gathering said that the change is coming soon.
Meanwhile, ...back at the secret hideout, Scarface Al sneeringly put his proposition to little Nell... Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani ... Pakistain's erstwhile current prime minister, whose occasional feats of mental gymnastics can be awe-inspiring ... congratulated Sharif on his unopposed election as the President of Pakistain Mohammedan League (N), Punjab.
Gilani in a message expressed best wishes for Sharif and hoped that he would continue making efforts for the strengthening of democracy.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[6 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
For a map, click here. For a map of Nuevo Leon state, click here. For a map of Monterrey city, click here
Nine individuals were killed and three others wounded in or around Monterrey, Nuevo Leon Saturday and Sunday, five of them at the hands of the Mexican Army.
A Mexican Army unit came under small arms fire at a location on the Monterrey, Neuvo Leon to Monclova, Coahuila highway from an undisclosed number of armed suspects. The shooting took place last Sunday at about 1730 hrs at El Rancho San Gabriel,near the village of San Bartolo which is at Kilometer 116 of the highway. Army return fire killed three armed suspects. One soldier was reportedly wounded in the exchange of gunfire. In the aftermath, soldiers seized four vehicles, weapons and ammunition.
Two unidentified armed suspects were killed and three more were detained Saturday in a firefight between a detachment of the Mexican Army and armed suspects. The shootout took place in the village of San Rafael in Galeana municipality in Nuevo Leon state, where the army unit came under small arms fire by the suspect group.
Two unidentified men were wounded and a third critically wounded in a shooting in Monterrey city Sunday. The shooting took place near the intersection of calles Sidra and Ortiguilla in La Esperanza colony where armed suspects broke into a residence at shot the three men.
A man in his 20s was shot to death in Monterrey Monday afternoon. José Luis Lara Resendiz, 22, was shot to death a short distance from his mother's home in Venustiano Carranza colony near the intersection of calles Francisco Mungia and Emiliano Zapata. Shortly after leaving the residence armed suspects travelling aboard a sedan pursued the victim a short distance before hitting him with gunfire at about 1420 hrs.
A man was shot to death Sunday night in northern Monterrey. Eduardo Rodríguez Armejo, 23, was shot near the intersection of calles Hoz and Brida in Fomerrey 113 colony after a shouting match with armed suspects who were travelling aboard a sedan. Reports say an AR-15 was used in the shooting, and that a second unidentified individual also exchanged words with armed suspects before the shooting.
An unidentified youth was shot to death near a children's party in Monterrey Monday. The victim had been accosted on the street by armed suspects in Unidad Pedreras colony near the Topo Chico hills.
An unidentified youth in his teens was shot to death in Monterrey Sunday night. The victim was walking with his mother and a toddler when armed suspects travelling aboard a sedan near the intersection of calles Toronja and Melocotones in Fomerrey 121 colony, shot him to death.
[An Nahar] Taliban Islamic fascistigrabbed credit for a suicide kaboom that killed at least two civilians at a U.S. military base near the Afghan capital Kabul Monday, saying it was Dire Revenge™ for the burning of Korans there.
"A suicide attacker came out of a truck and blew up his vest outside Bagram airfield (at a gate used by supply vehicles)," provincial governor Abdul Basir Salangi told Agence La Belle France Presse.
"As a result, two people are killed and four maimed, all were civilians." A front man for the U.S.-led International Security assistance Force (ISAF) confirmed that no soldiers had been killed, adding that reports put the corpse count at between two and five civilians.
"They didn't breach the base. We have blocked off the area with Afghan cops," he said.
Taliban front man Zabihullah Mujahid said in an SMS message to AFP: "Around 5:00 pm (1230 GMT), one of our fighters attacked the third gate of the Bagram airfield in Dire Revenge™ for the Koran burning ...One of the basic tenets of Islam is that once a Koran has been printed it is expected to last for all time, no matter how old, ratty, and smelly other, lesser holy books may become. Should it actually become necessary to put a Koran out of its misery there is a ritual that includes extensive charivari, featuring long drawn-wailing and head bonking, ritual wife beating, and the sacrifice of dozens of women's noses and pubic lips. When the actual disposal has been completed there is a prescribed period of celebratory gun sex with the expectation of a minimum of two hundred casualties. Should actual infidels dispose of a Koran, Islamic custom calls for three weeks of rioting and a minimum of three dozen dead, which is a holdover from the days of Moloch worship... .
"As a result, a number of Americans were killed and maimed in the attack."
The incident in which Korans were sent to an incinerator pit at the Bagram base two weeks ago ignited days of violent anti-U.S. protests in which some 40 people died, including six U.S. soldiers killed by their Afghan colleagues.
While U.S. President Barack Obama I don't sit around just talking to experts because this is a college seminar, we talk to these folks because they potentially have the best answers, so I know whose ass to kick... has apologized for the incident and street protests have died down, relations between foreign forces and their Afghan allies have hit an all-time low.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[0 views]
Top|| File under: Taliban
[An Nahar] A top U.S. official on Monday pledged to help Nigeria address security threats as Africa's most populous nation and largest oil producer deals with scores of attacks blamed on Islamist group Boko Haram. ... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. Currently wearing a false nose and moustache and answering to Jama'atu Ahlus-Sunnah Lidda'Awati Wal Jihad, or Big Louie... "I think the United States wants to support Nigeria in every way that is appropriate from Nigeria's point of view, to deal with any threat here in this country," U.S. Under-Secretary for Political Affairs Wendy Sherman told news hounds. That's all very nice and everything, but Nigeria makes lotsa money with oil exports and 419 scams, so what kinda bill are we gonna foot?
Sherman, the US State Department's number three, spoke of a "holistic approach" to addressing security in Nigeria, with most of the violence having occurred in the country's deeply impoverished and mainly Moslem north. She spoke of development and job creation.
"And together we will do whatever we can, from intelligence sharing to assistance, to development, to security training, as we have done, given that Nigeria is one of the leaders in peacekeeping forces throughout the world," she said.
Nigeria has contributed to a list of U.N.-sponsored peacekeeping missions and is a major supplier of U.S. oil imports.
Sherman spoke after talks with Nigeria's junior minister of foreign affairs Viola Onwuliri. She was in Nigeria for a 24-hour visit during which she was also meeting civil society organizations and other top government officials.
Nigeria has been hit by almost daily gun and kabooms mainly in the north and blamed on Boko Haram. There have been deep concerns over whether the group has formed ties with al-Qaeda.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[4 views]
Top|| File under: Boko Haram
[An Nahar] The Phalange Party The Kataeb (Phalange) party was founded by Pierre Gemayel in 1936, who modeled the party after Spanish and Italian Fascist parties he had observed as an Olympic athlete during the 1936 Summer Olympics held in Berlin, then Nazi Germany. The movement's uniforms originally included brown shirts and members used the Nazi salute. Despite the party's uniform, its strong sense of nationalism and dedication to a single charismatic leader, the Lebanese Kataeb was not and never became a fascist party nor did it espouse a totalitarian ideology. called on the government on Monday to carefully follow up on the flow of Syrian refugees into Leb, warning of a "new form of naturalization" facing the country.
It said in a statement after its weekly politburo meeting: "A crisis committee should be formed to address the possible repercussions of the Syrian unrest on Leb."
It criticized some authorities' handling of the refugee issue, "which has started to take on a dramatic security and humanitarian turn."
Addressing the Syrian crisis, the Phalange Party called on all Lebanese factions to maintain the country's internal unity and "refrain from taking to the street in protest or in support" of the developments in Syria.
On Sunday, a demonstration in support of the Syrian people and another in support of the Syrian regime was staged in downtown Beirut amid fears that the rival rallies could take a violent turn.
The protests took place without incident.
On the dispute between the March 8 and 14 camps over government extra-budgetary spending, the Phalange Party politburo stressed the need for all concerned sides to agree on a mechanism that would be adopted on spending.
The meeting also tackled party chief Amin Gemayel's trip to Italia last week where he held talks with a number of officials, including President Giorgio Napolitano.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[10 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
Supporters of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement are on the defensive.
Supporters of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement are on the defensive. A surprisingly candid interview on video with anti-Israel guru Norman Finkelstein at the beginning of last month has sparked a flurry of soul-searching on far-left websites such as +972 and Mondoweiss and among left-wing ideologues such as M.J. Rosenberg, senior foreign policy fellow at Media Matters Action Network, and Haaretz columnist Bradley Burston.
In the video, which went viral first on YouTube and later, after being removed to contain damage to BDS, on Vimeo, Finkelstein declared BDS to be a failure.
Though BDS activists tout the movements many successes, in reality its a cult where the guru says We have all these victories and everyone nods their head, he said.
Finkelstein went on to explain why BDS has failed so miserably. The movements duplicity and disingenuousness in hiding the fact that a large part of its membership wants to eliminate Israel made it impossible for BDS to reach a broad public.
Finkelsteins comments have resulted in a reevaluation of the entire BDS movement on the Left. And it comes at a particularly opportune time as BDS activists on campuses around the world mark Israel Apartheid Week.
For instance, an article titled Boycotting Israel means denying its right to exist that first appeared last Wednesday on the +972 blog has generated a lively debate. In their zeal to attack author Noam Weiner, an Israeli doctoral candidate at the University of Michigan Law School, critics have in the process proved Weiner and Finkelstein right. In trying to support BDS, many ended up expressing their support for Israels demise as a Jewish state by championing the right of return for millions of Palestinians and their offspring, who were forced or chose to leave Israel after the War of Independence.
Meanwhile, moderates such as Rosenberg have tried to differentiate between BDS against Israel as a whole and a BDS campaign that focuses solely on the West Bank. Meretz, a self-proclaimed Zionist political party, makes such as distinction. And for many Jewish organizations in the US one can support a targeted boycott of Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria and still remain within the big tent of Jewish consensus.
But even this more moderate form of BDS is problematic.
Modern economies are highly complex. How directly does a company have to be involved in the development of Judea and Samaria to justify a boycott against it? Would paying taxes constitute support for the occupation? How about firms run by people who serve reserve duty? Any attempts to direct a boycott at Judea and Samaria inevitably result in a boycott against Israel.
More substantively, a boycott, even one supposedly directed only at the settlements, ignores the complexity of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It ignores Palestinian incitement to violence, which goes on to this day. It ignores the broad support among Palestinians for Hamas and other terrorist groups that aspire to destroy Israel, even with pre-1967 lines. A BDS campaign, even one that only targets occupation, strengthens the most radical elements within Palestinian society by refraining from placing at least some of the blame for the conflict on Palestinian shoulders.
And as blogger Jon Haber, creator of the Divest This! website, has pointed out, BDS activity tends to undermine the basic values of organizations that use it. When, for instance, the British National Union of Journalists is asked to join BDS, it members are expected to suspend their journalistic objectivity to single out Israel for censure.
University professors are asked to disregard the notion of academic freedom to use their positions to silence Israeli colleagues. Businesses and co-ops are asked to forgo their right to pursue the best products at the lowest prices to punish the Jewish state. And mainline Protestant churchgoers are asked to compromise their religious faith, as if God Himself were aligned with the BDS movement.
Finkelsteins candid interview has sparked an important reassessment of the entire BDS movement. Let us hope that the soul-searching raging on the Left leads to more honesty and less of the duplicity and disingenuousness that has characterized the BDS movement to date.
#3
Actually, I very much disbelieve that this process is actually happenening in the BDS movement: it is predominantly populated by leftists and "liberals" whose capacity for honest self-assessment and self-criticsm is practically nonexistent. "Soul-searching" is a pose they take on to head-fake conservatives, not something they are capable of doing when it comes to certain subjects. The conservative mental maps have regions marked "unknown", while the liberal mental maps have regions marked "Here be dragons!"
And yah, I thought it was referring to Bush Derangement Syndrome myself.
#4
The movements duplicity and disingenuousness in hiding the fact that a large part of its membership wants to eliminate Israel made it impossible for BDS to reach a broad public.
Um. I thought that was openly the goal, thus the reason it is rejected by a broad public. So I agree, Ptah: I think by "soul-searching" they mean "re-branding."
The chief of the North Korean People's Army's General Staff, who is widely held responsible for the artillery attack on Yeonpyeong Island in November 2010, has threatened a similar attack. In a piece for the North's state-run Rodong Sinmun daily on Sunday, Kim Kyok-sik said, "We will deliver a devastating punishment to the traitors, whose strength cannot compare to the sea of fire seen in the Yeonpyeong attack."
By "traitors" he was apparently referring to President Lee Myung-bak, Defense Minister Kim Kwan-jin and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Jung Seung-jo.
Kim added Lee and other South Korean officials "will never be forgiven. You will not be able to escape our blows just because you are in Seoul and hiding behind the back of the U.S. imperialists. We are right in front of you and our bayonets are already aimed at your throats."
Kim was thought to have been sacked last year but was in fact promoted to chief of the Army's General Staff and appeared in the front ranks on Jan. 16 celebrating Kim Jong-il's posthumous 70th birthday.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[1 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Oh, More dead idiots.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
03/06/2012 1:58
Comments ||
Top||
[An Nahar] Iran's new parliament will be largely dominated by conservatives who support supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, according to latest results Monday of last week's election.
The parliament, also known as the Majlis, will have about half of its current members replaced by newcomers, many of whom ran on an "independent" ticket.
But the complex structure of Iran's politics and the uncertainty over factional allegiances and personal alliances make it difficult to predict the equilibrium of the newly elected politicians, who are divided between supporters and critics of President Mahmoud Short Round Ahmadinejad.
According to official figures on the Majlis website, 224 parliamentary seats out of 290 have been filled through Friday's election while 63 others, including 25 in the capital, will be decided in a run-off vote.
The fate of three other seats remains unknown.
The largely marginalized reformists, who had mainly boycotted the elections, lost most of their seats, only hanging on to 19 out of their 60 in the current parliament.
The elections saw two major conservative factions, one bringing together Ahmadinejad's supporters and the other his opponents, battling for the control over the new parliament.
But neither the United Conservatives Front, critical of the president, nor the pro-Ahmadinejad Front of Islamic Iran's Resistance managed to establish themselves as majority, according to a compilation of the results by AFP.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[6 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
#1
Pundits claim that this is a sign that Ahmadinejad is losing power + influence to the Ayatollah Khamenei, but I don't see how as El Supremo Khamenei has said or inferred nothing publicly that Ahmadinejad himself hasn't said or inferred already???
North Korea is in a tizzy about a South Korean army unit in Incheon that reportedly scrawled threatening slogans on portraits of new North Korean leader Suet Face Kim Jong-un and his father Kim Jong-il.
Best not tell them about the Burg then...
The North Korean Foreign Ministry in a statement on Sunday said, "The group of traitors led by Lee Myung-bak [the customary term for the South Korean government] is in a last-ditch fight to prolong its life amid signs of progress in dialogue between the U.S. and" the North.
North Korean Central TV on Saturday aired footage of soldiers shooting at banners with slogans, "Let's beat up traitor Lee Myung-bak and South Korean military jingoists!" Some 150,000 people gathered in the Kim Il-sung Square on Sunday to protest against the South, the largest crowed since the funeral of late leader Kim Jong-il.
The Supreme Command of the North Korean People's Army in a statement on Friday threatened "a sacred war to bury the traitors in this land." And the official KCNA news agency urged 1.7 million young students nationwide to join or return to the military from Friday to Saturday.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[2 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
the official KCNA news agency urged 1.7 million young students nationwide to join or return to the military from Friday to Saturday.
#2
North Korean Central TV on Saturday aired footage of soldiers shooting at banners with slogans, "Let's beat up traitor Lee Myung-bak and South Korean military jingoists!"
#4
NK citizens use the fairly porous border with China, to smuggle videos revealing harsh living conditions in the family tyranny. all resources go to the cities, so that elites live in luxury while the rest starve. Too bad those videos rarely surface.
The civilized world is gauging the new NK tyrant. So far it looks like the same old crap.
If you can stomach it, find BHO's 2009 Prague spew on a "world without nuclear arms." That mentality puts steel into the back of the enemy. BHO has got to go.
#9
a last-ditch fight to prolong its life amid signs of progress in dialogue between the U.S. and the North
Like it's free-agent time and we're gonna do a trade even up. Gotta admire their delusion.
[An Nahar] Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told U.S. President Barack Obama I've now been in 57 states -- I think one left to go... Monday that Israel must remain the "master of its fate" in a firm defense of his right to mount a unilateral strike on Iran.
Netanyahu and Obama met for delicate Oval Office talks taking place amid clear differences on the imminence of the nuclear threat from Iran and after weeks of speculation that Israel may mount go-it-alone military action.
"Israel must have the ability always to defend itself, by itself, against any threat," Netanyahu said in a short, but impassioned comments to cameras at the start of a meeting with Obama, with whom he has had sometimes strained relations.
"After all, that is the very purpose of the Jewish state, to restore to the Jewish people control over our destiny.
"That's why my supreme responsibility as prime minister of Israel is to ensure that Israel remains the master of its fate," said Netanyahu, who ruffled Obama's feathers last year with a stunning lecture in the Oval Office.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[5 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
#1
How dare he? Doesn't Netanyahu know that The One determines the fate of all?
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
03/06/2012 7:17
Comments ||
Top||
#2
Yup, the "One" doesn't like such defiance, sass, and backtalk.
* WORLD NEWS > "ENEMY LACKS COURAGE TO TAKE ON IRAN ARMY", + attempt any act of aggression.
Ground Forces Commander BGEN. Ahmad Reza-Pourdastan.
* TOPIX > JOEL RUBIN: NO IRAN BOMB, NO IRAN WAR IN 2012.
D *** NG IT, THERE BE "NO WMDS IN IRAN"!
* TOPIX, DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > PLA DAILY: AMERICAN STRIKE ON IRAN IS OUT OF TURN [US N-O-T ready for new war, Iran in better shape].
* NEWSMAX > PANETTA: US WILL TAKE MILITARY ACTION AGZ IRAN IFF ALL ELSE [Diplomacy, UN Sanctions] FAILS.
OTOH ANALYST > iff Israel were to attack Iran, HISTOIRE' = suggests Israel is most likely to strike sometime in the month of MARCH???
WHICH IS THIS MONTH.
* DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > ISRAEL'S STRATEGY: START WAR WID IRAN FORCING US TO JOIN | [ABC News] IFF ISRAEL ATTACKS IRAN: GAS PRICES, CYBERWAR, TERROR THREAT.
* SAME > MAKING THREATS AGZ IRAN IS CRIMINAL UNDER INTERNATIONAL LAW.
#8
TOPIX > US TO DEPLOY TROOPS IFF PAK NUKES UNDER THREAT.
* SAME > WHY PAKISTAN IS VULNERABLE TO IRAN?
* SAME, BHARAT RAKSHAK > IRAN MUSCLES IN ON AZERBAIJAN.
Lest we fergit, + Iran Azeris aside, AZERBAIJAN IS WHERE THE SOVIETS KEPT A LOT OF THEIR NUCLEAR FIREPOWER DURING THE COLD WAR, + still maintains potent Nuclear Forces there.
Collectively, methinks the US is trying hard NOT to say it will deploy US Milfors as such iff a US-Iran de facto breaks out, + Iran makes good on its threat to VOLUNTARILY OR FORCIBLY use the territories of its sovereign neighbors, ala VIETNAM WAR, to launch MILITARY, BASIJ, + PROXY TERROR OPS agz any foreign invasion + occupation force.
The above concept IMO already presumes that Iran is willing, or expecting, to militarily lose or give up half, majority, or perhaps all? of Iran proper to a major outside occupation force???
[Dawn] An alliance of minority parties on Sunday appealed to Chief Justice of Pakistain Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry to take a suo motu ...a legal term, from the Latin. Roughly translated it means I saw what you did, you bastard... notice of the kidnapping of a Hindu girl and order her immediate return to her parents to restore the waning sense of security in the minorities.
Speaking at a protest demonstration staged outside the Bloody Karachi ...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It may be the largest city in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous... Press Club, Pakistain Minority Leaders Alliance representatives said they would launch a protest movement and stage a sit-in on March 10 if the authorities failed to recover the girl, Rinkle Kumari.
According to an uncle of the girl, Raj Kumar, she was kidnapped from her house in Mirpur Mathelo over a week ago and forced to marry Naveed Shah and change her religion. He alleged that the case was heard by a civil judge in Ghotki, but he did not allow her relatives to enter the courtroom while giving a verdict in favour of the 'kidnapper', Mr Shah.
Speaking on the occasion, Jeay Sindh Mahaz chief Riaz Chandio expressed solidarity with the minority community members and demanded arrest of and punishment to culprits involved in her kidnapping.
He said those belonging to religious minority groups, including Hindus, Christians and Sikhs, were sons of the soil. They should not feel threatened by such acts, as all Sindhis were one and that they were equal citizens and had equal rights, he said.
He said it was unfortunate that the girl was given in police custody instead of being sent to Darul Aman.
Mr Chandio announced that if "the daughter of Sindh" was not rescued and returned and culprits were not placed in long-term storage soon and punished according to law, a province-wide sit-it would be staged on Saturday.
Manohar Lal, Muttahida Qaumi Movement ...English: United National Movement, generally known as MQM, is the 3rd largest political party and the largest secular political party in Pakistain with particular strength in Sindh. From 1992 to 1999, the MQM was the target of the Pak Army's Operation Cleanup leaving thousands of urdu speaking civilians dead... politician in the national assembly, condemned the kidnapping and forced conversion of a young girl. He urged the president to take notice of the incident.
He said Islam guaranteed protection to minorities, but such people were giving a bad name to the religion. With such incidents, a sense of insecurity was growing in the community, he said. Earlier their sons were kidnapped for ransom, but now their daughters were being kidnapped and forcibly converted, he remarked.
Jeay Sindh Taraqi Pasand Party leader Gulzar Soomro said that forced conversions were a conspiracy against Islam, which preaches love and peace and opposes use of force. He said the culprits were agents of the establishment that wanted to divide the Sindhis.
"Our patience should not be mistaken as our weakness," he warned, seeking her immediate recovery.
A Pakistain Tehrik-e-Insaf ...a political party in Pakistan. PTI was founded by former Pakistani cricket captain and philanthropist Imran Khan. The party's slogan is Justice, Humanity and Self Esteem, each of which is open to widely divergent interpretations.... leader and former politician, Michael Javed, said the Quaid-e-Azam had said that the minorities would be equal citizens in Pakistain, but over the years the Quaid's message was being forgotten.
Amar Lal, a community leader, said he and the girl's uncle had met US consulate general staff a few days back and political counsellor Junaid J. Muneer had assured him that the issue would be taken up with the authorities concerned. He said he had also received a call from a former political counsellor of the US embassy in Islamabad, L.K. Robinson, who was currently in Washington. He told him that he would take up the issue with human rights ...which often intentionally defined so widely as to be meaningless... organizations there.
Mahesh Singh, Mangla Sharma, Ramesh Kumar, Vijay Kumar and others also spoke.
Raj Kumar, the girl's uncle, earlier informed the gathering that on Feb 24, a few gunnies barged into her home in Mirpur Mathelo and kidnapped her at gunpoint.
He said a case was filed in a Ghotki court where he said she gave a statement about the threats she had received to convert and marry Naveed Shah or she and her entire family would be killed. He quoted her as saying in the court that she wanted to return and live with her parents.
He also alleged that the judge, in the presence of gunnies in the court, sent her to police custody rather than to her parents' home or to a shelter home. The next hearing was scheduled to be held at 11am on Feb 27, but the case was heard at 8.15am and the girl's family was not allowed to enter the courtroom, he said, adding that the judge then gave a verdict in favour of Mr Shah.
Mr Kumar urged the chief justice to take a suo motu notice of the issue and order her safe return to her parents.
Earlier, the participants in the demonstration rolled their eyes, jumped up and down, and hollered poorly rhymed slogans real loud such as 'we want justice' and 'Rinkle be rescued'.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[6 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
[An Nahar] Russian police Monday placed in durance vile over 500 people protesting Vladimir Putin ...Second President of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Because of constitutionally mandated term limits he is the current Prime Minister of Russia. His sock puppet, Dmitry Medvedev, was installed in the 2008 presidential elections. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law. During his eight years in office Russia's economy bounced back from crisis, seeing GDP increase, poverty decrease and average monthly salaries increase. During his presidency Putin passed into law a series of fundamental reforms, including a flat income tax of 13%, a reduced profits tax, and new land and legal codes. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile... 's crushing victory in elections that the opposition denounced as illegitimate and international monitors said were skewed.
Western powers reacted warily to the prospect of Putin returning in a May inauguration to the Kremlin for a six year term from his current job as premier, urging a full investigation into the reports of violations.
Police said they placed in durance vile 250 people in Moscow and 300 in Saint Petersburg after moving in roughly to break up rallies claiming that Sunday's polls were rigged.
Some 20,000 anti-Putin protestors had turned out in Pushkin Square in central Moscow chanting "Russia Yes! Putin No!". Most of the rally dispersed peacefully but police moved in to disperse hundreds of people who refused to leave the square.
Amid frantic scenes, they placed in durance vile dozens by dragging them to waiting police vans, an Agence La Belle France Presse correspondent said.
Among those placed in durance vile were Russian anti-corruption crusader Alexei Navalny, seen in some quarters as a possible future rival to Putin, and two other opposition leaders, Sergei Udaltsov and Ilya Yashin.
"People were calm, but at some point police started moving in, kicking people, tearing their clothes," Yashin told independent Dozhd TV from the police van by phone.
Moscow police also roughly placed in durance vile dozens of protesters at a separate unsanctioned event near the central election commission, including the leader of the Other Russia radical opposition group Eduard Limonov.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[7 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Not sure just what to think of this Red STATE electoral outcome, but I have a sense that Putie-Poot's detractors at home will help to keep things "Fair and Balanced".
[Dawn] Unknown gunnies shot and killed a former local politician in Charsadda district, in the northwestern Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa ... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central... province, police officials said.
Police officials said the man was a member of the Awami National Party (ANP), the provincial ruling party, which is often targeted by gun-hung tough guys who see the ANP as supporting the US-led war against al Qaeda and The Taliban in Afghanistan.
No one grabbed credit.
Meanwhile in 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... , a group of gun-hung tough guys ambushed a paramilitary convoy in the Uch area, security officials said.
Three gun-hung tough guys were killed when Pak forces returned fire.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/06/2012
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[5 views]
Top|| File under: Baloch Liberation Army
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.
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon
The hunt was on Monday for a penguin that scaled a 
An official history of the Australian military in the Vietnam War says alcohol abuse was a significant problem for troops who at times were supplied with the equivalent of more than five cans of beer per soldier daily.
John 
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
[Dawn] The issue of disenfranchisement of women once again surfaced during the by-elections in several constituencies on Feb 25.
Presently, there is no specific provision in the Representation of People's Act (RPA), 1976, dealing with the issue of disenfranchisement of women.
U.N. humanitarian chief Valerie Amos said Monday that Syria has approved a visit to the conflict-stricken country this week.
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
[An Nahar] Police in Jordan's southern city of Tafileh fired tear gas on Monday to disperse angry unemployed demonstrators who demanded that the authorities make good on their promise of jobs.
A Sri Lankan man has died while trying to set a record for the longest time spent buried alive, police said Monday.
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
[Dawn] Dozens of 
[An Nahar] Troops in Nigeria's northern city of Maiduguri on Monday 
[Dawn] Pakistain 
...One of the basic tenets of Islam is that once a Koran has been printed it is expected to last for all time, no matter how old, ratty, and smelly other, lesser holy books may become. Should it actually become necessary to put a Koran out of its misery there is a ritual that includes extensive charivari, featuring long drawn-wailing and head bonking, ritual wife beating, and the sacrifice of dozens of women's noses and pubic lips. When the actual disposal has been completed there is a prescribed period of celebratory gun sex with the expectation of a minimum of two hundred casualties. Should actual infidels dispose of a Koran, Islamic custom calls for three weeks of rioting and a minimum of three dozen dead, which is a holdover from the days of Moloch worship...
Supporters of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement are on the defensive.
The chief of the North Korean People's Army's General Staff, who is widely held responsible for the artillery attack on Yeonpyeong Island in November 2010, has threatened a similar attack. In a piece for the North's state-run Rodong Sinmun daily on Sunday, Kim Kyok-sik said, "We will deliver a devastating punishment to the traitors, whose strength cannot compare to the sea of fire seen in the Yeonpyeong attack."
Iran's new parliament will be largely dominated by conservatives who support supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, according to latest results Monday of last week's election.
Mahmoud 
[Dawn] An alliance of minority parties on Sunday appealed to Chief Justice of Pakistain Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry to take a 
...Second President of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Because of constitutionally mandated term limits he is the current Prime Minister of Russia. His sock puppet, Dmitry Medvedev, was installed in the 2008 presidential elections. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law. During his eight years in office Russia's economy bounced back from crisis, seeing GDP increase, poverty decrease and average monthly salaries increase. During his presidency Putin passed into law a series of fundamental reforms, including a flat income tax of 13%, a reduced profits tax, and new land and legal codes. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile...
