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Kashmir: Five Indian soldiers killed in shooting
Today's Headlines
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-Land of the Free
Colorado apt building tells tenants: Get rid of firearms or leave.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 11:15 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  The complex in Castle Rock changed the contract and give until Oct. 1 to comply.

I don't know Colorado tenant protections, but changing a contract while in the middle of a contract is bull; unless 10/1 is the official renewal date for the entire complex.

Personally I think these manager whores should go back to working Colfax to remember what happens when they change the terms in the middle of a John.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 08/07/2013 19:50 Comments || Top||

#2  Every thug out there now knows where to rape and pillage... Good job Oakwood, lets see how you respond to the first break in...
Posted by: 49 Pan || 08/07/2013 21:01 Comments || Top||

#3  unintended consequences by moron managers who knee jerk emotionally and don't think things through.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 08/07/2013 21:04 Comments || Top||

#4  Unlawful and unconstitutional.

Have fun getting sued idiots.
Posted by: DarthVader || 08/07/2013 21:34 Comments || Top||


Africa Subsaharan
Nairobi airport closes as fire crews tackle blaze - bbc with photos
Posted by: 3dc || 08/07/2013 11:11 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Government
Who is The Champ really working for ? - Mcyhal Massie's Daily Rant
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 10:28 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


-Short Attention Span Theater-
Detroit is dead and Al-Qaeda is alive.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 10:24 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  As per FREEREPUBLIC, Al-Qaeda is not only NOT dead, but is apparently prevailing + possibly winning agz the USA = Bammer Admin???

* FREEREPUBLIC > AL-QAEDA WINS THIS ROUND.

See also WORLD MILITARY FORUM > US, WORLD MEDIAS CONFIRM THE US IS NOW A SECOND-RATE POWER, US SEEN AS RETREATING FROM EXTRENAL INTERNATIONAL OR GEOPOL POWER CENTRES IN FAVOR OF DOMESTIC
"SELF-ISOLATION/CONTAINMENT". OBAMA + GLOBALIST REVITALIZATION OF THE US TO FOLLOW THE SOCIALIST PATH.

Iff one believes that Communism or Leftism-Socialism won the Cold War, then why not as per Radical Islam = God-Faith based [Arabist?] Socialism???

BY THE ABOVE, HOW CAN AL-QAEDA, ETAL. = ISLAM/ISLAMISM N-O-T WIN THE GWOT AGZ OWG AMERIKA???
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 08/07/2013 19:49 Comments || Top||


Africa Subsaharan
135 year old voted in Zim polls - Nuus24
Doubt this makes the Chicago Tribune front page.
The oldest person who voted in Zimbabwe's 31 July poll is 135 years old and still serves in the Zimbabwe National Army, zimelections13.com has claimed in a tweet.

"The oldest person who voted in Zimbabwe's July 31 poll is135 years old and still serves in the Zimbabwe National Army", it tweeted.

The allegation comes as the outcry over the outcome of the just ended disputed elections in Zimbabwe continues to rattle the country and the international community, with the US saying it noted a "number of serious concerns".

ZimbabweÂ’s incumbent president Robert Mugabe won overwhelmingly in the polls which have been dismissed as a 'sham' by his long-time arch rival Morgan Tsvangirai of the Movement Democratic Change.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 10:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Good morning
Posted by: Scooter McGruder || 08/07/2013 09:18 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Birthday Gam Shot

AltaĂ­r Jarabo[Mexico][Filmography](age 27)



Pathway to Citizenship Design


Posted by: GolfBravoUSMC || 08/07/2013 9:34 Comments || Top||

#2  Music would play and Falina would whirl.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 9:41 Comments || Top||

#3  Excellent bloid Scooter!
Posted by: Steve White || 08/07/2013 13:34 Comments || Top||

#4  Damn, I must really be deaf. I always thought she was named Selena in the song.

Then again, I always thought it was "Four hundred children and a crop in the field..." and "She lost her looks and she lost her toenails, now she's lost her mind..."
Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain || 08/07/2013 15:00 Comments || Top||

#5  test
Posted by: gorb || 08/07/2013 15:49 Comments || Top||

#6  Music would play and Falina would whirl. Still one of my favorite tunes. Along with Big Iron of course

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGmUsJvRv7U
Posted by: Cheaderhead || 08/07/2013 18:33 Comments || Top||

#7  Just got back from Tijuana and didn't see anything like that!

But going to Ensenada next week so there is still hope.
Posted by: USN, Ret. || 08/07/2013 21:37 Comments || Top||


Home Front: WoT
Turning a NukeSub into a reef
The Navy has decided that it will not repair the nuclear-powered submarine USS Miami after concluding that the cost of repairing damage from a fire set by a civilian worker is more than it can afford due to mandated budget cuts.

The decision to scrap the Groton, Conn.-based sub comes after a damage assessment by the Navy found that estimated repair costs, originally estimated to be about $450 million, have risen dramatically, a Navy official told The Military Times.

Rear Adm. Rick Breckenridge, director of undersea warfare, said Tuesday that repairing the submarine would have meant canceling work on dozens of other ships because of new budget constraints. He said that would've hurt the Navy's overall readiness.

"The Navy and the nation simply cannot afford to weaken other fleet readiness in the way that would be required to afford repairs to Miami," Breckenridge said in a statement.
Posted by: Skidmark || 08/07/2013 09:08 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


-Lurid Crime Tales-
Man does a Napoleon
Norfolk, Va. -- Folks who live on Red Brooke Road off East Little Creek Road never thought they'd be dealing with blood stains on their street or neighbors who wield guns near their kids.
But then they live in the land of delusion.
But that's exactly what they say happened Tuesday night when a driver accidentally shot himself.
Neighbors tell NewsChannel 3 it happened because of an argument over speeding.
Couldn't figure out which way to point it?
"My friends were standing right there in the yard and the guy came flying by and they were like 'slow down, there's kids' and the guy did a U-turn and pulled over," said Ashley Summerson, who was standing outside down the street when the gun went off.
There was an earth-shattering kaboom!
After getting out of his car and waving around a gun, neighbors say the gun suddenly went off.
All by itself. Obviously an evil gun.
"Pulled his gun out trying to shoot one of them but he shot himself," Summerson says.
Sounds like he needs more range time.
"He was holding his groin and there was blood everywhere," said neighbor Zach Watson.
Pulled a Napoleon and blew his boneapart.
Residents say it could have turned out much worse. They say the kids playing in the street were just feet away from where the man was shot.
There are some people who should not have weapons.
"I'm just happy none of the kids got hurt," Watson says. "I'd rather get shot than one of these kids."
Neighbors say the two men who flagged down the shooter for speeding went with police.

Posted by: Deacon Blues || 08/07/2013 08:49 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  This is my rifle.
This is my gun.
This is for shooting.
This is for fun.

The man obviously never made it to basic training.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 08/07/2013 21:21 Comments || Top||

#2  "Pulled a Napoleon and blew his boneapart."

ROFLMAO!

Go to your room, Deacon.
Posted by: Barbara || 08/07/2013 22:38 Comments || Top||

#3  And everybody stood around laughing at him. After a long while, someone remembered to call the police. After the the police stopped laughing at him, they called an ambulance.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia || 08/07/2013 22:57 Comments || Top||


Africa North
Five Lessons from Egypt and the Arab Spring
h/t Gates of Vienna
1. Don't Believe Anything You Hear

...Middle Eastern politics is reality-selective, it's conspiratorial and it's based around shaky alliances between mortal enemies that are constantly falling apart.

...everything you hear coming out of Egypt is meaningless. Egyptian politics is completely cynical and completely unaware of its own cynicism. Everyone manufactures their own propaganda and conspiracy theories.

...Not only does no one there mean what they say, but they don't even know that they don't mean it.
The permitted/required lies of taqiyya, tawriya, kitman, and muruna make it hard to separate truth from lies, when the lie is actually higher truth, Allah being the master of deceit and all.
2. It's Not Democracy, It's Permanent Chaos

Democracy in the Middle East is just another means of political change. It's not any different than mob action, a coup or an invasion. It's just a way that one government replaces another.
"One man, one vote, one time." Or contrariwise, we will keep voting until the voters get the right answer.
It's just another way of describing business as usual...
Beyond all the obvious critiques of exporting democracy, the voting booth depends on a sense of law and order. It carries very little weight in lawless societies. In Egypt, mass protests really are as legitimate a means of political change as the ballot box. Probably better. It's harder to rig rallies of millions of people than it is to fake millions of votes.
Vote by mob is a very long tradition in Arab societies...
The Arab Spring represented political chaos in a lawless society, not social change or cultural enlightenment.

3. Everyone Will Always Hate America

The one thing that everyone in Egypt can agree on is that they hate America.

The Muslim Brotherhood hates America. Period. Not for anything we've done. This hatred is widely shared in Egypt. It will always be widely shared in Egypt. Denouncing America is one of the safest political positions to take. It's the Egyptian equivalent of motherhood and apple pie.

4. Fanatics and Democracy Don't Mix

One of the fondest myths of democracy promotion is that bringing terrorists into the political process moderates them. It doesn't.

John Kerry headed out on yet another peace process mission is a reminder of the futility of such thinking.
John Kerry is a reminder of the futility of thinking. He can't help it, poor man, he just wasn't born with the right tools. That's why the family sent him to school in France.
Bringing terrorists into the political process just gives them another set of tools with which to tear the system down. Which was their first goal...
Fanatics don't compromise because their goals require purity. They feint compromise only long enough to get to power. And then they turn on their former allies.
See required lies, above.
5. The Muslim World Has No New Ideas

...The three options are still military rule, strongman or theocracy. There is no fourth option. The Arab Spring tilted the rule of strongmen and soldiers toward theocracy. That outcome was as modern as the Caliphate. Now the military has once again stepped in. Eventually there will be a strongman. Or a theocracy. Or a junta. And they will go on overthrowing each other

Everything else is only window dressing or a disguise for where the power actually goes.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/07/2013 04:39 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Democracy in the Middle East is just another means of political change. It's not any different than mob action, a coup or an invasion. It's just a way that one government replaces another.
No different than anywhere else.
Posted by: Glenmore || 08/07/2013 7:40 Comments || Top||

#2  Not only does no one there mean what they say, but they don't even know that they don't mean it

I think it was T.E. Lawrence who first commented on the Arab mind's astonishing capability to hold two opposing thoughts as equally true, at the same time.
Posted by: Pappy || 08/07/2013 11:36 Comments || Top||


Government
Obamacare months behind in testing IT data security: government
(Reuters) - The federal government is months behind in testing data security for the main pillar of Obamacare: allowing Americans to buy health insurance on state exchanges due to open by October 1
Is that a bug or a feature?
The missed deadlines have pushed the government's decision on whether information technology security is up to snuff to exactly one day before that crucial date, the Department of Health and Human Services' inspector general said in a report.

As a result, experts say, the exchanges might open with security flaws or, possibly but less likely, be delayed.

"They've removed their margin for error," said Deven McGraw, director of the health privacy project at the non-profit Center for Democracy & Technology. "There is huge pressure to get (the exchanges) up and running on time, but if there is a security incident they are done. It would be a complete disaster from a PR viewpoint."

The most likely serious security breach would be identity theft, in which a hacker steals the social security numbers and other information people provide when signing up for insurance.
But a beneficial side effect is that it allows political snoops to check out your medical condition whenever they want in case they want to use that against you. Just ask Joe the Plumber...
The inspector general's report, released without fanfare last Friday, found that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services or CMS - the agency within HHS that is running Obamacare - had set a May 13 deadline for its contractor to deliver a plan to test the security of the crucial information technology component.

A test was to have been performed between June 3 and 7. But the delivery deadline slipped and the test - assessing firewalls and other security elements - is now set for this week and next.

"CMS," concludes the inspector general's report, "is working with very tight deadlines."
What are they using, Windows ME?
The delays mean that the ruling by CMS's chief information officer certifying the Obamacare IT system as secure will be pushed back from September 4 to September 30, a day before enrollment under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the law that established Obamacare, is supposed to start.

"Several critical tasks remain to be completed in a short period of time," the report concluded.

Any additional delays could mean CMS would not have the information it needs to authorize use of the system by October 1, the inspector general found.

CMS spokesman Brian Cook said the agency is confident the Obamacare exchanges will open on time. "We are on schedule and will be ready for the marketplaces to open on October 1," he said.
Brian is practicing keeping his lips on when he says stuff like that. When he gets it right he'll go to work for Hillary...
When people try to enroll in health insurance starting on October 1 for insurance plans taking effect in 2014, their identity, income and other information they furnish with their application will be funneled through a federal "data hub."

The hub is like a traffic circle for data. It does not itself store information, but instead has digital spokes connecting to the Internal Revenue Service and other agencies that will allow it to verify information people provide. Opponents of Obamacare have repeatedly raised concerns that sensitive personal information could be stolen.
Not 'stolen', just 'borrowed'...
Before the hub or any other federal information system can open, a 2002 law requires that it obtain a "security authorization package," which is essentially the roadmap for keeping out hackers and preventing security breaches.

The first component of the package provides an overview of the system's security requirements and describes the controls the contractor has installed. It covers access controls and authentication, for instance, so that hackers cannot ping the hub and access IRS data.

A second component is a risk assessment that identifies vulnerabilities and determines the probability of a data breach.

The final component is an assessment by an independent testing organization that proper security controls have been implemented correctly, are operating as intended, and are meeting security requirements.

"CMS has extensive experience building and operating information technology systems that handle sensitive data" as a result of its experience with Medicare and Medicaid, the agency said in a statement.

Despite the tight IT deadlines Obamacare faces, the 2002 federal law on information security might provide an important loophole. The requirement that CMS's chief information officer make a "security authorization" decision does not mean the CIO has to conclude that the data hub is impregnable. He can decide that, despite identified security risks, the hub can operate.
After all, it's only a "small risk"...
Health privacy expert McGraw said "the worst case scenario" of not meeting the IT security deadline is that the government will not be able to bring the data hub online on October 1. In that case, people will be able to apply for insurance starting on that date but will not be told if they have been accepted or whether they are eligible for government subsidies to pay their premiums.
All is proceeding as has been foretold.
Posted by: Beavis || 08/07/2013 02:14 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


#2  Mike Rogers got it right.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 10:36 Comments || Top||

#3  Two fellows walking down the street in Moscow. One asks the other; "tell me, do you think we have finally achieved full communism"? The other replies, "oh hell no, it has to get a lot worse than this".
Author unk.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 10:55 Comments || Top||

#4  Besoeker, today that joke could take place in Pyongyang.

In a few years, it might take place in Detroit or Chicago. Never in D.C.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia || 08/07/2013 19:42 Comments || Top||


-Land of the Free
Hacker creates cheap spying tool for amateur snooping
Brendan O'Conner of Malice Afterthought, a security consulting agency, is not helping bring back your sense of safety. A self-described and unabashed hacker who has worked for DARPA, O'Conner has also taught at the US military's cybersecurity school. His new project, CreepyDOL (or Creepy Distributed Object Locater), is raising eyebrows.

Essentially, CreepyDOL allows a user to track, locate and then break into some unsuspecting victim's smartphone.

"For a few hundred dollars," he says, "I can track your every movement, activity and interaction, until I find whatever it takes to blackmail you."

O'Conner, 27, wanted to see if a private citizen could do pretty much the same thing the NSA is doing but on a budget. He created boxes, costing a mere $57, that intercepted and transmitted data carried by nearby Wi-Fi networks.

"Actually it's not hard," O'Conner told The New York Times. "It's terrifyingly easy...It could be used for anything depending on how creepy you want to be."

"It eliminates the idea of 'blending into a crowd,'" he claims. "If you have a wireless device (phone, iPad, etc.), even if you're not connected to a network, CreepyDOL will see you, track your movements and report home."

O'Conner contends that he didn't spy on anyone, instead testing the equipment only on himself. In fact, he says that use of the device on someone is a violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, which WikiLeaks whistleblower Bradley Manning was convicted of last week.

"I haven't done a full deployment of this because the United States government has made a practice of prosecuting security researchers," O'Conner says. "Everyone is terrified."
Posted by: 3dc || 08/07/2013 01:58 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Olde Tyme Religion
Saudis drastically cut Haj slots available to Chechens
Posted by: 3dc || 08/07/2013 01:46 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  The 'Panel' has decided pilgrims over the age of 70 need not apply.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 11:22 Comments || Top||


Terror Networks
Debka: Terror alert prompted by suspected suicide bombers with implanted explosives

According to one high placed US official, concern focuses on the possibility of terrorists carrying explosive devices implanted inside their bodies.

Counter terrorism sources add that plastic explosives in the body of a would-be suicide bomber without metal components are undetectable by standard screening devices such as those used at most international airports.

It has been suspected for some years that doctors and surgeons in Yemen in the service of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula were experimenting with implanting of plastic explosive devices inside the bodies of suicide bombers or even animals. According to Western counter terrorism sources, the surgeon would open the abdominal cavity and implant the explosive device among the bomber's internal organs.

Some US sources are calling the current threat the most serious since 9/11. They are alarmed by the degree of confidence AQAP leaders show in openly using electronic communications to boast about the unstoppable attack they are plotting.

A senior US official described the terrorists as saying the planned attack is "going to be big" and "strategically significant."

BTW in other area news... It appears Jomo Kenyatta airport was closed after the international arrivals hall had a big fire.
Posted by: 3dc || 08/07/2013 01:36 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  This has been obvious for years. The interesting part is the detonator - mixing chemicals after a membrane dissolves? Not precise timing, maybe good enough.

Or something far more sophisticated involving external electronics?
Posted by: KBK || 08/07/2013 10:33 Comments || Top||

#2  MST-13 timer detonators have been around for a while.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 10:48 Comments || Top||

#3  terrorists carrying explosive devices implanted inside their bodies.


I note without comment that Islam's greatest contribution to civilization to date appears to be the ass-bomb.
Posted by: SteveS || 08/07/2013 13:40 Comments || Top||

#4  Back in the late 80s early 90s I played role playign games and one of the products I had was the Traveler 2300 Earth Cyberpunk sourcebook. In that little book was a story of terrorists surgically installing bombs into the abdomen of innocent people. So either Al Queda plays old role playing games or the idea has been around for a long time.

Embassies need a bomb proof waiting room and they need to invite suspicious looking people to wait within for a few hours. Oh, and they can communicate through skype while in there to get their business done.
Posted by: rjschwarz || 08/07/2013 14:37 Comments || Top||

#5  The detonator ought to be hackable. Everything else is.
Posted by: gorb || 08/07/2013 15:54 Comments || Top||

#6  A Time-Bubble stasis ought to do it.
Let them walk out with it still ticking like a Timex.
Posted by: Skidmark || 08/07/2013 16:34 Comments || Top||

#7  Let them stand in front of an EMP machine.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 08/07/2013 21:02 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Al Qaeda's Chechen, Caucasian fighters win N. Syrian air base, execute captive troops
Debka so apply your ration of salt.
Russian-speaking Al Qaeda fighters from Chechnya and the Caucasian seized the key northern Syrian air base of Minakh 10 kilometers south of Aleppo, from the Syrian army Monday, Aug. 5.This was the first important gain by Al Qaeda's North Caucasian brigade, Jaish al-Muhajireen wal Ansar, and its Chechen commander Abu Omar. They did not give the Syrian troops at the base a chance to flee. They caught and executed them by slashing their throats or beheading -- in accordance with al Qaeda custom. This fate was also suffered by the Syrian air force's chief operations officer in the north.

The assault was enabled by suicide bombings at the gate of the air base which enabled the foreign assailants to surge into the compound.

The fall of Minakh abruptly halted Syrian government air strikes against opposition-held regions in Aleppo province. Based there was a fleet of Syrian Air Force German-made MBB 223 Flamingo training craft and Russian-made Mi-8 assault helicopters. It also opened the way for Syrian rebel forces to advance on government outposts in President Bashar Assad's Alawite heartland in the Jabal al-Akrad hills of Latakia province, and capture a number of villages.
Posted by: 3dc || 08/07/2013 01:30 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  IIRC MIDDLE EAST ONLINE > SYRIAN REBELS IN HOMS LOOK TO AL-NUSRA [Al-Qaeda] FOR HELP, agz Baby Assad + Syrian Army [SA].

VERSUS

* GROONG > RUSSIAN AIRBORNE TROOPS MAY GET TO SYRIA [under UNO = UNSC Mandate]IFF PRESIDENT ISSUES ORDER.

Moscow won't like the idea of Caucasus militants overthrowing Assad + then returning to the Caucasus or Russia proper to resume their Jihad.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 08/07/2013 2:36 Comments || Top||

#2  Chechens are vicious fkkers.
Posted by: OldSpook || 08/07/2013 2:41 Comments || Top||

#3  Debka sez they got 600 anti-tank missiles.
Posted by: phil_b || 08/07/2013 5:39 Comments || Top||

#4  And where did they get their arms? Libya? Thanks to Obastard?
Posted by: AlanC || 08/07/2013 8:54 Comments || Top||

#5  The Saudis, more likely.
Posted by: Pappy || 08/07/2013 10:53 Comments || Top||

#6  RUSSIA TODAY > AL-QAIDA REPLACING [overthrowing] ASSAD IS BIGGEST THREAT TO US SECURITY - CIA DEPUTY DIRECTOR, espec iff AQ gets control of Syria's CHEMWAR = WMDS + LR Scuds.

Acting CIA Chief Mike Morrell.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 08/07/2013 22:31 Comments || Top||


Government
T.S.A. Expands Duties Beyond Airport Security
[NY Times] As hundreds of commuters emerged from Amtrak and commuter trains at Union Station on a recent morning, an armed squad of men and women dressed in bulletproof vests made their way through the crowds.

The squad was not with the Washington police department or Amtrak's police force, but was one of the Transportation Security Administration's Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response squads -- VIPR teams for short -- assigned to perform random security sweeps to prevent terrorist attacks at transportation hubs across the United States.
"VIPR" sounds like it's a branch of SPECTR, probably staffed by ex-SMERSH guys.
"The T.S.A., huh," said Donald Neubauer of Greenville, Ohio, as he walked past the squad. "I thought they were just at the airports."
Wait a couple years and that'll be a fond memory...
With little fanfare, the agency best known for airport screenings has vastly expanded its reach
...the NYT inadvertently uses the right word, reach...
to sporting events, music festivals, rodeos, highway weigh stations and train terminals. Not everyone is happy.

T.S.A. and local law enforcement officials say the teams are a critical component of the nation's counterterrorism efforts, but some members of Congress, auditors at the Department of Homeland Security and civil liberties groups are sounding alarms. The teams are also raising hackles among passengers who call them unnecessary and intrusive.

"Our mandate is to provide security and counterterrorism operations for all high-risk transportation targets, not just airports and aviation," said John S. Pistole, the administrator of the agency. "The VIPR teams are a big part of that."
High-risk transport includes rodeos and music festivals?
Some in Congress, however, say the T.S.A. has not demonstrated that the teams are effective. Auditors at the Department of Homeland Security are asking questions about whether the teams are properly trained and deployed based on actual security threats.

Civil liberties groups say that the VIPR teams have little to do with the agency's original mission to provide security screenings at airports and that in some cases their actions amount to warrantless searches in violation of constitutional protections.

"The problem with T.S.A. stopping and searching people in public places outside the airport is that there are no real legal standards, or probable cause," said Khaliah Barnes, administrative law counsel at the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington. "It's something that is easily abused because the reason that they are conducting the stops is shrouded in secrecy."

T.S.A. officials respond that the random searches are "special needs" or "administrative searches" that are exempt from probable cause because they further the government's need to prevent terrorist attacks.
Nice get-around of the law...
Created in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the T.S.A. has grown to an agency of 56,000 people at 450 American airports. The VIPR teams were started in 2005, in part as a reaction to the Madrid train bombing in 2004 that killed 191 people.

The program now has a $100 million annual budget and is growing rapidly, increasing to several hundred people and 37 teams last year, up from 10 teams in 2008. T.S.A. records show that the teams ran more than 8,800 unannounced checkpoints and search operations with local law enforcement outside of airports last year, including those at the Indianapolis 500
...ovoid transportation...
and the Democratic and Republican national political conventions.
Convention security should be done by local/state police combined with the U.S. Marshals.
The teams, which are typically composed of federal air marshals, explosives experts and baggage inspectors, move through crowds with bomb-sniffing dogs, randomly stop passengers and ask security questions. There is usually a specially trained undercover plainclothes member who monitors crowds for suspicious behavior, said Kimberly F. Thompson, a T.S.A. spokeswoman. Some team members are former members of the military and police forces.

T.S.A. officials would not say if the VIPR teams had ever foiled a terrorist plot or thwarted any major threat to public safety, saying the information is classified. But they argue that the random searches and presence of armed officers serve as a deterrent that bolsters the public confidence.

Security experts give the agency high marks for creating the VIPR teams. "They introduce an unexpected element into situations where a terrorist might be planning an attack," said Rafi Ron, the former chief of security for Ben-Gurion International Airport in Israel, who is now a transportation security consultant.
An easily spotted and avoided element...
Local law enforcement officials also welcome the teams.

"We've found a lot of value in having these high-value security details," said John Siqveland, a front man for Metro Transit, which operates buses and trains Minneapolis-St. Paul. He said that local transit police have worked with VIPR teams on security patrols on the Metro rail line, which serves the Minnesota Vikings stadium, the Mall of America and the airport.

Kimberly Woods, a spokeswoman for Amtrak, said the railroad has had good experiences with VIPR team members who work with the Amtrak police on random bag inspections during high-travel times. "They supplement our security measures," she said.

But elsewhere, experiences with the teams have not been as positive.

In 2011, the VIPR teams were criticized for screening and patting down people after they got off an Amtrak train in Savannah, Ga. As a result, the Amtrak police chief briefly banned the teams from the railroad's property, saying the searches were illegal.

In April 2012, during a joint operation with the Houston police and the local transit police, people boarding and leaving city buses complained that T.S.A. officers were stopping them and searching their bags. (Local law enforcement denied that the bags were searched.)

The operation resulted in several arrests by the local transit police, mostly for passengers with warrants for prostitution and minor drug possession. Afterward, dozens of angry residents packed a public meeting with Houston transit officials to object to what they saw as an unnecessary intrusion by the T.S.A.

"It was an incredible waste of taxpayers' money," said Robert Fickman, a local defense lawyer who attended the meeting. "Did we need to have T.S.A. in here for a couple of minor busts?"
Posted by: Fred || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Ihre Papieren bitte, Buerger!

Sorry, I can't do the u-umlaut like German uses.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia || 08/07/2013 0:17 Comments || Top||

#2  ALT + 0252 = Ă¼
Posted by: Raj || 08/07/2013 0:26 Comments || Top||

#3  [shaps heels]

"Your papers PLEASE!"
Posted by: CrazyFool || 08/07/2013 0:30 Comments || Top||

#4  Raj, I'm using my Android phone - there is no Alt key. (Or any Neu key. (just a little German humor))
Posted by: Sonny the Well-mannered8648 || 08/07/2013 0:59 Comments || Top||

#5  Arrrgh - FireFox must have lost my cookies.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia || 08/07/2013 1:02 Comments || Top||

#6  Thousands
Standing
Around
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 08/07/2013 1:43 Comments || Top||

#7  test
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 2:49 Comments || Top||

#8  Rafi Ron's firm uses and teaches 'Behavioral Pattern Recognition'. Good luck teaching Atlanta TSA employees how to say BPR, let along learn how to employ it. Sorry, silk purse sow's ear...affirmative action gone wild.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 3:14 Comments || Top||

#9  Mission creep so that public functionaries can have their guaranteed magic checks without anxiety forever?

Who'd a thunk?
Posted by: Grereting Unoque7887 || 08/07/2013 5:43 Comments || Top||

#10  That last was me. Any problems with the comment system?
Posted by: no mo uro || 08/07/2013 5:45 Comments || Top||

#11  And how many terrorists has the TSA caught?

Oh yeah. Zero.

But they need to expand operations. Sounds like typical government logic to me.
Posted by: DarthVader || 08/07/2013 6:37 Comments || Top||

#12  Any problems with the comment system?

You'll have to ask the NSA. Good Morning Gentlemen, Ladies.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 08/07/2013 8:50 Comments || Top||

#13  Legal blogs appear to be preferred at the moment. Probably a professional assist for an embattled Attorney General.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 9:05 Comments || Top||

#14  Viper teams? Putting the ole smiley face away already huh, and acronym needing a definition.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 08/07/2013 11:52 Comments || Top||

#15  T.S.A. officials would not say if the VIPR teams had ever foiled a terrorist plot or thwarted any major threat to public safety, saying the information is classified.

...or "zero".
Posted by: tu3031 || 08/07/2013 19:22 Comments || Top||

#16  When I was in the Navy, I was told that information should be classified only if releasing it would harm the United States. Obvious examples include operational plans, intelligence sources and methods, and so on. Information was not supposed to be classified just because releasing it would be embarrassing to someone or some group.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia || 08/07/2013 22:02 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Kashmir: Five Indian soldiers killed in shooting
[BBC.CO.UK] Five Indian soldiers have been rubbed out in Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmire, the chief minister of the disputed region says.

India's army accused Pakistain over the incident, saying troops had "entered the Indian area and ambushed" an army patrol in the Poonch area.

A Pak military official told the BBC that "no fire took place" from their side.

Claimed by both countries, Kashmire has been a flashpoint for over 60 years.

In January, several deadly cross-border attacks plunged the neighbours into the worst crisis in relations in years.

The latest incident comes as the two sides are preparing for peace talks, the first since a new Pak government took office.

The chief minister of Jammu and Kashmire state, Omar Abdullah, said such incidents "don't help efforts to normalise or even improve relations with Pakistain and call in to question the Pakistain government's recent overtures".

Indian Defence Minister AK Antony told the parliament that the government "has lodged a strong protest with the government of Pakistain through diplomatic channels".

'Unprovoked'
A top Indian army officer told the BBC that a group of "elite commandos" from the Mighty Pak Army had breached the line of control on Tuesday morning and ambushed an Indian army patrol in the Poonch sector of Jammu region.

The officer said one Indian soldier was injured in "unprovoked firing" by Pak soldiers in a separate incident in Udhampur region on Monday.

A Pak military official described the Indian allegations as "baseless" and said there was no firing from the Pak side.
Posted by: Fred || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan

#1  "Elite Commandos" > Dey M-A-Y be the following ...

* DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > PAK ARMY'S "MUJAHIDEEN REGIMENT" BEHIND LOC ATTACK.

In any case, India = New Delhi is vowing mighty investigation-n-revenge.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 08/07/2013 0:21 Comments || Top||


Africa North
Twelve More Palestinians Arrested In Sinai
[Ynet] The Paleostinian news agency Ma'an reported that 12 Paleostinians were locked away
Drop the rosco, Muggsy, or you're one with the ages!
in Al Arish in Sinai in wake of events in the peninsula that left two Egyptian soldiers dead.
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Salafists


U.S. to file charges against Benghazi hard boy
Just before CNN broadcasts interview with same

U.S. government officials have reportedly filed the first criminal charges related to the Sept. 11, 2012 attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya that left four Americans dead and a diplomatic outpost in ruins.

Arwa Damon, a CNN reporter, spoke with Ansar al-Sharia leader Ahmed Abu Khattala in an interview to be broadcast Tuesday night. The network first reported on the criminal charges against him a few hours before airtime.
We have him in custody, then? Kudos to those who captured him.
Nowhere in the article does it say we have him; we're just filing charges. Maybe we'll send someone to Benghazi to collect him. Maybe not.
Oh. Never mind.
The U.S. government has not yet spoken with Khattala, but CNN found him in Benghazi, the eastern LIbyan port city where militant members of his al-Qaeda-linked group lobbed mortars and gunfire at the consulate compound, killing U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and three others.
Wow. That's embarrassing. But I s'pose after the AP and other bugging-the-reporter scandals, they can't tail the CNN's person too closely.
'It's still stunning to see how little protection this sprawling compound had,' Damon says in the preview footage, walking through the burned-out remains of the U.S. Consulate.
Indeed. Although they did have very good men on the ground for a while, as it turned out.
Perhaps it was intended to be a temporary facility. The "very good men" weren't intended to be there, at least not in that capacity.
But they were there nonetheless, running to the sound of guns.
CNN released a few short video clips Tuesday afternoon, but neither included portions of the Khattala interview, which the network said would not include any footage of the suspected terror ringleader's face.

He told CNN, however, that while he was present in the U.S. Consulate compound when hostilities began, he played no part in it. Khattala said in the interview that no Libyan or American officials have reached out to him.

'Never,' he said.

'Even the investigative team did not try to contact me,' he said, referring to the FBI.
Still? Perhaps they should have consulted CNN.
OutFront host Erin Burnett also interviewed Geoff Porter, director of North Africa Risk Consulting Inc. Porter was responsible for briefing Ambassador Stevens on security risks, according to CNN, and spoke about why security at the diplomatic outpost was so sparse.

'What we're essentially talking about is a CIA mission in Benghazi, whose purpose was to collect information, to collect weapons potentially,' Porter says, 'and they may have deliberately wanted to keep a low security profile.'

'There were so many different violent non-state actors - armed groups - that the U.S. couldn't identify the threat. They couldn't distinguish which was a group threatening the United States' interests, and which was simply a violent non-state actor pursuing its own agenda.

At least two other media outlets interviewed Ahmed Abu Khattala in October 2012. At the time, he scoffed at reports that said 'no one knows where I am and that I am hiding.'

'But here I am in the open,' he told Reuters, 'sitting in a hotel with you. I'm even going to pick up my sister's kids from school soon.'

He also told The New York Times a story that resonated with the Obama administration's earliest contentions about the terror attack. Khattala 'contended that the attack had grown out of a peaceful protest against a video made in the United States that mocked the Prophet Muhammad and Islam,' the Times reported.

'He also said that guards inside the compound -- Libyan or American, he was not sure -- had shot first at the demonstrators, provoking them.'

Khattala was a member of the Islamist opposition when Muammar Gaddaffi was alive, and spent years in the country's notorious Abu Salim jail. After his release in 2011, he helped the rebels capture and kill the longtime dictator.

Ansar al-Sharia, his brainchild along with other former political prisoners, means 'supporters of Islamic law.' At the time of the attack, Libyan sources said the group numbered between 100 and 200 people.

Damon's reporting has brought outrage from eight congressional Republicans, who castigated the newly confirmed FBI Director James Comey in a letter and demanded a full investigative briefing within 30 days. The Obama administration's investigation of the attack, they wrote, has been 'simply unacceptable.'
Yet they've been accepting it...
'It has been more than 10 months since the attacks,' the letter reads. 'We appear to be no closer to knowing who was responsible today than we were in the early weeks following the attack.'

Utah Republican Rep. Jason Chaffetz, a vocal proponent of a more aggressive Benghazi administration, told reporters on July 31 that "one of the pertinent questions today is, why we have not captured or killed the terrorists who committed these attacks?'

If 'CNN was able to go in and talk to one of the suspected terrorists,' he asked, after news of the Ahmed Abu Khattala interview percolated throughout Washington, 'how come the military hasn't been able to get after them and capture or kill the people? How come the FBI isn't doing this and yet CNN is?'

He added that he would be willing to speak with investigators, 'but not as an interrogation, as a conversation like the one we are having right now.'

Chaffetz said during a July 31 Fox News broadcast that the FBI hasn't placed a high priority on bringing to justice the attackers who are connected with the Ansar al-Sharia.
Perhaps the FBI could contract-out to the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department; they found and arrested Nakoula Basseley Nakoula rather quickly.
'Our FBI has never talked to these people,' Chaffetz said, 'and that's just wholly unacceptable.'
Y'know, war isn't the responsibility of the FBI. Nor of the American court system. This is CIA and DOD business, those people who used to be called the War Department, back when we were into clear communication instead of obfuscation
Posted by: Steve White || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Ansar al-Sharia


-Short Attention Span Theater-
I'm a guy again! ABC newsman who switched genders wants to switch back
[NYPOST] He thought he was a woman trapped in a man's body -- but it turns out he's "just another boring straight guy."
"Once she got out of my body all that was left was... me. Dunno where she went. But I'm not transgender! I just like wearing pink underwear!"
ABC News editor Don Ennis strolled into the newsroom in May wearing a little black dress and an auburn wig and announced he was transgender and splitting from his wife. He wanted to be called Dawn.
"But don't get fresh!"
But now he says he suffered from a two-day bout of amnesia that has made him realize he wants to live his life again as Don.
"I'm done with all that stuff! I wanta drink beer and burp! I wanta scratch my butt whilst I'm watching football on the teevee, maybe even vent a little methane!"
"I accused my wife of playing some kind of cruel joke, dressing me up in a wig and bra and making fake ID's with the name 'Dawn' on it.
"Honest! I went on a bender and I woke up and there was my bra, hanging from my nipple!"
"Seriously," Ennis wrote in a memo he posted to the newsroom bulletin board Friday, explaining his shock after he woke up from what he called a "transient global amnesia" last month.
"It was induced by my evil twin, while I was recovering from a subdural hematoma! I knew right then that he was the real killer!"
The memo was first obtained by the website NewsBlues.com
"Hey, Harry! Look at dis! You remember that ABC guy who showed up dressed like a broad?"
"It became obvious this was not the case once I took off the bra -- and discovered two reasons I was wearing one," he said, referring to his hormone-induced breasts.
"Whoa! Bartender! Milk for everyone!"
"I thought it was 1999 . . . and I was sure as hell that I was a man," Ennis said in the e-mail titled "Not Reportable, Very Confirmed."
"Uhhh... Honey? Have you seen my manly member?"
"Fortunately, my memories of the last 14 years have since returned. But what did not return was my identity as Dawn," said Ennis, who had been wearing lipstick, skirts and heels.
"She left me! Forever! It's all over! [Sob!]"
"I am writing to let you know I'm changing my name . . . to Don Ennis. That will be my name again, now and forever. And it appears I'm not transgender after all.
"I'm just a dumbass who watches too many soap operas and whose wife is mainly glad to have somebody like me. To take out the garbage."
Posted by: Fred || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Iff HeShe had the "Op" I don't think HeShe can get it back.

This has got "HANGOVER III" written all over it.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 08/07/2013 0:17 Comments || Top||

#2  All the more reason you should ALWAYS ask yourself "What if IM wrong" before doing anything major.
Posted by: OldSpook || 08/07/2013 2:23 Comments || Top||

#3  The Connecticut resident has now assured friends and colleagues that his switch back to being a man isnÂ’t a joke

West East Coast again. Is it the waters ?
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 3:09 Comments || Top||

#4  We'll have to check with Dr. Steve but isn't the operation to become a man called an "addadictomy".

I'll be in my room.

(This is GORT but Fred's autogenerated nic was much too good to not use)
Posted by: One Eyed Ulung5801 || 08/07/2013 7:40 Comments || Top||

#5  Reverse vaginalectomy. Yes, it is covered by the Affordable Care Act.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 8:49 Comments || Top||

#6 
Posted by: junkiron || 08/07/2013 9:58 Comments || Top||

#7  Good one junkiron.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 08/07/2013 11:24 Comments || Top||

#8  One of your best JunkIron.
Posted by: Shipman || 08/07/2013 13:01 Comments || Top||

#9  He thought he was a woman trapped in a man's body -- but it turns out he's "just another boring straight guy."

His therapists got it wrong. He's really a lezbean in a man's body.
Posted by: gorb || 08/07/2013 15:49 Comments || Top||

#10  Ah, for the olden days..when Don would just be tossed in the nearest nuthouse and forgotten about.
Does that make me "mean-spirited"?
Posted by: tu3031 || 08/07/2013 19:27 Comments || Top||


Caribbean-Latin America
4 die in southern Chihuahua, cops detained

For a map, click here. For a map of Chihuahua state, click here.

By Chris Covert
Rantburg.com

A total of four individuals were found dead in ongoing drug and gang related violence in southern Chihuahua municipalities in separate incidents, according to Mexican news reports.

Meanwhile, Mexican Army units detained two police commanders in San Franciscio de Conchos municipality Sunday.

A news account which appeared in El Diario de Chihuahua said that San Francisco de Conchos Secretaria de Seguridad Puiblica José Luis Baca Molina, a local police commander, Pablo Fierro, and an unidentified civilian were detained by a Mexican Army unit Sunday at a local tourist resort.

According to data supplied in the report, Pablo Fierro were detained in June 2012 with two other police agents, Erick Holguin and Omar Duran because of alleged links to organized crime. The arrests were made after two other unidentified government officials had been stripped of their weapons, and an investigation was underway.

In last Sunday's arrests, Mexican Army elements seized an undisclosed quantity of drugs and guns, as well as police car.

Four individuals were found murdered in southern Chihuahua, two in Guadalupe y Calvo municipality and one each in Belleza and Bocoyna municipalities.

  • Fernando Luna Hernandez, 26 was found dead Monday in the town of Creel near a gap in Chapultepec neighborhood. He had been shot six times with a 9mm weapon. He was reported missing six days before he was found.

  • Jesus Diaz Vizcarra, 36 was shot to death at a "narco" road block in Guadalupe y Calvo municipality Saturday morning. According to an El Diario de Chihuahua news account, Diaz Vizcarra was traveling aboard a pickup truck with several others when they were stopped at a roadblock near Arroyo de las Canoas by armed suspects wearing masks. Diaz Vizcarra was kept at the roadblock, while the others were told to go on without the vehicle. When the group returned Diaz Vizcarra was found dead. Diaz Vizcarra was a collection agent for the Programa Federal de Oportunidades.

  • Antonia Ramos Chaparro, 48, was found stabbed to death in Baborigame in Guadalupe y Calvo municipality Monday, according to a news report which appeared in the online edition of El Sol de Parral. Antonia Ramos Chaparro was in the courtyard of her home when a male suspect, after dismounting from a vehicle with several others stabbed her multiple times in the chest before fleeing the scene.

  • An unidentified man in his 40s was found stabbed and beaten to death in Belleza municipality Tuesday, according to a news account in El Sol de Parral. Mexican Army and state police units had been sent to a location between Parral and El Vergel after receiving an anonymous tip. The victim was wrapped in rubber tied with nylon yarn. Originally, reports were that several people were killed, but officials only found one victim.

Chris Covert writes Mexican Drug War and national political news for Rantburg.com and BorderlandBeat.com. He can be reached at grurkka@gmail.com
Posted by: badanov || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Arabia
Saudi King replaces deputy Defense Minister
The Saudi King on Tuesday replaced the country's deputy defense minister, Saudi Press Agency reported. Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud issued a royal order, exempting deputy defense minister Prince Fahd bin Abdullah bin Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Saud, and naming Prince Salman bin Sultan bin Abdulaziz Al Saud to the post, Xinhua reported.

Prince Fahd was appointed deputy defense minister on April 20, replacing Prince Khalid bin Sultan bin Abdulaziz Al Saud.

The newly-appointed deputy defense minister was the assistant secretary of National Security for Security and Intelligence Affairs.
Posted by: Steve White || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


-Lurid Crime Tales-
Murdering PA gunman tackled, leg shot.... with own weapon.
That's Pennsylvania, not the Middle East. Though with the leg shooting, it could easily have been otherwise.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Africa North
Egypt: Plot To Assassinate Al-Sisi, Elbaradei Uncovered
[Ynet] Security officials say Sinai-based jihadists planned to attack convoys of senior figures behind Morsi's overthrow with grenades on first day of Eid al-Fitr holiday

Egyptian intelligence agencies exposed this past week three armed terror cells in the Sinai peninsula that were working together to carry out a plan to assassinate senior military and police figures, Kuwait newspaper Alrai reported, citing Egyptian officials.

Egyptian security services are currently seeking some 60 people who are suspected of being involved in the plot.

According to the report, the conspirers planned to kill Defense Minister Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, Interior Minister Mohamed Ibrahim and Vice President Mohamed ElBaradei
Egyptian law scholar and sometime Iranian catspaw. He was head of the IAEA from December 1997 to November 2009. At some point during his tenure he was purchased by the Iranians. ElBaradei and the IAEA were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for something in 2005. ElBaradei served on the Board of Trustees of the International Crisis Group, a lefty NGO that is bankrolled by the Carnegie Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, as well as George Soros' Open Society Institute. After the fall of Mubarak he ran for president. He lost.
The officials said that as soon as the plot was exposed the suspects fled to the mountainous areas in Sinai. The suspects, who in the past have operated individually when they attacked sensitive facilities and army and police outposts, have now joined forces with the goal of assassinating those who were behind the overthrow of Islamist President Mohamed Morsi.

Alrai further reported that a Paleostinian conspirer who was incarcerated
Keep yer hands where we can see 'em, if yez please!
in Sinai revealed that 12 of the suspects who fled belong to the Paleostinian Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason, movement, while the rest are Salafists
...Salafists are ostentatiously devout Moslems who figure the ostentation of their piety gives them the right to tell others how to do it and to kill those who don't listen to them...
The Egyptian officials said the Islamists planned to arrive in Cairo on the first day of Eid al-Fitr -- the holiday marking the end of Ramadan -- and carry out the attack on the senior figures' motorcades using grenades obtained from Libyan arms smugglers.

Meanwhile,
...back at the alley, Slats grabbed his rosco...
the Paleostinian news agency Ma'an reported that Egyptian police have arrested 12 Paleostinians from Gazoo as part of an operation in the city of El-Arish to track down infiltrators. The detainees were transferred to Cairo for further interrogation.

On Sunday, separate attacks by jihadists on army positions in Sinai resulted in the death of two soldiers.

Monday night saw unknown assailants, thought to belong to an bully boy religious group in North Sinai, use improvised bombs to blow up the shrines of two religious leaders. The first shrine belonged to Sheikh Hamid Abu Jarir, located in the Al-Mughara region of the city of Al-Hassana in Central Sinai, with the second belonging to Sheikh Salim Ashraf Abu Jarir in the Mazar region in the city of Bir Al-Abd.

The attacks were coordinated and took place at the same time, with the assailants fleeing both scenes in four-wheel-drive pickup trucks without license plates.

Over the weekend a senior Egyptian official said 90 suspects, including seven Paleostinians, have been arrested over the past month during military operations in Sinai. He said 60 gunnies have been killed, among them 30 Paleostinians.
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Salafists


Home Front: Culture Wars
New York Times reports 2 years of declining revenue
More feel goodery about another media empire that is crumbling.
The New York Times Company [$NYT] reported second quarter 2013 earnings 48% below last year's quarter due to severance and other "special" items but digital paid subscriptions rose 40%.
In other words, digital paid subscriptions can't float the bottom line. If Pinchie hurries he can get as much as Bezos paid for WaPo...
Posted by: badanov || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of folks...
Posted by: Raj || 08/07/2013 0:12 Comments || Top||

#2  Faster.
Posted by: Secret Asian Man || 08/07/2013 4:37 Comments || Top||

#3  carlos slim still holds about 8% of class A stock and various mutual and similar funds (blackrock, vanguard, etc.) cumulatively own about 60%

class B stock, which has essentially all decision power, is almost all owned by Sulzberger extended family

market cap is still about $ 1.8B
Posted by: lord garth || 08/07/2013 8:46 Comments || Top||

#4  Watching them bleed to death sure is more fun than reading their shite.
Posted by: Iblis || 08/07/2013 11:35 Comments || Top||

#5  carlos slim still holds about 8% of class A stock

Does he regret his purchase, or is he happy to have a platform with which to push "immigration reform" and other hobbyhorses?
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/07/2013 18:02 Comments || Top||

#6  If he said that he's a women every other day and they wouldn't accommodate him, the courts would side with him...Hello Franz Kafka, please come in and make yourself at home.
Posted by: Jack Salami || 08/07/2013 18:58 Comments || Top||


Government
Victor Davis Hanson: Obama who?
Critics of the president are convinced that Barack Obama will do lasting damage to the U.S. I doubt it.
Ouch. Cool and analytical, but ...ouch.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  We'll see soon enuff, as Iran is ignoring the Bammer's "red lines" + going Nukulaar; + China is still upping its escalations agz Japan in East China Sea + PHIL, etc. in South China Sea.

SEQUESTER-LED AMERIKA "PROUDLY SURRENDERING LIKE FRANCE" = UNILATER GIVING UP 1/2 OF THE PACIFIC TO CHINA + LIKING IT.

D *** NG IT, OWG "CO-SUPERPOWER" GLOBALIST AMERIKA DEMANDS THE CHINESE PLA [Islamist Navy(s)?] PATROL OFF HAWAII + WEST COAST!
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 08/07/2013 0:31 Comments || Top||

#2  I seldom disagree with VDH. But, IMO he's only right in the sense that Obama is a symptom not the disease.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/07/2013 3:14 Comments || Top||

#3  For those who doubt the long-term damage, take a read of 'The Forgotten Man' by Amity Shlaes [FDR and the Great Depression]. I agree with g(r)om. Expertly written as are nearly all of VDH's articles, but it in my opinion it arrives at a rather mistaken conclusion. If anything is to be learned from the Obama experience, it is the evils of unearned empowerment for the sake of equality and justice.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 3:34 Comments || Top||

#4  ..which in the end create even greater inequity and injustice.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 08/07/2013 8:36 Comments || Top||

#5  Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, Jerry Rice, and Joe Montana all had bad days.

So too with VDH.

Remember, VDH was a cheerleader for the Blue State model until way beyond the point that most of the center/right had figured out that the model was obsolete and morally and functionally a failure. That he was a late adopter of the post-Blue meme set gives some indication of what he is willing to tolerate as "lasting damage".

I'm a big fan of his writings, but that does bear mentioning.
Posted by: no mo uro || 08/07/2013 9:06 Comments || Top||

#6  Besoeker

"the evils of envy, government thuggishness, and the knowledge that one does not have the smarts, work ethic, or skills to produce anything worth your desired lifestyle, pretending to be policies done for the sake of equality and justice."

Fixed it for ya.
Posted by: no mo uro || 08/07/2013 9:12 Comments || Top||

#7  Thank you Nomouro, but did you have to make it so personal ?

"one does not have the smarts, work ethic, or skills to produce anything worth your desired lifestyle"
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 9:18 Comments || Top||

#8  If anything is to be learned from the Obama experience, it is the evils of unearned empowerment for the sake of equality and justice.

Moreover, there is no will on the part of the country to call Obama to an accounting for anything. It seems that no one wants to criticize the first African-American-Kenyan President even when deserving. It is a PC thing or something rooted deeply in the American psyche--maybe liberal white guilt.
Posted by: JohnQC || 08/07/2013 11:05 Comments || Top||

#9  Not personal to you, Besoeker!

Hope you didn't take that the wrong way!
Posted by: no mo uro || 08/07/2013 11:33 Comments || Top||

#10  Perhaps he is correct in that in 50 years, Obama will remembered right up there with William Henry Harrison.

Remember him? Served 31 days after a really long speech in really cold weather.
Posted by: Bobby || 08/07/2013 12:52 Comments || Top||

#11  Wahaaha, no, just pulling your leg a bit Nomouro.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 13:27 Comments || Top||

#12  I don't think this is the case; I think we're on the road to finally answering Lincoln's rhetorical question about exactly how much ruin there is in a country.

I think Obama's role is to take the last two terms before the Really Big Collapse and make sure there isn't gonna be any seed corn available for whoever comes along after him.
Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain || 08/07/2013 14:42 Comments || Top||

#13  If you really believe that, It's time for action, BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE.
Posted by: Redneck Jim || 08/07/2013 16:04 Comments || Top||

#14  And do what?
Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain || 08/07/2013 16:27 Comments || Top||

#15  First of all, Arrest try and impeach president Obama, for lying to the people, second take "Slow Joe" and send him home, third elect ADULTS and quit nominating Frauds, fourth (From here on in all is well) De-fund obamacare,

That should do it.
Posted by: Redneck Jim || 08/07/2013 22:12 Comments || Top||

#16  The Obama presidency will be easy to sum up

#FAIL
Posted by: European Conservative || 08/07/2013 23:05 Comments || Top||


Arabia
Drone strikes kill militants in Yemen
[CNN] A pair of suspected U.S. drone strikes killed four al Qaeda bully boyz in Yemen as the United States maintained a heightened security alert in the country and urged all Americans to leave immediately.

Security sources told CNN about the strikes but didn't offer additional details. A Yemeni official said four drone strikes have been carried out in the past 10 days.

None of those killed on Tuesday were among the 25 names on the country's most-wanted list, security officials said.

It is unclear whether the strikes were related to the added security alert in the country after U.S. officials intercepted a message from al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri
... Formerly second in command of al-Qaeda, now the head cheese, occasionally described as the real brains of the outfit. Formerly the Mister Big of Egyptian Islamic Jihad. Bumped off Abdullah Azzam with a car boom in the course of one of their little disputes. Is thought to have composed bin Laden's fatwa entitled World Islamic Front Against Jews and Crusaders. Currently residing in the North Wazoo area. That is not a horn growing from the middle of his forehead, but a prayer bump, attesting to how devout he is...
to operatives in Yemen telling them to "do something." The message was sent to Nasir al-Wuhayshi, the leader of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the terror group's Yemeni affiliate. U.S. intelligence believes al-Wuhayshi has recently been appointed the overall terror organization's No. 2 leader.
Posted by: Fred || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda


-Lurid Crime Tales-
Florida man who murdered 8 finally cured of mental illness.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  So now we can execute him?
Posted by: Skidmark || 08/07/2013 0:34 Comments || Top||

#2  Besoeker's snarky headline notwithstanding, he was executed
Posted by: badanov || 08/07/2013 0:40 Comments || Top||

#3  You know, if ignorance of the law is no excuse, how come insanity is?
Posted by: Silentbrick - Oil Rig Insanity Division || 08/07/2013 1:45 Comments || Top||

#4  one doctor wrote that Ferguson should not be released because he was a danger to himself and to society.

But he was released and, months later, committed the Carol City murders.


Another set of victims by "compassion". Why aren't those who released him in jail?
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 08/07/2013 4:58 Comments || Top||

#5  Execution tends to be the only cure for his kind of mental illness.
Posted by: Glenmore || 08/07/2013 7:34 Comments || Top||

#6  Definitely shows remarkable success in reducing recidivism.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 08/07/2013 8:06 Comments || Top||


Terror Networks
Report: US Special Forces On Alert To Strike Al Qaeda Targets
[TheHill] The American special forces teams have spent the past week waiting for U.S. military and intelligence officials to confirm the whereabouts of the terror cell plotting to attack U.S. diplomatic outposts in the Mideast and North Africa.

Unnamed sources told CNN on Monday that the teams were poised to carry out the preemptive strikes, but declined to comment on where the U.S. forces were located or which potential targets the Pentagon has identified.
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda

#1  Hope the O gets it right this time and actually protects our citizens .
Posted by: AckoopmedHope || 08/07/2013 11:41 Comments || Top||


China-Japan-Koreas
N.Korea Truncates Military Drills Due to Rain Damage
Seriously? That's not what happens in real countries.
Last month's heavy rain in North Korea seems to be having an impact on the country's annual summer military exercises.

Citing a South Korean government source, Yonhap News said troops in the North have been ordered to help with flood relief work. Up to 900 millimeters fell in parts of the country in July, killing roughly 60 people and destroying over 100 sq km of farmland, while flooding more than 26,000 buildings.

North Korea regularly conducts large-scale military exercise around this time of year.
Posted by: Steve White || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Commies

#1  North Korea has farmland?
Posted by: Raj || 08/07/2013 0:02 Comments || Top||

#2  Korea(s) is a wet mountain range. The hills are rocky and abrupt. Travel of people and water happens in the valleys. Rain is an attractant for heavy equipment and dirt roads. I remember exercises when the gear was left behind and reported 'pre-deployed' for later retrieval.
Posted by: Skidmark || 08/07/2013 0:23 Comments || Top||

#3  900 mm, that is 35 inches of rain. Some real gully washers were seen, I'll bet. Army first and all that.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 08/07/2013 1:27 Comments || Top||

#4  Yes, raj, Nork has farmland, and steam locomotives that burn tires for fuel.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 08/07/2013 1:31 Comments || Top||

#5  test
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 2:49 Comments || Top||

#6  Thanks, AP. But maybe they're taking the tires somewhere to get them recycled?

/obvious sarc
Posted by: Raj || 08/07/2013 10:50 Comments || Top||

#7  I'd say a country reduced to rusty tire-burning trains has finally achieved full communism. It has always baffled me how leftists fail to understand that that is what the fabled pot of gold at the end of the rainbow really looks like.
Posted by: RandomJD || 08/07/2013 13:43 Comments || Top||

#8  "It has always baffled me how leftists fail to understand that that is what the fabled pot of gold at the end of the rainbow really looks like."

Doesn't baffle me, RJD - they're IDIOTS.
Posted by: Barbara || 08/07/2013 13:52 Comments || Top||

#9  Paper mache doesn't do well in the rain.
Posted by: KBK || 08/07/2013 19:25 Comments || Top||

#10  I don't know too much about steam locomotives, but that looks like an awful lot of steam bypass for such a slow train. The steam cylinders' seals must be totally worn out.
Posted by: KBK || 08/07/2013 19:31 Comments || Top||

#11  Along w/ bad seals, how about how hard that thing was working @ the 1:20-ish time hack; only 3 empty cars and was putting a huge load on the engine.

the dual guage trackage was interesting however. as was the faceted curves; musst not have stolen a rail bender yet.
Posted by: USN, Ret. || 08/07/2013 21:57 Comments || Top||


Africa North
McCain, Graham urge release of political prisoners in Egypt
...At the request of our beloved president. Those two do like being needed.
[CBSNEWS] After meeting with Egyptian leaders from across the political spectrum, Sens. John Maverick McCain
... the Senator-for-Life from Arizona, former presidential candidate and even more former foot soldier in the Reagan Revolution...
, R-Ariz., and Lindsey Graham
... the endangered South Carolina RINO...
, R-S.C., on Monday urged the military-backed government there to release political prisoners, begin the process of reconciliation and move towards an open democracy - or risk losing international aid and support.

"There are many in Congress - not many yet - there are some in Congress that want to sever this relationship," Graham said in a presser with McCain in Cairo.
"Okay, maybe not many at all. A few. There's John and I, at least until John's medication wears off."
"We want to maintain it because it is so important to our two nations and, quite frankly, the world."

That said, he added, the United States will only be able to support a democratic Egyptian government.

"The relationship of the past is no longer available to us in America," Graham said, referencing past U.S. support for ousted Egyptian autocrat Hosni Mubarak
...The former President-for-Life of Egypt, dumped by popular demand in early 2011...
. That relationship was not beneficial to the Egyptian people, he said, but "the politics of convenience are behind us in America."
Al-Arabiya has a related report here.
Posted by: Fred || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Arab Spring

#1  "begin the process of reconciliation and move towards an open democracy"

This is the same Lindsey Graham who wishes there was a way to 'hold people accountable' for speech that violates Sharia law. He was talking about non-Muslim US citizens in the US.

He's for 'open democracy' when temporary 'open democracy' is advantageous to islamofascists.

But when 'open democracy' displeases islamofascists he's against it.

Helping islamofascists gain power abroad and importing alien tyranny into Western nations, is this the new neo-con doctrine?
Posted by: Elmerert Hupens2660 || 08/07/2013 2:25 Comments || Top||

#2  Boith of them desperately wanting camer time and a petting from the liberal press. Disgusting. Recall McCain, and Dump Linda.
Posted by: OldSpook || 08/07/2013 2:38 Comments || Top||

#3  That said, he added, the United States will only be able to support a democratic Egyptian government.

Ignorant, cognitively challenged oud fok! Who does he think runs Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, Jordan, or the rest ?
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 3:57 Comments || Top||

#4  Who does he think runs Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, Jordan, or the rest ?

People who know how to be generous to their friends.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/07/2013 8:19 Comments || Top||

#5  How about that movie maker being held in California Senators? You know the one used by the feds as a scapegoat for Benghazi.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 08/07/2013 8:34 Comments || Top||

#6  Egyptian Govt: McCain 'persona non grata, an unwelcome person'
The Egyptian Cabinet took offense to comments Senator John McCain (R - AZ) made to the Washington Post about his advice to the new government of Egypt about releasing Muslim Brotherhood prisoners.
Posted by: Vernal Gray9391 || 08/07/2013 15:53 Comments || Top||

#7  Actually, I understood that Saudi Arabia et alia were rather upset at the current US administration for its actions in Egypt, which is why they offered to make up (and then some) any shortfall in US aid caused by the coup.
Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain || 08/07/2013 16:42 Comments || Top||

#8  "they offered to make up (and then some) any shortfall in US aid caused by the coup"

About f*king time. Why should we keep forking over to people who will hate us no matter what when the Saudis take our money and never give any to other goddam moslems (unless they're perpetrating terrorist activities against the infidels)?

Get off your goddam gold toilets, Saudi, and support your co-religionists.

I'm looking forward to the day the world (or at least the West) doesn't need M.E. oil, etc. - I want to watch what they do when they have to go back to being goatherds, like their patriarch Ibin Saud was. >:-(
Posted by: Barbara || 08/07/2013 18:10 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Car bomb in Damascus suburb kills 18
[USATODAY] Syrian state media say a boom-mobile has struck in a Damascus suburb, killing at least 18 people and wounding 56.

The news agency SANA says the powerful blast hit the Syrian capital's suburb of Jaramana late on Tuesday.

The suburb is an overwhelmingly pro-regime district located just a few kilometers (miles) southeast of Damascus.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.
My guess is cannibals.
Posted by: Fred || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Syria


Terror Networks
Obama and the Al Qaeda Surge
"President Obama wants his presidency to be about domestic policy – his plan to fundamentally transform the country, as he has put it. If he is conducting serious operations overseas, Obama will lack both the bandwidth and the money to drive his domestic agenda. And so he draws back. And al Qaeda is filling the space he abandons."
Posted by: Uncle Phester || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  They're in his mind. They understand that for him its all about preserving his 'image'. From that basis they can now conduct a campaign to manipulate how he responds or doesn't to their actions.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 08/07/2013 8:38 Comments || Top||


Arabia
Militants Shoot Down Army Helicopter In Yemen; 8 Killed
[BREITBART] A suspected U.S. drone killed four alleged al-Qaeda members Tuesday in Yemen, as the U.S. and British embassies evacuated staff amid reports of a threatened attack by the terrorist group.

As Yemen bolstered security by sending tanks and troops into the streets of Sanaa, the capital of the impoverished country, Death Eaters shot down an army helicopter, killing all eight people aboard, the government said.

Yemeni authorities have suggested that there were al-Qaeda threats in recent days to multiple potential targets in the country, which has been thrust back into the forefront of the international fight against the terrorist network. Among those sites were foreign installations and government offices in the capital of Sanaa as well as to the strategic Bab al-Mandeb straits at the entrance to the Red Sea in the southern Arabian Peninsula.

The State Department ordered nonessential personnel at the U.S. Embassy to leave the country. The department said in a travel warning that it had ordered the departure of non-emergency U.S. government personnel "due to the continued potential for terrorist attacks," adding that U.S. citizens should leave immediately because of an "extremely high" security threat level.

Britannia's Foreign Office also said it has evacuated all staff from its embassy due to increased security concerns. The Foreign Office said the staff were "temporarily withdrawn to the U.K." on Tuesday.
Posted by: Fred || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda in Arabia


Caribbean-Latin America
Mexican security forces round up 27 bad guys

For a map, click here. For a map of Tamaulipas, click here.

A total of 27 suspected criminals were detained over a week long period in late July and early August in Tamaulipas state, according to official news sources.

A news release posted on the government website of Tamaulipas said that several units of Base de Operaciones Mixtas (BOM) between July 29th and August 4th detained 27 suspected criminals and a number of weapons and drugs. The news release does not say where the detentions took place in the state.

According to the data supplied by the Tamaulipas state Grupo de Coordinacion Tamaulipas, in addition to the 27 detained, the BOMs seized 27 rifles, six handguns, 220 weapons magazines, 5,142 rounds of ammunition, five grenades, 28 vehicles and 35 cell phones and radios.

Drugs seized during that time included 1,600 kilograms of marijuana and a small amount of cocaine.

Of the 28 vehicles seized, six had been reported in carjackings and five were from the United States.

BOMs are security units comprising Mexican federal and state police units. The reason for the mixing of forces is for security purposes and cross training. BOMs have been used in several areas in Mexico including La Lagina Veracruz, where the Mexican federal government has concentrated its security forces to take drug criminals head on.

Chris Covert writes Mexican Drug War and national political news for Rantburg.com and BorderlandBeat.com. He can be reached at grurkka@gmail.com
Posted by: badanov || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Africa North
Egypt: 2 Arrested For Flying Into Country From Istanbul With Arms
[Ynet] Customs in Cairo's international airport incarcerated
Drop the rosco, Muggsy, or you're one with the ages!
two Egyptian travelers who arrived from Istanbul in possession of large quantities of arms and munitions.

Al-Qeada emblems and black flags associated with radical Islamism were found in their possession as well as fake Egyptian and Afghanistan army uniforms.
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda

#1  2 Arrested For Flying Into Country From Istanbul With Arms
Bet they were tired.
Posted by: Skidmark || 08/07/2013 0:40 Comments || Top||

#2  The fees for checked luggage must have been horrendous.
Posted by: tipover || 08/07/2013 12:13 Comments || Top||


Government
Benghazi scapegoat Nakoula Nakoula: I want the world to see the truth.
Further books and movies promised.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  This needs to be paired with the posting below titled "McCain, Graham urge release of political prisoners in Egypt"
Posted by: Procopius2k || 08/07/2013 8:41 Comments || Top||

#2  two of the problems with Islam truth films so far

- horribly low production quality

- all quasi documentary
Posted by: lord garth || 08/07/2013 9:31 Comments || Top||

#3  ....it's that kind of talk that will get him, er, "protective" custody....
Posted by: Uncle Phester || 08/07/2013 13:12 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
BBC: Who controls what in Syria - An excellent, informative video
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  From BBC?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/07/2013 3:12 Comments || Top||


Afghanistan
Mullah Omar calls for peace talks, new attacks on foreign troops
[LATIMES] The reclusive leader of Afghanistan's Taliban said Tuesday that his krazed killer group was willing to begin peace negotiations, even as he urged stepped-up attacks on foreign troops to force them out of the country.
In a lengthy and wide-ranging email message, Mullah Mohammad Omar called on Afghans to boycott elections scheduled for early 2014 and urged Afghan police, soldiers and paramilitary personnel to turn their guns on foreign troops -- as well as Afghan government troops cooperating with U.S.-led coalition forces.

In a separate development, individual members of the Afghan High Peace Council -- a group appointed by President Hamid Maybe I'll join the Taliban Karzai
... A former Baltimore restaurateur, now 12th and current President of Afghanistan, displacing the legitimate president Rabbani in December 2004. He was installed as the dominant political figure after the removal of the Taliban regime in late 2001 in a vain attempt to put a Pashtun face on the successor state to the Taliban. After the 2004 presidential election, he was declared president regardless of what the actual vote count was. He won a second, even more dubious, five-year-term after the 2009 presidential election. His grip on reality has been slipping steadily since around 2007, probably from heavy drug use...
to negotiate with Taliban elements -- said Tuesday they've held secret talks with the Taliban to try to bring momentum to a grinding of the peace processor that's foundered since its inception.

Taliban front man Zabiullah Mujahid said the statements were a deliberate lie designed to upstage his group's important Eid message. "The High Peace Council wants to keep its office open and money flowing, which is why they are spouting such propaganda," Mujahid said. "We don't intend to talk with the puppet Kabul government. We don't have contact with them, not individual talks, not group talks."

The one-eyed Omar, who has a $10-million bounty on his head, has made a practice in recent years of distributing a message shortly before Eid al-Fitr, a three-day Islamic holiday celebrating the end of the holy month of Ramadan when devout Mohammedans pray and fast.

Omar said in the five-page letter that the Taliban recently set up an office in Doha, the capital of Qatar, to hasten the departure of foreign forces from Afghanistan and to form an inclusive government based on "Islamic principles."

"We do not think of monopolizing power," he wrote. "Those who truly love Islam and the country and have commitment to both ... this homeland is theirs."
Posted by: Fred || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Taliban

#1  Demanding "Peace thru War"???
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 08/07/2013 0:15 Comments || Top||


Arabia
US and UK Pull Embassy Staff out of Yemen - BBC
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda

#1  Personally I'm more concerned at this time about any attempt(s) to rescue Ford Hood shooter MAJOR HASAN.

The US Army-DOD, etc. msut recognize the threat, as they repor have Hasan air-delivered to trial by Helo including diversionary helicopters agz attack.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 08/07/2013 22:35 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
Florida Governor Plans To Resume Voter Rolls Clean-Up
[Rooters] Florida Governor Rick Scott is planning a new effort to purge non-U.S. citizens from the state's voter rolls, a move that last year prompted a series of legal challenges and claims from critics his administration was trying to intimidate minority voters.
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Should delete the rolls and have everybody renew. Clean slate.
Posted by: rjschwarz || 08/07/2013 0:13 Comments || Top||

#2  Should require re-registration every 4 years - in person (except if you are physically unable to appear in person).

If you are too lazy to get your fat arse down and register - you are to lazy to know the issues.
Posted by: CrazyFool || 08/07/2013 0:28 Comments || Top||

#3  Lessee. Your drivers license and car registration lapse if you don't re-up. Why should voter registration be any different?

Sunset everything.
Posted by: M. Murcek || 08/07/2013 7:07 Comments || Top||

#4  What CF said. If nothing else it would mean the Donks have to hire a lot of low skilled people, of course at minimum wage without Obamacare, to walk around every four years (sort of like locust) to enroll people. It get tiring stooping down to read all those tombstones. No extra points for Mikey Mouse.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 08/07/2013 8:28 Comments || Top||


RNC Warns Networks: Drop Hillary Clinton Movies Or Lose 2016 GOP Debates
[TheHill] Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus threatened to pull the group's partnership with NBC and CNN for 2016 GOP presidential primary debates if the networks moved ahead with plans to air films on Hillary Clinton
... sometimes described as The Liberatress of Libya and at other times as Mrs. Bill, never as Another Al Haig ...
.
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  The networks will scream that the RNC is violating their 1st amendment rights. Preibus says explicitly that they have a right to broadcast it. The RNC has the right to take their business elsewhere.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia || 08/07/2013 1:06 Comments || Top||

#2  Frankly, I'd pull the partnership anyway and find more neutral venues.
Posted by: Pappy || 08/07/2013 1:10 Comments || Top||

#3  After Candy Crowley's performance during the last debates, it should not even be an issue for discussion.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 3:04 Comments || Top||

#4  The issue is 'in kind' campaign support. The cost of the programs and air time has to count against the corporations as just plain money. Fairness Doctrine would require the networks to provide equal time in similar time spots to the other party(ies) to air their material.

It would probably be more effective to start making noise to the effect to close the deficit that the Stupid Party consider new 'levies' as in the concept that while corporations pay taxes those who log, mine, or drill on federal land also have to pay royalties to do so. It's long past that those who profit from using the public air waves do the same. Make it 'progressive' based upon size of coverage.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 08/07/2013 8:25 Comments || Top||

#5  Shouldn't the IRS be looking into CNN's political activity?
Posted by: Ebbang Uluque6305 || 08/07/2013 11:48 Comments || Top||

#6  Shouldn't the IRS be looking into CNN's political activity?

No. And that's the point. It has to end, the overlarge government with the power to take away everything you have because a bureaucrat has been offended.
Posted by: badanov || 08/07/2013 16:48 Comments || Top||

#7  badanov is exactly right - I don't want the government involved. This is business to business.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia || 08/07/2013 19:34 Comments || Top||

#8  If the tea party riots after watching the Hillary movie will the Obama administration arrest the CNN producer?
Posted by: Airandee || 08/07/2013 21:19 Comments || Top||


Terror Networks
Strategic Leaks - Put a sock in it!
U.S. officials are warning, through strategic leaks to the press, that Al Qaeda — remember those guys? — has threatened to do … well, we don’t know exactly what. One thing we do know: The United States has penetrated Al Qaeda leaders’ communications. The volume with which officials have trumpeted this fact is almost certainly a mistake — one that could have real costs in American lives...
Posted by: Pappy || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  There is no reason to divulge that Al QaedaÂ’s communications have been penetrated.

NSA and the ever vigilant Susan Rice needing a 'win' was reason enough. Doubters and phony scandal hounds, "we know who you are".
[sarc off]
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 3:44 Comments || Top||

#2  one that could have real costs in American lives...

Well worth it if the President can claim credit for something he didn't have much, if any, involvement in.... (/sarc)
Posted by: CrazyFool || 08/07/2013 8:03 Comments || Top||

#3  The United States has penetrated Al Qaeda leadersÂ’ communications.

Sure stopped all those prison breaks. And Benghazi. I would have to guess that a plan attempting to capture/kill a US ambassador would get out to the local AQ warden, even if it was a closely guarded local job. Perhaps especially if it were a local job which took hours to complete. Where are the pics of before and during the attack, sure were a lot of the aftermath.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 08/07/2013 10:54 Comments || Top||

#4  Sure stopped all those prison breaks. And Benghazi.I would have to guess that a plan attempting to capture/kill a US ambassador would get out to the local AQ warden, even if it was a closely guarded local job.

They didn't break out of a U.S. prison; they didn't break out of a U.S. administered prison. Does one think that the Iraqis would have been informed, or, more likely if they had been, would have paid heed?

To be fair, one can't pin Benghazi on Al Qaeda - at this point. As the pros are saying, so many bad players in Benghazi and no scorecard to tell them apart. One also can't monitor communications if one isn't pointed to a particular place to monitor. IMNSHO, the Klingons weren't eager to put a spotlight on Benghazi prior to the attack.

The "kidnap/kill an ambassador" is a valid theory, but it's also among a herd of equally valid theories.

Posted by: Pappy || 08/07/2013 11:53 Comments || Top||

#5  No, in the US judges break people out of prison, and diplomats break out paleos. I'd put a safe bet that there is a parallel NSA program for international studies.

Its being sold as preventative, but is sounding more passive and reactionary. It is a tool, and only as effective as those wielding it. Going out into the wildes of Libya to weapon deal on 9/11 with a large groups of special operatives with nobody monitoring the radio/electronic traffic is some Custer grade work, I'd like to think they had that base covered.

I'm not sure which is the more depressing thought, that intelligence is not picking up the prison breaks, or the locals poo poo the info.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 08/07/2013 13:16 Comments || Top||


Home Front: WoT
Obama Refuses to Talk to America About Terror Threat
[WHITEHOUSEDOSSIER] President B.O. continues to say nothing to a jittery nation about what some who have been briefed on the danger are describing as the worst terrorist threat since 9/11, declining to either offer reassurance or an explanation of the peril the nation faces.

Certainly, the president does not want to take questions about a threat he had minimized during the 2012 campaign. But what's striking is that he has not addressed the nation in a formal manner on the potential for a major attack.

Incredibly, the first question Obama might take on the situation could come from a comedian. Obama is scheduled to appear on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno this evening in Caliphornia, an impregnable bastion of the Democratic Party,, and the topic is sure to come up. He has an event earlier in the day, but it's a campaign-style appearance at a high school in Phoenix, also an odd venue to be discussing potential terrorist attacks.

Not everyone has been excluded from receiving a high-level briefing. Vice President Joe Foreign Policy Whiz Kid Biden
The former Senator-for-Life from Delaware, an example of the kind of top-notch Washington intellect to be found in the World's Greatest Deliberative Body...
has met with members of Congress to discuss the threat, and some of the most specific information about what the United States is faced with has come from politicians.

Briefing news hounds Monday, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney did not minimize the problem. "This threat is significant and we are taking it seriously for that reason," he said.

But Carney refused to specifically characterize the extent of the danger to the United States itself.
Posted by: Fred || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda

#1  Prob because, once again, NO ONE TOLD THE HARD BOYZ THE GWOT = GLOBAL JIHAD IS OVER???
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 08/07/2013 0:22 Comments || Top||

#2  President B.O. continues to say nothing to a jittery nation.

Good! I'd rather not hear from him anyway.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 3:46 Comments || Top||

#3  “I think we are providing plenty of information to the public. And whatÂ’s more, the president will have much more to say about the terrorist attack after it has occurred.”

- Jay Carney
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 4:00 Comments || Top||

#4  What do you expect him to say "Actually, there is no more threat than usual, but we didn't like the general tone of headlines."?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/07/2013 4:07 Comments || Top||

#5  No worries. We've got it covered g(r)om.

Enjoy :-)
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 4:24 Comments || Top||

#6  "Mr. President, about one year ago it was mentioned AQ was dead. What has happened in this time frame which has caused the USA to close embassies on 1/5 of the world's governments?"

/exercise done in Junior High School classroom
Posted by: swksvolFF || 08/07/2013 11:11 Comments || Top||

#7  If Obama stood infront of America and said the truth of his opinion that the real threat is the tea party and returning vets from Afghanistan and Iraq. He would drop in the polls.
Posted by: airandee || 08/07/2013 12:18 Comments || Top||


#9  #5 No worries. We've got it covered g(r)om.

Enjoy :-)


'soeker, you are the best...!
Posted by: Uncle Phester || 08/07/2013 13:06 Comments || Top||

#10  " I want to talk about Tray..."
/channeling a worthless toe sucker
Posted by: USN, Ret. || 08/07/2013 22:15 Comments || Top||


Defiant Hasan tells Fort Hood trial 'I am the shooter'
[REUTERS] Nidal Hasan, a former U.S. army psychiatrist accused of murdering 13 fellow soldiers and wounding dozens more in a shooting rampage at Fort Hood four years ago, told a court on Tuesday that the evidence would clearly show "I am the shooter."

Hasan, who is confined to a wheelchair after being shot by military police during the attack, is representing himself in the trial at the Texas army base.

In a brief opening statement on the first day of the trial, he said witnesses would testify that "war is an ugly thing,"
"What?"
"[Click! Click! Whirrr! Snap!] Wahr iss an urgly t'ing!"
"What?"
"Wahr! It is an urgly t'ing!"
"Oh."

with death and devastation on both sides.
[Click! Click! Whirrr! Snap!]
Does this really need to be established for the benefit of a military tribunal, presumably intimately familiar with the uglier aspects of that war thingy? Will he also explain where down and up are located, and define the colour of the sky as "mostly blue during the daytime but seriously indigo at night"?
Posted by: Fred || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Good. He has confessed. Bring the guilty bastard in. We'll give him a fair trial before we hang him, or shoot him. I'm not proud.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia || 08/07/2013 0:05 Comments || Top||

#2  Be sure to have him called in the civil suit where they are trying to defend their treatment of this as workplace violence, instead of what it is: Islamic Terrorism.
Posted by: OldSpook || 08/07/2013 2:40 Comments || Top||

#3  Was is ugly, so he felt obligated to show us some of the ugliness right here in our backyard - and the heart of the Army. He's just a simple soldier, following orders from allen. Allen made him do it.

He thinks that makes him "not guilty". Should make for a short defense, unless his defense is how bad the US is.
Posted by: Bobby || 08/07/2013 7:41 Comments || Top||

#4  Good. He has confessed.

Better than that. He's now met the Constitution requirement to be tried for treason - confession in open court. At least the lads of 1861 resigned their commission before heading home.

Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court. The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted.

The offense will have to be handled in federal court rather than courts martial. Official transcripts will be evidence enough to meet the proof. Of course, that will require regime change that will treat the event as more than just 'work place violence'.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 08/07/2013 8:17 Comments || Top||

#5  Just as open about open jihad now as he was before the Ft Hood massacre.
Posted by: Glomosing Brown8795 || 08/07/2013 10:26 Comments || Top||

#6  Testing the system and its resolve.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 08/07/2013 10:42 Comments || Top||

#7  Great. He confessed. Shoot him.
Posted by: DarthVader || 08/07/2013 13:58 Comments || Top||

#8  He wants to die. Don't fall for it. I think he should be on permanent barrel duty in prison if that would bother him most.
Posted by: gorb || 08/07/2013 18:43 Comments || Top||

#9  I'm normally in favor of the death penalty, but for Hasan, I want him to live a very long life in maximum security, paralyzed and having to wait 30 or 40 years before he finds out whether or not the paradise he believes in exists.
Posted by: Chantry || 08/07/2013 19:07 Comments || Top||

#10  IMO its possible that the Major is intentionally presenting no viable defense in order to support a Court-ordered/mandated change of plea to "guilty by insanity"???

Hasan's defense is that he has no defense???
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 08/07/2013 19:37 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Hezbollah Arrest 2 Palestinians For Involvement In Beirut Blast
[Ynet] The Lebanese newspaper The Daily Star has reported that Hezbollah has tossed in the clink
Drop the rosco, Muggsy, or you're one with the ages!
two Paleostinians for their involvement in the detonation of a explosive laden car in Hezbollah's stronghold in a southern quarter of the city a month ago. Some 50 people were maimed as a result of the blast.

A month ago, a Syrian man was arrested for allegedly parking the car in the al-Abad neighborhood parking lot where the kaboom took place.
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Hezbollah

#1  hezb is doing what police were supposed to do

maybe the police were looking the other way and didn't want to arrest them
Posted by: lord garth || 08/07/2013 0:15 Comments || Top||


Africa North
Obama agrees to meeting with Brotherhood
U.S. President Barack Obama has agreed to meet with Muslim Brotherhood representatives at the White House, sources told Egypt Independent. Obama would reportedly meet with Brotherhood officials to "hear their opinion" on developments in Egypt, in the presence of Turkish diplomats.
Champ will meet with thugs and terrorists. In the White House. With his pal Erdogan's help. Boggle.
It's not like he's never done that before.
Egypt Independent heard from sources inside the Muslim Brotherhood that Islamist-linked billionaire Hassen Malek requested a meeting through Obama's office manager.

The meeting with Turkish officials is expected to take place this month.

Turkish diplomats are expected to push for Mohamed Morsy's reinstatement as Egyptian president, sources said, if not that the Muslim Brotherhood would be assured of political survival following a month-long violent stand-off with the armed forces in the wake of Morsy's overthrow.

The U.S. has repeatedly supported the Muslim Brotherhood's ascendancy in Egypt, researcher Mohamed Hasanein Heikahl said. While a number of Brotherhood leaders have publicly criticized the U.S. stance, accusing the Obama administration of "playing a role in Morsy's overthrow," they are said to be hoping for a shift as tentative talks continue with Egypt's interim administration.
Meanwhile the people of Egypt know better -- they know who Champ has allied himself with from day one.
Posted by: Steve White || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under: Muslim Brotherhood

#1  will he bow?
Posted by: 3dc || 08/07/2013 1:20 Comments || Top||

#2  Making nice with Islamists only works if you are an Islamist, and then only sometimes. Lying down with dogs, fleas... that sort of thing. I am not hopeful.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 3:01 Comments || Top||

#3  Family reunion?
Posted by: AlanC || 08/07/2013 8:55 Comments || Top||

#4  One thing for sure, the muslim in chief doesn't try to hide it.
Posted by: OCCD || 08/07/2013 9:09 Comments || Top||

#5  Another planning meeting? I wonder who's chairing it.
Posted by: KBK || 08/07/2013 10:26 Comments || Top||

#6  My money's on Jarret chairing the meeting this time - holding Obama's leash.
Posted by: CrazyFool || 08/07/2013 11:14 Comments || Top||

#7  He has more flexibility now, he's canceled his meeting with Vlad.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 11:17 Comments || Top||

#8  This video went viral in Egypt.
Posted by: newc || 08/07/2013 12:08 Comments || Top||


Afghanistan
US Army won't bar contractors supporting Taliban in AFG.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Taliban

#1  Somebody's gotta fill the vacumn when we leave!
Posted by: Skidmark || 08/07/2013 0:31 Comments || Top||

#2  By most accounts the Taliban + aligned will be the post-2014 Pak Govt.

The question is whether Washington, NATO-EU, + UNO trust the Hard Boyz wid Pakland's nukes???
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 08/07/2013 2:27 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
Bradley Smith: The IRS Attack on Political Speech
[ONLINE.WSJ] So why was the IRS involved at all, and why does it matter? The answer is that the IRS scandal is part of a long-term assault on First Amendment rights. Thanks to "campaign finance reform," citizen groups must navigate a maze of government paperwork and apply to the IRS for a tax license to speak on politics. People literally need a lawyer to figure it out, and not just any lawyer, but one from the highly compensated and mostly Washington, D.C.-based bar practicing "political law."

The standard used by the IRS to decide who qualifies for 501(c)(4) tax status is an arbitrary "facts and circumstances" test that few people understand. If more than 50% of an organization's activities might support or oppose candidates under the vague "facts and circumstances" test, then the group is placed in the same tax status--Section 527--as candidate committees, political parties and political-action committees.

Social-welfare groups under Section 501(c)(4) must disclose the campaign activity they undertake, but they do not have to publicly disclose information about their donors and members to either the IRS or the Federal Election Commission. This is the result of 70 years of Supreme Court decisions protecting the privacy right of Americans to associate in groups without disclosing their affiliations to the government.

Democrats want the IRS to require the conservative groups to register as political committees under Section 527. This would increase their regulatory burden by requiring them to file quarterly or monthly reports detailing their receipts and expenditures. It would also force them to reveal personal information about their supporters and members, enabling government retaliation and laying the groundwork for unofficial harassment of those supporters. Such harassment has become a routine tactic of the political left, especially since it was successfully used to target financial supporters of California's Proposition 8--which banned same-sex marriage in the state--to get them fired from jobs, for instance.

IRS apologists argue that Section 501(c)(4) requires organizations to operate "exclusively for the promotion of social welfare," but Section 501(c)(4) has never been interpreted to prohibit all political activity.

This explains why left-wing groups such as MoveOn.org, People for the American Way, Naral Pro-Choice America, and the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence have operated for years under 501(c)(4) status. They spend millions to support liberal candidates and agendas, with nary a protest from Democrats now raging against the tea parties and other conservatives. By delaying approval for conservative groups, the IRS left them in legal limbo, with uncertain liabilities, obligations and ability to act--exactly what the Obama administration wanted.

But this raises another question: Why aren't political education and discussion a form of promoting "social welfare"? What kind of democracy claims that political participation is not in the interest of "social welfare?"

Rep. Becerra argues that 501(c)(4) status should be reserved for "something good, not groups that are in business to do politics." That's a remarkable statement from a man who has spent the past 22 years in elective office. Yet this is also the logic of the campaign finance "reform" movement that has wielded so much political influence over the last 40 years. Its drumbeat is that participating in public affairs is bad.
Posted by: Fred || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1 
Posted by: OldSpook || 08/07/2013 2:44 Comments || Top||

#2  How about not registering, and just paying the taxes? I'm thinking along the lines of eschewing health insurance and just paying the doctor in cash or chickens...
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/07/2013 8:26 Comments || Top||

#3  OS: You can complain about your nuked comment at the o-club, but it won't do you any good. You've been warned about this.
Posted by: badanov || 08/07/2013 16:46 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Culture Wars
Jeff Bezos Is Bad News: Why the Washington Post Should Worry
The New Republic editor Alec MacGillis vying for this year's Fisk Award for the dumbest editorial.
Sometime in the summer of 2009, back when I still worked as a reporter at The Washington Post,
That you're no longer there is one point in favor of WaPo...
I found myself chatting over beers at the Post Pub, the unvarnished establishment cater-corner from the paper, with a business-side employee who mentioned a rather disconcerting stat: On one day in March of that year, in the very darkest days of the recession, there had been in the classified ad pages one job-wanted ad.

One.
That sux, really. But I guarantee you that for every one story you print about how it is so hard in the media industry, I can personally relate 10. Business isn't like the government where you can print money and ignore the consequences. In the world outside Washington DC, economics have consequences.
I didn't need any primer on the troubles facing my industry--I grew up in a newspaper family and had worked at six papers, several of which were seriously diminished by 2009--but that stat has stuck with me ever since as the ultimate signpost of a crumbling business model. The public discussion of newspapers' decline tends to focus on circulation, but newspaper people know that the devastation came as much on the ad side and above all in the lowly classifieds, which in their humble agate type had for decades delivered a disproportionate share of newspaper revenues.
Which we've only seen coming this past twenty years or so. Ten if you were especially blind.
This was where the digital revolution first exacted its toll--how could you keep charging $10 a line for a used car or apartment or job listing when there was a guy who was letting people post ads for free online--all the while subsidizing that operation by charging $5 or $10 for prostitution ads of the sort no respectable daily newspaper would ever think of running (the law eventually made him shut it down, but not before it was bringing in $36 million per year).
The digital side has its problems as well, Alec. For instance digital advertizing is way too expensive for the impact it has, and I speak from experience. And that comes from a rightwinger, so I am certain at some moment some from your side have reached the same conclusion. Digital advertizing won't save the newspaper business model.
Bezos is smart, but he ain't that smart.
Craigslist's Craig Newmark has not bought the Post, thank goodness--that would be too much to bear.
It could have been worse. Bezos could have bought The New Republic and recognized it to be a loser, and then shut it down.
But Amazon's Jeff Bezos as the white knight provokes only slightly less shock and dolor. We knew the other guys had won a long time ago, but it's another thing when they can waltz in and, in the charmless guise of "Explore Holdings LLC," drop $250 million in cash for a legendary paper (that's a mere one percent of Bezos's net worth), as flip and easy as plucking an Apollo rocket engine from the ocean or building a $42 million, 10,000-year clock in West Texas.
Capitalism is a terrible thing if you are a leftist, and you sound like a leftist, Alec. You a leftist, Alec? As much as I hate Bezos' political views, it's still his money. If he wants to drop $250 million on the craps tables at Vegas, he still has the right to do that. This is still America.
Pretty soon you'll need a permit to drop $250 mil on a newspaper. Maybe even at the craps table. But a donation to the Donks? That'll never require permission...
There are already hopeful noises coming out of the corner of 15th and L about Bezos as owner, compared with other possibilities. He is promising independence. He is, for now, keeping the leadership team in place (let's hope in particular that he keeps editor Marty Baron, under whose leadership the paper has been doing some notably hard-edged and influential journalism).
Unless it's about the White House, then it's rosey scenario and soft focus...
His politics are not visibly objectionable. But let's not kid ourselves here: The company that made him one of the richest men in the world has had a less than benign impact on our nation. It has devastated the publishing industry, from the big presses to the small booksellers.
Just because you can't get YOUR book published...
Pooh. Anyone can self-publish on Amazon, and some make a more than respectable living doing so. It just hasn't the same cachet as dropping the name of that exclusive little publishing house that everyone knows of at the right Manhattan cocktail parties.
It has exacerbated the growth of the low-wage economy, to the point where the president feels the need to celebrate an increase in warehouse jobs that will pay barely more than minimum wage. (Fun fact uncovered by the Morning Call in Allentown, Pa. two years ago: Instead of paying for air-conditioning at some Pennsylvania warehouses, Amazon had just stationed paramedics outside to take the inevitably heat-stressed workers to the hospital.)
Amazon may have devastated the publishing industry, but it has also launched one of the great periods in literary history where now anyone can publish anything they want and sell it on the open market, taking on all the risks associated with that. And Alec, even more fun fact: I work without air conditioning routinely in 100 degree heat sans paramedics, doing a helluva lot more than pulling books from shelves, but with plenty of water. The trick is to prehydrate and keep alert and on your feet. It ain't ideal, but it beats the hell out of going to the emergency room
Or standing in a welfare line. At least for some of us...
More generally, Amazon has embodied, more than any other of the giants that rule our new landscape, the faster-cheaper-further mindset that scratches away daily at our communal fabric: Why bother running down to the store around the block if you can buy it with a click? No risk of running into someone on the way and actually having to talk to them, and hey, can you beat that price?
Why would I want to talk with random strangers? These days that can get you arrested and maybe even shot down by a overly-militarized police unit...
No thought given to the externalities that make that price possible--the workers being violently shocked every time they pull a book off the warehouse shelf, or losing a chunk of their lunch break to go through the security checkpoint set up by their oh-so-trusting employer. They're Somewhere Else, working for a company that is Out There, in the cloud.
The subtext Alec wants you to think is that if you buy from Amazon, you have no life. Nice try, but no sale. And Alec, if prices on books are low, that means more people can buy and read. That's a good thing right?
Not that we should let ourselves go overboard in our lament for what came before. The Grahams are a remarkable Washington family, and I was as grateful as any of my fellow reporters for the notes that would occasionally arrive from Don with a kind and utterly sincere word for a piece he had liked.
Do you need a breath mint, Alec?
But
...you saw that coming, right...
we also should bear in mind the many decisions that can be second-guessed in hindsight--among many others, the decision not to make the paper national in scope and distribution, like the New York Times and Wall Street Journal;
...there's room for only so many national newspapers...
to keep the online operation separate as long as it was; to hold off so long on instituting a paywall. And we should most definitely not forget the failure to prevent what unfolded at the company's Kaplan education division, which was raking in huge profits from for-profit colleges with a highly dubious business model; when those improprieties were exposed and the Obama administration proposed new rules to protect students and taxpayers from being exploited, Don Graham went to Capitol Hill to lobby aggressively against them, seemingly unaware that his indubitable virtue as grandfather of the Post did not necessarily transfer to this other realm.
Profits are bad, Alec, we understand that, except that profits are what keeps businesses in businesses, even media. If the profits aren't there, money goes elsewhere. I understand that as a leftist economic logic is beyond you but do try to keep up.
The only difference between the size of the office of the Kaplan's boss and that of the average university president is that the office of the latter is larger and more nicely appointed...
Now the Grahams can go back to doing as they see fit with Kaplan, without worry that they are in any way imperiling the newspaper's public trust. That trust has been passed to Jeff Bezos, who will hopefully treat it with more care than his company did those heat-stricken workers deemed undeserving of an air-conditioning system. I avoid buying from Amazon as best I can, but I'll keep subscribing to my old paper as long as they keep printing it, which, to hear Bezos himself tell it, will likely end sooner than the mogul's 10,000-year clock.
Whatever public trust the WaPo may have had it was pissed away more than 20 years ago, Alec.
Posted by: badanov || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Imagine what Alec's squealing would be if the Koch brothers had been the buyers.
Posted by: Pappy || 08/07/2013 1:01 Comments || Top||

#2  I avoid buying from Amazon as best I can

So he buys from Amazon.

A few years I was waiting in line at the bank because I had no option with a physical cheque, and the man in front of me was saying he never he used online banking when banks were open, because he didn't want to make bank workers out of work. I thought, presumably you came here by horse and cart to save the jobs of blacksmiths and farriers.

Self interest on the Left is always rationalized to be the public good.
Posted by: phil_b || 08/07/2013 5:32 Comments || Top||

#3  "Progressive" hates progress. Stop the presses!
Posted by: Spot || 08/07/2013 8:06 Comments || Top||

#4  Spot- on- Regressive progressives. Democratic political rag for years. They want welfare, they want votes from guess who? the takers. Who is left to pay the bills. Who is left to make donations. Who is left to purchase the Post. Long overdue reset. Woodward go cry to your handlers and that other guy? Bernstein, Who? :)
Posted by: Dale || 08/07/2013 8:44 Comments || Top||

#5  WAPO, you DO remember the evil formula, right ?

In 1992, Mitt Romney was running Bain Capital, a private equity firm. Bain Capital bought American Pad & Paper Co. (Ampad) for $5 million.

Over the next several years Romney's firm bled the company dry. Hundreds of workers lost their jobs. Stockholders were left with worthless shares. Creditors and vendors were paid less than 50 cents on the dollar. While they were exploiting the company, Romney's firm charged Ampad millions of dollars in "management fees." In all, Romney and his investors reaped more than $100 million dollars from the deal.


Snicker, snicker.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/07/2013 9:24 Comments || Top||

#6  I grew up in a newspaper family and had worked at six papers, several of which were seriously diminished by 2009

Sensing a trend Alec?

Here's a hint...Amazon didn't destroy your precious, technology and a lack of talent did. Humble agate type, horrid. Everyone in the waiting room knew that mag sold at a loss for the circulation numbers for advertising revenues, now I can carry the entire works of Shakespeare and Vivaldi in a space smaller than my wallet - or throw birds against a brick wall, depending upon what kind of customer I am.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 08/07/2013 10:28 Comments || Top||

#7  Yes, it's a shame the Grahams and Jeff Bezos were not as smart as Alec MacGillis! Had he been a consultant, he could have sold his advice to them for a profit.

Oh, there's that bad word, again...
Posted by: Bobby || 08/07/2013 12:35 Comments || Top||

#8  swksvolFF, I'm not sure lack of talent is really the right term for the failure of newspapers. I would say subverting truth for messaging while alternatives exist is what did them in.
Posted by: rjschwarz || 08/07/2013 14:42 Comments || Top||

#9  Well I remember the time when ordering English books at your local bookstore in Germany it took them at least 6 weeks to deliver at a price usually twice as high as in the UK or U.S.

Then came Amazon. Most English books arrive the next day, at the same price you'd pay in the country of origin.
Posted by: European Conservative || 08/07/2013 19:08 Comments || Top||

#10  rjscwarz, I get what you are saying and agree. It just seems that going to college to learn how to write at a 3rd grade level would require the suppression of any talent possessed.

Here's some newspapering:

"Now we do assert and we declare, despite all the bolts and bars of the iniquitous legislature of Kansas, that persons have not the right to hold slaves in this territory. And we will emblazon it upon our banner in letters so large and language so plain that the infatuated invaders who elected the Kansas legislature, as well as that corrupt and ignorant legislature itself, may understand it—so that, if they cannot read, they may spell it out, and meditate and deliberate upon it; and we hold that the man who fails to utter this self-evident truth, on account of the insolent enactment alluded to, is a poltroon and a slave, worse than the black slaves of our persecutors and oppressors. The constitution of the United States, the great Magna Charta of American liberties, guarantees to every citizen the liberty of speech and the freedom of the press! And this is the first time in the history of America that a body claiming legislative powers has dared to attempt to wrest them from the people. And it is not only the right, but the bounden duty of every freeman to spurn with contempt and trample under foot an enactment which thus basely violates the right of freemen. For our part we do and shall continue to utter this truth so long as we have the power of utterance, and nothing but the brute force of an overpowering tyranny can prevent us."

John Speer, Sept. 15, 1855, commenting on a Kansas Territory law forbidding any discussion or action deemed offensive to pro-slavery by a 2 year or more imprisonment.

"so that, if they cannot read, they may spell it out, and meditate and deliberate upon it;"

Love that line, lots going on there.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 08/07/2013 20:23 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Syria Seeks To Tap Frozen Bank Accounts For Food Supplies
[Ynet] Syria is trying to tap frozen funds in foreign bank accounts to step up purchases of food stocks including wheat, as civil war and a deepening humanitarian crisis push Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad
Lord of the Baath...
to seek new ways to feed his people.

The country faces its worst wheat harvest in nearly three decades due to the conflict, dealing a blow to Assad's plan for self-sufficiency in food that was aimed at sidestepping Western moves to isolate his government through sanctions.
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/07/2013 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Syria



Who's in the News
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Two weeks of WOT
Wed 2013-08-07
  Kashmir: Five Indian soldiers killed in shooting
Tue 2013-08-06
  Clashes between Military, Insurgents Kill 35 in North Nigeria
Mon 2013-08-05
  Thirty killed in heavy fighting in Syrian mountains
Sun 2013-08-04
  9 Afghans killed in attack on Indian consulate
Sat 2013-08-03
  22 Police, 76 Taliban Killed in Afghan Battle
Fri 2013-08-02
  At least 40 killed in Syrian weapons depot blast
Thu 2013-08-01
  Qaida Chief Says Syria Exposed Hizbullah as Iran 'Tool'
Wed 2013-07-31
  Pakistan Elects Mamnoon Hussain President
Tue 2013-07-30
  Manning Acquitted of Aiding the Enemy
Mon 2013-07-29
  US drone kills 6 suspected militants in Yemen
Sun 2013-07-28
  Report: Hizbullah Wired Money To Bulgaria Bomb Suspects
Sat 2013-07-27
  Muslim Brotherhood claims its supporters massacred in Cairo
Fri 2013-07-26
  Officials: Cafe Bombings, Attacks Kill 42 In Iraq
Thu 2013-07-25
  Hezbollah commander killed in Syria
Wed 2013-07-24
  Reports: Top Syrian Army Commander Killed In Battles With Rebels

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