MOGADISHU, Somalia -- Hundreds of banner-waving residents took to the streets in Mogadishu to protest against Al Shabaab rampage on Wednesday, Garowe Online reports.
The participants at anti-Al Shabaab rally were chanting slogans denouncing Al Shabaab terrorists after a siege that left over a dozen, mainly government officials dead on Sunday. Protestors marched in large numbers from Mogadishu’s Shanghani district to Hamar municipalities.
Banadir regional administration officials urged residents to provide security services with any Al Shabaab tip-offs.
Militants shot their way into Mogadishu’s Sahafi Hotel, killing senior government officials over the weekend on Sunday.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/05/2015 00:00 ||
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Rival ambitions, insults and accusations of violence have brought Tunisia’s ruling party to the brink of collapse as the country struggles to lead the way towards a post-Arab Spring democracy.
The secularist Nidaa Tounes party was already weakened by the departure of its leader Beji Caid Essebsi, in line with the constitution after he was elected president last December.
It has now been riven for months by bad blood between its secretary general, Mohsen Marzouk, and the president’s son Hafedh Caid Essebsi, in what insiders are calling a “battle for succession”.
The rivalry threatens to tear apart the government in a country held up as a rare success story for the Arab Spring after its 2011 overthrow of longtime dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. On Sunday, the bitterness reached new heights with alleged violence during a meeting of Nidaa’s executive committee in Hammamet, 60 kilometres (35 miles) from the capital. Footage widely shared on the Internet shows a group of people armed with sticks — allegedly Essebsi supporters — blocking the entrance to the venue and hitting people trying to enter.
Several pro-Marzouk committee members charged that this amounted to “fascist aggression” orchestrated by “certain leaders of the party” intent on seizing control of it.
“Such violence threatens the democratic process,” one member, Bochra Belhaj Hmida, told AFP. As a loose alliance of leftist and centre-right figures together with former officials of Ben Ali’s regime, Nidaa Tounes has survived past internal crises.
But a key party congress has been delayed for several months, as protests are voiced over the ambitions of the 88-year-old president’s son, who is in his early 50s.
Resigning last month from his post as minister in charge of relations with parliament, party member Lazhar Akremi warned that the president may be trying to set up a dynasty.
“We’ve said no to hereditary power, no to the return of the old regime,” he said at the time. Tunisian media this week warned of an impending implosion, with La Presse newspaper saying Nidaa had reached “the point of no return” and magazine Leaders saying “the break is complete”.
Surprised? Anyone?
Lebanon's Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah attacked Saudi Arabia for its intervention in Yemen and Bahrain during a televised speech on Saturday.
During his speech in Beirut on Ashura, the day on which Shia Muslims commemorate the death of the Prophet Muhammed's grandson, Nasrallah condemned what he termed Saudi-US aggression in Yemen and listed the kingdom's leadership alongside traditional enemies Israel and the US.
"On this day, we renew our condemnation of Saudi and American aggression in Yemen," Nasrallah said to a large crowd of supporters.
Hezbollah members chanted "death to the Saud family" as Nasrallah railed against Sunni-led Saudi Arabia, reflecting deepening sectarian tensions.
The Saudi-Iranian rivalry is playing out in Yemen, where Saudi Arabia is leading a military intervention to try to restore President Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi's government, at present in exile in Riyadh, and fend off what it sees as creeping Iranian influence.
The crisis in Yemen has been escalating for several months amid failed attempts to bring rival parties to the negotiating table.
The UN special envoy for Yemen announced on Friday that he would begin working immediately with the government and Shia Houthi leaders who are opposed to Hadi to determine an agenda and date for peace talks. He also warned that a "catastrophic" humanitarian crisis loomed.
On 22 October, the International Committee of the Red Cross said battles in Taiz, Yemen's third-largest city and which remains in the hands of forces allied with President Hadi, were blocking the supply of essentials to the city.
Intensifying fighting in Taiz has plunged the city into a desperate situation, with hospitals closed and acute shortages of medicines, food, water and fuel, the Red Cross said.
Hezbollah acts as an important player in other struggles playing out between the Sunni-led Saudi Arabia and the Shia government of Iran.
Backed by Iranian forces and Russian air strikes, Hezbollah is taking part in a ground offensive in Syria to support President Bashar al-Assad and his forces against rebel groups.
Nasrallah in his Ashura day speech went on to condemn what he described as Saudi aggression against Bahraini citizens "revolting against oppression and fighting for their freedom and dignity".
Sunni-ruled Bahrain has a significant Shia population, which sets it apart from most of the Gulf countries. Its 2011 uprisings, however, were a broad, national protest movement calling for democracy and human rights.
Nasrallah further criticised Saudi Arabia for "neglect" and its "failure to protect pilgrims" against what he described as the "Mina massacre".
At least 2,432 people were killed on 24 September when Hajj pilgrims were crushed to death at a crossroads in Mina, inside Mecca.
An Emirates aircraft landed at Sanaa airport on Wednesday carrying 75 tonnes of medical aid for the first time since Arab coalition troops intervened in Yemen to restore legitimacy after a coup by the Iranian-backed rebels.
The plane, named “the land of two paradises” flew from Sharjah and landed in the Yemeni capital late Wednesday, Yemen’s Marib Press said.
“The plane is the first UAE aircraft to come to Sanaa airport since the start of the coalition operations in Yemen,” it said, quoting an airport source.
The report said the shipment was part of financial and humanitarian aid pledged by the UAE to support the conflict-battered Arab country.
It said massive aid has been delivered to liberated areas in Yemen over the past weeks but Wednesday’s shipment was the first to arrive in Houthi-controlled areas.
Bahrain said on Wednesday it had arrested 47 members of a group believed to have links to "terrorist elements in Iran" who it said were planning to carry out attacks in the coming days.
An interior ministry statement carried by Bahrain's news agency BNA said a large number of explosives and weapons had been found in secret caches in residential areas of several villages.
"The results of the inquiry and investigation indicate that the group has close links to Iranian elements and terrorist elements residing in Iran," the statement said.
Several members of the group received training in Iran on how to use weapons and manufacture explosives, it added.
Last month Bahrain recalled its ambassador to Iran, a day after the Gulf Arab state said its security forces had discovered a large bomb-making factory and had arrested a number of suspects linked to Iran's Revolutionary Guards.
Bahrain has been cracking down on militants behind bomb attacks against security forces that have killed several people this year.
Iran lied when it said that it denies involvement in any violence in Bahrain.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/05/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
How is the construction of the new British base coming along ?
North Korea faces the worst food shortage since 2011, when leader Fat Boy Kim Jong-un took power.
He should have pushed himself away from the table...
Experts say the impoverished state will fall 1 million tons short of next year's expected minimum food consumption of roughly 5.4 million tons.
A severe drought that plagued the North this summer has led to a 10-percent drop in food production.
Not to mention the totalitarian repression, concentration camps, militarized police state, and lack of an economy. No, the news reports never mention those things. It's always a drought.
A decrease in agricultural imports from China due to soured relations is believed to have exacerbated the situation.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/05/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
I think that the whole country should sleep more. They would also use less oxygen and generate less CO2. The latter should make 0bama happy.
Posted by: Sven the pelter ||
11/05/2015 0:33 Comments ||
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Posted by: Sven the pelter ||
11/05/2015 2:13 Comments ||
Top||
#4
Has anyone asked Bernie Sanders for a Comment?
Posted by: Bill Snore1687 ||
11/05/2015 7:07 Comments ||
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#5
Remember from 45 years ago studying the Soviet economy and how drought stricken it was that most of the vegetables had to be grown in small private plots instead of on collective farms. Amazingly localized droughts.
[AnNahar] The first refugees left Greece on Wednesday under an EU relocation plan, but Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras warned they were a "drop in the ocean" as the number of illegal migrant entries surged to 800,000 this year.
The six Syrian and Iraqi families, who are starting new lives in Luxembourg, are the first to be relocated from Greece under plans to share out nearly 160,000 migrants across the bloc in a scheme fiercely opposed by some EU members.
A Greek asylum service official said the Iraqi and Syrian families leaving Athens on Wednesday, chosen because they are considered vulnerable, included 16 children -- two of them disabled -- and a pregnant woman.
Tsipras, who was at Athens airport to see the 30 refugees off, said they were making "a trip to hope", but warned their numbers were nothing compared to the hundreds of thousands who have arrived on European shores this year.
"Today they have the opportunity to make a trip to hope, to a better life," said Tsipras, who was joined at the airport by Luxembourg's Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn.
"It's a drop in the ocean, but we hope the drop will become a stream and then a river of humanity."
He spoke as Fabrice Leggeri, the head of the EU's Frontex border agency, told Germany's Bild newspaper that migrants have made some 800,000 "illegal entries" to the bloc so far this year and warned that the influx has probably not "reached its peak".
In Germany, Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen announced that more than 6,000 soldiers have been mobilised to manage the influx into a country that is expected to take in up to a million asylum seekers this year.
This is more German troops than are deployed abroad, she noted.
- 'The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... is the gateway' -
"The human sacrifice that shames European civilisation must stop," said Tsipras, whose country saw more than 200,000 people land on its beaches in October alone, according to the UN refugee agency UNHCR.
Tsipras said the registration and relocation process for refugees must begin in Turkey, insisting: "Greece is not the gateway; Turkey is the gateway."
Ankara's cooperation is seen as key to ending the crisis, with the EU last month announcing a refugee cooperation deal with Turkey that includes a possible three billion euros ($3.3 billion) in aid.
Two first groups of Eritrea ...is run by the People's Front for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ), with about the amounts of democracy and justice you'd expect from a party with that name. National elections have been periodically scheduled and cancelled; none have ever been held in the country. The president, Isaias Afewerki, has been in office since independence in 1993 and will probably die there of old age... ns and Syrians left Italia under the relocation scheme last month, bound for Sweden and Finland, although some countries such as the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia and Poland still oppose the mandatory quotas.
[Rudaw] The Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... group (ISIS) released the names of three assailants it said had launched Tuesday's deadly attack on the small town of Dubis near Kirkuk, ... a thick stew of Arabs, Turkmen, Kurds, and probably Antarcticans, all of them mutually hostile most of the time... saying that two of them were of Kurdish origin.
Kurdish authorities said at least five attackers were involved.
According to pro-ISIS social media accounts, two of the assailants were of Kurdish origin, named Abu Basiri al-Kurdi and Mohammed Omer al-Kurdi, and a jacket wallah named Abu Jundi Anasari was also involved in the 8 pm attack on the mayor's office.
Kamal Kirkuki, commander of the Peshmerga on the western Kirkuk front, told Rudaw that two simultaneous attacks had taken place.
"Last night a boom-mobileexploded in front of the Dubis municipal building," he said. "A few minutes later the assailants blustered into the building with grenades. Later, a suicide bomber also targeted a Peshmerga checkpoint on the Dubis-Kirkuk road, killing four coppers and wounding 15 others."
He confirmed an earlier account by Brig. Sarhad Qadir of the Kirkuk police, who told Rudaw Tuesday that four holy warriors managed to break into the mayor's office after the building was attacked by as many suicide bombers, and that a fifth suicide bomber targeted a checkpoint in a simultaneous and related attack.
He said six Peshmerga soldiers and coppers were killed in the fight.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
11/05/2015 00:05 ||
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So much for being a brave Lion of Islam speaking truth to anyone.
[Jpost] After facing a backlash for the comments from the Moslem Bruderbund and other political rivals, Sheikh Halabi releases two new videos.
A senior Jordanian Salafi sheikh who stirred controversy in the Muslim world recently by issuing a fatwa against the killing of Jews, walked back his comments in a video released Tuesday.
Sheikh Ali Halabi had said in a video from February, which went viral in recent days, that Jews can be killed during war only, and that killing them at other times is a betrayal. When asked by a student if it is permissible to kill Jews in Paleostine, the sheikh answered: "Someone who protects you, gives you electricity and water, transfers you money and you work for him and take his money - would you betray him, even if he was a Jew?"
According to the sheikh's original fatwa, killing is allowed during festivities or declared war, "But if you trust him and he trusts you, then it is forbidden to betray him. And therefore you are forbidden to murder him." When the sheikh was asked by a student about armed Israeli soldiers in the streets, he responded: "The same answer. Does a soldier holding a weapon in the street kill every Muslim he sees?" The student answered "No."
After facing a backlash for the comments from the Moslem Bruderbund and other political rivals, Halabi released two videos, translated by MEMRI, in which he rebutted the criticism.
In his rebuttal, the sheikh called Jews "occupiers and plunderers," who are prone to "betrayal, fraud, cunning and deceit."
Halabi said that jihad against the Jews is a "mandatory jihad...upon any Muslim who accepts Allah as the Lord and Islam as his religion."
Clarifying his earlier fatwa, however, the sheikh said that the jihad could not be carried out by an "emotional thrust and with such excitement that only serves to harm us."
"How can we think that this leads to victory?" he asked. "The nation must prepare and unite in order to uproot his enemy," Halabi charged.
"By Allah, if your brother, the son of your mother and father, were to attack you in your own home, and you have no way to fend him off other than killing him, then we say that he was the aggressor and you were the defender - all the more so when the aggressor is an evil Jew, from among the brothers of apes and pigs," he said.
Halabi said that "unfortunately tens of thousands of Paleostinians work with the Jews, and accept money from the Jews. They need the Jews. Sadly this is the reality of an occupied people. I am not saying this as some people mistakenly understood it, as praise for the Jews, who deserve nothing but more and more curses. I am talking about the reality."
Halabi said that an asymmetrical war by the Paleostinians against the Jews could only end in "total defeat."
"Yes, we are happy when the Jews are humiliated and defeated, when they fall, but there is a way of doing things."
Halabi said that Jihad against the Jews is a duty, but is dependent on capabilities. "Everybody knows America has Israel's back. Are today's fragmented Muslims up for the task?" He said that Muslims must not "fool themselves."
[Ynet] Zigzagging, the government has returned the body of the terrorist from Hebron who ran over and critically maimed a Border Police officer; mass funeral is expected on Thursday; Paleostinian Authority representative at the UN claims bodies have been returned with organs missing.
Israel returned the body of Ibrahim Saqafi to the Paleostinians on Wednesday evening. Saqafi, a Hebron resident, had carried out a vehicular attack near Halhul earlier on Wednesday that left a Border Police officer critically maimed.
The return of Saqafi's body came in spite of Israel's earlier decision to delay returning terrorists' bodies to the Paleostinians.
Meanwhile, ...back at the precinct house, Sergeant Maloney wasn't buying it. It was just too pat. The whole thing smelled phony, kind of like a dead mackeral but without the scales... the Paleostinian Authority representative at the United Nations ...the Oyster Bay money pit... claimed that other bodies which had been transferred to them "were returned with organs missing, after the occupying forces harvested organs from the Paleostinian victims."
Saqafi's body was handed over to the Paleostinians at Tarqumia checkpoint and from there taken to Hebron. The funeral it to place on Thursday afternoon, also contradicting Israel's stipulation that it would only return terrorists' bodies on the condition that the Paleostinians do not organize mass funerals for them.
The decision not to return bodies was taken after the government was criticized by the Israeli public for giving back the bodies of holy warriors that had committed attacks during the current wave of violence. Mass funerals were held for the holy warriors and an official ceremony was held for them at the Hebron Muqataa.
Because of Paleostinian intransigence regarding the condition placed by Israel, Israel suspended the return of five terrorists' bodies to their families in Hebron. But Israeli officials decided to return the body of the terrorist who committed the car attack on Wednesday, even though he was not a resident of Hebron and although his funeral is to take place during the day. A Border Police officer was critically maimed in the car attack.
Hebron has in the last two weeks been the site of a major public campaign urging the return of all bodies of holy warriors who lived in Hebron that are in Israeli hands. The highest number of holy warriors from the West Bank in the latest escalation comes from the Hebron area. The campaign is enhanced by demonstrations held every few days, which quickly escalate into festivities with security forces.
Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon said at the Knesset on Wednesday that holding the bodies does not deter potential terrorists, "in contrast to house demolitions or revoking residency, for which we have proof that they are deterrent measures."
Ya'alon explained that the question was being decided on a case-by-case basis. Bodies are to be returned, he said, as long as a quiet, modest funeral is ensured. "The policy is consistent and reasoned in accordance with ethical and security considerations," added Ya'alon.
Blood libel
Paleostinian Permanent Observer to the UN Riyad Mansour submitted a formal complaint against Israel on Wednesday, alleging that it had returned terrorists' bodies with organs missing.
"A medical examination conducted on bodies of Paleostinians returned after they were killed by the occupying power found that they were missing organs," Mansour claimed in the letter.
Israeli Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon wrote a letter in response to the UN Secretary General, stating that "the Paleostinian representative's anti-Semitic face has been revealed" and that the allegation was "blood libel". Danon urged the UN to sharply condemn "the Paleostinian representative's inflammatory statements and remove anti-Semitism from the hallways of the United Nations."
Border Police reservists to be released
The terrorist attack in Hebron came after a quiet day, and security officials have said they believe the terrorism wave is abating. In addition to removing some checkpoints inside Jerusalem this week, a reduction in the amount of soldiers in Jerusalem neighborhoods has begun.
In the next few days, about 300 Border Police fighters who were called up for reserve duty will be released. This comes on the heels of many regular Border Police fighters returning to their regular postings, after they were recently sent reinforce security in the city.
#4
I'm not a doctor, but isn't it true that you essentially have to die while on a ventilator in order for your organs to be harvested? Wasn't this guy shot dead at the scene of his attack?
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
11/05/2015 15:44 Comments ||
Top||
#5
I'm not a doctor, but isn't it true that you essentially have to die while on a ventilator in order for your organs to be harvested?
You are correct.
"we will accept organs from the brain-dead,
from former persons who are permanently unconscious,
from former persons who are in persistent vegetative state,
and from patients who have lost their personhood to Alzheimer's disease."
[Ynet] Unprecedented amount of arrests and indictments served since Rosh Hashanah: Significant decrease in stabbing attacks in Jerusalem the last three weeks due to increase in police presence.
Police data obtained by Ynet, has indicated an unprecedented amount of suspects detained and indictments served on charges of participation in riots across the country since Rosh Hashanah: 437 indictments were served for throwing stones, petrol bombs, and shooting fireworks.
.
During the last three weeks there has been a significant decrease in the amount of stabbing attacks in Jerusalem, moreover, there has been a downturn in the amount of rioting in the city. Police officials are reluctant to declare a return of calm, but say that it is quite possible that a series of actions carried out in the capital - may have begun to bear fruit.
According to the data, since the terrorist attack on the eve of Rosh Hashanah in which Alexander Levlovitz was murdered, 1,632 suspects across the country were investigated for participation in riots of whom 1,553 were detained. Since the beginning of the current wave of terror, the highest rate of detention was recorded in Jerusalem, in which 797 terror suspects were tossed in the calaboose Don't shoot, coppers! I'm comin' out! - most of them from East Jerusalem. During this period of time, West Bank police investigated 499 suspects for being involved in disturbances and Northern District police arrested 177 suspects for questioning.
The high number of arrests led to a significant amount of indictments. Since Rosh Hashanah 120 indictments were served to those involved in riots in Jerusalem and 237 indictments were served on similar charges in the West Bank.
The intensive arrest activity was made possible after six special investigation teams from around the country were deployed to Jerusalem for an investigative effort that lasted ten days. "We took a chief superintendent with Sherlocks from each district and brought them to Jerusalem. They are working in coordination with the Shin Bet and with the Central District's minority division," said Acting Police Commissioner Benzi Sau at a recent press briefing.
Since the terrorist attack in Jerusalem's central bus station on October 15, in which a 68-year-old woman was moderately maimed, only one terrorist managed to carry out a stabbing attack in the city. Last Friday a Paleostinian terrorist stabbed a young man near Ammunition Hill wounding him lightly to moderately. On Monday, a Paleostinian from Jabal Mukaber attacked a Jewish tour guide with a bottle near Jaffa Gate wounding her lightly.
Apart from this, several stabbing attacks were thwarted in Jerusalem. On October 17 a terrorist was killed when he tried to stab a police officer at Armon Hanatziv in East Jerusalem. In the other cases there was no need for shooting and Paleostinian suspects were arrested carrying knives.
Jerusalem District Police arrested Sheikh Khaled Al Mughrabi on Wednesday morning, after videos of his sermons raised suspicions of incitement. The sheikh gives sermons twice a week at the Temple Mount and Al-Aqsa Mosque and previous complaints filed against him claimed that he was inciting worshippers to attack Jews.
Honenu, a right-wing legal aid organization, was among those who submitted complaints. In August 2015, the organization received a letter from the deputy commander of the David District Police, Erez Tavor, which stated that the sheikh was arrested and questioned. The letter continued that the case had been passed on to the district prosecutor for an evidentiary hearing, but no indictment has been filed since.
Recordings of the sermons were shared across Palestinian social media platforms and seem to show that the sheikh has continued in the same vein. One of the sermons, which was posted on the website "Palestinian Media Watch" and later transferred to police, showed him saying: "We will pursue the Jews everywhere. They won't escape us. The sons of Israel will all be killed."
Honenu praised the arrest: "We are happy that the inciting sheikh was finally arrested and hope that a serious indictment will be filed immediately. It cannot be that a young Jewish man is arrested and immediately banned from the Temple Mount for praying, while Islamic leaders incite against the Jews uninterrupted."
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/05/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
As Bill would say, it all depends on the meaning of "the".
Posted by: Sven the pelter ||
11/05/2015 1:06 Comments ||
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Helluva deal, Barky
TEHRAN: Iran will not cooperate with the United States on the “fight against terrorists in Syria,” a top adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was quoted as saying by state media on Wednesday.
“Iran will not cooperate directly or indirectly with the United States,” Ali Akbar Velayati was quoted as saying on Press TV after a meeting with Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad in Tehran.
“Iran will not accept any initiative regarding Syria without consultation with the country’s government and people,” Press TV also quoted Velayati as saying.
In a meeting with Mekdad on Wednesday, Iran’s foreign minister reiterated Tehran’s position that it believed the Syrian crisis only had a political solution.
“We believe only the Syrian people should decide about their future and others can only facilitate this political process to resolve the crisis,” Mohammad Javad Zarif was quoted as saying by Fars news agency.
Posted by: badanov ||
11/05/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
The mafia doesn't cooperate with the FBI either.
Posted by: Sven the pelter ||
11/05/2015 0:28 Comments ||
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#2
Probably something to do with an anti-Mo video.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
