September 04, 2006
A final decision on what do about immigration policy awaits a meeting this week of senior Republicans. But key lawmakers and aides who set the Congressional agenda say they now believe it would be politically risky to try to advance an immigration measure that would showcase party divisions and need to be completed in the 19 days Congress is scheduled to meet before breaking for the election.President Bush had made comprehensive changes in immigration laws a priority, even making the issue the subject of a prime-time address, but House Republicans have been determined not to move ahead with any legislation that could be construed as amnesty for anyone who entered the country illegally. They held hearings around the country in recent weeks to contrast their enforcement-only bill with a Senate measure that could lead to citizenship for some.
“I don’t see how you bridge that divide between us and the Senate,” said Representative Peter T. King, Republican of New York and chairman of the Homeland Security Committee. “I don’t see it happening. I really don’t.”
Democrats say they are not surprised by the immigration impasse and believe some Republicans would prefer to keep the issue alive to stir conservative voters rather than reach a legislative solution.
This will not please the GOP base -- no matter how good the legislation the GOP leadership is preparing to deal with is.
With Congress reconvening Tuesday after an August break, Republicans in the House and Senate say they will focus on Pentagon and domestic security spending bills, port security legislation and measures that would authorize the administrationÂ’s terror surveillance program and create military tribunals to try terror suspects.
All of that is important -- and all of it should have been dealt with sooner. And the failure to deal with immigration issues because of divisions within the Congress simply means that an issue that resonates with many voters across the political spectrum will never pass in this Congress.
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On September 17, the Catholic Church will beatify one of those who died seeking to save Jews from the satanic Nazi regime.
A Hungarian nun who helped saved the lives of dozens of Jews during World War II will be beatified by the Catholic Church, officials said Monday.Sara Salkahazi was killed by the Arrow Cross -- the Hungarian allies of the Nazis -- on Dec. 27, 1944 for hiding Jews in a Budapest building used by her religious order, the Sisters of Social Service.
Salkahazi was taken along with several other occupants of the home and shot, their bodies falling into the Danube River and never recovered.
The beatification rite will take place Sept. 17 at Budapest's St. Stephen Basilica.
"Sara Salkahazi heroically exercised her love of humanity stemming from her Christian faith," said Cardinal Peter Erdo, who will celebrate the beatification mass. "This is for what she gave her life."
Salkahazi was born in the city of Kassa in 1899, at the time in Hungary but now known as Kosice and part of Slovakia.
It is estimated that Sister Sara Salkahazi and her order, the Sisters of Social Service, saved over 1000 Jewish lives through their efforts.
May the example of Blessed Sara Salkahazi serve as a reminder to all the Christian faithful of our obligation to act in the face of genocide, and to stand up to the evil forces of anti-Semitism which even today seek to finish the job begun by Hitler and his minions during the Holocaust.
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The Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem, Isaac Herzog, sent the Pope a personal message of thanks on February 28, 1944, in which he said: "The people of Israel will never forget what His Holiness and his illustrious delegates, inspired by the eternal principles of religion which form the very foundations of true civilization, are doing for us unfortunate brothers and sisters in the most tragic hour of our history, which is living proof of divine Providence in this world."
But did anyone realize that there was an increase in anti-Semitic incidents in Great Britain over the last few weeks, as Israel fought to defend its existance?
The number of anti-Semitic incidents in Great Britain has risen sharply since the start of the Lebanon war, according to an organization dedicated to the safety of Britain's Jewish community.According to Mark Gardner, spokesman of the Community Security Trust, there were over 90 incidents of anti-Semitism in Britain during July, including attacks on Jewish-owned stores, hate mail sent to representatives of the Jewish community and verbal and physical attacks on Jews in public. Over the past few years, the monthly average has been 10 to 30 such attacks.
The British report is merely the latest in a series of reports documenting an increase in anti-Semitic incidents throughout Europe in the past two months.
On Thursday, an all-party parliamentary inquiry into anti-Semitism in Britain will publish a report that is expected to declare anti-Semitism a serious problem and call on the government to fight it. Committee Chair Denis MacShane MP said in yesterday's London Times that the CST's figures "confirm the evidence given to us that anti-Semitic attacks are a very real problem."
Gardner told The Times that the July incidents "were more dispersed than usual," noting that "it is usually a small number [of people] responsible for a large number of attacks, but these were very widespread across the country and included graffiti attacks on synagogues in Edinburgh and Glasgow."
Hate mail sent to senior Jewish figures blamed them for the deaths of Lebanese children in Beirut, Gardner told The Times.
I wonder -- would the same be found here in the United States? And if so, why haven't such attacks been highlighted? After all, such incidents against muslims are freely reported and loudly decried in the media -- why not some equal treatment?
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09:19 AM
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Steve Irwin, the hugely popular Australian television personality and conservationist known as the "Crocodile Hunter," was killed Monday by a stingray while filming off the Great Barrier Reef. He was 44.Irwin was at Batt Reef, off the remote coast of northeastern Queensland state, shooting a segment for a series called "Ocean's Deadliest" when he swam too close to one of the animals, which have a poisonous barb on their tails, his friend and colleague John Stainton said.
"He came on top of the stingray and the stingray's barb went up and into his chest and put a hole into his heart," said Stainton, who was on board Irwin's boat at the time.
Crew members aboard the boat, Croc One, called emergency services in the nearest city, Cairns, and administered CPR as they rushed the boat to nearby Low Isle to meet a rescue helicopter. Medical staff pronounced Irwin dead when they arrived a short time later, Stainton said.
Irwin was famous for his enthusiasm for wildlife and his catchword "Crikey!" in his television program "Crocodile Hunter." First broadcast in Australia in 1992, the program was picked up by the Discovery network, catapulting Irwin to international celebrity.
Irwin is also known for one of the worst movies ever made -- 2002's "The Crocodile Hunters: Collision Course".
This is a truly sad event, especially for his wife, Terri, and their two children, daughter Bindi Sue, 8, and son Bob, who will turn 3 in December. May they be comforted by the fact he died doing what he loved.
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September 03, 2006
FAR-RIGHT extremists have adopted the tactics of Islamic jihadists by posting videos on the internet in which they threaten to behead British Muslims.The films show balaclava-clad white British men brandishing guns, knives and clubs, calling on all Muslims to leave the United Kingdom or be killed. One appears to be a soldier who has served in the Gulf.
In one film a man tells Muslims to “go homeâ€� or risk being burnt alive. He threatens: “I’ll cut your head off,â€� and claims to have “comradesâ€� across Britain who have “had enoughâ€�.
The videos have all been made since the arrest three weeks ago of suspects connected to the alleged plot to blow up transatlantic jets. Their style mimics the “martyrdom videosâ€� of Islamic radicals talking about their plans for terrorist outrages against the West.
The release of the videos on YouTube, an American-based open-access website, coincides with reports of a rise in the number of attacks on mosques.
I'm curious -- is there an actual rise in the number of attacks on mosques that has been documented, or are we simply talking about claims by Muslim groups of such an increase. After all, it seems like every time Islamists engage in an act of barbarism, the usual apologists for Muslim terror claim that they are te evictims of eve more hatred -- claims that are never retracted after the events are shown to be hoaxes or frauds committed by Muslims themselves.
But I do have a question about these videos -- are they really threats against Muslims, or are they parodies intended to satirize the barbarism of the jihadi pigs around the world? Not, of course, that it makes a particular difference, for the apologists for islamist terrorism won't be willing to distinguish between the two, any more than they are willing to condemn the real videos from their co-religionists engaged in terrorism around the globe.
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Surveillance video recovered by Montreal police shows a masked man throwing a firebomb at the door of an orthodox Jewish school in an attack early Saturday.The bomb started a fire but the damage was described as minimal.
Police said a neighbour heard what sounded like a window breaking just after midnight and looked out to see the main entrance of the Taldos Yakov Yosef school in Outremont in flames.
In the video, the man takes a few steps toward the entrance, then steps back to throw a lighted Molotov cocktail. He removes his mask as he steps out of the video frame, but his face is not visible.
Although officials of Jewish groups disagree, police have been unwilling to declare the attack a hate crime. In the absence of graffiti or other other evidence, it is being treated as an unexplained case of arson.
I wonder -- in the absence of a note or grafitti, would a similar attack on a Muslim institution be treated as "an unexplained case of arson"? Or would it be presumed to be a bias-related attack?
I think we can all answer that without too much trouble.
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05:20 PM
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The American Left is notoriously anti-Israel. It seems that if one is pro-choice, or pro-gay, or even pro-civil liberties, one is almost automatically against the evil theocratic military machine dug in unfairly in amongst its peace loving neighbors.Nevertheless, as I set out to continue my efforts to end the Iraq War by working as a summer intern at a major anti-war coalition based in New York City, a coalition famous for organizing some of the largest demonstrations against the war, I expected the activists who worked there to be different. I expected individuals dedicated to ending all war and the atrocities that are chained to any and every armed conflict to be able rise above the quid pro quo political banter that has dominated the Arab-Israeli conflict from its conception and simply work for peace. I was wrong.
In every instance, Israel was painted as the villain, the Jews as the agents of wrong-doing. Even when israel was teh victim of attacks, it was the wrong-doer for engaging in self-defense.
Sounds like the "anti-war" Left is simply against Jews daring to fight back.
ADDENDUM: Just a reminder of how deep Jew-hatred goes in the "mainstream" Left.
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02:24 PM
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And if you don't, you can die at the hands of the jihadi faithful. Malkin transcribes part of the video.
"Islam is the only religion acceptable to God and came with the revealed book, the Koran, which abrogates all previous revelations, like the Torah and Evangel... God recognizes no separation between religion and state...""To Americans and the rest of Christendom we say, either repent (your) misguided ways and enter into the light of truth or keep your poison to yourself and suffer the consequences in this world and the next..."
"If the Zionist crusader missionaries of hate and counter-Islam consultants like Daniel Pipes, Robert Spencer, Michael Scheuer, Steven Emerson, and yes, even the crusader-in-chief George W. Bush were to abandon their unbelief and repent and enter into the light of Islam and turn their swords against the enemies of God, it would be accepted of them and they would be our brothers in Islam. And we send a special invitation to all of you fighting Bush's crusader pipe dream in Afghanistan, Iraq, and wherever else W. has sent you to die."
So much for the believe that the God of the Jews, of the Christians, and the Muslims are the same God. They don't seem to believe that, so why should the rest of us -- no matter what my troll Ken Hoop and his "religious experts" say about the matter.
Captain Ed points to a historical analog for the American propagandist for the Religion Of Peace -- Lord Haw-Haw, the Nazi propagandist of WWII. May they meet the same fate.
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01:35 PM
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And now... the winning entries in the Watcher's Council vote for this week are Empire and Apocalypse by Gates of Vienna, and Check or Checkmate? Death by Cop on the Global Stage by Kobayashi Maru. All members, please be sure to link to both winning entries (and to the full results of the vote) in a post. I actually had to break a tie in the non-council category this week... Ms. Cornelius made an interesting comparison between high school and Dante's concentric Circles of Hell, but I ultimately cast my lot for Kobayashi Maru's bleak analysis of our struggle against Islamofascism. Two members were unable to vote this week... but The Sundries Shack was the only member affected by the 2/3 vote penalty. Thanks to everyone for all the great entries this week... I'm eager to see next week's entries! Here are the full tallies of all votes cast:
Votes Council link 2 1/3 Empire and Apocalypse
Gates of Vienna2 Targeted Killings, Moral Consideration
Soccer Dad2 Meanwhile, in Darfur...
Joshuapundit1 Say Anything
AbbaGav2/3 Flag Flapped In Colorado
The Education Wonks2/3 Valid Pedagogical Purpose -– Poor Pedagogical Methodology
Rhymes With Right1/3 Save the Electoral College!
Right Wing Nut House1/3 Pluto Struck Down As Unconstitutional
Socratic Rhythm Method
Votes Non-council link 3 Check or Checkmate? Death by Cop on the Global Stage
Kobayashi Maru2 When Teaching School Is Like... A Divine Comedy
A Shrewdness of Apes1 1/3 Shaw's "But" Proves Him an Ass
Caerdroia1 Anchoress Called on to "Retract" Support for Rudy
The Anchoress1 Niall Ferguson on the 21st Century
The Belmont Club2/3 The First Scene of Ehud Olmert's Last Act
Israel Matzav2/3 All the News ThatÂ’s Fit To Blackout
Blue Crab Boulevard1/3 Walking Among the Tent Camps
Publius Pundit1/3 A Greek Tragedy: Glass Half-Empty
Pixane1/3 NYTimes Watch: It's Not Easy Being Blind
Villainous Company1/3 "Melting Pot" of Victims Shows Depth of Muslim Integration
Point Five
Congratulations all around -- especially to my Non-Council nominee, Ms. Cornelius.
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I'll be posting this article from the Washington Post in my classroom as a resource for my students.
JAMESTOWN -- They were known as the "20 and odd," the first African slaves to set foot in North America at the English colony settled in 1607.For nearly 400 years, historians believed they were transported to Virginia from the West Indies on a Dutch warship. Little else was known of the Africans, who left no trace.
Now, new scholarship and transatlantic detective work have solved the puzzle of who they were and where their forced journey across the Atlantic Ocean began.
The slaves were herded onto a Portuguese slave ship in Angola, in Southwest Africa. The ship was seized by British pirates on the high seas -- not brought to Virginia after a period of time in the Caribbean. The slaves represented one ethnic group, not many, as historians first believed.
The discovery has tapped a rich vein of history that will go on public view next month at the Jamestown Settlement. The museum and living history program will commemorate the 400th anniversary of Jamestown's founding by revamping the exhibits and artifacts -- as well as the story of the settlement itself.
Although historians have thoroughly documented the direct slave trade from Africa starting in the 1700s, far less was known of the first blacks who arrived in Virginia and other colonies a century earlier. A story of memory and cultural connections between Africa and the early New World is being unearthed in a state whose plantation economy set the course for the Civil War.
"We went entirely back to the drawing board," said Tom Davidson, senior curator of the Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation. "The problem has always been that all of the things that make for a human story [of the Africans] were missing. . . . Now we can talk about the Africans with the same richness we talk about the English and the Powhatans."
Too often, people think of history as old, dead, and stagnant. The reality is that there is always more artifacts to be recovered and more old records to be discovered, and as a result there are new insights into the past that help us understand who we are as a people and how we came to be that way. I'm thankful for this article, and for the work of those at Jamestown who have provided a little insight inot the development of one of the less proud aspects of American history.
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September 02, 2006
Guess what -- the letter was not ALL he was demanding. As Bob Dunn over at Fort Bend Now points out, Don Richardson was also asking for "a check for $20,000 as a refund of my campaign expenses".
Richardson initially indicated he failed to follow through on his promise to drop out of the race because he wanted proof from national Republican officials that $4 million in funding was on its way to Sekula-Gibbs.However, a copy of a fax from Richardson to Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman reveals an additional issue.
“I will withdraw as a write-in candidate upon receipt of your letter and a check for $20,000 as a refund of my campaign expense. Please see my FEC report, filed today,” the fax, dated Aug. 25, 2006, says.
Apparently Richardson didnÂ’t get that $20,000 check, because heÂ’s still a registered write-in candidate, not to mention that heÂ’s also in the running in the special election.
For those of you who don't believe my charge against this miserable poltroon, let me supply you with a little bit of photographic evidence -- sent to all the CD22 precinct chairs by Don Richardson himself!
Now I don't know about you, but Richardson's demand for a check made out to him to cover his "expenses" certainly looks like solicitation of a bribe to me -- and given that he was communicating via fax with the RNC in Washington, DC, it would appear that he committed a federal offense in the process.
Hey, Don -- Go to jail. Go directly to jail. Do not pass GOP. Do not collect $20,000!
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10:00 AM
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, Clayton from Burma.
Palestinian militants who held two Fox News journalists hostage for nearly two weeks threatened in a statement posted online Saturday to abduct non-Muslims visiting the Palestinian territories and kill them unless their demands were met.The statement, posted in the name of the Holy Jihad Brigades on a Web site frequently used by militants, said the group would kill any hostages it takes unless they converted to Islam, paid a ransom or Muslim prisoners were exchanged for their release.
"Any infidel blood will have no sanctity," the group said in the statement.
That's right -- we infidels are all targets, and we are subject to killing if we don't knuckle under to the demands of the followers of ROPMA.
I'm curious -- where are all the outraged liberals and "moderate Muslims" who were offended by Ann Coulter's comments about forcibly converting terrorists and their supporters to Christianity in the wake of 9/11? They seem strangely silent following the forced conversion of the Fox News hostages and this statement.
So let me proudly proclaim my position on this matter.
Allah is simply Satan, and Muhammad is his false prophet.
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04:16 AM
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Attorneys for Merck & Co. want to see bank and cellphone records that could show the extent of a juror's financial relationship with a plaintiff who won a $32 million verdict against the drug company in the death of a 71-year-old man who took Vioxx.Jose Manuel Rios, a $22,000-a-year school janitor who served on the panel that found Merck liable for Leonel Garza's fatal heart attack after taking the painkiller Vioxx, testified in a post-trial deposition to borrowing up to $10,000 interest-free from Garza's widow, Felicia, the plaintiff in the lawsuit against Merck. He said the loans included $2,500 that was paid off just weeks before he was selected as a juror in the case.
He said Felicia Garza also loaned money to others in the community.
Tilden Katz, a spokesman for Merck's legal team, said Merck attorneys were hoping the documents would help them ``get to the bottom of" the financial relationship.
``Everyone is entitled to a fair trial," he said. ``A financial relationship with a juror raises a serious question as to whether the Garza trial was consistent with these vital principles."
Plaintiff attorney Joe Escobedo did not return a call for comment.
Rios produced cellphone records that showed calls from his number to Garza's. He told lawyers his wife, a teacher's aide, made the calls on school business. Merck lawyers say the timing of the calls, including evening calls made days after he received his jury summons and the day before jury selection, is ``highly suspicious."
Merck lawyers requested Rios's deposition in June, after a fellow school employee alerted the local attorney to the loans.
Oneida Saenz, a textbook data specialist for the Rio Grande City school district, said she observed the financial transactions beginning in the fall of 2003.
Saenz said that she spoke to Rios in March.
``He said, `I can't wait to get back to court,' and I said, `You don't want to get me started. You know you don't belong there,' " the affadavit reads.
The case, which ended in April, was the sixth to reach a verdict among more than 11,000 lawsuits involving the blockbuster painkiller . Plaintiff attorneys hailed it as the first in which a jury found short-term usage was one of the factors leading to a heart attack.
Merck attorneys said Leonel Garza only used the drug for a week, which wasn't long enough for it to cause heart attacks. Plaintiff attorneys said he took the drug for 17 days.
Garza was a smoker with a 20-year history of heart disease, but plaintiff attorneys said recent medical tests showed his veins to be clear and his heart attack risk to be low.
Sounds to me like this was an attempt to play the jury-lottery -- and that the plaintiff and her legal team sought to rig the verdict. Toss the verdict out -- and the suit along with it.
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03:58 AM
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New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin vowed never again to call the World Trade Center site a "hole in the ground" during a visit to New York on Friday to let investors know his hurricane-devastated city is reopen for business.Nagin stopped short of again apologizing for using that description of the Twin Towers site -- where 2,759 people died in the September 11 attacks -- during a U.S. television interview that aired last week.
"I tell you what I will never do again is refer to that site as a hole. It's a sacred site that is presently in an undeveloped state," Nagin told a news conference to launch the New Orleans Rebirth economic development tour.
Nagin had drawn criticism for his remarks in an interview with CBS's "60 Minutes" when asked why it was taking so long to clean up New Orleans a year after Hurricane Katrina, which killed 1,339 people and caused $80 billion in damage.
"You guys in New York City can't get a hole in the ground fixed and it's five years later. So let's be fair," he said on "60 Minutes."
Nagin apologized for the comment on Sunday.
If the WTC comment were his only offense, I might give him a pass. But from his incompetent handling of the evacuation of New Orleans to his histrionic attempts to blame the Bush administration for the failures of his administration and that of Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco, to his "chocolate city" comment to this latest outrage, it is clear that the man is an idiot -- and that the people of his city are even dumber than he is because the reelected him.
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03:38 AM
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Russia on Friday cast new doubt on the prospects for the Bush administrationÂ’s efforts to punish Iran for refusing to suspend its nuclear program, even as European leaders expressed wariness at moving quickly to impose sanctions.In Moscow, officials expressed regret that an Aug. 31 deadline had passed without an agreement by Iran to halt its efforts to enrich uranium that could be used for building nuclear weapons, as American and European officials believe Iran intends to do.
At the same time, Russian officials made it clear that they do not support retaliatory sanctions or other steps to isolate IranÂ’s leadership. That was a view that seemed to be widely shared across Europe, despite public consternation over IranÂ’s defiance of a United Nations Security Council resolution.
Despite weeks of diplomacy and compromise among the Security Council’s permanent members — the United States, Britain, France, China and Russia — the resolute deadline set by the Security Council for Iran to halt its nuclear work seemed fairly irresolute once it passed.
Russia’s defense minister, Sergei B. Ivanov, said that the issue of sanctions was “not acute,” and added that diplomats from the five permanent members and Germany would meet to discuss further steps. France’s Foreign Ministry said the meeting was scheduled for next Thursday in Berlin.
RussiaÂ’s foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, said that Russia favored continued negotiations and not punitive measures, calling into question their effectiveness.
Even though Russia previously joined the other permanent members of the Security Council in setting the deadline for Iran to comply — with the implicit threat of sanctions — Mr. Lavrov left in doubt whether Russia would ever agree to any penalties. His view echoed one heard increasingly here: that sanctions could be a first step toward a new American-led military conflict in the Middle East.
In light of this, I have to ask why the US and other countries believe that the UN has any role at all in settling world problems. This sort of crap is what we see in the worst parents and worst teachers -- threats made but an unwillingness to carry out. As a result, the wrong-doers are able to continue to act at will, knowing there are no consequences to a failure to comply.
But then again, maybe we should look at history. In 1939, the Russians cut a deal with Hitler. Want to bet that they have a deal with Ahmadinejad?
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03:15 AM
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ritish police said on Saturday they had arrested 16 men in two separate anti-terrorism operations just three weeks after uncovering a suspected plot to bring down U.S.-bound airliners over the Atlantic.Fourteen of the men were held in London in an operation that a police source said focused on suspected “training, recruitment and encouraging others to take part in terrorist activity”.
Anti-terrorist police in Manchester arrested two men early on Saturday and were carrying out three searches but this was not linked to the London arrests, police there said.
Most of these arrests seem to be related to terrorist training camps within Great britain, and are unrelated to the airline bombing plot that was recently disrupted.
Furthermore, it appears that the Brits are taking no chances, and are engaged in a great deal of surveilance of those with suspected links to terrorism.
British police are currently trying to monitor "thousands" of potential security suspects, the head of the anti-terrorism unit at London's Metropolitan Police said in an interview to be broadcast Sunday.In an interview recorded in July, before the arrest of more than two dozen people on suspicion of an alleged plot to blow up US-bound aircraft, Peter Clarke said Britain was facing an increasing threat from homegrown extremists.
He refused to give an exact figure about how many people he said were either directly or indirectly involved in plotting atrocities on British soil but said the number ran into four figures.
"I don't want to go down the numbers game, I don't think it's helpful," he told a BBC television programme entitled "Al-Qaida -- Time to Talk?"
"All I can say is that our knowledge is increasing and certainly in terms of broad description, the numbers of people who we have to be interested in are into the thousands."
He added: "That includes a whole range of people, not just terrorists, not just attackers, but people who might be tempted to support or encourage or to assist."
Clarke highlighted the potential for home-grown terrorism in Britain since the September 2001 attacks on the United States, implicitly citing the July 2005 London bombings carried out by four British Muslim suicide bombers.
"What we've learnt since 9/11 is that the threat is not something that's simply coming from overseas into the United Kingdom. What we've learnt, and what we've seen all too graphically and all too murderously, is that we have a threat which is being generated here within the United Kingdom."
here's hoping that we are doing the same sort of thing here in the US -- and that we can keep it secret from the ACLU, New York Times, Washington Post and other al-Qaeda associates who would rather embarrass the Bush Administration than keep America safe.
UPDATE: Surprise! Surprise! Looks like one of the targets in the current investigation may be a Muslim "school" in East Sussex. It seems like it was less interested in education students thanindotrinating them in violent jihad. So much for the "Religion of Peace".
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03:04 AM
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An enduring mystery of the C.I.A. leak case has been solved in recent days, but with a new twist: Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the prosecutor, knew the identity of the leaker from his very first day in the special counselÂ’s chair, but kept the inquiry open for nearly two more years before indicting I. Lewis Libby Jr., Vice President Dick CheneyÂ’s former chief of staff, on obstruction charges.Now, the question of whether Mr. Fitzgerald properly exercised his prosecutorial discretion in continuing to pursue possible wrongdoing in the case has become the subject of rich debate on editorial pages and in legal and political circles.
Richard L. Armitage, the former deputy secretary of state, first told the authorities in October 2003 that he had been the primary source for the July 14, 2003, column by Robert D. Novak that identified Valerie Wilson as a C.I.A. operative and set off the leak investigation.
Mr. FitzgeraldÂ’s decision to prolong the inquiry once he took over as special prosecutor in December 2003 had significant political and legal consequences. The inquiry seriously embarrassed and distracted the Bush White House for nearly two years and resulted in five felony charges against Mr. Libby, even as Mr. Fitzgerald decided not to charge Mr. Armitage or anyone else with crimes related to the leak itself.
In other words, Fitzgerald knew the leaker FROM DAY ONE. The focus of the case should therefore have been limited to Richard Armitage and his legal culpability for releasing the Plame name, which Fitzgerald quickly realized did not constitute criminal conduct. At that point, the investigation should have been closed down. But Fitzgerald continued to investigate legal activity by the administration to rebut the demonstrably false charges of an administration critic -- activities which are essential to ensuring that the people of the United States are fully informed about the conduct of their government, which is in turn essential for the healthy functioning of our representative democracy.
What also needs to be investigated are tactions by others who knew of Richard Armitage's guilt in leaking Plame's name.
On Oct. 1, 2003, Mr. Armitage was up at 4 a.m. for a predawn workout when he read a second article by Mr. Novak in which he described his primary source for his earlier column about Ms. Wilson as “no partisan gunslinger.” Mr. Armitage realized with alarm that that could only be a reference to him, according to people familiar with his role. He waited until Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, an old friend, was awake, then telephoned him. They discussed the matter with the top State Department lawyer, William H. Taft IV.Mr. Armitage had prepared a resignation letter, his associates said. But he stayed on the job because State Department officials advised that his sudden departure could lead to the disclosure of his role in the leak, the people aware of his actions said.
Later, Mr. Taft spoke with the White House counsel, Alberto R. Gonzales, now the attorney general, and advised him that Mr. Armitage was going to speak with lawyers at the Justice Department about the matter, the people familiar with Mr. ArmitageÂ’s actions said. Mr. Taft asked Mr. Gonzales whether he wanted to be told the details and was told that he did not want to know.
As I see it, the other folks who need to be investigated here are Powell, Taft, and others who were aware of Armitage's misdeeds yet intentionally concealed them from the President. I exclude Gonzales from this group only because, in his role as White House legal councel, it was proper to decline being informed of teh leaker's identity. Such disclosure would have brought prompt presidential action which would have disrupted the investigation of the leak. Any disclosure of the leaker's identity should properly have come through either the State or justice Departments. That they did not allowed a viper to remain deeply involved in the policy process.
Here's a great analysis of the case at American Thinker.
And Fred Barnes lists all the "bad actors" in his Plamegate rogues gallery.
OPEN TRACKBACKING: Samantha Burns, Stuck On Stupid, Bacon Bits, Third World County, Pirate's Cove, Blue Star Chronicles, Dumb Ox, Adam's Blog, Is It Just Me?, Random Yak, Median Sib, Selective Amnesia, Stop the ACLU, Basil’s Blog; Comedian Jenée: People are Idiots , Woman Honor Thyself, Conservative Cat, Church and State, bRight and Early, Right Wing Nation; Jo’s Cafe, MacBro’s Page, Leaning Straight Up; The Amboy Times; Assorted Babble, NIF, Imagine Kitty, Oblogatory Anecdotes, The Uncooperative Blogger
Posted by: Greg at
02:52 AM
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September 01, 2006
Lockheed Martin Corp. won a multibillion-dollar contract yesterday to build a vehicle to replace NASA's space shuttles, put a human on the moon for the first time since 1972 and be the precursor to a manned spaceship to Mars.The award marks NASA's most concrete step to fulfill President Bush's two-year-old, $230 billion promise that the space agency would return astronauts to the moon and restore excitement about space exploration. NASA has planned to replace the shuttles since the mid-1980s and has spent almost $5 billion to do so -- with little success so far.
"It's just thrilling, for all of us," said Skip Hatfield, NASA's project manager. The vehicle, known as Orion, is the embodiment of the "very future of human space flight," he said.
Orion will look somewhat like the three-man Apollo command module but will carry as many as six astronauts. Like the shuttle, Orion will be able to carry cargo to and from the International Space Station.
Orion is expected to make its first manned flight by 2014, four years after NASA's three operating shuttles are retired. NASA said it hopes for a moon landing by 2020.
Unlike the shuttle, which lands like an airplane on a runway, Orion will descend with the aid of a parachute to landings in the ocean or on land. NASA plans to build two of the vehicles, one for manned flight and the other for unmanned. After judging how often the spaceships can be reused, the agency will decide how many more to buy, Hatfield said.
Since this part of Houston is, in many ways, a company town, I'm particularly gratified to see that so many friends now have some idea of where the space agency is headed next.
First, back to the moon.
Next, on to Mars. . . and beyond.
Posted by: Greg at
02:36 PM
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The global nuclear monitoring agency deepened suspicions on Thursday about IranÂ’s nuclear program, reporting that inspectors had discovered new traces of highly enriched uranium at an Iranian facility.Inspectors have found such uranium, which at extreme enrichment levels can fuel bombs, twice in the past. The International Atomic Energy Agency concluded that at least some of those samples came from contaminated equipment that Iran had obtained from Pakistan.
But in this case, the nuclear fingerprint of the particles did not match the other samples, an official familiar with the inspections said, raising questions about their origin.
In a six-page report to the United Nations Security Council on Thursday, the agency withheld judgment about where the material came from and whether it could be linked to a secret nuclear program.
Is it time yet for a little bit of Persian Carpet-bombing?
Iran lied about its peaceful intentions?
How can that be -- Islam is a religion of peace!
Posted by: Greg at
02:26 PM
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WE'RE RELUCTANT to return to the subject of former CIA employee Valerie Plame because of our oft-stated belief that far too much attention and debate in Washington has been devoted to her story and that of her husband, former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, over the past three years. But all those who have opined on this affair ought to take note of the not-so-surprising disclosure that the primary source of the newspaper column in which Ms. Plame's cover as an agent was purportedly blown in 2003 was former deputy secretary of state Richard L. Armitage.Mr. Armitage was one of the Bush administration officials who supported the invasion of Iraq only reluctantly. He was a political rival of the White House and Pentagon officials who championed the war and whom Mr. Wilson accused of twisting intelligence about Iraq and then plotting to destroy him. Unaware that Ms. Plame's identity was classified information, Mr. Armitage reportedly passed it along to columnist Robert D. Novak "in an offhand manner, virtually as gossip," according to a story this week by the Post's R. JeffreySmith, who quoted a former colleague of Mr. Armitage.
It follows that one of the most sensational charges leveled against the Bush White House -- that it orchestrated the leak of Ms. Plame's identity to ruin her career and thus punish Mr. Wilson -- is untrue. The partisan clamor that followed the raising of that allegation by Mr. Wilson in the summer of 2003 led to the appointment of a special prosecutor, a costly and prolonged investigation, and the indictment of Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, on charges of perjury. All of that might have been avoided had Mr. Armitage's identity been known three years ago.
That's not to say that Mr. Libby and other White House officials are blameless. As prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald has reported, when Mr. Wilson charged that intelligence about Iraq had been twisted to make a case for war, Mr. Libby and Mr. Cheney reacted by inquiring about Ms. Plame's role in recommending Mr. Wilson for a CIA-sponsored trip to Niger, where he investigated reports that Iraq had sought to purchase uranium. Mr. Libby then allegedly disclosed Ms. Plame's identity to journalists and lied to a grand jury when he said he had learned of her identity from one of those reporters. Mr. Libby and his boss, Mr. Cheney, were trying to discredit Mr. Wilson; if Mr. Fitzgerald's account is correct, they were careless about handling information that was classified.
Nevertheless, it now appears that the person most responsible for the end of Ms. Plame's CIA career is Mr. Wilson. Mr. Wilson chose to go public with an explosive charge, claiming -- falsely, as it turned out -- that he had debunked reports of Iraqi uranium-shopping in Niger and that his report had circulated to senior administration officials. He ought to have expected that both those officials and journalists such as Mr. Novak would ask why a retired ambassador would have been sent on such a mission and that the answer would point to his wife. He diverted responsibility from himself and his false charges by claiming that President Bush's closest aides had engaged in an illegal conspiracy. It's unfortunate that so many people took him seriously.
Now, when will we see the prosecution of Joe Wilson for his treasonous lies in this matter -- and when will Scooter Libby be cleared of the accusations agaoinst him, which clearly stem from a faulty memory and not a conspiracy of any sort?
Oh, no! The only liar was Joe Wilson.
Posted by: Greg at
02:19 PM
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