joyfulchristian

Hmmm

Jonathan Foreman argues that not defending Georgia would be disastrous. I agree. He says we don't have to actually fight for them. I'm not so sure. They fought for us; how can we not fight for them?

Update: It's certainly true that it would be very difficult for us to engage in combat there given the geographical issues involved. At the rate things are going, it seems unlikely there will even be a Georgia by the time we could move many troops any way.

Still, I can't help but thinking we should be doing SOMETHING.

Fun news

The French have lost a bunch of Semtex. And detonators.

Today we celebrate Memorial Day. I want to take this time to thank all those who have served to protect our country. I also want to thank the families of all who have fallen on behalf of that cause.

So I knew Obama was arrogant

But to think that a speech by Bush blasting appeasement before the Israeli Knesset was a political attack on Obama smacks of hubris of the highest order.

Political Radar: Obama Takes Issue With Bush Foreign Policy Speech

"Some seem to believe we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along," the President said to the country's legislative body, "We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: 'Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided.' We have an obligation to call this what it is –- the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history."

I watched this part of the speech and Obama isn't mentioned. You know, typically when someone blasts a generic group and you take it as a personal affront, it's because secretly you know you're part of that group.

From Obama's policy statements it seems obvious to me that he would, in fact, be an appeaser. However, given that a big part of Israel's problems over the years have stemmed from a significant minorities appeasement instincts, wouldn't it be much more logical to assume that Bush was talking about appeasers there, in general, than one over here in specific?

There's good news in all this

Hardly an original observation, I'm sure, but the more time Fatah and Hamas spend trying to kill each other, the less time they have to kill Israelis.

Hamas says it has foiled Fatah plot to kill leader - Yahoo! News

GAZA (Reuters) - A senior Hamas official in the Gaza Strip on Saturday accused rival Fatah of plotting to assassinate Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh as he prayed and said the would-be suicide bomber had been arrested and had confessed.

Click here to find out more! Click here to find out more! Tension between Islamist Hamas and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's secular Fatah faction has increased since Hamas took control of the Gaza Strip in a brief but bloody civil war in June. Fatah still holds sway in the occupied West Bank.

"There was a plan by a suicide bomber wearing an explosives belt to assassinate Haniyeh as he prayed in the mosque. He was arrested and confessed," Saeed Seyam, who oversees Hamas government security forces in Gaza and is a former interior minister in the Hamas government, told reporters.

This is the same attempted bombing that Tim Blair called an attempt at the "world irony record", proof that Blair has a wonderful gift for a turn of phrase.

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Religious studies ain't what it used to be

Well, actually, in much of the middle east, this is unfortunately much like it always has been.

MEMRI Turkish Media Blog - Full Entry

In a vocational high school in Sisli, Istanbul, an Alevi student was beaten by the teacher of religion and was taken to hospital with serious injuries to his inner organs and head that threatened his life. In a series of recent events Alevi students have been targets of humiliation and sometimes physical assault by teachers of the controversial religious studies that only teach Sunni Islam.

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Long live the Queen

Al-Qaeda plotted to kill Queen | NEWS.com.au

A PLOT by al-Qaeda operatives to kill the Queen during a state visit to Uganda less than two months ago was foiled by security services.

The terrorists had planned to hide inside two broadcast vans owned by the Ugandan Broadcasting Corporation and then set off bombs during the Queen's visit to Kampala last November.

London's Sunday Express reported the vans were seized after a tip-off from intelligence agents.

How is it that this plot was broken up two months ago and we're only just now finding out about it?

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There he goes again. On Al Jazeera no less.

Just how much of that Kool-Aid has Kucinich been drinking?

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Frightening if true

From Memri

Iranian Army Air Force Commander Brig.-Gen. Ahmad Miqani has said that the Iranian army will soon manufacture a fourth and fifth generation of the Al-Sa'aqe fighter plane, and that these planes cannot be detected by radar.

Of course, Islamic governments often exaggerate their technical accomplishments.If true, however, this will make Iran even more of a danger down the road.

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Not a sentence you hear very often

FOXNews.com - Woman Booted From Army for Having Breast Implants - International News | News of the World | Middle East News | Europe News

“Now my fake boobs have cost me my job.”

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Hey, wait a minute!

11 Iranian Special fources killed in Al Kut.

US and Iraq forces continue to target the Iranian-backed Special Groups in southern and central Iraq. The latest raid in Al Kut in Wasit province resulted in 11 Special Groups fighters killed, Multinational Forces Iraq reported. Al Kut, a logistical hub for the Special Groups and center of power for Muqtada al Sadr's Mahdi Army, has seen an uptick in activity over the past two weeks.

But Ron Paul said they didn't have an Army? How can they be fighting in Iraq. This must be a neo-con plot!

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And so it begins

I'm sure this list of explosive (no pun intended) behavior in Pakistan is only the beginning.

Looks like they've already got at least 11 riot-related deaths.

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My knowledge of the political situation in Pakistan is sadly lacking

Consequently, I won't try to analyze this other than to say things are about to go from bad to worse.

BBC NEWS | South Asia | Benazir Bhutto killed in attack

Pakistani former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto has been assassinated in a suicide attack.

Ms Bhutto had just addressed an election rally in Rawalpindi when she was shot in the neck by a gunman who then set off a bomb.

At least 16 other people died in the attack and several more were injured.

Update: John Hawkins is chalking this up to al Qaeda. It's pretty early for an assumption like that, isn't it?

Another Update: I hadn't seen this before. Apparently, there is at least one claim of al Qaeda responsibility.

That Iran might be passing arms to the Taliban is hardly a surprise

That Canada's defense minister would make the accusation publicly is somewhat different.

Canada's defence minister has accused Iran of providing weapons to the Taliban and fuelling the conflict in Afghanistan, where thousands of Canadian troops are involved in military operations.

Peter MacKay made the comments at Kandahar Airfield, where he is spending Christmas Day serving a Yuletide meal to hundreds of soldiers.

Speaking to reporters after the festivities, MacKay accused Afghanistan's neighbour, Iran, of propelling the conflict by providing improvised explosive devices (IEDs), or roadside bombs, to insurgents there.

Good for him.

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Army generals really hack me off

You would think that the goal of an army general in charge of determining which guns to give his men would be to choose the absolutely best piece of equipment for the circumstance they find themselves in. Apparently, however, giving soldiers fighting in a desert guns that don't get jammed by sand isn't a priority.

This latest update is the angriest I have ever been when writing an article at Defense Industry Daily. Words like "unconscionable" come to mind as the among the few printable things I can say, and the kindest. But the topper came from Brig. Gen. Mark Brown, commander of the US Army's Program Executive Office Soldier and the Natick Soldier Systems Center. He's responsible for equipping Army soldiers. The quote?

"However, the three other candidates did perform better at about a 99 percent rate or better, which is a mathematically statistically significant difference, but not an operationally statistical difference.".... The Army has put an option on an existing contract for 64,450 M4s, according to the general."

What is wrong with this guy?

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Well, duh!

Iran accuses US of nuclear espionage | Jerusalem Post

Iran has sent a formal protest note to Washington for "spying" on Iran's nuclear activities, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Saturday in the wake of the latest US report on the alleged Iranian weapons program.

I think it goes without saying that the US is spying on Iran. Just like it goes without saying that we are spying on Russia, China, Syria, etc. And they, of course, are spying on us too.

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Yes

Power Line: High confidence in low confidence

In the end, we have no way to assess why the intelligence community flipped from saying with high confidence in 2005 that Iran is currently determined to develop nuclear weapons, to saying now with high confidence that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003. The only thing we can say with high confidence is that our intelligence community's assessments do not deserve our high confidence.

I wish Paul was wrong.

Technorati Tags: http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives2/2007/12/019199.php

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I'm shocked

Chavez finally stopped

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) - Humbled by his first electoral defeat, President Hugo Chavez said Monday he may have been too ambitious in asking voters to let him stand indefinitely for re-election and endorse a huge leap to a socialist state. "I understand and accept that the proposal I made was quite profound and intense," he said after voters narrowly rejected the sweeping constitutional reform by 51 percent to 49 percent. Opposition activists were ecstatic as the results were announced shortly after midnight - with 88 percent of the vote counted, the trend was declared irreversible by elections council chief Tibisay Lucena. Some shed tears. Others began chanting: "And now he's going away!"

We can only hope.

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Harvey gets serious

IMAO: I Fear Ron Paul for the Same Reason Terrorists Don't

Any free or semi-free nation has the right (although not the duty) to invade any dictatorial slave state for the purpose of liberating it, or to extinguish a threat to the free nation's existence.

In 2001 we put the world on notice that they would either have to root out the terrorist organizations in their midsts, or we would do it for them. Ron Paul is against this policy, which is why I'm against Ron Paul.

Conversely, W is only moderately supportive of this policy, which is why I'm only moderately supportive of W.

Hopefully the next president will understand that the War on Terror doesn't just need to be fought, it needs to be won.

Harvey is right that Bush seems only moderately supportive of a policy that was initially dubbed, somewhat ironically in retrospect, the Bush Doctrine. Of course, as I just mentioned, when he pursues the policy, he tends to do it ineptly, so I'm not sure it matters that much.

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It's a good thing FDR and Truman didn't think like this

The American military has developed a new heat wave gun.  This is part of their ongoing push towards developing a generation of non-lethal weapons.  So why aren't we using it?  It's not for tactical reasons:

Washington fears a barrage of adverse publicity in the suspicious Muslim world and is concerned that critics will claim the invisible beam weapons were being used for torture.

Now the US military directorate charged with developing non-lethal weapons, which has invested more than a decade developing the Active Denial System (ADS), has launched a concerted effort to convince both the public and its own bosses at the defence department of the device's merits.

"With brand new technology like this, perception is everything," said Col Kirk Hymes, a former Marine artillery officer who heads the directorate.

Can't you just imagine Truman refusing to use the A-bomb out of fears of Japanese conspiracy theories?  (Now don't get me wrong, the Muslim world is, unfortunately, filled with such conspiracy theories. Just read this article by Daniel Pipes for an example.)

That being said, what kind of twilight zone are we in? Will our military really eschew the use of weapons that will both protect our military while making sure that they don't have to cause unnecessary deaths to do so because we're afraid of a conspiracy theory?

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Round them up ...

And move them out...

U.S. deserters lose bid for Canada refugee status | Reuters.ca

Two Americans who deserted the U.S. Army to protest against the war in Iraq lost their bid for refugee status in Canada on Thursday, and the Canadian government made it clear they were no longer welcome. The Supreme Court of Canada declined to hear appeals from the two men, Jeremy Hinzman and Brandon Hughey, over decisions by immigration authorities -- backed in two subsequent court rulings -- that they were not refugees in need of protection. Opposing the war on the belief that it was illegal and immoral, the two deserted when they learned their units would be deployed to Iraq, and came to Canada.

But, too bad, so sad, they can't stay. How's Leavenworth sound?

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All news is good news

If you're in the Russian media, at least:

MOSCOW, April 21 — At their first meeting with journalists since taking over Russia’s largest independent radio news network, the managers had startling news of their own: from now on, they said, at least 50 percent of the reports about Russia must be “positive.”

In addition, opposition leaders could not be mentioned on the air and the United States was to be portrayed as an enemy, journalists employed by the network, Russian News Service, say they were told by the new managers, who are allies of the Kremlin.

How would they know what constituted positive news?

“When we talk of death, violence or poverty, for example, this is not positive,” said one editor at the station who did not want to be identified for fear of retribution. “If the stock market is up, that is positive. The weather can also be positive.”

In a darkening media landscape, radio news had been a rare bright spot. Now, the implementation of the “50 percent positive” rule at the Russian News Service leaves an increasingly small number of news outlets that are not managed by the Kremlin, directly or through the state national gas company, Gazprom, a major owner of media assets.

Charming, especially that part about portraying the US as the enemy. 

What's the Bush administration's position on Russia?

WASHINGTON, April 20 — The Bush administration is offering Russia a new package of incentives to drop its strong opposition to American missile defense sites in Poland and the Czech Republic, including an invitation to begin linking some American and Russian antimissile systems, according to senior administration and military officials.

The package includes American offers to cooperate on developing defense technology and to share intelligence about common threats, as well as to permit Russian officials to inspect the future missile bases.

So while the Kremlin is exerting more and more control over the media and a Kremlin friendly group is telling their reporters to treat the US as a media. Our response, "Want to see our missile tech?"

Note to George, "The Kremlin is not our friend!"

Update: Apparently I wasn't the only one to draw the connection.

I haven't heard about this elsewhere

... and I wonder why:

In his book, which came out this week, Kengor focuses on a KGB letter written at the height of the Cold War that shows that Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) offered to assist Soviet leaders in formulating a public relations strategy to counter President Reagan's foreign policy and to complicate his re-election efforts.

You know, even if it is Teddy, I'd really like to think that no member of the US Senate would have offered to conspire with the KGB against his own President. But I'm finding this story believable.

Open letters

John Hawkins begs Condi to save Israel ... sorta.

If I'd set up a category about John Kerry's ego during the election ...

... this would have been the time to break it back out.

"If I was president, this wouldn't have happened," said Kerry during a noon stop at Honest John's bar and grill in Detroit's Cass Corridor.

It's tempting to take a shot about John Kerry speaking at a place called "Honest John's". Oh wait, I guess I just did.

Anyway, given John Kerry's ego trips during the campaign, statements like this aren't really a surprise.  I'm not sure I understand his thinking though:

The president has been so absent on diplomacy when it comes to issues affecting the Middle East," Kerry said. "We're going to have a lot of ground to make up (in 2008) because of it.

Absent on middle east issue?  Are we talking about the same George Bush?  Cause the one I see in the White House focuses on the mid-east almost to the exclusion of all else.  Now in fairness, elsewhere in the article there are indications that Kerry was saying that Bush was focusing so much on Iraq that the rest of the region was being ignored.  That would be more understandable, but still awfully wrong-headed.

Here's a news bulletin for everyone.  The problems between Israel and Hezbollah are not the results of too much or too little attention by any US president.  The problems between Israel and Hezbollah are caused by the fact that Hezbollah wants to drive Israel into the sea. 

It's not about "engagement."  It's not about the "peace process."  It's not even about "occupied territories."  Israel exists.  As far as Hezbollah is concerned, that's the problem.  From Israel's point of view, the problem is that Hezbollah expresses their feelings on the subject by kidnapping their soldiers and launching missiles into their cities.

Unless we're willing to force the Israelis to evacuate the region, the only way to deal with this issue is to destroy Hezbollah's ability to wage war.  Strangely, Kerry and I seem to agree on this issue:

This is about American security and Bush has failed. He has made it so much worse because of his lack of reality in going into Iraq.…We have to destroy Hezbollah," he said.

It's hard to tell since some of the context was nixed, but he seems to be saying that we wouldn't need to be destroy Hezbollah if Bush weren't so incompetent.  Still, at least he admits that Hezbollah needs to be destroyed.

That's something, I guess.

Pre-emptive arrests

I'm all for stopping terrorist plots in the early stages.  However, stories like this make me wonder:

Both men developed contacts with other supporters of jihad, traveling to Toronto, Canada, and made video clips of "potential terrorist targets" in Washington including the Capitol building, the indictment said.

"Ahmed, Sadequee and another person known to the Grand Jury engaged in physical and rudimentary paramilitary training including activities with paintball guns in northwestern Georgia," said the indictment filed at Atlanta district court.

It said Ahmed traveled to Pakistan to get paramilitary and religious training with the aim of fighting in Kashmir, while Sadequee went to Bangladesh in part to support jihad.

I certainly hope there's more "there" there.  Unless we've got them for more than this, I have trouble seeing how the charges are going to stick.  While it certainly sounds like these guys were up to no good, I'm not sure there's enough of an overt act here to justify the arrest.

My fear that the charges won't stick isn't my only concern.  As the government begins pre-empting conspiracies earlier and earlier, don't we risk picking up people who weren't actually planning anything at all?

Just about right

Mark Steyn summarizes the problems with the 9/11 commission:

Maybe we need a 9/11 Commission Commission to investigate the 9/11 Commission. A body intended to reassure Americans that the lessons of that terrible day had been learned instead engaged in what at best was transparent politicking and collusion in posterior-covering and at worst was something a whole lot darker and more disturbing.

The problem pre-9/11 was always political: that's to say, no matter how savvy individual operatives in various agencies may have been, the political culture of the day meant that nothing would happen except a memo would get typed up and shoveled into a filing cabinet. Together with other never fully explained episodes -- like Sandy Berger's pants-stuffing at the national archives -- the Able Danger story makes one thing plain: The problem is still political.

Of course, this is Washington we're talking about; politics is almost always the problem.  Except, of course, when money is the problem.

You've got to be kidding me!

Oh yeah, this is a good idea. 

Not.

CANBERRA Australia, one of the biggest exporters of uranium, said Tuesday that it would hold formal talks to start selling and shipping uranium to China, which plans to increase nuclear energy output fourfold by 2020.

 

The agreement will set up safeguards to ensure that Australian uranium supplied to China is used only for peaceful purposes, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said.

Yeah, and we can trust them because?

Well, this can't be good

It seems the F-18 has got some problems:

WASHINGTON - The front-line fighter jet of the Navy and Marines has suffered a series of recent accidents blamed on brake failure, exposing a problem that has spurred urgent warnings from commanders, military documents obtained by The Associated Press show.

Brake problems affecting the F/A-18 Hornet pose "a severe hazard to Naval aviation" that could kill pilots and ruin valuable aircraft, a Navy air wing commander wrote last year after one of his jets roared off a runway and splashed into San Diego Bay, destroying the $30 million plane.

Many of the brake failures have been traced to a $535 electrical cable — about as thin as a drinking straw — that controls the jet's antiskid brakes, the equivalent of antilock brakes on a passenger car. Investigators say the cable can chafe or break, since it runs close to where heavy tie-down chains secure the jets to a carrier deck.

This is not good.  The Navy is in the process of phasing out the F-14 and the Joint Strike Fighter is still, as I understand it, several years off.  We can't afford for the F-18 to have major problems.  They need to get this fixed soon.

That was fast

Already arraigned:

New York - A man who triggered a bomb scare and the evacuation of New York's Penn Station has been arraigned on charges of making a terrorist threat and falsely reporting an incident, prosecutors said Monday.

Raul Claudio, 43, was arrested on Sunday following a dispute with a train ticket agent, during which he placed a bag on a counter and said there was a bomb inside.

Security on New York's trains and buses has been tightened significantly in the wake of the attacks on London's transport system and Claudio's bomb claim prompted the immediate evacuation of Penn Station, a major suburban and long-distance railway hub.

This incident only happened a few hours ago. I'm quite happy to see that charges have already been brought.  If nothing else, given today's political climate, this guy is guilty of near terminal stupidity.

Here we go again

Another attack on London:

LONDON, July 21 - Just two weeks after a string of attacks on buses and subways in London that killed 56 people, the British police evacuated three subway stations in the city today after explosions that sent commuters into a panic. But casualty numbers appeared to be low. The police said the Oval subway station in south London, Shepherd's Bush in the west and Warren Street in central London had been evacuated. There was also a small explosion on the No. 26 bus that blew out the bus windows, police said.

Police with sniffer dogs took up positions outside some of the stations and set up cordons, while sirens blared from ambulances racing to the scene. Initial reports from witnesses said smoke had been seen at one station.

"There were four explosions, or attempts at explosions," Sir Ian Blair, the head of Scotland Yard, said.

So far there have not been many serious injuries reported, which is the bright side.

 

Someone's playing it close to the vest

OK, the FBI has arrested a Pentagon analyst for espionage and the first story I see on it is exactly two sentences long.  Seems kinda strange to me.

Update: This story has much more.

         May 4 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Defense Department analyst Lawrence A. Franklin surrendered today to face charges he gave classified military information on Iraq to two individuals, the Justice Department said. The men who received the information were described by people familiar with the case as employees of a pro- Israel group.

A strange point in all of this is this paragraph:

Franklin is accused of handing over classified information related to potential attacks upon U.S. forces in Iraq. Franklin told the two individuals that the information was ``highly classified'' and asked them not to ``use'' it, the Justice Department's criminal complaint said.

This seems like a lame attempt at acheiving plausible deniability. "Yes, your honor, I passed classified information to people without clearance, but I told them it was a big secret and that they shouldn't use it." ???????  Only a moron would pass secret information to people with a vested information in the outcome of the actions involved and seriously expect them not to move it.  Are we really supposed to believe that he's that stupid?

For crying out loud

Once again, the House is trying to create a plan for filling vacancies in the event that it's membership was radically reduced due to a catastrophe.  And once again, there is much wailing that this bill isn't the best way to deal with the problem.  I agree that holding special elections in 49 days isn't a perfect solution, but none of the solutions being batted around are perfect.  However, all of them are better than what we have now, which is nothing. 

Three years after 9/11 we still don't have a contingency plan of any sort in place.  This is just absurd.  Do something already!

How did this happen?

I've been pulled out of line at the airport for my pocket knife. I've seen the bags of 3 year olds searched at the Smithsonian. So how on earth did this guy get a knife into the Department of Agriculture?

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A federal employee was stabbed Tuesday inside the U.S. Agriculture Department in downtown Washington, a department spokesman said, in what seemed to have been a dispute between acquaintances.

The employee was stabbed with a knife in the USDA's South building, a sprawling block-long building across the street from the USDA administration building on the National Mall, USDA spokesman Ed Loyd said.

Ummm ... I'm not exactly impressed. Fortunately the injured employee doesn't seem to be great danger, but there's no way this should have been possible.

No story here. Move along.

The Washington Post reports:

Seoul, South Korea, Nov. 7 (UPI) -- Newly declassified documents revealed the United States planned as recently as 1998 to drop nuclear bombs on North Korea if the country attacked South Korea.

As part of "scenario 5027," 24 F15-E bombers flew simulation missions at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base in North Carolina to drop mock nuclear bombs on a firing range between January and June 1998, the Korea Times reported Sunday.

The revelation followed claims by a South Korean lawmaker that the U.S. drew up plans to launch preemptive strikes on key targets in North Korea in 1994.

This isn't news.  Well, it shouldn't be news.  We've had nuclear weapons in our arsenal for 60 years people.  It shouldn't come as a shock that we have battle plans that involved, THE HORROR, actually using them.

It's not a poor reflection on the Clinton administration that they had plans in the hopper that involved nuking North Korea.  Indeed, it would have been highly irresponsible for them not to have such plans.

No one in their right mind wants nuclear war.  Unfortunately, there are possible scenarios in which using them would be necessary.  Any administration that refuses to admit that possibility is way to pollyannish to be in the White House.

More on the terror tape

Drudge claims that when ABC handed this new tape over the the CIA, they redacted the final 15 minutes:

ABCNEWS withheld portions of an alarming new al Qaeda videotape which warns the next terror attack will dwarf 9/11 from the feds when they submitted the video for analysis, a top federal source tells the DRUDGE REPORT.

And what do these final minutes supposedly contain?

"What took place on September 11 was but the opening salvo of the global war on America and that our Lord willing, the magnitude and ferocity of what is coming your way will make you forget all about September 11," the man, whose face is covered by a headdress, warns in the video. "After decades of American tyranny, now it's your turn to die."

And what is the pretext of this attack supposed to be?

A top goverment source said from Washington that ABC withheld the final 15 minutes of the tape from the feds -- the portion of the tape where the man warns of retribution for Americans electing Bush and Cheney.

[...]

"You are guilty, guilty, guilty. You're as guilty as Bush and Cheney. You're as guilty as Rumsfeld and Ashcroft and Powell...," the man states.

He goes on to warn of an upcoming horror: "The streets will run with blood," and "America will mourn in silence" because they will be unable to count the number of the dead.

"People of America, that was the verdict now for the sentencing: as participants and partners in the crimes of the regime, you too shall pay the price for the blood that has been spilled."

Of course, the election of Bush and Cheney is a complete straw man. Before 9/11 Bush's foreign policy basically boiled down to, "You leave us alone and we'll leave you alone." That didn't stop the attacks in 2001. If al-Qaeda doesn't like Bush's current foreign policy, they have no one to blame but themselves; they pretty much forced his hand.

On another issue, why hasn't ABC aired the tape yet?

One ABC source, who demanded anonymity, said Thursday morning, the network was struggling to find a correct journalistic "balance" before airing any story on the video.

"This is not something you just throw out there while people are voting," the ABC source explained.

Because, of course, the American people aren't capable of watching the tape for themselves and figuring out what conclusions to draw. Of course not! They can only be allowed to see the tape after ABC has decided on the meta-contextual narrative that will surround such a viewing.

Earlier today Megan McArdle said:

It's no better to hold a story until after the election because of its political impact, than to hold one until right before the election because it will make a bigger bang. Nor would it be right to hold a tape telling Americans to elect Kerry, or else he'd kill them.

I would tend to agree with Megan on this. Holding on to a story because you're trying to keep it from affecting the elections is just as bad as holding a story in order to affect the elections. (Note the update to her post which indicates that the CIA may not have authenticated the tape after all.)

On another note entirely I'm not sure how the final 15 minutes could be withheld from the CIA without them noticing. Surely, to have any chance of determining whether the tape had been altered or enhanced, they would have demanded the original recording. I'd be shocked if ABC removed the last 15 minutes from their original. After all, if they did that, once they aired the wittheld footage, how could they prove it was authentic? And if they did remove the footage from the original, shouldn't the CIA have been able to tell? It's possible they might even be able to retrieve some of it.

Any way, that whole angle confuses me.

All bluster?

This is currently the only story linked by Drudge:

In the last week before the election, ABCNEWS is holding a videotaped message from a purported al Qaeda terrorist warning of a new attack on America, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned.

The terrorist claims on tape the next attack will dwarf 9/11. "The streets will run with blood," and "America will mourn in silence" because they will be unable to count the number of the dead. Further claims: America has brought this on itself for electing George Bush who has made war on Islam by destroying the Taliban and making war on Al Qaeda.

[...]

The terrorist's face is concealed by a head dress, and he speaks in an American accent, making it difficult to identify the individual.

US intelligence officials believe the man on tape may be Adam Gadhan - aka Adam Pearlman, a California native who was highlighted by the FBI in May as an individual most likely to be involved in or have knowledge of the next al Qaeda attacks.

Is this just bluster? My gut reaction says yes. Al Qaeda made similar claims running up to July 4, 2002. Nothing happened then except for the Egyptian who shot a few people at the El Al ticket counter at LAX. He appeared to be acting alone. They were chanting, "We're going to kill you," again in the run up to 9/11/02, but nothing happened then either.

In fact, as far as I can recall, every time they claimed they were going to hit us hard, little to nothing happened. Most of their big operations against America have happened with little to no warning at all. Intuition tells me that they only bluster when they're trying to scare people at times when they know they don't have any actual operations that could create the terror they crave.

I could be wrong, of course. However my tentative reaction is to say that the more they bark, the less we need to worry about the bite.

This is normally Black Five's territory

... but this is definitely someone you should know:

FORT BRAGG, N.C. - George Perez lost his leg to a roadside bomb in Iraq (news - web sites) more than a year ago, but despite the phantom pains that haunt him, he says he is determined to prove to the Army that he is no less of a man — and no less of a soldier.

"I'm not ready to get out yet," he says. "I'm not going to let this little injury stop me from what I want to do."

Perez, 21, still feels the sweat between his toes when he exercises. He's still plagued with nagging cramps in his calf muscle. And sometimes, when he gets out of bed at night without thinking, he topples over.

[...]

"I was going to stay in no matter what," he recalls telling the surgeons. "Do whatever would get me back fastest."

Perez was left with a rounded stump that fits into the suction cup of the black carbon-fiber prosthetic leg.

When he arrived at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., for his rehabilitation, Perez asked a pair of generals who visited his bedside if it was possible for him to stay in the Army.

"They told me, 'It's all up to you, how much you want it,'" he says. "If I could do everything like a regular soldier, I could stay in."

He wasted little time getting started. At one point, a visitor found him doing push-ups in bed. He trained himself to walk normally with his new leg, and then run with it.

You should definitely keep reading.

Disturbing idea

JYB has some thoughts on what the terrorist might be up to.

If you listen to Kerry

... this story should be headlined, "Rumsfeld meets with 18 imaginary friends."

Part of me says this goes to far

... and part of me says it's not far enough.

"Tom Paine" describes what he wants in a President:

I want Darth Vader in the White House. I guess Cheney would do in a pinch, but I want a Dark Lord sitting on his Throne of Blood in the situation room, commanding vast carrier battlegroups, legion after legion of grim-faced troops and waves of aircraft so thick they darken the skies over enemy countries. I want a President who will say things like "I find your lack of faith disturbing, Mr Spanish prime minister" and "You have failed me for the last time Mr Bremer". I want the President to go on "The Daily Show" so he can toss a drinking cup made from Saddam's skull into Jon Stewart's lap, just to laugh at how green Stewart would go. I want the heads of terrorists impaled on stakes at the entrance to Congress. I want the mere prospect of having the President pissed off at them to make Chirac and Schroeder soil their silk underwear.

I don't know that we need to go that far. However he's right that we don't take this war any where near seriously enough.

Yeah, that will be objective

Just saw that 20/20 is going to interview "Cat" Stevens or whatever he's calling himself now. I can see it now.

"Are you a terrorist?"

"No."

Sounds like a really informative interview to me.

He's right, of course

Michael Ledeen explains why the beheading videos need to be seen.

Hmm

Stephen Schwartz argues that the expulsion of "Cat Stevens" was justified.

Asleep at the wheel

So I see this story about how a flight was diverted to remove a passenger from a plane. The action was taken because the passenger was identified as being on Homeland Security's watchlist after the plane was already in the air. What if a) he'd been a terrorist anc b) been planning to do something on the plane?

Good grief.

The war goes on

Just a reminder that we're still at war, in many places.

TASHKENT (Reuters) - Simultaneous bomb attacks struck the U.S. and Israeli embassies in Uzbekistan as well as the state prosecutor's office in the capital Tashkent Friday, killing at least two people and wounding five.

The action appeared clearly coordinated, days after the start of a trial in Tashkent of 15 suspected Islamist extremists on charges of trying to overthrow the ex-Soviet state in connection with attacks in March that killed nearly 50 people.

This appears to have been a well coordinated attack using suicide bombers. I understand the attack, in this instance, on the Uzbek and US targets, but bombing the Israeli embassy appears to have just been a target of opportunity. After all, they can never find too many opportunities to kill Jews.

Last word

... I hope.

The absurd defenses of Sandy Berger's pilfering of classified documents in his pants are truly shocking. If I reacted to every outrageous thing I've heard on this subject, I'd never stop talking. So I think I'm just going to let John Cole say it for me and be done with it.

No surprise

When it comes to the military, the media is clueless. Black Five explains the difference between "reservist" and "retired".

Democratic Congressmen are grilling Ashcroft ...

... about being to soft on a terrorist. And it certainly appears they might have a point:

WASHINGTON - Key lawmakers, including a Republican committee chairmen, are asking the Justice Department (news - web sites) to explain why it released a terror suspect to Syria when several prosecutors and FBI (news - web sites) agents had collected evidence for possible criminal charges against the man.

The circumstances surrounding Nabil al-Marabh's release, detailed in a recent Associated Press story, are "of deep concern and appear to be a departure from an aggressive, proactive approach to the war on terrorism," Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, wrote Tuesday in a letter to Attorney General John Ashcroft (news - web sites).

"Al-Marabh was at one time No. 27 on the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) list of Most Wanted Terrorists," wrote Grassley, who leads the committee that controls federal spending and also is a member of the Judiciary Committee (news - web sites) that oversees the Justice Department. "He appears to have links to a number of terrorists and suspected terrorists in several U.S. cities."

[...]

"The odd handling of this case raises questions that deserve answers from the Justice Department," Leahy said Tuesday. "Why was a suspected terrorist returned to a country that sponsors terrorism? We need to know that the safety of the American people and our strategic goals in countering terrorism are paramount factors when decisions like this are made."

Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., another member of the Judiciary Committee, said Tuesday the Justice Department's explanation so far that al-Marabh's deportation was the best option does not make sense. "It seems that pursuing a military tribunal, a classified criminal trial or continued immigration proceedings would have made more sense than merely deporting a suspected terrorist."

I never thought I'd hear a bunch of liberals clamoring for secret tribunals, but there you are. Obviously not all the facts are available to the public, but they do seem to have some valid concerns. I hope that their concern is genuine and not just opportunistic sniping.

It's good to have allies

Michael Ubaldi points out that the Japanese are seriously considering amending their Constitution to allow their military to take more over roles in military actions. The thing I find most interesting about this is that one of the stated reasons for the desired change is that it would allow Japan to take more direct action against those that attack the United States.

As Ubaldi points out, the Japanese seem to understand better than most that the United States is a target because we have been defending the world from tyrannic oppression for 50 years, often on our own. A growing portion of the people, both in and out of government, in Japan now seem to realize that they now have the capabilities to help us in that effort. The only real obstacles they have are the political will and constitutional obstructions. If they can summon the former they will also get rid of the latter.

I wish that the world was such a place that Japan didn't feel the need to take this action. But since there is so much danger in the world I'm glad that the Japanese people are willing to ask, "What do we need to do to help?" I don't know what will come of this, but the very fact that amending the constitution in this way is under consideration seems a sure sign that the world has changed.