You Do The Maths

This:

Halliburton Subsidiary Gets Contract to Add Temporary Immigration Detention Centers By RACHEL L. SWARNS
Published: February 4, 2006

WASHINGTON, Feb. 3 — The Army Corps of Engineers has awarded a contract worth up to $385 million for building temporary immigration detention centers to Kellogg Brown & Root, the Halliburton subsidiary that has been criticized for overcharging the Pentagon for its work in Iraq.

KBR would build the centers for the Homeland Security Department for an unexpected influx of immigrants, to house people in the event of a natural disaster or for new programs that require additional detention space, company executives said. KBR, which announced the contract last month, had a similar contract with immigration agencies from 2000 to last year.

The contract with the Corps of Engineers runs one year, with four optional one-year extensions. Officials of the corps said that they had solicited bids and that KBR was the lone responder.

A spokeswoman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Jamie Zuieback, said KBR would build the centers only in an emergency like the one when thousands of Cubans floated on rafts to the United States. She emphasized that the centers might never be built if such an emergency did not arise.

"It's the type of contract that could be used in some kind of mass migration," Ms. Zuieback said.

A spokesman for the corps, Clayton Church, said that the centers could be at unused military sites or temporary structures and that each one would hold up to 5,000 people.

Plus this

Bush submits new terror detainee bill
By ANNE PLUMMER FLAHERTY, Associated Press Writer
Fri Jul 28, 6:53 PM ET

WASHINGTON - U.S. citizens suspected of terror ties might be detained indefinitely and barred from access to civilian courts under legislation proposed by the Bush administration, say legal experts reviewing an early version of the bill.

A 32-page draft measure is intended to authorize the Pentagon's tribunal system, established shortly after the 2001 terrorist attacks to detain and prosecute detainees captured in the war on terror. The tribunal system was thrown out last month by the Supreme Court.

Administration officials, who declined to comment on the draft, said the proposal was still under discussion and no final decisions had been made.

...equals - what exactly? Bill O'Reilly thinks he knows.

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Posted 7:36 PM by Republic of Palau

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Says It all, Really

Last pic of the day, I promise, but it's a good one, from Tennessee Guerilla Women:

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Posted 3:26 PM by Republic of Palau

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Are They By Chance Related?

I think we should be told...

Hardware

Wetware

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Posted 2:49 PM by Republic of Palau

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Your Daily Cuteness

The Pygmy Slow Loris, courtesy Fearguth at The American Street.

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Posted 1:54 PM by Republic of Palau

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Bolton Testifies via 'Death-Star' Videolink

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Posted 1:47 PM by Republic of Palau

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What Do You Give The Genocidal Wingnut Who Has Everything?

Why, this handy nuke launcher/USB hub, that's what! Cue the stampede of slavering 101st keyboard brigaders, Instawanker Glenn Reynolds at the head. The Register:

Nuclear War launcher (and USB hub) heads West

By Tony Smith

28th July 2006 14:57 GMT

The all-out nuclear war launch button Reg Hardware featured a couple of weeks ago - the gadget's a four-port USB hub in its spare time - is coming to the US and will be available to buy on Sunday, we've learned.

US-based purveyor of products for the nerdily inclined GeekStuff4U apparently has a consignment of the red-button boxes winging its way westward from Japan even as we speak.

Fortunately, the silly gagdet, which comes complete with flashing lights, sound effects and authentic (apparently) power switches and arming key, can be shipped to Europe, according to GeekStuff4U's website, for a modest €23/$25.40 (£16) charge. You'll find full details at teh company's website.

The box itself costs €49/$62 (£33.50) - a small price to pay, perhaps, to hook up your USB devices and launch the war to end all worlds... ®

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Posted 1:03 PM by Republic of Palau

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Comment of the day

J. A. Baker, on Atlas Shrugs:

Atlas’ Juggs (Motto: My tits are as Nazi as my mind!)

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Posted 11:53 AM by Martin Wisse

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A Little Light Relief : Daydream Dinners

I've been sitting in the sun in the garden with Martin, who's reading A Fine Old Conflict, an excellent book I must've read a dozen times ovr the past 20 years.

I commented that I'd love to have had dinner with Jessica Mitford, which then led onto fantasy dinner-party lists generally. A hackneyed meme yes, nevertheless it's tried and tested, so here's my fantasy dinner party:

Jessica Mitford, MFK Fisher, Nancy Mitford ( for added vicious family squabble value), SJ Perelman, Fanny Trollope, Stephen Fry, Evelyn Waugh (so Nancy'd have a shoulder to cry on), Jeremy Hardy (for Jessica), Armando Ianucci, TH White, Samuel Pepys, Linda Smith, EF Benson, Rosa Luxemburg, Martha Gellhorn and Ian Hislop, with Mrs Gaskell and Spalding Gray as first reserves.

Such a dinner party might be bit raconteur-heavy and liable to sound like a cacophony of parrots in full flight, but I think Stephen Fry's charm and sheer chairmanly abilitiy would carry the day.

Now, about the food...

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Posted 4:29 PM by Republic of Palau

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US War Criminals To Walk Away Scot-Free

Er... isn't not upholding the laws and constitution an impeachable offence?

WaPo reports that Bush's attorney general Alberto Gonzalez is seeking to have retroactive legislation passed that will exempt US citizens from prossecution under the War Crimes Act of 1996 for past illegal acts, even when those acts were ordered by Bush or his minions :

[...]

An obscure law approved by a Republican-controlled Congress a decade ago has made the Bush administration nervous that officials and troops involved in handling detainee matters might be accused of committing war crimes, and prosecuted at some point in U.S. courts.

Senior officials have responded by drafting legislation that would grant U.S. personnel involved in the terrorism fight new protections against prosecution for past violations of the War Crimes Act of 1996. That law criminalizes violations of the Geneva Conventions governing conduct in war and threatens the death penalty if U.S.-held detainees die in custody from abusive treatment.

In light of a recent Supreme Court ruling that the international Conventions apply to the treatment of detainees in the terrorism fight, Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales has spoken privately with Republican lawmakers about the need for such "protections," according to someone who heard his remarks last week.

Gonzales told the lawmakers that a shield is needed for actions taken by U.S. personnel under a 2002 presidential order, which the Supreme Court declared illegal, and under Justice Department legal opinions that have been withdrawn under fire, the source said. A spokeswoman for Gonzales, Tasia Scolinos, declined to comment on Gonzales's remarks.

What's this with the 'obscure'? Is WaPo trying to frame this law (which has been on the statute books for ten years, through Bosnia and Somalia) as some little, unimportant bit of text not worth arguing over, let alone applying as actual law? The statute in question doesn't look particularly obscure to me:

War Crimes Act of 1996 (as amended)18 U.S.C. § 2441.

(a) Offense.--Whoever, whether inside or outside the United States, commits a war crime, in any of the circumstances described in subsection (b), shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for life or any term of years, or both, and if death results to the victim, shall also be subject to the penalty of death.

(b) Circumstances.--The circumstances referred to in subsection (a) are that the person committing such breach or the victim of such war crime is a member of the Armed Forces of the United States or a national of the United States (as defined in section 101 of the Immigration and Nationality Act).

(c) Definition.--As used in this section the term ‘war crime’ means any conduct--
(1) defined as a grave breach in any of the international conventions signed at Geneva 12 August 1949, or any protocol to such convention to which the United States is a party;
(2) prohibited by Article 23, 25, 27, or 28 of the Annex to the Hague Convention IV, Respecting the Laws and Customs of War on Land, signed 18 October 1907;
(3) which constitutes a violation of common Article 3 of the international conventions signed at Geneva, 12 August 1949, or any protocol to such convention to which the United States is a party and which deals with non- international armed conflict; or
(4) of a person who, in relation to an armed conflict and contrary to the provisions of the Protocol on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Mines, Booby-Traps and Other Devices as amended at Geneva on 3 May 1996 (Protocol II as amended on 3 May 1996), when the United States is a party to such Protocol, willfully kills or causes serious injury to civilians.

That looks pretty clear and unequivocal to me. I have a horrible feeling this is another one of those utterly immoral Gonzalez legal manoeuvres that will be ignored by the general public and the media, The torturers and rapists of Abu Ghraib, the military murderers of innocent women and childfren and the officers and politicians who ordered them to do it, all the way from Rumsfeld to the White House and Bush himself, can carry on doing whatever sadistic cruelties they like, secure in the knowledge there will be no consequences.

Untruth and injustice, it's the American way.

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Posted 5:54 PM by Republic of Palau

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"But It's A Dry Heat..."

I wouldn't care if it were the most temperate place on earth - Phoenix Arizona is not somewhere I'd care to be just now.

Two Serial Killers Keeping Phoenix Residents Indoors
July 24, 2006
Los Angeles Times

PHOENIX -- Summer nights used to be something to look forward to in the sweltering, sprawling metropolis of Phoenix.

Residents don't dare leave air-conditioned homes and offices during the day, when temperatures routinely crack triple digits. When the desert sun goes down, parks fill up, joggers take to the streets and diners flock to outdoor tables at restaurants.

But this summer it's a different story. Phoenix is being terrorized by two serial killers who have killed 11 people - after dark. Residents across the city are thinking twice before going out at night.

[...]

The victims, apparently chosen at random, have been men and women of all ages, and dogs. Both killers used guns.

Police call one of the attackers "The Baseline Killer," after a broad boulevard that runs through poor neighborhoods and upper-middle-class suburbs where several of the victims have died.

He is suspected of killing five women and one man between the ages of 19 and 39 and committing eight robberies and seven sexual assaults.

The second killer is called "The Serial Shooter" by police and blamed for shooting at least 22 men and women whose ages range from 16 to 56. Five have died. The shots apparently come from a light-colored, four-door sedan. Police say it's possible there is more than one person firing from the car.

Since May 2005, the shooter mostly has targeted people walking alone. But the victims also include people getting off buses at the end of workdays, and riding or pushing bicycles. The shooter is suspected of killing dogs on the street and is believed responsible for fatally shooting three horses on private property.

Dogs, eh? has anyone seen Pasteboy, Dr Frist or James Dobson recently?

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Posted 9:42 AM by Republic of Palau

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Creation From Destruction

This .mp3. Starry Night, was recorded by Mazen Kerbaj a Lebanese artist, during the shelling of Beirut:

STARRY NIGHT (excerpt) 6.31 min
a minimalistic improvisation by:
mazen kerbaj / trumpet
the israeli air force / bombs
recorded by mazen kerbaj on the balcony of his flat in beirut,
on the night of 15th to 16th of july 2006.
© mazen kerbaj 2006

back to mazenkerblog.blogspot.com

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Posted 9:32 AM by Republic of Palau

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Head-Banging Kittens!

Maybe Martin will like this kitten video a little bit more than the last.

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Posted 9:27 AM by Republic of Palau

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Thought For The Day

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Posted 9:04 AM by Republic of Palau

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Self-Defence? Hardly.

The Israeli bombardment of Lebanon so far, courtesy of Lebanon Updates via Lenin's Tomb:

Israel's Carte Blanche. posted by lenin According to an Israeli minister in failing to agree on a call for an immediate Middle East ceasefire, the world has given Israel permission to continue with the destruction of Lebanon. So, Israel has taken the initiative, blowing up a residential block of flats in Tyre, which has sparked an exodus - exactly what the Israelis have been trying to effect with some success across the whole of Lebanon south of the Litani - in fact, it is hard to believe given their tactics elsewhere that they intend to let it rest at the Litani. Here is a map of Israeli bombardment as of 25th. (click to enlarge)

See that? Certainly a large concentration of attacks across the south, which they have openly advertised they intend to ethnically cleanse and annexe, but they're basically terrorising the whole country. As you'll note from the Fact Box in the graphic, the infrastructure is especially being targeted. Israel certainly wants a ruined Lebanon to lord it over, and dispelling the civilian population has the purpose for them of depriving Hezbollah fighters of the base of support in which they move. It is Fallujah many times over. They know, of course, that by destroying roads, targeting fleeing vehicles, blowing up ambulances, destroying airports, blockading the seaside ports and basically targeting any means of transport more sophisticated than a bicycle, they are making it extremely difficult for people to escape to anywhere safe. But that's fine too, because they also know that in targeting Hezbollah they are targeting a huge (and growing) part of the Lebanese population. The greasy disavowal from American neoconservatives like William Kristol and Brit Hume - oh, Israel doesn't want to harm civilians, but of these terrorists insist on hiding... - must echo some contemptuous AIPAC press release. The Israeli government knows full well that it is up against the Lebanese people: the Christian forces, the communists, Hezbollah and even their rivals Amal are all fighting.

Read the whole thing...

And now the UK is complicit is arming Israel with US bunker busters, not to mention the other regular arms shipments we've been selling them all this time.

Oh, how very well played, Mr Blair & Mrs Beckett.

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Posted 8:46 AM by Republic of Palau

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Tinkling While Lebanon Burns

ASEAN Conference, Malaysia:

"US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, seen here at the piano, is expected to resume her Middle East crisis mission, as the United States warned against a "fake peace" to end fighting between Israel and Hezbollah(AFP/HO) "

Tire, Lebanon:

"My day covering Tyre begins with a visit to a mass grave site. Here, the bodies lie in thin plywood coffins in a shallow trench marked only by a large stone at one end and a metal pipe at the other. According to officials at the city coroner's office, this is just a temporary resting place (partly a way to meet the immediacy of Islamic burial requirements) until the fighting is over. Then, the bodies will be moved to more dignified burial grounds. Next to the site is another long trench already dug out and waiting to be filled. Dozens of empty coffins are also stacked in the courtyard of the city morgue. I ask one of the medical examiners if they are for people already killed or for the future. "The future," she says, with a small sigh."

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Posted 7:10 AM by Republic of Palau

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Lovely Front Page, But It's A Waste of Time

He didn't listen to 2 million people shouting at him then - why would he listen to this now?

In any case, even if he did as asked and stood up to Bush it would hardly register; that little unguarded glimpse into their relationship we were afforded at the G8 tells us that. Blair was weakly supplicant, almost desperate and Bush blthely dismissive of his plea to be given a role, any role at all.

The Israeli lobby at home that Blair is so beholden to would also have something to say. His Middle East envoy, bagman and staunch zionist Lord Levy, who's just hopped it to Israel , has the evidence that could put away Blair for conspiracy in the cash-for-peerages and Labour loans investigations.

Blair is in a very uncomfortable position indeed.

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Posted 6:44 AM by Republic of Palau

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Modern Manners

Christianity or moral bankruptcy?

Outrage

No Outrage

We report, you decide.

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Posted 5:19 AM by Republic of Palau

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Coulter: Clinton's "A Latent Homosexual"

Ah, so this is what he was thinking about in the Oval Office...

...not this.

Well, I guess Coulter is the go-to guy (and I use that word advisedly) for advice on gender dysmorphism and sexual ambiguity.

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Posted 2:47 PM by Republic of Palau

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Night Of The Living Dumbasses

Looks like the Minnesota Stasi wannabes have too little to occupy their time. [h/t Avedon Carol]:

Party's over for these 'zombies'
Six Minneapolis revelers jailed on suspicion of carrying fake bombs
BY DAVID HAWLEY
Pioneer Press

"Zombies" lurching along a downtown street tend to cause a stir. When the living dead carry duffel bags and backpacks with what look like wires sticking out, the cops step in.

This horror show unfolded Saturday evening in Minneapolis, where officers arrested six ghoulish revelers in thick makeup who police said were staggering along like zombies near Sixth Street and Hennepin Avenue.

"They were arrested for behavior that was suspicious and disturbing," said Lt. Gregory Reinhardt, a police spokesman.

All six were booked into the Hennepin County jail under a post-9/11 Minnesota statute making it a felony to "simulate weapons of mass destruction." Dressing up like characters from the movie "Night of the Living Dead" might have been OK, but toting bags with what police said appeared to be protruding wires apparently crossed a line.

A friend of the group said the arrests were overkill and that the suspicious devices were homemade stereos.

Whole Story...

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Posted 2:27 PM by Republic of Palau

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China activist 'beat himself up'

Chinese investigators say activist Fu Xiancai, who was paralysed after a severe beating, inflicted the blows himself, according to a rights body.

Mr Fu, who campaigned for people displaced by the Three Gorges Dam, was beaten up returning home after he was summoned by police in Hubei province.

The June beating was so severe he is not expected to walk again, according to Human Rights in China (HRIC).

But an official investigation has ruled the attack was fabricated.

More...

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Posted 2:18 PM by Republic of Palau

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Breaking: Al-quaeda: "The Whole World Is a Battlefield Open To Us"

BBC radio is reporting that a statement has been made saying that they "will not stand idly by while their brothers in Lebanon are attacked". Oh shit. Well done, Bush and Blair!
More on that story, as they say, later.

UPDATE: here's the report.

"As they attack us everywhere, we will attack them everywhere. As they have joined forces to fight us, our nation will unite to fight them," he said.

"The shells and rockets which are tearing the bodies of Muslims in Gaza and Lebanon are not purely Israeli. They are produced and financed by all the countries of the Crusader alliance.

"Therefore, all those who have taken part in the crime must pay the price. We cannot just watch these shells as they pour wrath on our brothers in Gaza and Lebanon and sit back in submission."

I wonder what Hizbollah thinks about that?

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Posted 1:09 PM by Republic of Palau

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A Little Light Relief

Oooh, matron.
No, not that kind of relief. Tsk.
All this doom, gloom and oppressive hot and humid weather calls for the only thing that could lighten the mood... yes, you guessed it, a KITTEN video, and a heavy-metal(or thrash, or post-punk, or speed-metal, or whatever it is you young whippersnapper hipsters are calling it these days)-backed, tiny kitten vs. big dog video at that.
Enjoy.

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Posted 1:01 PM by Republic of Palau

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The Future Is Now

You have to read this for its eminently readable and lucid explanation of the full economic and existential threat that the current confluence of economics, geology and sociology - exacerbated by untramelled war in the Middle East - poses to the Western status quo.

This is the text of a talk given by Chris Sanders at the 5th International Conference on Oil and Gas Depletion (ASPO-5) in Pisa:

[...]

Now the prospective end of the first half of the Age of Oil is most commonly addressed as a financial and engineering problem. Financial, so the argument goes, insofar as two or three decades of underinvestment in commodities has resulted in too little supply. Engineering, inasmuch as the necessity of finding alternatives is basically a matter of first finding adequate investment capital after which it is simply a matter of the market and scientific progress doing their work to create alternatives to oil and gas.

There is valid precedent underlying this point of view, of course. After all, the transitions from wood to coal and from coal to oil were managed against a backdrop of what appears to the collective memory to have been a linear march of progress onwards and upwards.

Viewed through the lens of geopolitics though, things look different. The transition from wood to coal initially favoured newly industrialising Britain thanks to her abundant coal resources. The transition that followed from coal to oil at the dawn of the twentieth century was, from financial and scientific point of view fairly straightforward perhaps. But two world wars were fought in the first half of the 20th century largely because one alliance was trying to get access to oil and the other was trying to deny that access. The deniers won.

The point here is that what looks straightforward from the perspective of the market trading floor, the scientific laboratory or the wellhead is something else altogether when the human element and the will to power are introduced. For the millions who died in the two world wars the transition from coal to oil was a major discontinuity. It is neither a coincidence nor insignificant that the fighting in the current world war to control the world energy net has been in the Balkans and latterly in Afghanistan and Iraq. In each case, what is at issue is control of energy supply and distribution.

The reason for this is simple enough, and is made abundantly clear from the oil and gas clocks showing world oil and gas reserve distribution. It is in the Persian Gulf and the former Soviet Union, mostly Russia, that the world’s remaining gas and oil reserves lie. This represents a substantial shift in the fulcrum of world power. For the first time in the history of the oil age the marginal barrels of crude oil and cubic feet of natural gas are not directly controlled by the Anglo-American powers.

[...]

Read more...

Sanders comes to the view that all this leaves Putin sitting in the catbird seat, a conclusion I blogged about the other day.

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Posted 11:58 AM by Republic of Palau

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Murdering Scum Outed

Far be it for me to defend the racist scumbags (pictured above) who murdered Stephen Lawrence, that's the last thing I'd like to do (actually, I'd like to see them have the shit kicked out of them on national TV, but that's by the bye) but should a respected UK national newspaper be so blatantly making them easy for vigilantes to identify, find and possibly attack or kill?

From this mornings' Guardian:

[...]

Among their haunts are the Old Post Office pub and the Eletriq Cafe Italian restaurant in Eltham, the area where Stephen was killed.

David Norris, 29, whose drug-dealing father, Clifford, is now out of prison, has four children aged five to 11. Until last summer he lived in his parents' £800,000 home in Chislehurst, bought with his father's criminal proceeds. After a lengthy legal wrangle the house had to be sold to meet claims from HM Revenue & Customs. He now rents a flat in Plumstead but is rarely seen there.

By 2002 Norris had two minor convictions for driving offences and two for theft. But in September of that year he and Neil Acourt (see below) were jailed for a racist attack on an off-duty black detective on the same road where Stephen was murdered.

Norris, a passenger in a car driven by Acourt, threw a drinks carton and shouted "nigger" at an off-duty detective constable, Gareth Reid, as he was crossing the road. They were sentenced to 18 months in prison, later cut to a year on appeal. Passing sentence, the judge said Norris and Acourt were both "infected and invaded by gross and revolting racism".

Shortly before being locked up, they wrote letters of praise to London nail bomber David Copeland, who killed three and injured 139 in three bomb attacks on blacks and homosexuals in 1999. "We've been done for abusing a black copper," they wrote. " We're getting banged up. We hope we don't get slammed in with a load of niggers."

In May 2004 Norris was back in prison. He was jailed for 27 months for burglary and handling a stolen Range Rover. Croydon crown court was told that he had stolen hundreds of pounds' worth of beer after breaking into a pub with a friend. In a separate offence, he was caught by police trying to jumpstart the Range Rover.

Neil Acourt, 30, also has a 2001 conviction for possessing an offensive weapon, for which he was sentenced to community service. He has shaved his head, changed his surname to Stuart and shares a council maisonette in Greenwich with his mother, Pat. He drives a black Golf.

Gary Dobson, 30, has a five-year-old son and lives in a flat in Woolwich with his partner, Charlotte Hunter, a secretary. In 1999 he was arrested in connection with a series of burglaries on commercial premises, but no prosecution followed.

Luke Knight, 31, maintains the lowest profile of the five, living with his girlfriend in Chislehurst.

Jamie Acourt, Neil's 29-year-old brother, who lives in Sidcup, has one recent conviction, for theft in 1999 (with co-defendant Norris ). He is always dressed in sharp designer clothers and drives a black Mercedes. On Tuesday morning he left London on holiday.

If someone catches up with these bastards, I won't cry for them -look, I just republished their details, which tells you all you need to know about my feelings on the matter.

But I'm a private individual with a small readership and it won't make much of a splash. The Grauniad is read nation and world-wide and one would hope they'd be a little more responsible, especially so as these individuals have not been convicted for the Lawrence murder and have served their time for their other crimes.

What's to stop another newspaper, Murdoch's Sun maybe, or the Islamophobic Daily Mail or Express identifying someone arrested for terrorism and released? That was over 700 people last year.

This exercise in outing is something that the Guardian, with its history of fighting for individual rights and civil liberties, should emphatically not be doing.

Leave that to the blogs.

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Posted 11:04 AM by Republic of Palau

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Into The Mystic

Back along in '98, Art Bell interviewed two Hopi Elders about their prophecies and whether the End Times are upon us:

AB: Ok. I think that my first question?..if I may ask the first question?..and Robert, you're welcome to ask one any time you'd like. I would like to ask Grandfather 1 why he has come forward in public at this time?

GF2: {Asks GF1 in Hopi language, then translates.}

GF1: {Answers in Hopi language.} It is our time to bring forth the message into the world. It has been taught to us by our Elders, from way back. That is why I have chosen to step forward and bring out the message today. There are people out there who are leading two lives?..who are there to stop us from putting forth the message, but it is the Elders, that taught us the wisdom, that are telling us to do this now for you and the rest of the world.

AB: With regard to what may be changing, Earth changes, is the time now very short?

GF2: {Asks, then translates.} It is time for the end times here, that was prophesized and through the dreams that were given to us also. Through those dreams, we are learning that we are getting very close to the end times.

Wow, isn't that crazy? Myths and legends being treated as though they were for real? Surely no US mainstream media outlet would be so silly - would they?

Duh, of course they would.

Step forward that formerly-attached-to-some-semblance-of-reality news network CNN:

Media Matters -CNN or CBN? Phillips asks apocalypse authors: "[A]re we living in the last days?"

Summary: With Kyra Phillips's discussion of the Apocalypse and the Middle East conflict with Christian authors Jerry Jenkins and Joel C. Rosenberg -- who share the view that the Rapture is nigh -- CNN has, for the second time in three days, featured a segment on the potential coming of the Apocalypse, as indicated by current conflicts in the Middle East.

For the second time in three days, CNN featured a segment on the potential coming of the Apocalypse, as indicated by current conflicts in the Middle East. The July 26 edition of CNN's Live From ... featured a nine-minute segment in which anchor Kyra Phillips discussed the Apocalypse and the Middle East with Christian authors Jerry Jenkins and Joel C. Rosenberg -- who share the view that the Rapture is nigh. At one point in the discussion, Phillips asked Rosenberg whether she needed "to start taking care of unfinished business and telling people that I love them and I'm sorry for all the evil things I've done," to which Rosenberg replied: "Well, that would be a good start." Throughout the segment, the onscreen text read: "Apocalypse Now?"

As Media Matters for America documented, the July 24 edition of CNN's Paula Zahn Now featured a segment examining what "the Book of Revelation tell[s] us about what's happening right now in the Middle East." CNN re-aired this segment the next day. Media Matters also noted that Rosenberg is just one of several conservative media figures who have identified and expounded upon the purported signs of the Apocalypse to be found in the Israel-Hezbollah conflict. During his appearance on Live From ..., Rosenberg claimed that he had been invited to the White House, Capitol Hill, and the CIA to discuss the Rapture and the Middle East, and noted -- several times -- that the apocalyptic events described in his novels keep coming true.

[...]

Read Whole Article

The Hopi end times story is just as valid as the fundies' end-times myth, ie they're both imaginary bollocks, but I thought the job of news organisations was to report news, not to collude in mass hysteria based on unproven superstition.

CNN is being pumped out worldwide. Do Americans have any idea how insane the rest of us think they are for believing in this shit? It wouldn't be so bad if they kept it behind closed doors, where it belongs, but now religion is being treated as though it were real and is now apparently the main impetus of US foreign policy.

It's bad enough the US government is run by crazies and could kill us all, but now any semblance of credibility US media may once have had in reporting is gone too. Ted Turner must be spitting feathers.

[In other news news ( as it were) a Fox live reporting crew were shot at by the Israeli Defence Force for revealing their position live on air. Hoist by their own petard...]

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Posted 10:18 AM by Republic of Palau

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Cheney - 'Condi Rice Is Rubbish'

The only black and female member - how very handy - of the Bush administration is about to have an accountability moment not from the public or the opposition, (such as it is) but from her own side, Dick Cheney's and Rumsfeld's offices to be precise...

Funny how they didn't notice her incompetence back along when. It was just as bloody obvious as the nose on your face then, as it is now:

April 20, 2004 A Review of Rice's Uncertain Alliances Czech Mate for Condi By JOSEPH KALVODA Review in American Historical Review (1985):[please note that the reviewer evidently believes Dr. Rice is a man]

CONDOLEEZZA RICE. The Soviet Union and the Czechoslovak Army, 1948-1983: Uncertain Allegiance. Princeton: Princeton University Press. 1984. Pp. xiv, 303. $37.50

To write a scholarly study on the relationship of the Soviet Union and the Czechoslovak army without access to relevant Czechoslovak and Soviet documents is difficult. Therefore, much of this book by Condoleezza Rice is based on secondary works. His thesis is that the Soviets directly influence military elites in the satellite countries, in addition to the Soviet Communist party interacting with the domestic party. Rice selects Czechoslovakia as a case study and attempts to show the role of the military as instrument of both national defense and the Soviet-controlled military alliance.

Rice's selection of sources raises questions, since he [sic] frequently does not sift facts from propaganda and valid information from disinformation or misinformation. He passes judgments and expresses opinions without adequate knowledge of facts. It does not add to his credibility when he uses a source written by Josef Hodic; Rice fails to notice that this "former military scientist" (p. 99) was a communist agent who returned to Czechoslovakia several years ago. Rice based his discussion of the "Sejna affair" (pp. 111, 116, 144) largely on communist propaganda sources and did not consult writings and statements by former General Jan Sejna who had access to Warsaw Pact documents and is the highest military officer from the Soviet bloc to defect to the West since World War II.

Rice's generalizations reflect his lack of knowledge about history and the nationality problem in Czechoslovakia. For example, in 1955 Czechoslovakia was not yet "the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic" (pp 83, 84). In May 1938 Ludvik Svoboda was serving in the Czech army, not organizing a Czech military unit in Poland. In the fall of 1939 he was captured by the Soviet invading forces in eastern Poland; he did not "[escape] to the USSR" (p. 43). Rice's discussion of the "Czechoslovak Legion" that was "born during the chaotic period preceding the fall of the Russian empire" (pp. 44-46) is ridiculous. (It was "born" on September 28, 1914.) He is clearly ignorant of the history of the military unit as well as of the geography of the area on which it fought.

[...]

The writing abounds with meaningless phrases, such as is its "last word": "Thirty-five years after its creation, the Czechoslovak People's Army stands suspended between the Czechoslovak nation and the socialist world order" (p. 245). Joseph Kalvoda teaches at Saint Joseph College West Hartford, Connecticut.

Read whole article

Nope, sorry boys, you don't get out of it that way. Any fool could sea she's always been totally out of her depth in international diplomacy - but that was what you wanted, wasn't it?

UPDATE: Tristero has a different theory, one I think may be bang-on.

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Posted 3:12 PM by Republic of Palau

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Harry's Place, Free Republic for Brits

Guest-posting at Lenin's Tomb, Justin Horton examines Harry's Place, the British version of Free Republic, and finds it has very similar rabid wingnut tendencies, although it's titularly a Labour blog:

[...]

HP's writers are, briefly, McCarthyites. Their practice and purpose is to support the Iraq War, Israel, and general warmongering, by throwing mud at their opponents: by slandering those who oppose them as terrorists and anti-Semites. Their squalid means of achieving this squalid goal, I'd narrow down to two: a game called We Are Fighting Terrorists, Therefore You Are One and a slightly different one called Links.

In Links, or Two Degrees of Separation, you say this: because X is connected with Y who is connected with Z - who is apparently an anti-Semite - therefore X is an anti-Semite too. It is an easy game, because nearly everybody is connected with nearly everybody else, especially in a broad movement (the movement against the war being, as it goes, pretty broad, encompassing as it does most of the population of the world). Curiously, though, it is never played with the war's proponents: we do not say, for instance, "Tony Blair is best mates with George Bush whose best mate was Ken Lay who was a prodigious crook". Nor do we go via Lord Levy, or via Tessa Jowell's husband, or straight to Silvio Berlusconi.

You Are A Terrorist bids us trace a similar connection: because some of the people fighting the US in Iraq are terrorists, you are one with them. (It has a corollary, roughly stated "because the enemy are bad, that means that we are good": it is the same Certificate of Perpetual Immunity that Israel is awarded by its admirers and which is currently being used to justify the slaughter of civilians in Beirut.) It is, quite simply, traitor-hunting. It sniffs out and identifies fifth columnists, complicit with the enemy and acting on the enemy's behalf. And this is, pretty much, what Harry's Place is there to do. It smears the opponents of the war. To read, takes a strong stomach: to agree, takes an absent sense of right and wrong. Its arguments could not be more ad hominem: except that the objects of their attack are imaginary, devils of their own devise.

[...]

But nobody is listening. Which is, I understand - I finally understand - the whole reason why they have such a hysterical tone. What tone do you adopt when people believe you and your cause appears to be prevailing? Dismissive, perhaps. Triumphant. Perhaps most common, smug. But this sort of hysteria? It's true, it can belong to triumph, or at least to the temporary triumph of the witch-hunt, the search for traitors, Joe McCarthy's America, Stalin's Soviet Union, Torquemada's Spain. But this is not the hysteria of those who persecute the Unbelievers. This is the hysteria of the Unbelieved.

[...]

A bit overwrought, perhaps, but he makes a valid point. The rump of Blair's supporters are growing increasingly shrill as the public's credulity drops away with each new horror.

What I think Justin underestimates though is the actual, physical danger these people could conceivably pose to those they consider 'traitors'. They aren't on the political fringe - these are the core supporters of a government that doesn't think twice about suppressing dissent, that has already colluded in rendition and torture and that wants to lock people up indefinitely without charge or trial, for trumped up crimes like the 'glorification of terrorism.

The New York Times had a hoax anthrax attack from people who called the paper traitorous, and HP's writers and commenters are those attackers' spiritual kin. But it's unlikely that something similar'd happen to a UK journalist or publication, in my opinion. Too crude. Labourites are a little more subtle than that, though there are some in Labour Friends of Israel that can be particularly vicious when it comes to those they consider traitors to the zionist cause.

Actual physical violence is unlikely, as I said, but if it does occur it's much more likely to happen by proxy - one phone call could be all it would take to turn someone's life into a Kafkaesque hell or even end it, and the putative HPer would have clean hands.

Remember Forest Gate and Stockwell?

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Posted 2:34 PM by Republic of Palau

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Comment Of The Day

On winger Cliff May's equating punditry with frontline war service:

"When an intellectual/electronic IED from Osama bin Laden or somebody else blows up some winger's laptop in a Starbucks and he has to get fitted for robotic hands at Walter Reed or Johns Hopkins, I will begin to listen.

Bruce Homepage 07.25.06 - 2:02 pm # "

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Posted 2:28 PM by Republic of Palau

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Progress, Of A Sort

The BBC reports that parents of British soldiers killed in Iraq have won the right to have the decision to go to war judicially reviewed. Finally a crack in the facade?

It's progress, at least - and not only there, but also in the Stephen Lawrence investigation, where there's finally to be an investigation of the coverup of corruption between a senior officer closely involved in the original enquiry, and the gangster father of one of the accused.

I remember marching with thousands of others to shut down the BNP bookshop in Welling, close to where Stephen Lawrence was murdered, and to protest the subsequent police coverup.

Riot police, anti-fascist march, Welling 1993

If the savagery with which the riot squads penned the protestors in a cul-de-sac, then had baton-wielding mounted police ride them down is any guide, the Met's desire to hide their own corrupt complicity ( not just in the racist Lawrence murder but in criminal gang and far-right activity in London and the South East generally) was pretty damned strong.

The corruption of the investigation has been an open secret ( see Private Eyes passim) ever since the murder - so why investigate now? Maybe certain as yet unknown sensitive individuals have retired, or died, or the political winds have shifted within the Met and the knives are out for someone.

Maybe some on- the-square officer offended the senior master at a Lodge dinner or cut him up on the fairway at the golf club - who knows? Whatever the reason and for what it's worth , the police have opened an incident room.

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Posted 11:59 AM by Republic of Palau

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How Cute Is This?

"Blowing bubbles : "Cess," a short-beaked Echidna, blows a mucus bubble through his nose as he recovers from injuries at Taronga Zoo's wildlife clinic in Sydney. (AFP/Greg Wood) "

H/T Norbizness

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Posted 11:59 AM by Republic of Palau

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Global Warming Watch

The BBC is featuring a series of satellite images from the European Space Agency, showing the effect of the current heatwave on Europe. This is pollution from cars, otherwise known as smog:

This may become a permanent, even worsening state of situation every summer. Lovely.

Whole Story

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Posted 7:02 PM by Republic of Palau

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Torture, As Down-Home American As Applie Pie

That last post, calling the US a potential Rwanda? Drop the 'potential', insert 'actual.

Raw Story: Video shows Ghraib-like torture by sheriffs lead to man's death, say groups, family Jennifer Van Bergen Published: Tuesday July 25, 2006

On Feb. 6, 2006, Jessie Lee Williams, Jr., a 40-year-old black man in a Southern Mississippi jail, was allegedly hooded and hog-tied by police, beaten about the head and testicles and ultimately died from blunt injuries to the head.

The coroner determined the death was a homicide. The local sheriff indicated law enforcement agencies were investigating and that the individual targeted by the investigation is “no longer employed by the Harrison County Sheriff’s Department.”

Despite the fact that the beating was videotaped, no arrests have been made.

Williams’ family has filed a $150 million civil suit for damages. Last Friday, the sheriff’s attorney in the Williams case asked the court to halt the civil proceedings until the criminal investigation is complete in order to avoid self-incrimination.

The complaint documents numerous previous incidents of abuse in the Harrison County jail booking room where Williams died, including beatings, hooding, use of a restraint chair – called “the torture chair” or “the devil’s chair” by inmates – and a technique similar to water-boarding where a sheet was wrapped tightly around the head of a man in the restraint chair and water was poured into the breathing hole.

In April, US Attorney Dunn Lampton told reporters, “We’re moving at a good speed.” Lampton told Harrison County Sheriff George Payne not to discuss the investigation with anyone and Payne has not returned RAW STORY’s calls.

US Prisons the Training Ground for Military Detentions?

A recent Amnesty International report covered by RAW STORY revealed that nearly 200 African-American men in a Chicago prison have alleged torture between 1971 and 1991. The report concluded there are troubling similarities between detainee abuse allegations in US military prisons around the world and US prisons at home.

Williams’ treatment, like that of many of those in the Chicago cases, is similar to reports of abuses at Abu Ghraib, the US prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and other US detention facilities in the Middle East. The nurse’s notes in Williams’ case states that Williams was placed in a restraint chair, hooded, sprayed with pepper spray, and had blood coming from both ears. He was told by the restraining officer that the officer would kill him, after which the man choked him until he couldn’t breathe.

Based on witness statements, the attorney for the Williams’ estate commissioned an artist to create an illustration which shows Williams being carried hooded and hog-tied.

The caption reads, “This picture is a depiction made of the Harrison County Adult Detention Facility's booking room on the night of February 4, 2006, based upon witness statements, in which Jessie Lee Williams, Jr. was hog-tied, shackled (hands to feet), sack on his head, blood dripping from the beating, and carried like a human suitcase – soon to be slammed/dropped on his face – two times.” Such treatment closely resembles methods depicted in photographs of detainees at Abu Ghraib.

James Johnson, an Australian with a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering and a Masters Degree in Psychology, who has been an advisor to the Australian government and has been researching the US penal system for eleven years for a book, says, “I believe that the principal method of torture applied in the prisons is psychological. However outright brutality is used quite regularly.”

Johnson provides examples from letters inmates have written him: solitary confinement, rapes, beatings, use of restraint chairs, hooding, shackling to the floor, sleep deprivation, extreme air-conditioning, reduction of food allowance, refusal of medical treatment, electric cattle prods, TASERs and water-boarding. Williams suffered serious burns on his back from being shot with TASERs.

“Everything you have read about them using in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Guantanamo is used in American prisons,” Johnson avers. “ That is where most of the torturers gain their experience.”

Read the rest here, if you can bear it.

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Posted 6:32 PM by Republic of Palau

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USA Goes Rwandan

Hyperbole? No, I don't think so, not when you read constitutional lawyer Glenn Greenwald and Media Matters' dissections of the increasingly hysterical and violent calls for the jailing (and worse) of dissenters against Bushco:

In addition to the Media Matters items, there are numerous unreported stories regarding the right-wing blogosphere that are of great significance. Let's read about what goes on as part of the daily "discussions" at Little Green Footballs (whose daily readership numbers place it very near the top 100 daily newspapers in terms of circulation figures), and in similar venues of derangement such as Free Republic.

What type of rhetoric is one of the leaders of the pro-Bush blogosphere, Glenn Reynolds a/k/a Instapundit, a University of Tennessee law professor, promoting with his links, and himself disseminating on a regular basis? What sentiments motivate publication by Michelle Malkin of some of the most disturbing and hateful propaganda posters which can be imagined? And what causes three bland, corporate Minnesota lawyers at Powerline to routinely accuse political opponents and journalists of treason, urge their imprisonment, and engage in "rhetorical excesses too frequent to list"?

One of the pro-Bush blogs most heavily promoted by Instapundit currently displays satellite photographs of the home of the NYT Publisher, along with his home address -- isn't that thuggish tactic worth an article by itself? And virtually every mainstream Democrat, along with journalists who publish articles embarrassing to the Bush administration, are routinely accused in the pro-Bush blogosphere of being traitors and adjudged to be guilty of treason -- not by obscure pro-Bush blogs but by the most significant and well-read ones. As a result, as the Media Matters post documents, many pro-Bush bloggers have a virtual obsession with vivid demands for hanging political opponents and journalists.

If you still think, after all that, that such eliminationist rhetoric is all just a joke to be taken lightly and as no real threat, just sound and fury signifying nothing - then let's take a look at how the horror that was Rwanda came about:

In the beginning, the radio station' Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines was a popular station that successfully preyed upon the deep animosities and prejudices between the Hutu and Tutsi populations. The sophisticated use of humor and professional delivery was interspersed with popular Zairean music. Contrasted with the musically staid Rwandan state radio, Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines quickly developed a faithful audience among the young, who eventually transformed themselves into the ruthless Interahamwe. It was only when the genocide actually erupted that openly racist comments such as "stamp out the cockroaches" were aired.

[...]

Not since the Nazi propaganda speeches of World War II has media been credited with having such a direct influence on inciting violence. The Hutu-led, anti-Tutsi, Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines has now become a genocidal icon. Synonymous with the term 'hate-media', it is a name that has come to evoke fear.

One can only hope that the majority of the regular listeners to talk radio and the readers of the Hate Blogs (note to Skippy, that one's mine) are using their outrageous output purely as a form of escapist and outrageous entertainment and wouldn't dream of acting on any of the vicious suggestions being made by the likes of Reynolds, Goldstein and Malkin.

But can we rely on the American people's batter natures? Do they even have any better natures? Abu Ghraib and Haditha say otherwise. Americans who say that such an avowedly Christian country as theirs would not be hustled by such obvious demagogues as these down the slippery slope to the murder, lynching and imprisonment without trial of alleged 'liberals' should study recent history a little more. Not even the Church itself is immune.

On 7 May 1994 soldiers and militias arrived at Shyogwe Diocese aboard a red pick-up vehicle to transport civilian Tutsi refugees to the killing sites. "On that day Bishop Samuel Musabyimana was present and, addressing the soldiers and militias, publicly stated that he did not oppose the killing of Tutsis, but that he did not want killings at the Diocese and that the Tutsis should be taken to Kabgayi to be killed." (Indictment by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda against former Anglican Bishop Samuel Musabyimana).

[...]

On 22 April 1994, Séraphine Mukamana had hidden herself in a garage when militias attacked a convent in Sovu in southern Rwanda. "We sought refugee in the garage and closed and barricaded the doors. Outside a bloodbath is going on. Suddenly an orphan begins to weep as it gets to hot in the garage. At once, the killers approach the garage." As the refugees refuse to come out, the militia leader Emmanuel Rekeraho decides to burn them alive in the garage. "'The nuns are coming to help us. They are bringing gasoline,' I heard [Rekeraho] say. Looking through a hole that the militiamen meanwhile had made in the wall, I indeed saw Sister Gertrude and Sister Kisito. The latter was carrying a petrol can. Shortly upon that, the garage is set on fire." Testimony against two Catholic nuns, Sisters Gertrude and Maria Kisito in a Brussels court, May 2001.

Before anyone protests the unlikelihood of US Christians ever participating in anything so horrific I have just two names for you: Fred Phelps & Matthew Hale.

They at least are or were honest about their murderous hate. The heroes of the Right blogosphere like Malkin and Reynolds are channeling from behind their safe pc screens an acceptable mainstream version of Phelps and Hale's evil rhetoric while denying vehemently that they do so. "Mass murder enabler? Me? Not me , I'm just a plain-speaking, down-home blogger."

They also serve who only stand blog and wait.

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Posted 3:01 PM by Republic of Palau

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Remind Me, Who's The Terrorists Again?

BBC Radio 4 history programme Document is to broadcast new informationt released by the UK government tonight that shows that the Stern Gang had Jewish assassination squads in place in England in 1948 to murder the then prime minister, Ernest Bevin, and attack and destroy the Houses of Parliament using high explosives.

Will we hear the current Israeli government condemn the terrorism of their own founding fathers following the release of this information? Can we flatten their cities and wantonly slaughter their civilians in a 'proportionate' revenge response now?

Nope, didn't think so.

Because of course that was then and this is now, and as we all know time sanitises everything - and because it was Jewish terrorism and not Islamic, somehow that makes it legitimate.

Not only that, but apparently having suffered from murderous oppression and genocide absolves a people from any and all wrongdoing for ever and if anyone objects, well that's just anti-semitism.

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Posted 2:36 PM by Republic of Palau

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The Roses of Success

Blair's last political commercial?

Read more about: Tony Blair, UK politics

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Posted 1:31 PM by Martin Wisse

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Shorter Digby

I'm too polite to say it, but isn't Ezra kind of thick?

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Posted 5:52 PM by Martin Wisse

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Lookylikies

Jesus' General's latest Hannidate

Patrick Nice.

Has anyone seen John Thomson recently?

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Posted 5:43 PM by Republic of Palau

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The dullest fucking woman on the planet

So far I've only enjoyed the tedium that is Ann Althouse through the sanity preserving filter that is Alicublog, but then somebody in his comments pointed me at the above video. I only lasted fifteen seconds. She didn't have to say anything about her vile politics or clueless views on art, she just introduced us to her office and it was the most dull, excruciating exercise in tedium I've been subjected to in my life. Five me the shrieking monstrosity that is Atlas Juggs anyday over this. At least she is amusing, in a rightwing loony sort of way. Althouse, not so much.

Read more about: Ann Althouse, wingnuts, wingnuttery

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Posted 12:25 PM by Martin Wisse

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The Great Dick-Tater

Polish leader and professional twin President Kaczynski is seeking to have a German satirist arrested on an EU extradition warrant, reports Fistful of Euros.

His crime? Calling said President a potatohead, which is illegal under Polish law. No mocking the afflicted, apparently.

He said that "...“even in the history of this peculiar newspaper” the potato portrait was an unprecedented insult of a foreign head of state and a criminal act."

I only have one thing to say: President Kascynski, not only are you a potatohead, you're a dickhead as well, and a nepotistic dickhead at that. And so's your brother. No wonder half your population prefers to live elsewhere.

Now arrest me. Go on, I double-dare you with sprinkles and a cherry.

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Posted 11:30 AM by Republic of Palau

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Human Sandbags, Huh?

Via Wisse Words - Lenin's Tomb reports on the unremittingly zionist London Evening Standard's deliberate yet unsurprising parroting of the Israeli government key talking point, ie that Hezbollah is using civilians as human shields and therefore they are inhuman animals who must be wiped off the face of the earth.

But then Lenin found this from B'Tselem, the Israeli center for human rights information in the occupied territories:

20 July 2006:

Israeli Soldiers use civilians as Human Shields in Beit Hanun

B'Tselem's initial investigation indicates that, during an incursion by Israeli forces into Beit Hanun, in the northern Gaza Strip, on 17 July 2006, soldiers seized control of two buildings in the town and used residents as human shield.

After seizing control of the buildings, the soldiers held six residents, two of them minors, on the staircases of the two buildings, at the entrance to rooms in which the soldiers positioned themselves, for some twelve hours. During this time, there were intense exchanges of gunfire between the soldiers and armed Palestinians. The soldiers also demanded that one of the occupants walk in front of them during a search of all the apartments in one of the buildings, after which they released her.

International humanitarian law forbids using civilians as human shields by placing them next to soldiers or next to military facilities, with the intention of gaining immunity from attack, or by forcing the civilians to carry out dangerous military assignments.

B'Tselem has demanded that the Judge Advocate General immediately order a Military Police investigation into the matter and prosecute the soldiers responsible for the action.

Read whole story

Looks like the Republicans and the Israeli government not only share a Middle-East policy, they also share their propaganda methods. I'm sensing some projection here.

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Posted 11:03 AM by Republic of Palau

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"W00T! i got lebanon haha1!11111 suxXxor"

Sadly No explains the Mideast crisis in their own special way.

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Posted 10:06 AM by Republic of Palau

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What's Next, Plodcasting?

Blogging Chief Constable makes his 'net debut
Jul 19 2006
icWales
A POLICE CHIEF known for his controversial views has launched a blog.
North Wales Police boss Richard Brunstrom claims he is the first Chief Constable in the UK to publish an online diary.
In it, he discusses his views on policing and makes a brief reference to his frustration with Home Office merger plans.

Actually, it's his second blog, so it's not really news, but why let mundane reality get in the way of a good pun?

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Posted 6:59 PM by Republic of Palau

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"You Bald Under That, Sport?"

Bush tries for a little relief before heading off to his Crawford ranch on Air Force One...

Hang on a minute - he's going on holiday while the Middle East goes up in flames? Why am I not surprised?

I suppose he wants to be comfortable when the Rapture comes.

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Posted 4:50 PM by Republic of Palau

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I Know I said I Was Going But...

Bwahahahahahahahaha.

Garage door remote triggers man's erection Hard luck for implant chap
An anonymous Merseyside man who had an implant to "help with erection problems" has found he becomes uncontrollably aroused every time his neighbour pulls up in his 4X4, the Scottish Daily Record reports.

Read Whole Story

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Posted 1:27 PM by Republic of Palau

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Bonsai Mountains: The Plot Thickens

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Posted 1:24 PM by Republic of Palau

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UPDATE: Well, I'll Be Buggered.

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Posted 1:00 PM by Republic of Palau

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Friday Pie Blogging and Blogger Cursing

I just spent the best part of an hour and a half putting tgether an excellent ( if I say so myself)compendium post . It had John Prescott, parrotfish paintings, John Bolton, Jeremy Clarkson as a secret Pole, an insane Dorian Green-esque woman vlogging, and many other splendidnesses. It was a good post dammit!

And then Blogger ate it. I could spit.

I'm not doing it again, I've no patience and it's too bloody hot, and I've had enough of death and destruction for the time being. So I'm leaving the pc, turning off the BBC and going out into the big blue room to look at some greenery and to curse vehemently the very name of blogger, to the bemusement of passing wasps.

Just because I'm bitter is no reason to leave anyone else with a bad taste in their mouth - and since cherries and apricots are lusciously in season right now here's a Friday Pie recipe, though I plan to make it on Sunday. Enjoy.

Cherry Apricot Pie With Almond Streusel Topping

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Posted 12:39 PM by Republic of Palau

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Short Cuts

Is it because they is white? The Guardian has a whole G2 section devoted to welcoming Polish immigrants today and while it's fascinating (who knew Jeremy Clarkson's a closet Pole?) I can't help cynically wondering if they'd be doing the same for an influx of workers from Zimbabwe.

Why are fewer students from poor backgrounds going to university?

Best post title of the day: Zing Went the Springs of My Pants. Who else but Walcott.

Remember that old BBC sitcom Birds of A Feather? Remember Dorian Green, the stereotypically Jewish nympho neighbour? [That's her in the middle above.] Transpose her to the US, add fake tits, even less taste and even more neurosis and you've got this monstrosity. Hey, don't blame me, blame Tbogg, he pointed at it.

Hands off, Brilliant at Breakfast, I want that cat too....

Gorgeous paintings of parrotfish from Daniel Jean-Baptiste

How to cook Naked Babies In The Grass...

The diversity of bees and wild flowers in Britain and the Netherlands are declining together, scientists find.

Recess-appointed US Ambassador to the UN, all-round asshole and former Plato's Retreat regular John Bolton to be re-grilled next week over nomination.

There really is a sucker born every minute...

A growing number of Minuteman Civil Defense Corps leaders and volunteers are questioning the whereabouts of hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of dollars in donations collected in the past 15 months, challenging the organization's leadership over financial accountability. Many of the group's most active members say they have no idea how much money has been collected as part of its effort to stop illegal entry -- primarily along the U.S.-Mexico border, what it has been spent on or why it has been funneled through a Virginia-based charity headed by conservative Alan Keyes. [h/t Hairyfishnuts]

Friday Pie Blogging: Cherries and apricots are lusciously in season at the moment (thanks, global warming) so here's a recipe for Cherry Apricot Pie With Almond Streusel Topping.

Right, I'm out of here. I need to get away from death and destruction for a while so I'm going to have lunch and go look at some greenery, maybe cuddle some cats.

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Posted 11:11 AM by Republic of Palau

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First It's Tragedy, Then It's Farce.

Washington Post has printed a sex line number instead of the Lebanon evacuation hotline:

Wonkette -

The number listed in the print edition of today’s Post? 1-800-407-4747. Which we called. And we heard:

“Feeling horny? Try these red hot lines from National. Live hot fun at just 69 cents per minute.”

The lesson: Americans seeking information about evacuations of US citizens in Lebanon should just relax, man. (Or: Taking evacuation into your own hands indeed.)

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Posted 9:46 AM by Republic of Palau

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Could They By Chance Be Related?

Many worldwide are racking their brains for a good reason as to why Israel is acting with such abandoned barbarity towards Lebanon. The usual real politik-al explanations don't seem to suffice to explain their harshness. Now it's not just bombardments any more.

2006: Israel hints at a full-scale invasion

What has Israel got to gain in material terms from a full-scale invasion and occupation of the country, other than to cascade terrorism down the generations? It could be something very simple: water. From American University in Beirut's Notes on the Geology of Lebanon:

The chief natural resource is water. The high mountains gave a high rainfall (widely over a meter a year in Mount Lebanon), and the porous fractured limestone made excellent aquifers which were refilled over summer by slow snow melt. The resulting abundant springs and rivers, unique to the region, gave the country its abundant forests and legendary fertility. However due to the steep slopes and the stony, shallow soils this fertility has proved hard to harness for agriculture and the removal of the forests tended to produce only short lived farming land.

2002: The Wazzani Water Dispute

[...]

The project—carried out by the Council of the South, a government body affiliated with the Shi'i movement Amal—will divert by pipeline as much as 9,000 cubic meters of water daily to dozens of villages. This portion of the project is expected to be complete by the end of the year, after which the Lebanese plan to construct a pumping station and a reservoir from which the water will be channeled. The amount of water that such a project could divert from Israel would be enough to lower the level of the Sea of Galilee by almost an inch. Under normal circumstances, such a unilateral step would likely have passed without incident. Considering the existing tension along the border, however, this seemingly small water dispute could deteriorate into a military confrontation. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has warned that Israel will not accept Lebanon's project, telling Army Radio that he sees the plan as " a pretext for war." Indeed, water is a sensitive topic that has contributed to several Arab-Israeli conflicts, including the 1967 Six Day War, which resulted in part from a Syrian-Lebanese plan to divert the Jordan River's tributaries.

[...] Israel's Water Anxiety

For years, Israel's fresh water supply has been declining in both quality and quantity. The combination of low precipitation, growing population, and over-pumping has created a national water crisis. In recent years, Israel's water balance has been so negative that the country failed to meet its allocation transfer quotas to Jordan from the shared Jordan and Yarmouk Rivers—transfers mandated by the 1994 peace treaty between the two nations. In order to meet its needs, Israel has been forced to import water from Turkey. Last month, the two countries signed a water accord in which Turkey undertook to export 50 million cubic meters of water to Israel over a 20-year period.

Israel's water anxiety stems from the fact that all of its three main water sources—the Coastal Aquifer, the Mountain Aquifer, and the Sea of Galilee—are currently under stress. First, the Coastal Aquifer is rapidly deteriorating due to contamination, low rainfall, and the growing population in the coastal plain. Second, the Mountain Aquifer may be threatened by the future establishment of a Palestinian state in Judea and Samaria. Third, the Sea of Galilee depends on an inflow of water, and 50 percent of this inflow originates in Syria and Lebanon, both of which are still in a state of war with Israel. With no diplomatic relations between these neighbors, water division is regulated by a number of unwritten accords and understandings in place since the 1920s, all designed to preserve a certain status quo in the region and minimize disputes. But these understandings are not binding; they are predicated only on the goodwill of Syria and Lebanon.

When Israel controlled southern Lebanon, Beirut had no access to Israel's water sources. Since Israel's withdrawal, however, Lebanon has twice attempted to unilaterally change the status quo of water usage in the Hatzbani basin (in March and August 2001). Both times, Lebanon's actions elicited Israel's condemnation, but no military action. Israel is concerned that its tolerance of past incidents created a dangerous precedent that prompted the Lebanese government to initiate larger water projects. Failure to act now could lead to more water withdrawals from other sources originating in Lebanon and Syria.

See also this British Israel Communications and Research Centre report and the EU's end of programme report from its Israel/Wazzani Springs Rapid Response Team for much more detail.

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Posted 4:41 PM by Republic of Palau

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Comment of The Day

Gilliard commenter Lower Manhannite (who doesn't blog unfortunately) to regular troll Jim in a thread re the racist comment made by WH Press Secretary and former Fox anchor Tony Snow to veteran WH reporter and Lebanese-American Helen Thomas:

Jim: "I just prefer to acknowlege Helen for what she is."

As I prefer to acknowledge Tony Snow for what he is... ...namely an unabashed, dim-bulb, water-headed, third-rate Klansman who requires two queen-size sheets for his pointy hood alone.

And don't you have a check to cash...bitch?" LowerManhattanite 07.19.06 - 4:03 pm

That's The Way To Do It!

Guardian Comment is Free Except When It Isn't editor Georgina Henry , look and learn.

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Posted 2:09 PM by Republic of Palau

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Comment Isn't Free.

There's a bit of a brouhahahahaha (sorry, I couldn't stop typing it) brewing over at The Grauniad's Comment Is Free: Georgina Henry's imposition of a 'one comment per half hour' rule seems to have riled up a lot of people.

"For those that want to cotinue to debate the issues raised by CiF bloggers, we're proposing to introduce a comment frequency cap which will only allow individuals to comment once every half an hour. If it works it might make for more thoughtful contributions from those who tend to write before they think. If it doesn't work - ie, if it simply dries up or drives away the best while leaving us with the worst - we'll think again."

Reaction has been swift, for example:

YellowDuck Comment No. 139173 July 18 18:38 DEU Hihi. CiS? Comment in Slow-motion? That will be the end of flippant posts, then, funny one-liners, add-ons you had forgotten about, spelling corrections, etc. We'll have to think about everything for half an hour now and then mull the next reponse for another half an hour. Then you'll get comments like this:

"Well, if you may remember, MrPikeBishop, about three hours ago you said this, to which I replied two hours ago, such and such and, followed by a PhD thesis on the uses of tooth brushes throughout the ages and zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz (4076 characters by the way).

So: Anyone up for a posts trading scheme? I will actually be working a lot next week and the week after, so I've got some spare posts to go around. But this week I'd like to sharpen my debating skills in one of them Israel/Palestine circular argument threads and could do with some extra amo. Anyone willing to swap posts and character counts?

Do the number of posts really influence the debate? I don't think so. Over at www.spiegel.de a respectful German weekly with a popular debating forum, comments are moderated, but on average the number of comments goes into the 1000s. Needless to say, because of the moderation, all comments stay on topic. Thing is, of course, moderating comments costs money, you have to pay someone, even if it is just a happless arts student, so this is out of the question.

Either way, Georgina, you have to start thinking about rebranding yourself. Comment is obviously not free this way. It would be taking the piss to leave the name as it is.

There are some right nutters posting on Comment Is Free, and I do have some sympathy for those posters (who appear to be in the minority, based on a quick scan of the comment threads) who think a strong policy to deal with them is a good idea. It is very irritating to have to wade through piles of dross posted by one troll just to find one tiny nugget.

But there are always trolls, they're the cockraoches of the internet. Commenters already have to register, and there's already post moderation - and I do think the average commenter is perfectly able to either squash or ignore a troll, so on the whole I'm much more inclined to agree with commenter TheNuclearOption in the same thread:

[Guardian]T&C number 11 reads: "11. Arrogant Tossers We reserve the right to behave like arrogant Tossers whenever we see fit. We are the professionals and you are just proles. The scum who we allow to gaze with adoration at the wonderous prose of our contributors. Should you have the audacity to show up and ridicule the limited intellect of our contributors we reserve the right to show our unbridled power by acting like Tossers. At least we'd like to if we had any half decent developers but on the salaries we pay we are lucky to recruit McDonald's rejects."

OK, now I'm offski. Just wanted to vent my spleen. Also, I'd like to say to the developers that I'm sure you do an heroic job for very little money. I've seen the adverts and bloody hell you guys are paid peanuts.

By the way Georgina, someone's already posted the easy-peasiest comment-policy hack in the world - just delete your cookies, and hey presto, no time-limit.

Silly Grauniad, no clue at all.I'll give the last word to commenter Zolaink:

It seems that this thread is the most popular on CiF. At the same time this thread is mostly, over 90% to say the least, critical of the management techniques and provider ethics.

is there something to be learnt from this?

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Posted 12:27 PM by Republic of Palau

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A Musical Interlude

I just heard something so brilliant - Kate Bush's Wuthering Heights, Andrews Sisters style, by new cult darlings The Puppini Sisters.

Oooh, it's just like the Blitz again, only all postmodern-like. I always wanted to live in the 'forties (all those lovely, elegant clothes) and now I can, only with WWIII and the Puppini Sisters instead. Thanks Bush and Woman's Hour!

Listen here You need today's (Thursday 20 July) programme.

There's video at their MySpace page, and I'll have a trawl of YouTube etc for any Puppini downloads and link to them in another post. They have to be heard to be believed.

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Posted 11:34 AM by Republic of Palau

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