A COP'S WATCH

Officer Down

2012-02-23T18:00:00.000-06:00

Trooper Tony Radulescu
Washington State Patrol
End of Watch: Thursday, February 23, 2012
Age: 44
Tour: 16 years

Trooper Tony Radulescu was shot and killed while making a traffic stop on State Route 16 at Anderson Hill Road, in Gorst, shortly before 1:00 am.

He had radioed in his location and the pickup truck's license plate and description to dispatchers. When dispatchers were unable to contact him for several minutes a Kitsap County sheriff's deputy was sent to check on his status and discovered him laying wounded outside of his patrol car. He was transported to St. Joseph Medical Center in Tacoma where he succumbed to his wounds a short time later.

The vehicle that Trooper Radulescu had stopped was found abandoned on a country road approximately three hours later. A SWAT team deployed to the registered owner's home and as they approached it the suspect committed suicide.

Trooper Radulescu was a military veteran and had served with the Washington State Patrol for 16 years.

Rest in Peace Bro…We’ll Continue The Watch

Day is done, Gone the sun, From the lake, From the hills, From the sky. All is well, Safely rest, God is nigh.

First John Conyers....

2012-02-23T11:41:00.000-06:00

John Conyers is one of the worse members of the Congress and as dirty as the day is long. Anyone who thinks he should vote yes on a multi-trillion dollar take over of over a sixth of our economy without reading the bill.

During his speech at a National Press Club luncheon, House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.), questioned the point of lawmakers reading the health care bill.

“I love these members, they get up and say, ‘Read the bill,’” said Conyers.

“What good is reading the bill if it’s a thousand pages and you don’t have two days and two lawyers to find out what it means after you read the bill?”

But for some reason he is continually reelected. Just like Maxine Waters, Sheila Jackson Lee and Charlie Rangle they will die in office. Even if found in bed with a live or dead child they will win again.

But here is another example of what Mr Conyers is and what he thinks about his voters.

John Conyers Pledges to Make Right after Blight Inflates Neighbor's Insurance: MyFoxDETROIT.com
Blight causes woman's insurance to jump to $7,000

DETROIT (WJBK) - Remember when we told you about the blighted property Congressman John Conyers owns on Detroit's east side?

You know the one. The fallin' down, peelin' back, pile o'dump that looked like it was reverting back to nature?

It's winter time now, and all those wild greens have died and fallen to the ground. It might look better to some, but not to the neighbor next door who's now being forced to shell out her own green.

According to her, er yearly homeowners insurance jumped from $1,700 - to $7,000!

What in the world could have caused that?

"They raised it because of the abandoned house next door. They said my house is now being rated up because of the risk of the house next door catching on fire," she said.

Yup. The same house. Seven thousand dollars insurance for a house in the hood? These homes aren't worth that much!

So let's catch up. The home was originally owned by the Congressman's mother. She signed it over to him, then he signed it over to his wife Monica - who currently resides in a federal prison for bribery.

We have to pay for her legal bill, remember?...

Then again it's like he really lives in Detroit. He lives in Washington and keeps his residence for voting purposes in Detroit. But the people there are stupid enough to vote him in again and again and again. If his damage only afflicted his voters I would have no real issue. But he is inflicting pain on me and mine.

But the stupidity of Detroit is not limited to it's federal representation.

Toy Guns Becoming A Criminal Offense?

DETROIT (WWJ) – State lawmakers are currently reviewing legislation that targets the use of certain toy guns. A planned proposal before the Senate would make it a crime to possess a toy gun that has its required markings removed or by having a real gun that is made up to look like a toy.

State Senate Republican Rick Jones said that this has become a major problem, especially within the gang community. “People are taking imitation firearms that look real, cutting off the orange end and then threatening people,” he said.

Supporters of the proposed legislation have also cited a recent case where a police officer was forced to shoot a gang member who was aiming a toy gun without its required markings. Jones believes this proposal will be vital in preventing incidents such as this from occurring in the future.

“This is an important package to control this problem,” Jones said.

If the legislation is passed, people who possess these toy guns and use it to commit a felony, would be punishable for up to 18 months behind bars and be subject to fines.

Normally such stupidity is pushed by leftists but again Republicans have our idiots. John McCain anyone?

Mr Jones I really doubt the world is worse off for the death of the gang member. And I am more happy the cop went home. So get your focus right. The problem is not the plastic gun. It's the moron with it aiming it at a cop.

Damned Detroit, once such a great city and now you have this.

Security Weekly: The Myth of the End of Terrorism, February 23, 2012

2012-02-23T08:17:00.000-06:00

By Scott Stewart

In this week's Geopolitical Weekly, George Friedman discussed the geopolitical cycles that change with each generation. Frequently, especially in recent years, those geopolitical cycles have intersected with changes in the way the tactic of terrorism is employed and in the actors employing it.

The Arab terrorism that began in the 1960s resulted from the Cold War and the Soviet decision to fund, train and otherwise encourage groups in the Middle East. The Soviet Union and its Middle Eastern proxies also sponsored Marxist terrorist groups in Europe and Latin America. They even backed the Japanese Red Army terrorist group. Places like South Yemen and Libya became havens where Marxist militants of many different nationalities gathered to learn terrorist tradecraft, often instructed by personnel from the Soviet KGB or the East German Stasi and from other militants.

The Cold War also spawned al Qaeda and the broader global jihadist movement as militants flocking to fight the Soviet troops who had invaded Afghanistan were trained in camps in northern Pakistan by instructors from the CIA's Office of Technical Services and Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence directorate. Emboldened by the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, and claiming credit for the subsequent Soviet collapse, these militants decided to expand their efforts to other parts of the world.

The connection between state-sponsored terrorism and the Cold War ran so deep that when the Cold War ended with the Soviet Union's collapse, many declared that terrorism had ended as well. I witnessed this phenomenon while serving in the Counterterrorism Investigations Division of the Diplomatic Security Service (DSS) in the early 1990s. While I was in New York working as part of the interagency team investigating the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, a newly appointed assistant secretary of state abolished my office, declaring that the DSS did not need a Counterterrorism Investigations Division since terrorism was over.

Though terrorism obviously did not end when the Berlin Wall fell, the rosy sentiments to the contrary held by some at the State Department and elsewhere took away the impetus to mitigate the growing jihadist threat or to protect diplomatic facilities from it. The final report of the Crowe Commission, which was established to review the twin August 1998 bombing attacks against the U.S. embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, explicitly noted this neglect of counterterrorism and security programs, as did the 9/11 Commission report.

The 9/11 terrorist attacks triggered a shift in international geopolitics by leading the United States to concentrate the full weight of its national resources on al Qaeda and its supporters. Ironically, by the time the U.S. government was able to shift its massive bureaucracy to meet the new challenge, creating huge new organizations like the Department of Homeland Security, the efforts of the existing U.S. counterterrorism apparatus had already badly crippled the core al Qaeda group. Though some of these new organizations played important roles in helping the United States cope with the fallout of its decision to invade Iraq after Afghanistan, Washington spent billions of dollars to create organizations and fund programs that in hindsight were arguably not really necessary because the threats they were designed to counter, such as al Qaeda's nuclear briefcase bombs, did not actually exist. As George Friedman noted in the Geopolitical Weekly, the sole global superpower was badly off-balance, which caused an imbalance in the entire global system.

With the continued diminution of the jihadist threat, underscored by the May 2011 death of Osama bin Laden and the fall in Libya of the Gadhafi regime (which had long employed terrorism), once again we appear on the brink of a cyclical change in the terrorism paradigm. These events could again lead some to pronounce the death of terrorism.

Several developments last week served to demonstrate that while the perpetrators and tactics of terrorism (what Stratfor calls the "who" and the "how") may change in response to larger geopolitical cycles, such shifts will not signal the end of terrorism itself.

The Nature of Terrorism

There are many conflicting definitions of terrorism, but for our purposes we will loosely define it as politically motivated violence against noncombatants. Many terrorist acts have a religious element to them, but that element is normally related to a larger, political goal: Both a militant anti-abortion activist seeking to end legalized abortion and a jihadist seeking to end the U.S. military presence in Iraq may act according to religious principles, but they ultimately are pursuing a political objective.

Terrorism is a tactic, one employed by a wide array of actors. There is no single creed, ethnicity, political persuasion or nationality with a monopoly on terrorism. Individuals and groups of individuals from almost every conceivable background -- from late Victorian-era anarchists to Klansmen to North Korean intelligence officers -- have conducted terrorist attacks. Because of the impreciseness of the term, Stratfor normally does not refer to individuals as terrorists. In addition to being a poor descriptor, "terrorist" tends to be a politically loaded term.

Traditionally, terrorism has been a tactic of the weak, i.e., those who lack the power to impose their political will through ordinary political or military means. As Carl von Clausewitz noted, war is the continuation of politics by other means; terrorism is a type of warfare, making it also politics by other means. Because it is a tactic used by the weak, terrorism generally focuses on soft, civilian targets rather than more difficult-to-attack military targets.

The type of weapon used does not define terrorism. For example, using a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device against an International Security Assistance Force firebase in Afghanistan would be considered an act of irregular warfare, but using it in an attack on a hotel in Kabul would be considered an act of terrorism. This means that militant actors can employ conventional warfare tactics, unconventional warfare tactics and terrorism during the same campaign depending on the situation.

Terrorist attacks are relatively easy to conduct if they are directed against soft targets and if the assailant is not concerned with escaping after the attack, as was the case in the Mumbai attacks in 2008. While authorities in many countries have been quite successful in foiling attacks over the past couple of years, governments simply do not have the resources to guard everything. When even police states cannot protect everything, some terrorist attacks invariably will succeed in the open societies of the West.

Terrorist attacks tend to be theatrical, exerting a strange hold over the human imagination. They often create a unique sense of terror dwarfing reactions to natural disasters many times greater in magnitude. For example, more than 227,000 people died in the 2004 Asian tsunami versus fewer than 3,000 on 9/11, yet the 9/11 attacks produced a worldwide sense of terror and a geopolitical reaction that has had a profound and unparalleled impact on world events over the past decade.

Cycles and Shifts

A number of events last week illustrate the changes happening in the terrorism realm and demonstrate that, while terrorism may change, it is not going to end.

On Feb. 17, the FBI arrested a Moroccan man near the U.S. Capitol in Washington who allegedly sought to conduct a suicide attack on the building. The suspect, Amine el Khalifi, is a clear example of the shift in the jihadist threat from one based on the al Qaeda core group to one primarily deriving from grassroots jihadists. As Stratfor has noted for several years, while these grassroots jihadists pose a more diffuse threat because they are harder for national intelligence and law enforcement agencies to focus on than hierarchical groups, the threat they pose is less severe because they generally lack the terrorist tradecraft required to conduct a large-scale attack. Because they lack such tradecraft, these grassroots militants tend to seek assistance to conduct their plots. This assistance usually involves acquiring explosives or firearms, as in the el Khalifi case, where an FBI informant posing as a jihadist leader provided the suspect with an inert suicide vest and a submachine gun prior to the suspect's arrest.

While many in the media tend to ridicule individuals like el Khalifi as inept, it is important to remember that had he succeeded in finding a real jihadist facilitator rather than a federal informant, he could have killed many people in an attack. Richard Reid, who many people refer to as the "Kramer of al Qaeda" after the bumbling character from the television show Seinfeld, came very close to taking down a jumbo jet full of people over the Atlantic because he had been equipped and dispatched by others.

Still, the fact remains that the jihadist threat now predominantly stems from unequipped grassroots wannabes rather than teams of highly trained operatives sent to the United States from overseas, like the team that executed the 9/11 attacks. This demonstrates how the jihadist threat has diminished in recent years, a trend we expect to continue. This will allow Washington to increasingly focus attention on things other than jihadism, such as the fragmentation of Europe, the transformation of global economic production and Iran's growing regional power. It will mark the beginning of a new geopolitical cycle.

Last week also brought us a series of events highlighting how terrorism may manifest itself in the new cycle. On Feb. 13, Israeli diplomatic vehicles in New Delhi, India, and Tbilisi, Georgia, were targeted with explosive devices. In Tbilisi, a grenade hidden under a diplomatic vehicle was discovered before it could detonate. In New Delhi, a sticky bomb placed on the back of a diplomatic vehicle wounded the wife of the Israeli defense attache as she headed to pick up her children from school.

On Feb. 14, an Iranian man was arrested after being wounded in an explosion at a rented house in Bangkok. The blast reportedly occurred as a group was preparing improvised explosive devices for use against Israeli targets in Bangkok. Two other Iranians were later arrested (one in Malaysia), and Thai authorities are seeking three more Iranian citizens, two of whom have reportedly returned to Iran, alleged to have assisted in the plot.

While these recent Iranian plots failed, they nonetheless highlight how the Iranians are using terrorism as a tactic in retaliation for attacks Israel and Israeli surrogates have conducted against individuals associated with Iran's nuclear program.

It is also important to bear in mind as this new geopolitical cycle begins that terrorism does not just emanate from foreign governments, major subnational actors or even transnational radical ideologies like jihadism. As we saw in the July 2011 attacks in Norway conducted by Anders Breivik and in older cases involving suspects like Eric Rudolph, Timothy McVeigh and Theodore Kaczynski in the United States, native-born individuals who have a variety of grievances with the government or society can carry out terrorist attacks. Such grievances will certainly persist.

Geopolitical cycles will change, and these changes may cause a shift in who employs terrorism and how it is employed. But as a tactic, terrorism will continue no matter what the next geopolitical cycle brings.

The Myth of the End of Terrorism COPYRIGHT STRATFOR.COM

New Hampshire used to be a beacon of common sense in the north east.

2012-02-22T23:42:00.000-06:00

Then we hear about crap like this.
Man said he fired to stop burglar, now faces felony charges

FARMINGTON — A 61-year-old man is facing felony charges after he said he fired a shot into the ground to apprehend a burglar Saturday afternoon.

After discovering someone had rummaged through the drawers and taken items from his home on Ten Rod Road, Dennis Fleming said he grabbed a .38 caliber handgun from a shelf, went outside and spotted a man with a backpack walking down the road.

“It's a violation. I was pissed,” Fleming said, adding he realized he should have called police, but wasn't sure officers would arrive in time.

The sound of a crash at a neighbor's home — just over 1,000 feet away — drew Fleming's attention; he spotted the same man he'd seen on the road coming out of his neighbor's window.

Fleming said he wasn't sure he could stop the man, so he fired his pistol once into the ground — far off to the side — to detain the man, later identified as Joseph Hebert, 27, of 70 Bunker St.

“I just wanted him to take me serious,” Fleming said. “He did.”

Fleming said he unloaded the pistol and put it on a nearby rock after a couple of his neighbors arrived to restrain Hebert, who police said had broken his heel jumping out of Fleming's second-floor window.

Bastard will probably sue the owner...

After searching the backpack, Fleming said he found two pocket watches, some decorative pins, a handful of rubber bands, some rubber gloves and some tape that Hebert had taken from his house.

...Police Chief Scott Roberge said officers had contacted the Strafford County Attorney's Office, which recommended Fleming be charged with reckless conduct, a class B felony, for discharging his weapon.

“My understanding is that he (Fleming) fired a warning shot,” Roberge said.

Strafford County Attorney Thomas Velardi could not be reached for comment.

Fleming said he takes responsibility for his actions, which could result in 3 1/2 to 7 years in prison if he is convicted.

“I'm hoping it won't come to that, but I've got broad shoulders, so I'll deal with it,” Fleming said, adding he has 14 grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.

“Even knowing what I face, I would do it again,” Fleming said.

Fleming said he's surprised at the reaction of his neighbors, many of who have shaken his hand and thanked him.

“This is something that has struck a chord — nationwide,” Fleming said, noting he's received a tremendous amount of support from around the area and has been contacted by people as far away as the Midwest and Utah.

Herbert, who remains at Strafford County Jail, entered no plea to the three felony charges — two counts of burglary and possession of Vicodin — during his video arraignment in Rochester District Court Tuesday.

He admitted to being an addict and asked to be released so he could get the help he needs. Herbert, who appeared on crutches, also asked to be confined at his home, arguing he is not a flight risk, as he broke his heel.

“I've been very cooperative to this point,” Herbert said, adding he'd showed police several homes he allegedly stole from in town.

The prosecution argued against releasing Herbert, noting he was convicted of possession of controlled drugs, criminal threatening, robbery, criminal mischief and for violating probation in New Hampshire between 2004 and 2006. He added Herbert also was twice charged with breaking and entering in Massachusetts in 2010 and 2011....

...Fleming, who was released on personal recognizance, is scheduled to be arraigned in Rochester District Court March 20.

Hopefully the grand jury will look at the DA and say "You're kidding...you want me to indict this man for protecting his friend's house...not here pal.." If Mr Flaming has a legal defense fund I will post it and donate to it.

Is there any question why Iran wants nukes...

2012-02-22T20:28:00.000-06:00

From the widow of an assassinated nuke scientist.
Wife of Assassinated Scientist: Annihilation of Israel "Mostafa's Ultimate Goal"

TEHRAN (FNA)- The wife of Martyr Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan Behdast, who was assassinated by Mossad agents in Tehran in January, reiterated on Tuesday that her husband sought the annihilation of the Zionist regime wholeheartedly.

"Mostafa's ultimate goal was the annihilation of Israel," Fatemeh Bolouri Kashani told FNA on Tuesday.

Bolouri Kashani also underlined that her spouse loved any resistance figure in his life who was willing to fight the Zionist regime and supported the rights of the oppressed Palestinian nation.

Iran's 32-year-old Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan Behdast, a chemistry professor and a deputy director of commerce at Natanz uranium enrichment facility, was assassinated during the morning rush-hour in the capital early January. His driver was also killed in the terrorist attack.

Roshan was killed on the second anniversary of the martyrdom of Iranian university professor and nuclear scientist, Massoud Ali Mohammadi, who was also assassinated in a terrorist bomb attack in Tehran in January 2010.

The method used for Roshan's assassination was similar to the 2010 terrorist bomb attacks against the then university professor, Fereidoun Abbassi Davani - who is now the head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization - and his colleague Majid Shahriari. Abbasi Davani survived the attack, while Shahriari was martyred.

Another Iranian scientist, Dariush Rezaeinejad, was also assassinated through the same method on 23 July 2011...

Granted an Iranian news agency is not exactly an objective news source but it's not a rag like the NY Times. Now it's open that they are building a nuclear capability for one purpose, to destroy Israel. A couple of weeks ago an Israeli official said (paraphrasing) "President Obama should stop warning Israel about attacking Iran and start warning Iran abut threatening Idrael"

At least the Israeli's don't take this moron seriously.

Israel dismisses warnings from US about attacking Iran

Israel’s foreign minister on Wednesday said it's not the business of the United States whether his country decides to attack Iran.

Foreign Minister Avigor Lieberman said that warnings from the United States and Russia about an attack would not affect Israel’s decision-making.

“[It] is not their business,” Lieberman said in an interview with an Israeli TV station Wednesday, according to The Associated Press.
“The security of the citizens of Israel, the future of the state of Israel, this is the Israeli government’s responsibility,” he said...

I hate to say it Mr Lieberman but Israel cannot rely on America's government right now. Hopefully after January you can.

Security Weekly: The State of the World: A Framework, February 21, 2012

2012-02-21T08:15:00.000-06:00

Editor's Note: This is the first installment of a new series on the national strategies of today's global power and other regional powers. This installment establishes a framework for understanding the current state of the world.

By George Friedman

The evolution of geopolitics is cyclical. Powers rise, fall and shift. Changes occur in every generation in an unending ballet. However, the period between 1989 and 1991 was unique in that a long cycle of human history spanning hundreds of years ended, and with it a shorter cycle also came to a close. The world is still reverberating from the events of that period.

On Dec. 25, 1991, an epoch ended. On that day the Soviet Union collapsed, and for the first time in almost 500 years no European power was a global power, meaning no European state integrated economic, military and political power on a global scale. What began in 1492 with Europe smashing its way into the world and creating a global imperial system had ended. For five centuries, one European power or another had dominated the world, whether Portugal, Spain, France, England or the Soviet Union. Even the lesser European powers at the time had some degree of global influence.

After 1991 the only global power left was the United States, which produced about 25 percent of the world's gross domestic product (GDP) each year and dominated the oceans. Never before had the United States been the dominant global power. Prior to World War II, American power had been growing from its place at the margins of the international system, but it was emerging on a multipolar stage. After World War II, it found itself in a bipolar world, facing off with the Soviet Union in a struggle in which American victory was hardly a foregone conclusion.

The United States has been the unchallenged global power for 20 years, but its ascendancy has left it off-balance for most of this time, and imbalance has been the fundamental characteristic of the global system in the past generation. Unprepared institutionally or psychologically for its position, the United States has swung from an excessive optimism in the 1990s that held that significant conflict was at an end to the wars against militant Islam after 9/11, wars that the United States could not avoid but also could not integrate into a multilayered global strategy. When the only global power becomes obsessed with a single region, the entire world is unbalanced. Imbalance remains the defining characteristic of the global system today.

While the collapse of the Soviet Union ended the European epoch, it also was the end of the era that began in 1945, and it was accompanied by a cluster of events that tend to accompany generational shifts. The 1989-1991 period marked the end of the Japanese economic miracle, the first time the world had marveled at an Asian power's sustained growth rate as the same power's financial system crumbled. The end of the Japanese miracle and the economic problem of integrating East and West Germany both changed the way the global economy worked. The 1991 Maastricht Treaty set the stage for Europe's attempt at integration and was the framework for Europe in the post-Cold War world. Tiananmen Square set the course for China in the next 20 years and was the Chinese answer to a collapsing Soviet empire. It created a structure that allowed for economic development but assured the dominance of the Communist Party. Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait was designed to change the balance of power in the Persian Gulf after the Iraq-Iran war and tested the United States' willingness to go to war after the Cold War.

In 1989-1991 the world changed the way it worked, whether measured in centuries or generations. It was an extraordinary period whose significance is only now emerging. It locked into place a long-term changing of the guard, where North America replaced Europe as the center of the international system. But generations come and go, and we are now in the middle of the first generational shift since the collapse of the European powers, a shift that began in 2008 but is only now working itself out in detail.

What happened in 2008 was one of the financial panics that the global capitalist system periodically suffers. As is frequently the case, these panics first generate political crises within nations, followed by changes in the relations among nations. Of these changes, three in particular are of importance, two of which are directly linked to the 2008 crisis. The first is the European financial crisis and its transformation into a political crisis. The second is the Chinese export crisis and its consequences. The third, indirectly linked to 2008, is the shift in the balance of power in the Middle East in favor of Iran.

The European Crisis

The European crisis represents the single most significant event that followed from the financial collapse of 2008. The vision of the European Union was that an institution that would bind France and Germany together would make the wars that had raged in Europe since 1871 impossible. The vision also assumed that economic integration would both join France and Germany together and create the foundations of a prosperous Europe. Within the context of Maastricht as it evolved, the European vision assumed that the European Union would become a way to democratize and integrate the former Communist countries of Eastern Europe into a single framework.

However, embedded in the idea of the European Union was the idea that Europe could at some point transcend nationalism and emerge as a United States of Europe, a single political federation with a constitution and a unified foreign and domestic policy. It would move from a free trade zone to a unified economic system to a single currency and then to further political integration built around the European Parliament, allowing Europe to emerge as a single country.

Long before this happened, of course, people began to speak of Europe as if it were a single entity. Regardless of the modesty of formal proposals, there was a powerful vision of an integrated European polity. There were two foundations for it. One was the apparent economic and social benefits of a united Europe. The other was that this was the only way that Europe could make its influence felt in the international system. Individually, the European states were not global players, but collectively they had the ability to become just that. In the post-Cold War world, where the United States was the sole and unfettered global power, this was an attractive opportunity.

The European vision was smashed in the aftermath of 2008, when the fundamental instability of the European experiment revealed itself. That vision was built around Germany, the world's second-largest exporter, but Europe's periphery remained too weak to weather the crisis. It was not so much this particular crisis; Europe was not built to withstand any financial crisis. Sooner or later one would come and the unity of Europe would be severely strained as each nation, driven by different economic and social realities, maneuvered in its own interest rather than in the interest of Europe.

There is no question that the Europe of 2012 operates in a very different way than it did in 2007. There is an expectation in some parts that Europe will, in due course, return to its old post-Cold War state, but that is unlikely. The underlying contradictions of the European enterprise are now revealed, and while some European entity will likely survive, it probably will not resemble the Europe envisioned by Maastricht, let alone the grander visions of a United States of Europe. Thus, the only potential counterweight to the United States will not emerge in this generation.

China and the Asian Model

China was similarly struck by the 2008 crisis. Apart from the inevitably cyclical nature of all economies, the Asian model, as seen in Japan and then in 1997 in East and Southeast Asia, provides for prolonged growth followed by profound financial dislocation. Indeed, growth rates do not indicate economic health. Just as it was for Europe, the 2008 financial crisis was the trigger for China.

China's core problem is that more than a billion people live in households earning less than $6 a day, and the majority of those earn less than $3 a day. Social tensions aside, the economic consequence is that China's large industrial plant outstrips Chinese consumer demand. As a result, China must export. However, the recessions after 2008 cut heavily into China's exports, severely affecting GDP growth and threatening the stability of the political system. China confronted the problem with a massive surge in bank lending, driving new investment and supporting GDP growth but also fueling rampant inflation. Inflation created upward pressure on labor costs until China began to lose its main competitive advantage over other countries.

For a generation, Chinese growth has been the engine of the global economic system, just as Japan was in the previous generation. China is not collapsing any more than Japan did. However, it is changing its behavior, and with it the behavior of the international system.

Looking Ahead

If we look at the international system as having three major economic engines, two of them -- Europe and China -- are changing their behavior to be less assertive and less influential in the international system. The events of 2008 did not create these changes; they merely triggered processes that revealed the underlying weaknesses of these two entities.

Somewhat outside the main processes of the international system, the Middle East is undergoing a fundamental shift in its balance of power. The driver in this is not the crisis of 2008 but the consequences of the U.S. was in the region and their termination. With the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, Iran has emerged as the major conventional power in the Persian Gulf and the major influence over Iraq. In addition, with the continued survival of the al Assad regime in Syria through the support of Iran, there is the potential for Iranian influence to stretch from western Afghanistan to the Mediterranean Sea. Even if the al Assad regime fell, Iran would still be well-positioned to assert its claims for primacy in the Persian Gulf.

Just as the processes unleashed in 1989-1991 defined the next 20 years, so, too, will the processes that are being generated now dominate the next generation. Still powerful but acutely off-balance in its domestic and foreign policies, the United States is confronting a changing world without yet having a clear understanding of how to deal with this world or, for that matter, how the shifts in the global system will affect it. For the United States strategically, the fragmentation of Europe, the transformation of global production in the wake of the Chinese economy's climax, and the dramatically increased power of Iran appear as abstract events not directly affecting the United States.

Each of these events will create dangers and opportunities for the United States that it is unprepared to manage. The fragmentation of Europe raises the question of the future of Germany and its relationship with Russia. The movement of production to low-wage countries will create booms in countries hitherto regarded as beyond help (as China was in 1980) and potential zones of instability created by rapid and uneven growth. And, of course, the idea that the Iranian issue can be managed through sanctions is a form of denial rather than a strategy.

Three major areas of the world are in flux: Europe, China and the Persian Gulf. Every country in the world will have to devise a strategy to deal with the new reality, just as 1989-1991 required new strategies. The most important country, the United States, had no strategy after 1991 and has no strategy today. This is the single most important reality of the world. Like the Spaniards, who, in the generation after Columbus' voyage, lacked a clear sense of the reality they had created, Americans have no clear sense of the world they find themselves in. This fact continues to define how the world works.

Therefore, we next turn to American strategy in the next 20 years and consider how it will reshape itself.

The State of the World: A Framework Copyright: STRATFOR.COM

It's almost Mardi Gras...

2012-02-20T19:14:00.000-06:00

A cat's gotta do what a cat's gotta do!

Sums it up well....

2012-02-19T16:15:00.000-06:00

For those of us who have memories (not fond) of the Carter years, enduring the current regime is déjà vu all over again.

Thanks Chris W for the link!

Captain we're taking fire from below!

2012-02-18T19:29:00.000-06:00

A few weeks ago I posted on how the NY Police Department was going to use drones to observe activity in the city. Now it looks like someone didn't appreciate being observed. Have to say it couldn't have happened to a nice group of people.

Animal rights group says drone shot down
A remote-controlled aircraft owned by an animal rights group was reportedly shot down near Broxton Bridge Plantation Sunday near Ehrhardt, S.C.
Steve Hindi, president of SHARK (SHowing Animals Respect and Kindness), said his group was preparing to launch its Mikrokopter drone to video what he called a live pigeon shoot on Sunday when law enforcement officers and an attorney claiming to represent the privately-owned plantation near Ehrhardt tried to stop the aircraft from flying.

"It didn't work; what SHARK was doing was perfectly legal," Hindi said in a news release. "Once they knew nothing was going to stop us, the shooting stopped and the cars lined up to leave."

He said the animal rights group decided to send the drone up anyway.

"Seconds after it hit the air, numerous shots rang out," Hindi said in the release. "As an act of revenge for us shutting down the pigeon slaughter, they had shot down our copter."

He claimed the shooters were "in tree cover" and "fled the scene on small motorized vehicles."

"It is important to note how dangerous this was, as they were shooting toward and into a well-travelled highway," Hindi stated in the release...

...The incident report went on to state that "once shot, the helicopter lost lift and crash landed on the roadway of U.S. 601."...

...Hindi estimated damage to the drone at around $200 to $300...

..."This was SHARK's first encounter with the Broxton Bridge Plantation, but it will certainly not be the last," Hindi said in the release. "We are already making plans for a considerably upscaled action in 2013."

Sorry pal you fly over my property like that and get hit, oh well. This group was engaging in a legal activity (dove hunting is still legal in SC last time I checked) so I for one will gladly send a few bird shot shells to this group.

Officer Down

2012-02-18T18:00:00.002-06:00

Sergeant Michael Todd May
Monongalia County West Virginia Sheriff's Department
End of Watch: Saturday, February 18, 2012
Age: 41
Tour: 10 years

Sergeant Michael May was killed while pursuing a vehicle across the West Virginia - Pennsylvania state line.

The vehicle had been involved in a hit-and-run accident shortly before 1:00 am. Approximately 20 minutes later, officers from the Granville Police Department stopped the vehicle and called for assistance from the Monongalia County Sheriff's Department. The driver refused to exit the vehicle and then drove away with officers in pursuit.

The pursuit crossed into Pennsylvania and the driver got onto I-79 southbound back towards West Virginia. Approximately one mile north of the state line the driver rammed Sergeant May's patrol car, causing it to crash. Sergeant May was transported to a hospital in Morgantown, West Virginia, where he died a short time later.  

The driver of the vehicle was charged with homicide by vehicle in Pennsylvania.  

Sergeant May had served with the Monongalia County Sheriff's Department for 10 years.

Rest in Peace Bro…We’ll Continue The Watch

Day is done, Gone the sun, From the lake, From the hills, From the sky. All is well, Safely rest, God is nigh.

Ebony and Ivory....

2012-02-18T10:47:00.000-06:00

There is no black or white...only green. From The Smoking Gun:

In another instance of harmony in post-racial America, a white Aryan Nations member joined forces with a black gang member to distribute methamphetamine in Missouri, according to federal investigators.

The partnership between white supremacist Richard Treis, 38, and Robert “Biz” Swinney, 22, was torn asunder by an undercover Drug Enforcement Administration probe that resulted in this month’s indictment of Treis, Swinney, and five codefendants on a variety of drug distribution and conspiracy charges.

According to investigators, Swinney allegedly marshaled a network of friends, relatives, and fellow gang members in St. Louis to purchase decongestants containing pseudoephedrine from various stores. Swinney then allegedly sold the pseudoephedrine to Treis, who cooked it down into meth.

If convicted of the various felony charges, each man faces decades in prison (where they would be unlikely to share a cell)...

Good to see we're making progress in racial relations!

The entire campaign in one cartoon

2012-02-17T22:44:00.000-06:00

"The problems we face today exist because the people who work for a living are outnumbered by those who vote for a living."

Thanks Mark C for the cartoon.

Officer Down

2012-02-17T10:35:00.000-06:00

Detective David White
Clay County Florida Sheriff's Office,
End of Watch: Thursday, February 16, 2012
Age: 35
Tour: 9 years

Detective David White was shot and killed during a raid of a suspected meth lab on Alligator Boulevard at approximately 6:30 p.m. Officers engaged a suspect as they approached the front of the house, and Detective White suffered a fatal gunshot wound.

Another detective was shot and wounded while participating in the raid. One suspect was shot and killed by officers as he fled out the back of the house. Several suspects were arrested.

Detective White was a military veteran and served with the Clay County Sheriff's Department for nine years. He is survived by his wife and two children.

Rest in Peace Bro…We’ll Continue The Watch

Day is done, Gone the sun, From the lake, From the hills, From the sky. All is well, Safely rest, God is nigh.

A daughter of Jersey and a fallen Marine

2012-02-16T18:00:00.000-06:00

I have to agree with this woman. Whitney Houston tragically died but it was by her own actions and in actions. This mother lost her son in the line of battle. Flags should be lowered for Phillip McGeath, a Marine who died serving his country. Not for a multimillionaire who squandered her fortune and who's actions directly led to her death.

Mother Of Fallen Marine Offended By Half-Mast Flag For Houston « CBS Dallas / Fort Worth

ARLINGTON (CBSDFW.COM) – Flags will be lowered in New Jersey Saturday, the day of Whitney Houston’s funeral. But a Marine mom in Arlington says it’s an honor Houston doesn’t deserve.

When Phyllis McGeath heard Gov. Chris Christie had ordered flags lowered to half-staff for Houston, she said she felt a pain deep inside her.

“I was hurt and offended. Disappointed. Saddened,” she said. “I felt like the honor that was given to my son was tarnished.”

McGeath had three sons who were active duty Marines.

Her oldest, Philip, was killed by a suicide bomber just four weeks ago in Afghanistan. He was 25.

“They killed my son.They took his body away from me,” she said, overcome by emotion.

Arizona, the McGeath’s former home state, lowered their flags in his honor.

“That honor meant a lot to me,” McGeath said.

McGeath says Houston is not deserving of that same honor.

“Nothing against Ms. Houston because she was a beautiful singer and I was a fan for years,” McGeath said.

But, “It was like putting them on the same level. And I know how my son lived. And I know through the media how Ms. Houston lived,” she said.

New Jersey’s Governor, Chris Christie, defended his decision to lower the flags in his state saying he wasn’t honoring Houston as a role model but as “a daughter of New Jersey.”...

Again she died not in the line of duty for other but by a tragic accident. A formal symbol of morning is not requried.

...Christie is a conservative Republican. He’s also a former U.S. Attorney who recently called for mandatory drug treatment for non-violent offenders. But he said Houston’s substance abuse issues shouldn’t negate her achievements.

“There but for the grace of God go I,” he said...

One, to whomever wrote this crap Christie may be a Republican but he's no conservative. Also I don't question Houston's achievements in music/arts or that anyone can fall victim of drug abuse. But that is not giving you life for something greater than yourself. A Soldier, Sailor, Airman or Marine fall in the line of duty he was serving something more than himself. Ms Houston was serving what when she died?

That Marine gave a lot...much more than Ms Houston ever did.

...Christie approved a similar order when Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band member Clarence Clemons died last June....

And you had no business doing that with all due respect.

Governor, with all due respect there are other ways you can honor a "daughter of New Jersey" such as a proclamation, resolutions, etc. Lowering of the flag to half staff is reserved for more deserving people and yes, that Marine deserved it. Ms Houston did not.

Ike said it best when he was asked if he ever made a mistake in his term as President.

2012-02-16T15:00:00.006-06:00

“Yes, two and they are both sitting on the Supreme Court!”

After Justice Sandra Day O’Connor announced her retirement, a leftist (ain’t they all) columnist of the Washington Post commented on how she came into her time on the bench a conservative but she “grew” and “matured”, discovering the Constitution must “breath” to modern times.

In other words she starting to find things she liked in the document and people are too stupid to see them.

Now we come to this judge in the Ohio who seems to have had a change of heart on the death penalty. In and of itself I have no issue with. If over his life he changes view on a major issue, so be it. But to stand up there and say he can give a fair judgment on this issue is beyond credibility

Senior Associate Justice Paul Pfeifer

Ohio Justice Rejects Death Penalty Law He Wrote « CBS Cleveland

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — As a young state senator 30 years ago, Paul Pfeifer helped write Ohio’s death penalty law. Today, as the senior member of the state Supreme Court, he’s trying to eliminate it.

It’s not uncommon for sitting judges to change their mind on the death penalty — U.S. Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun famously said in 1994 he would no longer “tinker with the machinery of death” — but Pfeifer may be the only one to argue so ardently against a capital punishment law he himself created, and yet continue to rule on death penalty cases.

“I have concluded that the death sentence makes no sense to me at this point when you can have life without the possibility of parole,” Pfeifer said in his most recent public comments, testifying in December in favor a bill to abolish Ohio’s law. “I don’t see what society gains from that.”

Fair enough Mr Pfeifer, if you don’t think society should execute someone, so be it. But you are lying if you say you can be fair and impartial on a capital case. If you recluse yourself, fair enough. But I think that won’t happen.
…At least two county prosecutors say Pfeifer should stop ruling on death sentences, including Hamilton County prosecutor Joe Deters, who said that Pfeifer’s actions were inappropriate. “It gives rise to a credible inference that he cannot be fair to both sides,” Deters said recently.

Bettman, a University of Cincinnati law professor and former state appeals court judge….

…Pfeifer, a Republican, has always charted his own course on the court. For years he was a member of a foursome — two Democrats and two moderate Republicans — dubbed “the Gang of Four” for a series of 4-3 rulings that critics said were anti-business and favored Democrats and their causes …

…Pfeifer made similar statements in court opinions over the years. He took his position public in 2001, calling unsuccessfully for an independent panel to review the law. He began to complain that prosecutors were overusing the statute, seeking death sentences in domestic quarrels that went bad instead of for the worst of the worst killers.

He often cites the case of Richard Nields, who murdered his girlfriend in their southwestern Ohio home in 1997, then stole her car and travelers’ checks, as an example of overreaching by prosecutors.

“This case is not about robbery,” Pfeifer wrote in his dissent to the court’s 2001 decision upholding Nields’ death sentence. “It is about alcoholism, rage and rejection and about Nields’ inability to cope with any of them.” Ultimately, Gov. Ted Strickland agreed and in 2010 changed Nields’ sentence to life without parole.

In January 2011, Pfeifer made his strongest statements to date, calling on Gov. John Kasich to empty death row.

Pfeifer says he’s required as a judge to take positions to make laws better, hence his current stand. He’s also required to rule according to the law and the Constitution, which he says he does. Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor says she’s comfortable Pfeifer is following the law and not showing bias

This makes less sense than having George Stephanopoulos hosting a Republican debate or Danny Rather interviewing a Bush. Forgive me, it goes beyond the pale.

Mr Pfeifer, show some integrity and just recluse yourself.

Security Weekly: Meth in Mexico: A Turning Point in the Drug War? February 16, 2012

2012-02-16T08:32:00.000-06:00

By Ben West

Mexican authorities announced Feb. 8 the largest seizure of methamphetamine in Mexican history -- and possibly the largest ever anywhere -- on a ranch outside of Guadalajara. The total haul was 15 tons of pure methamphetamine along with a laboratory capable of producing all the methamphetamine seized. While authorities are not linking the methamphetamine to any specific criminal group, Guadalajara is a known stronghold of the Sinaloa Federation, and previous seizures there have been connected to the group.

Methamphetamine, a synthetic drug manufactured in personal labs for decades, is nothing new in Mexico or the United States. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has led numerous crusades against the drug, increasing regulations on its ingredients to try to keep it from gaining a foothold in the United States. While the DEA's efforts have succeeded in limiting production of the drug in the United States, consumption has risen steadily over the past two decades. The increasing DEA pressure on U.S. suppliers and the growing demand for methamphetamine have driven large-scale production of the drug outside the borders of the United States. Given Mexico's proximity and the pervasiveness of organized criminal elements seeking new markets, it makes sense that methamphetamine would be produced on an industrial scale there. Indeed, Mexico has provided an environment for a scale of production far greater than anything ever seen in the United States.

But last week's methamphetamine seizure sheds light on a deeper shift in organized criminal activity in Mexico -- one that could mark a breakthrough in the violent stalemate that has existed between the Sinaloa Federation, Los Zetas and the government for the past five years and has led to an estimated 50,000 deaths. It also reveals a pattern in North American organized crime activity that can be seen throughout the 20th century as well as a business opportunity that could transform criminal groups in Mexico from the drug trafficking intermediaries they are today to controllers of an independent and profitable illicit market.

While the trafficking groups in Mexico are commonly called "cartels" (even Stratfor uses the term), they are not really cartels. A cartel is a combination of groups cooperating to control the supply of a commodity. The primary purpose of a cartel is to set the price of a commodity so that buyers cannot negotiate lower prices. The current conflict in Mexico over cocaine and marijuana smuggling routes shows that there are deep rifts between rival groups like the Sinaloa Federation and Los Zetas. There is no sign that they are cooperating with each other to set the price of cocaine or marijuana. Also, since most of the Mexican criminal groups are involved in a diverse array of criminal activities, their interests go beyond drug trafficking. They are perhaps most accurately described as "transnational criminal organizations" (TCOs), the label currently favored by the DEA.

Examples from the Past

While the level of violence in Mexico right now is unprecedented, it is important to remember that the Mexican TCOs are businesses. They do use violence in conducting business, but their top priority is to make profits, not kill people. The history of organized crime shows many examples of groups engaging in violence to control an illegal product. During the early 20th century in North America, to take advantage of Prohibition in the United States, organized criminal empires were built around the bootlegging industry. After the repeal of Prohibition, gambling and casinos became the hot market. Control over Las Vegas and other major gambling hubs was a business both dangerous and profitable. Control over the U.S. heroin market was consolidated and then dismantled during the 1960s and 1970s. Then came cocaine and the rise in power, wealth and violence of Colombian groups like the Medellin and Cali cartels.

But as U.S. and Colombian law enforcement cracked down on the Colombian cartels -- interdicting them in Colombia and closing down their Caribbean smuggling corridors -- Colombian producers had to turn to the Mexicans to traffic cocaine through Mexico to the United States. To this day, however, Colombian criminal groups descended from the Medellin and Cali cartels control the cultivation and production of cocaine in South America, while Mexican groups increasingly oversee the trafficking of the drug to the United States, Europe and Africa.

The Mexican Weakness

While violence has been used in the past to eliminate or coerce competitors and physically take control of an illegal market, it has not proved to be a solution in recent years for Mexican TCOs. The Medellin cartel became infamous for attacking Colombian state officials and competitors who tried to weaken its grasp over the cocaine market. Going back further, Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel is thought to have been murdered over disagreements about his handling of the Flamingo Hotel in Las Vegas. Before that, Prohibition saw numerous murders over control of liquor shipments and territory. In Mexico, we are seeing an escalating level of such violence, but few of the business resolutions that would be expected to come about as a result.

Geography helps explain this. In Mexico, the Sierra Madre mountain range splits the east coast and the west from the center. The Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean coastal plains tend to develop their own power bases separate from each other.

Mexican drug traffickers are also split by market forces. With Colombian criminal groups still largely controlling the production of cocaine in jungle laboratories, Mexican traffickers are essentially middlemen. They must run the gauntlet of U.S.-led international interdiction efforts by using a combination of Central American traffickers, corruption and street-gang enforcers. They also have to move the cocaine across the U.S. border, where it gets distributed by hundreds of street gangs.

Profit is the primary motivation at every step, and each hurdle the Mexican traffickers have to clear cuts into their profit margins. The cocaine producers in Colombia, Peru and Bolivia can play the Sinaloa Federation and Los Zetas (as well as others) off of each other to strengthen their own bargaining position. And even though keeping the traffickers split appears to create massive amounts of violence in Mexico, it benefits the politicians and officials there, who can leverage at least the presence of a competitor for better bribes and payoffs.

For Mexican drug traffickers, competition is bad for the bottom line, since it allows other actors to exploit each side to get a larger share of the market. Essentially, everyone else in the cocaine market benefits by keeping the traffickers split. The more actors involved in cocaine trafficking, the harder it is to control it.

The Solution

Historically, organized criminal groups have relied on control of a market for their source of wealth and power. But the current situation in Mexico, and the cocaine trade in general, prevents the Mexican groups (or anyone) from controlling the market outright. As long as geography and market forces keep the traffickers split, all sides in Mexico will try to use violence to get more control over territory and market access. We assume that Mexico's geography will not change dramatically any time soon, but market forces are much more temporal.

Mexican criminal organizations can overcome their weakness in the cocaine market by investing the money they have earned (billions of dollars, according to the most conservative estimates) into the control of other markets. Ultimately, cocaine is impossible for the Mexicans to control because the coca plant can only grow in sufficient quantity in the foothills of the Andes. It would be prohibitively expensive for the Mexicans to take over control of coca cultivation and cocaine production there. Mexican criminal organizations are increasing their presence in the heroin market, but while they can grow poppies in Mexico and produce black-tar heroin, Afghanistan still controls a dominant share of the white heroin market -- around 90 percent.

What Mexicans can control is the methamphetamine market. What we are seeing in Mexico right now -- unprecedented amounts of the seized drug -- is reminiscent of what we saw over the past century in the infancy of the illegal liquor, gambling, heroin and cocaine markets: an organized criminal group industrializing production in or control of a loosely organized industry and using that control to set prices and increase its power. Again, while illegal methamphetamine has been produced in the United States for decades, regulatory pressure and law enforcement efforts have kept it at a small scale; seizures are typically measured in pounds or kilograms and producers are on the run.

Mexican producers have also been in the market for a long time, but over the past year we have seen seizures go from being measured in kilograms to being measured in metric tons. In other words, we are seeing evidence that methamphetamine production has increased several orders of magnitude and is fast becoming an industrialized process.

In addition to the 15 tons seized last week, we saw a record seizure of 675 tons of methylamine, a key ingredient of methamphetamine, in Mexico in December. From 2010 to 2011, seizures of precursor chemicals like methylamine in Mexico increased 400 percent, from 400 tons to 1,600 tons. These most recent reports are similar to reports in the 1920s of U.S. liquor seizures going from barrels to shiploads, which indicated bootlegging was being conducted on an industrial scale. They are also eerily similar to the record cocaine seizure in 1984 in Tranquilandia, Colombia, when Colombian National Police uncovered a network of jungle cocaine labs along with 13.8 metric tons of cocaine. It was the watershed moment, when authorities moved from measuring cocaine busts in kilograms to measuring them in tons, and it marked the Medellin cartel's rise to power over the cocaine market.

A True Mexican Criminal Industry?

Anyone can make methamphetamine, but it is a huge organizational, financial and legal challenge to make it on the industrial level that appears to be happening in Mexico. The main difference between the U.S. labs and the Mexican labs is the kind of input chemicals they use. The U.S. labs use pseudoephedrine, a pharmaceutical product heavily regulated by the DEA, as a starting material, while Mexican labs use methylamine, a chemical with many industrial applications that is more difficult to regulate. And while pseudoephedrine comes in small individual packages of cold pills, methylamine is bought in 208-liter (55-gallon) barrels. The Mexican process requires experienced chemists who have mastered synthesizing methamphetamine on a large scale, which gives them an advantage over the small-time amateurs working in U.S. methamphetamine labs.

Thus, while methamphetamine consumption has been steadily growing in the United States for the past two decades -- and at roughly $100 per gram, unpure methamphetamine is just as profitable on the street as cocaine -- it is even more profitable for Mexican traffickers. Methamphetamine does not come with the overhead costs of purchasing cocaine from Colombians and trafficking valuable merchandise through some of the most dangerous countries in the Western Hemisphere. Precursor materials such as methylamine used in methamphetamine production are cheap, and East Asian producers appear to be perfectly willing to sell the chemicals to Mexico. And because methamphetamine is a synthetic drug, its production does not depend on agriculture like cocaine and marijuana production does. There is no need to control large swaths of cropland and there is less risk of losing product to adverse weather or eradication efforts.

For the Mexican TCOs, industrializing and controlling the methamphetamine market offers a level of real control over a market that is not possible with cocaine. We expect fighting over the methamphetamine market to maintain violence at its current levels, but once a group comes out on top it will have far more resources to expel or absorb rival TCOs. This process may not sound ideal, but methamphetamine could pick the winner in the Mexican drug war.

Security Weekly: Meth in Mexico: A Turning Point in the Drug War? Copyright STRATFOR.COM

A Tale of Two Brainworms

2012-02-16T00:07:00.001-06:00

Been a musical day and I'm going to go postal before it's over.

All week I've had this one song in my head, Greatest Love of All by Whitney Houston. A little history. This is without question the most f#$%ing overplayed song in the history of music. Summer of 1986 I was driving all night to Fort Knox KY and what do I hear over four states on dozens of radio stations. Yep, Ms Houston. I make it to my friend's apartment and as I'm walking up the stairs what do I hear coming out of his apartment. GLOA. Pardon me while I puke and I was ready to get back in the car and just drive all night again.

I leave the next day and all the way to Fort Riley, Kansas. Yep, all over the freaking state.

And to make it perfect my company commander loved the song and we had one cadet who sang it. The cadet really did have a beautiful voice but I finally looked up and asked, "God, what have I done to piss you off this much!?"

Since this morning I've been having a battle between Whitney and What a Wonderful World from the Sons of Anarchy soundtrack.

Great album...and getting the Whitney song away from head.

Have a great almost weekend!

Honey, this is my day care center!

2012-02-15T10:26:00.000-06:00

Thanks Dawn for the picture

What's going on in the World Today 120215

2012-02-15T08:00:00.004-06:00

Kinda back on board...hope you had a great weekend!

HYPERLINKS MAY REQUIRE AN EMAIL:

USA

Except where noted courtesy STRATFOR.COM

EUROPE

NOTHING SIGNIFICANT TO REPORT

ASIA

Limits in the Modernization of India's Air Force | STRATFOR

China's Looming Pension Crisis | STRATFOR

AFRICA

NOTHING SIGNIFICANT TO REPORT

RUSSIA

The Next Stage of Russia's Resurgence: Central Asia | STRATFOR

IRAN

Iran's Deterrence Strategy in the Strait of Hormuz | STRATFOR

Iran: Tehran Director-General Vows To Confront Feb. 14 Rallies February 11, 2012

Tehran Governor-General Morteza Tamaddon said Feb. 11 that he will confront any opposition rallies held Feb. 14 in the city, Iranian news agency YJC reported. Tamaddon Hsaid all security systems are on alert after social media and opposition groups called for rallies.

Iran: Homemade Nuclear Rods To Be Placed In Research Reactor February 15, 2012

Nuclear fuel rods will be placed in a Tehran research reactor Feb. 15, Iranian deputy nuclear negotiator Ali Bagheri said, Xinhua reported, citing the semi-official ISNA news agency. Bagheri said Iran has begun enriching uranium to 20 percent itself since Western countries are not assisting.

IRAQ

Iraq: Turkey Strikes PKK Targets February 12, 2012

Turkish fighter jets carried out airstrikes Feb. 11 against two Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) targets in the Zap and Hakurk regions of northern Iraq, the Turkish military said, Today's Zaman reported Feb. 12.

Iraq: Weapons, Jihadists Moving To Syria - Official February 11, 2012

Iraqi Deputy Interior Minister Adnan al-Assadi said Feb. 11 that weapons and jihadists are now moving from Iraq to Syria to oppose the regime of Syrian President Bashar al Assad, AFP reported. Al-Assadi said the weapons are being transported from Baghdad to Mosul and then into Syria through crossings near Rabia and the Syrian city of Abu Kamal. He said weapon prices are rising because they are being sent to the Syrian opposition.

ISRAEL

A Concerted Effort To Kill Israeli Diplomats? | STRATFOR

Israel: Iran Behind Attacks In India, Georgia February 13, 2012

Iran and Hezbollah are behind the car bomb attack on Israeli officials in India and the thwarted attack in Tbilisi, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Feb. 13, Haaretz reported. Israel will continue to work against the terror Iran produces, Netanyahu said. There have been several attempts to target Israeli citizens and Jews in different countries, but these attacks were stopped through cooperation with local forces, Netanyahu added.

AFGHANISTAN

NOTHING SIGNIFICANT TO REPORT

MIDDLE EAST

Special Report: Hamas In Transition STRATFOR

SOUTH OF THE BORDER

Polarization and Sustained Violence in Mexico's Cartel War | STRATFOR

MISC

Geopolitical Calendar: Week of Feb. 13, 2012

Now this report brings up an interesting question

2012-02-14T19:46:00.001-06:00

I remember hearing something about this late last year. Now beside the physical evidence we know this is likely because the Northern Fleet is kinda know for it's nuclear accidents. But again, read the article and see if the question comes out at you?

Russia faced major nuclear disaster in 2011-report
By Guy Faulconbridge

MOSCOW, Feb 14 (Reuters) - Russia came close to nuclear disaster in late December when a blaze engulfed a nuclear-powered submarine carrying atomic weapons, a leading Russian magazine reported, contradicting official assurances that it was not armed.

Russian officials said at the time that all nuclear weapons aboard the Yekaterinburg nuclear submarine had been unloaded well before a fire engulfed the 167-metre (550 feet) vessel and there had been no risk of a radiation leak.

But the respected Vlast weekly magazine quoted several sources in the Russian navy as saying that throughout the fire on Dec. 29 the submarine was carrying 16 R-29 intercontinental ballistic missiles, each armed with four nuclear warheads.

"Russia, for a day, was on the brink of the biggest catastrophe since the time of Chernobyl," Vlast reported. The 1986 disaster in modern-day Ukraine is regarded as the world's worst nuclear accident.

Neither the Russian Defence Ministry nor the office of Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, who has responsibility for military matters, would immediately comment on the report. A spokesman for the navy could not be contacted.

SPARKS FLY

The fire started when welding sparks ignited wooden scaffolding around the 18,200-tonne submarine at the Roslyakovo docks, 1,500 km (900 miles) north of Moscow and one of the main shipyards used by Russia's northern fleet.

The rubber covering of the submarine then caught fire, sending flames and black smoke 10 metres (30 feet) above the stricken vessel. Firemen battled the blaze for a day and a night before partially sinking the submarine to douse the flames, according to media reports.

Vlast reported that immediately after the fire the Yekaterinburg sailed to the navy's weapons store, an unusual trip for a damaged submarine supposedly carrying no weapons and casting doubt on assurances that it was not armed....

Now the question. Who is bigger liar? The Russians or Reuters/Vlast? Something to consider.

I really love how the article strings this along.

"K-84 was in dock with rockets and torpedoes on board," the magazine said, adding that apart from the nuclear weapons the submarine was carrying torpedoes and mines as well as its two nuclear reactors.

The magazine said that if one of the torpedoes had exploded it could have threatened the nuclear missiles, leading to an extremely dangerous nuclear accident.

IF a torpedo has exploded then it could have threaded the missile. How, if I might ask? I don't know. The missiles are on the other side of the conning tower from the torpedoes and the nuclear warhead is encased by serious medal. The chain reaction is not going to be set off by a fire by an atomic detonator.

Again something to consider before you put your name to an article Mr Faulconbridge.

Geopolitical Weekly: Disparity in the Covert War Between Iran and the West, February 14, 2014

2012-02-14T06:41:00.000-06:00

Within thirty minutes of each other on Monday, a "sticky bomb" attached to the back of a van detonated in New Delhi, India, and, more than 3,200 kilometers (2,000 miles) away, an aware driver in Tbilisi, Georgia, discovered and reported what was essentially a grenade duct-taped to the undercarriage of his vehicle, enabling police to defuse the device. Both vehicles were connected to the Israeli Embassy in the respective capitals. The device that exploded seriously wounded an Israeli Embassy employee and wife of an Israeli defense attache and inflicted less severe injuries on the driver and two bystanders.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu almost immediately pointed the finger at Iran. Iran just as quickly characterized the entire affair as an Israeli fabrication intended to discredit Tehran. This sort of rhetorical exchange has been the normal state of affairs for years now.

There is a covert war raging between Israel and the United States on one side and Iran on the other. It is difficult to ignore the persistent and tactically consistent assassinations of Iranian scientists associated with the country's nuclear program -- assassinations in which sticky bombs have figured prominently -- as well as the Stuxnet computer worm that targeted Siemens industrial software important to Iran's uranium enrichment efforts. At this point, it is hard to find a more rational explanation for the assassinations and sabotage than that Israel or the United States -- or, more likely, both in collaboration -- are working to undermine Iran's nuclear program.

Similarly, it is difficult to separate the most recent attacks in New Delhi and Tbilisi from arrests in Azerbaijan and Thailand that purportedly disrupted terrorist plots aimed at Israeli diplomatic targets and an apparent threat to Israeli interests in Bulgaria. There was also an admittedly odd plot to conduct attacks on American soil against U.S., Saudi and Israeli targets.

Monday's events merely reinforce the existence of an already obvious campaign on both sides. But the remarkable aspect is the disparity between the two efforts. By and large, Stuxnet as well as the larger sabotage and assassination campaign against Iran have been consistently professional and effective. On the other hand, the Iranian counterattack has been repeatedly foiled or exposed as ineffective or even inept.

Tehran may not be employing its most capable assets. It is possible that these attacks have been conducted via ill-conceived contract work or poorly trained proxies simply for the sake of deniability. But while the trend of attempted attacks against Israeli and U.S. interests could be interpreted as a warning of worse to come, they stand in stark contrast to the consistently effective attacks against Iranian interests on Iranian territory.

Stratfor has argued that the principle Iranian deterrent to attack is its ability to attempt to disrupt maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, through which 40 percent of the world's seaborne oil trade passes. No matter how good the military response is to such an attack, no military in the world can control the markets' reaction to even short-term disruptions, and that calculus has become only more compelling during the global economic crisis. Iran has thus gone out of its way to showcase this deterrent through recent and upcoming military maneuvers.

But its other deterrents may have begun to decline. It has yet to demonstrate a capability to covertly attack opposing interests abroad, a reputation for which it has long held credibly. This does not mean that Tehran does not wield such a capability, but the principal purpose of this capability is deterrence, not reprisal. Once the United States or Israel has initiated an attack on Iran as part of the covert war, Tehran's strategy of deterrence has, by definition, failed. As time passes, the United States continues to reinforce its own installations and those of Israel with more and newer ballistic missile defenses against Iran's ballistic missile arsenal. And while American diplomats and Western contractors remain vulnerable to direct attack in Iraq, now that the U.S. military withdrawal has been completed, it is far easier to remove the remaining presence than has been the case in close to a decade.

The deterrent Iran derives from its power over the Strait of Hormuz continues to hold sway. But while Stratfor is dismissive of the impact of sanctions (based on their scattered track record), they are not without their impact over time. Sanctions will not bring down the regime in Tehran, but Iranians have a far higher standard of living than, say, the average North Korean. In this context, the correlation of increasingly expensive food staples on the streets in Iran and the apparent ineffectual application of Iranian power abroad raises questions about the status of Iranian power in the region.

It is difficult to understate the significance of the continued survival of the regime of Syrian President Bashar al Assad, which is increasingly dependent on Iranian support. And the durability of Iranian power from the border of Afghanistan, through Iraq, where Iranian power currently peaks, all the way to the Mediterranean that the continued survival of the al Assad regime entails has potentially fundamental implications. But as the United States and its allies extract themselves from Afghanistan, American military power becomes more flexible in comparison to the fixed nature of Iranian power in the region. At some point, American power in the region will begin to converge with the limitations of Persian power in an Arab-dominated region. The question is at what point those powers converge.

Disparity in the Covert War Between Iran and the West Copryight STRATFOR.COM

How to look around and see what's happening in your neighborhood.

2012-02-12T23:00:00.002-06:00

Sometimes the information you need is staring you right in the face.

How To Gather Intel

Use free fliers, public bulletin boards, and the civic center marquee to gather intel that will plug you in at your station.

by William Harvey

Being the newest officer in the precinct makes life harder than it should be, because you have to dig for every morsel of information to get ahead. Some of the old heads seem tuned in to things, and you're left out of the loop. Yes, being new to the city or precinct sucks. So how can you develop a system of building intel for you? No, you can't rent an informant from a cop shop or buy a bottle of instant intelligence. You must work on it.

You go into any coffee shop or convenience store and there are assorted fliers. These free papers, fliers, or "fish wrappers" have good information. It may give you no more than which small club may have a blues singer, or list a gathering. Sooner or later, it will pay off. I recall a sergeant who told me one of the FNGs (fabulous new guy/girl) had information on an underground unlicensed club that led to a great case on the operation. That little flier had paid off. These often individually published fliers are focused on some smaller, under the radar activities that are harmless at best. But, they offer ideas or leads about the beat's activity.

These are especially prominent in college towns. There are so many varied interests, music scenes, and special interests that flourish there. Internet cafés and blogs typically stay within their expected circles.

While in a café or coffee shop, look for bulletin boards. I know several officers who scan these for moving sales, yard sales, and the like. The local internet listings haven't run these out of business. These bulletin boards and free posting areas are still out there, so give them a gander.

Years ago I worked in Savannah, Ga., and the downtown precinct had a civic center. I was taught by my Field Training Officer (FTO) to read the civic center's marquee and make note of whom or what was occurring. We all know that certain bands and performers have their own special following. On some nights, we had to concentrate on the post-concert activities and carnage.

As you perform your daily patrol duties, you'll find a plethora of information that's free for the taking. Of course, you'll have to do some analysis and research to see if it has any potential value to you on patrol. You may not find the major break that solves a big case. But you will develop positive patrol habits that will stick, which will keep you a leg up on the other officers. Who knows, you might impress one of the old guys with some good information that they didn't know about.

As a long time spook I can tell you most of what you need to know is right in front of you. Most of what I briefed was open source with a quick look at the classified side to make sure it all aligned.

Good way to gather info here.

Officer Down

2012-02-12T18:32:00.000-06:00

Reserve Deputy Don Williams
Dale County Alabama Sheriff's Office
End of Watch: Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Age: 55
Tour: 17 years
Badge # 26-77

Reserve Deputy Don Williams died after being involved in a single vehicle accident on South Union Avenue, near Martin Street, in Ozark.

He had just completed serving civil papers when his patrol car left the roadway and struck several parked cars. It is believed that he may have suffered a medical emergency prior to the accident.

Deputy Williams had served as a reserve deputy with the Dale County Sheriff's Office for 17 years. He is survived by his wife and six children.

Rest in Peace Bro…We’ll Continue The Watch

Day is done, Gone the sun, From the lake, From the hills, From the sky. All is well, Safely rest, God is nigh.

As goes California so goes the nation....

2012-02-10T18:00:00.000-06:00

Now any rational human looking at this statement but I gotta say I find this article concerning the LA Police Department intriguing.
LAPD Pioneers High-Tech Crime-Fighting ‘War Room’ « CBS Los Angeles

LOS ANGELES (CBS) — The LAPD is fighting crime from a high-tech war room that gives it eyes all over the city. The surveillance hub is now a model for police forces around the world and KCAL9 got an exclusive tour inside from Chief Charlie Beck.

“We are targets on our own soil,” says Beck. “We have to be ready.”

What began as a grass roots idea following the 9/11 terrorist attacks is now a state-of-the-art real-time analysis critical response center. It’s called RACR, and it’s located in the heart of downtown Los Angeles.

“This is a system that cuts through the red tape, that gets information to the people that need it,” says Chief Beck. He calls it “the brains of the department, twenty-four/seven.”

Police in the activity center monitor live feeds of city and traffic cameras, counter-terrorism information, and real-time crime mapping, with cutting edge software.

“If we didn’t have that we would be operating blind,” says Capt. Sean Malinowski, the Commanding Officer at RACR. “Essentially we’re always activated here.”

RACR is a critical crime-fighting tool at the center of every high profile incident in the City of Los Angeles.

“We have some real-time tools that help us analyze crime as it’s happening,” says Malinowski. “And then we feed that information out to the geographic areas and to patrol divisions.”

RACR is relied upon during events like dignitary visits from the Royals and President Obama, as well as the recent Occupy LA showdown and arrests.

“We had eyes on that, both through video cameras that the city owns, and also through video streams that were provided by the actual Occupy LA protesters,” says Malinowski.

Most recently, RACR was invaluable in putting an end to the Hollywood arsons.

Malinowski says RACR plotted each arson fire incident as it happened, creating a three-square-mile geographic hot spot that resulted in the quick arrest of accused fire starter Harry Burkhart.

“At the time he was taken into custody, this area was flooded with sheriffs and with LAPD officers,” says Malinowski. “Based on the fact that we kind of could see his movements in real time.”

RACR was born in a functioning bomb shelter, four stories below the Los Angeles Civic Center.

LAPD Commander Blake Chow remembers a time when tracking crime at RACR was done by hand. “There was very little technology,” says Chow, and RACR had no budget.

Police operated with dry erase boards, personal computers, and simple monitors.

“When we built RACR, there was no template to look at,” says Chow. “There was no police department we could go look at and ask them, ‘how did you build it?’”

Today LAPD’s RACR is the standard operating model for law enforcement agencies worldwide. It’s used as a guidebook on how to protect communities and fight crime.

I can hear the usual suspects screaming about the right to privacy, etc, but I will point out they are monitoring things on the street. I.E. in public view. If it's visible to John Q Public then you have no now reasonable expectation of privacy so get over it.

Good work LAPD!

The feds do it again

2012-02-10T09:21:00.001-06:00

I remember that moron mayor from New York saying the Times Square bomber was"...Home-grown, maybe a mentally deranged person or somebody with a political agenda that doesn’t like the health care bill or something..."

And who can forget how the idiot in charge at DHS said the big threat out there was not Islamic extremists who took down the towers but veterans returning from the war.

Now they come out and tell us who a cop needs to worry about. Gangs from South American. Naa. Islamic extremists? Inner city gangs? Nope. No, sovereign citizens!

FBI warns of threat from anti-government extremists

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Anti-government extremists opposed to taxes and regulations pose a growing threat to local law enforcement officers in the United States, the FBI warned on Monday.

These extremists, sometimes known as "sovereign citizens," believe they can live outside any type of government authority, FBI agents said at a news conference.

The extremists may refuse to pay taxes, defy government environmental regulations and believe the United States went bankrupt by going off the gold standard.

Routine encounters with police can turn violent "at the drop of a hat," said Stuart McArthur, deputy assistant director in the FBI's counterterrorism division.

"We thought it was important to increase the visibility of the threat with state and local law enforcement," he said.

In May 2010, two West Memphis, Arkansas, police officers were shot and killed in an argument that developed after they pulled over a "sovereign citizen" in traffic.

Last year, an extremist in Texas opened fire on a police officer during a traffic stop. The officer was not hit.

Legal convictions of such extremists, mostly for white-collar crimes such as fraud, have increased from 10 in 2009 to 18 each in 2010 and 2011, FBI agents said.

"We are being inundated right now with requests for training from state and local law enforcement on sovereign-related matters," said Casey Carty, an FBI supervisory special agent.

Let me see this. Two officer tragically killed by two morons (who are thankfully no longer with us) and another moron shoots at an officer. We have a serious threat to law enforcement, the people in general, etc. Forgive me if I don't take this as true. Not that I'm saying the authors are lying but they are putting out a BS report.

An old cliche is "routine traffic stop". There is no such thing. You have no idea what you have pulled over. It could be a nice old lady on her way to the library who just accidentally went through the light. Or you could have a wanted felon who's mind was more on getting out of town instead of paying attention to his driving. I've pulled over two men in a car for an expired registration once and the driver was wanted for a third degree felony.

My point. This report and the propaganda being put out by the feds is worthless. If you want a real threat you may want to take a look at illegal immigration. I live in the Houston area and in the last ten years six Houston PD officers have been killed or injured by illegal aliens in the area. Maybe feds if you would do your job (like securing the border, not letting people with no ties to this country out on parole pending trial, deporting illegals, etc) that would help officer safety.

FBI agents said they do not have a tally of people who consider themselves "sovereign citizens."

J.J. MacNab, a former tax and insurance expert who is an analyst covering the sovereign movement, has estimated that it has about 100,000 members.

So we're taking the word of a tax and insurance agent to see how many nuts we have out there. Great. And I'm paying how much of my tax dollars for this crap.

Eric Holder's just-us department is a real work. He let's the Black Panthers walk on a slam dunk case of voter intimidation, he ships guns to Mexican gangs without the knowledge of the Mexican government and he's shacking down legit business left and right for his boss man, B Hussein Obama.

I just pray a future Attorney General purges the Justice Department of his minions. And then we can have professionals run law enforcement in federal law enforcement again.

Security Weekly, Mexico's Presidential Election and the Cartel War, February 9, 2012

2012-02-09T19:17:00.000-06:00

By Scott Stewart

Mexico will hold its presidential election July 1 against the backdrop of a protracted war against criminal cartels in the country. Former President Vicente Fox of the National Action Party (PAN) launched that struggle; his successor, Felipe Calderon, also of the PAN, greatly expanded it. While many Mexicans apparently support action against the cartels, the Calderon government has come under much criticism for its pursuit of the cartels, contributing to Calderon's low popularity at the moment. The PAN is widely expected to lose in July to the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), which controlled the Mexican presidency for most of the 20th century until Fox's victory in 2000. According to polls, the PAN has lost credibility among many Mexican voters, many of whom also once again view the PRI as a viable alternative.

In our effort to track Mexico's criminal cartels and to help our readers understand the dynamics that shape the violence in Mexico, Stratfor talks to a variety of people, including Mexican and U.S. government officials, journalists, business owners, taxi drivers and street vendors. At present, many of these contacts are saying that the Calderon administration could attempt to pull off some sort of last-minute political coup (in U.S. political parlance, an "October surprise") to boost the PAN's popularity so it can retain the presidency.

The potential election ploy most often discussed is the capture of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman Loera, the leader of the Sinaloa cartel, who is widely believed to be the richest, most powerful drug trafficker anywhere. The reasoning goes that if the government could catch Guzman, Calderon's (and hence the PAN's) popularity would soar.

Still, very real questions exist about whether such an operation really would give the PAN the boost it needs to retain the presidency, however. North of the border, the re-election of U.S. President Barack Obama has not been guaranteed by the May 2011 death of Osama bin Laden. Political considerations aside, the factors that have helped Guzman avoid capture thus far are the very same factors that inhibit the Mexican government's ability to capture him. While we don't put a lot of stock in these rumors of an election surprise, we do see them as a good reason to examine the factors that have protected Guzman.

Plata o Plomo
As we noted in our annual cartel report, Mexico's cartels have begun to form into two major groupings around the two most powerful cartels, the Sinaloa cartel and Los Zetas. These two cartels approach business quite differently. The common Mexican cartel expression "plata o plomo" (literally translated as "silver or lead," the Spanish phrase signifying that a cartel will force one's cooperation with either a bribe or a bullet) illustrates the different modes of operation of the two hegemonic cartels.

Los Zetas, an organization founded by former Mexican special operations soldiers, tends to apply a military solution to any problem first -- plomo. They certainly bribe people, but one of their core organizational values is that it is cheaper and easier to threaten than to bribe. Rather than retain people on their payroll for years, Los Zetas also tend toward a short time horizon with bribery.

By contrast, people like Guzman and Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada Garcia, founders of the Sinaloa cartel, have been producing and trafficking narcotics for decades. Guzman and Zambada got their start in the trafficking business working for Miguel "El Padrino" Angel Felix Gallardo, the leader of the powerful Guadalajara cartel in the early 1980s. Because they have been in the illicit logistics business for decades, the Sinaloa leaders are more business-oriented than military-oriented. This means that the Sinaloa cartel tends to employ plata first, preferring to buy off the people required to achieve its objectives. It also frequently provides U.S. and Mexican authorities with intelligence pertaining to its cartel enemies rather than taking direct military action against them, thus using the authorities as a weapon against rival cartels. While Sinaloa does have some powerful enforcement groups, and it certainly can (and does) resort to ruthless violence, violence is merely one of the many tools at its disposal rather than its preferred approach to a given problem.

Thus, Sinaloa and Los Zetas each use the same set of tools, they just tend to use them in a different order.

Guzman's Web
Within his home territory of rural Sinaloa state, Guzman is respected and even revered. An almost-mythical figure, he has used his fortune to buy good will and loyalty in his home turf and elsewhere. In addition to his public largesse, Guzman has bribed people for decades. Unlike Los Zetas, the Sinaloa cartel leadership tends to take a long view on corruption. It will often recruit a low-level official and then continue to pay that person as he rises through the ranks. This long-term approach is not unlike that taken by some of the more patient intelligence services, along the lines of the Soviet recruitment of the "Cambridge Five" while they were still students. Quite simply, Guzman and the Sinaloa cartel have had police and military officers, politicians, journalists and judges on their payroll for years and even decades.

This intelligence agency-like approach has permitted the Sinaloa leadership to construct a wide web of assets with which to gather intelligence and serve as its agents of influence. At the street level, all Mexican cartels employ lookouts called "halcones," Spanish for "falcons," who provide their cartel masters with early warning of law enforcement or rival cartel activity in the halcones' area of responsibility. Higher-ranking officials on a cartel's payroll essentially serve as high-level halcones who provide early warnings when government operations against the cartel are being planned. Such advanced warning allows the cartels to protect their shipments and leadership.

Once an official or politician is on a cartel payroll (a situation similar to a network of sources run by an intelligence agency), he is subject to blackmail should he stop cooperating. And the relationship between a politician and the cartels can go beyond just cash. It can also involve the murder of a rival or provide other forms of non-cash assistance in the attainment of political power.

Whatever the relationship entails, once a cartel gets its hooks into a person, it tends not to let go -- and the person thus entangled has little choice but to continue cooperating, since he can be subject to arrest and political or financial ruin if he is caught. He also can be assassinated should he decide to quit cooperating. No Mexican politician wants to become the next Raul Salinas de Gortari, the brother of former President Carlos Salinas de Gortari, who the U.S. government alleges made hundreds of millions of dollars in dirty money, much of it from cartel figures. Raul Salinas' arrest in 1995 for murder, the subsequent money laundering charges brought against him, and questions about what his brother Carlos knew about his activities were important factors in the 2000 presidential election in which the PRI lost.

This fear of being linked to a figure like Guzman serves as a strong deterrent to his arrest. Guzman has been operating as a high-level narcotics trafficker in Mexico for decades now, and a big part of his operations has involved bribery. For example, in November 2008, Mexico's drug czar, Noe Ramirez Mandujano, was arrested and charged with accepting $450,000 a month from Zambada and the Beltran Leyva brothers, who were aligned with Sinaloa at the time.

If Guzman were to talk to authorities after his arrest, he could implicate a number of very powerful political and business figures. Indeed, it is likely this fear led to the delicate treatment he received after his 1993 arrest in Guatemala and his subsequent conviction in Mexico for narcotics trafficking and bribery. Guzman was able to continue to run his criminal empire from behind bars, and it was only when it appeared that Guzman might face extradition to the United States that he chose to escape from his comfortable prison cell in January 2001. Since his escape, he undoubtedly has continued to add strands to the web of protection surrounding him.

We must also note that without Guzman, the dynamics that drive the Mexican cartels would continue, and other leaders or even organizations would rise to take his place. Killing or arresting an individual will not be the end of Mexico's criminal cartels.

If Guzman is concerned that he could be killed rather than captured, like his former associate Arturo Beltran Leyva, it is possible that he could have prepared some type of insurance document incriminating powerful people on Sinaloa's payroll. As a deterrent to Guzman's killing, Sinaloa could threaten to release such a document should Guzman be killed.

That said, a long line of powerful Mexican cartel leaders have been arrested. Guzman's mentor, Felix Gallardo, was arrested in 1989 in large part due to U.S. pressure on the Mexican government in the wake of the torture and murder of U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration special agent Enrique Camarena. Gulf cartel founder Juan Garcia Abrego, also a protege of Felix Gallardo, was arrested in 1996. Garcia Abrego allegedly was linked to Raul Salinas and other high-ranking officials in the government of then-President Ernesto Zedillo. Garcia Abrego's successor as leader of the Gulf cartel, Osiel Cardenas Guillen, was arrested in 2003 and, like Garcia Abrego, was deported to the United States and convicted in a U.S. court; he is currently incarcerated in the "Supermax" penitentiary in Florence, Colo. Indeed, Guzman and Zambada are the last of Felix Gallardo's proteges still at large.

Along with Zambada, Guzman has been a high-profile fugitive for three decades now. He has not survived that long by being careless or stupid. It would be very difficult to track down such an individual in a short window of time established by political calculations unless those responsible already know his exact location and have chosen not to arrest him thus far. The Calderon administration and the PAN have struggled with public perceptions for some time now, making it likely that if high-level PAN officials knew where Guzman was and wanted to arrest him for the public relations bump such an operation could provide, they already would have done so.

Still, Guzman is one of the most wanted individuals in the world, and large teams of Mexican and U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agents are trying to locate him. Therefore, it is possible that Guzman could be arrested before the election in July. Any operation to capture him would be tightly compartmentalized for fear it could leak out to high-ranking halcones in the Mexican (or U.S.) government. Indeed, special Mexican units working closely with U.S. counterparts and segregated from any outside contact so that they cannot betray their mission -- or the intelligence that led to it -- normally carry out such sensitive operations. This means such an operation would likely be beyond the control of Mexican politicians to mandate, although they could conceivably provide actionable intelligence to the forces involved in such an operation.

Interestingly, with all the chatter of an election surprise floating around Mexico, any arrest at this point would be met with a great deal of skepticism. The arrest of such a powerful figure would almost certainly become very politicized with all parties attempting to use it to their advantage -- and dodge any connections they might have to Sinaloa. Such an environment would serve to bring more attention to the issue of corruption and collusion between the cartels and the government. And that could end up hurting rather than benefiting the PAN in the upcoming presidential election.

Mexico's Presidential Election and the Cartel War COPYRIGHT STRATFOR.COM

Now this is a stud!

2012-02-08T01:00:00.000-06:00

You gotta love it when a man doesn't let a literal bad break stop him from going after what he wants.

As a former Marine, Spartanburg (S.C.) Police Officer Keith Soules is bringing his never-say-die approach to accomplishing his dream of joining the agency's tactical team.

Officer Soules lost part of his leg in a motorcycle accident about a year ago, but his disability hasn't kept him from trying out for the Spartanburg PD's tactical team. Officer Soules tells WJBF that a role on the team would bring "the gratification of taking someone who's wanted for a violent felony and bringing them to justice ... that's real rewarding."

Don't need to add anything more. Good luck Officer Soules.

The Very Last World War I Veteran Has Died

2012-02-07T13:43:00.000-06:00

History marches on..
The Very Last World War I Veteran Has Died - Global - The Atlantic Wire

A British woman who served with the Royal Air Force for the last two months of World War I was the last known veteran of the war when she died in her sleep Saturday night. Florence Green joined the RAF at the age of 17 and died just before her 111th birthday, which would have been Feb. 19. She had been a mess steward with the air force, the BBC reported, serving in two U.K. air bases after she joined up on Sept. 13 1918. The Allies signed the armistice with Germany on Nov. 11, 1918. Green follows Claude Choules, a Royal Navy sailor who was the last WWI combatant before he died in May 2011, and Frank Buckles, the last American veteran of the war, who died in February 2011. All were 110 years old.

I recall the words of General Patton in the last year of his life
It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.

Speech at the Copley Plaza Hotel, Boston Massachusetts, 7 June 1945

Let us thank God women like Miss Green lived. RIP

Day is done, Gone the sun, From the lake, From the hills, From the sky. All is well, Safely rest, God is nigh.

Wooo....everything is so green!

2012-02-07T11:00:00.000-06:00

Brings a new meaning to The Big Apple!

Nearly 800 Pot Plants Found In NYPD Raid Of Bronx Building In The Morris Park Section « CBS New York

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) — You might call it a marijuana mega mansion.

Police raided a five-floor commercial building in the Bronx Tuesday afternoon that was filled with marijuana plants from wall to wall.

The building, located on Morris Park Avenue, had nearly 600 plants, some measuring 7 feet.

Police called the operation a sophisticated pot factory that was cranking out millions of dollars worth of weed

“It’s sad. I mean why didn’t the cops pick up on this before?” a neighbor asked.

Police told CBS 2’s Derricke Dennis they just got the tip late last year from a neighbor. They said they checked the building’s electric bill and found it to be sky high. So after weeks of surveillance, officers moved in with a search warrant, arresting three adult males and shutting down a 50-pound a month operation that netted $250,000 every 30 days...

...CBS 2′s John Slattery said there were no sleeping quarters inside, but the building fostered the perfect environment for growing the plants. There was an elaborate set-up of water and air filtration systems, plus heat lamps. Slattery reports that the drugs were allegedly packaged on the top floor.

Neighbors in the area said they were surprised and never suspected anything...

Right. Here is the article with some more pictures. Man someone was making some cash off this.

I need air!

2012-02-07T09:59:00.000-06:00

A good friend of mine used that as he finally drank a bit much and had to throw up on the side of the road after a night out. That was a historical occasion. He has drunk many a good man under the table.

The thing that killed him off? Jameson's Irish Whiskey. Since then every one of his friends had made sure we have a bottle at the ready, "Mike, want some Jameson's?" (And no, it was not me....another Mike).

I'm a long time Scotch lover but I gotta say Irish Whiskey is always welcome. Along with Jameson's I keep a bottle of Redbreast Irish Whisky which is smooth as a baby's bottom. I kinda recall killing off a bottle of that at a friend's wedding in Denver....kinda...the memory of the night is kinda weak!

Interesting article on Irish Whiskey from this weekend.

Irish whiskey now outsells Scotch single malt in the United States | Irish News | IrishCentral

The US Distilled Spirits Council (DISCUS) recently released their reports on sales for spirits in 2011. The findings show that Irish whiskey has outsold single malt Scotch in the US.

Just-Drinks reports that with the new sales figures , the United States has now become a key battle ground where Irish whiskey outsells single malt Scotch.

During the calendar year of 2011, Irish whiskey sales rose by 24% to 1.7m nine-litre cases, while Scotch single malt whisky sales increased by only 9.5% to 1.4m cases.

According to Just-Drinks, Ireland’s beloved Jameson's brand whiskey is helping to bolster the upward growth of sales.

What’s driving the growth of Irish whiskey sales? “Irish whiskey is enjoying a renaissance at the moment. The bigger companies have come in with enough commercial muscle to expand production, sales and grow the brands,” said Kieran Tobin, chairman of the Drinks Industry Group of Ireland.

Similarly, younger American generations seem to be discovering and enjoying Irish whiskey’s “smooth and sweet texture.”

“On the other hand, let's not get carried away,” writes Chris Mercer for Just-Drink. “If blended Scotch is included in the Scotch figures then one can add a further 6m cases to Scotch sales. Include bulk, bottled malt and grain Scotch, too, and the total Scotch figure is 9m cases.”...

And I mostly drink single malt scotch myself. But many a night I've spent on the porch with a good cigar, good book and Redbreast in the glass. Life is good!

Geopolitical Weekly: Afghanistan: Moving Toward a Distant Endgame, February 7, 2012

2012-02-07T07:32:00.000-06:00

By George Friedman

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta suggested last week that the United States could wrap up combat operations in Afghanistan by the end of 2013, well before the longstanding 2014 deadline when full control is to be ceded to Kabul. Troops would remain in Afghanistan until 2014, as agreed upon at the 2010 Lisbon Summit, and would be engaged in two roles until at least 2014 and perhaps even later. One role would be continuing the training of Afghan security forces. The other would involve special operations troops carrying out capture or kill operations against high-value targets.

Along with this announcement, the White House gave The New York Times some details on negotiations that have been under way with the Taliban. According to the Times, Mullah Mohammad Omar, the senior-most leader of the Afghan Taliban, last summer made overtures to the White House offering negotiations. An intermediary claiming to speak for Mullah Omar delivered the proposal, an unsigned document purportedly from Mullah Omar that could not be established as authentic. The letter demanded the release of some Taliban prisoners before any talks. In spite of the ambiguities, which included a recent public denial by the Taliban that the offer came from Mullah Omar, U.S. officials, obviously acting on other intelligence, regarded the proposal as both authentic and representative of the views of the Taliban leadership and, in all likelihood, those of Mullah Omar, too.

The idea of negotiating with the Taliban is not new. Talks, as distinct from negotiations, in which specific terms are hammered out, have gone on for some time now. Several previous attempts have ended in failure, including one instance when the supposed representative proved to be a fraud. However, according to the Times report, the negotiations took on a degree of specificity last summer. They began in November 2010, initiated by a man named Tayyab Agha, who claimed to speak for Mullah Omar. The administration of U.S. President Barack Obama regards authenticating the present offer as unimportant and the intermediary as having authority; the question on the table is the release of Taliban captives as a token of American seriousness.

The Taliban see themselves as already having made a major concession. Their original demand was the complete withdrawal of Western forces from Afghanistan as a precondition for negotiations. The talks have continued in spite of the U.S. refusal to comply. The Taliban shifted their position to a very specific timetable for withdrawal, something Panetta may have been hinting at last week, though not on a timetable to the Taliban's liking. Two more years of combat operations -- not to mention an unspecified time in which U.S. special operations forces will continue working in Afghanistan -- is a long time. In addition, the United States has not delivered on the release of the Taliban, an issue that has not emerged as a campaign issue in the U.S. presidential election.

Still, U.S. operations have become less aggressive. This is in part due to the season: It is winter in Afghanistan, a time of year when large-scale operations are not practical in many areas. At the same time, we are not seeing the level of operations we have seen in previous winters after Obama increased the number of U.S. forces in Afghanistan. This in part reflects a realization of the limits of U.S. military power in Afghanistan. Regardless of the motive, the Taliban interpret it as a signal -- and it is understood in Washington as a signal, too.

The Pakistani-Taliban Channel

To get negotiations going, the United States had to reach two conclusions. The first was that negotiations could not happen without Pakistani involvement. U.S. accusations that current and former military figures in Pakistan maintained close ties with the Taliban undoubtedly were true. Conversely, this meant Pakistan represented a clear channel the United States could use to reach the Taliban. That channel permitted the Obama administration to conclude that it had no hope of meaningfully dividing the Taliban.

Certainly, the Taliban are an operationally diffuse group. Even so, Mullah Omar is at their center, with the political operatives surrounding him representing the political office of the Taliban. The line of communications with the Taliban runs through Pakistan and terminates with Mullah Omar. This means that U.S. hopes of splitting the Taliban politically and conducting factional negotiations are not realistic. Particularly after a series of attacks and suicide bombings in Kabul last fall, it also became apparent that the United States would not be able to manage negotiations at arm's length using Afghan President Hamid Karzai and his advisers as the primary channel.

The Pakistanis and the Taliban also had to face certain realities. The Taliban had claimed that the United States and its allies in Afghanistan had lost. This underpinned their demand for an immediate U.S. withdrawal; their offer to permit this without harassment was made under the assumption that the United States had a defeated military force at risk.

The reality was that, while the United States had not won the war in Afghanistan and in all likelihood could not defeat the Taliban militarily, it was far from defeated. The United States remained, and remains, able to conduct operations in Afghanistan as and where it wishes. The Taliban have not reached the point where they can operationally defeat the forces arrayed against them. Where large Western forces exist, the Taliban must decline combat and disengage or be annihilated. As important, there is no overwhelming pressure from the American public to withdraw -- something not true of some U.S. allies. However, in this election, Obama is likely to be challenged by candidates supporting his position in Afghanistan or wanting a more aggressive stance. Mitt Romney, for example, not only rejected the idea of releasing Taliban fighters, but also said in response to a question that his strategy in Afghanistan was to "beat them."

The United States could hypothetically remain in Afghanistan indefinitely given the current cost and force structure. But we would argue that defeating a guerrilla force with sanctuary and support across the border in Pakistan, an excellent intelligence capability and units able to operate independently is unlikely. But neither, for that matter, can the Taliban defeat the coalition forces.

Stalemate in Afghanistan

This makes for a stalemate, one the Americans hope to solve by creating an Afghan state under Karzai and a security and military force able and willing to engage the Taliban. As I have argued in the past, the core problem with this plan is the same problem that existed during the Vietnamization phase of the Vietnam War. The Afghan military must recruit troops, and some of the most eager volunteers will be Taliban operatives. These operatives will be indistinguishable from anti-Taliban soldiers, and their presence will have two consequences. First, the intelligence they will provide the Taliban will cause the Afghan army offensive to fail. Second, shrewd use of these operatives will undermine the cohesion and morale of the Afghan forces. Surprise is crucial in locating, engaging and destroying a guerrilla force. Afghan security forces will face the same problem the South Vietnamese army did; namely, they will lack the element of surprise and at least some of their units will be unreliable.

Accordingly, the U.S. strategy of using the stalemate to construct a capable military force accordingly looks unlikely to succeed even leaving aside the issue of the fragmentation of the Afghan nation and the Karzai government's internal problems. The Taliban are intimately familiar with the U.S. dilemma and are positioned to choose from two strategies. One is to increase their tempo of operations and so increase American casualties prior to the November elections. But this strategy would see Taliban casualties increase even more dramatically, and its impact on the elections would be unclear to say the least. The Taliban are more likely to pursue the second strategy, which involves accepting the stalemate and permitting the United States to try to build an Afghan military.

Like the Taliban, the United States is aware of the difficulty of building an Afghan army. It also understands that deploying troops in Afghanistan is unlikely to lead anywhere. It does not have to flee defeat in Afghanistan, but there are strategic reasons for leaving, beginning with the fact that the military situation is about as satisfactory as it likely ever will be. Improving the situation would incur costs without yielding anything like victory. With the United States reducing its military budget, serious issues emerging in Iran and throughout the Arab World, and a new emphasis by the U.S. Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force on the Pacific, the world is moving on. A violent yet frozen conflict in Afghanistan simply does not benefit the United States.

This, of course, leaves a crucial question: Will Afghanistan become a base for al Qaeda or follow-on transnational jihadist groups in the event of a U.S. withdrawal? It is true that these groups can form anywhere, but the fact is that they did form in Afghanistan while Mullah Omar was in charge. The negotiators undoubtedly have promised that, in exchange for withdrawal, they will take responsibility for suppressing jihadist elements. But trusting the Taliban, or trusting those in Pakistan who took violent offense at the killing of Osama bin Laden, poses obvious risks for the United States. In truth, it does not increase the risk much: Afghanistan is not necessary for the jihadists, but it is naturally fragmented and the threat of its re-emergence as a sanctuary is always there. Even so, the issue will remain a sticking point in the negotiations. The United States will want a residual force to deal with the jihadist threat, something the Taliban and Pakistan will oppose.

The Pakistani Role

In this sense, the negotiations really come down to Pakistan and the burden it is willing to undertake in the event of a U.S. withdrawal.

The United States does not trust the Taliban or many of those Pakistani officials speaking to and for the Taliban. But the United States also knows two things. First, that the future of Afghanistan is of fundamental interest to Pakistan. Instability or Indian or Iranian influence in Pakistan is not in Pakistan's interest. Therefore, the Pakistanis will play a leading role in Afghanistan as they did after the end of the Soviet occupation. Second, the United States knows that India remains Pakistan's major adversary. The Pakistanis have tried to play the China card to make the United States nervous about Pakistan. But the fact is that the Chinese People's Liberation Army does not have the training and logistics to support Pakistan against India, and the last thing Pakistan wants is a large Chinese military deployment in Pakistan. Indeed, that is the last thing China wants.

The issue over time will boil down to this: The United States will want a coalition government in which Taliban elements take Cabinet positions in the current structure of the Karzai regime. The Taliban will want an entirely new government in which elements of the existing power structure (Karzai has promised not to seek a third term when his current one ends in 2014) might have a position but that would be an altogether new regime. In either case, the Taliban assume, as the North Vietnamese assumed a generation ago, that a political settlement followed by a U.S. withdrawal would, after a "decent interval," result in a Taliban-dominated regime.

Ultimately, the United States could remain in Afghanistan indefinitely and there is nothing the Taliban could do about it. But the United States cannot defeat the Taliban. The Taliban have nowhere to go and no desire to leave. The United States has other issues to attend to and no overriding strategic interest in Afghanistan. From the American point of view, its presence in Afghanistan does not reduce Islamist threats to the homeland but it does absorb military resources.

What the United States is engaged in now, as it was in 1971, is the complex process of crafting a political path from the current situation to the inevitable end. This isn't easy, since the manner in which the United States withdraws will influence its position in the region as much as its indefinite presence would. This is why the administration is so eager to pursue the current initiative and prepared to release prisoners as a gesture. It is also why the Taliban will accept a coalition government for a while, and why Pakistan will make and likely honor guarantees.

However this war is brought to an end will be a complex and time-consuming process, during which the fighting will continue. But then the how is never trivial in ending a war.

Afghanistan: Moving Toward a Distant Endgame COPYRIGHT: STRATFOR.COM

For those of you who think we don't have enough government....

2012-02-06T13:00:00.000-06:00

I've often said any bureaucracy has only one reason to exists and that is, to exist. If it doesn't the people who man it must actually get jobs and that may screw up their life plans.

I've had arguments with people in the past who actually think the economy is under regulated. Here is a greater example of a government agency run a mock.
For Now, Government Still Lets You Pick Your Own Roommate

The people of the United States ordained a Constitution of limited government. As time passes, the people have more of the “government” and less of the “limited.” Americans must work at maintaining their freedoms. Defense of the constitutional freedom of association involved in choosing roommates to share housing illustrates the effort required. Government has attempted to regulate our ability to choose a roommate, but efforts to resist that intrusion pay off in preserved liberty.

Tricia Rowe, a 31-year-old single woman who owned a three bedroom, single-family house, wanted a roommate. She posted on a church bulletin board a notice that said, “I am looking for a female Christian roommate. Rent is $375/mo, which includes utilities.”

On Thursday, July 15, 2010, an overcast day in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Elizabeth Vezino of an organization calling itself the Fair Housing Center of West Michigan filed a complaint stating under oath that she believed that Ms. Rowe’s roommate-wanted notice expressed “an illegal preference for a Christian roommate, thus excluding people of other faiths.” The Michigan Department of Civil Rights and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) went into high gear.

Luckily for Ms. Rowe, the Alliance Defense Fund took up her cause and provided legal representation. Ms. Rowe invoked her freedom of association under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution as a defense against the claim that her statement preferring “a female Christian roommate” illegally discriminated. Ultimately, HUD ruled sensibly that “in light of the facts provided and after assessing the unique context of the advertisement and the roommate relationship involved in this particular situation potentially involving the sharing of personal religious beliefs, the Department defers to Constitutional considerations in reaching its conclusion” that “there is No Reasonable Cause to believe that the Act was violated in this matter.”

In a separate case, Roommates.com provided a well-known roommate locator service over the Internet. The service asked customers to create a profile identifying among other things their gender, sexual orientation, and whether children would live with them, and provided a space for “Additional Comments.” Individuals could search the Roommates.com database for potentially compatible roommates.

In California, organizations called the Fair Housing Council of San Fernando Valley and the Fair Housing Council of San Diego filed lawsuits against Roommates.com, alleging that questions seeking disclosure of gender, sexual orientation and familial status discriminate in violation of the federal Fair Housing Act.

Today, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit rejected the Housing Council claims that Roommates.com had discriminated in violation of the Act in helping people find roommates to share housing. The Court characterized the issue as follows:

There’s no place like home. In the privacy of your own home, you can take off your coat, kick off your shoes, let your guard down and be completely yourself. While we usually share our homes only with friends and family, sometimes we need to take in a stranger to help pay the rent. When that happens, can the government limit whom we choose? Specifically, do the anti-discrimination provisions of the Fair Housing Act (“FHA”) extend to the selection of roommates?
The Court indicated that a roommate’s unfettered access to one’s home implicated considerations of safety, privacy, property protection, and the constitutional freedom of association. Noting that it sought to avoid constitutional difficulties that would arise from government regulation of roommate selection, the Court construed the key term “dwelling” in the FHA to mean an independent housing unit and a not shared living unit.
The Court held that “[b]ecause we find that the FHA doesn’t apply to the sharing of living units, it follows that it’s not unlawful to discriminate in selecting a roommate” and therefore “Roommate’s facilitation of discriminatory roommate searches does not violate the FHA.”...

How many man-hours, how much money, etc was wasted on this. A great reform would be loser pays in civil actions. And until we get common sense corrections abuses like this will continue. Thank God this Miss Rowe had a friend in her corner.

Makes you wonder if we need a cabinet level Department of Housing and Urban Development. Oh did I say that?

Guns and morons...like HIZONORDAMAER

2012-02-06T09:22:00.002-06:00

I have nothing by contempt for the moron who currently occupies Gracie Manor. When a criminal tried to blow up Time Square his first comment was how this was someone who was upset with Obamacare passing. People are leaving the city to escape the high taxes which leads to declining revenue so what does he do..increase the rates even more. And when the police department is short of officers he can't help but damned he can hire more meter maids.

Now his idiot is going to put his ugly face on TV during the most watched event in the year. Thankfully I didn't see it but his stupidity comes through on this report.

Special Report: Bloomberg reloads in push for gun control

(Reuters) - Among the slick, million-dollar ads for the likes of Pepsi and Honda during the Super Bowl this Sunday, viewers in Washington will see a far more modest spot. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Boston Mayor Thomas Menino will be sitting on a couch touting an issue most politicians avoid like the plague: gun control.

The two mayors, whose local teams face off in the big game, are making the pitch for Mayors Against Illegal Guns (MAIG), the organization they co-founded in 2006.

Murder has been on the decline in New York and other major American cities for years, but the mayors say they still see too many dead cops and teens. On Tuesday night, Bloomberg was at Bellevue Hospital in Manhattan visiting a New York police officer who had just been shot in the face in Brooklyn.

"We have someone who's dedicated his life to protecting all of us, who has had a much too close brush with death tonight because of what appears to be an illegal gun," Bloomberg told a news conference. He added that more Americans have been killed by illegal guns since 1968 than were killed in World War II.

Of course he uses a cop's almost death at the hands of a criminal to push his agenda. But I did some checking on his stats and they don't really match up. In WWII the US lost approximatley 418 thousand men and women in combat. According to the US Department of Justice's states in the US there are been from 1976-2006 around 350 thousand murders with firearms. Granted this doesn't cover 68-75 or 07 to now so one has to wonder where he gets these states. But notice he says these were done with Illegal weapons. What is an illegal weapon in your mindset Mr Bloomberg. I know the ones shipped to Mexico in Fast and Furious were illegal but again what is your definition. He probably means any firearm because in his mind all weapons not owned by the state or limited people (like his bodyguards) are illegal.

Now this in funny.

"We have to face the fact that both Democrats and Republicans have for a while viewed this as the third rail of American politics," said John Feinblatt, who helps run MAIG as Bloomberg's chief advisor for policy and strategic planning. (Bloomberg is an independent; Menino is a Democrat.)

Democrats, who are more likely than Republicans to favor some restrictions on gun ownership, made a conscious decision to stay away from the gun issue in the 2010 midterm congressional elections. The aim: protect the so-called Blue Dog conservative Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives, who didn't toe the party line on gun control. Most were defeated anyway.

Bloomberg is a leftist democrat in all but name. He changed his affiliation to succeed Giuliani and changed it to independent later on. He also got the city council to let him run for a third term. Gee worked out well for them.
Also those Blue Dog Democrats were liberal in everything but name for the most part. They may have voted against gun right but they were good little boys and girls on Obamacare, speeding, Dodd-Frank, etc.

...New York's activist mayor cannot simply restrict handguns in his city - as he has done with smoking and transfats. Two Supreme Court decisions - District of Columbia v. Heller and McDonald v. Chicago - have declared such local initiatives unconstitutional. Instead, Bloomberg launched MAIG, which now has 600 members nationwide. Although it has a handful of private donors, the bulk of MAIG's $4 million budget comes out of the mayor's own pocket.

"He's putting his money where his mouth is," said Carolyn McCarthy, a Democratic congresswoman from Long Island. She entered politics after a 1993 shooting spree on the Long Island Rail Road left her husband dead and her son severely injured.

...In the past, advocates for stricter gun controls held marches, rallies and candlelight vigils. MAIG has taken a far more activist approach, conducting undercover investigations and sting operations that are then dramatically revealed to the press.

In 2009, New York City contracted the security firm Kroll Inc. to send undercover agents to gun shows in Ohio, Tennessee and Nevada to show how people who could not pass a background check easily bought guns.

MAIG also used undercover investigators to expose gun dealers who sold to "straw purchasers," buyers intending to quickly resell the guns on the black market. Another investigation identified online gun sellers who did not require background checks.

Bloomberg launched another probe after the January 2011 shooting in Arizona that killed six people and wounded 13, including Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. Using city money, he sent undercover investigators to Arizona to repeat the gun show sting and prove how easy it was for someone like Jared Lee Loughner, the shooter, who was diagnosed with schizophrenia, to get a gun.

Gee, nice of him to check up on crime in other states. Hey Mr Mayor, maybe if you had such concern about crime in the city you're mayor of there would not be such a problem with it.
...REAL CHANGE

Members of the MAIG say they are not trying to take guns away from their legal owners, just to close loopholes that allow criminals to get guns and move them around undetected.

"It's a serious safety issue," said Margaret Stock, the Democratic mayor of Butler, Pennsylvania, the town of 13,000 where Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum spent part of his childhood. "If an officer gets shot with an illegal gun I'm responsible."

There is the problem. No Miss Stock, you are not responsible for a cop getting shot with a firearm. Nor is the manufacturer of the gun or the ammunition or the retail seller of the gun. The person reasonable if the piece of s#$% who shot the cop. A simple fact you leftist can't comprehend or don't want to acknowledge because it pushes against your agenda. And we know what it is, the effective removal of the 2nd Amendment via legislation or judicial activism
..."We're a big hunting community, but this is illegal handguns, it's a totally different issue," Stock said. "I had a little bit of backlash from local members of the NRA that I was somehow anti-gun. That was not the intent of the coalition."...

See how every gun used to commit a crime is an illegal gun. Just what makes it illegal? If it was manufactured outside the US and shipped in under the radar and used in the commission of a crime I don't question it's illegal. However if someone breaks into my house and steals my pistol then uses it in a robbery the gun is not illegal. The acts of breaking into my house, stealing the gun and using it in the robbery are the unlawful acts of a criminal. If we follow these people's logic I should be held accountable for the robbery because my gun was used, even though it was stolen. The criminal is where law enforcement should concentrate his efforts. But that won't happen under a liberal's direction.

UPDATE: Who says Da Mayor doesn't know his job:

From Buzzfeed.com

...The Mormon Church owns one of the most active and unregulated gun sale portals on the web, according to a national investigation released by the New York City Mayor's office...

Cool. Transfat, salt, smoking and guns on the other side of the country cool are critical issues for this man. Budget deficits, people running from the city, lack of firemen and cops are things he doesn't need to be concerned with. But he wants to see how the Mormons in Utah are doing with guns.

Who voted for this moron?

Dealilng with a boy with Autism

2012-02-06T08:00:00.002-06:00

A scary sight of a kid with a knife coming at an officer. The officer's (the led two in this case) fire in self defense and the boy is tragically dead at the scene.

Now if anyone thinks someone with a knife is no threat to someone with a gun should take a look at this post. I would say the officer suffered serious bodily injury from the suspect in this case. A rule we are taught in the academy is a safe distance is 21 feet for someone with a knife.

Could they have done things differently? Look at the report (Bill Kurtis doing local TV news...didn't know he was this hard up for work).

Family Furious After Calumet City Police Shoot, Kill Boy With Autism « CBS Chicago

CALUMET CITY, Ill. (CBS) — Police in Calumet City were defending their actions Wednesday after officers shot and killed a 15-year-old boy, who has a form of autism, after he threatened them with a knife.

Stephon Watts’ family said he suffered from Asperger’s Syndrome — a high-functioning form of autism — and attention deficit disorder.

As CBS 2′s Susanna Song and WBBM Newsradio’s Steve Miller report, they claimed the boy was only holding a butter knife. Police would only describe it as a “kitchen knife.”

Question. If I stick that knife in your face, won't it cause injury? It get's you in the eye will it cause very serious injury.

Calumet City Police Chief Edward Gilmore said the boy cut a police officer through his shirt sleeve with a “kitchen knife.”

“I think they did everything they possibly could to avoid this,” Gilmore said. “It’s unfortunate that we had to get to this situation.”

As CBS 2’s Suzanne Le Mignot reports, Stephon’s mother, Danelene Powell-Watts, arrived at the police station in Calumet City on Wednesday shortly before police held a news conference to discuss the shooting.

Powell-Watts was screaming, livid, and inconsolable after her son was killed. She was furious that officers used deadly force against her son this time, rather than subduing him with a stun gun.

“They shot my son,” she yelled as officers as she was blocked from entering the Calumet City police station. “Every last one of you know my son has autism.”...

OK Channel 2, simple question. Why do you want to interview a woman who will be very distract over the loss of her son at the same location the Chief is giving a press conference on that subject? You obviously wanted to cause a scene and you succeeded. I guess you should be proud of yourselves. You used a mother's grief for a scene on your report.

...The chief said police were called to the home to get Stephon under control, as they had been before. But that didn’t work, he said.

“When he slashed the officer’s arm, the officer felt his life was in jeopardy and he had nothing else to do, but to defend himself,” Gilmore said.

Stephon’s family said police have used a stun gun on him in the past.

“They didn’t have to murder him. This is nothing but murder and they shoot to kill,” Powell-Watts said. “He had a butter knife and … my husband said that he lunged at the police officer.”
Stephon’s uncle said police had subdued his nephew with stun guns before.

“They didn’t have to shoot him. They could have tasered the child. He’s only 15 years old,” Wayne Watts said. “They could have tased him, like they did him before, took him to the hospital and he would have been fine and that’s what I want to know. Why couldn’t they do that to him so that he could still be breathing with us right now?”

Gilmore said a stun gun wasn’t used because the lead officer did not have a stun gun.

Five officers responded to the Watts home after Stephon’s father called police, according to Gilmore. Two entered the house, heading to the basement where they found Stephon. One of those two officers did have a stun gun with him.

“Unfortunately today, when he slashed the officer’s arm, the officer felt his life was in jeopardy and he had nothing else to do, but defend himself,” Gilmore said.

I understand why the family is upset and they can’t really look at this in any objective way. Leave that to the Monday morning quarterbacks.

Dr. Louis Kraus, professor and section chief of child and adolescent psychiatry at Rush University Medical Center, questioned whether deadly force was really necessary.

“With everything that they’ve done before, they should have known before going in what they were dealing with. And, you know, the goal really should have been to have gotten this child to a hospital,” Kraus told CBS 2′s Dana Kozlov.

He said people with autism can frequently become aggressive, but not because they are trying to hurt someone.

“What we know is that, when they get anxious – probably more commonly than they typical person when they get anxious – they might lash out; not with the intention of doing harm, but simply because of how frightened they are,” Kraus said.

I remember a few years ago dealing with a mentally challenged person in front of a car dealership. He was swinging at me with a crutch and half a can of mace did not stop him. Oh doc, this was BT (before Taser). Long story short three of us had to use batons to get him subdued. The manager of the dealership came out and said “I’m your witness, he started it all... “ Then he mentioned “Three of my guys thought you were kinda hard on him...”

My answer was simple, “Have those three gentlemen come out here, we’ll each loan them a baton and mace and take the cuffs off...they can show us how it’s done.” For some reason they didn’t want to come out and play.

Calumet City Ald. Brian Wilson had questions about the shooting as well.

“I think less deadly means could have been used,” Wilson said.

The alderman is staging a protest at 7 p.m. outside the Calumet City police station.

A local Jessee Jackson...despicable. The family is grieving and you’re trying to make hay out of it.

I have little tolerance for morons who question the actions of an officer put into a crisis and told to bring instant order to something that took years to deteriorate. I feel sorry for the family’s loss but from this report you have not been raising your son and been expecting police to control him for you. Forgive my bluntness but we’re not here to raise you children even if they have special needs. And while I regret you loss, I’m glad another family did not suffer a loss. The officer’s.

God Bless Occupy D.C.!

2012-02-06T03:34:00.001-06:00

The House Minority Leader (great title for the women, although former congresswoman would be better, if not federal prisoner) recently commented "God bless them" when asked about the Occupy Wall Street Movement.

I guess she really like this.

Police raid Occupy D.C. camp - Washington Times

Police in riot gear and cleanup crews in hazardous materials suits began enforcing no-camping laws in McPherson Square and Freedom Plaza over the weekend, resulting in intense — and often physical — confrontations with Occupy D.C. protesters who resisted their efforts.

At least 12 people were arrested during the weekend enforcement actions, and the majority of tents that made up the McPherson Square camp were removed along with truckloads of trash. One police officer was injured Saturday when he was struck in the face with a brick.

...Police said Sunday they had found human feces, urine in plastic bottles, used condoms and rats — alive and dead. Some of the equipment was tagged and bagged and for protesters to claim beginning Monday morning at U.S. Park Police headquarters.

Sounds like the future of America...
In a scene that was repeated several times Saturday, police at McPherson Square shoved confrontational protesters out of areas of the park they planned to clear, while demonstrators chanted and hurled obscenities at officers.
...Occupy protester Thi Lee was caught in the push. She said she was jabbed a few times as police came through the area.

“They just started coming in and shoving people around,” she said. “I just got caught up on it. I was like, ‘I can´t believe they’re doing this.’ “

Park Police spokesman Sgt. David Schlosser said the enforcement was a way for police to address “nuisance abatement” and “not an eviction.”...

...“This is just another American foreclosure,” protester Brian Eister said....

Yo Brian, how many thousands of dollars did your parents pay for your education. You must be a student because what you said is so dumb. You don't own that park, it's not your house. And a foreclosure happens when someone fails to pay their mortgage. You have not supported it with tax dollars because I really doubt you work. So, shut the f$%^ up and go back to mommy. Otherwise McDonalds is hiring. They will give you a better education than Columbia.

Another year, another Superbowl

2012-02-05T21:57:00.000-06:00

Last year was Elmer's first Superbowl and he really enjoyed himself.

So he has even more fun this year with the family and you can tell!

Great game, congrats to the Giants and Eli Manning. Archie and Peyton, I know you're all proud as hell of the man. But Saints next year in the Superbowl in New Orleans!

Where are the Racial Profiling Nazi's on this...

2012-02-05T18:00:00.001-06:00

Hey, good enough for law enforcement, it's good enough for law breakers right?

Immigrant-smuggling ring used black drivers to avoid racial profiling

LOS ANGELES — (MCT) In the calculus of cross-border human smuggling, Maria Lopez-Diaz allegedly concluded that black instead of brown equals green.

The 60-year-old Compton, Calif., woman, prosecutors say, tried to cash in on racial profiling by operating a human smuggling ring that hired mostly African-American drivers who didn't speak a word of Spanish to ferry small groups of immigrants from Mexico to Los Angeles.

In the end, the venture failed. Authorities announced charges Thursday against Lopez-Diaz and four others, including conspiracy and transporting and harboring illegal immigrants. Lopez-Diaz, two family members and a driver were arrested by agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol...

..."It's absolutely true that most of the people involved in transporting human smuggling networks are Hispanics, by virtue of the fact that most customers are Hispanics," said ICE Special Agent in Charge Claude Arnold. "This organization thought, 'What if we recruited those who attract less attention from law enforcement?' Obviously they were wrong."

The group, allegedly headed by Lopez-Diaz and two family members, recruited drivers who were down on their luck — jobless, homeless or drug-addicted — who were lured by the few hundred dollars' payoff and kept in the dark about the extent of the enterprise, prosecutors said. Had they been able to communicate with their passengers, they would have learned the ringleaders charged the immigrants up to $4,000 a person for the ride north, authorities said.

"There were two layers of exploitation here, one of the aliens in the trunks coming up to Los Angeles, and then of the drivers they used," said U.S. Assistant Attorney Rupa Goswami, the federal prosecutor in the case.

The investigation began when Border Patrol officials noticed an unusual pattern in early 2010. They found African-Americans, mostly from Compton, carrying up to six immigrants in the trunks and hidden compartments of their cars. Their vehicles were elaborately modified, including compartments under the hood or under the back seats, as well as special shock absorbers to conceal the heavy load.

The group is estimated to have smuggled several dozen immigrants a month into Los Angeles, immigration authorities said.

Juan Eduardo Baltazar, 35, Lopez-Diaz's son-in-law, was allegedly responsible for preparing the vehicles and installing the compartments. Her daughter-in-law, 23-year-old Karen Esteban-Morales, is accused of coordinating the pickup of the immigrants. Lopez-Diaz and her two family members are themselves in the U.S. illegally, according to authorities, and face deportation if they are convicted....

And to answer my own first question, there is no money in it so the race industry will not go after it. The market hasn't developed yet for them to sue illegal smugglers and Jessee Jackson et all is not really concerned about black unemployment.

Go ahead...Make My Day Better!

2012-02-05T13:31:00.000-06:00

From this morning's paper.
Make My Day law for business advances in Colorado

DENVER (AP) — Colorado takes pride in its Western entrepreneurial spirit — and that extends to the belief of some lawmakers that business owners should be able to use deadly force against anyone who tries to take what's theirs.

It's an idea that conjures Clint Eastwood's Dirty Harry, and its supporters have taken liberties with the hardboiled character's famous line in naming their measure "Make My Day Better."

The state already has a law that allows people in homes to gun down invaders, and the bill's sponsor, Republican state Rep. Chris Holbert, is asking lawmakers to weigh: "Are you worth somehow less in the workplace than you are in your residence?"

Opponents, including some in law enforcement, consider the plan an overreach.

"This bill gives business owners a license to kill when nothing is threatened other than property," Democratic state Rep. Claire Levy said.

Most states have some variation of a self-defense law. In legislatures from Alaska to Oklahoma, lawmakers are considering adopting or extending such protections...

...Republicans found motivation for the proposal about five years ago after a Denver nightclub owner shot an intruder and was charged with attempted murder, and have unsuccessfully introduced a version of the measure in several sessions.

Holbert said the bill's opponents raised concerns when the state passed a "Make My Day" law back in the '80s.

"The opponents to that law were quite sure that we would have an increase in people just being shot on doorsteps, and that hasn't been the case," he said.

Holbert said, "This isn't a blanket coverage to do bad things."

I remember when states we passing concealed carry laws the usual suspects were screaming about how we would have blooding the streets, etc. I see how well that worked out. Now in places where handguns are basically banned (Chicago, New York, Washington DC) it's safe as hell right?

I got a suggestion for people who are concerned about this. You don't want to be shot by a business owner, don't break into his business. Simple and it works.

Art and politics

2012-02-05T11:00:00.000-06:00

I would only ask who in this group does't belong. Hint, it's not the guy sitting on the bench.

Controversial Artist Depicts Obama Trampling The Constitution « CBS Las Vegas

Provo, Utah (CBS Las Vegas) - In front of the White House a man is sitting on a park bench in the throes of depression. He is surrounded by all 43 presidents. In the forefront, purposefully ignoring the depressed man is President Obama, whose right foot is stepping on the Constitution. James Madison is next to Obama, pleading with him to stop.

This tableau is called “The Forgotten Man”, a painting by Jon McNaughton, an artist who is known for his politically-charged work.

The painting, which uses objects such as discarded dollar bills as symbols and scraps of paper with individual constitutional amendments scrawled onto them, has been making the rounds across the Internet...

...The responses have ranged from sarcastic — “We’ll trade you this peasant for that constitution. We’ll even throw in the bench.” – to Photoshop works of art....

You can read the full article and I support this man for many reasons, first of all freedom of expression. But I do wonder were are the other "defenders of the Constitution", e.g. ACLU, PFTAW, etc on this. After all they seemed to defend the producers of Death of a President, showing the assignation of George W Bush during his term. Till this point motion pictures have never shown a sitting president murdered. Then again we all know it was projection of a lot of what Hollywood wanted.

But I have to agree with the artist more on his last point in the article.
He later added to CBSLV: “I’m not trying to create an art style. I want to communicate my ideas. Isn’t that the purpose of art?”

You would think so Mr. McNaughton. Then again, your ideas are not right with the Progressive movement and they don't want to allow it.

Officer Down

2012-02-04T12:28:00.000-06:00

Police Officer Steven Green
Mobile Alabama Police Department
End of Watch: Friday, February 3, 2012
Age: 36
Tour: 1 year, 8 months

Police Officer Steven Green was stabbed to death by a prisoner outside of the Mobile County Metro Jail at approximately 3:50 pm.

The subject had been arrested by an off duty police officer earlier in the day when he attempted to rob a dollar store. He had approached the store's checkout counter, demanded money, then lit the counter on fire after spraying it with lighter fluid. An off duty officer shopping in the store tackled him and took him into custody.

He was processed at the police station and was being transported to the county jail by Officer Green when he attacked and fatally stabbed Officer Green outside of the jail complex. The subject then stole the officer's service weapon and patrol car. Other officers pursued the suspect to a home off of Dauphin Island Parkway where he engaged them in a shootout, wounding one officer in the arm. The suspect suffered a fatal gunshot wound during the exchange of shots.

Officer Green had served with the Mobile Police Department for 20 months. He is survived by his wife and children.

Rest in Peace Bro…We’ll Continue The Watch

Day is done, Gone the sun, From the lake, From the hills, From the sky. All is well, Safely rest, God is nigh.

Now I'm going to have this song in my head all day...

2012-02-03T07:39:00.000-06:00

But it's still as cool as hell!

Great way to start a weekend!

Security Weekly: Mali Besieged by Fighters Fleeing Libya, February 2, 2012

2012-02-02T11:30:00.000-06:00

By Scott Stewart

Mali has experienced perhaps the most significant external repercussions from the downfall of the regime of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi. Stratfor has discussed the impact of the conflict in Libya on the wider region since international intervention began in March 2011. Instability in Libya due to that country's deep internal fault lines meant that re-establishing a government would prove difficult. As we pointed out, that instability could spread to neighboring countries as weapons and combatants flow outward from Libya.

Reports now indicate that thousands of armed Tuareg tribesmen who previously served in Gadhafi's military have returned home to Mali. The influx of this large number of well-armed and well-trained fighters, led by a former Libyan army colonel, has re-energized the long-simmering Tuareg insurgency against the Malian government. These Tuareg insurgents have formed a new group, the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA). In mid-January, they began a military campaign to free three northern regions of Mali from Bamako's control.

The government of Mali has claimed that the MNLA is aligned with al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM). MNLA, however, has strongly denied any link to the group and said it will serve as a bulwark against AQIM. Given the U.S. and European interest in preventing the strengthening of AQIM, both sides have considerable incentive to take their respective positions. These developments make it an opportune time to examine the MNLA, its current offensive and the potential implications for Mali and the region.

The Tuaregs and the Origins of the MNLA

The Tuaregs are a semi-nomadic people who inhabit the interior of Africa's Sahara region, including parts of Mali, Algeria, Niger and Libya. (Click here for background information on the Tuaregs.) Tuareg militancy extends to pre-colonial times; the current conflict is merely the latest manifestation of a longstanding struggle between the Tuaregs and their ruler of the moment. In modern times, Tuareg insurgencies seem to occur almost every decade. They have fought the governments of Mali, Niger and Algeria since those countries' independence from France. Major Tuareg rebellions occurred in Mali from 2007 to 2009 and from 1990 to 1995.

During these rebellions, Tuareg militants typically exploit their mountain bases in Mali's northeast to launch hit-and-run guerrilla attacks against military targets across Mali's vast northern region, leaving the Malian armed forces spread thin.

The Tuaregs are a tribal people. Some Tuareg tribes in Mali -- such as the Oulemedens, Ichnidharans and Imgads -- tend to be more closely aligned than tribes such as the Idnans, Ifoghas and Chamanesse, which tend to be involved with armed opposition to the government.

Traditionally, the Tuaregs controlled caravan routes across the Sahara. In days past, those caravans carried gold, spices, salt or dates. Today, contraband including weapons, untaxed tobacco and even narcotics traverse the desert routes. Banditry remains common in the region.

The MNLA emerged against this backdrop on Oct. 16, 2011, four days before the killing of Moammar Gadhafi. Its leader is former Libyan army Col. Ag Mohamed Najem, who hails from the Ifogha tribe, at present the most radical tribe of the Tuareg opposition in Mali.

MNLA's website notes that the group is composed of remnants of former Tuareg opposition movements such as the United Fronts of Azawad, which led the 1990s uprising, and the Tuareg Movement in Northern Mali led by Ibrahim Ag Bahanga, who spearheaded the 2007-2009 rebellion. A cousin of MNLA leader Ag Mohamed Najem, Ag Bahanga died Aug. 26, 2011, in what some reports call a car accident. Other reports indicate he may have been killed in a strike by a U.S.-trained Malian counterterrorism unit. At the time of his death, he was trying to return to Mali from Libya, where he had fled in 2009 after a failed offensive into southern Mali.

Najem reportedly rose quickly among Gadhafi's ranks to become colonel of a unit of the Libyan army stationed in Sabha, in central Libya, making him quite familiar with the tactics of desert warfare. He reportedly deserted the Libyan army in July 2011 and, according to media reports, now holds at least two camps in Tigherghar and Zakak in the Tin-Assalak hills of northeast Mali, an area where Ag Bahanga established bases in 2007.

Najem is not the only MNLA leader with significant military experience. Experienced defectors from the Malian army including Lt. Col. Ag Mbarek Aky and Col. Ag Bamoussa reportedly have bolstered the organization. The presence of experienced military leaders gives the MNLA an increased ability to organize and mobilize its units across a broad swath of territory in northern Mali.

According to the group's website, their long-term demands include the liberation of the Timbuktu, Gao and Kidal regions in northern Mali. Previous Tuareg opposition movements have demanded reforms including decentralization and regional military integration. Notably, the MNLA does not seek control of all of Mali, just the northern regions.

The MNLA's website also goes to great lengths to distance the MNLA from the Gadhafi regime, but its claims that its Tuareg fighters fought alongside the Libyan rebels against Gadhafi are highly dubious. Indeed, many of Gadhafi's Tuareg troops supported the regime until his death and the capture of his son Seif al-Islam. But no matter which side they fought on in Libya, the arrival of a large contingent of heavily armed Tuareg fighters (reportedly numbering between 2,000 and 4,000) poses a significant challenge to the government of Mali.

Current MNLA Offensive

On Jan. 16-17, MNLA militants attacked a military barracks and a national guard base in Menaka, Gao region. A government helicopter forced the attackers to retreat. The Malian Defense Ministry stated that one soldier and several assailants were killed, but the actual number of casualties is thought to be higher. According to media reports, Tuareg rebels led by Malian army defector Ag Assalat Habbi may still be in the Menaka area.

On the morning of Jan. 17, the MNLA continued attacks against the northeastern cities of Aguelhoc and Tessalit in Kidal region. Witnesses reported that approximately 20 vehicles drove through the town of Aguelhoc to the military barracks before firing on the army with small arms and heavy weapons. Throughout the clashes there were contradicting claims over who controlled the cities, but by Jan. 20 the Malian government released a statement indicating that the three towns of Menaka, Aguelhoc and Tessalit had been reclaimed, indicating the rebels had held them for at least a short period. As Mali is very large and has poor roads and limited air assets, it can take the Malian military quite some time to reinforce units overland from southern Mali.

The rebels reportedly returned with reinforcements to Aguelhoc and, after cutting off supply convoys for nearly two days, launched an assault on the city early Jan. 24. According to one media account, the army had to abandon Aguelhoc after troops ran out of ammunition; another report says they staged a tactical retreat to reinforce the larger city of Kidal nearby. Following the retreat, the Malian government conducted airstrikes on Aguelhoc using fixed-wing Malian aircraft (likely MiG-21s), reportedly destroying some 40 rebel vehicles and killing dozens of fighters. The MNLA posted a photo on its Facebook page it claims shows a MiG-21 that MNLA forces shot down, but the photo is actually of a destroyed truck. On Jan. 25, government troops recaptured Aguelhoc. Subsequent reports suggest control of Aguelhoc has passed back and forth more than once since then.

The MNLA continued its series of armed assaults Jan. 26 on the towns of Anderamboukane in Gao region and Lere in Timbuktu region. While reports from Anderamboukane, near Menaka, have conflicted -- as have almost all reports regarding the fighting in the region -- it appears that the rebel assaults were similar to those launched against other towns and that the military used helicopters to disperse the attackers.

Lere, a small town, is approximately 320 kilometers (about 200 miles) west of the towns previously targeted. Local residents reported that MNLA fighters arrived in a dozen cars after a military unit had left the town so the militants faced no resistance. According to Reuters, military reinforcements were deployed in the direction of Lere on Jan. 28, but the present status of the town is unclear. Although tactically simple, this assault displays the geographic reach of the rebel movement and its intent to make government forces deploy across Mali's expansive north.

Lere is just south of Lake Faguibine, an area frequented by AQIM convoys. In June 2010, a joint Malian-Mauritanian force chased AQIM fighters into the Lere area after it attacked AQIM camps located in Wagadou Forest, on the Mali-Mauritania border.

On Jan. 31, the MNLA also reportedly attacked Niafunke, in Timbuktu region, in the far west of northern Mali. We have also seen an unconfirmed report of a purported MNLA attack in Ntilit, Goa region.

MNLA and AQIM

Mali is poor and its troops are poorly trained and equipped. Historically, the government has not demonstrated the will to seriously tackle Tuareg militants -- or AQIM for that matter. As noted above, the influx of thousands of armed Tuareg fighters poses a significant threat to the Malian government's ability to control the north of the country. The number of Tuareg fighters now reportedly engaged in the insurgency is considerably larger than the number involved in the 2007-2009 uprising. And the MNLA is not the only threat Mali faces. Like other nations in the region, the presence of AQIM threatens Mali, and in recent years the United States, France and the European Union have all provided funding and training intended to assist the government of Mali in countering the AQIM threat. Matters become murky at this point.

The government of Mali has publicly claimed that the MNLA is associated with AQIM to draw even more support from the United States and the Europeans. In fact, if not for the AQIM threat, the Americans and Europeans would not be inclined to pay much attention to the happenings in Mali: The AQIM card is really the only one the Malian government has to play to induce Western involvement. Given the grave Tuareg threat they face, the Malians are attempting to hype the AQIM-Tuareg relationship.

Certainly, U.S. and European air assets could provide a dramatic boost to the efforts of the Malian military, not just in terms of strikes, but also in terms of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance. Such assets could provide an elevated sense of battlefield awareness that could permit the Malian government to deploy its limited resources in a decisive manner. It could also help them know when not to engage. Likewise, as seen in Libya, even small teams of Western special operations forces working to advise and coordinate close air support for local forces could provide a tremendous boost to their combat capability.

Because of these factors, it is in the Malian government's best interests to paint the MNLA as associated with AQIM -- and of the MNLA to deny such association. The MNLA vociferously has denied ties to AQIM and even claims that once it controls the northern part of Mali, it will serve as a buffer against AQIM. The truth probably lies somewhere in between these statements.

In the past, Tuareg opposition networks have had varying degrees of involvement with AQIM. For example, former rebel leader Ibrahim Ag Bahanga (the deceased cousin of MNLA leader Ag Mohamed Najem) is thought to have maintained close associations with AQIM for financial reasons. Arab smugglers are known to pay large fees for protection as they run drugs, fuel, arms, cigarettes and migrants across Tuareg territory. There are also reports that Tuareg tribesmen have kidnapped Westerners in the Sahel and that those Westerners somehow made their way into AQIM custody, perhaps after being traded or sold.

The nuances of the relationship between AQIM, the Tuareg insurgents and smuggling networks in the Sahel are complex but appear to be linked primarily to the economic needs of the Tuaregs. Ag Bahanga clearly appears to have been plugged into these smuggling networks and to have used them, along with the patronage of Gadhafi, to fund and support his rebel movement.

With the cessation of supply lines from Libya, the MNLA must have a stream of income, food and ammunition if it is to sustain itself for the long term. Despite the MNLA's claims that it would clean up smuggling in the north, it would not be difficult for the MNLA to look to traditional smuggling networks as its principal source of revenue in much the same way AQIM currently does. We are unsure of how closely the MNLA will work with AQIM. Logically, it would likely cooperate, or not cooperate, with AQIM as best suits its cause.

Outlook

As the MNLA continues its efforts to establish control over northern Mali, and the Malian government works to prevent that from occurring, we will be looking at a number of factors to help determine which way the struggle is going.

First, the Libyan weapons currently under MNLA's control give it an ability to support itself in the short term, but it will need to find alternative sources of supply if it is going to be able to sustain its offensive operations. One option would be to re-establish Libyan lines of supply through a new relationship with the black and gray arms market there.

This means we will also need to watch for more defections from the Malian government and army -- especially units deserting with their equipment.

Second, the MNLA will need to win the hearts and minds of the people if it is to succeed in its insurgency. We will need to watch for indications that other tribal groups are jumping on the MNLA bandwagon and for the reaction of local populations to MNLA activities. So far, local populations have fled the MNLA. They also have conducted demonstrations in some places, demanding that the government take action against the MNLA. Alternatively, the MNLA could seek to drive opponents out of the regions it seeks to control, so we also need to watch for indications that it is driving civilians who do not support it out of the areas in which it operates.

Western help could dramatically change the situation, especially in areas like intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance resources and strike aircraft. We need to watch carefully for the increased deployment of such systems or of special operations forces to Mali and their use against the MNLA and not just against AQIM.

Algeria is positioning itself to serve as a neutral mediator, as it has in past confrontations between the Malian government and the Tuaregs. Algiers has temporarily frozen its operations and training with the Malian military and withdrawn its advisers from the northern states to avoid being caught in the middle of the clashes. Algerian diplomats reportedly have reached out to Tuareg tribal leaders in Algeria's own southern desert to pressure their counterparts in Mali to return to talks. The Algerian government has refused to treat wounded MNLA fighters, instead insisting on maintaining its neutral stance in the conflict, meaning that it is unlikely that the MNLA will be able to turn to Algeria if Malian forces push it into a corner. Like Algeria, Niger and Libya have their own Tuareg populations and internal stability issues and thus are not likely to take risks for the MNLA. This could put the group in a very tight spot, so we need to carefully watch the Algerian mediation efforts.

Mali Besieged by Fighters Fleeing Libya Copyright STRATFOR.COM

Congress shall make no law...

2012-02-01T19:30:00.000-06:00

Five of the most beautiful words written in the English language.

I've been out of it for the last few days and I found this article from Michelle Malkin interesting.

First, They Came for the Catholics

President Obama and his radical feminist enforcers have had it in for Catholic medical providers from the get-go. It's about time all people of faith fought back against this unprecedented encroachment on religious liberty. First, they came for the Catholics. Who's next?

This weekend, Catholic bishops informed parishioners of the recent White House edict forcing religious hospitals, schools, charities and other health and social service providers to provide "free" abortifacient pills, sterilizations and contraception on demand in their insurance plans -- even if it violates their moral consciences and the teachings of their churches.

NARAL, NOW, Ms. Magazine and the Feminist Majority Foundation all cheered the administration's abuse of the Obamacare law to ram abortion down pro-life medical professionals' throats. Femme dinosaur Eleanor Smeal gloated over the news that the administration had rejected church officials' pleas for compromises: "At last," she exulted, the left's goal of "no-cost birth control" for all had been achieved.

As always, tolerance is a one-way street in the Age of Obama. "Choice" is in the eye (and iron fist) of the First Amendment usurper.

Like the rising number of states who have revolted against the individual health care mandate at the ballot box and in the courts, targeted Catholics have risen up against the Obamacare regime. Arlington (Va.) Bishop Paul Loverde didn't mince words, calling the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services order "a direct attack against religious liberty. This ill-considered policy comprises a truly radical break with the liberties that have underpinned our nation since its founding." Several bishops vowed publicly to fight the mandate.

Bishop Alexander Sample of Marquette, Mich., asserted plainly: "We cannot -- we will not -- comply with this unjust law."

...Hannah Smith, senior counsel at the nonprofit law firm The Becket Fund, which is representing the schools, boiled it down for Bloomberg News: "This is not really about access to contraception. The mandate is about forcing these religious groups to pay for it against their beliefs."...

Again I go back to the title of this post. Someone with a decent education should know it's the beginning of the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

I think it's in any simple reading of the document that the Congress (and therefore the bureaucracy or the President) cannot order a church institution to do something against their belief.

I would not hold my breath for Americans United for the Separation of Church and State to come to the aide of the church in this matter. You know, that wall of separation between church and state only goes one way, right? Or the ACLU...yea, right.

Hopefully the church finds a judge to slap the Secretary of HHS with an injunction. She cannot order a church to preform a procedure that they find repugnant. Hell, ordering any hospital or doctor to give away their property without due process of law may seem a bit quaint but again I pray a judge stops this crap.

Why I will never vote for Mitt Romney

2012-01-31T14:00:00.012-06:00

I've often said if the choice this November is between B Hussein Obama and the kid on the eTrade commercial, I'll send in the kid. He is light years more qualified in terms of economics and budget.

But in all seriousness if the choice is between Santorum or Newt, I will give those men my vote plus money and other support. This election is just too damned serious not to sit out.

Now if the Republican Party nominates the former governor of Massachusetts, I will save some money in the short term He's not getting a donation from me and God knows I won't work a phone bank or anything else. Why you ask? If anything shows why this man belongs in the Democratic Party (alone with his buddy, Jon Huntsman) this is it. From Mother Jones:

First, anyone who praises the efforts of Ted Kennedy in health care is not a conservative or really a Republican. But the article puts it suscinctly:
It's no secret that Mitt Romney has an albatross around his neck: Romneycare, the Massachusetts health care overhaul he enacted while governor of the Bay State. The plan, which included a mandate compelling state residents to obtain health insurance, was a model in part for President Barack Obama's health care reform, which is much-despised by conservatives and Republican voters.

So far, Romney has deftly navigated this potential land mine of a campaign issue. Defending his health care program, he has argued that it was significantly different from Obama's measure—while calling for repeal of the Obama initiative. His foes in the GOP presidential primary have jabbed Romney for imposing a mandate on Massachusetts residents. But none of these blows have floored the candidate. That's partly due to his opponents' ineptitude.

At a September 12 debate, Texas Gov. Rick Perry did exclaim that Romneycare is "the model for Obamacare." Yet Romney slyly replied, "I'd be careful about trusting what President Obama says as to what the source was to his plan." Perry's assault fizzled. But according to a story broken on Tuesday by NBC News' Michael Isikoff, White House visitors logs reveal that Romney's health care advisers and experts repeatedly met with senior Obama administration officials in 2009, while Obama's health care plan was being drafted...

Now Mother Jones is not a leftist rag like the NY Times, WP, USA Today, etc. Unlike those waste of paper this magazine is proudly leftist and I can respect that. And unlike those rags who are trying to push the weakest candidate (with the possible exception of Ron Paul) for the Republican nomination, Mother Jones has a good look at what this means.

This Ted Kennedy lovefest footage from the 2006 bill-signing ceremony for the health care law is probably not what Romney wants GOP primary voters to have in mind when they enter a polling place or caucus meeting. When he has discussed his health care law on the presidential campaign trail—in 2007 and this past year—Romney has occasionally noted that it demonstrated his ability to work with the opposition, including the late Sen. Kennedy. But in these settings he doesn't describe Kennedy as his "collaborator" whose work "behind the scenes" was "absolutely essential" for passage of the health care plan. Nor does he call Kennedy, whom Romney praised for winning crucial federal support for the Massachusetts bill, a "parent" of Romneycare.

Yet on the day his health care plan became state law, an excited Romney joyously shared credit with the liberal lion of the US Senate.

As of Tuesday, only 2,016 people have viewed this video, which was posted during Romney's 2007 presidential campaign. It would not be surprising if Romney's opponents in the current campaign find a way to direct a bit more traffic in its direction.

I asks anyone who sees this video to spread it to anyone who is thinking of voting for Romney in the Republican nomination fight. This is what you are supporting and he's not a conservative. I don't argue if Romney is nominated vote for him against Obama. But we have to do better than this. And lets keep this vetting process on till the convention.

And I know Governor Romney's campaign doesn't want this shown so I will do what I can to push it out. Thank you Mother Jones for putting this out and for Mark Levine for linking it up. Hopefully other campaigns are getting ready to show what the most electable candidate really stands for.

Kinda puts it in perspective....

2012-01-31T10:28:00.000-06:00

The Conservative Movement, led by the TEA Party in 2010 gave Republicans the House of Representatives, broke the 60 vote majority in the Senate and a clear pattern to the White House in 2012.

Oh well....

Geopolitical Weekly: Germany's Role in Europe and the European Debt Crisis, January 31, 2012

2012-01-31T09:41:00.000-06:00

By George Friedman

The German government proposed last week that a European commissioner be appointed to supplant the Greek government. While phrasing the German proposal this way might seem extreme, it is not unreasonable. Under the German proposal, this commissioner would hold power over the Greek national budget and taxation. Since the European Central Bank already controls the Greek currency, the euro, this would effectively transfer control of the Greek government to the European Union, since whoever controls a country's government expenditures, tax rates and monetary policy effectively controls that country. The German proposal therefore would suspend Greek sovereignty and the democratic process as the price of financial aid to Greece.

Though the European Commission rejected the proposal, the concept is far from dead, as it flows directly from the logic of the situation. The Greeks are in the midst of a financial crisis that has made Greece unable to repay money Athens borrowed. Their options are to default on the debt or to negotiate a settlement with their creditors. The International Monetary Fund and European Union are managing these negotiations.

Any settlement will have three parts. The first is an agreement by creditors to forego repayment on part of the debt. The second is financial help from the IMF and the European Union to help pay back the remaining debt. The third is an agreement by the Greek government to curtail government spending and increase taxes so that it can avoid future sovereign debt crises and repay at least part of the debt.

Bankruptcy and the Nation State

The Germans don't trust the Greeks to keep any bargain, which is not unreasonable given that the Greeks haven't been willing to enforce past agreements. Given this lack of trust, Germany proposed suspending Greek sovereignty by transferring it to a European receiver. This would be a fairly normal process if Greece were a corporation or an individual. In such cases, someone is appointed after bankruptcy or debt restructuring to ensure that a corporation or individual will behave prudently in future.

A nation state is different. It rests on two assumptions. The first is that the nation represents a uniquely legitimate community whose members share a range of interests and values. The second is that the state arises in some way from the popular will and that only that popular will has the right to determine the state's actions. There is no question that for Europe, the principle of national self-determination is a fundamental moral value. There is no question that Greece is a nation and that its government, according to this principle, is representative of and responsible to the Greek people.

The Germans thus are proposing that Greece, a sovereign country, transfer its right to national self-determination to an overseer. The Germans argue that given the failure of the Greek state, and by extension the Greek public, creditors have the power and moral right to suspend the principle of national self-determination. Given that this argument is being made in Europe, this is a profoundly radical concept. It is important to understand how we got here.

Germany's Part in the Debt Crisis

There were two causes. The first was that Greek democracy, like many democracies, demands benefits for the people from the state, and politicians wishing to be elected must grant these benefits. There is accordingly an inherent pressure on the system to spend excessively. The second cause relates to Germany's status as the world's second-largest exporter. About 40 percent of German gross domestic product comes from exports, much of them to the European Union. For all their discussion of fiscal prudence and care, the Germans have an interest in facilitating consumption and demand for their exports across Europe. Without these exports, Germany would plunge into depression.

Therefore, the Germans have used the institutions and practices of the European Union to maintain demand for their products. Through the currency union, Germany has enabled other eurozone states to access credit at rates their economies didn't merit in their own right. In this sense, Germany encouraged demand for its exports by facilitating irresponsible lending practices across Europe. The degree to which German actions encouraged such imprudent practices -- since German industrial production vastly outstrips its domestic market, making sustained consumption in markets outside Germany critical to German economic prosperity -- is not fully realized.

True austerity within the European Union would have been disastrous for the German economy, since declines in consumption would have come at the expense of German exports. While demand from Greece is only a small portion of these exports, Greece is part of the larger system -- and the proper functioning of that system is very much in Germany's strategic interests. The Germans claim the Greeks deceived their creditors and the European Union. A more comprehensive explanation would include the fact that the Germans willingly turned a blind eye. Though Greece is an extreme case, Germany's overall interest has been to maintain European demand -- and thus avoid prudent austerity -- as long as possible.

Germany certainly was complicit in the lending practices that led to Greece's predicament. It is possible that the Greeks kept the whole truth about the Greek economy from their creditors, but even so, the German demand for suspension of Greek national self-determination is particularly striking.

In a sense, the German proposal merely makes very public what has always been the reality. For Greece to have its debt restructured, it must impose significant austerity measures, which Athens has agreed to. The Germans now want a commissioner appointed to ensure the Greek government fulfills its promise. In the process, the debt crisis will profoundly circumscribe Greek democracy by transferring fundamental elements of Greek sovereignty into the hands of commissioners whose primary interest is the repayment of debt, not Greek national interests.

The Judgment of Athens

The Greeks have two choices. First, they can accept responsibility for the debts on the terms negotiated and accede to the constraints on their budget and tax discretion whether imposed by a commissioner or by a less formal structure. Second, they can default on all debts. As we have learned from corporate behavior, bankruptcy has become a respectable strategic option. Therefore, the Greeks must consider the consequences of simply defaulting.

Default might see them frozen out of world financial markets. But even if they don't default, they will be present in those markets only under the most constrained circumstances, and to the primary benefit of creditors at that. Moreover, as many corporations have found, borrowing becomes more attractive after default, as it clears the way to new post-default debt. It is not clear that no one would lend to Greece after a default. In fact, Greece has defaulted on its debt several times and managed to regain access to international lending.

More significantly, defaulting would allow Greece to avoid fueling its internal political crisis by forfeiting its national sovereignty. Much of the political crisis inside of Greece stems from the Greek public's antipathy to austerity. But another part, which would come to the fore under the German proposal, is that the Greeks do not want to lose national sovereignty. In their long history, the Greeks have lost their sovereignty to invaders such as the Romans, the Ottomans and, most recently, the Nazis. The brutal German occupation still lives in Greek memories. The concept of national self-determination is thus not an abstract concept to the Greeks. Its loss plus austerity imposed by foreign powers would create a domestic crisis in which the Greek state would be seen as an economic and political enemy of Greek national interests along with the commissioner or some other mechanism. The political result could be explosive.

It is unclear if the Greeks will opt not to default. The certain price of default -- being forced to use their national currency instead of the euro -- actually would increase national sovereignty. There will be economic pain if the Greeks continue with the euro, and there will be economic pain if the Greeks leave the euro; the political consequences of losing sovereignty in the face of such pain could easily be overwhelming. Default, while painful to Greece, might well be less painful than the alternative.

The German Dilemma

The Germans are caught in a dilemma. On the one hand, Germany is the last country in Europe that could afford general austerity in troubled states and the resulting decline in demand. On the other hand, it cannot simply tolerate Greek-style indifference to fiscal prudence. Germany must have a structured solution that to some degree maintains demand in countries such as Spain or Italy; Germans must show there are consequences to not complying with the orderly handling of debt without default. Above all, the Germans must preserve the European Union so they can enjoy a European free-trade zone. There is thus an inherent tension between preserving the system and imposing discipline.

Germany has decided to make an example of the Greeks. The German public largely has bought into Berlin's narrative of Greek duplicity and German innocence. German Chancellor Angela Merkel has needed to frame the discussion this way, and she has succeeded. The degree to which the German public is aware of the complexities or the consequences of a generalized austerity for Germany is less clear. Merkel must now satisfy a German public that questions bailouts and sees Greece as simply irresponsible. Capitulation from Greece is necessary for her as a matter of domestic politics.

The German move into questions of sovereignty has raised the stakes in the debt crisis dramatically. Even if the Germans simply back off this demand, the Greek public has been reminded that Greek democracy is effectively at stake. While Greece may have borrowed irresponsibly, if the price of that behavior is yielding sovereignty to an unelected commissioner, that price not only would challenge Greek principles, it would bring Europe to a new crisis.

That crisis would be political, as the ongoing crisis always has been. In the new crisis, sovereign debt issues turn into threats to national independence and sovereignty. If you owe too much money and your creditors distrust you, you lose the right to national-self determination on the most important matters. Given that Germany was the historic nightmare for most of Europe, and it is Germany that is pushing this doctrine, the outcome could well be explosive. It could also be the opposite of what Germany needs.

Germany must have a free-trade zone in Europe. Germany also needs robust demand in Europe. Germany also wants prudence in borrowing practices. And Germany must not see a return to the anti-German feeling of previous epochs. Those are several needs, and some of them are mutually exclusive. In one way, the issue is Greece. But more and more, it is the Germans that are the question mark. How far are they willing to go, and do they fully understand their national interests? Increasingly, this crisis is ceasing to be a Greek or Italian crisis. It is a crisis of the role Germany will play in Europe in the future. The Germans hold many cards, and that's their problem: With so many options, they must make hard decisions -- and that does not come easily for postwar Germany.

Germany's Role in Europe and the European Debt Crisis Copyright STRATFOR.COM

Questions on threats against Obama

2012-01-30T21:06:00.000-06:00

Now I don't knock the Secret Service for their work. Having to defend people they may not like can sound like a challenge while your being rational. But this is an example of overreaction if you ask me.

Now threats against a president are nothing new and they will continue as long as their is a president. Now I wonder if the Secret Service got really concerned by these.

Now for some reason this image is really getting the Secret Service upset.

Now if the Secret Service got upset enough to investigate the previous examples of threats against the president, so be it. But se we can insure future viewers can observe this photo, I'll leave it up for all to see.

Officer Down

2012-01-30T20:00:00.000-06:00

Master Corporal Sandra E. "Sandy" Rogers
Aiken Department of Public Safety, South Carolina
End of Watch: Saturday, January 28, 2012
Age: 49
Tour: 27 years

Master Corporal Sandy Rogers was shot and killed while responding to a call for a suspicious vehicle at Eustis Park at approximately 7:50 am. Master Corporal Rogers arrived on scene and radioed that she was approaching a blue vehicle. Another officer called for her one minute later and did not receive a response.

Master Corporal Rogers was transported to Aiken Regional Medical Centers where she succumbed to her wounds.

The subject was linked to another shooting in Richmond County, Georgia, earlier in the day. He was apprehended in Batesville-Leesville several hours later.

Master Corporal Rogers was a 27 year veteran of the Aiken Department of Public Safety and a lifelong resident of Aiken County.

Rest in Peace Sis…We’ll Continue The Watch

Day is done, Gone the sun, From the lake, From the hills, From the sky. All is well, Safely rest, God is nigh.

Kinda like a big dog to me....

2012-01-29T21:44:00.000-06:00

I've often said you have no reasonable expectation of privacy in the open, such as walking in the street. For that reason I cannot object when people video tape officers working on the street. So turn about is fair play. Call it the Peacemaker.

Police roll out video surveillance truck called The Peacemaker

FORT LAUDERDALE— Tania Ouaknine is convinced the police are watching her.

She's not paranoid — it says as much on the red sign painted along the side on the hulking armored truck that's been parked in front of her eight-room Parisian Motel for several days.

"Warning: You are under video surveillance," reads the bold message on the side of the truck.

From the front bumper of the menacing vehicle, another sign taunts: "Whatcha gonna do when we come for you?"

The truck is a new weapon for the Fort Lauderdale Police Department in the fight against drugs and neighborhood nuisances, and it looks like a Winnebago on steroids. They call it "The Peacemaker," and it may be a first in South Florida.

Mixing high tech with simplicity, the in-your-face strategy is straightforward: load an out-of-service armored truck with some of the latest surveillance equipment available and decorate it with police emblems. Then, simply leave it parked in front of trouble spots...

...In August, police got the first of their two Peacemakers after paying the Brinks company $10 for a discontinued armored bank truck. They retrofitted the vehicle with cameras that can stream live video back to headquarters. With its cameras hoisted on each bullet-proof window, the truck can gather panoramic footage for up to 700 hours.

Last month the department added a second truck to its arsenal, converting a former SWAT vehicle into the second Peacemaker. Police park the unmanned trucks in front of the homes of suspected drug dealers and at crime-plagued street corners.

Ten bucks for an armored car...damned I thought I was cheap!

On a recent afternoon, a Peacemaker had at least one of its eight cameras trained on Ouaknine's one-story establishment...

...Some neighbors surrounding the Parisian Motel say the truck is another form of constant police harassment.

On a recent afternoon, Leo Cooper watched as two undercover street-crime officers jumped out of an unmarked Ford Crown Victoria just yards from the Peacemaker. They began questioning a group of men gathered at the corner. Within minutes, one of the men ran away. A second man was charged with loitering.

"This is what happens here every day. We can't sit outside without being harassed," said Cooper, 27. "Now we have that truck. Most of us are not doing anything wrong. We can't be outside?"

The police department has met the allegations of harassment with skepticism.

"People who are abiding by the law should have no problems with this," said Mandell. "People may feel that their privacy is being infringed on, but when you think about it, every day you walk down the street you are being watched by 20 to 30 cameras from private businesses and homes."

The feedback is much different in a neighborhood less than a mile east of the motel, close to where Sistrunk Boulevard is undergoing a major refurbishing project. In December, residents rallied at city meetings to get more police presence after a rash of daytime home burglaries, including one on New Year's Day, said Anthony Lucicero, a neighborhood leader.

"We had all sorts of people walking up and down this street at all hours," he said. "Prostitutes, junkies, everyone."

In early January, police parked the Peacemaker at an empty lot on Northwest Fifth Court between 10th and 11th avenues. Neighbors say it's already making a difference.

"Before the truck, we were afraid to go to work knowing your house might be robbed in the middle of the afternoon," said Lucicero's neighbor, Tangerine Davis. "Now we go to work in peace."

Their biggest worry now, they say, is what happens when the Peacemaker drives away and the police are no longer watching.

"I wish they had another one out here," Lucicero said. "I have an empty lot right there they can use."

A check with the region's major law enforcement agencies indicate Fort Lauderdale's Peacemakers may be the first in South Florida, but not the first in the nation. News reports show that agencies in Green Bay, Wis., Lafayette, La. and St. Louis, Mo., have been using them for at least a year.

"We are definitely not doing something like that right now," said Deputy Eric Davis, a spokesman for the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office. "I would love to see this for myself. Sounds pretty novel."

Again, this is no more than a new form of high tech patrol. And if it deters a crime it's worth the money. There is no issue of privacy as it is just recording things happening on the street. Fort Lauderdale, great work. Hope this catches on.

Reckless Driving, to Wit "....

2012-01-29T08:48:00.000-06:00

After seeing this on TV Beth asked if I could give the idiot girls a ticket for something like this and I said yes. There is a generic citation I can issue if I can articulate the hazardous driving action. I think this qualifies.

ROCKWALL — A sheriff's deputy is being hailed a hero after pulling two young women from a sinking car early Saturday morning — moments before it slipped beneath the surface of Lake Ray Hubbard.

"I saw the two females in the back seat," said Deputy Keven Rowan of the Rockwall County Sheriff's Office. "I was like, 'I got to get them out!'"

Rowan spotted the submerged Honda Civic shortly before 1 a.m. Saturday while he was patrolling the shoreline.

Moments earlier, the car's driver, Ngac Do of Garland, had mistaken a boat ramp for a road at Robertson Park in Dallas and drove into the lake. She and her cousin got lost while driving home from dinner.

Rowan, a five-year deputy, never saw the car until he happened to glance down the ramp and notice headlights thirty feet from the shore.

"I don't know what it is," Rowan said of the timing. "I guess it wasn’t those girls' time, and I guess I was at the right place at the right time."...

...He pulled both women to safety seconds before the car disappeared into the lake.

Kids, learn to keep an idea where the hell you are. Deputy Rowan, good work.

Security Weekly: Nigeria's Boko Haram Militants Remain a Regional Threat, January 26, 2012

2012-01-26T07:32:00.000-06:00

By Scott Stewart

The Nigerian militant group Boko Haram conducted a series of bombing attacks and armed assaults Jan. 20 in the northern city of Kano, the capital of Kano state and second-largest city in Nigeria. The attacks, which reportedly included the employment of at least two suicide vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices (VBIEDs), targeted a series of police facilities in Kano. These included the regional police headquarters, which directs police operations in Kano, Katsina and Jigawa states, as well as the State Security Service office and the Nigerian Immigration Service office. At least 211 people died in the Kano attacks, according to media reports.

The group carried out a second wave of attacks in Bauchi state on Jan. 22, bombing two unoccupied churches in the Bauchi metropolitan area and attacking a police station in the Tafawa Balewa local government area. Militants reportedly also tried to rob a bank in Tafawa Balewa the same day. Though security forces thwarted the robbery attempt, 10 people reportedly died in the clash, including two soldiers and a deputy police superintendent.

In a third attack, Boko Haram militants attacked a police sub-station in Kano on Jan. 24 with small arms and improvised hand grenades. A tally of causalities in the assault, which reportedly lasted some 25 minutes, was not available. This armed assault stands out tactically from the Jan. 20 suicide attacks against police stations in Kano. The operation could have been an attempt to liberate some of the Boko Haram militants the government arrested following the Jan. 20 and Jan. 22 attacks.

Stratfor has followed Boko Haram carefully to assess its intent -- and ability -- to become more transnational. As we noted after the U.S. State Department issued warnings in early November 2011 about Boko Haram's alleged plans to strike Western-owned hotels in Abuja, Nigeria's capital, the group made significant leaps in its operational capability during 2011. During that time, it transitioned from very simple attacks to successfully employing suicide VBIEDS. An examination of the recent attacks in Kano and Bauchi states, however, does not reveal further advances in the group's operational tradecraft and does not display any new ability or intent to project power beyond its traditional areas of operation.

Boko Haram's Tactical Evolution

Boko Haram, Hausa for "Western Education is Sinful," is an Islamist militant group established in 2002 in Maiduguri, the capital of Nigeria's Borno state. It has since spread to several other northern and central Nigerian states. It is officially known as "Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'awati wal-Jihad," Arabic for "Group Committed to Propagating the Prophet's Teachings and Jihad."

At first, Boko Haram was involved mostly in fomenting sectarian violence. Its adherents participated in simple attacks on Christians using clubs, machetes and small arms. Boko Haram came to international attention following serious outbreaks of inter-communal violence in 2008 and 2009 that resulted in thousands of deaths.

By late 2010, Boko Haram had added Molotov cocktails and simple improvised explosive devices (IEDs) to its tactical repertoire. This tactical advancement was reflected in the series of small IEDs deployed against Christian targets in Jos, Plateau state, on Christmas Eve 2010.

Boko Haram conducted a number of other armed assaults and small IED attacks in early 2011. The IEDs involved in these attacks were either improvised hand grenades constructed by filling soft drink cans with explosives -- which were frequently thrown from motorcycles -- or slightly larger devices left at the target.

This attack paradigm was shattered June 16, 2011, when Boko Haram launched a suicide VBIED attack against the headquarters of the Nigerian national police in Abuja. Though not overly spectacular (security measures kept the device away from the headquarters building and it exploded in a parking lot), the successful deployment of a large VBIED and a suicide operative represented a dramatic leap in Boko Haram's capability. An organization does not normally develop such a capability internally without some signs of progressive advancement in its bombmaking capability. For example, a group would be expected to employ medium-sized IEDs before it employed large VBIEDS. That it skipped a step prompted us to believe reports of Boko Haram members receiving training from al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb in northern Africa or from al Shabaab in Somalia (or some other outside group).

Boko Haram conducted its second suicide VBIED attack in Abuja on Aug. 26, 2011, this time targeting a U.N. compound in the city's diplomatic district. This attack proved far more deadly because the driver was able to enter the compound and reach a parking garage before detonating his device near the building's entrance. The attack against the U.N. compound also marked a break from Boko Haram's traditional target set of government and Christian facilities.

If the intelligence that triggered the warnings of hotel attacks in November 2011 is accurate, it appears the group may also have considered transnational targets -- at least to the extent of seeking to eliminate involvement by the international community in Nigeria in order to undercut Abuja. This shift in targeting raised concerns that the group's contacts with al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and/or al Shabaab had influenced it. It also raised fears that due to its rapidly evolving attack capability, Boko Haram now was on a trajectory to become the next jihadist franchise group to become a transnational terrorist threat, following in the steps of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the Yemen-based al Qaeda franchise group. The January attacks provide us an opportunity to evaluate this theory.

What the January Attacks Tell Us

First, the group appears to have no shortage of explosive material. In addition to the devices the group employed in the attacks, the police reportedly seized some 300 improvised grenades and 10 VBIEDs. It also appears Boko Haram has access to large quantities of commercial explosives, rather than being forced to rely on less reliable and less stable improvised explosive mixtures. A good deal of mining occurs in central Nigeria, and it seems that the group is either stealing commercial explosives from mining companies, extorting mining companies for explosives or has somehow been able to purchase commercial explosives using a front company or companies. The Nigerian government has sought to tighten controls on commercial explosives in response, but its efforts so far do not seem to have affected the group's ability to procure large quantities of explosives.

Boko Haram also appears to have competent bombmakers. While the improvised hand grenades the group is issuing are quite rudimentary, being made by inserting a non-electric detonator with a short piece of time fuse in a soda can filled with high explosives, their devices are functioning as designed. The same can be said for their suicide vests and VBIEDS: They are simple yet functional. This stands out, since IEDs commonly malfunction. Bombmaking is an art that normally follows a significant learning curve absent outside instruction from a more experienced bombmaker. Boko Haram's proficiency suggests the group's bombmaker(s) indeed received training from experienced militants elsewhere.

The group also appears to have had no problems recruiting militants, including suicide bombers. The Jan. 20 attacks alone involved dozens of militants. Two people served as suicide bombers for the VBIEDs while perhaps two other suicide bombers worked on foot; others threw IEDs from motorcycles and conducted armed assaults.

That said, the group's operational planners do not appear to be as advanced as their bombmakers and recruiters. Though they have proved fairly successful in attacking soft targets, they have not had much success in their attacks against harder targets. For example, the attacker in the Jan. 20 strike on the State Security Service office in Kano was shot and killed before he could approach the building. Likewise, security forces were able to repel the attackers in the Jan. 22 attempted bank robbery in Tafawa Balewa.

All three January attacks also occurred in Boko Haram's traditional area of operations in the northern and central regions of Nigeria. These areas are both familiar and accessible to the group and it has strong support there. (It also has significant support in the area around Abuja.) The group has yet to display an ability to project power outside its traditional operational area into less familiar and more hostile environments.

Some ask whether Boko Haram is merely a political tool used by northern politicians to pressure the Nigerian federal government in much the same way politicians from the Niger Delta have used militant groups such as the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta to ensure what they believe is their fair share of Nigeria's oil revenue. While undoubtedly some connections between some northern politicians and Boko Haram exist, it would be simplistic to suggest such politicians completely control Boko Haram. Indeed, the Nigerian newspaper Vanguard reported Jan. 24 that senior Boko Haram figures said Jan. 21 that they were retaliating against northern governors who had refused to pay the group previously agreed-upon monthly sums of cash not to conduct operations in their state and for allowing security forces to arrest groups of their members, as they did Jan. 18 when six Boko Haram leaders were detained in Maiduguri. (One of the arrested leaders, Kabiru Sokoto, escaped later when gunmen likely affiliated with Boko Haram attacked the police vehicles transporting him.)

At the very least, however, these recent attacks tell us that before the group can become an existential threat to the Nigerian government -- or a legitimate transnational threat -- it will need to develop the ability to deploy its IEDs and suicide operatives to the point that it successfully can attack hardened targets. It will also need to develop the ability to work beyond its traditional areas of operation. Until it can master those skills (and display an intent to use such skills), it will remain a regional, albeit deadly, threat.

Nigeria's Boko Haram Militants Remain a Regional Threat Copyright STRATFOR.COM.

Northern Lights Over Tepees, Yellowknife Canada

2012-01-26T01:00:00.001-06:00

My friend Linda T. sent me these...beautiful

Officer Down

2012-01-25T23:00:00.001-06:00

Senior Police Officer Gail Thomas
Atlanta Georgia Police Department
End of Watch: Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Age: 46
Tour: 15 years

Senior Police Officer Gail Thomas was struck and killed by a suspected drunk driver while assisting other officers with a traffic incident on the exit ramp from southbound I-75 to northbound I-85.

She had just exited her vehicle when she was struck. The drunk driver was arrested and charged with vehicular homicide, DUI, and reckless driving.

Officer Thomas had served with the Atlanta Police Department for 15 years.

Rest in Peace Bro…We’ll Continue The Watch

Day is done, Gone the sun, From the lake, From the hills, From the sky. All is well, Safely rest, God is nigh.

Guns and Hoses!

2012-01-25T22:05:00.000-06:00

Cool stuff....

WARNING: adult language!

I know there are firefighters out there who can relate to these!

Slip sliding away....slip sliding away....

2012-01-25T21:00:00.003-06:00

I've sometimes gotten into discussions with friends from Texas and Louisiana on weather. Occasionally I get someone saying "I'd rather have the cold, I can always put on more cloths.." My first question is "Have you ever lived where it's cold like North Dakota?" Usually I get a "no".

Things like this explain why I like it down here....

Those who forget history...

2012-01-25T19:42:00.000-06:00

Pat at And So it Goes in Shreveport last week posted on a Holocaust survivor's speech and I mentioned Eisenhower's comment after seeing the camps, "Some day some son of a bitch will say this never happened."

This is a disturbing stat.
EUROPE - One in five young Germans unaware of Auschwitz: poll

One in five young Germans has no idea that Auschwitz was a Nazi death camp, a poll released Wednesday showed, two days ahead of Holocaust memorial day.

Although 90 percent of those asked did know it was a concentration camp, the poll for Thursday's edition of Stern news magazine revealed that Auschwitz meant nothing to 21 percent of 18-29 year olds.

And nearly a third of the 1,002 people questioned last Thursday and Friday for the poll were unaware that Auschwitz was in today's Poland.

The poll comes ahead of the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by Soviet troops on January 27, 1945, which Germany has marked since 1996 with official memorial ceremonies for Holocaust victims.

According to a report by independent experts commissioned by the German parliament and published earlier this week, about one in five Germans is latently anti-Semitic.

Charlotte getting ready for Democratic Convention

2012-01-25T14:30:00.000-06:00

Good to know Charlotte is gonna take nothing from these occupy punks. Now the question is why didn't they do this before the Dems made it down.

Charlotte City Council OKs expanding police power during DNC

Rules changes also outlaw camps on city land, sparking outcry.

In preparation for the Democratic National Convention, the Charlotte City Council voted 10-1 Monday night to approve new ordinances that will give police more power to stop and search people during the convention.

In addition, the new rules will prohibit camping on city property, a change that will keep Occupy Charlotte protesters from sleeping on the lawn at old City Hall.

The vote was met with shouts of "Shame!" from a packed council chamber, which prompted most of the council and Mayor Anthony Foxx to temporarily leave the dais. Protesters upset at the vote continued to shout chants, such as "Evict us, we multiply ... Occupy will never die," in the lobby of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Government Center...

...The city has said the changes protect the First Amendment, though the American Civil Liberties Union has said some of the measures go too far, including giving the police power to arrest people carrying backpacks, satchels or coolers if they believe the items are being used to carry weapons.

Large protests - and some violence - have been common at political conventions, and Charlotte-Mecklenburg police say they are trying to ensure they have enough power to keep people and property safe...

...Michael J. Zytkow, who was arrested on a disorderly conduct charge during the public hearing for the ordinances two weeks ago, said Charlotteans will be "harassed for expressing themselves." He added the ordinances would "criminalize homelessness" because it will be illegal to sleep on city property...

...Since the fall, protesters have been staying on the old City Hall lawn, pitching tents and even creating a makeshift kitchen.

Under the new rules, protesters can stay on the site 24 hours a day, seven days a week. But they won't be allowed to sleep, or create any semi-permanent structures used for cooking food, sleeping or other living arrangements...

...People won't be allowed to carry items such as helmets and body armor; noxious substances; barricades, locks; pipes; mace or pepper spray; or other weapons.

In addition, the new ordinance prohibits people from carrying backpacks, satchels or coolers if police believe they are being used to carry weapons.

"They are frequently used to carry rocks and weapons," said CMPD Deputy Chief Harold Medlock, who is coordinating the police department's DNC response.

Medlock said during the 2008 DNC in Denver, some protesters would enter portable toilets and fill backpacks with feces, which were thrown at police...

Hopefully they keep these after the convention. These punks needed to be handled.

Questions the feds don't ask when they run a car company

2012-01-25T10:07:00.002-06:00

Is there a market? Does it cost too much? The stats in this article answer the questions.

Some Chevy dealers spurn Volt allocation

DETROIT -- Some Chevrolet dealers are turning down Volts that General Motors wants to ship to them, a potential stumbling block as GM looks to accelerate sales of the plug-in hybrid.

For example, consider the New York City market. Last month, GM allocated 104 Volts to 14 dealerships in the area, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Dealers took just 31 of them, the lowest take rate for any Chevy model in that market last month. That group of dealers ordered more than 90 percent of the other vehicles they were eligible to take, the source said.

In Clovis, Calif., meanwhile, Brett Hedrick, dealer principal at Hedrick's Chevrolet, sold 10 Volts last year. But in December and January he turned down all six Volts allocated to him under GM's "turn-and-earn" system, which distributes vehicles based on past sales volumes and inventory levels.

GM's "thinking we need six more Volts is just crazy," Hedrick says. "We've never sold more than two in a month." Hedrick says he usually takes just about every vehicle that GM allocates to him.

GM spokesman Rob Peterson confirmed that "dealer ordering is down" for the Volt...

...Industry insiders are closely watching sales of the Volt and Nissan Leaf as barometers of market demand for electric vehicles. Several other automakers are set to launch EVs this year.

At the Detroit auto show this month, GM executives said they wouldn't chase a previous Volt production target set for 2012 -- 60,000 units, three-quarters of which would be for U.S. sales -- and vowed simply to build as many as customers want.

GM sold 7,671 Volts in the United States in 2011, short of its 10,000-unit target. It launched the car in seven key markets starting in late 2010, but didn't begin a national rollout until this past autumn.

"We haven't satisfied demand," GM North America President Mark Reuss said on the sidelines of the Detroit show. He said GM will be able to gauge Volt demand by sometime in the second quarter.

Many dealers say they no longer have customers waiting in the wings...

Again, an expensive POS that has no market. Now I found this comment interesting.

Gas will be aproaching record levels as early as May. I would wait untill the end of summer before ordering Volt's tombstone. The car is a little overpriced but the last time we had a gas spike I witnessed dealers paying $33,000 for a used Prius at auction. That dealer might be a fool, but he probably had a willing buyer for more money back at the store. We are rapidly aproaching the end of the era for cheap gas. When the economy comes back (and it will) we will live in a time of cheap Gold and expensive gas.

And expensive everything else. This moron seems to now comprehend high fuel costs will inflate the prices of other items (food, housing, etc) that will keep the economy depressed. And if B Hussein Obama is not thrown the hell out of officer in November out economy is shot.

Officer Down

2012-01-25T08:00:00.000-06:00

Deputy Sheriff James I. Thacker
Pike County Kentucky Sheriff's Department
End of Watch: Monday, January 23, 2012
Age: 53
Badge # 71
Incident Date: 1/23/2012

Deputy Sheriff James Thacker was killed in an automobile accident on U.S. 460, just past Marrowbone Creek Road, at approximately 9:00 pm.

He was returning to Elkhorn City from Pikeville at the end of his shift when an SUV crossed the center line and struck his patrol car head-on. The SUV then collided with another vehicle. Deputy Thacker succumbed to his injuries at the scene.

.

Rest in Peace Bro…We’ll Continue The Watch

Day is done, Gone the sun, From the lake, From the hills, From the sky. All is well, Safely rest, God is nigh.

Drones in New York...and we're not talking about HIZORORDAMAER

2012-01-24T19:57:00.000-06:00

Interesting look at NYPD's use of drones in intelligence. Now I personally have no major issues with it. The usual suspects, e.g. ACLU (see below) are screeching but that is to be expected. Then again as someone said years ago "It's the 21st Century, there is no privacy, get over it!"

Is The NYPD Experimenting With Drones Over The City? Evidence Points To Yes « CBS New York

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) — They’re used in war zones for surveillance and military strikes. But are there plans to deploy drones in the Big Apple to keep an eye on New Yorkers?

Surveillance cameras already dot the city’s streets, but is the NYPD exploring the use of even more eyes in the skies, in the form of drones? Some evidence points to yes.

A website named Gay City News posted an e-mail it says it acquired through the Freedom of Information Act. It’s purportedly from a detective in the NYPD counterterrorism division, asking the Federal Aviation Administration about the use of unmanned aerial vehicles as a law enforcement tool...

...Drones are already being used by law enforcement in other cities. CBS 2 has obtained footage of a huge protest in Poland a few months ago, shot by a small drone that could fly a few dozen feet right over the heads of the crowd and the police. High-resolution cameras can capture every detail, including faces and license plate numbers. In this country, Miami and several cities in Texas are experimenting with such aircraft.

“We’re always looking at technology,” said NYPD Spokesman Paul Browne. “Drones aren’t that exotic anymore. Brookstone sells them. We’ve looked at them but haven’t tested or deployed any.”...

...But some are concerned about the invasion of privacy. Last month, the American Civil Liberties Union issued a 16-page report citing the growth of the use of drones and the lack of laws protecting citizens from airborne intrusions.

Just the mere possibility that the city could be looking into the use of drone surveillance aircraft prompted one anonymous New Yorker to post official looking NYPD warning signs all over the city.

Some say: “Attention, authorized drone strike zone.”

One Dahler found on Mercer Street said: “Local statutes enforced by drone.”...

Now I checked out the ACLU initial report on its website and the actual PDF. Most of it's boring history of drones, methods of surveillance, etc but they raise their issues towards the end. Now they put out a statement from an officer of the Aircraft Owners and Pilot's Association (AOPA) from 20006 on lack of guidance from the FAA on UAV use in civilian air space. Sorry, six years is a bit old for a current issue. They also claim that a couple making love (for those of you from Chalmette that means doing the nasty) on top of a high rise apartment have a reasonable expectation of privacy. Sorry guys, get a room. Kinda like the young ladies who flash themselves on Bourbon Street for beads and then sue Girls Gone Wild Mardi Gras for showing it. Sorry, you've shown modesty is not an issue for you so spare us your pretensions of being shy.

I do agree with them there needs to be guidance from the FAA and the Congress on how to use these in airspace. Now that may be an issue for a Congress that can't pass a budget in almost three years and is conceded with major issues like steroid use in baseball.

New York, please keep this up. Now on this salt enforcement crap you got going....

Geopolitical Weekly: Considering a U.S.-Iranian Deal, January 24, 2012

2012-01-24T09:16:00.000-06:00

Last week, I wrote on the strategic challenge Iran faces in its bid to shape a sphere of influence stretching from western Afghanistan to Beirut on the eastern Mediterranean coast. I also pointed out the limited options available to the United States and other Western powers to counter Iran.

One was increased efforts to block Iranian influence in Syria. The other was to consider a strategy of negotiation with Iran. In the past few days, we have seen hints of both.

Rebel Gains in Syria

The city of Zabadani in southwestern Syria reportedly has fallen into the hands of anti-regime forces. Though the city does not have much tactical value for the rebels, and the regime could well retake it, the event could have real significance. Up to this point, apart from media attention, the resistance to the regime of President Bashar al Assad has not proven particularly effective. It was certainly not able to take and hold territory, which is critical for any insurgency to have significance.

Now that the rebels have taken Zabadani amid much fanfare -- even though it is not clear to what extent the city was ceded to their control, much less whether they will be able to hold it against Syrian military action -- a small bit of Syria now appears to be under rebel control. The longer they can hold it, the weaker al Assad will look and the more likely it becomes that regime opponents can create a provisional government on Syrian soil to rally around.

Zabadani also gives outside powers something to help defend, should they choose to do so. Intervening in a civil war against weak and diffused rebels is one thing. Attacking Syrian tanks moving to retake Zabadani is quite another. There are no indications that this is under consideration, but for the first time, there is the potential for a militarily viable target set for outside players acting on behalf of the rebels. The existence of that possibility might change the dynamic in Syria. When we take into account the atmospherics of the Arab League demands for a provisional government, some meaningful pressure might actually emerge.

From the Iranian point of view, this raises the risk that the sphere of influence Tehran is pursuing will be blocked by the fall of the al Assad regime. This would not pose a fundamental challenge to Iran, so long as its influence in Iraq remains intact, but it would represent a potential high-water mark in Iranian ambitions. It could open the door to recalculations in Tehran as to the limits of Iranian influence and the threat to their national security. I must not overstate this: Events in Syria have not gone that far, and Iran is hardly backed into a corner. Still, it is a reminder to Tehran that all might not go the Iranians' way.

A Possibility of Negotiations

It is in this context that the possibility of negotiations has arisen. The Iranians have claimed that the letter the U.S. administration sent to Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei that defined Iran's threats to Strait of Hormuz as a red line contained a second paragraph offering direct talks with Iran. After hesitation, the United States denied the offer of talks, but it did not deny it had sent a message to the Iranian leadership. The Iranians then claimed such an offer was made verbally to Tehran and not in the letter. Washington again was not categorical in its denial. On Friday, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said during a meeting with the German foreign minister, "We do not seek conflict. We strongly believe the people of Iran deserve a better future. They can have that future, the country can be reintegrated into the global community ... when their government definitively turns away from pursuing nuclear weapons."

From our perspective, this is a critical idea. As we have said for several years, we do not see Iran as close to having a nuclear weapon. They may be close to being able to test a crude nuclear device under controlled circumstances (and we don't know this either), but the development of a deliverable nuclear weapon poses major challenges for Iran.

Moreover, while the Iranians may aspire to a deterrent via a viable nuclear weapons capability, we do not believe the Iranians see nuclear weapons as militarily useful. A few such weapons could devastate Israel, but Iran would be annihilated in retaliation. While the Iranians talk aggressively, historically they have acted cautiously. For Iran, nuclear weapons are far more valuable as a notional threat and bargaining chip than as something to be deployed. Indeed, the ideal situation is not quite having a weapon, and therefore not forcing anyone to act against them, but seeming close enough to be taken seriously. They certainly have achieved that.

The important question, therefore, is this: What would the United States offer if Iran made meaningful concessions on its nuclear program, and what would Iran want in return? In other words, forgetting the nuclear part of the equation, what did Hillary Clinton mean when she said that Iran can be reintegrated into the international community, and what would Iran actually want?

Recall that in our view, nuclear weapons never have been the issue. Instead, the issue has been the development of an Iranian sphere of influence following the withdrawal of the United States from Iraq, and the pressure Iran could place on oil-producing states on the Arabian Peninsula. Iran has long felt that its natural role as leader in the Persian Gulf has been thwarted, first by the Ottomans, then the British and now by the Americans, and they have wanted to create what they regard as the natural state of things.

The United States and its allies do not want Iran to get nuclear weapons. But more than that, they do not want to see Iran as the dominant conventional force in the area able to use its influence to undermine the Saudis. With or without nuclear weapons, the United States must contain the Iranians to protect their Saudi allies. But the problem is that Iran is not contained in Syria yet, and even were it contained in Syria, it is not contained in Iraq. Iran has broken out of its containment in a decisive fashion, and its ability to exert pressure in Arabia is substantial.

Assume for the moment that Iran was willing to abandon its nuclear program. What would the United States give in return? Obviously, Clinton would like to offer an end to the sanctions. But the sanctions on Iran are simply not that onerous with the Russians and Chinese not cooperating and the United States being forced to allow the Japanese and others not to participate fully. But it goes deeper.

Iran's Historic Opportunity

This is a historic opportunity for Iran. It is the first moment in which no outside power is in a direct position to block Iran militarily or politically. Whatever the pain of sanctions, trading that moment for lifting the sanctions would not be rational. The threat of Iranian influence is the problem, and Iran would not trade that influence for an end to sanctions. So assuming the nuclear issue was to go away, what exactly is the United States prepared to offer?

The United States has assured access to oil from the Persian Gulf -- not only for itself, but also for the global industrial world -- since World War II. It does not want to face a potential interruption of oil for any reason, like the one that occurred in 1973. Certainly, as Iran expands its influence, the possibility of conflict increases, along with the possibility that the United States would intervene to protect its allies in Arabia from Iranian-sponsored subversion or even direct attack. The United States does not want to intervene in the region. It does not want an interruption of oil. It also does not want an extension of Iranian power. It is not clear that Washington can have all three.

Iran wants three things, too.

First, it wants the United States to reduce its presence in the Persian Gulf dramatically. Having seen two U.S. interventions against Iraq and one against Afghanistan, Iran is aware of U.S. power and the way American political sentiment can shift. It experienced the shift from Jimmy Carter to Ronald Reagan, so it knows how fast things can change. Tehran sees the United States in the Persian Gulf coupled with U.S. and Israeli covert operations and destabilization campaigns as an unpredictable danger to Iranian national security.

Second, the Iranians want to be recognized as the leading power in the region. This does not mean they intend to occupy any nation directly. It does mean that Iran doesn't want Saudi Arabia, for example, to pose a military threat against it.

Third, Iran wants a restructuring of oil revenue in the region. How this is formally achieved -- whether by allowing Iranian investment in Arabian oil companies (possibly financed by the host country) or some other means -- is unimportant. What does matter is that the Iranians want a bigger share of the region's vast financial resources.

The United States doesn't want a conflict with Iran. Iran doesn't want one with the United States. Neither can be sure how such a conflict would play out. The Iranians want to sell oil. The Americans want the West to be able to buy oil. The issue really comes down to whether the United States wants to guarantee the flow of oil militarily or via a political accommodation with the country that could disrupt the flow of oil -- namely, Iran. That in turn raises two questions. First, could the United States trust Iran? And second, could it live with withdrawing the American protectorate on the Arabian Peninsula, casting old allies adrift?

When we listen to the rhetoric of American and Iranian politicians, it is difficult to imagine trust between them. But when we recall the U.S. alliance with Stalin and Mao or the Islamic republic's collaboration with the Soviet Union, we find rhetoric is a very poor guide. Nations pursue their national interest, and while those interests are never eternal, they can be substantial. From a purely rhetorical point of view it is not always easy to tell which sides' politicians are more colorful. It will be difficult to sell an alliance between the Great Satan and a founding member of the Axis of Evil to the respective public of each country, but harder things have been managed.

Iran's ultimate interest is security against the United States and the ability to sell oil at a more substantial profit. (This would entail an easing of sanctions and a redefinition of how oil revenues in the region are distributed.) The United States' ultimate interest is access to oil and manageable prices that do not require American military intervention. On that basis, Iranian and American interests are not that far apart.

The Arabian Factor and a Possible Accommodation

The key point in this scenario is the future of U.S. relations with the countries of the Arabian Peninsula. Any deal between Iran and the United States affects them two ways. First, the reduction of U.S. forces in the Persian Gulf requires them to reach an accommodation with the Iranians, something difficult and potentially destabilizing for them. Second, the shift in the financial flow will hurt them and probably will not be the final deal. Over time, the Iranians will use their strengthened position in the region to continue pushing for additional concessions from them.

There is always danger in abandoning allies. Other allies might be made uncomfortable, for example. But these things have happened before. Abandoning old allies for the national interest is not something the United States invented. The idea that the United States should find money flowing to the Saudis inherently more attractive than money flowing to the Iranians is not obvious.

The main question for the United States is how Iran might be contained. The flow of money will strengthen Iran, and it might seek to extend its power beyond what is tolerable to the United States. There are potential answers. First, the United States can always return to the region. The Iranians do not see the Americans as weak, but rather as unpredictable. Challenging the United States after Iran has achieved its historic goal is not likely. Second, no matter how Iran grows, it is far behind Turkey by every measure. Turkey is not ready to play an active role balancing Iran now, but in the time it takes Iran to consolidate its position, Turkey will be a force that will balance and eventually contain Iran. In the end, a deal will come down to one that profits both sides and clearly defines the limits of Iranian power -- limits that it is in Iran's interest to respect given that it is profiting mightily from the deal.

Geopolitics leads in one direction. Ideology leads in another direction. The ability to trust one another is yet a third. At the same time, the Iranians cannot be sure of what the United States is prepared to do. The Americans do not want to go to war with Iran. Both want oil flowing, and neither cares about nuclear weapons as much as they pretend. Finally, no one else really matters in this deal. The Israelis are not as hardline on Iran as they appear, nor will the United States listen to Israel on a matter fundamental to the global economy. In the end, absent nuclear weapons, Israel does not have that much of a problem with Iran.

It would not surprise me to find out that the United States offered direct talks, nor to discover that Clinton's comments could not be extended to a more extensive accommodation. Nor do I think that Iran would miss a chance for an historic transformation of its strategic and financial position in favor of ideology. They are much too cynical for that. The great losers would be the Saudis, but even they could come around to a deal that, while less satisfactory than they have now, is still quite satisfactory.

There are many blocks in the way of such a deal, from ideology to distrust to domestic politics. But given the knot that is being tied in the region, rumors that negotiations are being floated come as no surprise. Syria might not go the way Iran wants, and Iraq is certainly not going the way the United States wants. Marriages have been built on less.

C: STRATFOR.COM

Sometimes you go out for business, sometimes the business comes to you!

2012-01-24T07:16:00.000-06:00

Gotta love it...technology at it's best!
Sorry, Wrong Number! Drug-Sale Text Message Goes To Police Instead

MERIDEN, Conn. (CBS Connecticut) – A recent Pew Research study found 73 percent of cell phone owners send text message and those who do, send an average of more than 40 messages each day. With all those text messages coming and going, it’s not surprising that some reach the wrong recipients.

In Meriden recently, police say officers received a text from an unknown sender, offering black market sale of Percoset tablets, the prescription combination of oxycodone and acetaminophen. He notified the drug unit, continued communication with the texter, and set up a “buy.”

Police say the two people who showed up to sell the drugs grew suspicious, separated and tried to run, but police were able to take both into custody and seized 100 Percoset tablets...

I agree with the man is some points and disagree in others.

2012-01-23T12:31:00.000-06:00

From USA Today, a surprisingly good article on the GPS tracking case.

Supreme Court rules warrant needed for GPS tracking

The opinion was unanimous, although the justices split in their views of how the Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable searches and seizures applies to such high-tech tracking...

...The court reversed the cocaine-trafficking conviction of a Washington, D.C., nightclub owner. In 2005, police secretly attached a GPS device to a Jeep owned by Antoine Jones while it was parked in a public lot. Agents then used evidence of Jones' travels over four weeks to help win the conviction on conspiracy to distribute cocaine.

"The government's physical intrusion on the Jeep for the purpose of obtaining information constitutes a search," Justice Antonin Scalia said for the court as he read portions of his opinion from the bench Monday.

Scalia based his decision on the roots of the Fourth Amendment and wrote, "Where, as here, the government obtains information by physically intruding on a constitutionally protected area, such a search has undoubtedly occurred." He was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Anthony Kennedy, Clarence Thomas and Sonia Sotomayor.

The four other justices, led by Samuel Alito, concurred only in the judgment for Jones. Alito said the case would be better analyzed by asking whether Jones' "reasonable expectations of privacy were violated by the long-term monitoring of the movements of the vehicle he drove."
Alito contended the attachment of the GPS device was not itself an illegal "search." Rather, he argued, what matters is a driver's expectation of privacy.

"We need not identify with precision the point at which the tracking of this vehicle became a search, for the line was surely crossed before the 4-week mark," Alito wrote, joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and Elena Kagan.

Sotomayor, who fully joined Scalia's opinion, suggested in a separate concurring statement that she agreed with parts of Alito's analysis, which would cover privacy expectations not only when police affix a device but when there's no physical invasion. That could cover when police access signals from a GPS-enabled smartphone.

The Justice Department had argued that drivers do not expect their movements on public streets to be kept private, no matter the duration, so GPS tracking should not fall under the Fourth Amendment protections regarding searches and seizures...

I am more of the mine of the Chief Justice. I agree that is a suspect is being tracked by GPS for a month there is a need for judicial oversight, i.e. a warrant. I just don't agree The Constitution says that. It is not in there. I believe the legislatures should write law on this matter and have it signed by the governors. Something reasonable would be a GPS of less than 48 hours is OK without a warrant, more than 48 hours would require it.

Gotta see how this plays out but it shows a problem with the way we are being governed. The elected branches are deferring their duties to the courts and this has led to major abuses of the Constitution. The greatest one of recent memory is when a federal judge ordered a city to raise taxes to pay for schools. If Obamacare is held Constitutional the document is worthless. And God help us all.

What South Carolina means....

2012-01-23T10:15:00.000-06:00

From this morning's Red State, Erick Erickson puts the SC primary, and the Republican nomination itself in good context. Here are the highlights, the full article is worth a few minutes.
Newt Gingrich Wins. What It Means.
Mitt and Newt will both have trouble beating Barack Obama. Mitt's trouble will come from Obama. Newt's trouble from himself. But right now, the base doesn't care.

“The base is revolting because they swept the GOP back into relevance in Washington just under two years ago and they have been thanked with contempt ever since.”...

We’re now confronted with a designated front runner, Mitt Romney, who got less votes in Iowa in 2012 than he got in 2008 and who lost South Carolina. His reason for being somehow remains that he is “electable.”

If you read a lot of the Republican commentary coming out of Washington even before the polls closed, suddenly South Carolina is irrelevant and the hick rubes of the Palmetto state are just petulant children.

Actually, like with Iowa, it is a rather desperate scream to get another player on the field. It is a red flag. It is the giant “Danger” sign ahead for the general election.

Newt Gingrich’s rise has a lot to do with Newt Gingrich’s debate performance. But it has just as much to do with a party base in revolt against its thought and party leaders in Washington, DC. The base is revolting because they swept the GOP back into relevance in Washington just under two years ago and they have been thanked with contempt ever since.

Adding insult to injury, the party and thought leaders now try to foist on the base a milquetoast moderate from Massachusetts. Newt Gingrich can thank Mitt Romney and more for the second look he is getting. Base hostility will now be exacerbated by Mitt Romney’s backers now undoubtedly making a conscious effort to prop up Rick Santorum to shut down Newt Gingrich...

...People are mad as hell they are about to be stuck with another boring, moderate, uninspiring choice that has at best a 50/50 shot at losing to the worst president since Carter. They are flocking to Newt not because they think he’s a great guy, but because right now, he’s the only one fighting for conservatism and GOP voters are looking for a vessel to channel their anger with Obama and their complete disappointment with the GOP establishment which is now embodied perfectly by Romney. They want a conservative fighter because most conservatives look back at Ford, Reagan, Bush, Dole, Bush, and McCain and see only the ones taking a conservative path against the Democrats actually winning.

Trump was a flash in the pan last year, but it was because he took the fight to Obama. And all of the others (Bachmann, Perry, Cain, etc) got their rise because at the time voters sensed they would fight back with them. If nothing else, in the last year, Newt has proven he won’t wilt like Mitt did yesterday under pretty basic questioning from Laura Ingraham or a month ago under routine questioning from Brett Baier.

Newt has taken the worst the media, Romney and the left can dish out, and he’s still standing and fighting with passion and eloquence. Sure, he’d probably be an erratic President, but right now Republican voters don’t care about his Presidency. They care about the fight with the left both Mitt Romney, and the Washington Republican leaders like John Boehner and Mitch McConnell don’t seem inclined to engage in...

...And while few of the Romney advocates of the past four years will admit it, it is because they have tried to foist onto the base a milquetoast moderate from Massachusetts as energizing to conservatives as a dead battery.

Officer Down

2012-01-23T06:00:00.003-06:00

Officer Garret Davis
Honolulu Hawaii Police Department
End of Watch: Saturday, January 21, 2012
Age: 28

Tour: 3 years

Officer Garret Davis was killed in an automobile accident when his patrol car was rear-ended on H-1, near the Kaonohi Street overpass, at approximately 8:20 pm.

He had stopped his marked patrol car behind a stalled vehicle on the left shoulder. Before he was able to exit his car it was struck from behind by another vehicle and burst into flames.

Officer Davis suffered fatal injuries and died at the scene. Two civilians were also injured in the crash.

Officer Davis had served with the Honolulu Police Department for three years.
.

Rest in Peace Bro…We’ll Continue The Watch

Day is done, Gone the sun, From the lake, From the hills, From the sky. All is well, Safely rest, God is nigh.

Alec Baldwin has been dethroned!

2012-01-22T18:56:00.000-06:00

I never thought anyone would take Alec Baldwin's title of Father of the Year from him. After first calling his then 11 year old girl Ireland a thoughtless pig in 2007, he followed up with saying he would throw her in a volcano in 09 and just last year said to her he would kill himself.

As if we would be that lucky.

But I gotta say this turd may just do it.

Threat to electrify dog cage with girl inside just ’horseplay’

A man accused of punishing his 12-year-old daughter by binding her hands and feet with duct tape and sticking her in a dog cage, then threatening to electrify the crate, was just engaging in "some horseplay" that "got out of control," his lawyer says...

...The Hamilton County Clerk of Courts Office said James Tapke restrained his 12-year-old daughter's hands and feet using duct tape before placing her in a dog cage on Jan. 10. Then, while his daughter was in the cage, investigators said, Tapke dropped small amounts of water on her face.

According to court papers, the victim was in the cage for about 20 minutes before her 13-year-old brother let her out. When she got out, authorities said, the victim poured water on her father's head and in his ear.

Tapke then bound his daughter again with duct tape and put her back in the dog cage, investigators said, and while she was in the cage, Tapke told his son to go to the garage and retrieve an electrical jump pack so that he could electrify the cage. The girl's brother brought the jump pack and placed it in front of the cage, so his sister could see it.

Tapke never attempted to electrify the cage, but investigators said he told his daughter several times he would.

Tapke then let her out of the cage, and her grandmother helped her with taking off the duct tape, authorities said. During the entire incident, authorities said the girl's brother and her father took pictures of her in the cage.

Her brother posted the pictures on Facebook, investigators said, but the pictures were deleted.
In court on Thursday, Tapke's attorney, Christopher Jackson, said that the entire incident was a joke.

"We believe the evidence will eventually show that this was simply some horseplay that ended up, you know, taking pictures." Jackson said. "It just doesn't look that funny when you see it in pictures ... Maybe not the best joke in the world, but I believe that's what is going to come out later at trial."

"Judge, if this is a joke, it's about the most unfunny joke I've ever heard," said assistant prosecutor Matt Broo.

Tapke, 41, was charged with child endangering. Bond was set at $50,000.

As many of you know I'm new to fathering. Can I understand the aggravation of a kid and what they can do with talking back, not doing their choirs, etc, yes. But in my worst I would never cover a kid's mouth with duct tape, place her in a cage and pretend your going to put an electric charge on the metal. Then you put picture of your girl like this on Facebook.

I pray your children have good foster parents. God knows they deserve better than you.

Another good stupid criminal

2012-01-22T18:19:00.000-06:00

Sometimes it's too easy!!!!

Accused carjacker arrested after parking between 2 police cars

A 23-year-old man was arrested by Bell Gardens police after allegedly carjacking a car from a Burbank woman and later parking it between two police cars, officials said.

...At about 4 p.m., officials got a call from Bell Gardens police who said they located the suspect — Jorge Martinez, 23, of Atwater in Central California — after he allegedly parked the stolen car between two double-parked patrol cars.

Two Bell Gardens police officers had parked their cars to respond to an unrelated call, Ryburn said.

“One officer comes back to the car, and this guy had parked the stolen car between the patrol cars,” Ryburn said. “It turns out that the in-dash camera captured it all on video.

It's even better than this story let's on. He double parked between two police vehicles. Driving a stolen vehicle.

Man this is too good sometimes....

Officer Down

2012-01-22T18:00:00.001-06:00

Sergeant Barbara Ester
Arkansas Department of Correction
End of Watch: Friday, January 20, 2012
Bio & Incident Details
Age: 47
Tour: 12 years

Sergeant Barbara Ester was stabbed to death by an inmate at the East Arkansas Regional Unit in Brickeys, Arkansas.

She had observed an inmate in possession of contraband pair of sneakers and entered the open barracks to confiscate them. As she approached the inmate he suddenly stabbed her twice in the stomach with a shank.

Sergeant Ester was flown to a hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, where she succumbed to her wounds.

The inmate, who had was serving a life sentence for murder, was immediately taken into custody and transferred to the maximum security wing of the prison.

Sergeant Ester had served with the Arkansas Department of Correction for 12 years. She is survived by her husband, who also serves as an officer at the same facility.

Rest in Peace Sis…We’ll Continue The Watch

Day is done, Gone the sun, From the lake, From the hills, From the sky. All is well, Safely rest, God is nigh.

Officer Down

2012-01-22T13:00:00.001-06:00

Deputy Sheriff Randall L. Benoit
Calcasieu Parish Louisiana Sheriff's Office,
End of Watch: Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Age: 41
Tour: 18 years

Deputy Sheriff Randall Benoit was killed in an automobile accident at the intersection of Highway 27 and Red Rose Drive in Carlyss at approximately 8:00 am.

His patrol car was struck head-on by another vehicle, causing fatal injuries.

Deputy Benoit had served with the Calcasieu Parish Sheriff's Office for 18 years and was assigned to the Civil Division.

Rest in Peace Bro…We’ll Continue The Watch

Day is done, Gone the sun, From the lake, From the hills, From the sky. All is well, Safely rest, God is nigh.

Electric Car Parking

2012-01-22T11:00:00.000-06:00

I have little use for the Chevy Volt or other electric cars out there. They may have limited use for a concentrated area but as a general use vehicle they are worthless. I personally commute over 60 miles a day and this will not work. And I know people who commute more.

Now a question. Is the use of a charger at the Wal-Mart a privilege or a perk of using the over glorified golf cart? Let's see.

Electric car parking: Perk or privilege?

They drive whisper-quiet cars, zing past you in the parking lot, and use dedicated charging stations just a few steps from the front entrance. Electric car owners enjoy many perks, and there’s a growing frustration among owners of conventional cars about the charging stations popping up at places like Ikea, Whole Foods, Walgreens, and other stores -- especially when the spots in front of them are empty.

“This makes me think drivers of electric cars must be a little disabled,” one customer who did not want to be identified told FoxNews.com about the charge ports at a Goodwill store in St. Paul, Minn. “They are usually health freaks, so I wonder why they don’t mind walking a half-mile back to a charging station.”

Meanwhile, charging stations are being installed at public libraries, sports stadiums, and even airports. In some cases, the electric vehicle-only parking spots are located closer to the front entrance than the handicapped spaces. Yet, even an advocate for green living says the charge ports are superfluous.

“If stores and organizations wish to minimize their environmental footprint then they can give priority access to bicyclers and pedestrians,” says Ozzie Zehner, a visiting scholar and the University of California-Berkeley, and author of Green Illusions, an upcoming book that pokes holes in alternative energy practices.

Zehner says EV charge stations just reinforce eco-fetishism and urban sprawl.

“American taxpayers give electric car owners tax breaks and credits to buy their vehicles as well as priority parking and special freeway lanes even though there’s no evidence they’ve done anything positive for the environment in return," Zehner says. "In fact, the mining, heavy metals, and other side effects of electric car production and operation are likely worse for the environment."...

...Not every EV owner is an advocate of front-of-the-parking-lot privileges, however. Angela Miller, an IT executive in San Diego, owns a Nissan Leaf and says she would not mind parking in a back lot and walking. She says it will be less likely that a massive gas-chugging SUV will take her spot.,,

Rarely do I agree with an environmental nutcase like Zehner but he has legit points here. Electric vehicles use regular electrify (usually coal) for charging. That really helps with pollution right? But more to the point I am paying for this POS with my tax dollars or my other money I spend at places like BestBuy. But more to the point these EV morons piss me off because hey expect others to pay for there electrify. I'm paying over three dollars a gallon for gas right now, in large parts because of enviro-morons and the policies they push. But again, I am paying for it. The no brain enviro whack brains like to live in their city like New York or Seattle, take an electric car they could only afford with tax breaks I paid for and on top of that expect me to pay for the electrify at the library or other "municipal charging station". An example:
All told Houston, working with its partner ECOtality, will install 28 additional public charging stations at city libraries and parks. Another partner, GRIDbot, will handle the installation of an additional 28 municipal charging stations in the parking garage underneath Tranquility Park, for the fleet of city vehicles.

A city that is broke as Houston cannot afford this crap. But please, don't let reality get in the way of a good press event.

Things to look at after an early morning.

2012-01-22T06:48:00.002-06:00

Up early on Saturday so Beth and I could go on a ride with Blue Knights Texas VII on the chapter's anniversary ride. We spent the day in Bay City with other members at a auction hosted by another chapter. So after getting home Beth is dead and I"m not far behind. Both of us are dead by 900pm. Problem with that is I'm up at 400am.

So I kill a few minutes on the computer and found two interesting articles on current issues.
HURT: Why use 'despicable,' clueless left-wing media to moderate GOP debates? - Washington Times

By Charles Hurt-The Washington Times Friday, January 20, 2012
NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. — There is growing consternation in Republican circles and among conservatives over why Republicans keep allowing the various Communist, leftist and otherwise anti-American TV networks to host GOP debates.

The ickiness of Diane Sawyer asking questions in her cloying voice is more than most can bear. The utter cluelessness of the questions these people think actual American voters care about is mystifying. The shameless and ham-handed pandering to conservatives by the networks is revolting.

Indeed, the entire phoenix rising candidacy of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich can be attributed to America's abject hatred of the left-wing media. He was destitute and written off by the press when he tapped into one of the most visceral political reactions coursing through the veins of regular Americans. And once be began beating up the media, America gathered around him.

Last night, we saw once again why Republicans need to keep allowing fakers and Communists to moderate their GOP debates. Because without the leftist, elitist snobs to beat the ever-living crap out of every couple of weeks, the debates would be so much less fun.

Now I realize that what we watched last night was not a simple beating and perhaps it was wrong of so many of us to enjoy it with such bloodlust. It was more a public evisceration. A man's entrails were picked out and drawn far out from inside him and left for jackals to chew on before his living eyes.

If John King of Communist News Network were not, in fact, a cardboard cutout of a blockheaded jock, it would have been much more gruesome. Because then human blood would have been spewing all over the stage and the fine people watching the debate live. Instead, it was just minced corrugated cardboard stuffing floating in the flood lights.

From the moment the debate began, Mr. King tried setting the tone of the debate by lobbing unsubstantiated claims about Mr. Gingrich made by an ex-wife. News flash: The ex-wife is not a big Newt fan, as is often the case in the course of human relations, especially divorces...

We all know the details on this. But I'm drawn to this part of the article.
...From there, Mr. King suffered several more smackdowns by Mr. Gingrich and others. And, ever clueless, the network pressed on in its complete disdain for regular voters wanting answers to their most pressing questions. In its folly of pretending to care about these voters, CNN allowed one voter in the audience to ask a question. She simply wondered what each candidate would do to make sure that all the illegal aliens flooding the country would not take the jobs of actual legal Americans.

Superb question. But CNN cut her mic, and Mr. King tossed her question aside to ask his own idiotic, canned question about immigration that rendered the same canned answers we have heard a hundred times before...

I remembered good questions from a debate a few months ago. The network, CNN. The host? John King. Well there broke to commercial with "a question from one of our viewers" that actually was pretty intelligent (although I can't remember what it was I"m sorry to say). So what does John King asks the candidates:
"Keep dish or thin crust?"
"iPhone or BlackBerry"
"Elvis or Johnny Cash?"
"Coke or Pepsi?"

And these morons in Atlanta wonder why they are not trusted. Then again the final four were stupid enough to agree to go on their debate. I don't know if it was as bad when George Stephanopoulos held it but hey guys, this was Bill Clinton's Minister of Propaganda. Do you really expect a fair hand from him?

Next I got this from Townhall.com and it put Newt's second marriage into perspective.

A Naughty Newt, A Bitter Ex and Misplaced Rage by Doug Giles

As a Christian, I will neither defend nor excuse Newt’s past adultery. That said, after watching his ex-wife Marianne go off on him on ABC, as a man, I now get why he supposedly wanted an “open marriage.” Holy crikey. That chick is scary! Hell hath no fury like a furry woman. That’s one angry, gangrenous ex-Gingrich chica right there, folks. Let’s see … what do we have here? Lonely and bitter? Table for one?...

Hello, Tom Arnold with Roseanne? Bill with Mrs Bill Clinton? Good point!

Well get up early and to my shock the damned paper is here on Sunday. Elmer gets up with me and as I type this he's looking at me "Daddy play with me!" with his toy in his mouth, so I get to throw a toy while typing. Coffee is done and I got a few quiet minutes before the house go crazy with the girls up.

Conference championships today and start studying for the Sergeant's test this week. Hope your week is better than that!

Take care, Go Giants.

Americans and caffeine....is there a problem

2012-01-22T03:00:00.000-06:00

A look at the way Americans put down some coffee among other things....

American caffeine addiction races full speed ahead - Washington Times

Oil and coffee “are two dark, black liquids that run this country,” says Robert Thompson, director of the Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture at Syracuse University. The standard 16-ounce cup of Starbucks coffee contains 330 mg of caffeine — the equivalent of three No-Doz pills.

When future talking-monkey archaeologists sift through the detritus of postapocalyptic America, they would do well to ignore the usual cultural Rosetta Stones — the Statue of Liberty, Mount Rushmore, seven seasons and counting of "The Real Housewives of Orange County."

They should focus instead on a single artifact: the AeroShot caffeine inhaler.

Sleek and plastic, the size of a lip balm tube, the AeroShot is the brainchild of David Edwards, a Harvard professor of biomedical engineering who also invented breathable chocolate. (Don't ask.) The AeroShot contains a puff of lime-flavored caffeine powder; one squeeze, and it dispenses about 40 mg of the drug in your mouth, like an asthma inhaler.

A startup product recently released in the Boston area, the AeroShot already has drawn the ire of Sen. Charles E. Schumer. In December, the New York Democrat expressed concern that the inhaler would be used as a "party enhancer" and asked the Food and Drug Administration to review the safety and legality of selling it to children.

In doing so, Mr. Schumer overlooked the obvious: When it comes to the nation's predilection for energy-boosting enhancement — at parties, at the office or anywhere in between, for young and old alike — the horse has long since left the barn, if only to lap up a double espresso at the neighboring Starbucks. (Speaking of which, the coffee bar chain briefly pilot-tested its own caffeine inhaler in 2006, one with mint flavor instead of lime.)

"At the time we came up with the AeroShot, we were looking at breathable coffee, breathable vitamins, the most high-value ingredient the product could have," Mr. Edwards said. "We came up with energy. There is a big demand for energy in the United States."

One nation under a buzz

...To understand the depths of our perked-up desire, consider:

• The average American ingests as much as 300 mg of caffeine a day, equal to three No-Doz pills;

• From June 2010 to June 2011, amid ongoing economic malaise, energy drink sales rose a whopping 31.6 percent.

• At an Army lab in Natick, Mass., military scientists reportedly have taken time out from developing Global Positioning System-guided helicopters to test and develop ... caffeinated meat.

Or, just visit a Starbucks.

Once upon a time — say, the 1950s — there was the standard, 5-ounce cup o' Joe, containing about 70 mg to 100 mg of caffeine. Quaint. In the here and now, the standard16-ounce cup of regular Starbucks coffee contains 330 mg of the same substance.

"There are two dark, black liquids that run this country," said Robert Thompson, director of the Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture at Syracuse University. "Oil and coffee. Walk down the street in any major city at lunch hour. You just see coffee and cell phones."

...According to historian David T. Courtwright, American per capita coffee consumption rose from three pounds per year in 1830 to eight pounds per year by 1859. Today, the National Coffee Association reports that the number of 18- to 39-year-olds who drink coffee daily jumped almost 10 percent year-over-year in 2011.

Remember, that's in a country where about 90 percent of the adult population already ingests caffeine on a daily basis. A country where all of the coffee sold at our 10,000-plus Starbucks locations amounts to less than 4 percent of the domestic market for brewed coffee.

Is it any wonder that coffee is the world's second-most valuable commodity, behind only oil?

Beyond java, we have caffeinated lip balm. Caffeinated sunflower seeds. Caffeinated soap. We have caffeine mixed with gobs of sugar — that tasty Frappuccino isn't sweet on its own — and with all sorts of other chemicals, energy drink mystery ingredients like taurine, guarana and L-carnitine. We even have something called the "5150 Juice Syringe," available online, which basically allows you to squirt an extra helping of liquid caffeine into whatever you're already drinking.

The surest cultural signs our fair republic has become akin to a coffee-and-greenie-fueled Major League Baseball clubhouse, circa 1975?

(a) Vice-free, clean-living Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow endorses an energy drink.

(b) Elite Northwest Washington private school Sidwell Friends — where the Obama daughters go to school — has its own coffee bar.

(c) We don't just drink vodka. We drink vodka mixed with the up-all-night energy drink Red Bull - because even our downers need uppers.

...The history of caffeine consumption is more or less the history of the modern world, according to Mr. Weinberg and co-author Bonnie Bealer. Prior to the 1700s, Europeans drank copious amounts of beer — even for breakfast — because water was largely unsafe.

With the widespread adoption of coffee and tea, however, Western civilization swapped its daylong, semi-drunk alcoholic stupor for energy, alertness, attentiveness and sociability. One result? Intellectuals gathered in coffee shops, spawning (among other things) the Enlightenment and the French Revolution.

"Visit churches in Europe, and the tour guides will constantly point out that so-and-so fell off the rafters," Mr. Weinberg said. "The reason they fell off is that they were drunk all the time.

"When caffeine swept over Europe, it changed the nature of society. It gave people a way to control and harness their energies, helped to initiate the industrial economy. That requires a different kind of discipline and mental focus than agrarian work."

As for today? We're stressed and squeezed by economic turmoil in a hypercompetitive global economy that places a premium on knowledge and mental-task completion. We're surrounded by round-the-clock entertainment, stimulated at every turn. We're a nation of working fathers and mothers, strapped for family time. We're an older generation of baby boomers who refuse to dodder into our golden years and a younger cohort of millennials who keep our smart phones bedside.

In short, we need caffeine — and other energy boosters — more than ever. The rise of Starbucks corresponds with the rise of the Internet.

"What's really boosted this up in the past 20 years is that now everybody is connected to a portable transmission and reception device, expected and available to be working all the time," Mr. Thompson said. "It used to be you went home at 5:30, then got into the office the next morning and had messages. Now, you're constantly checking email. Our lifestyles need stimulants to keep up with things."...

...Consider an executive X who gets up at 5:30 a.m. every day, proposes Mr. Thompson. "Could she or he not do their job without a certain dosage of caffeine a day? If the answer to that is no, that's an interesting thing to consider."

Every year I have my usual resolutions (weight exercise, etc) but one thing I have done in the last two year. Reduce the amount of caffeine I take in by limiting Diet Cokes and morning coffee. But I'm probably still above the 300mg reported in this article. When someone says that's still too much my retort is:

1. I never smoked cigarette like most of the family.

2. I'm not the alcoholic half the family is.

3. I never used narcotics.

The only thing I abuse is caffeine. Cut me some freaking slack! And if is pisses off Schumer you know there is something right about it!

Taser use in Canada

2012-01-21T00:00:00.001-06:00

I caught the link to this article from PoliceOne.com and it covers TASER use in Canada.

Tasers a ‘new urban terrorism’ against ‘downtrodden’: Canadian study

A new study is calling for a moratorium on Taser use in Canada. By Douglas Quan

The use of Tasers by Canada’s police forces represents a “teething new urban terrorism” that targets society’s “downtrodden,” says a study published this month that looked at more than two dozen deaths involving the stun guns.

Those most likely to get “tased” include the poor, mentally ill and chronic drug users, according to the study, led by Temitope Oriola, who received a Governor General’s Gold Medal for academic excellence upon the completion of his doctoral studies at the University of Alberta last year.

Mr Oriola, you say "the poor, mentally ill and chronicle drug users" as if they are three different income levels. They are the people that cops deal with every day and more to the point they are all in the same. If you are mentally ill (and unable to control them with treatment from that great Canadian medical system) you generally don't hold a job and you are poor. Yes, the overwhelming majority of homeless people are mentally ill and they don't have much money. And they steal and harass other law abiding citizens. Those people the call the cops for protection. And this leads to conflict with the police.

“It is beneath the integrity of the RCMP — a well-respected organization by international standards — and other police establishments in Canada to continue to use the Taser without conclusive independent scientific evidence succinctly demonstrating its effects or consequences on the human body,” the study, published in the journal Social Identities, concludes...

...In a statement, RCMP spokeswoman Sgt. Julie Gagnon said the force has revised its use-of-force training and policies since 2007 to focus on “de-escalation and communication.”

The latest revision to the RCMP’s Taser-use policy in April 2010 states that Tasers can only be used when someone is causing bodily harm or when an officer believes that a person will imminently cause bodily harm, she said....

...The study reviewed 26 fatalities across the country in which a Taser was involved, including the high-profile death of Robert Dziekanski, a distraught Polish immigrant, following an encounter with police at Vancouver International Airport.

Relying on news accounts of those incidents, the study’s authors conclude that Tasers tend to be used on the most “hapless” members of society.

Many were poor or had chronic drug problems, some were ethnic minorities, and a few were certified as mentally ill, they said.

“Taser use on the downtrodden has led to a very unhealthy mistrust, dread and fear of the police akin to the way members of the public are terrified by terrorist attacks,” the authors wrote...

Again Mr Oriola you seem clueless. You must be a PhD. :...very unhealthy mistrust, dread and fear of the police...", Mr Oriola, that mistrust, dread and fear of the cops was there long time before the TASER was invented and will still be there after the TASER is replaced by the next non-lethals pistol. It was not caused by the TASER but by the fact the cops are there to control the criminal element.
...In an interview, Oriola said he understands the dangers and risks that police face, but he insisted that there should be a moratorium on Taser use in Canada.

The days when academics sit on the sidelines and do “objective analysis” are becoming a “thing of the past,” Oriola said. Scholars need to take a stance on issues, especially those that involve society’s most vulnerable, he said.

Lack of objectivity from an academic, I don't believe it! I have no doubt there is federal funding waiting for you.

Yes Mr Oriola, why are you not coming into your true calling. You needed to get to the RCMP and let them know how to their job. To paraphrase a great bumper sticker, "Hire your college student while they still know everything." Or ever better, come with an officer on patrol and tell the cops he's screwing up.

What the Environmental Movement is really about.

2012-01-20T09:16:00.000-06:00

An excellent article on the hypocrisy of the environmental movement. Instead of really being liberal they are the most conservatives. They like things as they are and their opposition is not to use of the environment but to progress.
Environmentalism and the Leisure Class By WILLIAM TUCKER

In playing Keystone cop, President Obama protects his environmental flank for no good reason.

This week President Obama handed down what may prove to be one of the most fateful decisions of his entire administration when he rejected the plan to build the Keystone XL Pipeline carrying oil from the tar sands of Canada to the refineries of Houston. The decision did not win him one new vote but was crucial in protecting his environmental flank. The movie stars and Sierra Club contributors were getting restless and had drawn the line in the sand.

In turning down Keystone, however, the President has uncovered an ugly little secret that has always lurked beneath the surface of environmentalism. Its basic appeal is to the affluent. Despite all the professions of being "liberal" and "against big business," environmentalism's main appeal is that it promises to slow the progress of industrial progress. People who are already comfortable with the present state of affairs -- who are established in the environment, so to speak -- are happy to go along with this. It is not that they have any greater insight into the mysteries and workings of nature. They are happier with the way things are. In fact, environmentalism works to their advantage. The main danger to the affluent is not that they will be denied from improving their estate but that too many other people will achieve what they already have. As the Forest Service used to say, the person who built his mountain cabin last year is an environmentalist. The person who wants to build one this year is a developer.
It is not that they have any greater insight into the mysteries and workings of nature.
Gee, like an idiot ex-vice president who majored in government at Harvard but for some reason is now considered a genius on environmental issues. Even though he avoided science and math class in college because he sucked at them.

...In 1977, I wrote a cover story for Harper's called "Environmentalism and the Leisure Class," my first story for a national magazine. Environmentalism was very young at the time -- born supposedly on Earth Day in 1970 -- but had already achieved a seat in the upper echelons of the Carter Administration. These freshly appointed bureaucrats began canceling dams, preaching the sins of fossil fuels, and raising obstacles to nuclear power. In its place they promised distant, over-the-horizon technologies of wind and solar energy. I remember one iconic photograph of Andrew Young, Carter's Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, holding a pyramid over his head on Earth Day in the fashionable superstition that pyramids had mysterious powers to concentrate the sun's rays.

My story in Harper's was built around the devastating 1977 New York City blackout (the subject of the book The Bronx is Burning) and the almost forgotten fact that Con Edison had been trying for 15 years to construct an upstate power plant designed to prevent blackouts. The Storm King Mountain facility was a pumped storage plant 40 miles up the Hudson that stored power overnight by pumping water uphill and then releasing it the next day to generate hydroelectricity. The idea was to avoid building more coal plants in New York City. As an added attraction, the utility never failed to mention, the floodgates could be opened in an instant to provide power in the event of an emergency, while ordinary generators took the better part of an hour to get up to speed.
Pumped storage was considered an engineering marvel of the time and many were built. There are now about 30 around the country. In the Hudson Highlands, however, Con Ed had unwittingly disturbed a nest of New York aristocrats who had escaped from the city in the 19th century. As Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (who now lives in the area) would write 30 years later without a trace of irony:
The committee [the Scenic Hudson Preservation Conference] quickly found support among the well-heeled residents of the Hudson Highlands. Many of its founding members were the children and grandchildren of the Osborns, Stillmans, and Harrimans, the robber barons who had laid out great estates amid the Highlands' spectacular scenery and whose descendants had fought fiercely since the turn of the century to preserve the views for themselves and the public. [John Cronin and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., The Riverkeepers,Scribner, 1997.]

Well-connected both in New York society and the editorial pages of the New York Times, Scenic Hudson began an opposition campaign that eventually engulfed the entire city. The battle to "Save Storm King" was the nation's first great environmental crusade, becoming a legal landmark when the Federal District Court allowed Scenic Hudson to intervene on environmental grounds for the first time in history. The case is still cited. Several Scenic Hudson members went on to found the Natural Resources Defense Council.

...What finally focused my attention on the aristocratic roots of environmentalism, however, was a chapter in Thorstein Veblen's Theory of the Leisure Class. Although the book is justly famous for coining "conspicuous consumption" and "conspicuous waste," there is a lesser-known chapter entitled "Industrial Exemption" that perfectly describes the environmental zeitgeist. Veblen posed the question, why is it that people who are the greatest beneficiaries of industrial society are often the most passionate in condemning it? He provided a simple answer. People in the leisure class have become so accustomed affluence as the natural state of things that they no longer feel compelled to embrace any further industrial progress:

The leisure class is in great measure sheltered from the stress of those economic exigencies which prevail in any modern, highly organized industrial community.… [A]s a consequence of this privileged position we should expect to find it one of the least responsive of the classes of society to the demands which the situation makes for a further growth of institutions and a readjustment to an altered industrial situation. The leisure class is the conservative class.

...It is not that the average person is not concerned about the environment. Everyone weighs the balance of economic gain against a respect for nature. It is only the truly affluent, however, who can be concerned about the environment to the exclusion of everything else. Most people see the benefits of pipelines and power plants and admit they have to be built somewhere. Only in the highest echelons do we hear people say, "We don't need to build any pipelines. We've already got enough energy. We can all sit around awaiting the day we live off wind and sunshine."
Environmentalists have spent decades trying to disguise these aristocratic roots, even from themselves. They work desperately to form alliances with labor unions and cast themselves as purveyors of "green jobs." But the Keystone Pipeline has brought all this into focus. As Joel Kotkin writes in Forbes, Keystone is the dividing line of the "two Americas," the knowledge-based elites of the East and West Coasts in their media, non-profit and academic homelands (where Obama learned his environmentalism) and the blue-collar workers of the Great In- Between laboring in agriculture, mining, manufacturing, power production and the exigencies of material life.

This article fives numerous examples of why the environment movement is more against progress than anything and worth the read.

This ain't real

2012-01-19T23:00:00.002-06:00

I see a pattern here. A few days ago I posted on how Washington DC said it had lowered the murder rates. Now we get this from Chicago.

Chicago Goes Murder-Free ... for 24 Hours

Police Supt. Garry McCarthy announced Thursday the city of Chicago went 24 hours without a murder or shooting. Wednesday marked Chicago's first shooting- and murder-free day for almost a year. Early 2011 was the last time the city was this still, McCarthy said....

...Last year Chicago saw fewer homicides than in 2010 except for the Englewood neighborhood. Police logged 419 murders days before the New Year, down from 437 in 2010. Englewood saw a 40 percent increase, though, to 56 people killed in 2011.

Again, my ass! Those redeployed cops are moving the bodies out of the city!

I NEVER THOUGHT I WOULD SAY THIS!

2012-01-19T10:16:00.000-06:00

BUT I'M IN PLAYBOY!

Now I only subscribe for the articles and while reading The Advisor I found this letter I sent in a few months ago.

So I called McCoy's and the owner said all of his humidor boxes were filled. I told him I was putting in just a couple of sticks and a bottle of scotch and he answered "I remember the article from Playboy on that..." I told him "Yea, I wrote the letter." and he said "Come on down...I will make this happen!"

Gotta love a great businessman!

Secuity Weekly: A Hezbollah Threat in Thailand?, January 19, 2012

2012-01-19T08:55:00.000-06:00

By Ben West

On Jan. 12, Thai authorities arrested a man they say was a member of the Lebanon-based Shiite militant group Hezbollah who was plotting an attack in Bangkok. In uncovering the plot, Thai police cite cooperation with the United States and Israel going back to December 2011. Bangkok is indeed a target-rich environment with a history of terrorist attacks, but today Hezbollah and other militant and criminal groups rely on the city as more of a business hub than anything else. If Hezbollah or some other transnational militant group were to carry out an attack in the city, it would have to be for a compelling reason that outweighed the costs.

The suspect was identified as Atris Hussein, who was born in Lebanon but acquired Swedish citizenship and a passport after marrying a Swedish woman in 1996. Hussein was arrested on immigration charges as he was trying to board a plane at Suvarnabhumi airport, Bangkok's main international airport. Police said another suspect is still at large and possibly already out of the country. Hussein's arrest on Jan. 12 was followed by a statement the next day from the U.S. Embassy warning U.S. citizens in Bangkok of the potential foreign terrorist threat in the country and encouraging them to avoid tourist areas. Other countries, including the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and Israel, issued similar warnings. Thai police have responded by increasing security in tourist areas like Bangkok's Khao San Road and the island of Phuket.

Then, on Jan. 16, some 200 Thai police officers searched a three-story commercial building in a town along the coast 32 kilometers (about 20 miles) southwest of Bangkok. Information on the location and contents of the building was said to have been provided by Hussein after two days in custody. On the second floor of the building, officers found 4,380 kilograms (about 10,000 pounds) of urea-based fertilizer and 38 liters (about 10 gallons) of liquid ammonium nitrate -- enough materials to construct several truck bombs comparable to the one detonated at the Marriott hotel in Islamabad in 2008. Urea fertilizer can be used to manufacture the improvised explosive mixture urea nitrate, which was the main charge used in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. The compound is also frequently used in improvised explosive devices in Iraq and to some extent in Afghanistan. On the ground floor of the same building, police found reams of printing paper and 400 electric table fans in cardboard boxes.

The following day, a Bangkok court charged Hussein with illegal possession of explosive materials. As in many other countries, a permit is required for handling such large amounts of fertilizer in Thailand.

Since Hussein's arrest and the police raid, a flurry of statements from Thai authorities have given contradictory accounts of what happened. Gen. Yuthasak Sasiprapha, Thailand's defense minister, seemed comfortable connecting the U.S. and Israeli warnings to the arrest and seizure, stating that Hussein and other conspirators were linked to Hezbollah and had chosen Bangkok as part of a plan to retaliate against Israel. The general speculated that the Israeli Embassy, synagogues, tour companies and kosher restaurants could be targeted.

The defense minister's speculations are logical. In 2010, Thailand received 120,000 Jewish tourists, and Bangkok itself has a large Jewish community, complete with a Chabad house (a Jewish cultural center and one of the targets in the 2008 Mumbai attacks). According to its website, the Israeli Embassy is located in a commercial office building with (from what we can tell from photographs) relatively little perimeter security. Hundreds of thousands of Americans also visit Thailand each year. At the same time, the United States and Israel are engaged in a covert war with Iran that has most recently seen the assassination of an Iranian scientist allegedly involved in the country's nuclear program. Since Hezbollah has been considered a proxy of Iran, the United States and Israel have long anticipated reprisal attacks from Iran via Hezbollah against U.S. or Israeli targets around the world.

While there are certainly plenty of U.S., Jewish and Israeli targets in Thailand in general and Bangkok in particular, other officials have given different accounts of the alleged plot that add more nuance. According to National Police Chief Priewpan Damapong, Hussein insisted that the materials seized were not intended for attacks in Thailand but were going to be transported to a yet-to-be-named third country (a Stratfor source has cited the Philippines as a logical destination). He also allegedly told authorities that, although he was a member of Hezbollah, he was not a member of the group's militant arm. A Hezbollah official in Beirut, Ghaleb Abu Zainab, told the Lebanese Broadcasting Corp. that Hussein was not a Hezbollah member, while Stratfor sources have told us that he was. Our sources also have confirmed Hussein's reported confession to police that he was on the business side of things -- likely involved in procurement and logistics -- rather than the militant side, which involves such things as bombmaking or operational planning. As a Swedish passport holder, Hussein would have much more access to business connections, so it makes sense that Hezbollah would want to compartmentalize his skills.

Most other official statements since Gen. Sasiprapha's have focused on softening the threat and mitigating the damage done to Thailand's tourism industry. Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra has called on the United States to revoke its warning, saying it will damage the country if it is prolonged. Hence, it is not surprising that tidbits released from Hussein's purported interrogation have moved the spotlight away from the domestic threat and focused more on targets abroad.

The historical record shows ample precedent for attacks by foreign extremists in Bangkok. In 1972, members of Black September took over the Israeli Embassy in Bangkok and held diplomats hostage there for 18 hours. In 1988, Hezbollah gunmen hijacked Kuwait Airways Flight 422, which was departing Bangkok for Kuwait City, in an effort to coerce the Kuwaiti government to release the "al-Dawa 17," a group of Shiite militants being held in Kuwait. And in 1994, a truck laden with explosives was en route to attack either the U.S. or Israeli Embassy (the investigation did not yield conclusive results) when a traffic accident disrupted the plot. Bangkok has long been on the map for terrorist operational planners.

During the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s, Hezbollah and other groups conducted dozens of attacks targeting Jews, Israel and Israel's allies around the world. However, over the past decade, Hezbollah has become a more serious political party in Lebanon, and while its international network is still in place, its activities are increasingly focusing on illicit business ventures rather than terrorist attacks. The shell corporations and drug-smuggling networks that for years provided the means to fund ideological terrorist operations have, in many ways, become the end itself. Hezbollah members who have grown rich off the international network are more interested in spending the cash from the network and building up political patronage at home than in provoking powerful enemies abroad. For example, Bangkok is a hub for acquiring counterfeit documents, which are a lucrative commodity around the world and part of Hezbollah's criminal enterprise. Conducting an attack in Bangkok would likely disrupt a node in the network and ultimately affect the group's bottom line.

Thus, Hezbollah's profile and set of interests support Hussein's reported claims that the bombmaking materials that police found were being moved out of the country and were not intended for use in Bangkok or other tourist locations in Thailand.

Other details from the case support this scenario. The fertilizer was to be hidden in the 400 table fan boxes found in the same building, a move conducive to smuggling the fertilizer, not constructing explosive devices. The sheer amount of fertilizer (nearly 5 tons) is a wholesale amount. The largest vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices (VBIEDs) in recent history have contained about a ton of fertilizer. The device used in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing consisted of about 1,300 pounds of urea nitrate. Constructing and delivering bombs larger than that tends to create technical and logistical hitches. It is much more likely that such a large amount of fertilizer would be meant for multiple smaller or medium-sized devices.

While urea-based fertilizer and ammonium nitrate are key ingredients for the main charge of a VBIED, many more materials are required to make it a viable device, including nitric acid, which must be mixed with urea-based fertilizer to make urea nitrate. (Urea nitrate is highly corrosive and has typically been mixed and held in plastic industrial chemical drums. While cardboard boxes would be fine for holding the urea-based fertilizer, they certainly would not be heavy-duty enough to contain the urea nitrate mixture.) In the Bangkok case, there has been no mention of other important bombmaking components such as fuses, timing mechanisms or detonating charges or of a competent bombmaker to put it all together.

In other words, while some of the materials to make a bomb were present in the commercial building that police raided, there was no viable device there. Nor has there been any mention of weapons such as rifles, handguns or grenades, which are often (although certainly not always) involved in terrorist attacks. Some media sources alleged that Hussein was plotting a "Mumbai-like" attack, which would have required a stash of automatic rifles, ordnance, communication devices and other tactical tools that have yet to surface.

Just as Bangkok is an attractive business hub in Southeast Asia for legitimate businessmen, it is also an attractive hub for illicit businessmen. In 2008, Thai police arrested Russian arms smuggler Viktor Bout after agents from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, posing as members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia guerrilla group trying to negotiate a deal to buy weapons, incriminated Bout during a meeting in Bangkok. It appears that Hussein's role in this case would have been an administrative one similar to Bout's: sourcing the fertilizer, finding a place to stockpile it and concealing it in innocent-looking fan boxes. This would not make him any less guilty of assisting a militant group, but it would deflate the theory that Hezbollah was plotting to use this material in an immediate attack in Bangkok.

This is not to say that Hezbollah or some other militant group will not conduct an attack in Bangkok in the future. But it would take a lot to convince group leaders that the financial pain of an attack in the city would be worth the ideological gain. And the recent alleged plot should remind investigators and policymakers to remember the financial bottom line as well as the ideological bottom line when assessing future terrorist threats.

A Hezbollah Threat in Thailand? Copyright STRATFOR.COM

Gun-Scanning Technology

2012-01-18T15:00:00.005-06:00

In and by itself I have no real issue with this technology being used in a public place. Hey there are hundreds of cameras in Time Square and you are a fool if you think there is privacy there. And the NY Criminals Lover's Union is staffed with idiots, err lawyers who see no real issue with TSA groping children but for some reason they have issues with police surveillance in the public.

Mr Kelly, how about you concentrate on Middle Eastern males between the ages of 18-40? You know, the types of people who took down the World Trade Center Towers in 2001. Please don't tell me about profiling concerns because you really don't have them. Remember when the Time Square Bomber was at loose and HISONORDAMORON was asked by Katie Couric who the mayor though was responsible:

Let's just say I would like to know a few more details on what this technology can detect but I right now give it a qualified yes. You don't wanna be photographed in Time Square then don't go there.

Here is the article that came with it.

Home-grown, maybe a mentally deranged person or somebody with a political agenda that doesn't like the health care bill or something. It could be anything.

NYPD Testing Gun-Scanning Technology « CBS New York

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) – The NYPD is stepping up their war against illegal guns, with a new tool that could detect weapons on someone as they walk down the street.

But is it violating your right to privacy?

Police, along with the U.S. Department of Defense, are researching new technology in a scanner placed on police vehicles that can detect concealed weapons.

“You could use it at a specific event. You could use it at a shooting-prone location,” NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly told CBS 2′s Hazel Sanchez on Tuesday.

It’s called Terahertz Imaging Detection. It measures the energy radiating from a body up to 16 feet away, and can detect anything blocking it, like a gun.

...Police Commissioner Kelly said the scanner would only be used in reasonably suspicious circumstances and could cut down on the number of stop-and-frisks on the street.

The wisdom of remaining silent and thought a fool....

2012-01-18T14:00:00.001-06:00

Than opening your mouth and removing all doubt.

Hey I can relate on this. No one who has handled firearms routinely has not had a mishap of some type. If he had shown some wisdom and simple been grateful no one was injured. Then he would have let his 15 minutes of fame (or infamy really) pass and simple walked back into obscurity. But know he decided to sue.

Sorry Agent Paige. Making a mistake, that happens. Having the misfortune of it being published in the open like this, all I can say is welcome to the 21st Century. Now simply ignore this and go back to your life. This incident will be with you forever so get over it.

By Nedra Pickler Associated Press

WASHINGTON — A federal agent who accidentally shot himself while lecturing children on gun safety lost his appeal Tuesday in a lawsuit over release of the video that subjected him to ridicule on the Internet and late-night talk shows.

Lee Paige sued his employer, the Drug Enforcement Administration, after video of the 2004 accident in Florida appeared in the news and went viral on the Internet. The video shows Paige shooting himself in the leg just as he displays his firearm and tells a gathering of about 50 youth and their parents, "I'm the only one in this room professional enough, that I know of, to carry this Glock 40."

Paige claimed in his lawsuit that the DEA's release of the video, taken by a parent attending the demonstration, invaded his privacy and ended his ability to work undercover or give motivational speeches. Paige, a former professional football player who worked at the DEA since 1990, said the release has also resulted in humiliating comments toward him and his family not only on television but at grocery stores and restaurants.

Siding with the DEA in December 2010, a U.S. District court judge ruled that Paige had provided no evidence of who made the video public. On Tuesday, a three-judge appeals court panel upheld that ruling and found that the video contained no private facts because the accidental discharge occurred in an Orlando community center at an event open to the public.

But the appellate judges found that even though Paige's privacy rights weren't violated, the DEA's handling of the video as part of its internal investigation into the shooting "is far from a model of agency treatment of private data."

"The widespread circulation of the accidental discharge video demonstrates the need for every federal agency to safeguard video records with extreme diligence in this Internet age of iPhones and YouTube with their instantaneous and universal reach," the judges wrote...

Wow, a judge figures that something in the public is not private. Who would have thunk that? But judges you may wanna get off the bench and look around. The DEA couldn't stop this. As soon as the parent had this it's in the open and unless you seize the phone or camera it's gone. And there would be legit privacy issues.

Again Agent Paige just drop it and go on with your life and career.