At Armies of Liberation: Petition from Yemen for a Yemeni Kid in Jail
Jane writes,

Though he was reportedly not directly involved, Ibrahim al Saiani was reportedly injured by shrapnel during the clashes in Sa’da, north of Yemen, between government forces and followers of Hussain Badr al-Din al-Huthi, a cleric from the Zaidi community. His right arm is said to have been amputated, a piece of shrapnel is lodged in his skull, and he has an injury to his right leg. He is said to be completely dependant on his family to carry out daily activities.

So please consider signing THIS PETITION, all it asks is for a doctor and, if he’s innnocent, to release him.

SmadaNek's hosting this week. Thank you Ken!

Fidelugo-TV: Telesur signals to alliance with al-Jazeera
It's all for the sake of diversity, of course.

Since the Bolivarian revolution will be televised, Fidel's and Hugo's latest joint project, Telesur, began broadcasting from Caracas on July 24, the anniversary of the birth of 19th century South American independence leader Simón Bolívar. Telesur is broadcst through Direct TV (article in Spanish).

Telesur is wasting no time in its path to diversity by becoming the next al-Jazeera: According to former Venezuela’s Minister of Communication and Information and now Telesur president Andrés Izarra (via El Liberal Venezolano article in Spanish), Venezuela/EEUU.- El canal Telesur anuncia una posible alianza con la cadena árabe Al Yazira (Venezuela/USA - Telesur channel announces a possible alliance with the Al-Jazeera Arab network)

Caracas, 27 Jul:
Tres días después de comenzar sus transmisiones, el polémico canal Telesur, promovido por el Gobierno de Hugo Chávez, avanza en una posible alianza estratégica con la cadena de televisión árabe Al Yazira, según anunció hoy el presidente de la empresa, Andrés Izarra.
"Hay una posibilidad de lograr un acuerdo con Al Yazira, pero nuestro interés, más que todo, está en buscar mayor diversidad y visiones más profundas sobre los temas", señaló Izarra en rueda de prensa.
Izarra indicó que la cadena árabe es la única que tiene en el mundo 18 equipos en Irak, la mayor cantidad de corresponsalías en el Medio Oriente y resaltó que esta abriendo un servicio en inglés, que "va a potenciar todas sus capacidades de distribución de información".
Asimismo, el presidente del canal aseguró que "una alianza estratégica" con Al Yazira sería la misma que tienen con otras agencias noticiosas para "buscar más materiales, buscar profundizar en la información".
Telesur comenzó el domingo sus transmisiones a varios países sudamericanos con una programación regular inicial de cuatro horas, hasta alcanzar en los próximos meses las 24 horas de transmisiones diarias.

La televisora venezolana tiene también como socios a los gobiernos de Argentina, Cuba y Uruguay, quienes han contribuido con material cinematográfico y documentales, además de la infraestructura de las corresponsalías en sus respectivos países. (my translation:)
Caracas, July 27, 2005
The days after starting to broadcast, the controversial Telesur channel , sponsored by Hugo Chávez's goverment, advances towards a possible strategic alliance with the Arab TV network al-Jazeera, according to the organization's president, Andrés Izarra.

"An agreement with aj-Jazeera is possible, but our interest, above all, lies in searching for more diversity and depth of vision on the issues", stated Izarra at a press conference.

Izarra pointed out that the Arab network is the only one in the world with 18 tems in Iraq, the largest number of correspondents in the Middle East, and pointed out that it's opeming a service in English, which will "harness its information distribution capacity".

Telesur started to broadcast to several South American countries with an initial 4 hours of programming, which is scheduled to increase within the following months to a daily 24 hours.

The Venezuelan station's partners are the governments of Argentina, Cuba, and Uruguay, which have contributed film and documentary material in addition to the infrastructure for correspondents in each of these countries

You can also read about it at al-Jazeera, which mentioned in a different article that Telesur has "advisory board of international left-wing intellectuals and celebrities." Actor Danny Glover's happy to be on the Telesur advisory board, saying

"Certainly the television station itself is not a tool that would be used to demonize the north," said Glover, according to AP. "It is a tool to be used to celebrate the extraordinary diversity of this hemisphere."

Another board member is Tariq Ali (see bio).

According to Atina Chile! blog, Telesur, whose motto is "Nuestro norte es el sur" (Our North is the South) [uh??] is 51% financed by the Venezuelan government, with the remaining funds coming from the goverments of Argentina (20%), Cuba (19%), and Uruguay (10%), but other sources show that the Venezuelan government provides 70% of funds -- it's all the same, as an Hispalibertas commenter noted, Cuba's portion is financed by Venezuela. Journalist Carlos Alberto Montaner states that Venezuela sends Cuba an estimated $4-$5 million dollars daily (link in Spanish, via Venezuela News and Views). Al-Jazeera, as readers of this blog know, is 100% owned by the Emir of Qatar.

Undoubtedly having a cable TV network that is fully owned by the governments of four countries forge an alliance with a network fully owned by the rulers of yet another country should add "more diversity and depth of vision on the issues" to the already existing MSM bias. That way we can "celebrate the extraordinary diversity of this hemisphere" all we want, although Venezuelans just aren't being allowed much freedom of the press.

As if all this talk of diversity weren't enough, according to this article, Telesur's format will be 30 to 40 percent news and the rest cultural programming.

That won't make it a competitor to CNN en Español. Nonetheless, you can be sure it'll be all-propaganda, all the time.

Last April I posted a report on Al Jazeera: How It Sees the World, where I quoted directly Abderrahim Foukara, Al Jazeera's New York Bureau Chief:

"the Arab world is anti-American -- because being 'anti-something' sells."

Fidelugo and associates hope that will make people tune in.

Good news from Iraq
Chrenkoff isn't the only one; read what Luis I. Gomez of Hispalibertas has to say,

El desempleo después de la guerra estaba entre el 50 y 60 %. Ahora se sitúa entre el 30 y el 40 %. Se desconoce el nivel de paro bajo Saddam, pero las estimaciones iban desde el 30 al 50 %. El crecimiento económico se sitúa entre el 10 y el 12 %, esto es, mayor que en China. El progreso es también aquí indudable. El transporte en las carreteras iraquíes aumentó un 400% en comparación con la era Saddam.

Los medios de comunicación tambien crecen. Desde enero de este año, han aparecido 70 nuevos medios independientes. Estamos hablando de 170 publicaciones en total. Bajo Saddam no había ninguno. El número de canales comerciales de televisión aumentaba un 200%, desde los 10 a principios de 2005 hasta los 29 que existen hoy. Contamos 80 emisoras de radio independientes, bajo Saddam tampoco había ninguna. Antes de la guerra, se contaban en Iraq 0,8 millones de teléfonos. En enero de 2005, eran ya 2,4, ahora 3,8 millones. Antes de la guerra, Irak tenía 4500 conexiones Internet. En marzo de 2005, eran 150.000 y sin censura.

En el 2000 acudían 3,6 millones de niños a la escuela. En la actualidad, son 4,3 millones.

(my translation:)
Post-war unemployment was between 50%-60%. Now it's between 30%-40%. It's unkown what it was under Saddam, but estimates vary between 30% to 50%. Economic growth is between 10% to 12%, that is, greater than China's. The progress on this is also beyond doubt. Transportation on Iraqi roads increased by 400% compared to the Saddam era.

The media's also growing. From January this year 70 new media have appeared. We're talking 170 publications in total. The number of commercial TV channels increased by 200%, from 10 early in 2005 to the current 29. There are 80 independent radio stations, while under Saddam there were none. Prior to the war, Iraq had 800,000 telephones. In January 2005 there were 2.4 million, now, 3.8 million. Before the war, Iraq had 4,500 internet connections. In March 2005, there were 150,000, uncensored.

In 2000, 3.6 million children attended schools. Currently, there are 4.3 million.

Hispalibertas got its data from Iraq Index: Tracking Variables of Reconstruction and Security in Post-Saddam Iraq, and Iraq Weekly Status Report (both PDF files).

Too bad the MSM can't seem to find time to read those reports.

The Spanish leaking scandal
Barcepundit explains,

Someone doesn't like that newspaper El Mundo has been publishing embarrasing information (such as this, this, this, this, this, this and this, to point out just a few, and don't miss the last one: "the wife of Syrian-born PSOE member and imprisoned terrorist Mouhannad Almallah in 2003 charged her husband with domestic abuse, and informed police about her husband's plan to blow up the Kio Towers office buildings in Madrid"; more here) so they're threatening the editor with jail unless he hands the judge all the information he has on the case.

In some cases it means that the internal code in documents and data DVDs originally given by the court to the affected parties and their attorneys will allow the judge to know who the leaker is.

Previous leaks published by El Pais, virtually the Socialist party house organ, which helped the Socialist government's case naturally were not theatened with prosecution (link in Spanish)

More details to come, that is, if the editors aren't in jail by then.

Cake Eater Chronicles post on the McCartney sisters
Last March I posted about Paula, Catherine, Donna, Claire and Gemma McCartney, and Bridgeen Hagans. Cake Eater Chronicles posts on terrorism and the McCartney sisters:

again, it's been speculated that it's because these moderate Muslims are afraid to speak up, for fear that the Islamofascists will turn on them.

Well, it appears that six women---who loved a man as a brother and a fiancee---proved to be the straw that broke the camel's back when it came to the IRA. Robert McCartney, a Belfast Catholic, was murdered for no other reason than he was critical of the IRA and had the guts to speak truth to power. When the IRA offered to "take care of the matter" the women who loved him refused, and instead opted to speak out. The IRA is an organization that used as much terror on its supporters as it did the British.

It should be a lesson to those moderate Muslims we only hear from when they're worried about being attacked themselves that only by speaking out and denouncing the Islamofascists acts---by refusing to play the game the Islamofascists way---will they spare themselves an IRA-like rule of terror. They have got to start denouncing these actions now, and they must do it loudly. They cannot only be worried about the racial profiling of their community, but rather must integrate further into their communities. They must learn that there can only be respect for their faith when they are not silent about the acts that some would commit in the name of it. This will spare them a reign of terror like that of the IRA's. Because, if 7/7 wasn't a message to moderate Muslims to get with the program, it should be said that that message is already being played daily in Baghdad. And that's the message we really don't want to be played in the streets of London or New York or D.C.---or anywhere for that matter.

It's past time for them to choose.

Terrorism is terrorism.

Sharon, and the bullets
Here's a story that wasn't exactly making headlines: ARIEL FACES GAUL-ING ARMS TWIST

How mixed up is the Mideast these days? So mixed up that the United States wants the Israelis to give bullets to their good friends — the Palestinians.

And to persuade the Israelis to do this, the Bush administration enlisted the help of its good friends — the French.

The American position is that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas needs all the help he can get in his power struggle with Palestinian terrorists.
. . .
But the big surprise came this week in Paris, when Sharon heard Jacques Chirac ask, "Why don't you strengthen President Abbas by giving ammunition — as the U.S. has been asking you?"

Sharon was also squeezed by Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin and Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy.

What Sharon told them was: "Why does Abbas need our bullets? He can get all he wants — by taking them away from Hamas."
. . .
Sharon replied that if Abbas finally reforms his notoriously corrupt and inept security, then Israel will talk about bullets.

And just to make the point clear, he told Chirac about the latest Israeli victims: Dov and Rachel Kol, a Jerusalem couple slain last week by two gunmen — one of them a Palestinian policeman.

International diplomacy -- need I say more

Dr. K says "Give Grandma a Pass"
Read Charles Krauthammer's article, Give Grandma a Pass. Politically Correct Screening Won't Catch Jihadists

The fact is that jihadist terrorism has been carried out from Bali to Casablanca to Madrid to London to New York to Washington by young Muslim men of North African, Middle Eastern and South Asian origin.

This is not a stereotype. It is a simple statistical fact. Yes, you have your shoe-bomber, a mixed-race Muslim convert, who would not fit the profile. But the overwhelming odds are that the guy bent on blowing up your train traces his origins to the Islamic belt stretching from Mauritania to Indonesia.

Yet we recoil from concentrating bag checks on men who might fit this description.

While Dr. Krauthammer is partially correct (he says "Then we could exempt whole ethnic populations, a list that could immediately start with Hispanics, Scandinavians and East Asians", but there is at least one Hispanic jihadist: José Padilla, who's being defended by -- you guessed it! -- the ACLU), the fact remains that profiling is justified.

Victor Davis Hanson looks at the larger issue of the war in his article, Reformation or Civil War? The jihadists cannot be reasoned with, only defeated.

The father of Mohammed Atta is emblematic of this crazy war, and we can learn various lessons from his sad saga.

First, for all their braggadocio, the Islamists are cowardly, fickle, and attuned to the current political pulse.
. . .
The other lesson is that the war the Arab autocracies thought was waged against the West by their own zealots has now turned on them.
. . .
Quite simply, Islam is not in need of a reformation, but of a civil war in the Middle East, since the jihadists cannot be reasoned with, only defeated. Only with their humiliation, will come a climate of tolerance and reform, when berated and beaten-down moderates can come out of the shadows.

Hanson also looks at history, both in this article, and in The past as today's politics: When references to history totally confuse the point. While profiling might raise complaints of racism, and all sorts of historical references, Tunku Varadarajan of the WSJ That Feeling Of Being Under Suspicion: What of "profiling" as an anti-terrorism forensic tool? explains,

But what of "profiling" as a forensic tool? Here, one must be satisfied either that profiling ought to be done or at least--per Bentham--that it isn't something that "ought not to be done." I am satisfied on the second count. The practice cannot be rejected with the old moral clarity. The profiling process is not precisely racial but broadly physical according to "Muslim type." (Does that make it worse or better?) The process under way now does not constitute racial profiling in the classic sense--Muslims, after all, come in flavors other than Pakistani, including white Chechens and black Somalis.

But there is no getting around profiling, surely, because of the life-or-death, instant decisions involved. So we have to ask one section of society to bear up under heightened scrutiny, asking them also to work extra hard--visibly so--to expunge the threat. Meanwhile, and just as important, we must ask the rest of society not to stigmatize those who conform to the broad physical category while also not allowing feelings of racial and moral guilt to slow our society's response to danger.
. . .
Do I like being profiled? Of course not. But my displeasure is yet another manifestation of the extraordinary power of terrorism. I am not being profiled because of racism but rather because Islamist fanatics have declared war on my society. They are the dark power that leads me to an experience in which my individuality is corroded. This is tragic; but it strengthens my resolve to support the war that seeks to destroy terrorism.

It is war, after all.

Update Wake up, folks — it’s war!

(technorati Terrorism)

Livin' la vida loca idiota
Back when I was growing up in Puerto Rico I was "raised proper"; as such, I was told that when your host publicly gives you a gift you accept it as graciously as possible, almost enthusiastically (with enthusiasm but remaining within the bounds of decorum). I believe the singer Ricky Martin was probably "raised proper". What little I've seen of him shows him to be polite, and calm -- I read somewhere he's a Buddhist.

Unfortunately for him, he's been played for propagandistic purposes by his hostess, media-savvy Queen Rania of Jordan. Queen Rania just last month was on the cover of ¡Hola! magazine which featured a 10-page color spread and interview of her, immediately followed by a 10-page color spread advertisement of Jordan. Rania knows her PR. (via Chrenkoff. Emphasis mine):

The LIVIN' LA VIDA LOCA singer was in Jordan yesterday (25JUL05), where he attended the silver jubilee of the Arab Children's Congress, which was set up 25 years ago by the country's QUEEN NOUR to promote creativity, peace, cross-cultural understanding and tolerance.

And at one point while posing for photographs with fans, he draped the kaffiyeh over his shoulders, without being able to understand the statement it carried.

The kaffiyeh had the slogan "Jerusalem Is Ours" written in Arabic on it.

I'm certain that photo will be making the rounds of the anti-Israel media for a long time, thanks to Queen Rania. Nothing like the-hostess-with-the-mostess to creatively make an idiot of her guests in the name of "peace, cross-cultural understanding and tolerance".

Martin's trip to Jordan was for the purpose of trying to change negative perceptions of Arab youth in the West, and, before the scarf was planted on him, had declared he will become a spokesperson for the Arab youth in the West.

On his way to Thailand, where his organization, the Ricky Martin Foundation, has built 225 homes to protect children orphaned by 26 December's (04) Indian Ocean tsunami, Mr. Martin apologized for the incident.

Web India quotes Israeli general consul in New York, Arye Mekel, who said, "This incident proves once again that singers should stick to singing, and leave politics to those who really understand it".

Listen to Mr. Mekel, Ricky.

(technorati Entertainment Ricky Martin) Middle East)

We are at war

We are at war.

Congress approves CAFTA
CAFTA wins vote in House. The Senate approved CAFTA in late June.

Former senator Bob Graham's Looking beyond CAFTA

DR-CAFTA may not be a perfect trade vehicle — if one actually exists — but it is an important policy tool to knit the U.S. together with its closest neighbors in the name of homeland security, friendship and common interest. The gains heavily outweigh the concerns — with economic growth rippling broadly through the U.S. economy and catalyzing positive changes that improve our own security, prosperity and international standing. It is hard to ask for more from any international agreement.

I'm very pleased that CAFTA has been approved. The USA needs to encourage trade with Latin America -- now more than ever.

Let's now go for a unilateral lowering of tariffs and the repeal of all import quotas. Sugar, steel, and textiles would be good starting points.

Hip-hop Chaucer
Chaucer's tales become rap songs

A rap artist has translated some of the best known works of poet Geoffrey Chaucer into hip-hop to make them appeal to schoolchildren.

Canadian Baba Brinkman wants modern teenagers to warm to the 14th-century Canterbury Tales.

He is to tour English schools with his versions of the Pardoner's Tale, Miller's Tale and Wife of Bath's Tale.

Baba's no Eminem or SnoopDog, though:

Some of Chaucer's original bawdier language had to be "toned down" for his young audience.

My ony objection is that the intended audience (15 and 16-year-olds) is old enough to be able to handle the originals, if maybe not in Middle English (take it from me, Middle English can be hard), at least in modern English. You can find the Tales in both Middle English and modern English here.

The BBC article states that "Chaucer, who lived from around 1340 to 1400, was also a courtier and diplomat"; to the best of my knowledge he did not roam the English countryside in the buff.

In related Chaucer news, (via Why oh why must everybody have a blog?) [HARRY POTTER SPOILER ALERT] Dumbledore's death in the style of Geoffrey Chaucer: The Poppynge of the Clogges.

Update M. emailed saying that Chaucer in sunglasses reminds her of Bono

(technorati tags Culture Entertainment English Chaucer)

More on the ACLU and the Boy Scouts
Victory For The BSA.

President Bush's appearance at the National Jamboree was rescheduled for this afternoon because of yesterday's severe thunderstorms. Michelle Malkin posts on how to help the families of the deceased Scouters.

The Cuban dissidents, the French, and the sell-out
From The Telegraph: A leading Cuban dissident yesterday accused a "two-faced" French government of putting trade ahead of the suffering of the Cuban people
The article states that after Paris unilaterally ended a European Union diplomatic embargo against the regime of President dictator-for-life Fidel Castro, and normalised relations with his government on Bastille day,

Apparently emboldened by the French overture, Cuban authorities responded by launching the largest wave of dissident arrests since 2003, when almost the entire dissident leadership of the Communist-ruled island was rounded up.

In the latest wave of arrests, about 30 democracy activists, including Mrs Roque, were taken into custody after they attempted to protest outside the French embassy on July 14 to denounce the new policy towards Cuba. As many as 19 were still believed to be in custody last night.

I smell oil.

When Jacques comes crying crocodile tears over EU unity, remind him that it was France who moved to restore full ties with Havana by inviting Cuban government, thereby

The Bastille Day invitation went against an agreement by 24 of the 25 EU governments, who decided in February that neither dissidents nor Cuban government leaders should be invited to national day celebrations at European embassies. Spain, a vocal supporter of trade and political ties with Havana, abstained.

Now France calls for release of Cuban dissidents as Cuba frees nine dissidents but still holds 17 others in crackdown, while the "rapid-response brigades" (government-organized groups that harass and assault dissidents under the guise of a counter-protest) are back.

Read up on the Danish daydream, and the Norwegian nonsense
Econotrix has two posts on what welfare societies look like: The first one, on Norway, is a reprint of the NYT Bruce Bawer article Perspective; We're Rich, You're Not. End of Story.
The second post, on the Danish model (which is talked of with great reverence in South American universities), looks at The myths and fairy-tales behind the Danish welfare society, namely

• "We must protect the weak"
• "The Danish economy is booming because of the welfare society"
• "Fair play"

Econotrix links to a study by the Belgian think tank Work For All titled CAUSES OF GROWTH DIFFERENTIALS IN EUROPE. Tax policies for growth and job creation which shows that found that reducing the tax burden stimulates wealth creation and growth in the economy. One surprising result of the study was that low interests do not help to stimulate growth: while lowering rates has a positive effect on consumer spending and potential investment, the study found that "low interests causes savers' income to go down, and also the external balance of payments suffers". Lower taxes along with reduced goverment spending and decreasing the size of government have made the economy in Ireland outpace all the other European countries' economies, and also,

One notices this wealth explosion when one visits Ireland in all aspects of daily life; one notices the unequaled optimism. Around Dublin, a forest of tower cranes limits the skyline. In the countryside new houses everywhere, the newest car models, modern factories and offices. One also notices it in the reorganization of people’s neighborhoods, and in the care they spend at the environment. The wealth is visible in the absence of criminality and in the view of unclosed cars. One reads also luck in the ey [sic] now climbes of people, in the birth rate, and in the welfare-ranking. In this ranking Ireland hased to number one as the most pleasant country in the world to live in.

It'd be nice if NJ politicians were to listen.

Zimbabwe and the UN
Don't miss Claudia Rosset's article, Ruin By Design: The U.N. misses it, but Mugabe's regime is Zimbabwe's problem (emphasis mine)

The U.N. report does warn that its findings are incomplete. But they are rather worse than that. The eviction of hundreds of thousands was not, in Mugabe's universe, a policy mistake. It was, for Zimbabwe's murderous tyrant, a success--now yielding leverage over decent people who are indeed prone to send help to those suffering in Zimbabwe. We have seen this cycle before. It is what led to the U.N. devising, albeit on a far grander scale, with a far bigger cut for its own administrative services, the now scandal-ridden Oil-for-Food program in Iraq, which fortified Saddam Hussein and helped him keep power for years beyond what many in the early 1990s expected. What must be grasped in dealing with Zimbabwe is that the problem is Mugabe himself. And whatever welcome, warm or otherwise, he may provide to visiting U.N. delegations, the true recovery can only begin with his departure.

A must-read.

What do terrorists want?
asks Daniel Pipes

In nearly all cases, the jihadi terrorists have a patently self-evident ambition: to establish a world dominated by Muslims, Islam, and Islamic law, the Shari'a. Or, again to cite the Daily Telegraph, their "real project is the extension of the Islamic territory across the globe, and the establishment of a worldwide ‘caliphate' founded on Shari'a law."

It's time to listen.

Update on the Jamboree
Despite 4 deaths, Boy Scouts carry on at Jamboree. Of the scouters who died, Michael Shibe had two sons at the Jamboree; Mike Lacroix had one. President Bush is to address the Jamboree today, as he was previously scheduled.

The article ends in a positive note:

On Tuesday, the Senate voted 98-0 to allow U.S. bases to continue hosting Boy Scout events as part of a massive bill setting Defense Department policy for next year

Call your representative in Congress and ask them to support the Jamboree, and the Boy Scouts. For other ways to support the Scouts, see this prior post.

The London Underground shooting, Brazil's TBA, and al-Qaeda
The day after unexploded explosives were found in the London public transport system, Jean Charles de Menezes was shot and killed after being followed by police, jumping a turnstile and running into a London Underground car. That much we know. Mr. de Menezes, who had lived in England for three years but spoke no English (correction: Commenter Pollo gave us this link to The Independent which states he spoke fluent English), is not known to have had connections with terrorists.

The mayor of Gonzaga (pop. 6,000), Mr. Menezes's hometown, commented,

Mayor Souza said the root cause of Mr. Menezes' death was Mr. Blair's decision to back the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. That prompted the wave of terrorist attacks, the mayor said.

Mayor Souza needs to get out more often, and should visit Brazil's own Triple Border region, also called the Tri-Border Area (TBA).

I hasten to add that the town of Gonzaga is not in the Tri-Border Area. In fact, it's over a thousand miles away. I repeat, Mr. de Menezes is not known to have had connections with terrorists.

What is the Triple Border/TBA, and what does it have to do with terrorism?

The Triple Border, or Tri-Border Area (TBA), is where Argentina, Paraguay and Brazil meet. This report (pdf file), dated July 2003, by the Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress, which was prepared under an interagency agreement with the Central Intelligence Crime and Narcotics Center, concludes that the TBA is a haven and base for Islamic terrorist groups:

• Various Islamic groups, including the Egyptian Al-Jihad (Islamic Jihad) and Al-Gama's Al-Islamiyya (Islamic Group), Hama, Hizbollah, and al Qaeda, probably have a presence in the TBA
• Islamic terrorist groups are using the TBA for purposes of safe haven, fund-raising, money laundering, recruitment, training, training, plotting, and other terrorist activities

The study found that the TBA works as a center for organized crime, with an informal tripartite alliance between Islamic terrorist groups, the organized crime mafias which include not only the indegenous mafias but also the Chinese, Chechen, and Hong Kong (the Hong Kong mafia has close relations with Hizbollah in the region), and the many corrupt government or police officials in the area.

The activities are not limited to terrorism, since al-Qaida reportedly has become deeply involved in cocaine and heroine trafficking, arms and uranium smuggling, counterfeiting CDs and DVDs and money-laundering activities. Just this morning there's an article on a 2002 Bin Laden deal with Colombian drug lords that fell through.

Mind you, the Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress report is dated 2003, but in 2002 Sebastian Junger had published an article in Vanity Fair magazine (not available on line) where he explained that Hezbollah had been in the TBA for about 10 years, which would predate even the Operation Desert Storm in Iraq. In an interview with Connie Chung he said, "They mounted two attacks in Argentina from there in the early 90s", one of which took place almost exactly 11 years ago at the Argentine Jewish community center, AMIA, on July 18, 1994. The link, which is from the The Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center explains the roles played by Hezbollah, extremist Shiite Muslims, and Iran in the 1994 AMIA explosion. Visit that link and look at the similarities between that attack and recent terrorist attacks.

Iranian Voice has more information on the TBA:

The Triple Border, Junger explains, finds that many other militant groups, such as the Irish Republican Army, Basque Separatists (ETA), Colombian terror group FARC, and even a few disgruntled Americans, come to the region to raise cash and plan terrorism. From his observations Junger feels we're entering a new era where militant groups and terrorist organizations, many once adversaries or who otherwise share no common goals, work together to help one another succeed. While free-for-all militant training centers are a disturbing thought, the most disturbing is Junger's report of joint al Qaeda/Hezbollah terror camps in the region. More than just cooperation, it could signal a merger.

In his article, Junger explained,

According to local information, Triple Border has been a major logistical and planning base for al-Qaeda. But not just al-Qaeda. Triple travelers include members of the Irish Republican Army, ETA (the Basque separatist movement), FARC from Columbia and even neo-Nazi groups from the United States. They may represent either a stage of evolution or a deliberate process called "crossover."

The "crossover" process is not limited to terrorists and mafiosi, however. As Mona Charen describes,

In the aftermath of Sept. 11, the FMLN (a Salvadorian Communist terrorist organization) sent a letter to the U.S. embassy suggesting that the terror attack was a consequence of U.S. malfeasance, and four days later FMLN leaders attended a celebrations hosted by leftists in San Salvador in which Osama bin Laden was praised and the U.S. and Israeli flags were burned.

The Forum of Sao Paulo is Castro's worldwide alliance, and its members are quite a rogue's gallery. In addition to the heads of state mentioned above, the Forum also includes the Provisional IRA, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the Baath Party, and representatives from Libya, the Tupac Amaru guerrillas in Peru and assorted other terror organizations. Also represented are the communist parties of the remaining "dead-enders" of the communist world — China, Laos, Vietnam and North Korea.

In addition to the TBA area, both al-Qaida and Hezbollah were reported as being active in the common border area of Colombia, Peru and Ecuador (link via Jihad Watch).

Yes, one man was shot by Police in the London Underground.

That doesn't mean there's reason to ignore the Brazil-Argentina-Paraguay terrorist breeding grounds. Their existence precedes any of "Mr. Blair's decision to back the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq".

Update: Welcome, LGF readers!

(technorati tags Terrorism London Brazil)

Breaking News: Electrical accident at Boy Scout Jamboree
Boy Scouts: Four (new number) killed in accident at Jamboree

The Boy Scouts of America now says four Boy Scout leaders have been killed in an electrical accident at the organization's 2005 Jamboree in Bowling Green, Virginia. It was first reported that five had died.

A Jamboree spokesman says the accident happened this afternoon, but had few other details.

One other leader and a contract worker were also injured but remain in stable condition at a local hospital.

My heart and prayers go out to them.

Recently, a federal judge banned Pentagon support for future Boy Scout Jamborees. I hope this decision is overturned. The Scouts need your help. The ACLU is determined to destroy the Boy Scouts organization. Here are a few things what you can do:

• Read the articles at the Boy Scouts of America Legal Issues Site.


• Spread the word. Tell all your friends about this. Email your entire mailing list.


• Write, call, and email both the national ACLU and your state ACLU offices protesting this current policies. Insist on being heard. To find your local office, navigate the national ACLU site to the right-bottom corner where it says "YOUR LOCAL ACLU" and you'll find the states listed alphabetically.


• Register at the BSA website for updates, donate money to their legal defense fund. Join any of the supporting organizations, and add your organization to the supporting organizations roster.


• Laura Friedel and David Scott of the Schiff Hardin law firm are the lawyers assisting the ACLU in the Illinois law suit. If you're their client, withdraw your business and tell them why.


• Call your representative in Congress and ask them to support the BSA. Call your Senator and ask him/her to support the BSA. Find out how they voted and insist that they support the Scouts.


• Write to your local papers supporting the Scouts.


• Call your local United Way and request that they support the Scouts. If they don't, don't support the United Way.

The Save Our Scouts bill will be reintroduced in the next session of Congress. We need to act now.

Scott Burgess strikes again
Following up on Scott Burgess outs Guardian staff reporter, which led to the firing of the terrorist from the Guardian, the Guardian wrote an article stating Scott's bad because 1. he works indoors, 2. is from New Orleans, and 3. is jealous because he doesn't work at the Guardian.

Now go watch Scott slap the Guardian around some more in his post L'Affaire Aslam: The Ablution Responds.

Sweet.

Cotillion time!
Hosted by MY Vast Right WIng Conspiracy, who links to Honky Tonk Women; Who Tends the Fires; Fistful of Fortnights links to Quintessential Femme Fatales; and e-Claire invites you to Come Dance 'Til Your Feet Sing!, with photos The Manolo would approve.

Why bother with literacy while implementing censorship?
My reaction, when I read this headline, is, Why bother?: Venezuela and Cuba: Illiteracy can be eradicated by 2012

Caracas, Jul 24 (Prensa Latina) About to become an illiteracy-free country, Venezuela is ready to support literacy campaigns in other Latin American and Caribbean nations.

Venezuela's disposition to help other countries will be announced at the upcoming summits of the Ibero American countries and the Organization of American States, Education Minister Aristóbulo Istúriz announced Saturday.

According to the government official, his country has proven that the Cuban teaching method "Yo si puedo" (Yes, I can) can be easily adapted to any country.

Why bother with all this talk of "erradicating illiteracy" when people are not allowed to read freely?

• Chávez has already come out with his version of Don Quijote For Dummies: just this year he took the excellent, definitive Don Quijote de la Mancha 4th Centennary edition by the Read Academia Española, abridged it, removed the essay "Una novela para el siglo XXI" by Mario Vargas Llosa, and replaced that essay with a short preface by José Saramago.


• The essence of Vargas Llosa's censored preface is that Don Quijote's a free men's novel. Saramago, Nobel Prize winner and Portuguese Communist Party member, has gone on the record (link to an article in Spanish) saying he hates democracy.
• Chávez is using the Cuban "Yo si puedo" method -- while Cubans are sent to concentration camps for owning banned books -- the books Fidel doesn't want the people of Cuba to read.
• Investor's Business Daily (via Publius Pundit) reports that Chávez's new television network is designed to put the region’s free press out of business

Yo si puedo, but only if it's what Hugo and Fidel say is OK.

And by the way, "yo si puedo"? Not if it has to do with owning property: Chavez announces mass expropriations

A side note: tell the semi-illiterate literacy campaigners that, if what they mean is "Yes, I can", they should be writing "Yo sí puedo". Otherwise they imply "me, if /when I can". But, on second thought, maybe that's exactly what they have in mind.

More on Cubazuela here.

(technorati tags Venezuela Cuba)

Captain's Quarters asks why Australia,
why India?

AQ targeting of India shows quite clearly (as does its attempt to strike Australia) that the analysis of American causality as the origin of the 9/11 attacks and the London bombings clearly do not make sense. If anything, India's targeting shows that AQ doesn't just dream of an Arabian peninsula under its tyrannical control, but an Asian and African continent ruled by a new Caliphate. That has nothing to do with American interest in the Middle East, but rather an old dream of world conquest that has haunted the consciousnesses of lunatics for centuries.

And here's a good question for our media -- why haven't we heard about Mohammed Afroze? Why hasn't his conviction for targeting India and Melbourne made headlines in the United States? Could it be that the media understands all too well what Afroze's conviction means for its meme of American provocation of al-Qaeda and have chosen to remain quiet rather than prove itself tragically wrong?

Arthur Chrenkoff posts on Why we fight, part 2

Yet, all the talk about withdrawing foreign "crusader" troops from the Middle East and Central Asia is but a ruse. It is not really about withdrawing troops per se, but about giving Islamofascists the free hand to overthrow all the current governments throughout the region, many of whom actually or tacitly rely on Western assistance, and replace them with Taliban clones.

So yes, maybe - or maybe not - the withdrawal would temporarily diminish international terrorism, but at a price of helping to create a monster - a totalitarian jihadi superstate in control of most of the world's oil resources and in possession of weapons of mass distraction.

This is absolutely crucial to understand: all the talk about the war on terror being the Third (or the Fourth, depending how you're counting) World War, or the new Cold War, obscures the fact that it is in reality a largely pre-emptive war to smother in the cradle, while it's still relatively weak, the menace which if allowed to grow would in a decade or two confront us with a specter of a genuine, apocalyptic world war.

Mark Steyn says multiculturalism is a kind of societal Stockholm Syndrome.

Public service post: Everything you wanted to know about jockstraps
but hadn't even thought of: Where Have All the Jockstraps Gone?

He did it!

and with four minutes to spare.

WELCOME TO THE CARNIVAL OF NEW JERSEY BLOGGERS, #10



Last week’s host Sluggo Needs A Nap after all his work but this week he’s been reading up on Eudora Welty. It’s going to be hard to come up with as good a post as Sluggo’s, but welcome to this week’s Carnival of the NJ Bloggers. Let’s start with dessert, of course.

Dojo Mojo has the latest on ice cream festivals and ways to enjoy the Summer in the Jersey City area, including Aloha, say the pretty girls. Wine Goddess likes to add some Pedro Jimenez to her ice cream. Mmmm.
Life is short, have dessert first, especially if it’s spiked.

Commuters As a former commuter I know a little ice cream is good when you take the train to and from the city since commutes are frequently delayed.

Commuter Jeff Jarvis says search me even if it adds to his commute. Another commuter, Jersey Side, reveals what’s in the bag, and, like myself, keeps cheese sticks handy. Update Gigglechick not only got searched, she got interviewed, and quoted.

You’ll find NJ bloggers in all the professions, some commuting to New York, some to Philadelphia, and some commute within NJ. TigerHawk managed to do some Parkway Blogging on his way to the Adirondacks. Not commuting to work yet is Mary of Mary’s Lame Attempt at Fame, who’s studying for the Bar exam.

Covering the news Armies of Liberation explains Some Context to the Yemeni Protests. Armies of Liberation blog consistently does an excellent job of analyzing the Middle East.

Mary of Exit Zero examines the idea of classifying terrorists as we once classifed Pirates, as Enemies of the Human Race, in her post Terrorism: Been there, done that. Northeast Corridor posts on why they hate us, and on multiculturalism backlash.

Likelihood of Confusion Blog by lawyer Ron Colman posts on copyrights and trademark cases, and has been taking a look at Little McCain Feingolds and Their Allies. Blogger Dan Riehl, who’s been doing an excellent job covering the Natalee Holloway investigation, has also been posting on other matters, like terrorism and a Sex Smuggling Ring Busted.

SloppyDawg posts on a different item in the news, and the subsequent Deep Smear. The Opinion Mill looks at reporters and finds them Weak In The Knees.

Imagination, and reality Imaginary Therapy, which is from a blogging therapist, comes across some precocious baby talk, imaginary or not. Speaking of therapy, Extreme Psychosis has been watching “reality based” TV and its Skewed Reality, and doesn’t like what’s there.

Not imaginary at all are the shipwrecks of Shipwrecks Blog, whose creator, David A. Bright, just got back from Newfoundland after visiting the Titanic and will be reporting his findings at a conference in Washington next September. Before that, he asks us to make sure we watch the Discovery Channel today

Please don't miss James Cameron's LIVE dive to Titanic documentary that will air July 24th on the Discovery Channel. I have seen the equipment used while on Keldysh and it is on the cutting edge of underwater technology. This documentary is a must-see event.

The Center of NJ Life takes a peek at some of the things visitors have come searching for at her blog, while Poor Impulse Control ponders karma and The Fine Art of Acting Nonchalant while minding the store.

Joe’s Journal is Looking Back At New Year’s Resolutions, and Joe has earned our hearty congratulations – take a look at his list, and wish him continued success.

Rob of Laughing at the Pieces remembers Ed McBain in Evan Hunter, R.I.P., a writer whose work defines a genre.

New Jersey NJ politics are always a ripe subject for writers, journalists, and of course for bloggers. Jackie Corley, who’s all three, looks at the Aberdeen-Matawan Train Station redevelopment project asks, Does the arm of 1260 Stelton have Monmouth in its grasp?

Hondo at inadmissible evidence posts about a politician trying to ban smoking in cars. As Hondo says,

Now that New Jersey has solved the problems of high property taxes and outrageous car insurance premiums, it's time to move on to other pressing problems.

Mr. Snitch! has a post on Our “forgiving” political culture and a new “star lobbyist”. Mr Snitch’s post led me to Eye On Hoboken’s article on Kay Elizabeth LiCausi's questionable "Climb Up the Ladder". As Eye On Hoboken points out, Ms. LiCausi is also vice chairman of the Hudson County Democratic Party, an elected position.

Smadanek takes statistical analysis to Educational Performance and finds that

New Jersey classifies school districts by District Factor Group (DFG), which indicates “the socioeconomic status of citizens in each district.” Based on US Census data, the factors include adult education levels, occupations, population density, income, unemployment, and the percent of residents below the poverty level. DFG is strongly correlated with student performance.

NJ Conservative finds a snake -- not on the grass, but on the wall -- that makes yet Another Reason School Taxes are out of Control

eCache realizes that the Gas Tax Hike Does Not Solve the Problem of mismanagement at the Transportation Trust Fund. I urge you to not only read this post, but to look into how your municipality is budgeting its expenses.

Carnival creator Enlighten NJ looks at which of the New Jersey’s House members support the Patriot Act.

Here at Bad Hair Blog HQ our bad hair is due to high taxes, but Katespot’s post about doing the roots is a hair care lesson as of itself.
Jim of Parkway Rest Stop notices how some people are bothered that in NJ the liquor stores on Sundays open Not Until Noon. Last month Jim had a Village story that reminded me of a song from the dying days of disco.

The Rix Mix visits Asbury Park and listens to a radio broadcast, for which he says, At last, Asbury Park wins a kewpie doll!.
Down The Shore blog remembers Saul the Vegetable Man of Bradley Beach.
Beach Blog is always ready for the beach, and is now pledging allegiance to the sun.
The Jersey Shore Real Estate Bubble Blog remembers when Sea Bright used to flood.

Speaking of real estate, The Art of Getting By will be buying her first house soon and she explains what it’s like to go looking to live in all the wrong places.
The Barista survey their neighbors, and you, too, if you’d like.

Gregg reminisces about Main Street, West Orange. There’s talk of redeveloping the area, including Thomas Edison’s former factory

Currently, there are no large monuments to Edison's achievements in town. A fading black structure, called the "Black Maria," sits on Main Street. It is the world's first movie theater. The Middle School named in his honor has since been renamed. There are, however, plans to "redevelop" the site and turn it into luxury loft-style condominiums. Much of the plan also includes the potential taking of residential and commercial property via eminent domain -- made much easier by the recent Supreme Court decision involving the City of New London, Connecticut.

Which brings us to the next blog: If you are worried about Eminent Domain issues, stop by
NJ Eminent Domain Law’s bog. This week he’s looking at New Jersey Eminent Domain Redevelopment: Forest City Ratner coming to Bloomfield

Culture and sports Nordette Adams announces New TV show "Freshman Seminar" Director, Producers, Creator, and Cast Members Live on PowerTalkFM.com.

The interview with the producers, creator, and cast of "Freshman Seminar" has been scheduled for this Thursday, 7:00 p.m. EST, July 28 on PowerTalkFm.com.

Tune in for a behind-the-scenes look.

Roberto at DynamoBuzz notes that the new hockey arena in Newark is built on a centuries-old cemetery and wonders if the hockey NJ Devils will experience some poltergeist type activity. Or a jinx that will foil their attempts to win a Stanley Cup.

The Nightfly comes up with the World’s first friendly fisk,

Popular culture is lazy. It settles. Actual accomplishment, on the other hand, requires effort. It's work to come up with a good idea and see it through. It's hard to come up with a persuasive argument that makes sense. And of course, the rewards are not always apparent - the idea may be slow to find an audience, and the argument may not convince until reinforced years later. It's quicker to grab attention with bawd and spectacle, or to lob insults.

Friendly fisk, yet accurate.

On Friday Jersey Writers started a 3-part series on the proposed New Jersey Music Hall of Fame, and she opens the post with something written by Old Blue Eyes himself. While the NJ Music Hall of Fame would be in Asbury Park, Sinatra’s probably Hoboken’s most famous native, and Maxwell’s is one of Hoboken’s best known nightspots; Mary of Exit Zero was visiting Maxwell’s the other evening and found that it's got a great beat.. If this is paradise I wish I had a lawn-mower looks at some talking heads.

One Trick Pony tells us that “One Trick Pony is a humor magazine available in print and online. Featuring stories, poems, lists, essays, and tomfoolery. Also contains the adventures of Arnold Schwarzenegger”, so drop by sometime.

This weekend Dan of 11th and Washington took to Baseball and the road,

Three games, three ballparks, three cities, three days. Three teams in the tight NL East race. Had I thought of tackling this trip on a different weekend, when the Braves and Marlins were visiting two of the stops, I could have seen the entire division.

while fellow sports blogger Liss is More pays attention to the Mixed messages on steroids.

Today’s Carnival started with ice cream and commuters, and will leave at the ballpark with some coffee: Coffeegrounds found out that a little Cream would cost $3,295 That’s US$, not pesos, kopecks, or lempiras. At those prices, I’ll take my coffee black, thanks.

Remember to watch the Discovery Channel tonight, and listen to PowerTalk FM Thursday.

Next week's carnival will be hosted by Smadanek. Please send links to njcarnival@gmail.com for posts you would like featured in the next Carnival.

Thank you for visiting, and don't miss next week's Carnival!

UPDATE
The Pink Panther recovers, and finds out that the past is the new black.

A REMINDER If you're a NJ blogger and want to participate in the Carnival, please PLEASE remember to email njcarnival@gmail.com a link to the post you want featured. As you can see, the Carnival's been growing. It's up to you to send the posts each week you want to participate.

Welcome, Instapundit readers!

(technorati tag New Jersey)

Explosions in Egypt
Blasts in Egypt Kill at Least 83 at Resort in Sinai Peninsula. Sharm el-Sheik Terrorism: Round Up Of Early Coverage

We are at war, and yet some people can't seem to understand it. To them, it's all a matter of temporary, sporadic incidents of varying intensity that roll on to other places, like a bout of bad weather.

On yesterday's averted attack in London, the NYT article, 5 Shots in a Train Car Leave Londoners Shaken, quotes a Londoner saying,

"I wonder why London is different to New York and Madrid, why is it being sustained here?" said Patricia Mitchell, 35, a call-center worker. "I'm wondering if it's an easier target. It feels like London has a lot more people and a lot more public transport. But I was completely surprised. I totally thought it was going to be an attack on London and then they move on to another city."

Victor Davis Hanson asks, And Then They Came After Us: We’re at war. How about acting like it?

Apparently, the hatred of radical Islam was not just predicated on the “occupation” of the West Bank. Instead it involved the pretexts of Americans protecting Saudi Arabia from another Iraqi attack, the United Nations boycott of Iraq, the removal of the Taliban and Saddam, and always as well as the Crusades and the Reconquista.

But Europe was supposedly different. Unlike the United States, it was correct on the Middle East, and disarmed after the Cold War. Indeed, the European Union was pacifistic, socialist, and guilt-ridden about former colonialism.

Hundreds of thousands of Muslims were left alone in unassimilated European ghettoes and allowed to preach or promulgate any particular hatred of the day they wished. Conspire to kill a Salmon Rushdie, talk of liquidating the “apes and pigs,” distribute Mein Kampf and the Protocols, or plot in the cities of France and Germany to blow up the Pentagon and the World Trade Center — all that was about things “over there” and in a strange way was thought to ensure that Europe got a pass at home.

But the trump card was always triangulation against the United States. Most recently anti-Americanism was good street theater in Rome, Paris, London, and the capitals of the “good” West.

But then came Madrid — and the disturbing fact that after the shameful appeasement of its withdrawal from Iraq, further plots were hatched against Spanish justices and passenger trains.

Surely a Holland would be exempt — Holland of wide-open Amsterdam fame where anything goes and Muslim radicals could hate in peace. Then came the butchering of Theo Van Gogh and the death threats against parliamentarian Hirsi Ali — and always defiance and promises of more to come rather than apologies for their hatred.

Yet was not Britain different? After all, its capital was dubbed Londonistan for its hospitality to Muslims across the globe. Radical imams openly preached jihad against the United States to their flock as thanks for being given generous welfare subsidies from her majesty’s government. But it was the United States, not liberal Britain, that evoked such understandable hatred.

But now?

After Holland, Madrid, and London, European operatives go to Israel not to harangue Jews about the West Bank, but to receive tips about preventing suicide bombings. And the cowboy Patriot Act to now-panicked European parliaments perhaps seems not so illiberal after all.

So it is was becoming clear that butchery by radical Muslims in Bali, Darfur, Iraq, the Philippines Thailand, Turkey, Tunisia, and Iraq was not so tied to particular and “understandable” Islamic grievances.

Perhaps the jihadist killing was not over the West Bank or U.S. hegemony after all, but rather symptoms of a global pathology of young male Islamic radicals blaming all others for their own self-inflicted miseries, convinced that attacks on the infidel would win political concessions, restore pride, and prove to Israelis, Europeans, Americans — and about everybody else on the globe — that Middle Eastern warriors were full of confidence and pride after all.

Meanwhile an odd thing happened. It turns out that the jihadists were cowards and bullies, and thus selective in their targets of hatred. A billion Chinese were left alone by radical Islam — even though the Chinese were secularists and mostly godless, as well as ruthless to their own Uighur Muslim minorities. Had bin Laden issued a fatwa against Beijing and slammed an airliner into a skyscraper in Shanghai, there is no telling what a nuclear China might have done.

India too got mostly a pass, other than the occasional murdering by Pakistani zealots. Yet India makes no effort to apologize to Muslims. When extremists occasionally riot and kill, they usually cease quickly before the response of a much more unpredictable angry populace.

What can we learn from all this?

Hanson points to three items:

Almost no secular Middle Easterners or religious officials write or state flatly, “Islamic terrorism is murder, pure and simple evil. End of story, no ifs or buts about it.”

Second, thinking that the jihadists will target only Israel eventually leads to emboldened attacks on the United States. Assuming America is the only target assures terrorism against Europe. Civilizations will either hang separately or triumph over barbarism together. It is that simple — and past time for Europe and the United States to rediscover their common heritage and shared aims in eradicating this plague of Islamic fascism.

Third, Islamicists are selective in their attacks and hatred. So far global jihad avoids two billion Indians and Chinese, despite the fact that their countries are far tougher on Muslims than is the United States or Europe. In other words, the Islamicists target those whom they think they can intimidate and blackmail.

In another article, Hanson says Enough is enough:

Civilization has only two choices. It can continue appeasing these murderers, looking in vain for "root causes" of the mayhem. Maybe Mohammed Bouyeri did not have equal opportunity in the Netherlands? Maybe $50 billion in past American aid to Mohamed Atta's Egypt was too little? Maybe Britain was too insensitive to its Muslim minorities? Maybe the price paid for Middle East oil really is too low?
Or the United States and its allies can deny suspect Middle Eastern males entry into the West while distancing themselves from all Middle East dictatorships, which neither punish nor even shame thousands of their citizens whose money and psychological support fuel murderers across the globe.
We wait for a Western leader with the intellectual integrity and guts at last to say, "Enough is enough".

Enough, yes.

Following up on the Scott Burgess outs Guardian staff reporter
post of last Monday. Scott found out that the Guardian employed Dilpazier Aslam, a member of Hizb ut-Tahrir, a terrorist organization banned in Russia, Germany and Holland. Alsam, "27-year-old British Muslim from Yorkshire", was educated at British taxpayers' expense. The Hizb ut-Tahrir organization, while still legal in the UK,

In this country [the UK] the National Union of Students has barred Hizb ut-Tahrir from its unions, claiming the group is "responsible for supporting terrorism and publishing material that incites racial hatred".

Now the Guardian explains, in a long and self-congratulatory article, that they finally got around to firing Aslam,

On Monday July 18 Aslam was advised that the Guardian considered that Hizb ut-Tahrir had promoted violence and anti-semitic material on its website and that membership of the organisation was not compatible with being a Guardian trainee.

The following day Aslam told the editor, Alan Rusbridger, that he was not willing to leave Hizb ut-Tahrir and that, while he personally repudiated anti-semitism, he did not consider the website material to be promoting violence or to be anti-semitic.

If it hadn't been for Scott bringing up the matter, a major UK newspaper would still be carrying feature articles from a member of a terrorist organization.

Good job, Scott.

Penguin people
Yesterday was hot enough I went to see March of the Penguins in the afternoon. While driving to see a penguin movie I thought of a joke Bill Cosby had in his 1990s show, where his character, Hilton Lucas, subscribes to cable TV and becomes so addicted to it and feels he has to watch each of the hundreds of channels that he stays awake all night watching the penguin channel. Still, what better way to cool off than to watch a penguin movie?

If you wonder how penguins can tell each other apart, it's from their sound, because, in my untrained eyes (and apparently in the eyes of their babies) every penguin -- boy or girl -- looks much like the penguin next to it, except that some are sligthly fatter or taller compared to the rest. Which makes me wonder, how does the species manage to avoid genetic flaws from inbreeding? After all, it's a very limited genetic pool.

March of the Penguins' orignal title was La Marche de l'empereur, the Emperor's March, which I find more fitting, but maybe the marketing department thougth that sounded too much like a Bing Crosby movie. The penguins are emperors of the harshest wilderness, and the film lyrically shows every aspect of their family lives. There's even a love scene that rivals Brad Pitt's in Thelma & Louise. Photographer Luc Jacquet did a magnificent job.

The theater was nearly full, with families and people of all ages, and we all were involved in the penguins' lives and travails. A little kid commented to her mom, "penguins are people, too". Bloggers have posted on Penguin Family Values, and are grateful that the actors don’t spout dumb political opinions.

The result has been that Star penguins walk all over Tom Cruise.

In other animal news, the Sunday NY Times Magazine (not on line yet) has a cover article about chimpanzee retirement homes.

(technorati tag Movies penguins)

Reminding NJ bloggers to send in their Carnival links
A quick reminder that I'm hosting the Carnival this upcoming Sunday. As Enlighten NJ says,

All New Jersey bloggers and blog readers are invited to participate. Please send links to njcarnival@gmail.com for posts you would like featured in this week's Carnival.

Please make sure to send it RIGHT AWAY.

Now look at the great graphic Enlighten's come up with:

I absolutely love it!

Follow-up on Havana Night Club story of last year
On November 15 I posted that 44 dancers, singers and musicians, here to stage a revue, sought political asylum in the United States.

Well, I was wrong, there were fifty of them, not forty-four, and they succeeded: Cuban Performers Are Granted Asylum. The troupe had reasons to ask for asylum:

A year ago this week, Cuban officials raided the Havana building where the group rehearsed and seized thousands of dollars worth of equipment. They ordered the group to disband and told them they would no longer be permitted to perform. Their founder and artistic director, Nicole Durr, who is German, was arrested and expelled from the country.

Commenting on the story, Prof. Pamela Falk, their legal advisor, said,

she believed the case was the largest mass defection in the history of Cuba. The troupe, she said, contained a fascinating cross-section of Cuban society, ranging in age from 19 to 38 and representing many of the island's racial groups - Afro-Cuban, mulatto and European.

Welcome.

Man shot in London Underground
BBC reports,

Another passenger on the train, Anthony Larkin, told BBC News the man had been wearing a "bomb belt with wires coming out".

As Stephen Pollard says, I'm waiting for the first denunciation of the police for this.

Update It didn't take long: Via Roger L. Simon, the fact that the suspected suicide bomber was shot so many times also caused some disquiet today.

(A detail from the NY Sun article, Police shot and killed a man wearing a thick coat at a London subway station. I've taken the London Underground in the Summer, and, take my word for it: it's not air-conditioned and it's hot.)

If you haven't read it yet, don't miss Chrenkoff's post This is why we fight

Entertainment category: Rude TV
Bernard Goldberg's new book 100 People Who Are Screwing Up America has caused quite a stir, and it's on the top-10 bestseller list. No, I haven't read it, and probably won't.

Mr. Goldberg went on a TV show I'd never heard of and now Jeff Jarvis, one of the show's pannelists is blogging about it, along with Captain's Quarters.

Crooks and Liars has the video of the TV program. All I can see is rude people interrupting each other -- yet another case of "rude TV".

And please, when will TV hosts actually read the books they talk about??

My type of guy
Star Trek's Scotty was a real guy, a regular guy. I knew an engineer who told me that, until he watched Star Trek he thought an engineer was a guy who drove a subway. Scotty inspired not only thousands of future engineers, he also inspired many a TV and film character, my favorite of which was Mac from Chicken Run

[the plane reels as Mrs. Tweedy hangs on to it]
Fowler: Great Scott, what was that?
Mac: A cling-on, Cap'n, and the engines can't take it.

Via The Nightfly, Lileks had a nice tribute to James Doohan,

It’s impossible to understate Doohan's appeal - if you sneak into a NASA control room during a mission and ask the controllers how many chose their profession because of Scotty, half the hands in the room would go up. No one wanted to go into space because of that whiny little red-head kid on Lost in Space. It takes something indefinable to be a Kirk, it takes med school to be a McCoy, it takes green blood to be Spock, but Scotty – aye. Any man could be Scotty, if he applied himself. And he'd be among manly things, too.

In a hundred years from now, no one will remember Brad Pitt. But they’ll have a picture of Scotty taped up in the break room off the moon shuttle.

Sure, Spock was moody in a sexy sort of way, Kirk was a party guy, but Scotty was the guy you'd marry.

I should know, I married a techie.

Breaking news: Small bombs hit London transport
from CNN

At least three small bombs have exploded on Underground subway stations and a bus in London, two weeks after the July 7 terror attacks, police said.

Police said Thursday there were small explosions at Warren Street, Oval and Shepherd's Bush stations and an incident was reported on a bus in east London.

Scotland Yard also confirmed they were looking into an "incident" at University College Hospital, where armed officers have been deployed. Witnesses report policemen with flak jackets entered the hospital along with dogs.

Also at Fox News

Update The Counterterrorism Blog has continous updates and commentary.

For the NOT A Good Idea File: Scuffles during a US Secretary of State visit to Sudan
The Beeb: US fury as Sudan manhandles staff

The BBC's Jonathan Beale, who is travelling with Ms Rice, says the row is very bad news for a new government which is trying to say that it is becoming more open and introducing press freedom.

Bad news, for sure; just look at what happened. The London Times: Condoleezza Rice today demanded a full apology from the Sudanese President after members of her entourage were allegedly roughed up by guards at a diplomatic meeting. (emphasis mine)

Jim Wilkinson, a senior adviser to the US Secretary of State, was grabbed and thrown against a wall at the entrance to President Omar al-Bashir’s palace in the capital Khartoum.

US officials said that the security guards elbowed and pushed them, barring advisers and the press from entering the meeting by slamming closed the residence's wooden doors.

An attempt was also made to seize tapes from a National Public Radio reporter before Sean McKormack, Miss Rice's spokesman, and others intervened.

A Sudanese official quickly came out to apologise to the second group of journalists, held back in the anteroom to the residence.

Later, when NBC reporter Andrea Mitchell tried to ask why Khartoum should be believed in its promises to crack down on militias in Darfur, she was cut off and pushed away by the Sudanese security.

The BBC article states that, while the head of the African Union peacekeeping force claims that security had improved in Darfur, with no major attacks since January and a decrease in low-level skirmishes, US aid official Andrew Natsios said: "The major reason for that, frankly, is there are not many villages left to burn down and destroy." More on Sudan, Africa's biggest country, at the NYT.

It is estimated that at least 180,000 people in Darfur have been killed since 2003 by the janjaweed — an Arab militia that kills for the Sudanese government.

. . . meanwhile, back in France,
Jacques's in Madagascar for a Indian Ocean commission summit, while his adopted daughter rides to his rescue at home.

(One thing that bothers me are all these "summits". By now there are fewer summits in the Himalayas, since every conference is referred to as a "summit". But I digress)

Not that things are all that great at home in France. The Americans are taking over: the Tour de Lance, for instance, and now Danone's about to be purchased by Pepsi. While Jacques can't do anything about Lance, he's "vigilant" and "mobilised" about the possibility of a foreign takeover of Danone, and has been saying that "France's key priority was to defend the strength of its firms." How about lower taxes and less stringent labor laws, Jacques?

Parts of France are under a drought, and water restrictions are in order. There's another type of drought in the horizon, as France looks at cut in housing perks for new `nobility', i.e., the functionnaires "-- museum directors, bank managers, regional councilors and public architects -- who are paid salaries that the country's 10 percent unemployed can only dream of but pay nothing or peppercorn rents for their housing."

However, the real bad news, as Captain's Quarters points out, is that

The French continue to isolate themselves in the war on terror. First they allegedly concocted the forged documents that came to the CIA and caused a row over the State of the Union speech. Now they have gone out of their way to lie about sensitive information in the middle of the London bombing case simply to score a couple of political points, enraging the British and threatening to end cooperation between the two countries on intelligence

If and when Sakozy gets elected, things are unlikely to change much in that respect. The NYT article reports,

After an emergency European Union summit meeting of justice and interior ministers in Brussels last Wednesday, the French interior minister, Nicolas Sarkozy (Mr. Chaboud's boss), suggested that part of the cell responsible for the London terror attacks had been arrested before, apparently referring to a large police and intelligence operation, code-named Operation Crevice, against an ethnic Pakistani cell.

"It seems that part of this team had been subject to partial arrest" in the spring of 2004, Mr. Sarkozy told reporters. In a veiled criticism of the British, Mr. Sarkozy described that development as making "the work of the police services across Europe extremely difficult."

The remarks prompted an immediate response from the British home secretary, Charles Clarke, who had called for the meeting. "There is absolutely no foundation in them," Mr. Clarke, speaking at a news conference, said of Mr. Sarkozy's remarks to the press. He added, "I'm sorry to be so blunt, but that is the state of affairs."

Asked whether he had confronted Mr. Sarkozy directly about his statements, Mr. Clarke said there had not been the opportunity since Mr. Sarkozy left the meeting "halfway through."

In all, the more things change . . .

Here in the USA, France 2's special correspondents stumble onto a snag. The snag's named Charles Johnson