| Christie speaks in Washington DC, calling Newark schools 'absolutely disgraceful' |
| Christie says he and Obama agree on school reform; the teachers union is the only one out of step |
Contents HT: New Jersey Star Ledger
| Christie speaks in Washington DC, calling Newark schools 'absolutely disgraceful' |
| Christie says he and Obama agree on school reform; the teachers union is the only one out of step |
Carrier in the Pacific
ReplyDeleteHe and Obama are on the same page?
ReplyDeleteMr Obama, he is a man for all seasons. But even so, I find it hard to believe that he and Mr Christie are really standing shoulder to shoulder.
"It's everywhere," Grand Isle Fire Chief Aubrey Chaisson said, describing goop churning. "And it's still coming."
ReplyDeleteThursday night, at a community meeting a few blocks away, a BP representative told a crowd of several dozen that there was only one thing the company could say.
"We are sorry," BP's Jason French said. "It happened again.
Offers Apology
Hamas raids, closes NGO offices
ReplyDeleteBy KHALED ABU TOAMEH
04/06/2010
Outrage in Gaza after group confiscates files, equipment.
Hamas’s security forces on Monday and Tuesday raided the offices of several non-governmental organizations in the Gaza Strip and confiscated equipment and furniture, drawing sharp condemnations from human rights groups.
The sources said the raids were carried out by agents belonging to Hamas’s Internal Security apparatus without court permission.
Hamas spokesmen in the Gaza Strip on Thursday refused to comment on the raids.
After conducting a thorough search of the offices of the organizations, the Hamas security agents confiscated files, documents, computers, fax machines and other equipment.
The agents also informed the managers and workers of the organizations of the Hamas government’s decision to close them down indefinitely.
The Gaza-based Al-Mezan Center for Human Rights expressed outrage over the raids and called on the Hamas government to open an investigation.
“Al-Mezan condemns these assaults against NGOs and views them with much concern,” the center said. “Al-Mezan calls on the Gaza government to initiate an investigation into these acts, ensure full respect of the law, and protect the right of NGOs to work freely.”
According to affidavits given to Al-Mezan by workers at the NGOs, on Monday morning Hamas security agents stormed the NGOs offices in the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah.
The NGOs raid on Monday were: Sharik Youth Institution, Bonat Al-Mustaqbal (Future Builders) Society, the South Society for Women’s Health, and the Women and Children Society.
The security agents searched the offices and made a list of the equipment and other belongings.
Later in the day, Hamas policemen returned to the offices of the same NGOs and called the directors by telephone. They confiscated most of the equipment and other items, including computers, faxes, cameras, documents and reports, in addition to the keys to their doors. The security agents informed the directors that their organizations were closed. They did not provide any reasons behind this decision.
The following day [Tuesday], Hamas security men stormed the offices of another two NGOs, the Palestinian Mini Parliament and the National Reconciliation Committee. They confiscated the keys to their doors and ordered them closed.
“Al-Mezan views these assaults on NGOs and the way they were carried out without any respect for the law with great concern,” the center said in a statement. “Al-Mezan condemns them and questions their timing, which comes amid the outcry against the Israeli crime against the Freedom Flotilla.”
It said such assaults on NGOs “violate constitutional rights under Article 26 of the amended Palestinian Basic Law, which provides Palestinians the right to participate in public life, particularly by forming syndicates, unions, institutions, clubs and popular institutions.”
The UN’s special coordinator for the Middle East peace process, Robert Serry, expressed deep concern over the raids and closure of the NGO offices.
“This targeting of NGOs, including UN partner organizations, is unacceptable, violating accepted norms of a free society and harming the Palestinian people,” he said. “The de facto [Hamas] authorities must cease such repressive steps and allow the re-opening of these civil society institutions without delay.”
Gangsters of Gaza
ReplyDeletevs
Pirates of the Mediterranean
Quite the novella.
It's reported Abba Eban once said, “The Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.”
ReplyDelete.
Whoops, I assumed WiO's post was more recent.
ReplyDeleteI guess we will need to give Hamas a little more time to prove Eban right.
Again.
.
Yea, Q, it is misplaced on the time line, but does paint an accurate picture of the Gangsters of Gaza.
ReplyDeleteAs ash was saying, the toughest prison gang in that walled off ghetto.
The Warden and the guards, they let 'em run the cell block and the yard, but will shoot 'em off the walls if they try to escape.
The Gangsters of Gaza run the Yard, the Pirates of the Mediterranean run the Prison.
Working shoulder to shoulder to keep the regular citizen folk helpless and hopeless.
Hamas raids, closes NGO offices
ReplyDeleteBy KHALED ABU TOAMEH
04/06/2010
the date is euro stated
it's june 4th in israel now
the criminal rodent states:
ReplyDeleteThe Gangsters of Gaza run the Yard, the Pirates of the Mediterranean run the Prison.
and yet misses the point that Egypt CONTROLS the border as well...
and Egypt is the historic occupier of Gaza
Then Israel should have given it back, to Egypt, back in 1972, when the US asked, nicely.
ReplyDeleteBut they didn't, so the responsibility stays on the Israeli. It was their decisions and actions that got them where they are, today.
No one else but Israel is responsible. The Israeli have held the keys to the prison gates for over forty years, as your shipping manifests so amply exemplified.
Gazans have been streaming through the Rafah border with Egypt over the past two days following an order from Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to open the crossing “indefinitely”.
ReplyDelete...
On 1 June, the World Health Organization (WHO) called for “the unimpeded access into the Gaza Strip of life-saving medical supplies, including equipment and medicines, as well as more effective movement of people in and out of the territory for medical training and the repair of devices needed to deliver appropriate healthcare”.
...
Israel's Gaza District Coordination Office (DCO) said some of the cargo on board the aid ships, such as building materials, was banned from Gaza under the blockade and as such would not be delivered. But it said it began on 1 June delivering items that are on the list of supplies allowed into Gaza through the Kerem Shalom crossing.
Egypt Border
The prison gang leaders have changed, the gangs have morphed and gotten more violent, all to true.
ReplyDeleteBut all of that happened under the watchful eye of the Israeli military occupation.
They always have had the upper hand.
Arabfat lived in a 'compound' of rubble.
"the date is euro stated"
ReplyDeleteI'm afraid I'm not as cosmopolitan as I would like to be.
Anyway I guess I can restate the original post:
"It's reported Abba Eban once said, “The Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.”
.
Abba Eban was a great speaker.
ReplyDeleteThe Eurotrash cannot keep their dates straight, give it a break.
ReplyDeleteThey best get with the Standard.
Or be left behind.
The Euro, the metric, just another set in a series of Europeon jokes.
The Pirates vs The Gangsters
Coming Soon on Pay For View!
Tomorrow morning the Bureau of Labor Statistics will release the EMPLOYMENT SITUATION REPORT. Because the Employment Situation Report is such an influential economic metric, it has become a source of great speculation.
ReplyDelete...
May’s rise in private employment was the fourth consecutive monthly gain. However, over these four months the increases have averaged a modest 39,000.
...
This is a tough spot to be in if you're floating. We are at a crossroads.
Trend Reversal?
Abba Eban, born a South African of English descent.
ReplyDeleteHe was renowned for his oratorical skills. In the words of Henry Kissinger:
"I have never encountered anyone who matched his command of the English language. Sentences poured forth in mellifluous constructions complicated enough to test the listener’s intelligence and simultaneously leave him transfixed by the speaker’s virtuosity."
His polished presentation, grasp of history, and powerful speeches gave him authority in a United Nations that was generally skeptical of Israel or even hostile to it. He was fluent in ten languages. In 1952, Eban was elected Vice President of the UN General Assembly.
They certainly don't have the likes of Abba Eban representing Israel now a days.
No, today they have people like Avigdor Lieberman, a Soviet-born politician.
Little wonder the excrement is hitting the rotating blades.
When you visit Gaza, you see that the siege has accomplished nothing — except to devastate the lives of 1.5 million ordinary Gazans. Gisha, an Israeli human rights organization, has compiled a list of goods that Israel typically blocks from Gaza: notebooks, blank paper, writing utensils, coriander, chocolate, fishing rods, and countless more.
ReplyDelete...
President Obama needs to find his voice and push hard for an end to the Gaza blockade. He needs to talk sense to Israel and encourage it to back away from its plans to intercept other flotillas now headed for Gaza — that would be a catastrophe for Israel and America alike.
Above all, he needs to nudge Israel away from its tendency to shoot itself in the foot, and us along with it.
Saving Israel
"Yemeni al-Qaida urges kidnapping of Americans and Saudi royals"
ReplyDeleteThe Associated Press
"A senior member of an al-Qaida offshoot in Yemen has called on supporters in a new audio message to kidnap Christians and members of the Saudi royal family.
"The deputy chief of al-Qaida in the Arabian peninsula, Said al-Shihri, says such hostages could be used as a bargaining chip to secure the release of the terror group's supporters held in jails across the region.
"In a rare nod to al-Qaida's female supporters, al-Shihri singles out a Saudi woman preacher, Haila al-Kassir. He says al-Kassir is currently in Saudi custody.
"Al-Shihri recently made a similar appeal for attacks against U.S. and Saudi interests in the Middle East.
"The 17-minute audio tape was posted Thursday on websites frequently used by Islamist extremists."
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At virtually every turn lately, the White House cannot shake the appearance that it is hamstrung and a step behind. From a major crisis such as the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico to smaller and seemingly avoidable controversies over internal Democratic Party politics, President Obama and his team are on the defensive.
ReplyDelete...
The latest setback came Wednesday night, when Andrew Romanoff, a former state House speaker who is challenging incumbent Michael Bennet in Colorado's Democratic Senate primary, issued a statement describing his interaction with White House Deputy Chief of Staff Jim Messina. Romanoff said Messina, in seeking to gauge his willingness to quit the race, raised the possibility of three jobs in the administration.
...
Democratic strategists said there is cause for concern, but they were reluctant Thursday to speak on the record and risk the wrath of the White House. Their critiques, however, suggested that even within the party, there are questions about the effectiveness of the administration's political operation and its communications strategy.
Oil Spill/Elections
With the slick expected to reach the Florida panhandle within days, Coast Guard investigators were also probing unconfirmed reports that tar balls and an oily substance had been found in the tourist-heavy Florida Keys.
ReplyDeleteAllen, who is coordinating the government's response to the spill, said nearly a million gallons of dispersants have been used to break up the oil in the Gulf.
"It's a milestone and there are concerns about that and we will continue to work the dispersants very, very closely."
Oil Leak
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/03/AR2010060304287.html---
ReplyDeleteCharles Krauthammer tells us what's actually going on in this Gaza peace ship shit.
By the way, unless you're a mindless criminal rodent, you might well be better off to home school your kids.
"Speaking of the MSM and demonization, has anyone else noticed the bad news volume coming out of Afghanistan."
ReplyDelete- Whit, in previous thread
I'm waiting for the next deluge. In the usual pattern, it follows a major, above-the-fold-incident or quick series of incidents.
Things are heating up there, weather-wise and otherwise.
The administration has to be preparing for that inevitable week when casualties again become a driving concern.
"Hamas is stronger and Israel has not enhanced its interests anywhere.
ReplyDelete"As a strategy, it is a diplomatic failure. If there is no plan B, this would be a good time to develop one."
- Blue, in the previous thread
Again, I just don't think Israel is aiming for any kind of diplomatic win.
To describe this latest action, for instance, as a public relations catastrophe is to assume to some extent that public relations is a significant motive to begin with.
Once you've concluded that the popularity contest is irretrievably lost - and worse, was fixed from the outset - winning hearts and minds (outside of a critical base of solidarity and support in the US) falls off the List of Things To Do.
I don't, however, put much stock in the War Is Coming mantra. Much less now, anyhow, than I did just a month ago.
Take another swing at Lebanon? A bite out Syria? I really don't think so. Israel's not prepared to do it, lack of concern with global favor notwithstanding.
At the end of the day - every day - it's all about the central problem of Iran.
I don't see that war coming either.
Detroit Fans Cheer JIm Joyce
ReplyDelete"Baseball umpire Jim Joyce made a hideously incorrect ruling Wednesday night that cost Detroit Tigers pitcher Armando Galarraga one of the rarest achievements in the sport: a perfect game. But 15 hours later, when Galarraga made his way to home plate before Thursday afternoon's game to present his team's lineup card to Joyce, the umpire's reception was just as clear-cut.
The fans in Detroit cheered, and baseball and sport had one of its most inspiring and least expected moments...
We All Make Mistakes
Most people realize that everybody makes mistakes. Umpire Jim Joyce was big in admitting his. The fans appreciate the honesty.
Likewise, most people reject the canard implicit in one accepting responsibility for everything but never admitting you (or your administration) has actually made any mistakes.
.
There ARE any number of questions about the manner in which this most recent interdiction was undertaken.
ReplyDeleteWhy not just disable the motor and tow? It's done easily enough.
When was the decision to use any necessary lethal force made? If you know what you're stepping into, it's made ahead of time. And in that case, you aren't descending on deck into an angry mob. Were they caught unaware?
Shit happens. But that's why doctrine is your friend.
"To describe this latest action, for instance, as a public relations catastrophe is to assume to some extent that public relations is a significant motive to begin with...".
ReplyDeleteI disagree rish.
Israel is a small country completely surrounded by hostile Arab states. They need all the support they can get.
If that requires playing the diplomatic game. You gotta do what you gotta do.
Making decisions as what is in your best interest is more important than not getting the last ounce of satisfaction.
In the last six months, Israel has made some diplomatic blunders that while they may have given temporary satisfaction in fact could hurt them in the long run.
.
"rish"
ReplyDeleteThat's my new name for you.
.
Check this out, Whit!
ReplyDeleteHere ya go, Trish.
ReplyDeleteFast-Roping 101
The International Muslim Brotherhood had a heavy hand in orchestrating the flotilla.
ReplyDeleteAs my colleague Jonathan Schanzer wrote earlier this week, the flotilla was organized in large part by a radical Turkish Islamist organization named IHH (Islan Haklary Ve Hurriyetleri Vakfi). The IHH, in turn, is part of a Saudi-based umbrella group called the Union of Good, which was created by Hamas. The U.S. Treasury Department designated the Union of Good a terrorist organization in 2008. Of course, Hamas itself was designated a terrorist organization many years ago.
The Union of Good’s leaders include Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi, a top Muslim Brotherhood cleric, and Sheikh Abd al Majid al Zindani, who heads Yemen’s Islah party. Zindani and the Islah party have deep Brotherhood roots.
In other words, the IHH is an offshoot of the Union of Good, which is in turn an offshoot of the Brotherhood -- as is Hamas. It is a matter of basic logic, then, that if the IHH was one of the prime movers behind the flotilla then that means the Brotherhood itself was.
It is as simple as that. But there is much more.
The Grand Jihad: How Islam and the Left Sabotage America
The real threat to the United States is not terrorism. The real threat is Islamism, whose sophisticated forces have collaborated with the American Left not only to undermine U.S. national security but also to shred the fabric of American constitutional democracy—freedom and individual liberty. In The Grand Jihad: How Islam and the Left Sabotage America, bestselling author Andrew C. McCarthy offers a harrowing account of how the global Islamist movement’s jihad involves far more than terrorist attacks, and how it has found the ideal partner in President Barack Obama, whose Islamist sympathies run deep.
For years, McCarthy warned of America’s blindness to the Islamist threat, but in The Grand Jihad McCarthy exposes a new, more insidious peril: the government’s active appeasement of the Islamist ideology. With the help of witting and unwitting accomplices in and out of government, Islamism doesn’t merely fuel terrorism but spawns America-hating Islamic enclaves in our very midst, gradually foisting Islam’s repressive law, sharia, on American life. The revolutionary doctrine has made common cause with an ascendant Left that also seeks radical transformation of our constitutional order. The prognosis for liberty could not be more dire.
What do you see them doing about the thousands of new missiles in Lebanon, Trish.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your POV about image.
This latest incident proves the Worldwide "News" Cabal will define reality as whatever they damn well please.
Always at Israel's expense almost always at our expense.
My McCarthy book link spells out the details.
"If that requires playing the diplomatic game. You gotta do what you gotta do."
ReplyDeleteI'm not saying that it's ultimately wise to disregard IC opprobrium. I'm saying that IC disapproval is taken to be a given. That Israel sees itself as invariably and unfairly regarded as THE regional immiserator and victimizer. In other words, that there's no joy to be had from a hostile and obsessively critical "whirled".
Furthermore, they know that no other state in the region wants the Palestinians - except as a kind of convenient, wretched political prop.
What do you see them doing about the thousands of new missiles in Lebanon, Trish?
ReplyDelete"What do you see them doing about the thousands of new missiles in Lebanon, Trish."
ReplyDeleteNot a clue.
I think the better question is, What can be done that doesn't actually stand the chance of just totally fucking your day?
I see that, Doug. Fl, CA, Az are all in trouble...
ReplyDelete***************************
As long as missles aren't flying and jihadis aren't crossing the borders, I don't believe Israel is going to do anything.
I agree that Israel realizes that the PR battle is lost, especially with the current US Administration.
I have heard that Obama is being held in check by Congress and more recently, (how do I put this?) the Democrat friends of Israel. Okay, the large Jewish donors.
What did the US do, doug, about the thousands of missiles that the Soviets had pointed at US?
ReplyDeleteFunny thing, we NEVER attacked them preemptively.
Even though nuclear tipped missiles were pointed at ALL, EVERY ONE, of the major population centers of the United States.
There was a solution to the challenge, it was not a military one.
Often times the "solution" is more deadly than the "threat". It is a MAD world, the Israeli will need to learn that.
That is the answer to the missiles, in Lebanon, get over it.
Lessons learned, you know.
"I'm not saying that it's ultimately wise to disregard IC opprobrium. I'm saying that IC disapproval is taken to be a given..."
ReplyDeleteAll I'm saying is that its one thing to shit in the sandbox, it's another to rub the othe kids face in it.
In January, some deputy foreign minister calls the Turkish council into his office to be dressed down over a tv show. He leaves the guy standing in the hall waiting. When he does call him in there is no Turkish flag flying (which is the usual form) and he sits in a high seat while putting the Turkish guy in a lower one. Then proceeds to berate him.
You can argue that Israel was pissed and the guy got the dressing down he deserved. But as to rubbing his nose in it, they televised the meeting and broadcast the humiliation in both Israel and Turkey. Typical diplomacy. None I've eer heard of.
You know the story about Biden and the settlements.
In both instances, Israel beat their chest and refused to apologize initially only to then have Peres and Bibi finally come out and do it.
Everyone agrees the latest fiasco was a problem on an operational basis. The initial blackout they imposed gave the impression they had something to hide. For the reasons I mentioned yesterday I personally think it was also a strategic mistake. Others may disagree.
My main point is that if in the instances mentioned, if Israel did nothing differently than change the "stick it in your eye" type diplomacy used they would have been a lot farther ahead.
Maybe some there wouldn't have gotten the satisfaction they wanted but what they did get was short lived anyway.
Israel has bigger fish to fry at the moment. The adults should be playing a smater game.
.
Different actors, different situation, 'Rat.
ReplyDeleteI'm with Trish @ 6:38
Flotilla Choir presents: We Con the World
ReplyDelete(Carolyn Glick)
ReplyDeletePardon the misspellings.
ReplyDeleteThere were to many to correct.
It's early. Need some coffee.
.
Turkey is rapidly becoming a Sunni Iran, Quirk.
ReplyDeleteCondi Rice pretended they were an ally, but they haven't been since the Military was legally constrained and the country was becoming Islamised.
Look whit, at the fella that made Mr Obama a millionaire and his Chief of Staff.
ReplyDeleteMr Obama is firmly on the Friends of Israel team.
He has none absolutely nothing to disabuse that part of his team. His rhetoric is tempered by moderation, but his actions are not.
It is the performance that counts, not the rhetoric.
Neither we nor the Sovs ever fired Missiles at one another.
ReplyDeleteLebanon launched all their missiles.
Now has new, improved missiles.
The Communists certainly fired Soviet supplied missiles and artillery rounds at the US around the whirled.
ReplyDeleteKilling over 100,000 of US, in the process. We often retaliated, killing Communists by the hundreds of thousands, in Korea, alone.
Yet, you are correct, no one ever fired off a "big one".
There is the lesson learned.
Watching the pictures of the animals covered in oil this morning makes you sick.
ReplyDelete.
Don't look at them.
ReplyDeleteThese Muslims are many things, but not nearly as crazy as the Communists were.
ReplyDeleteThe Muslims certainly do not have the capacity for death and destruction that the Communist Eurotrash employed around the whirled.
No, these Muslims are a poor excuse for an enemy and not at all as crazy as the Communists.
Or Eurotrash, in general.
"BP, already bedeviled by an out-of-control well spewing millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, now finds itself with one more problem: Tony Hayward, its gaffe-prone chief executive.
ReplyDelete"Among his memorable lines: The spill is not going to cause big problems because the gulf “is a very big ocean” and “the environmental impact of this disaster is likely to have been very, very modest.” And this week, he apologized to the families of 11 men who died on the rig for having said, “You know, I’d like my life back.”
"But rather than receiving a limited public role, Mr. Hayward, a geologist who has led the company for three years, has become even more the public face of the company. On Thursday, BP began showing a new television ad in which Mr. Hayward, speaking directly into a camera, pledges to spare no effort to clean up the spill.
"It ends with a heartfelt promise: “We will get it done. We will make this right.” (The same day, in an interview published in The Financial Times, he said, “What is undoubtedly true is that we did not have the tools you would want in your tool kit.”)..."
CEO of the Spill
I can buy the argument that BP is limited in what they can do right now, but I have to agree with Ruf. This company has been playing it fast and loose for years.
.
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Seems normal for old men to avoid snuff films, blood, gore and death.
ReplyDeleteOne thing we avoid even more:
Gore.
The left and the right are calling for Obama to show some emotion or as Spike Lee says, "Go off!" about the Gulf. Other than making the childish happy, what would that do?
ReplyDeleteWhat's done is done. All we can do now is try to cap the well. I suspect that those most expert at that are doing it.
As far as the environmental damage, we'll know more later. It's something we'll just have to live with. It's the price we pay for our oil addiction.
"Don't look at them."
ReplyDeleteSounds like something Mr. Hayward might have said.
.
That is not going to happen, whit.
ReplyDeleteThe animals are a major propaganda tool, in the War on Oil. Every real, true blue, red blooded American will be sicken by the disaster that pursuing a policy of Drill, Baby, Drill has brought upon US.
Far worse than any threat posed to US by the Islamoids.
BP's live feed currently covered with oil!
ReplyDeleteMr. Haywood?
ReplyDeleteIf you truly believe that Islam is at war with the US, whit, then the solution is Green Ethanol.
ReplyDeleteNot more oil.
Domestic methadone as opposed to imported heroin.
A game changer.
"ward"
ReplyDeleteEmbrace the War on Oil
ReplyDeleteJust advocate for a different, Greener and economically viable path to victory.
Middle America would march with us, if we did.
But the Wahhabi at FOX News will not help organize that "Grassroots Movement". No indeed.
This is better
ReplyDeleteBut the bought and paid for agents of the Wahhabi at FOX News ...
Fair and Balanced.
Mr. Haywood?
ReplyDeleteTony Hayward, BP CEO.
See my post a Fri Jun 04, 07:13:00 AM EDT
.
The excrement will encounter the impeller, one way or another.
ReplyDeleteOur kids face a vastly different future than the days of cheap oil and ever increasing affluence.
So far, we choose to deny the oncoming train wreck.
As far as the environmental damage, we know more than enough, now.
ReplyDeleteIt is a man made disaster of unprecedented proportions.
Ride the tide, do not fight it.
The years of the
ReplyDeleteDeer in the Headlights.
"It is a man made disaster of unprecedented proportions."
ReplyDeleteOnly an act of God can save our Gulf:
Favorable winds and currents and no hurricanes.
The Exxon Valdez polluted Alaska.
ReplyDeleteFew go or have ever been, to Alaska.
Drill, Baby, Drill is messing with life on the Gulf coast, from the Mississippi River to Panama City, Florida.
Everyone has been to Panama City, Florida.
Ride the tide, Go Green!
It's good to be stoic when there is little that you can do.
ReplyDeleteHowever, it's been observed that Americans at times seem to show more empathy for distressed animals than for distressed neighbors.
I suspect it will get uglier before this is over.
Likewise, if this latest fix doesn't stem the flow, this thing could be pumping into August.
It will be interesting to observe whether Whit can maintain the stoicism if wildlife starts washing up on Florida beaches.
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THE BIRTH OF GOO
ReplyDeleteSanta Barbara Blowout
ReplyDeleteWhat Went Wrong?
ReplyDeleteUnion Oil's Platform A ruptured because of inadequate protective casing. The oil company had been given permission by the U.S. Geological Survey to cut corners and operate the platform with casings below federal and California standards. Investigators would later determine that more steel pipe sheating inside the drilling hole would have prevented the rupture.
---
Sounds Familiar!
Nude Beach Defiled.
ReplyDeleteThe Man Who Pulled the Trigger
ReplyDeleteThe Jerusalem Post interviews an Israeli commando who killed six people on the Mavi Marmara earlier this week. He explains what happened and why he did what he did.
Looking to his side, he saw three of his commanders lying wounded--one with a gunshot wound to the stomach and another with a gunshot wound to the knee. A third was lying unconscious; his skull was fractured by a devastating blow with a metal bar.
As the next in the chain of command, S., who has been in the Shayetet for three and a half years, immediately took charge.
He pushed the wounded soldiers up against the wall of the upper deck and created a perimeter of soldiers around them to begin treating their wounds, he said. He then arranged his men to form a second perimeter, and pulled out his 9 mm. Glock pistol to stave off the charging attackers and to protect his wounded comrades.
The attackers had already seized two pistols from the commandos, and fired repeatedly at them. Facing more than a dozen of the mercenaries, and convinced their lives were in danger, he and his colleagues opened fire, he said. S. singlehandedly killed six men. His colleagues killed another three.
On Thursday, S. sat down with The Jerusalem Post at the Shayetet’s base in northern Israel for an exclusive interview, during which he described the dramatic events aboard the Mavi Marmara on Monday; he is being considered for a medal of valor.
“When I hit the deck, I was immediately attacked by people with bats, metal pipes and axes,” S. told the Post. “These were without a doubt terrorists. I could see the murderous rage in their eyes and that they were coming to kill us.”
[…]
The IDF’s understanding is that the mercenaries mainly chose dual-purpose items of this sort rather than guns, since opening fire would have made it blatantly clear that they were terrorists and not so-called peace activists.
Nevertheless, the IDF suspects that the group did have some guns of its own. Israeli forensic experts who examined the ship found casings belonging to a weapon that was not used by the commandos, and the Turkish captain of the ship later told the IDF that the “mercenaries” threw their weapons overboard after the commandos took control of the vessel.
John Wooden near death @ 99.
ReplyDeleteThem were Islamic Peaceniks, WIO!
ReplyDeleteKilling Peaceniks is evil.
thus, Israel is evil.
But we already knew that.
Interesting blurb in today's WaPo in re the almost complete evaporation of DOS v. DOD disagreements over the use of SOF.
ReplyDeleteYes, indeed. Change the messenger but not the message and there's all kinds of previously contentious policies and ops that win at least lukewarm support among the recalcitrant.
We
ReplyDeleteCon the World, A tribute to the Flotilla
Waterboarding will be declared an aquatic sport.
ReplyDeleteAn Assault, Cloaked in Peace
ReplyDeleteBy MICHAEL B. OREN
Published: June 2, 2010
PEACE activists are people who demonstrate nonviolently for peaceful co-existence and human rights. The mob that assaulted Israeli special forces on the deck of the Turkish ship Mavi Marmara on Monday was not motivated by peace. On the contrary, the religious extremists embedded among those on board were paid and equipped to attack Israelis — both by their own hands as well as by aiding Hamas — and to destroy any hope of peace.
Millions have already seen the Al Jazeera broadcast showing these “activists” chanting “Khaibar! Khaibar!”— a reference to a Muslim massacre of Jews in the Arabian peninsula in the seventh century. YouTube viewers saw Israeli troops, armed with crowd-dispersing paintball guns and side arms for emergency protection, being beaten and hurled over the railings of the ship by attackers wielding iron bars.
What the videos don’t show, however, are several curious aspects Israeli authorities are now investigating. First, about 100 of those detained from the boats were carrying immense sums in their pockets — nearly a million euros in total. Second, Israel discovered spent bullet cartridges on the Mavi Marmara that are of a caliber not used by the Israeli commandos, some of whom suffered gunshot wounds. Also found on the boat were propaganda clips showing passengers “injured” by Israeli forces; these videos, however, were filmed during daylight, hours before the nighttime operation occurred.
The investigations of all this evidence will be transparent, in accordance with Israel’s security needs.
There is little doubt as to the real purpose of the Mavi Marmara’s voyage — not to deliver humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza, but to create a provocation that would put international pressure on Israel to drop the Gaza embargo, and thus allow the flow of seaborne military supplies to Hamas. Just as Hamas gunmen hide behind civilians in Gaza, so, too, do their sponsors cower behind shipments of seemingly innocent aid.
This is why the organizers of the flotilla repeatedly rejected Israeli offers to transfer its cargo to Gaza once it was inspected for military contraband. They also rebuffed an Israeli request to earmark some aid packages for Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier held hostage by Hamas for four years.
In the recent past, Israeli forces have diverted nine such flotillas, all without incident, and peacefully boarded five of the ships in this week’s convoy. Their cargoes, after proper inspection, were delivered to non-Hamas institutions in Gaza. Only the Marmara, a vessel too large to be neutralized by technical means such as fouling the propeller, violently resisted. It is no coincidence that the ship was dispatched by Insani Yardim Vakfi (also called the I.H.H.), a supposed charity that Israeli and other intelligence services have linked to Islamic extremists.
The real intent of breaking the embargo is to allow rockets to be transported to Gaza from Hamas’s suppliers in Syria and Iran. Israel has already intercepted several such ships laden with munitions. Since Israel’s disengagement from Gaza in 2005, Hamas has fired more than 10,000 rockets and mortars at our civilian population. This week, two Hamas rockets exploded near Ashkelon, one of Israel’s largest cities.
ReplyDeleteIsrael has a right and a duty to defend itself from Hamas and its backers. Our struggle is not with the people of Gaza but only with the radical regime that overthrew the legitimate Palestinian Authority and has pledged to seek Israel’s destruction. Each day, Israel facilitates the passage into Gaza of more than 100 truckloads of food and medicine — there is no shortage of either. We, too, want a free Gaza — a Gaza liberated from brutal Hamas rule — as well as an Israel freed from terrorist threats.
Israel will scrupulously review the events surrounding the Marmara’s interception. But Israel will also persist in denying advanced weaponry to Hamas. At the same time, the Israeli government will vigorously pursue peace with the Palestinian Authority, which shares our need for defense against armed extremists. The real peace activists are those who support our vision of a two-state solution, not those supporting the terrorists bent on destroying it.
Michael B. Oren is Israel’s ambassador to the United States.
WIO
ReplyDeleteSee my Fri Jun 04, 06:56:00 AM EDT
,,,a Carolyn Glick Production.
Doug...
ReplyDeleteYou got there 1st...
I bow to your greatness
and thanks for helping beat back the nonsense..
trish said...
ReplyDeleteInteresting blurb in today's WaPo in re the almost complete evaporation of DOS v. DOD disagreements over the use of SOF.
Yes, indeed. Change the messenger but not the message and there's all kinds of previously contentious policies and ops that win at least lukewarm support among the recalcitrant.
Fri Jun 04, 08:06:00 AM EDT
Selfish, lazy bitch trish provides no url, per usual.
Nasty piece of work.
ReplyDeleteI dunno, Doug. Somewhere there in the A section.
ReplyDeleteNew Ship Heads to Gaza, and Israel Vows to Stop It
ReplyDeleteAs the ship approached Gaza Friday, Turkey said it would reduce economic and defense cooperation with Israel.
Why did BP use a freaking six inch pipe to service a 21 inch BOP?
ReplyDelete"all of the tourists covered with oil."
ReplyDeleteVery disappointing Jobs Report this morning.
ReplyDeleteWay out of line with Industrial Production, ISM Reports.
Back to Rufus's theorem of expanding production through "machinery," and jobs "going away" for good.
Meanwhile, the banks are playing down at the casino, and small businesses can't get any money.
We got problems, chilluns.
The AIGs, Citis, and Goldmans can get all the money they want, but a county, or small start-up wanting to build a cellulosic ethanol plant can't even get a loan guarantee, much less a loan.
ReplyDeleteThis administration has completely derailed Bush's drive toward energy independence through biofuels (a strategy that replaced approx. 10% of our gasoline use in just a couple of years, I might add.)
A slight difference, gag, between Deep Horizon crude and coco oils.
ReplyDeleteJust a tad.
Here's an example of coco oil doing its' worse to a beach.
As opposed to this beach scene
Buddy Larsen Saves the Day
ReplyDeleteBy design, rufus, by design.
ReplyDeleteThe Wahhabi control the MSM, on the Left and the Right. Bought and paid for, just like the politicos.
Pining for magic batteries and windmills, on the one side.
The other, telling US to ignore what our eyes plainly see.
While both ignore the only practical solution to the energy and economic needs of the country.
250 million acres brought into energy production, in the next five years. A Manhattan Project kind of an effort.
In our own economic self-interest.
A better route to power than claiming the President is a Marxist that was born in Kenya and is a usurper.
Rufus said...
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile, the banks are playing down at the casino, and small businesses can't get any money.
We got problems, chilluns.
---
Doc Housing Bubble, who you, for whatever reason mock, says the banks are playing the markets on our dime while sweeping the defaults, ARMs, and trillions of dollars of commercial RE under the carpet.
...and the beat goes on.
Wooden won 620 games during his coaching career, which began at UCLA in 1948. He retired following the 1974-75 season, after his Bruins won their 10th title in 12 seasons.
ReplyDeleteHis "Pyramid of Success" is used as a teaching foundation in business and for coaches across the country, in every sport.
The Marxists have a natural antipathy to agriculture. Small farmers, who own their land, are difficult to control. That's why ALL Communist regimes end up Importing food.
ReplyDeleteLarge Stockholders, also, have a natural disdain for agriculture. It's too hard to "make a buck" off of it.
The Wahhabis, and their minions, of course, would rather see their children playing with rattlesnakes than see ethanol refineries being built.
The natural contituency of ethanol is the Tea Party, but they, largely, watch Fox News, and read the Wall Street Journal (both owned by the Sauds,) and as a result, are misinformed of the situation.
No one said it was going to be "Easy," I guess.
I repeat:
ReplyDeleteThe Grand Jihad: How Islam and the Left Sabotage America
The real threat to the United States is not terrorism. The real threat is Islamism, whose sophisticated forces have collaborated with the American Left not only to undermine U.S. national security but also to shred the fabric of American constitutional democracy—freedom and individual liberty. In The Grand Jihad: How Islam and the Left Sabotage America, bestselling author Andrew C. McCarthy offers a harrowing account of how the global Islamist movement’s jihad involves far more than terrorist attacks, and how it has found the ideal partner in President Barack Obama, whose Islamist sympathies run deep.
For years, McCarthy warned of America’s blindness to the Islamist threat, but in The Grand Jihad McCarthy exposes a new, more insidious peril: the government’s active appeasement of the Islamist ideology. With the help of witting and unwitting accomplices in and out of government, Islamism doesn’t merely fuel terrorism but spawns America-hating Islamic enclaves in our very midst, gradually foisting Islam’s repressive law, sharia, on American life. The revolutionary doctrine has made common cause with an ascendant Left that also seeks radical transformation of our constitutional order. The prognosis for liberty could not be more dire.
The Real "Threat" to America is the possibility of Global DEPRESSION. Nothing else comes within a thousand miles.
ReplyDeleteLimbaugh to wed again, according to Chris Wallace.
ReplyDeleteMust be that hot young thing seen in Honolulu Hospital when the ecstasy popping sex fiend thot his heart had failed him.
Life's a (n oil covered) beach.
Rufus,
ReplyDeleteThe entire Admin econ team does not believe money supply means jack shit.
Just need more govt spending.
...I'll look up the M-3 thing.
US money supply plunges at 1930s pace as Obama eyes fresh stimulus
ReplyDeleteThe M3 money supply in the United States is contracting at an accelerating rate that now matches the average decline seen from 1929 to 1933, despite near zero interest rates and the biggest fiscal blitz in history.
Keynsians all, the Admin is not concerned.
Now that's a BLOCKADE
ReplyDeleteThe siege of Jerusalem was an Arab attempt to block the road to Jerusalem in the days leading up to Israeli independence, from December 1, 1947 to July 10, 1948, preventing basic food supplies from reaching the city.[
The siege was initiated by local Palestinian Arab militias immediately after the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution recommending partition of Palestine into Jewish and Arab states.
According to the plan, Jerusalem was to be an international zone surrounded on all sides by the Arab state. Before the British mandate expired, Palestinian Arab militias attacked Jews in and around Jerusalem. Although British forces sometimes confiscated weapons from the Haganah, they forcibly repelled attempted Arab incursions into the Jewish Quarter, sustaining casualties in the process. From May 15, following the end of the mandate and the declaration of the state of Israel, the Palestinian Arab militias were joined by the Transjordan Arab Legion, assisted by British officers, and by the Egyptian Army, which invaded Palestine.
The intention of besieging forces was to isolate the 100,000 Jewish residents of the city from the rest of the Jewish inhabitants of the territory of Palestine and, in the case of the Jordanian forces, to conquer East Jerusalem (including the Old City).] Aside from the large Jewish population, Jerusalem held special importance to the Yishuv for "religious and nationalist" reasons.
In particular, the Arab forces tried to cut off the road to Jerusalem from the coastal plain, where the majority of the Jewish population resided. The Arabs blocked access to Jerusalem "at Latrun and Bab al-Wad," a narrow valley surrounded by Arab villages on hills on both sides.
The Arabs also fired off shells indiscriminately into West Jerusalem. Jewish civilian casualties were very high. The Arab Legion also cut off the water pipe to Jerusalem. The breaking of the siege on Jerusalem and the annexation of the captured areas to the Jewish state became primary goals for the Israelis in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War.[5]
The fighting led to the evacuation of the Jewish villages of Neve Yaakov, Atarot, Kalya and Beit HaArava, and the expulsion of the Jewish inhabitants of the Old City of Jerusalem.
Before the war, the Jews of the Old City had friendly relations with their Arab neighbors and were sorry to have to be forced to leave.
Vieiw of the road to Jerusalem entering Bab al Wab seen from the Arab Legion positions at Latrun
Convoys of armoured vehicles which carried supply to the Jewish population were repeatedly attacked on the road to Jerusalem, inflicting heavy casualties and bringing the Jewish residents to the brink of starvation. Operation Nachshon and Operation Maccabee were held by Jewish military forces in April and May 1948 in attempt to seize control of the strategic "corridor". In late May and early June the Israeli launched several assaults on the Latrun salient but without succeeding of taking the position to the Arab Legion. Nevertheless, they were able to build a bypass road through the Judean Hills called the Burma Road, which was opened to traffic on June 10. During Operation Dani they launched two other attacks on Latrun, again without success and attacked several Arab villages to widen Jerusalem corridor that was 2 km wide in the area of Latrun.
In March an attack on a convoy south of the current location of Jerusalem left 15 dead. In April a Jewish medical convoy on its way to Hadassah Hospital on Mount Scopus was attacked. The British had provided no escort (as they had in previous months) and the they failed to intervene during the attack or help the Jews. In the end, 78 Jews (mostly unarmed medical personnel) were murdered.
Food rationing
ReplyDeleteStarting in early 1948, the Arab forces had severed the supply line to Jewish Jerusalem (especially to the Old City). In response, the mayor of Jerusalem, Dov Yosef, introduced a draconian system of food rationing during the siege. The mallow plant played an important role in Jerusalem history at this time. When convoys bearing foodstuffs could not reach the city, the residents of Jerusalem went out to the fields to pick mallow leaves, which are rich in iron and vitamins. The Jerusalem radio station, Kol Hamagen, broadcast instructions for cooking mallow. When the broadcasts were picked up in Jordan, they sparked victory celebrations. Radio Amman announced that the fact that the Jews were eating leaves, food for donkeys and cattle, was a sign that they were dying of starvation and would soon surrender.
United Nations reaction
Part of the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine, which the Jews of Mandatory Palestine accepted and the Arabs of Mandatory Palestine and neighboring states rejected, was that Jerusalem would be a corpus separatum, meaning that the United Nations would assume responsibility for the city and it would not be a part of either the proposed Arab or Jewish states. Israel argued that the partition plan regarding Jerusalem was "null and void" due to the UN's "active relinquishing of responsibility in a critical hour" when the UN did not act to protect the city. The Arabs, who had been against Jerusalem's internationalization all along, felt similarly.
Job One is to keep the banks open. They did that.
ReplyDeleteJob Two is to get the money circulating in the "Productive" area of the economy. That's where they're stalled.
I hate to say this, but, right now, we're tracking on the "Great Depression" timeline pretty closely.
ReplyDeleteWe won't get there, because we won't let the banks go under. There was a point in the thirties when 28 States did not have a bank open.
We could, however, be in for One hell of a Recession.
If this asshole Obumble had any vision whatsoever, AND if he wanted to save the economy, this would be the perfect time to lead the charge against imported oil, and deepwater drilling, and For 3,000 local Ethanol refineries.
This would, immediately (almost) put A Couple of Million Construction, and Manufacturing people to work.
It would signal lower transportation costs in the future, and a Very Positive "Balance of Payments" effect on the way.
The Timing is Perfect, but the administration, seemingly, has no interest, whatsoever, in doing anything like it.
And, yes, they DO understand about the Oil Crunch that's coming. Makes you wonder.
When I look at Obumble all I see is a combination of Benito Mussolini, Louis Quatorze, and Robert Mugabe. The pure autocratic totalitarian. He's a scary dude.
ReplyDeleteObama is now FURIOUS. OMG.
ReplyDeleteWhat would a big hurricane do to the oil floating around? Maybe it would suck it up, thin it out, rain it out, film it out thin, do some good? just asking.
ReplyDelete"...He's a scary dude..."
ReplyDeleteIn more ways than five Ruf. He is whipsawing the markets with his loose lips.
Two days ago, he had a speech in which he said today's jobs numbers were going to be great. On another occasion (I think it was yesterday) he was saying how the government was going to be getting behind and pushing NG usage. Today he visits and electric car plant.
The market hears the rhetoric, views the reality, and tanks.
What is the president of the US doing predicting job figures?
.