Despite the Blitz, it's 'business as usual' as England prepares for Christmas in this propaganda film intended for US audiences. It's a Christmas of holly and barbed wire, guns and tinsel, yet the British, we are told, are determined to make it as cheerful as possible.
1st Battallion 4th Marines, Bravo Company 3rd Platoon. Out of ECP1 in Fallujah, Iraq. We would like to thank everyone who has supported us through the first half of our deployment. This project was a challenge for me but in the end quite worth it. Merry Christmas everyone! -Nick Hesselgrave
1- full resupply of TP
2- megafones
3- crappy humvees
4- portajohns
5- hours of sleep
6- rusty dumbells
7- months deployment
8- IPs(iraqi police) dancing
9- sentries standing
10- hours posting
11- bags of trash
12- freakin' flies!
Westford said the troubles were linked to the recent closure of an Islamic cultural centre in Malmö's heavily-immigrant populated neighbourhood Rosengård.
The owner of the building wanted to use the space for other purposes, and the Islamic centre, which housed a mosque among other things, moved out and handed over the keys.
But a group of young people squatted the office space on November 24th, and police intervened early this week to remove the occupants and empty the offices.
Police guarded the location until Wednesday, and once they left youths tried to occupy the building again.
Riots broke out on Wednesday night, when youths set fires in the area and threw stones and bottles at police. Seventeen youths were detained during those clashes.
"The origin of the riots is the occupation of the building. But that's not really the reason now, now other troublemakers have just joined in, taking advantage of the situation," Westford said.
Hell’s Angels — Lithuanian Style:
U.S. and Afghan soldiers in Zabul Province give high marks to the Lithuanian Special Forces, who like to ride these captured Taliban motorbikes to sneak up on, and chase Taliban fighters. The “LithSof” are on their way to becoming living legends: Both Afghans and Americans report that the Taliban are afraid of the Lithuanians. Stories about them are filled with dangerous escapades and humor.
Americans say that the Lithuanians are sort of a weaponized version of Borat, who think nothing of sauntering around a base in nothing but flip-flops and underwear. “They look like mountain men. They never shave, sometimes don’t bathe, and often roll out the gate wearing nothing but body armor and weapons. Not even a t-shirt,” an American soldier told me. The Lithuanians may be a little bit nuts, but the Americans love to have them around because Lithuanians love to fight, and when you need backup, you can count on them. That contrasts starkly with many of the NATO “partners.” Maybe when your country spends almost a half-century with the Soviet boot on its neck, its first generation of free soldiers know what freedom is worth — and that you sometimes have to fight for it.
A team of Franciscan archaeologists digging in the biblical town of Magdala in what is now Israel say they have unearthed vials of perfume similar to those that may have been used by the woman said to have washed Jesus' feet.So what does this really mean? Honestly, not too much. We will never know what was actually used to anoint Christ's feet. But we will have more understanding of what was in use during His time. It will be interesting to see what properties these cosmetics had, scientists - or the blue haired perfume lady at the mall - will be able to make educated guesses as to the actual uses of these products.
The perfumed ointments were found intact at the bottom of a mud-filled swimming pool, alongside hair and make-up objects, the director of the dig conducted by the group Studium Biblicum Franciscanum told the Terrasanta.net religious website.
"If chemical analyses confirm it, these could be perfumes and creams similar to those that Mary Magdalene or the sinner cited in the Gospel used to anoint Christ's feet," Father Stefano de Luca, the lead archaeologist, told the website.
Mary Magdalene is cited in the New Testament as a steadfast disciple of Christ from whom seven demons were cast out. She is often considered the sinner who anointed Jesus' feet.
"The discovery of the ointments in Magdala at any rate is of great importance. Even if Mary Magdalene was not the woman who washed Christ's feet, we have in our hands 'cosmetic products' from Christ's time," De Luca said.
First there was the Burger King bubble bather, now this. A girl gets caught posting pics of herself and two friends… bathing in the sink at a KFC. In a word, what the hell were they thinking? And just how big are these sinks?
Ugh…. And is there anything kids won’t facebook or put on myspace?
Captain Smartypants was discovered by Madame Curie in 1913 as she was emptying a test tube. The radioactive slime mold developed in the Paris sewers until it gained consciousness and crossed the Atlantic. Upon landing in America, this new life form sprouted legs and strode across the continent, singing Partridge Family songs all the while. They settled in Seattle where they became quickly known as ‘Those Nine Homosexuals Who Won’t Stop Singing.’
Keith Bradsher, a Times correspondent, is sending The Lede updates from his BlackBerry as he watches a commando operation taking place at the Nariman House, home to the Orthodox Jewish group Chabad Lubavitch, and around Mumbai.
Date: Fri, 28 Nov 2008 10:45
A flurry of shots has just sounded from inside Nariman House, to which I have just returned. A team of Israelis who specialize in searching and securing sites after terrorist attacks just arrived here from Israel and said that they had been told that they might be allowed to go into the building soon. There has still been no official word on the fate of the rabbi and his wife who were living at Nariman House at the time of the assault.
Date: Fri, 28 Nov 2008 12:00
The Indians are sending a fresh set of commandos in black uniforms and heavy body armor into the buildings around Nariman House and withdrawing commandos in blue or black uniforms who have been in action all day.
For the first time today, a van with six medics in surgical gowns and masks has just driven up close to Nariman House in a possible sign of casualties.
Three heavy blasts have just been heard in as many minutes.
November 24, 2008 - San Francisco, CA - PipeLineNews.org - A lawsuit has been filed in the U.S. District Court DC, against the Council on American Islamic Relations [CAIR] alleging, "violations of the federal Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations Act ("RICO")1; the District of Columbia Consumer Protection Procedures Act ("DCCPPA"); the Virginia Consumer Protection Act ("VCPA"); breach of fiduciary duty; conversion; unjust enrichment; and intentional infliction of emotional distress on behalf of plaintiffs who sought legal representation from defendant."
"President-elect Obama strongly condemns today's terrorist attacks in Mumbai, and his thoughts and prayers are with the victims, their families, and the people of India. These coordinated attacks on innocent civilians demonstrate the grave and urgent threat of terrorism. The United States must continue to strengthen our partnerships with India and nations around the world to root out and destroy terrorist networks. We stand with the people of India, whose democracy will prove far more resilient than the hateful ideology that led to these attacks," said Brooke Anderson, Chief National Security Spokesperson.
Future dead guyWhen Prof. Kalisch took up his theology chair four years ago, he was seen as proof that modern Western scholarship and Islamic ways can mingle -- and counter the influence of radical preachers in Germany. He was put in charge of a new program at Münster, one of Germany's oldest and most respected universities, to train teachers in state schools to teach Muslim pupils about their faith.
Muslim leaders cheered and joined an advisory board at his Center for Religious Studies. Politicians hailed the appointment as a sign of Germany's readiness to absorb some three million Muslims into mainstream society. But, says Andreas Pinkwart, a minister responsible for higher education in this north German region, "the results are disappointing."
"We had no idea he would have ideas like this," says Thomas Bauer, a fellow academic at Münster University who sat on a committee that appointed Prof. Kalisch. "I'm a more orthodox Muslim than he is, and I'm not a Muslim."
German academics split. Michael Marx, a Quran scholar at the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences, warned that Prof. Kalisch's views would discredit German scholarship and make it difficult for German scholars to work in Muslim lands. But Ursula Spuler-Stegemann, an Islamic studies scholar at the University of Marburg, set up a Web site called solidaritymuhammadkalisch.com and started an online petition of support.
Alarmed that a pioneering effort at Muslim outreach was only stoking antagonism, Münster University decided to douse the flames. Prof. Kalisch was told he could keep his professorship but must stop teaching Islam to future school teachers.
Now I'm seriously jonesing for a G1...
Take a look at: AppVee Android Apps - Daily Android app video reviews! - Parallel Kingdom Review
Maybe I should order a G1 now... then port my number later...
He goes on to decry the way news becomes polarized -- he refers to it as the Crossfire Syndrome -- noting that it uses soundbites and extreme positions to ignore the real issues, and basically does the viewer or reader a disservice. And his premise is that the consumer of media recognizes this and would jump to alternatives. Ten years after he wrote this piece, Jack Shafer checked in with him to get his reaction to the fact that his prediction of the death of such media organizations appeared wrong. Crichton replied that: "I doubt I'm wrong, it's just too early."
And, indeed, earlier this year, Shafer checked back in with Crichton, admitting that many of his predictions did seem to now be on target. One of the statements Crichton made towards the end of that interview should be the mantra for the modern newsroom if it wants to be successful: "I want a news service that tells me what no one knows, but is true nonetheless. That's what I would value." He's not the only one.
KLANDORF, Germany – Yaron Svoray scrapes caked layers of dirt from a shard of glass, revealing a sunflower at the heart of a Star of David.
He carefully turns it, speculating it may have been a bowl used for Passover ceremonies in pre-World War II German Jewish homes.
The fragment is one of a handful of artifacts Svoray has pulled from mounds of debris in this former dump about an hour north of Berlin that locals say was used by the Nazis to deposit rejected loot from the 1938 pogrom known as Kristallnacht, or "The Night of Broken Glass."
It had never been in doubt that the Nazi propaganda machine fuelled the Night of Broken Glass but now a German scholar has uncovered strong evidence that on the night of Nov 9 the Fuhrer led Nazis to destroy an important synagogue, deliberately throwing a match into a tinderbox.
On November 7, 1938, Jewish teenager Herschel Grynszpan walked into Germany's embassy in Paris and shot dead diplomat Ernst vom Rath, sparking the Night of Broken Glass, the most ferocious single pogrom of the Nazi era.
....
Angela Hermann, an historian at Munich's Institute for Contemporary History, has decoded a mysterious passage in the diary of Hitler's propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels that had stumped scholars ever since this section of Goebbels' diaries was retrieved from Moscow in 1992.
"We have real evidence now that Hitler pulled the strings, that he personally directed the Kristallnacht," Dr Herman said, using the German name for the notorious night.
....
Goebbels then wrote: "Hitler's Stosstrupp goes out immediately to clean up Munich ... and a synagogue is smashed."
This had historians puzzled, as there was no force known as ''Hitler's Stosstrupp'' in 1938. By digging through Munich archives, Dr Hermann found letters and documents to show that the term referred to the veterans of Hitler's failed attempt to seize power in 1923, known as the Beer Hall Putsch.
These old street fighters remained loyal to Hitler, taking orders from no one else. Dr Hermann found invitations and seating plans for the November 9 Town Hall rally that showed 39 of these old comrades sat at adjacent tables to Hitler. They included Hitler's chief adjutant Julius Schaub and chauffeur Emil Maurice. These were the same 39 men who later hit the streets and destroyed the Ohel Jacob synagogue that night, fanning the flames of an incendiary situation – on direct orders, Dr Hermann concludes, of Hitler himself.
Obama will call on citizens of all ages to serve America, by developing a plan to require 50 hours of community service in middle school and high school and 100 hours of community service in college every year.
Obama will call on citizens of all ages to serve America, by setting a goal that all middle school and high school students do 50 hours of community service a year and by developing a plan so that all college students who conduct 100 hours of community service receive a universal and fully refundable tax credit ensuring that the first $4,000 of their college education is completely free.
If someone would have told me on September 11, 2001, that our next president would be named Barack Hussein Obama, I would have assumed we had lost a war or something.
"The sun will rise, the sun will set, and I'll have lunch."
-Former BoSox GM Lou Gorman, on what to do if things don't work out the way you planned.
You have to pinch yourself. A Marxist radical, who all his life has been mentored by, sat at the feet of, worshipped with, befriended, endorsed the philosophy of, funded and been in turn funded, politically promoted and supported by a nexus comprising black power, anti-white racists, Jew-haters, revolutionary Marxists, unrepentant former terrorists and Chicago mobsters, is on the verge of becoming President of the United States. And apparently it's considered impolite to say so.
Melanie Phillips Spectator, UK
Shall there be a Constitutional Convention to amend or revise the Constitution of the state?
But worst of all, for the last couple weeks,I've begun -- for the first time in my adult life -- to be embarrassed to admit what I do for a living. A few days ago, when asked by a new acquaintance what I did for a living, I replied that I was "a writer," because I couldn't bring myself to admit to a stranger that I'm a journalist.
Michael S. Malone is one of the nation's best-known technology writers. He has covered Silicon Valley and high-tech for more than 25 years, beginning with the San Jose Mercury News as the nation's first daily high-tech reporter. His articles and editorials have appeared in such publications as The Wall Street Journal, the Economist and Fortune, and for two years he was a columnist for The New York Times. He was editor of Forbes ASAP, the world's largest-circulation business-tech magazine, at the height of the dot-com boom. Malone is the author or co-author of a dozen books, notably the best-selling "Virtual Corporation." Malone has also hosted three public television interview series, and most recently co-produced the celebrated PBS miniseries on social entrepreneurs, "The New Heroes." He has been the ABCNews.com "Silicon Insider" columnist since 2000.
No, what I object to (and I think most other Americans do as well) is the lack of equivalent hardball coverage of the other side -- or worse, actively serving as attack dogs for the presidential ticket of Sens. Barack Obama, D-Ill., and Joe Biden, D-Del.
If the current polls are correct, we are about to elect as president of the United States a man who is essentially a cipher, who has left almost no paper trail, seems to have few friends (that at least will talk) and has entire years missing out of his biography.
That isn't Sen. Obama's fault: His job is to put his best face forward. No, it is the traditional media's fault, for it alone (unlike the alternative media) has had the resources to cover this story properly, and has systematically refused to do so.
Why, for example to quote the lawyer for Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., haven't we seen an interview with Sen. Obama's grad school drug dealer -- when we know all about Mrs. McCain's addiction? Are Bill Ayers and Tony Rezko that hard to interview? All those phony voter registrations that hard to scrutinize? And why are Sen. Biden's endless gaffes almost always covered up, or rationalized, by the traditional media?
I could give two shits about whether the AL wins the series - I have no loyalty to any team other than the Sox, much less will I ever feel compelled to root for a team simply because they were arbitrarily placed in the same league and division as my team. Tampa can suck it.
...and for the first time in my life I saw barely contained Righteous Fury. It wouldn't be too long before I really understood the combination of anger (at the attacker and "higher ups") and the twinge of 'survivor guilt' (an unreasonable emotion if you've done your duty, but if you do your duty you're more likely to feel it, in my opinion).
We continue to honor their memory, even as many have forgotten, and would treat with their murderers "without pre-condition".
