Tuesday - December 06, 2011
US/Brit Extradition Treaty … at loggerheads over fairness … your comments welcome
All I know is what I read in the papers and what LyndonB tells me on this subject. The Brit/American extradition treaty. Which some say is one way and only favors the USA. If that’s true they’re correct in the criticism. I really don’t know and have no time to do honest and serious research on the subject. But it has been causing a stir here, and this is some background.
A computer geek with a new age disease called Asperger’s Syndrome which I renamed Asparagus Syndrome, broke into American security computers and wrecked havoc for a time.
His name is Gary McKinnon, lives a quiet life with mommy and is in his 40’s, I have read. He is supposed to be a whiz with a computer.
Well, what Gary did was break into US puters which exposed our security as pitiful.
According to reports, we had no passwords and no firewalls.
He was eventually tracked down, arrested and has been facing extradition ever since.
Further to the story, his defenders say he wasn’t tying to do harm but was trying to research and track down the “truth” about flying saucers and little green men etc.
Poor deluded Gary.
Now I can not pretend to know a darn thing about the treaty that the Brits have with the USA on extradition. From what I have been hearing due to this case though, is that it is very one sided and not only favors the USA, but does so at the expense of the UK. And they are very unhappy. If it’s true, one can’t blame them.
So here we have this poor innocent (by way of his particular syndrome) young man facing possible jail in America if he is indeed turned over to the US.
Yeah well, little green men and flying saucers aside, that was not the subject of messages he left on American computers. Nope.
Perhaps one of the side effects of asparagus syndrome, is the ability to be very articulate which he was, it was originally reported. He wrote anti-war tracts for the war mongering Americans to read. Italics are mine. He knew damn well what he was doing from the get go. He was well written and one might even say professional in his approach.
So for well over a year now, maybe two, the fight has been going on to save Gary from American clutches. And oh btw, his mommy said that Gary would kill himself if he had to go to jail in the USA. So now the campaign is not only to stop any extradition, but save his life as well. And the Daily Mail has been campaigning on his behalf from the beginning, with headlines such as; GARY’S SUFFERED ENOUGH. DON’T LET US DOWN. Well anyway, that was written by his mommy in a column yesterday in the DM. Monday’s DM headline covered almost half a page with the words;
* DO YOUR DUTY FOR GARY AND BRITAIN.
* MPs VOTE ON UNFAIR EXTRADITION LAWS.
* AN AFFRONT TO BRITISH JUSTICE
* NEW HOPE FOR GARY AS MPs BACK RETHINK ON EXTRADITION
The hope is that Gary McKinnon if tried and found guilty, which he must be since he said he hacked in looking for the twilight zone, would be allowed to served his time in a Brit jail. Apparently he wouldn’t try to kill himself there. Only in America.
Which now brings us to the American response from the US Ambassador himself.
US - UK extradition treaty is fair and balancedBy Louis Susman
I want to state clearly the US position – and correct some of the myths, distortions, and inaccuracies that have developed. We believe that the existing US-UK Extradition Treaty works, is fair and balanced, promotes justice in both countries, and does not need to be changed.
We are not alone in this opinion. It is a view shared by a distinguished panel of UK legal experts appointed by the Home Secretary to review the fairness of the treaty and to ensure protection of Britain’s interests. That panel was led by the esteemed judge Sir Scott Baker and included two highly respected lawyers with significant experience in extradition proceedings – one from representing the accused; the other from representing governments.
Over more than a year, they solicited views from all interested parties – on both sides of the argument. Anyone holding a grievance was given the fullest opportunity to express their concerns. The panel received more than 200 written responses. Hearings and meetings were held with affected organisations and individuals, including officials and lawyers from the UK and the US. The extradition procedures of both countries were studied, and extraditions already concluded under the treaty examined.
Sir Scott Baker’s Commission conducted an exhaustive, meticulous and considered review. And it reached the only conclusion that could be supported by the facts: that the US-UK treaty in its current form is fair and balanced.
However, we recognise that the panel’s findings are not accepted by everyone. There have, of course, been vocal criticisms of Britain’s extradition arrangements aired for many years. We heard them again during last week’s Parliamentary debate and its subsequent press coverage.
Where there are concerns, they should not be confused with issues surrounding the European Arrest Warrant – a completely different agreement to our treaty. It should be clear that one has nothing to do with the other. As regards the US-UK Extradition Treaty, there appear to be two main criticisms. Neither is justified.
First, critics say that it is easier to extradite someone from the UK than from the US due to a different burden of proof. There may be some confusion because the standards of evidence for extradition under the treaty are different in terminology. But in practice, the UK’s “reasonable suspicion” test is the same as the US’s “probable cause”. They are the standards that police officers in our respective countries must meet to justify an arrest.British citizens are also protected by the “probable cause” test since the US cannot make an extradition request to the UK until probable cause has been successfully established in a US court. So the standard of evidence that each country has to meet to extradite someone is the same. Plain and simple. In fact, it is worth noting that the United States has never denied an extradition request from the UK under the present treaty.
The second mistaken claim is that the treaty somehow denies British citizens British justice. In all extradition cases, the UK authorities always begin by considering whether an individual can and should be tried in the UK instead of being extradited. Once the UK authorities decide that the case should be tried in the US, all extradition hearings are then held in UK courts – as are subsequent appeals. It is only when these avenues have been exhausted – when UK prosecutors, the courts, and the Home Secretary have all affirmed that the request is proper – that an extradition goes ahead. Moreover, the Baker Commission’s report stated that UK extradition judges “could not think of any case already decided under the 2003 act in which it would have been in the interests of justice for it to have been tried in the United Kingdom rather than in the requesting territory”. These are not the only arguments used by critics of the treaty.
In fact, neither country can ask for an extradition if the crime allegedly committed is not a serious crime in both countries. Nor does the US get special treatment – the UK’s domestic extradition law is the same for Australia, Canada, Israel, Russia, and Turkey. And nor do we seek the death penalty for any individual extradited from the UK.
In an age of international crime syndicates, global terror networks and cyber attacks, my government strongly supports the US-UK Extradition Treaty as an essential tool for bringing criminals to justice. It is a treaty that has been tested robustly by the British and the US justice systems, and now has been validated by the Baker Commission’s review.
For these reasons we remain confident that the treaty is fair and balanced. Because the treaty is valid, we hope that it will receive the endorsement from Members of Parliament that it deserves.
• Louis Susman is United States ambassador to the United Kingdom
Posted by peiper
on 12/06/2011 at 10:26 AM
Filed Under: • International • Politics • UK • USA •
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Permalink • Monday - December 05, 2011
New Panamax Green Solution
Just because I’m a Conservative doesn’t mean I’m not in favor of green technology. The ones that work, I’m all for. Here’s one that might be able to cut the mustard.
You may have heard that the Panama Canal is being enlarged. It’s a multi-year project that is well under way. A new set of locks, much larger than the original pair, is being built on both sides. The project seems to be running on time. These new locks will allow much bigger ships to transit Panama. One ship builder is using those new size constraints to design a far more efficient VLCC oil tanker, and while they’re at it they’re adding on everything they can find to add to that efficiency.
The smallest dimensions of the [current] locks are 110 ft (33.53 m) wide, 1,050 ft (320.04 m) long, and 85 ft (25.91 m) deep. Because of clearance issues, the usable sizes are somewhat smaller (for example, the maximum usable length of each lock chamber is about 1,000 ft (304.8 m). The maximum size of the ships that can transit the canal is known as the Panamax.
...
The new lock chambers will be 1,400 ft (426.72 m) long, by 180 ft (54.86 m) wide, and 60 ft (18.29 m) deep. They will use rolling gates instead of miter gates, which are used by the existing locks. Rolling gates are used in almost all existing locks with dimensions similar to those being proposed, and are a well-proven technology.
In late August [2009], traffic jams at the Atlantic and Pacific entrances to the Panama Canal impeded a healthy chunk of the world’s maritime commerce. Each day, on average, more than 40 massive ships, many of them three times as long as a football field and piled high with cargo, rode at anchor in impromptu fleets that stretched across the horizon. On the Atlantic side, most of the ships carried grain from the American heartland, bound for markets in Asia; the vessels on the Pacific side from the Far East were jammed with cars and electronics destined for the U.S. East Coast. Some ships with daily operational costs of $40,000 waited as long as a week for passage.
Ninety-three years after it first opened for business, the Panama Canal is finally maxed out. Designed before the Titanic was even on drawing boards and while the Wright brothers were still learning to fly, the canal today handles more traffic than its builders could have ever imagined. About 14,000 vessels carrying 5 percent of the world’s ocean cargo—280 million tons—pass through the waterway each year. Despite running the canal around the clock—at close to 90 percent of its theoretical maximum capacity—canal officials are struggling to keep up.
A VLCC tanker is an oil tanker built to carry about 2 million barrels of oil. That turns out to be the largest practical size for these giant ships; a few ULCC ships have been built but they are too large for most waterways, including the English Channel. Crude oil is a liquid, and 2 million barrels worth is a fixed volume. The new locks on the Canal will allow ships to be built that carry that same volume, but in a longer, shallower, relatively slimmer hull design, and that immediately translates into increased efficiency, even with the same basic shaped hull. Use a modern high-tech super hull design, like the ones used on racing yachts, and the efficiency increases even more. Now use the latest generation of pod propulsion motors and you’ve got a huge ship that’s fast and nimble with significantly reduced operating costs. Want to go further? Cover the massive ship in solar panels, and stick on a couple of dozen super efficient dynawing sailmasts, and it not only produces a large part of the electricity needed to run those motors, it also uses the wind to help move the ship along. Lastly, install high efficiency engines that run on LNG to help run the generators, and put a set of scrubbers in the smokestacks. Bottom line: a faster tanker that sails across the world for a whole lot less time and cost, and produces only a fraction of the pollution that the current ones do. And that’s exactly what Sauter Carbon Offset Design came up with. Nice going. Now build one and prove your concept.
Richard Sauter of Sauter Carbon Offset Design released his design for the “solar hybrid supertanker” today. If the ship is ever built, you can bet that some big oil company will be using it to tout its “green” credentials in short order.
Sauter’s certified carbon offset projects are aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions from super yachts and ships. His design team, Sauter Carbon Offset Design creates ships reducing greenhouse gas emissions down 50-100 percent by using all the technology available.
SCOD Presents Deliverance, a DynaWing Solar Hybrid Supertanker that qualifies as the Largest and by far the Greenest Post Panamax Vessel to be built and as such is the most Economical form of Crude Oil Transport to and from any part of the Globe.
To reduce fuel consumption and GHG emissions by up to 75% this superior fluid dynamic Emax Supertanker obtains half of her power from LNG and the other half from the latest advances in Solar and Wind Power Technology.
The Emax Deliverance is a 2 million barrel 330,000dwt Supertanker designed specifically for the newly enlarged locks of the Panama Canal which will accommodate vessels that have a maximum length of 426m, a beam of 54m and a draft of 18 meters.
Being longer, narrower and having less draft than previous 2 million barrel VLCC’s, the hull of the Deliverance produces less drag which in conjunction with twin CRP Hybrid Propulsion Pods reduces fuel consumption and GHG emissions by 35%. An additional 20 to 30% reduction is achieved her 5,000 sq. meter
DynaWing Boom Furling sails and another 15 to 20% reduction by her Solbian Solar Power generating array. The realization of up to a 75% reduction is made possible by Mitsubishi’s Bubble Hull and Wartsila’s Coded Hybrid power system.Generally speaking the total power requirement for a conventional 330,000dwt Supertanker is 30MWs.By comparison the total power requirement for the advanced 330,000dwt Emax Solar Hybrid Supertanker is 20MWs; 10MWs from LNG, 10MWs from the Sun and Wind.
Nice. Even when the sails are furled, the material that they’re made from will work as Fresnel lenses to concentrate light on the solar panels, making them that much more efficient. And lest you think this is all some kind of daydream, it isn’t. It’s pretty much built using off the shelf parts. The ‘bubble hull’ already exists. So do the engines, the solar panels, and the propulsion pods. Even the high tech Dynawing thing is proven tech - it’s the kind of sail used on the latest America’s Cup racing yachts.
The Dynawing design gives the same amount of thrust as a more conventional sail on a mast 25% taller. Shorter means sturdier, and sturdier means cheaper in the long run. But with 20 of these on the Deliverance, totaling half a million square meters of sail area, what it really means is quite a lot of thrust that took no fuel whatsoever to create. Sailboats don’t have exhaust fumes.
Roll it all up and you’ve got a supertanker that can save as much fuel cost in 4 years of operation as it took to build the ship in the first place. Which means it pays for itself, even if the thing cost 15% more than regular ships to build. And with a 25 year lifespan, that means 3 million tons less CO2 in the atmosphere. Nice. Why pollute if you don’t need to?
Posted by Drew458
on 12/05/2011 at 11:31 AM
Filed Under: • High Tech • Oil, Alternative Energy, and Gas Prices • planes, trains, tanks, ships, machines, automobiles •
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Permalink • Soylent Power
How’s this for the ultimate give-back to society? Extreme recycling? Or just more “journalism” designed to keep people upset?
Burning deceased humans will produce electricity
Turbines at crematorium will convert heat into as much as 150 kilowatt-hours per corpseIn Durham, England, corpses will soon be used to generate electricity.
A crematorium is installing turbines in its burners that will convert waste heat from the combustion of each corpse into as much as 150 kilowatt-hours of juice — enough to power 1,500 televisions for an hour. [which would give REAL meaning to the old “This broadcast sponsored in part by viewers like you”!] The facility plans to sell the electricity to local power companies.
Some might find this concept creepy. Others might be pleased to learn that the process “makes cremation much greener by utilizing its by-products,” in the words of cremation engineer Steve Looker, owner and chief executive officer of the Florida-based company B&L Cremation Systems, which is unaffiliated with the Durham enterprise.
In Europe, tightening regulations on crematorium emissions, coupled with the high price of energy, will lead more and more facilities to go the way of Durham in the future, Looker said. Will crematories in the United States follow suit?
According to Looker, whose company is currently testing different methods of utilizing cremation waste heat, the expensive turbine systems being installed in Durham are not yet economically viable for crematories here. “In the U.S., most crematories don’t have enough throughput,” he told Life’s Little Mysteries. “Cremation in some parts of Europe is over 90 percent, but it is not over 50 percent yet here.” That is, less than half of Americans opt for cremation. Most are buried.
Consequently, while burners in Europe typically run 24 hours day, ones in America operate only eight hours each day, Looker said. “A typical turbine system would cost somewhere between $250,000 to $500,000. If it’s running 24 hours a day, that’s a five-year payback. If it’s running eight hours a day, that’s a 15- or 20-year payback, which isn’t feasible,” he said.
However, Looker is hopeful that the situation could change in the near future. “Over the next 10 years, with the baby boomers coming through, cremation is going to reach 75 to 80 percent. Then, this might be feasible.”
Furthermore, a turbine designed by a company called Thermal Dynamic Engineering, which produces just 50 kilowatt-hours of energy but is much less expensive to install than the Durham system, will be available in the near future, Looker said.
Thus, it may indeed come to pass that deceased baby boomers will someday help power your household appliances.
Boy howdy, this ought to end the prejudice against the overweight. Think how much extra energy they’ll contribute! OTOH, it might provide the wrong kind of incentive to the more twisted types. Now put those twisted types in charge of the government ... or at least the judicial or health-care corners of it. Can you see a problem arising, mein fuhrer? Nein, es ist nicht ein problem auf allen! In some ways, this is nothing new to Europeans at all.
Huh, seems to me I read a sci-fi story similar to this ages and ages ago ... the aliens took all the fatties and wired them up to suck the energy out of them ... it was the greatest diet ever, until they ran out of chubsters.
Soylent Green is already here. It’s called ”bio-energy”, and a whole lot of unusual ideas can hide under that umbrella. But are they sick, or sensible?
Posted by Drew458
on 12/05/2011 at 08:19 AM
Filed Under: • Oil, Alternative Energy, and Gas Prices •
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Permalink • Sunday - December 04, 2011
That’s (ahem) About The Size Of It
Posted by Drew458
on 12/04/2011 at 07:01 PM
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Permalink • Just Shut Up And Sing Already
Steve Crowder finds more wisdom in Hollywood liberalism ...
Posted by Drew458
on 12/04/2011 at 05:02 PM
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Permalink • Saturday - December 03, 2011
Kellogg’s now includes a ‘halal certified’ logo on the side of its cereal boxes.
In the hard copy edition of the Mail, the logo was shown.
Just shows ya how far a minority and punch above it’s actual weight in these pc times.
And don’t ya just hate that?
Just say No to a bowl of halal Corn Flakes
By Kelvin MacKenzie
Daily MailI have just learned — thanks to a reader’s email — that Kellogg’s now includes a ‘halal certified’ logo on the side of its cereal boxes.
The company claims the move is ‘due to legislation for our multi-cultural society’. Apparently, ‘halal certified’ means the ingredients have been approved by a body called the Halal Food Authority as not containing any animal derivatives or alcohol.
For my part, I’m not sure I approve of the way that animals are killed ‘halal-style’ (with their throats cut and then bled to death, as prescribed by sharia law). If you agree with me, I suggest you need never buy Kellogg’s again.
Alternatively, you could, of course, write to Kellogg’s and ask the firm to produce two different types of cereal boxes — half ‘halal certified’ and half not.
Come to think of, since we are still a predominantly Christian country, perhaps they could produce half their boxes with a cross on them, and half not.
Posted by peiper
on 12/03/2011 at 01:47 PM
Filed Under: • Fine-Dining • Politically Correct B.S. • UK •
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Permalink • Speaking of Germany
When they say “It’s the bomb” I think they’ve got something else in mind ...
For more than 200 years, the myth of the Lorelei rock, named after a mythical mermaid who lured fisherman to their deaths by singing the most beautiful song ever heard and causing them to crash into the rocks, put fear into the hearts of captains of boats plying the Rhine River. Historically low water levels this November are presenting a new threat: World War II bombs.
Sinking water levels have exposed much more of the river bed than normal, and it turns out the bottom of one of Europe’s busiest waterways is still littered with World War II leftovers. Over the weekend, passers-by alerted the authorities to the presence of one incendiary bomb near Cologne, two barrels in Koblenz filled with a chemical used during the war to create smoke screens and one large bomb, also in Koblenz, that is still lying in 40 centimeters (16 inches) of water, waiting to be defused.
Indeed, the dangers of finding additional World War II detritus are so great that officials are now reminding people to immediately report any suspicious objects they might spot.
The munitions are now coming to light due to an unusually dry autumn in Germany, resulting in the lowest November water levels seen along the Rhine in decades. With no rain in sight, it is likely to continue to drop.
This weekend, a large section of the German city of Koblenz will come to a standstill as bomb experts gingerly defuse a massive World War II bomb that recently emerged from the Rhine River due to low water levels. Almost half of the residents will be evacuated, the largest such operation in the city’s history.
Unexploded ordnance from World War II frequently turns up in German communities, and sometimes authorities are forced to evacuate small areas to dispose of the dangerous explosives. But a large bomb that recently surfaced in the Rhine River has sparked security measures of historic proportions in the central German city of Koblenz.
Three meters (10 feet) long and weighing 1.8 tons, the aerial bomb was recently spotted after a particularly dry November lowered water levels along the busy river. Now preparations are underway for a massive evacuation set for Sunday.
Some 45,000 residents—nearly half of the city’s total population of 106,000—will be forced to leave the area. That includes two hospitals, seven retirement homes and the jail. To aid in the operation, the city has organized some 900 people and 350 vehicles to ferry residents to safety.
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Around 45,000 people will be evacuated from a 1.8 kilometer radius around the bomb site in what is Germany’s biggest evacuation since the end of World War II.
The 1.8 tonne bomb - dropped by the Royal Air Force (RAF) - was uncovered after water levels in the Rhine fell significantly as a result of a prolonged dry spell.
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Experts will defuse the bomb on Sunday. It is the biggest bomb-related evacuation in Germany’s post-war history. Nearly half the population of Koblenz is affected.
The bomb was found last week alongside a 275lb bomb dropped there by US forces during the war, after the Rhine’s water level fell due to lack of rain.
Authorities this week built a temporary dam of some 350 sandbags around the bomb which is covered by just 16 inches of water.
The plan is then for bomb disposal teams to pump the water out and get to the bomb proper to begin the delicate job of removing the detonator.
Koblenz was a German operations centre during the Second World War and was hit repeatedly by air raids carried out by RAF and US bombers says the report.
It was also the home of Army Group B which oversaw the conquest of France. Later in the war the city was the hub for defensive operations for German forces following D-Day. Eighty-seven per cent of Koblenz was eventually destroyed in more than two dozen air raids. German newspaper The National reports ‘an estimated 2,000 tonnes of American and British aerial bombs and other munitions are still found every year.’
Posted by Drew458
on 12/03/2011 at 01:35 PM
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Permalink • HIS NAME IS BONE, YEAH REALLY, AND RELIGION “BREACHES HIS RIGHTS”
It’s disingenuous jerks like this that give a bad name to all non believers.
It’s as true in the USA as it is here, where this story takes place.
Why oh why should anyone like this be pandered to?
City councils meetings begin with a prayer. I’d be willing to bet that many of them who bow their heads may not believe any more then this one blowhard. But it’s convention. It’s tradition. And it still is a Christian country. Well, until the muzzies outbirth the unbelievers in islam. And that won’t be long at the rate they breed.
But forget that for the moment please. Hard as it is.
This guy figures his rights are being violated and he’s made to feel an outsider because of a starting prayer at the council meetings. I think he has lost the plot.
Of course we’re outsiders. By our own choice. So what makes him think he has a right to decide that prayers shouldn’t be said. How hard would be to simply not say a prayer and just politely wait till the council is finished? Or, why not wait outside until the prayer is finished if it’s so horribly offensive?
I do not believe people like him or the agencies that support his view and give him support, are really as “offended” as they claim to be. But the civil rights industry, which has become the enforcement arm of the politically correct left, which is now a competing religion itself, must find strife or create strife wherever they can. And if you’re gonna pick a fight with a group, I guess they figure correctly, always pick on a soft target.
Orgs. like the Natl. Secular Society make it appear they speak for all atheists or people who only have some doubts. They claim that prayers said in a hall where there are ppl of other religions, or non believers, are made to feel uncomfortable and excluded.
BS! That’s something brand new in the last dozen years and they’ve managed to glom on to a few idiots who suddenly find for the very first time, that they are also offended.
This is totally serious stuff and it’s being reported that both sides on the issue are getting lawered up. I’ve never been one to warn about the falling sky but this case could have some serious ramifications if this loser manages to win his case.
It could conceivably lead to the abolition of the Coronation Oath, as reported by the Telegraph’s Religious Affairs Editor, Martin Beckford.
I guess I’m really an outsider on two counts then because; never at any time did I ever feel all those terrible things that the Secular Society says I felt. Not even once.
So either they are full of it, lying , or I’ve been deaf, dumb and blind for 74 years.
For me personally, and I stress I speak not for BMEWS or any of the folks who comment here. This has been a Christian country for over a thousand years. There have been divisions and sometimes bloody ones among Christians. Some pretty bad things were done by some pretty bad people over time, using religion as their excuse to bring others to heel. The past doings both good and evil have no relation to what most Western European nations are in fact. They are Christian. Why is that so hard to accept? Why should that and prayers said by the mostly faithful cause unbelievers to feel “excluded” and “uncomfortable?”
Frankly and finally, I don’t think all that many non believers care about this. I think the majority, like people of faith, simply want to get on with their lives and avoid conflict where possible. But sadly, it only takes one, with one single-minded agenda, to make enough noise and bother and create the impression that there are thousands who support their view.
That is one thing the left is very, very accomplished at. I’d say they were masters of the art. Shame that.
March of the PC brigade: Atheists in court battle to ban town hall prayersFormer councillor said he was ‘disadvantaged and embarrassed’
By STEVE DOUGHTYAn atheist campaign to ban the historic practice of saying prayers at council meetings yesterday found its way to the High Court.
Former councillor Clive Bone, backed by an anti-religious campaign group, claims the tradition breaches his human right to freedom of belief.
Mr Bone said he was ‘disadvantaged and embarrassed’ when Christian prayers were said in the council chamber.
Backed by the National Secular Society, Mr Bone wants prayers to be ruled out of the formal agenda of any local authority meetings.
His case reached the High Court yesterday at the culmination of a three-year campaign.
Success could open the way for a drive to force Parliament to abandon saying prayers as part of Commons and Lords business.
The NSS has based its legal challenge on the claim that Mr Bone, as an atheist, should not be subjected to religious ritual, and that to do so breaks his right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion.
However it was revealed yesterday that he is no longer a councillor in Bideford in Devon. Town clerk Heather Blackburn confirmed: ‘Mr Bone did not stand for re-election in May 2011.’
The Society said yesterday: ‘The NSS is taking Bideford Town Council to court after receiving a complaint from one of its councillors, Clive Bone, that he was disadvantaged and embarrassed as a non-believer by the saying of prayers as part of council business.
Posted by peiper
on 12/03/2011 at 12:54 PM
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Permalink • What, In Germany??
New Jersey Yankee, another one of our ex-pat readers living abroad ( I feel for you guys, so for lunch I’ll have a few Nathan’s hot dogs with extra bacon on top and some fries ) comments that Germany is actually a better climate for redheads than is Ireland (and presumably Scotland). So I took a quick digital look, but I wasn’t able to come up with much. It may take me a bit of time to hone my search terms. For now, I can give him this one:
How much more German can you get than that? 
Not exactly Germany, but right next door is this bunch. Damn, I could be lost in there for a week! The view from the other side isn’t at all bad either. All 3 pictures were taken at Roodharigendag 2011 in Breda, which is a bit to the west of Germany in The Netherlands. They have a red hair festival every year ... here are links to the videos ... don’t click them if you think you might be frightened by seeing a veritable army of gingers ...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3TM54qh_eA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXqLiESKUFs&feature=relmfu
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dp7gO-S32M0&feature=related
... and on a related note, a short article that shows one reason why we’ll never understand the English.
Posted by Drew458
on 12/03/2011 at 12:54 PM
Filed Under: • Eye-Candy •
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Permalink • Retail Surge
Not sure how I missed this one, but better late than never.
Gun dealers flooded the FBI with background check requests for prospective buyers last Friday, smashing the single-day, all-time high by 32%, according to bureau records.
Deputy Assistant FBI Director Jerry Pender said the checks, required by federal law, surged to 129,166 during the day, far surpassing the previous high of 97,848 on Black Friday of 2008.
The actual number of firearms sold last Friday is likely higher because multiple firearms can be included in a transaction by a single buyer. And the FBI does not track actual gun sales.
Some gun industry analysts attributed the unusual surge to a convergence of factors, including an increasing number of first-time buyers seeking firearms for protection and women who are being drawn to sport shooting and hunting.
Larry Keane, a spokesman for the National Shooting Sports Foundation, said 25% of the purchases typically involve first-time buyers, many of them women.
“I think there also is a burgeoning awakening of the American public that they do have a constitutional right to own guns,” Keane said.
The FBI has not yet released the NICS numbers for November, but so far 2011 is on track to surpass the record setting numbers of 2009 and 2010. Looks to me like about 2.5 million more guns per year during every year of Fearless Reader’s regime, and a fat surge in late 2008. Way to go. Mr. Smith and Mr. Wesson say thank you.
Posted by Drew458
on 12/03/2011 at 10:47 AM
Filed Under: • Guns and Gun Control •
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Permalink • Friday - December 02, 2011
muslim prayers trump new york parking laws.
Oh for heavens sake why won’t the authorities grow some back bone and rid our world of this virus. This scab on society.
Whatever country they infest, things must follow their faith and things convenient to it. Never mind local customs or traditions.
I wish we could cut out this cancer once and for all time. With no exceptions. Out,out damn spot!
I am not posting the photos but they are well worth seeing if you haven’t seen em yet.
The upmarket Manhattan block that grinds to a halt at prayer time… as Muslim taxi drivers illegally park outside Islamic center
By DANIEL BATESWith a sea of yellow stretching into the distance, it looks like the taxi queue at a busy airport.
But this picture was actually taken outside a Mosque during a prayer service - with 200 Muslim cabbies illegally parked.
Residents of the wealthy Upper West Side of Manhattan are outraged that their streets are being taken over multiple times each day for the 45-minute service.
The taxi drivers are double and triple parking in a huge line that forces traffic into the oncoming lane.
The situation has flared up and on one occasion a cop telling a taxi driver to move on was swarmed by other hacks - and had to call for reinforcements.
When several other police cars arrived the taxi driver was handcuffed and led away.
Muslims have been parking illegally at the Islamic Cultural Centre for four years but the row has blown up because a road that connects to it that has been closed for the whole time has now reopened.
Prayers take place five times a day but the busiest is on Fridays at lunchtime when up to 300 worshippers - and 200 taxi drivers - are in attendance.
Most of the taxi drivers appear unrepentant with one claiming: ‘I have to pray. I have no choice but to break the rules.’
Cabbie Abdoulaye Diallo, a 30-year-old immigrant from Guinea, told DNA info that he had got several $75 fines for parking illegally outside the mosque but he did not care.
He said: ‘For me, my prayer is more important, because that’s what I’m going to take with me the day I die’.
Residents however are increasingly anxious that they cannot cross the road safely.
‘It’s an accident waiting to happen, said James Beale, the resident manager at a Trump tower block that is next to the mosque.
‘It’s a very dangerous situation. It’s like all the rules of the road are thrown aside,’ he told DNA info.
Abdur Rahman, an assistant imam at the mosque, said it had told worshippers to respect the parking rules but they had failed to do so.
But he also claimed that the parking rules should be more flexible to accommodate worshippers’ needs.
A few comments on the subject by DM readers.
It happens here as well. I recently visited my childhood neighbourhood one Friday. I couldn’t drive my car down the street because of illegal parking near one of the many mosques in Green Street Upton Park. And not a plod to be seen anywhere. Perhaps they’ll take action if an MP gets killed in a fire and the rescue services are unable to reach them.
- Brian Cohen, JerusalemAmerica should step on this - NOW!. These people think nothing of complaining when we do something they don’t like.
- A. Green, Bournemouth, England.,I bet they would complain if taxi company would stop employing muslims for the same reason. Then it would be an issue of human rights,right?
- Lola, Belgium,
wtf? Abdu what? Abdoulaye? Jeesh. How about making it more American sounding so we can say it.
How about ...
Abscess. Vermin in human cloths and walking upright. How long they been walking that way? Need to find the rocks they live under. Oh whoops. That looks like a hate thought in progress.
Posted by peiper
on 12/02/2011 at 12:50 PM
Filed Under: • muslims • USA •
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Permalink • Face Time
Posted by Drew458
on 12/02/2011 at 12:07 PM
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Permalink • Sunlight On The Lino
If this bouncy little tune can’t get you boppin’ and shakin’ your ponytail, then you’re probably dead. Or bald. Very Cool for Cats.
And lo and behold, Squeeze is still in business, still plucking out the tunes 33 years later. Who knew?
Posted by Drew458
on 12/02/2011 at 10:50 AM
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Permalink • 3rd Ring Added To DC Circus
DC Elites Allowed To Do Insider Trades, Make Millions
Guess Who Will Run The Show Trial Investigations?
Yeah yeah, the article is mostly a push for the author’s book. But the truth behind it remains: Senators, Congressweasels, and top elected and appointed slimeballs in DC have their own special law that allows them to do insider trading, and these people are about as “insider” as it gets. Result is that they make millions doing the same exact thing that would land your backside in the slammer. And now that the word is out and the hue and cry is rising, they’re going to have an investigatory panel. Run by several people who are the top insider traders in the town.
Show trial much? This is more bogus than the “investigation” that the climate scientists did that cleared Hansen and those ass clowns in the UK of all wrongdoing. It’s a total crock, and you know what the outcome will be before they’ve even wasted the first million dollars of taxpayer money on it.
As a result of the stock transactions revealed in my new book “Throw Them All Out” and featured on “60 Minutes,” both the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee and the House Financial Services Committee have been pushed to hold hearings on the subject of congressional insider trading.
Some of the individuals I have cited in the book as having engaged in stock deals serve on the very committees that will be conducting the hearings. That’s a little like asking a defendant to also be a juror at their own trial — an absurdity that could only happen in Washington.
There’s no shortage of those who have tried to game the system on Wall Street.
Still, these hearings will give citizens and journalists a rare opportunity to see just how serious members of Congress truly are about cleaning up the cronyism and corruption rampant in Washington. It’s a pivotal moment that will hold electoral consequences.
Early indications are that both Congressional committees have stacked the decks with witnesses who will diminish the need to make members of Congress follow the same insider trading laws that citizens are bound by.
Observers therefore should pay close attention to the witnesses called.
In “Throw Them All Out,” I pointed out that during the 2008 TARP debate, eight members of the House Financial Services Committee were actively and aggressively trading financial and banks stocks before the bailout vote.
As the Wall Street Journal has also reported, senior staff members who work for members of this committee have also made very lucrative stock trades on banks, showing some remarkable timing. Will the hearings investigate these trades? And if not, why not?
Given Congress’s all-time low approval ratings, many citizens may not be terribly sanguine about the prospects for either of these hearings to produce serious results. However, members of Congress have a unique opportunity to respond directly to the will of the people by making it clear that the insider trading laws that apply to us also extend to members of Congress.
The eyes of the nation will be watching. And the voters stand ready to render their final verdict come next November.
I think we are getting to the point where serving in the government will have to be akin to going to jail. Maybe we should just save time and have them all serve FROM jail to begin with. Elected officials and the top 3 layers beneath them, including all appointees, will have all their assets put in a lockbox for their time at the job. They’ll be paid minimum wage, and housed in dormitories. No exceptions. Provide them with 10 changes of clothing to wear and give them a car and driver. All meals are to be taken in the workhouse cafeteria. Severe term limits, and a special law that makes it a major felony to work as a lobbyist or for a lobbyist or for a lobbyist’s law or accounting firm for 10 years after their time in government. And another “one shot” law that says that once they’ve played in the Bigs, they can’t work for any other government in any job at all, ever again. And while on the job, they don’t get benes any better than the average American. Sure, on the way out they get the rest of the salary, and, assuming they haven’t been convicted of a felony during their tenure, the government pads their assets by 15% per every 3 years served. And then they have to pay lump sum distribution taxes on both of those.
Posted by Drew458
on 12/02/2011 at 10:10 AM
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