BMEWS
 
Sarah Palin is the reason compasses point North.

calendar   Friday - February 24, 2012

Two From The K, and a PS

Yeah, Rich K is still around. Every blog needs a lurker or two, right? These links are from him. Thanks Rich!



Thick as a brick, and just as dead: fully drain the battery in your electric Tesla and it’s game over. Until you spring $40,000 for a new set of batteries!



And the Number 2 country in the world for having the most firearms in private hands ... may I have the envelope please ... and the winner is ... INDIA!!! Not that getting a gun legally there is all that easy, nor is the number of legal civilian guns anywhere close to the number in the USA, although illegal guns in India outnumber the legal ones nearly six to one. 40 million guns in total. Few can afford to buy one, new or used. But hey, in India, if you want a gun you MAKE one. Awesomeness. And the money quote is just priceless:

“All that Gandhi stuff is for tourists ... They should go off to Varanasi, see the holy cows.”

Holy cow!

Don’t worry, my good Desis. There is one way to get your license fast-tracked: have a vasectomy.

And you thought paying an arm and a leg for a decent rifle was bad!



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Ok, this one is not from the K-man, but from reader PS. Sweet.

If there’s someone strange
In your neighborhood
Who Ya Gonna Call?
Mosquebusters!



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Don’t you get a DFC for being a double ace?


“Progress So Far… 10,” reads the banner. To date, mosques in Blackpool, Bolton, Ealing, Huddersfield, Kirkless, Luton, and York have been fought off by the Mosquebusters. A mosque in Uxbridge, stopped initially by a Mosquebusters community petition, has now landed back in court under appeal from the local Muslim community. It threatens the Mosquebusters’ otherwise flawless record.

The Mosquebusters, or the Law and Freedom Foundation as they’re officially known, are part of a new wave of anti-Islamic campaigners in England with links to more established anti-immigrant groups such as England Is Ours and Stop Islamisation of Europe. Like many of these groups, the Mosquebusters fear that traditional British culture, laws, and values will disappear with the changing face of Britain and worry that extremist interpretations of sections of the Koran urge Muslims to kill non-believers and take slaves.

Until mid-February, the Mosquebusters advertised for volunteers, under a campaign called “No More Mosques,” on the website of the ultra-nationalist English Defence League (EDL), a group that organizes anti-Islamic street marches that often decend into brawls, riots, and arrests. The EDL and other anti-Islamic groups have no problem convincing their members to parade in public yelling insults like “Muslim bombers off our streets!” and “Allah is a pedophile!,” but the Mosquebusters have a quieter, perhaps more insidious approach: In offices and city halls, they are crafting legal cases against mosque construction applications across the country. It’s a war against Islam, but one that often resembles a bureaucratic turf battle more than a clash of civilizations.

Mosquebusters no longer advertises for volunteers through the English Defence League; a disclaimer makes clear that the two groups have no official association.

Still, Boby isn’t backing down from his crusade against Britain’s creeping Islamicization. “Authorities need to know that the wind is shifting and that when it has blown away the politically correct fog, they will be left in full view,”

Outstanding.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 02/24/2012 at 10:32 PM   
Filed Under: • High TechHumorNews-Briefs •  
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calendar   Thursday - February 02, 2012

Rlly? Srsly?

New report released by GOP lawmakers suggests top Justice officials had extensive knowledge of Operation Fast and Furious

Top Department of Justice officials had extensive knowledge of and involvement in Operation Fast and Furious, claims a new report released Thursday, hours before Attorney General Eric Holder’s scheduled testimony to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

The report released by Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, top lawmakers investigating the botched gunrunning operation, claims Justice Department officials in Washington and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were involved in the coordination in the early stages of the operation.

Justice headquarters “had much greater knowledge of, and involvement in, Fast and Furious than it has previously acknowledged,” the memo reads.

The memo, which contradicts claims by the Justice Department, is based upon interviews, documents and emails involving key players of the operation run by the ATF. The operation allowed some 2,000 weapons cross the border into Mexico and into the hands of cartel members.

Gak, why is this even news?

Is it finally, finally becoming obvious to even the willfully blind that F & F had to be run from the very top, with the involvement of all the major players and all the LEO departments? We figured that one out 7 months ago, and then a short essay by a DC insider on how the system works (meetings, sign-offs, emails, CYA when things are ‘above your pay grade’, etc ) drove the point home. No kidding. It could not have been any other way. DHS, BATFE, FBI, DOJ, and the whole alphabet of agencies probably even including the CIA are in this up to their eyeballs and have been since the beginning. State Department too in all likelihood, right up to the very top (HRH HRC) and that strongly implies White House involvement. “We’ve got something in the works, under the radar” quoth Fearless Reader back in the day.

The media is only starting to bay about Eric Holder. They haven’t even begun to think about Janet Napolitano. It might take them a century to have the epiphany that at least a handful of Senators and Congressweasels are also involved, along with quite a number of top state officials. Fast and Furious was not an accident and it did not operate in a vacuum.

We The People aren’t stupid, and we figured out the obvious months ago: that a large chunk of our federal government and some of our state governments were knowingly involved in a wide ranging action that was this close to being an act of war against a neighboring sovereign nation, all done to further their Alinksi plans to fracture society and to serve as the ultimate example for shredding the keystone piece of the Constitution that protects the rest of it.

It failed. The word leaked out. And now DC is furiously blowing smoke and twisting mirrors as fast as they can. Needless to say, the media is fairly complicit, since this has never been more than a bit of a small scale back burner sidebar story for just a few of the networks. If this shit ever really hits the fan, Holder will be left holding the bag ... and nobody will ever connect the dots to all the other players involved.

Fast and Furious is 1000 times dirtier than Watergate. This should have toppled the whole government. It is the prime example of the hubris in DC and their above-the-law elitist mentality. And for the most part, the mindless sheeple ignore it or are completely unaware of it, because the media doesn’t want to splatter any mud on their masters.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 02/02/2012 at 09:48 AM   
Filed Under: • GovernmentCorruption and GreedGuns and Gun ControlNews-BriefsNo Shit, Sherlock •  
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calendar   Saturday - January 21, 2012

Homerun For Newt

Gingrich Tramples SC Primary

Garners as many votes as Romney and Santorum Combined

Delivers knockout victory speech!

UPDATE: Here it is!  And here it is:

Says the choice - between him and Obama - is one between an America that stands for freedom/opportunity/independence and one that’s a Saul Alinksy socialism that bows to Saudi princes. (actually he first says “the centerpiece of this campaign is American exceptionalism versus the radicalism of Saul Alinksi”, and then it gets better)

HORRY CLAP. Newt didn’t just throw down the glove, he picked it up and smacked the crap outta the left time after time after time, in plain straight up talk, and called the far left and their policies a destructive anti-American bunch of pinkos, and the media their running dogs. He hit just about every single Tea Party point, and then a dozen more dear to Conservative hearts. Then he smacked Obama upside the head with a dead fish over the Keystone XL pipeline and our nation’s debt to China. By gosh, gumbo, and by Hillary’s hoary beard, hit the news sites and/or YouTube and listen to that speech. He’s on fire!



Not the victory speech, but a good talk, half an hour, from Newt:


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 01/21/2012 at 10:00 PM   
Filed Under: • News-BriefsRepublicans •  
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calendar   Friday - January 20, 2012

How low can you go?

I know there has to be more to this story, but OMG.

Police say woman offered sexual favors for chicken McNuggets

Burbank, Calif. – A Los Angeles woman was arrested last week for offering sexual favors in exchange for chicken McNuggets, according to Burbank police.

Khadijah Baseer of Los Angeles allegedly opened customers’ car doors while they were in the drive-thru of a Burbank McDonald’s.

A witness reported Baseer’s activity to police and she was arrested on suspicion of prostitution.

In LA you get a happy ending with your happy meal?

Upon further research, the good news is that she was not actually a McDonald’s employee.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 01/20/2012 at 08:28 AM   
Filed Under: • News-Briefs •  
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calendar   Thursday - January 19, 2012

The Shrinking Field

Rick Perry has dropped out of the Republican Primary race. He is going to throw his support to Newt Gingrich, news coverage at 11am.

Cain, Bachmann, Huntsman, and now Perry. Gone.

The decision comes after the Texas governor, who once led the field of GOP hopefuls, endured disappointing finishes in the leadoff Iowa and New Hampshire contests. While he is polling only in single digits in South Carolina, his decision to withdraw could end up giving a boost to one of his opponents should his supporters gravitate toward a particular candidate.

Crivens. At this rate, there won’t be any choice but Romney by the time the primary bandwagon gets to my state. Grrrrr.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 01/19/2012 at 11:00 AM   
Filed Under: • News-BriefsRepublicans •  
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calendar   Friday - January 06, 2012

TooDaze Stoopid Newz, Part 1

For once it wasn’t unexpected!


Jobless Rate Falls to 8.5%, Lowest In 3 Years!

Pay no attention to how we diddle the numbers, just be happy. Now go out and spend, and support your Autocrat In Chief.




The nation’s unemployment rate fell to its lowest level in nearly three years at the end of 2011, as a burst of private-sector hiring helped sustain what has been a positive trend lately in the job market.

The rate, which dipped to 8.5 percent in December, has dropped for four straight months. The direction of the numbers could help soften the political blow of what remains a tough economy for President Obama, who is charging into a competitive re-election year.

It’s good news that more Americans found work last month despite a sluggish economy, but both parties must come together and do more to address the ongoing uncertainty that small businesses face,” House Speaker John Boehner [aka Crybaby] said. “Today marks the 35th consecutive month of unemployment above eight percent, and too many Americans continue to struggle to find their next job.”

The December report painted a picture of a broadly improving job market. Average hourly pay rose, providing consumers with more income to spend. The average work week lengthened, a sign that business is picking up and companies may soon need more workers. And hiring was strong across almost all major industries.
...
Manufacturing added 23,000 jobs. Transportation and warehousing added 50,000 jobs. Retailers added 28,000 jobs. Even the beleaguered construction industry added 17,000 workers.

Don’t read this part:

The drop in the rate, the lowest since February 2009, was driven by a net payroll increase of 200,000 in December. The rate also came down in part because the size of the labor force shrank by 50,000. Many who are unemployed have stopped looking for jobs. The government only counts people as unemployed if they are actively searching for jobs.

When including those groups, the broader “underemployment” rate was 15.2 percent. That’s down from 15.6 percent the previous month, but still high. The figure has dropped for three straight months.

Also please don’t think about the stats: 28,000 new jobs in retail is 14% of the gain, yet this could be almost entirely seasonal help brought on for the holidays. If half of them get let go in January, we’re right back up to over 9% again. Grain of salt? No, a bucketful.

Personally, I’m glad the unemployment situation is improving, however the numbers may be diddled. Every new job helps us get back on our feet. And I’m rather proud that the American economy can show some signs of life no matter what the Commie In Charge tries to do to it. But even if it should catch fire tomorrow, and a record setting hiring spree go on all year long, I won’t give him or his policies a milligram’s worth of credit. Any economic good news is coming in spite of the government, not because of it.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 01/06/2012 at 11:32 AM   
Filed Under: • EconomicsNews-Briefs •  
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TooDaze Stoopid News, Part 3

Cops Sent To Collect Overdue Library Books

From Kindergartner



Golly, I guess there’s no crime whatsoever in this town if the local fuzz has time for this BS!


A Charlton (MA) mom says her local library crossed the line when they sent police to collect her daughter’s overdue library books.

Her mom says the 5-year-old girl was so afraid that she burst into tears.

Charlton Police Sergeant Dan Dowd stopped by the home of Shannon Benoit to let her know that her daughter had two books several months overdue which needed to be returned or paid for.

They found and returned the books, but Hailey’s mom argues that sending a cop to their house was like pounding a ten penny nail with a sledge hammer.

Even Sgt. Dowd admits he wasn’t real keen on it.

“Nobody wanted to, on this end to get involved in it,” says Sgt. Dowd. “But the library contacted us, and the chief delegated, and apparently I was one of the low men on the totem pole.”


Talk about a creeping culture of cowardice. i guess the librarians were “too uncomfortable” with the situation to just pick up the darn phone and call these folks? Because, you know, prodding the public about overdue books is above the pay grade for librarians, and they don’t need that kind of workplace stress. Plus, somebody could get offended and come shoot them or something. Better to play it safe and send the police. No, better to send the SWAT team. A good tazering would teach that nascent little criminal what’s what, what what?

Ok, the cop got stuck with the tsk, and he’s gonna get a month of grief from his buds at the donut shop. But the library? If they had half a lick of sense, there would be a bright and shiny Help Wanted ad in the paper today.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 01/06/2012 at 10:43 AM   
Filed Under: • News-BriefsStoopid-People •  
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calendar   Sunday - December 25, 2011

A present without wrapping paper

This is not a notice of retraction, or a statement that one of our old posts has been removed. It is a small notice that enough information has become available to me to admit that at least one of the angles in a news story we ran with last June may have been false, for whatever reason. So let’s call this a Grain of Salt Notification, and when I get or locate more information I will do more if that seems to be the correct course of action. The price of freedom is responsibility, and I am always willing to take the necessary steps that go with that. That’s the other side of the journalistic coin, whether the government considers me to be an official journalist or not.

Therefore I have updated the Tacoma shooting story from last summer with a fair sized lead-in paragraph that says that there is reasonable doubt about the accuracy of at least one aspect of the story.

I am waiting for more information from his friends that will help clarify this situation. It will never be a good situation; a man is dead. But there is no reason to support a false meme (or several of them), and the little I’ve found so far is enough to cast reasonable doubt on that. Not proof, but reasonable doubt ... against a misstatement/misunderstanding/malicious rumor/bit of emergency CYA perhaps. Welcome to the digital age; that’s about the best I can do right now. It’s not like we’ve never seen a smear campaign go on before. Herman Cain, Robert Bjork anyone?

If and when I get more information I will consider it and may edit out large parts of this story. Until such time it stands, but it would be irresponsible of me to not stridently point out that one, several, or nearly all the parts of this story may be wrong or false. Give the deceased a fair shake, because he can no longer speak for himself.

Merry Christmas.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 12/25/2011 at 08:48 PM   
Filed Under: • Blog StuffNews-Briefs •  
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calendar   Friday - December 16, 2011

Young criminals are being given party bags of sweets on their first night behind bars.

I have notes and clippings coming out my ears. And I still managed to lose track of this item which I found last week.  Then forgot I had it.
However, as I read Richard Littlejohn faithfully, he ran the brief story in his column today. 
Isn’t funny at all. Is it?

Banana Republic
A snapshot of modern, multi-culti Britain. Paulo Franco, who is Portuguese, says he was forced out of his job as a supervisor at Britain’s biggest banana-packing factory, in Coventry, because he couldn’t speak Polish.
Although Mr Franco speaks perfect English, he wasn’t able to communicate with his overwhelmingly Polish workforce. So he had to go.

image

Some other managers at the factory have now downloaded iPhone apps so they can translate their instructions into Polish.
Fyffes Bananas’ spokesman Paul Barrett said: ‘You can’t ban people speaking in their own language.’
No, but you can ban people speaking English in England, apparently.
Absolutely bananas.

image

Also among my notes is an example of what I think is theater of the absurd.
A story in the Telegraph for which there is no link because the Telegraph did not include the article anywhere on line that I could find.
So once again Littlejohn to the rescue as he mentions a much abbreviated version in The Daily Mail.

The headline in the other paper read,

SWEETS LEFT ON PILLOWS OF YOUNG OFFENDERS FOR FIRST NIGHT IN JAIL

Young criminals are being given party bags of sweets on their first night behind bars.

Ashfield Young Offenders’ Institution, in Gloucestershire, believes it helps them settle in to their new surroundings.
The bags contain fudge, Refreshers and Polos. Why not put an After Eight on their pillow, too.
I don’t believe in treating young offenders in the same way as hardened crooks. Many of them have never known kindness in their lives — but they are there to be punished, as well as rehabilitated.
A finger of fudge on their first night inside is not the way to go about it. Don’t forget the fruit gums, mum!

He left out the fudge bars. Yum. Many of the louts came in after the summer riots so I guess a few anyway are getting some taste of being locked up.
But a spokesman for the ppl who operate the prison, SERCO, who btw also do garbage and recycled trash collection, says the young offenders “need to be treated with kid gloves to some extent to protect them from the harsher side of life in prison.”

Right you are. Give em the impression it’s a walk in the park.  After all ... who’s afraid of the big bad wolf?


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Posted by peiper   United Kingdom  on 12/16/2011 at 10:56 AM   
Filed Under: • News-Briefs •  
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calendar   Wednesday - December 14, 2011

THERE ARE NO STARVING SOMALIS

OK, I want every single person reading this page to dig deep into your pockets or purse and give generously to famine relief for those poor starving Somalians.

Errr,,,, hang on. I think there’s a mistake. Can’t possibly be Somalia.
Because the guy who is head of the recognised government says,

Starving? What starving? I don’t got no stinkin starving here. Well, not in those words.

What he’s quoted as saying is …..


We have no famine, says Somalian prime minister

The world’s aid agencies have become “lords of poverty” and their claim that famine has struck Somalia’s capital is “absolutely” false, according to Abdiweli Mohammed Ali, the country’s prime minister.

Mr Ali, who leads Somalia’s officially recognised government, chose the week when the United Nations has appealed for $1.5 billion to help his country’s people to deliver a stinging attack on relief workers.

A Harvard-educated economist, he believes they have become an “entrenched interest group”, exaggerating the scale of suffering in order to drum up donations.
The United Nations says that 250,000 Somalis are suffering from famine in three regions of the country, including Mogadishu. Patches of waste ground across the bullet-scarred city, devastated by two decades of war, are filled with the shacks of refugees who have fled drought and food shortages. Children with distended bellies and stick-like limbs can be seen in many of these sand-blown camps.

Seated in his air-conditioned office, Mr Ali said the UN’s judgment that famine had struck his capital was wrong. “I have no idea how this international community makes the grading. You ask them and tell me how they did it. They don’t know what they’re talking about. But what I can say is enough relief came to Somalia and we provided enough relief to those affected by the famine.”

It’s not so much that any of us are surprised. And perhaps there are starving Somalis but I don’t give a damn. But I’d encourage you to read all the rest of the article because it is interesting. It really is.

AND YOU CAN READ MORE HERE


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Posted by peiper   United Kingdom  on 12/14/2011 at 06:29 AM   
Filed Under: • News-Briefs •  
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calendar   Tuesday - November 22, 2011

This ‘n That

Some somewhat interesting news links

Oh lucky me, I get to spend half the day on my hands and knees laying grout. Joy!


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 11/22/2011 at 09:11 AM   
Filed Under: • News-Briefs •  
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calendar   Friday - November 18, 2011

NEWS BRIEF

It’s been less then two weeks since I said I was tired of gypsy and traveller stories, and wasn’t going to post anymore on the topic.  Well …. I am reminded of that old expression, never say never cos guess what?
Yeah … that tired old subject is here again with the very same tiresome cast

They’re B A A A A KKK!

Or say they are. Here’s the brief lowdown.

While I was away, Drew posted the story about the eviction of the scum at a place called Dale Farm.  I won’t rehash the story here except to say they were on land illegally and it took sorry ass authorities 10 years to move em, at very high cost in monies.
Some of them said they’d fight their eviction to the death, but none did cos I notice every damn one is still breathing.

Well folks …. here’s a very brief update.

Their caravans are lining up and parked outside the old site where they were tossed from, waiting for the chance to move back in.  Which they say is their plan.

See?  They have proved my point made a year ago and repeated from time to time.
Dead travellers do not return to the scene of their former occupations.

Dead child abusers and rapists do not return to re-offend.  Which is the subject of a later post.  But in a nutshell … guy leaves mental unit unsupervised (after 23 yrs) and kidnaps a 10 year old boy within ten minutes of his release.
Old story with new cast member. The shrinks are so easily fooled.

WHY IS THIS GUY STILL BREATHING?


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Posted by peiper   United Kingdom  on 11/18/2011 at 10:50 AM   
Filed Under: • CULTURE IN DECLINENews-Briefs •  
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calendar   Tuesday - November 15, 2011

Libyan war casualties arrive in Rotterdam …. and Somali pirates get life in French prison

Caught this today and while short, no less interesting for that.
No problem helping folks in trouble etc. but ...  50 people today.  How many tomorrow and the day after that?  How many will remain and then bring in all their relations both real and imagined? 
Does anyone else see that thin wedge?  Or maybe it’s just my silly islamophobic thinking at work.

H/T Expatica.com

Libyan war casualties arrive in Rotterdam

The first group of Libyans injured in the recent fighting have arrived in the Netherlands for specialist hospital treatment.
Last week, a Dutch medical team working with Libya’s ministry for war casualties selected people for treatment in the Netherlands. The first 12 arrived in Rotterdam late this afternoon.

The Hague has agreed to treat 50 people in the Netherlands. Several other countries have also agreed to offer specialised medical treatment to people injured in the war against former dictator Muammar Gaddafi. All the cost will be met by the Libyan authorities.

The rest of the patients are expected to arrive over the next few days. After an initial assessment at a specialist facility in Utrecht the patients will be sent to various specialist medical facilities across the Netherlands.

SOURCE, EXPATICA

In other news ........

France tries six Somali ‘pirates’ in landmark case

Six Somali men appeared in a Paris court Tuesday in France’s first prosecution of alleged Somali pirates. The men face life imprisonment over charges of hijacking, kidnapping and armed robbery of a French couple’s yacht in 2008.

They are facing charges of hijacking, kidnapping and armed robbery after they allegedly seized the yacht and its crew, Jean-Yves Delanne and his wife Bernadette, both aged 60, off the coast of Somalia in 2008.

They face life in prison if convicted.

The six, aged between 21 and 35, were captured and flown to France after French special forces stormed the yacht, the Carre d’As IV, and rescued the couple. A seventh suspect was killed in the raid.

Journalists were allowed into the court for the start of the trial but judges are expected to later close the hearings to the public because one of the suspects was a minor at the time of the crime.

The suspects had reportedly demanded a ransom of $2 million (1.5 million) for the couple’s release.

Their case marks the first time France has put alleged Somali pirates on trial. Somali suspects in three other cases are currently awaiting trial.

source as above

Europeans do not approve the death penalty. I wouldn’t imagine French jails are a walk in the park, but dead pirates are preferable to live ones, even in jail. Does life mean life in France?  I don’t know.  If it’s anything like other western countries, it might only mean serving a certain amount of time and then going free. Maybe even remaining in France and ... bringing in the family? 


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Posted by peiper   United Kingdom  on 11/15/2011 at 11:59 AM   
Filed Under: • News-Briefs •  
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calendar   Tuesday - October 18, 2011

Unusual News

Sickles’ Leg Walks Once More

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The leg bone of highly controversial Civil War Union General Daniel Sickles is on the move again. Sickles, a very self-aggrandizing fellow, is remembered as either the savior of the battle of Gettysburg or it’s idiot, depending on your view of history.

When the battle happened, the entire Union army wound up closely packed together on a low ridge line above the small southern Pennsylvania town. The Confederate forces, the army of Virginia, had been marauding in territory to the north, while the Union forces, the army of the Potomac, were close to Washington DC. The rebs had turned south and by chance met the yankees coming north just outside the town. As the fighting progressed, the blue forces were pushed back up onto the ridge and nearly surrounded. Sickles “misunderstood” his orders and marched his troops out from the southern part of the line to meet a Confederate advance from the west. Had that advance succeeded, not only would the blue army have been surrounded, but the way would have been open to Washington DC and in all probability the South would have won the war. Sickles’ troops met the onslaught and engaged in some of the most intense fighting of the war, with thousands of casualties on both sides, but he stopped them. During the fight his leg was shot off by a cannonball. The battle continued the next day with the advance now known as Pickett’s charge. The southern forces came within inches of breaking the northern line and taking the hill, but they were repulsed and the battle was lost. This was the turning point of the war, and from that day until the end the south was on the defensive.

Sickles survived. Somehow his leg bone was kept, and for years afterwards he would visit it from time to time.

Over time, the leg became part of a morbid collection of military artifacts, including the bullet that killed President Lincoln, the part of President Garfield’s spine where he was shot, and a huge collection of bones and pickled flesh from other casualties. It became a museum of medicine. Now that collection is being moved again. Since the collection began in the 1860’s it has moved 10 times. Sickles’ leg just won’t stop marching on.

The bullet that killed Abraham Lincoln is mounted under glass, like a diamond in a snow globe, in its new home at the National Museum of Health and Medicine.

The lead ball and several skull fragments from the 16th president are in a tall, antique case overlooking a Civil War exhibit in a museum gallery in Silver Spring, just off the Capital Beltway. The military museum, known for its collection of morbid oddities, moved in September from the former Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington.

At Walter Reed, visitors had to pass through a security gate and find the museum on the campus, where parking could be a problem. The new building stands outside the gates of Fort Detrick’s Forest Glen Annex.

Visitors can just drive up, walk in and come face-to-face with a perpetually grinning skeleton directing them to an exhibit on the human body. There, one can see a hairball from the stomach of a 12-year-old girl and the amputated leg of a man with elephantiasis — a disease that causes limbs to become bloated. The leg floats upright in a glass jar like an enormous, pickled sausage.

Deputy Director Tim Clarke Jr. said the museum will close in January and reopen by May 21 with its largest-ever display of objects to mark its 150th anniversary. The scope of the exhibits is still being decided, he said.

“We are sure, though, that we are programming and planning an exhibit that will astound our visitors,” Clarke said.

The $12 million relocation established a permanent home for an institution that has had 10 addresses since 1862. That’s when Surgeon General William Hammond directed medical officers in the field to collect “specimens of morbid anatomy” for study at the newly founded museum along with projectiles and foreign bodies. A photograph nearly covering one wall of the museum’s new Civil War exhibit shows amputated legs stacked like firewood.

The exhibit also includes the shattered bones of U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Daniel Sickles’ lower right leg, mounted for display beside a 12-pound cannonball like the one that hit him during the 1863 Battle of Gettysburg. Most of the museum’s objects, including 2,000 microscopes and hundreds of thousands of human brain specimens, are in an off-site warehouse.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 10/18/2011 at 08:05 AM   
Filed Under: • MilitaryNews-Briefs •  
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The Brownshirts: Partie Deux; These aare the Muscle We’ve Been Waiting For
On: 03/14/23 11:20

Vietnam Homecoming
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On: 03/20/21 07:00

meaningless marching orders for a thousand travellers ... strife ahead ..
(1 total trackbacks)
Tracked at Casual Blog
[...] RTS. IF ANYTHING ON THIS WEBSITE IS CONSTRUED AS BEING CONTRARY TO THE LAWS APPL [...]
On: 07/17/17 04:28

a small explanation
(1 total trackbacks)
Tracked at yerba mate gourd
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On: 07/09/17 03:07



DISCLAIMER
Allanspacer

THE SERVICES AND MATERIALS ON THIS WEBSITE ARE PROVIDED "AS IS" AND THE HOSTS OF THIS SITE EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMS ANY AND ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF SATISFACTORY QUALITY, MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, WITH RESPECT TO THE SERVICE OR ANY MATERIALS.

Not that very many people ever read this far down, but this blog was the creation of Allan Kelly and his friend Vilmar. Vilmar moved on to his own blog some time ago, and Allan ran this place alone until his sudden and unexpected death partway through 2006. We all miss him. A lot. Even though he is gone this site will always still be more than a little bit his. We who are left to carry on the BMEWS tradition owe him a great debt of gratitude, and we hope to be able to pay that back by following his last advice to us all:
  1. Keep a firm grasp of Right and Wrong
  2. Stay involved with government on every level and don't let those bastards get away with a thing
  3. Use every legal means to defend yourself in the event of real internal trouble, and, most importantly:
  4. Keep talking to each other, whether here or elsewhere
It's been a long strange trip without you Skipper, but thanks for pointing us in the right direction and giving us a swift kick in the behind to get us going. Keep lookin' down on us, will ya? Thanks.

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GNU Terry Pratchett


Oh, and here's some kind of visitor flag counter thingy. Hey, all the cool blogs have one, so I should too. The Visitors Online thingy up at the top doesn't count anything, but it looks neat. It had better, since I paid actual money for it.
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