BS: I Read it in the Newspaper

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 12 Jun 07 - 07:31 AM

The following appeared yesterday at MSNBC but is no longer there. It also does not appear to be at the Washington Post site where it originally appeared, and is not included in a search on the writer's articles. It may be applicable to discussion in another thread here, so:

Originally at WP: U.S. unit allies with ex-insurgents [link dead as of this posting]

Soldiers in Baghdad give police powers, guns to former insurgents
By Joshua Partlow
The Washington Post
Updated: 11:22 p.m. CT June 8, 2007

BAGHDAD, June 8 - The worst month of Lt. Col. Dale Kuehl's deployment in western Baghdad was finally drawing to a close. The insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq had unleashed bombings that killed 14 of his soldiers in May, a shocking escalation of violence for a battalion that had lost three soldiers in the previous six months while patrolling the Sunni enclave of Amiriyah. On top of that, the 41-year-old battalion commander was doubled up with a stomach flu when, late on May 29, he received a cellphone call that would change everything.
"We're going after al-Qaeda," a leading local imam said, Kuehl recalled. "What we want you to do is stay out of the way."
"Sheik, I can't do that. I can't just leave Amiriyah and let you go at it."
"Well, we're going to go."

Embracing one-time enemies

The week that followed revolutionized Kuehl's approach to fighting the insurgency and serves as a vivid example of a risky, and expanding, new American strategy of looking beyond the Iraqi police and army for help in controlling violent neighborhoods. The American soldiers in Amiriyah have allied themselves with dozens of Sunni militiamen who call themselves the Baghdad Patriots -- a group that American soldiers believe includes insurgents who have attacked them in the past -- in an attempt to drive out al-Qaeda in Iraq. The Americans have granted these gunmen the power of arrest, allowed the Iraqi army to supply them with ammunition, and fought alongside them in chaotic street battles.

To many American soldiers in Amiriyah, this nascent allegiance stands out as an encouraging development after months of grinding struggle. They liken the fighters to the minutemen of the American Revolution, painting them as neighbors taking the initiative to protect their families in the vacuum left by a failing Iraqi security force. In their first week of collaboration, the Baghdad Patriots and the Americans killed roughly 10 suspected al-Qaeda in Iraq members and captured 15, according to Kuehl, who said those numbers rivaled totals for the previous six months combined. He is now working to fashion the group into the beginnings of an Amiriyah police force, since the mainly Shiite police force refuses to work in the area.

"This is a defining moment for us," said Kuehl, who commands the 1st Battalion, 5th Cavalry Regiment, attached to the 1st Infantry Division.

'A deal with the devil'

But aligning Americans with fighters whose long-term agenda remains unclear -- with regard to either Americans or the Shiite-led government -- is also a strategy born of desperation. It contradicts repeated declarations by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki that no groups besides the Iraqi and American security forces are allowed to bear arms. And some American soldiers worry that standing up a Sunni militia could have dire consequences if the group turns on its U.S. partners.

"We have made a deal with the devil," said an intelligence officer in the battalion.

The U.S. effort to recruit indigenous forces to defend local communities has been taken furthest in Anbar province, where tribal leaders have encouraged thousands of their kinsmen to join the police. In the Abu Ghraib area, west of Baghdad, about 2,000 people unaffiliated with security forces are now working with Americans at village checkpoints and gun positions.

Kuehl said he recognizes the risks in dealing with an unofficial force but decided the intelligence that the gunmen provided on al-Qaeda in Iraq was too valuable to pass up.

"Hell, nothing else has worked in Amiriyah," he said.

Taking on al-Qaeda

It was about 2 a.m. on May 30 when Capt. Andy Wilbraham, a 33-year-old company commander, first heard military chatter on his tank radio about rumors that local gunmen would take on al-Qaeda. Later that morning, a noncommissioned officer turned to him with the news: "They're uprising."

"It was just a shock it happened so fast," Wilbraham said.
By noon, loudspeakers in mosques throughout Amiriyah were broadcasting a call to war: "It is time to stand up and fight" al-Qaeda. Groups of men, some in black ski masks carrying AK-47 assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades, descended on the area around the Maluki mosque, a suspected al-Qaeda in Iraq base of operations, and launched an attack. For the most part, Kuehl's soldiers stood back, trying to contain the violence and secure other mosques, and let the gunmen do their work.

The next day, a Thursday, al-Qaeda counterattacked. Using machine guns and grenades, its fighters drove the militiamen south across several city blocks until they were holed up in the Firdas mosque, soldiers said. "I was getting reports every 10 minutes from one of the imams: 'They're at this point. We're surrounded. We're getting attacked. They're at the mosque,' " Kuehl recalled. He dispatched Stryker attack vehicles to protect the militiamen.

"We basically pushed that one back just by force," said Capt. Kevin Salge, 31, who led the Stryker team of about 60 men to the mosque. "We got in there. Our guns are much bigger guns. Then freedom fighters, Baghdad Patriot guys, started firing."

Spec. Chadrick Domino, 23, was with a Stryker unit that drove north of the mosque to set up a perimeter to prevent others from joining the fight. About noon, he was the first member of his team to walk into a residential courtyard. He may not have had time to see the machine gunner who killed him.

'We need them and they need us'

To the Americans, the fighters on both sides appeared nearly identical. They wore similar sweat suits and carried the same kind of machine guns. "Now we've got kind of a mess on our hands," Salge remembered thinking. "Because we've got a lot of armed guys running all over the place, and it's making it very hard for us to identify which side is which."

By afternoon, the Americans had secured the Firdas mosque and were helping treat the wounded who lay in the courtyard. Kuehl drove out from his headquarters to meet with the leaders of the militiamen and work out the terms that would guide their collaboration in coming days. Kuehl agreed to help if the militiamen did not torture their captives or kill people who were not affiliated with al-Qaeda in Iraq. The militiamen agreed to hold prisoners for no more than 24 hours before releasing them or handing them over to the Americans. They in turn wanted the Americans not to interfere and to provide weapons.

"We need them and they need us," Kuehl said. "Al-Qaeda's stronger than them. We provide capabilities that they don't have. And the locals know who belongs and who doesn't. It doesn't matter how long we're here, I'll never know. And we'll never fit in."

Experience in the ranks

The militiamen, who call themselves freedom fighters, are led by a 35-year-old former Iraqi army captain and used-car salesman who goes by Saif or Abu Abed. In an interview, he said he had devoted the past five months to collecting intelligence on al-Qaeda in Iraq fighters in Amiriyah, whose ranks have grown as they have fled to Baghdad and away from the new tribal policemen in Anbar province. He has said his own group numbers over 100 people, but American soldiers estimate it has closer to 40. At least six were killed and more than 10 wounded in the first week of collaboration with Americans.

"These guys looked like a military unit, the way they moved," Wilbraham said. "Hand and arm signals. Stop. Take a knee. Weapons up."
Ali Hatem Ali Suleiman, a leader of the Sunni Dulaimi tribe who works in Anbar and Baghdad, said many of the fighters in Amiriyah belong to the Islamic Army, which includes former officers from Saddam Hussein's military and is more secular than other insurgent groups. The fighters have been organized and encouraged by local imams.
"Let's be honest, the enemy now is not the Americans, for the time being," Suleiman said. "It's al-Qaeda and the [Shiite] militias. Those are our enemies."

Equipping the new troops

The American soldiers initially asked their new allies to wear white headbands and ride around in the Strykers to point out al-Qaeda households. But the joint patrols didn't work because the local fighters were disoriented after riding in the enclosed Strykers and couldn't find the right houses, Salge said.

Before long, he added, "people everywhere were wearing headbands, and I'm pretty sure that a lot of them were al-Qaeda."

The Americans then supplied reflective armbands that could be seen from their vehicle scopes, and had the fighters ride in Iraqi army Humvees instead of Strykers. They also gave the fighters plastic flex cuffs, to subdue captives, and flares -- red to use if they are in trouble and green to signal when a raid is over.

On June 1, a Friday, the fighters directed the soldiers to a large weapons cache. Sniper rifles, Russian machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and thousands of rounds of ammunition were stashed in a secret room, accessible only by removing a circuit-breaker box and crawling through a hole. While the Americans were tallying the haul, an explosive detonated outside, wounding several soldiers, including one whose feet were blown off.

Lingering suspicion

In return for their services, the militiamen had one request: Give us the weapons in the cache.
"Who are these guys really?" Salge remembered worrying. He told them to talk to the battalion commander.
Kuehl said later that he would probably supply weapons to the militiamen, but in limited amounts. The fighters have given the Americans identification, including fingerprints, addresses and retinal scans, so the soldiers believe they could track down anyone who betrayed them. "What I don't want them to do is wither on the vine," Kuehl said.

On Wednesday, a week after the fighting broke out, the Islamic Army issued a statement declaring a cease-fire with al-Qaeda in Iraq because the groups did not want to spill more Muslim blood or impede "the project of jihad." American soldiers played down the statement and suggested it did not reflect the sentiments of the men they are working with in Amiriyah.

Later that night, Wilbraham led his tank unit on an overnight mission to allow the militiamen to arrest seven al-Qaeda in Iraq members. The raids were to begin at 1 a.m., but two hours later the tanks were waiting on deserted streets, with no sign of the group. Then Wilbraham was told the militiamen had called off the raids.
The tank driver, Spec. Estevan Altamirano, 25, expressed skepticism about his new partners.
"Pretty soon they run out of al-Qaeda, and then they're going to turn on us," he said. "I don't want to get used to them and then I have an AK behind my back. I'm not going to trust them at all."

© 2007 The Washington Post Company

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 12 Jun 07 - 07:46 AM

Preceding post linked at:

BS: Arming Select Sunnis

for those curious.

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Jun 07 - 11:40 AM

I wonder who pulled strings to have it removed?

Thanks, John.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 12 Jun 07 - 03:05 PM

Check the other thread?

It appears that there has been a whole lot of bear-baiting about "giving weapons to the enemy" elsewhere around the world.

This one article is the only thing I've seen thus far in "US" press about it, so one would suspect that we're just "not supposed to know?"

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Jun 07 - 03:26 PM

I did, John. I don't see a statement that says "Rice asked that this be removed" or "Gates follows in Rumsfeld's footsteps, tampers with media," etc.

It was more rhetorical, anyway. We know who had it removed.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 12 Jun 07 - 04:51 PM

Ah but Stilly, with MSNBC one really doesn't know.

It may have been removed "for political reasons" or merely to make room for another popup/insert/Flash Ad from a paying entrepreneur.

[Another rhetorical comment, mainly because some of these "pages" are getting incredibly long and we need to break them up with a few short posts occasionally.]

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 14 Jun 07 - 10:00 AM

PETERBOROUGH, Ontario -- A judge has ruled that a 24-year-old Canadian man is not allowed to have a girlfriend for the next three years.

The ruling came after Steven Cranley pleaded guilty on Tuesday to several charges stemming from an assault on a former girlfriend.

Cranley, who has been diagnosed with a dependent personality disorder, attacked his girlfriend in an argument after their breakup.

He tried to prevent her from phoning the police by cutting her phone cord and punched and kicked her. He finally stabbed himself with a butcher knife when police did arrive, puncturing his aorta.

Doctors say Cranley has difficulty coping with rejection and runs a high risk to re-offend if he becomes involved in another intimate relationship.

Justice Rhys Morgan said Cranley "cannot form a romantic relationship of an intimate nature with a female person.

"That is the only way I can see the protection of the public is in place until you get the counseling you need."

Cranley had already served 146 days in pre-trail custody, which Morgan said was enough jail time in this case.

His lawyer says the no girlfriend order is the first of its kind that he has encountered.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 14 Jun 07 - 10:29 AM

Bork versus Bork

Published: June 14, 2007

There are many versions of the cliché that "a conservative is a liberal who has been mugged," and Robert Bork has just given rise to another. A tort plaintiff, it turns out, is a critic of tort lawsuits who has slipped and fallen at the Yale Club.

Mr. Bork, of course, is the former federal appeals court judge who was nominated to the Supreme Court in 1987 but not confirmed by the Senate. He has long been famous for his lack of sympathy for people who go to court with claims of race or sex discrimination, or other injustices. He has gotten particularly exercised about accident victims driving up the cost of business by filing lawsuits. In an op-ed article, he once complained that "juries dispense lottery-like windfalls," and compared the civil justice system to "Barbary pirates."

That was before Mr. Bork spoke at the Yale Club last year, and fell on his way to the dais, injuring his leg and bumping his head. Mr. Bork is not merely suing the club for failing to provide a set of stairs and a handrail between the floor and the dais. He has filed a suit that is so aggressive about the law that, if he had not filed it himself, we suspect he might regard it as, well, piratical.

Mr. Bork puts the actual damages for his apparently non-life-threatening injuries (after his fall, he was reportedly able to go on and deliver his speech) at "in excess of $1,000,000." He is also claiming punitive damages. And he is demanding that the Yale Club pay his attorney's fees.
(NY Times)

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 14 Jun 07 - 12:31 PM

Mexico City plans to legalize prostitution

Leftist lawmakers' bill is the latest in a string of liberal changes
Reuters: Updated: 9:57 p.m. CT June 13, 2007

Mexico City's leftist lawmakers plan to legalize prostitution, the latest step toward making the sprawling capital the most liberal in Latin America, following laws allowing abortion and same-sex unions.
Juan Bustos, a legislator with the leftist party that holds a majority in the city assembly, presented a bill this week to legalize sex work in the capital.

"This activity must be regulated, it can't just take place without control, without health support for the users or the workers," he said Wednesday.

Prostitution is widespread both on seedy street corners and in swanky brothels in Mexico, and authorities frequently turn a blind eye to it. The lack of control has allowed child prostitution to flourish in the city, Bustos said.

The legislator, who heads the assembly's human rights commission, said he hoped the bill would be voted on within a month. He said there were no clear estimates about the number of sex workers in the city, but that it could be as high as 50,000.

The left-wing Party of Democratic Revolution runs Mexico City's government and has a majority in the city assembly.

Controversial changes

Since the new legislative period began last year, the assembly has pushed through laws approving same-sex unions and abortion in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy.

The changes have outraged the Roman Catholic Church and conservative sectors of society and provoked Pope Benedict to threaten politicians with excommunication if they supported abortion. The abortion law has been challenged by the federal government in Mexico's Supreme Court.
Most of Latin America is strongly Catholic and while many people disagree with the church on issues like contraception, few places in the region have gone as far as to legalize abortion, considered by the church to be a grave sin.

Hugo Valdemar, spokesman for the Mexico City archdiocese, said the Catholic Church was concerned the city government was spending time passing laws that affected minorities rather than resolving issues like crime and water shortages.

"We have problems of drug dealers in front of schools and churches, and they do nothing to stop it. We have problems of family violence, a whole series of truly urgent situations," he said.

He said the church also disagreed with language in the bill describing prostitution as "dignified work."

Copyright 2007 Reuters Limited.

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 14 Jun 07 - 10:58 PM

HONEST GUYS, I DIDN'T MEAN IT THAT WAY!

F-16s stop 'hostile takeover' pilot

Turns out he was talking about business, not terrorism

The Associated Press
Updated: 2:05 p.m. CT June 13, 2007

KANSAS CITY, Mo. - F-16s intercepted a small plane after officials misinterpreted a phrase uttered by the pilot as his aircraft flew over military airspace: "hostile takeover."

The pilot was talking about business, the plane's owner said. But a frantic air traffic controller couldn't confirm that because the pilot had turned off his radio, said Maj. Roger Yates of the Clay County Sheriff's Department.

Within minutes, federal aviation authorities scrambled the fighter jets to intercept the plane Monday evening just outside of Oklahoma City and escort it to the Clay County airport near Mosby.

Once it was on the ground, more than a dozen armed federal agents and tactical deputies surrounded the plane. Federal authorities, who interviewed the pilot for two hours, said Tuesday that there was no threat to anyone and no charges would be filed.

"People should be very careful in this heightened state of security about comments they make regarding airplanes and air traffic," said FBI spokesman Jeff Lanza.

The plane's owner, Dr. Kenneth E. Mann, said the pilot was heading back to Kansas City after dropping him off in Oklahoma, where Mann regularly travels to provide treatment at several hospitals. Neither he nor authorities would identify the pilot.

Authorities said the pilot was flying over Vance Air Force Base in Oklahoma on his way back to the Kansas City area when he notified the air traffic tower at the air base that he was entering the base's airspace.

When asked what his destination was, the pilot said he preferred not to say because competitors could use such information to steal clients. He was not required to give a destination, Mann said. He said the pilot was concerned because he worked "in a hostile business environment."

The pilot was speaking about a "hostile takeover" of a company, Yates said.

Mann said FBI agents were at his home less than an hour after the incident.

"Mistakes happen," he said, "and in the times we live in after 9/11, it's better to overreact than not react at all."

Copyright 2007 The Associated Press

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 18 Jun 07 - 09:09 PM

Britain, U.S. smash pedophile ring

700 investigated; 31 children rescued as authorities shut global operation

The Associated Press
Updated: 11:11 a.m. CT June 18, 2007

LONDON - British police, aided by U.S. authorities, have smashed a global Internet pedophile ring that broadcast live-streamed videos of children being abused, investigating more than 700 suspects worldwide and rescuing 31 children in a 10-month probe, officials said Monday.

Some 200 suspects are based in Britain, said the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Center, a government agency. Of the 31 children, some only a few months old, more than 15 were in Britain, the center said. British authorities would not give a breakdown of where the other suspects or children came from, but said more than half the suspects in Britain were already being prosecuted.

The ring was traced to an Internet chat room called "Kids the Light of Our Lives" that featured images of children being subjected to horrific sexual abuse, including the streaming live videos.
Authorities said they used surveillance tactics normally used against terrorism suspects and drug traffickers to infiltrate the pedophile ring at its highest level.

Officials said the United States, Canada and Australia were Britain's main partners in the investigation, which involved agencies from 35 countries. The international investigation dated back to August 2006 until the ringleader's sentencing Monday.

The international probe began after Canadian officials — conducting their own long-running pedophile investigation — tipped off authorities in London about a possible British link.

A Canadian official said authorities there have arrested 24 Canadians and rescued seven Canadian children since late 2005.

[I'll omit the rest of the article, as MSNBC should keep the article up for a reasonable time. I just don't care to read it again to proof the post...]

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Jun 07 - 12:00 PM

CDC warns that antiques, such as clocks and thermometers, can pose mercury hazard
June 19, 2007 link

ALBANY, New York - Careful with that antique clock. It could pose a mercury hazard. The silvery, skittering, and toxic liquid can be found in some antiques. Mirrors can be backed with mercury and tin; Clock pendulums might be weighted with embedded vials of mercury; and barometers, thermometers and lamps may have mercury in their bases for ballast.

The problem is that mercury in old items can leak, particularly as seals age or when the items are moved, according to a study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Ask Ann Smith, whose heirloom clock's pendulum leaked mercury onto the carpet of her gift store in rural Delhi, New York, as a cleaner moved it. An attempt to vacuum the tiny silver balls off the carpet only made things worse, requiring a hazardous materials team to be dispatched to Parker House Gifts and Accessories last summer. "I didn't really think it was the hazard that it became," Smith said. "I grew up in the days when you played with the mercury that spilled out of a thermometer and nobody knew it was a problem."

Exposure to high levels of mercury can cause damage to the brain, heart, kidneys, lungs and immune system. Even the few ounces found in some antiques can be dangerous. Aptly nicknamed quicksilver, it's hard to clean up, and can become an inhalation hazard if it vaporizes.

Dr. Wanda Lizak Wells of the New York state Department of Health, co-author of the study, suggests getting professional help if even a few ounces spill from an old barometer.

And never use a vacuum. "That is one of the worst things that people can do," she said. The mercury can be heated up by the vacuum motor and vaporize. That was the mistake Smith's clock cleaner made at her shop near the Catskill Mountains. The vacuum was discarded as hazardous waste.

The amount of mercury in a fever thermometer, however, can be safely cleaned without expert assistance as long as proper steps are taken, like wearing old clothes and rubber gloves, according to Wells.

The study highlighted five other cases from 2000 through 2006 in New York state, which collects hazardous response data in a way that allowed researchers to identify cases involving antiques.

Among other examples in the report: A house in Long Island was cleared after two cups of mercury spilled onto a carpet from an antique clock that tipped over. Four workers at a New York City antique store were sent to the hospital for evaluation when mercury spilled from an antique clock column. A hazardous materials team was called to clean up more than an ounce of mercury from a Syracuse road after a spill involving an antique lamp.

Researchers said none of the incidents caused acute health problems. The CDC report noted that about a dozen states restrict the sale of products with mercury. Antiques experts say there are relatively few items that still contain it.

Among those that do are old barometers and thermometers, which account for only a small slice of the market.

Donald R. McLaughlin, a veteran antiques dealer in Ohio and president of the World Antique Dealers Association, said many such pendulum vials broke decades ago.

"There aren't many left," he said. "I rarely see them anymore, and I'm out every day."

Still, researchers urge people to inspect old items containing mercury to make sure the seals are tight. They recommend removing or replacing mercury components when possible, though they warn never to drain the mercury. When moving a piece containing mercury, researchers suggest placing it in a leak-proof container. And moving slowly.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 21 Jun 07 - 09:32 AM

Naked couple die from S.C. rooftop fall

June 20, 2007

COLUMBIA, S.C. --Police on Wednesday were investigating how a naked couple fell 50 feet from the roof of a downtown office building to their deaths.

The bodies were found on the road by a passing cabdriver around 5 a.m. Wednesday.

Clothing was discovered on the roof, leading authorities to suspect the man and woman, in their early 20s, may have been having sex. Their identities were not released.

"It's too early to rule out anything," Columbia police Sgt. Florence McCants said, but McCants said a preliminary investigation didn't show any sign of foul play.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: frogprince
Date: 21 Jun 07 - 10:23 AM

"I can't help,
falling in love, with, you..."

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 21 Jun 07 - 12:34 PM

Tokyo - Japan has returned to using the prewar name for the island of Iwo Jima - site of one of World War II's most horrific battles - at the urging of its original inhabitants, who want to reclaim an identity they say has been hijacked by high-profile movies like Clint Eastwood's "Letters from Iwo Jima." The new name, Iwo To, was adopted Monday by the Japanese Geographical Survey Institute in consultation with Japan's coast guard.

Surviving islanders evacuated during the war praised the move, but others said it cheapens the memory of a brutal campaign that today is inextricably linked to the words Iwo Jima.

Back in 1945, the small, volcanic island was the vortex of the fierce World War II battle immortalized by the famous photograph by Joe Rosenthal of The Associated Press showing Marines raising the American flag on the islet's Mount Suribachi.

Retired Marine Maj. Gen. Fred Haynes, who was a 24-year-old captain in the regiment that raised the flag on Mount Suribachi, was surprised and upset by the news.

"Frankly, I don't like it. That name is so much a part of our tradition, our legacy," said Haynes.

Haynes, 87, heads the Combat Veterans of Iwo Jima, a group of about 600 veterans that travels to the island every year for a reunion. He is working on a book about the battle called "We Walk by Faith: The Story of Combat Team 28 and the Battle of Iwo Jima." He doesn't plan to change the name.

"It was Iwo Jima to us when we took it," said Haynes. "We'll recognize whatever the Japanese want to call it but we'll stick to Iwo Jima." Before the war, the isolated spit of land was called Iwo To - pronounced "ee-woh-toh" - by the 1,000 or so people who lived there. In Japanese, that name looks and means the same as Iwo Jima - Sulfur Island - but it has a different sound.

The civilians were evacuated in 1944 as U.S. forces advanced across the Pacific. Some Japanese navy officers who moved in to fortify the island mistakenly called it Iwo Jima, and the name stuck. After the war, civilians weren't allowed to return and the island was put to exclusive military use by both the U.S. and Japan, cementing its identity.

Locals were never happy the name Iwo Jima took root. But the last straw came this year with the release of Eastwood's "Letters from Iwo Jima" and "Flags of Our Fathers," war films that only reinforced the misnomer.

In March, Ogasawara, the municipality that administers Iwo To and neighboring islands, responded by adopting a resolution making Iwo To the official name. Ogasawara residents and descendants of Iwo To evacuees petitioned the central government to follow suit.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 22 Jun 07 - 12:45 AM

Not fiction? Herman Munster's identity stolen

Thieves apparently didn't realize he is a fictional 1960s TV character

By Ted Bridis
The Associated Press
Updated: 1:51 p.m. CT June 20, 2007

WASHINGTON - Did Internet thieves steal Herman Munster's MasterCard number? Crooks in an underground chat room for selling stolen credit card numbers and personal consumer information offered pilfered data purportedly about Herman Munster, the 1960s Frankenstein-like character from "The Munsters" TV sitcom.

The thieves apparently didn't realize Munster was a fictional TV character and dutifully offered to sell Munster's personal details — accurately listing his home address from the television series as 1313 Mocking Bird Lane — and what appeared to be his MasterCard number. Munster's birth date was listed as Aug. 15, 1964, suspiciously close to the TV series' original air date in September 1964.

CardCops Inc., the Malibu, Calif., Internet security company that quietly recorded details of the illicit but wayward transaction, surmised that a Munsters fan knowledgeable about the show deliberately provided the bogus data.

"The identity thief thought it was good data," said Dan Clements, the company's president.

Clements said evidence indicates the thief, known online as "Supra," was operating overseas. "They really stumble over our culture. He's probably not watching any reruns of 'The Munsters' on TV Land."

Herman Munster was portrayed by Fred Gwynne, who died in July 1993.
"Phishing" thieves often trick consumers into revealing financial secrets by sending e-mail requests that appear to originate from banks. A consumer's financial details can be worth $4 and $40 among online thieves, who can use the information to open fraudulent credit accounts.

CardCops eavesdrops on conversations among thieves in underground Internet chat rooms to monitor for stolen credit card numbers being sold or traded. It offers monitoring services to alert consumers whose information is compromised by hackers.

© 2007 The Associated Press.

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Jun 07 - 12:56 AM

What you want to be the Herman Munster story makes it onto Wait, Wait! Don't Tell Me! this week?

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 22 Jun 07 - 01:10 AM

WP: CIA to air decades of dirty laundry

Assassination attempts, domestic spying among the abuses

By Karen DeYoung and Walter Pincus
The Washington Post
Updated: 10:52 p.m. CT June 21, 2007

The CIA will declassify hundreds of pages of long-secret records detailing some of the intelligence agency's worst illegal abuses -- the so-called "family jewels" documenting a quarter-century of overseas assassination attempts, domestic spying, kidnapping and infiltration of leftist groups from the 1950s to the 1970s, CIA Director Michael V. Hayden said yesterday.

The documents, to be publicly released next week, also include accounts of break-ins and theft, the agency's opening of private mail to and from China and the Soviet Union, wiretaps and surveillance of journalists, and a series of "unwitting" tests on U.S. civilians, including the use of drugs.

"Most of it is unflattering, but it is CIA's history," Hayden said in a speech to a conference of foreign policy historians. The documents have been sought for decades by historians, journalists and conspiracy theorists and have been the subject of many fruitless Freedom of Information Act requests.

In anticipation of the CIA's release, the National Security Archive at George Washington University yesterday published a separate set of documents from January 1975 detailing internal government deliberations of the abuses. Those documents portray a rising sense of panic within the administration of President Gerald R. Ford that what then-CIA Director William E. Colby called "skeletons" in the CIA's closet had begun to be revealed in news accounts.

An article about the CIA's infiltration of antiwar groups, published by New York Times reporter Seymour Hersh in December 1974, was "just the tip of the iceberg," then-Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger warned Ford, according to a Jan. 3 memorandum of their conversation.
Kissinger warned that if other operations were divulged, "blood will flow. For example, Robert Kennedy personally managed the operation on the assassination of [Cuban President Fidel] Castro." Kennedy was the attorney general from 1961 to 1964.

Worried that the disclosures could lead to criminal prosecutions, Kissinger added that "when the FBI has a hunting license into the CIA, this could end up worse for the country than Watergate," the scandal that led to the fall of the Nixon administration the previous year.

In a meeting at which Colby detailed the worst abuses -- after telling the president "we have a 25-year old institution which has done some things it shouldn't have" -- Ford said he would appoint a presidential commission to look into the matter. "We don't want to destroy but to preserve the CIA. But we want to make sure that illegal operations and those outside the [CIA] charter don't happen," Ford said.

Treasure-trove of documents

Most of the major incidents and operations in the reports to be released next week were revealed in varying detail during congressional investigations that led to widespread intelligence reforms and increased oversight. But the treasure-trove of CIA documents, generated as the Vietnam War wound down and agency involvement in Nixon's "dirty tricks" political campaign began to be revealed, is expected to provide far more comprehensive accounts, written by the agency itself.

The reports, known collectively by historians and CIA officials as the "family jewels," were initially produced in response to a 1973 request by then-CIA Director James R. Schlesinger. Alarmed by press accounts of CIA involvement in Watergate under his predecessor, Schlesinger asked the agency's employees to inform him of all operations that were "outside" the agency's legal charter.

This process was unprecedented at the agency, where only a few officials had previously been privy to the scope of its illegal activities. Schlesinger collected the reports, some of which dated to the 1950s, in a folder that was inherited by his successor, Colby, in September of that year.

But it was not until Hersh's article that Colby took the file to the White House. The National Security Archive release included a six-page summary of a conversation on Jan. 3, 1975, in which Colby briefed the Justice Department for the first time on the extent of the "skeletons."

Operations listed in the report began in 1953, when the CIA's counterintelligence staff started a 20-year program to screen and in some cases open mail between the United States and the Soviet Union passing through a New York airport. A similar program in San Francisco intercepted mail to and from China from 1969 to 1972. Under its charter, the CIA is prohibited from domestic operations.
Colby told Ford that the program had collected four letters to actress and antiwar activist Jane Fonda and said the entire effort was "illegal, and we stopped it in 1973."

Among several new details, the summary document reveals a 1969 program about CIA efforts against "the international activities of radicals and black militants." Undercover CIA agents were placed inside U.S. peace groups and sent abroad as credentialed members to identify any foreign contacts. This came at a time when the Soviet Union was suspected of financing and influencing U.S. domestic organizations.

The program included "information on the domestic activities" of the organizations and led to the accumulation of 10,000 American names, which Colby told Silberman were retained "as a result of the tendency of bureaucrats to retain paper whether they needed it or acted on it or not," according to the summary memo.

CIA surveillance of Michael Getler, then The Washington Post's national security reporter, was conducted between October 1971 and April 1972 under direct authorization by then-Director Richard Helms, the memo said. Getler had written a story published on Oct. 18, 1971, sparked by what Colby called "an obvious intelligence leak," headlined "Soviet Subs Are Reported Cuba-Bound."

Getler, who is now the ombudsman for the Public Broadcasting Service, said yesterday that he learned of the surveillance in 1975, when The Post published an article based on a secret report by congressional investigators. The story said that the CIA used physical surveillance against "five Americans" and listed Getler, the late columnist Jack Anderson and Victor Marchetti, then a former CIA employee who had just written a book critical of the agency.

"I never knew about it at the time, although it was a full 24 hours a day with teams of people following me, looking for my sources," Getler said. He said he went to see Colby afterward, with Washington lawyer Joseph Califano. Getler recalled, "Colby said it happened under Helms and apologized and said it wouldn't happen again."
Personal surveillance was conducted on Anderson and three of his staff members, including Britt Hume, now with Fox News, for two months in 1972 after Anderson wrote of the administration's "tilt toward Pakistan." The 1972 surveillance of Marchetti was carried out "to determine contacts with CIA employees," the summary said.

'A very different time'

CIA monitoring and infiltration of antiwar dissident groups took place between 1967 and 1971 at a time when the public was turning against the Vietnam War. Agency officials "covertly monitored" groups in the Washington area "who were considered to pose a threat to CIA installations." Some of the information "might have been distributed to the FBI," the summary said. Other "skeletons" listed in the summary included:

The confinement by the CIA of a Russian defector, suspected by the CIA as a possible "fake," in Maryland and Virginia safe houses for two years, beginning in 1964. Colby speculated that this might be "a violation of the kidnapping laws." The "very productive" 1963 wiretapping of two columnists -- Robert Allen and Paul Scott -- whose conversations included talks with 12 senators and six congressmen. Break-ins by the CIA's office of security at the homes of one current and one former CIA official suspected of retaining classified documents. CIA-funded testing of American citizens, "including reactions to certain drugs."

The CIA documents scheduled for release next week, Hayden said yesterday, "provide a glimpse of a very different time and a very different agency."

Barred by secrecy restrictions from correcting "misinformation," he said, the CIA is at the mercy of the press. "Unfortunately, there seems to be an instinct among some in the media today to take a few pieces of information, which may or may not be accurate, and run with them to the darkest corner of the room," Hayden said.
Hayden's speech and some questions that followed evoked more recent criticism of the intelligence community, which has been accused illegal wiretapping, infiltration of antiwar groups, and kidnapping and torturing terrorism suspects.

"It's surely part of [Hayden's] program now to draw a bright line with the past," said National Security Archive Director Thomas S. Blanton. "But it's uncanny how the government keeps dipping into the black bag." Newly revealed details of ancient CIA operations, Blanton said, "are pretty resonant today."

© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Check frequently as the information is published, to see if your name's there.

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 22 Jun 07 - 01:13 AM

The CIA release obviously is going to cause a lot of commotion amongst the media.

My question is:

What are they doing that merits a distraction of this magnitude at this time.?

What are we supposed to not notice while everyone's pointing fingers over this release?

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 22 Jun 07 - 11:41 PM

That's the question of the hour, all right, John!


A

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 23 Jun 07 - 01:33 AM

Thus far, MSNBC thinks the big news of the day is:

1. Paris Hilton gets out of jail on Tuesday.

2. The Vatican revoked the annulment of Joe Kennedy's first marriage.

I can't see that either of these needs a big diversion(?).

Or maybe they're part of the diversion.

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 23 Jun 07 - 08:51 AM

Hell, I was really confused for a few seconds over the Joe Kennedy annulment thing. I immediately thought of clan patriarch Joe, father of JFK, RFK and Ted. Was wondering if the Pope was planning on excommunicating the old bootlegger post mortem. But I'm awake now and it's all better.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 23 Jun 07 - 04:17 PM

From: The Register

Man Diagnosed With Heavy Metal Addiction


By Jan Libbenga → Published Wednesday 20th June 2007 12:52 GMT

The lifestyle of 42-year-old dishwasher Roger Tullgren from Hässleholm in southern Sweden has been classified as a disability by the Swedish Employment Service, which has agreed to pay part of Tullgren's salary, and his new boss has given him special dispensation to play loud music at work.

According to Swedish online newspaper The Local, Tullgren first developed an interest in heavy metal when his older brother bought a Black Sabbath album in 1971. Since then, Tullgren is a classic (albeit softly spoken) heavy metal head with tattoos and skull and crossbones jewellery. Last year he attended almost 300 heavy metal shows, while playing bass and guitar in two rock bands, including Silverland.

Tullgren says he has always had difficulty holding down a job, mainly because he is absent most of the time.

Psychologists decided Tullgren's obsession is nothing less than an addiction, which puts him in a difficult situation in the labour market. Tullgren said he has been fighting for recognition for a long time.

Many occupational psychologists in Sweden, however, are totally baffled by the decision. "If somebody has a gambling addiction, we don't send them down to the racetrack. We try to cure the addiction," deputy employment director Henrietta Stein for the Skåne region told The Local. ®

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 29 Jun 07 - 03:47 AM

The previously announced [see post here at 22 Jun 07 - 01:10 AM] release of the CIA "Family Jewels" has occured. Various reports and editorials are online, including at:

CIA opens the book on a shady past

Declassified 'family jewels' detail assassination plots, break-ins, wiretaps
By Alex Johnson
Reporter
MSNBC
Updated: 3:25 p.m. CT June 26, 2007

As this and other articles editorialize mildly but don't report much that's very specific, after extensive research (i.e. I read my local newsrag yesterday) I found that the important thing to know is that you can view the actual released pages at:

http://www.foia.cia.gov/

Actually, at this last link, you can view a couple of CIA FOI releases, and lots of propaganda about how "citizen friendly" the CIA is.

The glitch is that apparently the most recent release can only be viewed one page at a time, and there reportedly are about 700 (one report said 670?) pages. There is an input box where you can skip to a specific page, so if someone finds something that actually is interesting - PLEASE REPORT A PAGE NUMBER so the rest of us lazy b...ds can go look.

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: wysiwyg
Date: 29 Jun 07 - 01:34 PM

Fake Priest Arrested At Baptism

A Portugese baptism was disrupted when police stormed in to seize the fake priest conducting the service.

Just as the imposter was conducting his blessing police entered and arrested him, a member of the church was quoted by local daily Jornal de Noticias as saying.

A spokeswoman for the Portuguese police said the 34-year-old man was arrested on June 16th suspicion of impersonating a priest and had several similar arrest warrants to his name.

Spokeswoman Amelia Moutinho said, "We had to interrupt the religious ceremony to identify the suspect." The baby was later baptized by a real priest.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Jul 07 - 11:38 AM

Photo ID not needed to fly

Star-Telegram link

Nobody looked me in the eye. Nobody asked me any questions. I was standing at Philadelphia International Airport last week waiting to fly home after a conference. I had lost my wallet and all my photo identification cards, including my Texas driver's license.

Aside from losing my wallet, I also lost sleep. Worrying. I couldn't return home on a commercial airline without proper identification. Or could I?

The answer might surprise you as much as it did me. What I learned also raises questions about whether, in the name of security, we are being misled by the government. But according to a former presidential adviser I talked to later, it's not a security mat ter as much as a question of fairness to all paying travelers. We aren't being told what we need to know.

Here's what happened:

At the airport, I stepped up to the U.S. Airways counter, not knowing whether they would let me on the plane. I presented my boarding pass to the employee and announced: "I don't have a photo ID."

Without looking up, she replied, "You can still fly."

She scribbled with a red marker on my boarding pass the following notation: "SSSS."

I walked to the security line and presented my boarding pass to the woman inspecting photo IDs and boarding passes. The woman, a non-TSA contract employee, didn't look at me either as she sent me into a glass holding area.

A Transportation Security Administration employee took me into a corner area where the SSSS travelers go.

SSSS, according to Internet sites, apparently stands for "Secondary Security Screening Selection." But you can't be sure, as the TSA won't tell you.

"We don't go into detail about what that signifies," TSA spokeswoman Andrea McCauley told me later.

The secondary screeners gathered around, but again, nobody looked me in the eye or asked any questions.

One man waved a security wand around my upper torso. Then he patted me down.

Two others went through the electronic equipment in my carry-on bag. They used an Ionscan machine to test swabs for traces of explosives on my BlackBerry, cellphone, iPod and other items.

"You can fly now," a TSA screener announced, again without looking at me.

Before I flew, I had called the airline and asked what to do. I was told that I needed to file a missing wallet report with the Philadelphia police so I could get an incident number. I did, but at the airport, nobody asked me anything.

Turns out there is no requirement that you produce a photo ID when you travel on a commercial airplane.

Originally, the TSA's Web site stated, "You must present a Boarding Pass and a Photo ID to get to the checkpoint and to your gate."

The latest TSA Web site language, however, states: "We encourage each adult traveler to keep his/her airline boarding pass and government-issued photo ID available until exiting the security checkpoint [children are not required to show identification]. The absence of proper identification will result in additional screening."

The TSA spokeswoman confirms: "If a passenger doesn't have one, like yourself, because it was lost, which does happen, then we do subject them to additional screening."

The change came after an unsuccessful lawsuit filed by John Gilmore, a millionaire founder of Sun Microsystems who is now a civic activist. On July 4, 2002, Gilmore tried to fly without presenting a photo ID. He was refused and filed suit against the government.

As his case traveled through federal courts, Gilmore kept losing his quest for information on the government's actual policy.

The federal government stated in court papers that the policy was secret and could not be divulged.

In Gilmore's pleading to the U.S. Supreme Court, which refused to hear the case, his lawyers wrote that keeping the policy secret "purposely or inadvertently causes transportation security officials to mislead the public. Passengers are consistently advised that federal law requires them to show identification. That representation is false, however."

Now the policy's intent is clearer, but the actual written policy is considered secret and is still not publicly available.

I turned to Ohio State University law professor Peter Swire, an expert on privacy matters, for further explanation. He served as President Clinton's chief counselor for privacy.

Gilmore's case was important to travelers for two reasons, he said. But neither has to do with security, because secondary screenings should keep passengers secure, he said.

"It's important for the government to tell us the law before they punish us," he says. "What if you drive to the airport and forget your driver's license and say, 'Oh, I can't visit Grandma,' or, 'I can't go to my business meeting'? A lot of people turn back from travel because they thought they didn't have a choice, when they really did have a choice.

"So there's a basic principle that citizens should know what the law is. But there's also the practical matter: Did people change their behavior and suffer harm because they didn't know what the rules were?"

What kind of harm? Some, he said, may skip their flight or buy a more expensive ticket to fly later after they fetched their ID. None of this applies to foreign travel where passports are always required. And travelers' names are still checked against the government's No-Fly list, the TSA says.

The TSA spokeswoman told me that our personal security is not harmed by those, like me, who fly without an ID. Bags are screened. Bodies are checked for weapons.

So actually, it's all about knowing what the requirements are when you fly. And now you do.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Jul 07 - 11:59 AM

U-Haul's practices found to raise risk of accidents

TUCSON, Ariz. -- Marissa Sternberg sits in her wheelchair, barely able to move or speak. Caregivers are always at her side. Progress is measured in tiny steps: an unclenched fist, a look of recognition, a smile for her father.

Nearly four years ago, Sternberg was a high-spirited 19-year-old bound for school in Denver. She rented a U-Haul trailer to move her belongings, hitched it to her Toyota Land Cruiser and hit the road with her two dogs and a friend.

That evening, as the Land Cruiser descended a hill in the Chihuahuan Desert of New Mexico, the trailer began to swing from side to side, pushing the SUV as if trying to muscle it off the road.

"I knew something bad was going to happen," recalled Corina Maya Hollander, who was taking a turn behind the wheel. "We both knew."

The Land Cruiser flipped and bounced along Interstate 25. The trailer broke free and careened off the road. Hollander crawled from the wreckage, her head throbbing.

Sternberg, thrown from the SUV, lay sprawled on the highway, unable to move. "Where are my dogs?" she screamed. "Somebody go find my dogs!"

Sternberg fell victim to a peril long familiar to U-Haul International: "trailer sway," a leading cause of severe towing accidents.

Traveling downhill or shaken by a sharp turn or a gust of wind, a trailer can begin swinging so violently that only the most experienced -- or fortunate -- drivers can regain control and avoid catastrophe.

U-Haul, the nation's largest provider of rental trailers, says it is "highly conservative" about safety. But a yearlong Los Angeles Times investigation, which included more than 200 interviews and a review of thousands of pages of court records, police reports, consumer complaints and other documents, found that company practices have heightened the risk of towing accidents. Among the findings:

The safest way to tow is with a vehicle that weighs much more than the trailer. Yet U-Haul allows customers to pull trailers as heavy as or heavier than their own vehicles.

It often allows trailers to stay on the road for months without a thorough safety inspection, in violation of its own policies.

Bad brakes have been a recurring problem with its large trailers. The one Sternberg rented lacked working brakes.

Its small and midsize trailers have no brakes at all, a policy that conflicts with the laws of at least 14 states.

It relaxed a key safety rule as it pushed to increase rentals of one type of trailer, used to haul vehicles, and then failed to enforce even the weakened standard. Customers were killed or maimed in ensuing crashes that might have been avoided.

The company's approach to mitigating the risks of towing relies heavily on customers, many of them novices, some as young as 18. They are expected to grasp and carry out detailed instructions for loading and towing trailers, and to respond coolly in a crisis. But many renters never see those instructions -- distribution of U-Haul's user guide is spotty.

To those who receive and read it, the guide offers this advice for coping with a swinging trailer: Stay off the car's brakes and hold the wheel straight. Many drivers will reflexively do the opposite, which can make the swaying worse.

Yet when accidents occur, U-Haul almost always blames the customer.

[snip]

This is a long article. Find the rest of it here. (I read it in the Star-Telegram but the L.A. Times originated it and their version has photos).

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Jul 07 - 06:18 PM

I've been watching this story with interest. The first excavator was lost and I figured that was the end of the story. But no, there are some intrepid sorts who don't seem to understand that if you look up "quagmire" in the dictionary there is a photo of the Ebby Slough area. :)

Ebey Island mud pit sucks in second excavator

link (and a nice photo)

An unforgiving mud pit on Ebey Island swallowed its second excavator Sunday, leaving a contractor scrambling to retrieve not one but two expensive pieces of heavy equipment. "About the best way to describe this is a case of bad luck and a bottomless pit," said Fred Gossler, one of the workers for Pacific Reign, which is based in Grays Harbor.

The company came to Everett after it agreed to pay RSC Equipment Rental of Arizona $38,000 for salvaging rights to the stuck 2006 John Deere 200. A similar excavator would fetch as much as $200,000 new. A four-man crew expected to spend just a few days extracting the excavator and walk away with a sweet deal. Then things began to sour.

"It's definitely an attraction," Gossler said of the stuck excavators, which resemble mechanical mastodons sinking into a primordial tar pit. Gossler said a number of "onlookers and tourists" stopped by and hiked past tall weeds for a closer look at the ill-fated rescue Monday and to wish the crew good luck in finding a way out of the mess. The highly visible scene is situated north of the U.S. 2 trestle, just west of an environmentally sensitive wetland preserve.

Jeff Emery, one of the partners who owns Pacific Reign, was operating the second excavator when it, too started sinking into the pit. He said he underestimated the weakness of the soil. His machine, resting on heavy wood pads, was tethered to the stuck yellow excavator with steel cables.

At first, Emery was able to budge the 20-metric-ton yellow excavator a bit from the thick mud. But it didn't take long for his orange Hitachi to start sliding off the boards and into the muck. "That stuff out there's got no mercy for nobody," said Emery, who worked until 3 a.m. Monday trying to free his rig. "I went out there blind and should've never went."

Gerry Stajcar, Emery's business partner, said a third excavator narrowly escaped getting mired. Stajcar described Emery as one of the most skilled heavy equipment operators he has ever met, good enough to guide an excavator to gracefully lift a hat off someone's head without touching a hair. But Emery apparently was no match for the mud pit of Ebey Island.

The story began when Jim Clemetson, 48, of Everett, tried to cut a road to land that his mother recently bought on the island for $65,000. Clemetson wanted to use the 4.5 acres to store trees and equipment for his landscaping business. His dreams were dashed, however, when he learned that the state Department of Transportation would not allow him to get to his land by crossing under the trestle.

Clemetson negotiated an easement with his neighbor, and began cutting a driveway with a practically new, rented yellow excavator. When it got stuck, he called for help. But the help split with his $15,000 before getting the job done and actually made things worse, Clemetson said. The Department of Ecology is investigating the case and said Clemetson did not have proper permits to operate in the wetlands.

As far as he knows, he is still responsible for replacing the excavator and has turned to an attorney to learn about his options. Clemetson, who said getting stuck was humiliating, found some comfort in knowing that he is not alone in slipping into the mud."Do I feel less stupid? Yes," he said.

Bruce King, Clemetson's neighbor, said it is fortunate that no one has been injured. So far, it's just equipment, he said. "Swamp: 2. Excavators: 0."

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 04 Jul 07 - 02:06 AM

Unfortunately, SRS, that's not a very rare kind of incident.

Recovery of a wimpy little thing like a John Deere 200 series excavator shouldn't really be that much of a problem, but skill in conventional use of heavy equipment does not necessarily qualify anyone for the specialized task of recovery of one that's gotten into the muck.

Rule number 1: Don't try to drive up close to the one that's stuck.

Obviously violated here.

A cousin fresh out of college was assigned recovery, under somewhat similar conditions, of one more similar to this one, only bigger as his first job with his new employer. It took them about three months. It was about 30 yards out into the lake (it slide down the slope for a ways after the driver bailed out), with a full bucket of mud. Part of the problem was finding anything big enough to move it.

Rule number 2: The recovery vehicle should be at least twice as big as the one that's stuck.

With a really good crew, you can cheat on #2 - sometimes. But it ain't good sense if you've got a choice.

According to some 'Nam vets, equipment left in similar conditions there was often stolen by locals using hand labor only, when they went back to get it with big recovery equipment - although I think some of my friends who related such stories may have been a little influenced by the tequila.

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 04 Jul 07 - 02:37 PM

I bet humans scrambling over the equipment and excavating by hand are the only way to get it out, actually. This recovery job was a fool's errand by someone with dollar signs in their eyes. I'm sure it isn't a rare occurrence. This one just happened to present itself front and center where the world can pass by on the trestle and watch their progress (or lack of it).

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 04 Jul 07 - 03:00 PM

1st time's charm for Miss Texas

Star-Telegram link

One should be Shilah Phillips' favorite number. The 25-year-old singer was crowned Miss Texas last year in her one and only try at capturing the title, which will be passed on to another young woman Saturday. The pageant is being held at Will Rogers Memorial Center Auditorium.

In an era when some young women spend years trying to achieve that goal, Phillips tried in her last year of eligibility.

"That was my only time," she said this week, flashing a bright smile at her naiveté about how pageants operate. "It was a one-shot thing."

Music is her passion, and she attended high school at the Denver School of Performing Arts. While a voice major at Collin County Community College, she was accepted to the University of North Texas' prestigious vocal jazz program, the same one where recording artist Norah Jones studied.

Phillips, an honor-roll student, worked three jobs but did not have enough money to pursue her dream.

"I was in a desperate situation," she said.

When friends suggested the Miss Texas Scholarship Pageant and the thousands of dollars it offers, she decided to enter a preliminary pageant. In borrowed clothes and a swimsuit she'd actually worn to a pool, she was named Miss Frisco, holding her shoulders as straight as her mother's friend had taught her.

Last year, as the field narrowed during the Miss Texas pageant, she said she could only concentrate on how much her scholarship fund was growing.

As she stood with only one other contestant, she remembers telling her, "Isn't this exciting? We're going to college!"

Even as she walked the runway where she was unsure what to do, she remembers, "I wasn't thinking 'I won a crown,' but 'I'm going to college.'"

Phillips' is the first African-American Miss Texas.

She is also the first rookie to win the title since 1980, said Randy Pruett, the unofficial Miss Texas historian.

Phillips went on to the Miss America Pageant where she was named first runner-up.

Her scholarship totals have reached nearly $41,000.

"This is a miracle," she said of her ability to complete her education at UNT. "This was a blessing from God. I needed this money. It's so fortunate I had this opportunity."

While serving as Miss Texas, she has spoken to more than 100,000 schoolchildren, said her business manager, Carol Fuller.

Phillips is frequently asked to give her inspirational talk.

"Every once in a while, there comes a girl with an 'it' factor," Fuller said. "I feel Shilah is the representative of that 'it' factor."

In the past year, Phillips has made her own lists of firsts: eating a homemade biscuit at Babe's Chicken Dinner House in Roanoke, tasting Dublin's Dr Pepper, meeting Dallas Cowboy veteran Emmitt Smith and riding a longhorn.

"Dreams can come true, especially when it comes to education," she said. "But there's hope. There's always hope, even when you feel like you've done all you can. You don't just quit. I didn't give up on myself."

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 05 Jul 07 - 06:32 AM


Price of machetes drops after elections

Price of machetes drops in Nigeria after elections as political violence ebbs

Reuters
Updated: 4:14 p.m. CT July 3, 2007

ABUJA, Nigeria - The price of machetes has halved in parts of Nigeria since the end of general elections in April because demand from thugs sponsored by politicians has subsided, the state-owned News Agency of Nigeria reported.

NAN surveyed prices in the northeastern state of Gombe and found that a good quality machete was now selling for 400 naira ($3) compared with 800 naira before the elections, which were marred by politically motivated violence in many states.

"A price survey on machetes, which served as a popular weapon among political thugs in the state, indicated ... a drop in the price of the implement," NAN reported over the weekend.

Machetes are primarily used as a tool for farming in Nigeria, but they are also popular among political gangsters.

"Before the conduct of the general elections, I was selling a minimum of seven machetes daily but can hardly sell one a day now," said Usman Masi, a trader quoted by NAN.

Africa's most populous country returned to civilian rule in 1999 after three decades of almost continuous army rule, but violence remains a feature of politics, especially during the build-up to elections.

European election monitors estimated that at least 200 people were killed in politically motivated violence during months of campaigning ahead of the April polls.

Copyright 2007 Reuters Limited

[Get yours now before the next campaign starts and prices go up again?]

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 06 Jul 07 - 12:00 PM

Rats influenced by the kindness of strangers
06 July 2007
NewScientist.com news service


If rats benefit from the kindness of strangers they are more likely to assist an unfamiliar rat in future. In doing so, they provide the first evidence of an unusual form of altruism that appears to violate evolutionary theory.

Claudia Rutte and Michael Taborsky of the University of Berne, Switzerland, trained rats to pull a lever that released food for their partner in the next cage. If the rats subsequently received snacks released by lever-pulling strangers in neighbouring cages, they were more likely to lever-pull and so feed another unfamiliar rat in the future. In other words, the rats became altruistic in response to a general level of cooperation in the population.

Theoretically, such "generalised reciprocity" shouldn't exist. In large groups, dirty rats will take advantage of helpful strangers and offer nothing in return.

It persists, says Taborsky, because exploited animals move away. "An animal is more likely to leave the group if it didn't receive cooperation in the past," he says. "This leads to cooperative and uncooperative groups in a population." If cooperative groups are better at exploiting the environment, generalised reciprocity remains in the population (PLoS Biology, DOI: 10.1371/journal.pbio.0050196).

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 08 Jul 07 - 09:45 PM

Cement in fillings tied to dental aids' asthma

Women with daily exposure had higher risk of respiratory issues, study says

Reuters
Updated: 4:15 p.m. CT July 6, 2007

Dental assistants who work with substances called methacrylates may be at risk of developing asthma or chronic respiratory symptoms, a study has found.

Methacrylates are used in dental filling materials and bonding agents, like those used to cement porcelain veneers, crowns and orthodontic brackets. Dental assistants are exposed to airborne methacrylate particles when mixing these materials or during placement or removal of dental restorations.

In the new study, researchers found that among 799 Finnish dental assistants, those with greater methacrylate exposure had higher risks of developing asthma or respiratory problems like chronic nasal symptoms, hoarseness and breathing difficulty.

"The results suggest that exposure to methacrylates poses an important occupational hazard for dental assistants," the study authors report in the journal Allergy.

"The risks to respiratory health are related to inhaling these substances," lead author Dr. Maritta S. Jaakkola, of the University of Birmingham in the UK, told Reuters Health.

Probably the most important protective measure is for dentists to install exhaust systems in areas where assistants work with methacrylates, Jaakkola said.

Prolonged problem

The findings are based on questionnaire responses from 799 female dental assistants. The researchers asked the women how often they performed tasks like mixing dental fillings and sealings, and whether they'd been diagnosed with asthma or frequently suffered respiratory symptoms — like a stuffy nose, cough or breathlessness.

Overall, the study found, women who'd been exposed to methacrylates every day for the past three months were nearly three times more likely than less-exposed dental assistants to report adult-onset asthma. They also showed higher risks of nasal symptoms and work-related coughing.

The risk of respiratory symptoms appeared to grow the longer women had been on the job, and those who'd suffered allergies as children seemed particularly susceptible.

In general, dental assistants who reported daily exposure to methacrylates for more than 10 years had higher risks of hoarseness, breathlessness and wheezing. Among assistants with a history of childhood allergies, those who reported daily methacrylate exposure had a fourfold increased risk of adult-onset asthma, and a twofold higher rate of nasal symptoms.

Besides exhaust systems to clear the air, gloves also offer dental assistants protection from methacrylates, Jaakkola noted. The substances can cause skin reactions, she explained, and it's also possible that sensitization to methacrylates through skin contact makes some people more susceptible to suffering respiratory effects as well.

Copyright 2007 Reuters Limited.

[One might have thought that a responsible reporter would have commented on the consumer use of these same products - as in the ubiquitous "Super Glue."(?)]

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 09 Jul 07 - 04:07 AM

Money doesn't grow on trees for one robber

Failed burglar, covered in leaves, 'really went out on a limb,' officer says

The Associated Press
Updated: 5:23 p.m. CT July 8, 2007

MANCHESTER, N.H. - Leaf it to New Hampshire, where a bank branch was held up by a man disguised as a tree.

Just as the Citizen Bank branch opened Saturday morning, a man walked in with leafy boughs duct-taped to his head and torso, and robbed the place.

"He really went out on a limb," police Sgt. Ernie Goodno said Sunday.

Police said the leafy man didn't saying anything about having a weapon, just demanded cash, and was given an undisclosed amount.

Although the branches and leaves obscured much of the man's face, someone who saw images from the bank's security camera recognized the robber and called police.

Officers said James Coldwell, 49, was arrested early Sunday at his Manchester home and charged with robbery. Arraignment was not expected until Monday.

© 2007 The Associated Press.

Another use for duct tape.

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Jul 07 - 10:50 AM

Darn! I checked your link but they didn't have a shot from the survelliance camera. I wondered what species of tree he selected. :)

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 09 Jul 07 - 11:47 AM

"If you were a bank robber, what kind of tree would you be?"...a New Age psychotherapy quiz... dang, this gets confusing. It's not as if the criminal world weren't already quite FUBAR what with Cheney out performing the Mafia anymore. But now they are hauling in identitity crises involving other species!! This is just too much. Or too many. Whoever.


A

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JennyO
Date: 09 Jul 07 - 11:50 AM

Probably some kind of shade tree for a shady character. It must have been his local branch, because someone saw images on the security camera and twigged that it was him. I expect he'll be planted firmly in jail soon, and it will be a long time before he leaves.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 09 Jul 07 - 12:23 PM

SO he'll end up rooting around in the Big Houose exercise yard, looking for a nitrogen fix? Ya gotta get your fix -- if nodule die.

A

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 09 Jul 07 - 12:25 PM

Stilly just wanted to see a "woodie."

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: curmudgeon
Date: 09 Jul 07 - 12:33 PM

To see the picture, look   here -- Tom

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 09 Jul 07 - 12:37 PM

He must have thought the bank was in Dunsinane.

(Raucous Stratocaster arpeggios followed by hefty stomping blues riffs, dominant--subdominant--tonic-->dominant)

I shall not ever fear of death or bane.
No, I shall not ever fear of death or bane.
'Til Burnham forest
Come to Dunsinane.

Oh, rock, Lady, rock
Rock, Lady, rock
Rock, Lady, Rock!
Down home in Dunsinane....

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JennyO
Date: 09 Jul 07 - 01:16 PM

Oh, I thought this might have been him.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 09 Jul 07 - 01:18 PM

Me Thain? That's a gas man!

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Jul 07 - 03:18 PM

Looks like a red oak (not of the Entish variety, however).

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 10 Jul 07 - 06:32 PM

Amazing, and absolutely unbelievable?

Former surgeon general says he was muzzled

Claims Bush administration kept him from speaking on controversial issues

Reuters
Updated: 3:51 p.m. CT July 10, 2007

WASHINGTON - The first U.S. surgeon general appointed by President George W. Bush accused the administration on Tuesday of political interference and muzzling him on key issues like embryonic stem cell research.

"Anything that doesn't fit into the political appointees' ideological, theological or political agenda is ignored, marginalized or simply buried," Dr. Richard Carmona, who served as the nation's top doctor from 2002 until 2006, told a House of Representatives committee.

"The problem with this approach is that in public health, as in a democracy, there is nothing worse than ignoring science, or marginalizing the voice of science for reasons driven by changing political winds. The job of surgeon general is to be the doctor of the nation, not the doctor of a political party," Carmona added.

Carmona said Bush administration political appointees censored his speeches and kept him from talking out publicly about certain issues, including the science on embryonic stem cell research, contraceptives and his misgivings about the administration's embrace of "abstinence-only" sex education.

Carmona's comments came two days before a Senate committee is due to hold a hearing on Bush's nomination of Dr. James Holsinger as his successor. The administration allowed Carmona to finish his term as surgeon general last year without a replacement in place.

Gay rights activists and several leading Democrats have criticized Holsinger for what they see as "anti-gay" writings, but the White House has defended him as well qualified.

U.S. surgeons general in the past have issued influential reports on subjects including smoking, AIDS and mental health.

"Political interference with the work of the surgeon general appears to have reached a new level in this administration," said Rep. Henry Waxman, a California Democrat who chairs the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee to which Carmona testified.

"The public expects that a surgeon general will be immune from political pressure and be allowed to express his or her professional views based on the best available science," he said.

Carmona said he was politically naive when he took the job, but became astounded at the partisanship and manipulation he witnessed as administration political appointees hemmed him in.

Bush in 2001 allowed federal funding for human embryonic stem cell research, but only with heavy restrictions that many scientists condemn as stifling.

Carmona said the administration prevented him from voicing views on stem cell research. Many scientists see it as a promising avenue for curing many diseases. But because it involves destroying human embryos, opponents call it immoral.

Carmona said he was prevented from talking publicly even about the science underpinning the research to enable the U.S. public to have a better understanding of a complicated issue. He said most of the public debate over the matter has been driven by political, ideological or theological motivations.

"I was blocked at every turn. I was told the decision had already been made -- stand down, don't talk about it," he said.

Carmona testified with two predecessors, Dr. C. Everett Koop, who served under President Ronald Reagan, and Dr. David Satcher, named by Clinton but whose term ended under Bush.

Carmona said some of his predecessors told him, "We have never seen it as partisan, as malicious, as vindictive, as mean-spirited as it is today, and you clearly have worse than anyone's had."

©2007 Reuters Limited

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Jul 07 - 09:36 PM

I heard an interview with him on The News Hour (PBS) this evening.

I'm not in the least bit surprised. Bush should be held criminally liable for so many of his acts as chief executive, and this is one more. Denying good health care and research because of his fundamentalist support base.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Jul 07 - 09:36 PM

gotta do something for the big 800:

Potter Fans Beg Rowling to 'Save Harry!'

By Peter Griffiths
Reuters
Monday, July 9, 2007; 8:40 AM

LONDON (Reuters) - Thousands of Harry Potter fans have signed a petition urging J.K. Rowling to keep writing novels about the boy wizard after she admitted she could "never say never" to more books.

The "Save Harry!" petition calls on Rowling to reverse her decision to end the bestselling series with the seventh and final installment, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows."

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Jul 07 - 09:37 PM

The Potter link is here.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 11 Jul 07 - 12:47 AM

(Stilly wasn't sure the count was right, so she saved a bit to get one more post in just in case?)

John