Tuesday, August 10, 2004

It was a member of al-Ca'eta. Racial profiling may be too controversial too touch but just wait until somebody suggests species profiling: An escaped pet cat created a scare on a Belgian airliner, forcing the crew to turn back to Brussels 20 minutes into its journey. "We 100% support the decision made by the captain," Geert Sciot, the airline's communication vice-president, told the BBC. Nobody, he said, could tell what an agitated cat what might do in the circumstances, scrabbling around... [Samizdata.net] No doubt the Terrorist Safety Administration will now ban cats from the passenger compartment, lest some future would-be terrorist be foiled by an assault kitty. (I've never yet met a cat that wasn't more courageous than the average American.) 8:41:02 PM    comment () Bush Team on Defensive Over al-Qaeda Leak. One of the greatest coups in Washington's nearly three-year war against al-Qaeda has suddenly turned sour with reports the White House prematurely exposed the identity of a key source whose contacts and communication with the terrorist group's operational masterminds had yet to be fully exploited. The source, 25-year-old computer wizard Mohammed Naeem Noor Khan, had been cooperating with Pakistani police and the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) since he was quietly detained in Lahore on July 12, until the New York Times published his name last Monday after receiving a "background" briefing by the White House. The Bush administration, which had elevated the terror-warning level in three U.S. states on the basis of information acquired from Khan, set up the briefing to dispel public skepticism about the terrorism threat, particularly after it was disclosed that much of the information on which it was based was several years old. British and Pakistani intelligence agencies were reportedly furious with the leak, which forced UK police to hurriedly round up 13 al-Qaeda suspects who are alleged to have been in email communication with Khan. Five others who were sought by MI5 reportedly escaped capture, and there is some question that the British had gathered enough evidence to persuade a judge to keep the 13 detainees in custody, according to published reports. "The outing of Khan, probably the most important asset the U.S. has ever had inside al-Qaeda, is a huge disaster and a setback to attempts to finish off the top leadership of al-Qaeda," according to Juan Cole, a Middle East specialist at the University of Michigan, whose Web log (or "blog") "Informed Comment" is widely read in Washington. (link) Since Cole has indeed made the story his own, you can read more here and here. This particular article provides a good summary of the story so far. [Al-Muhajabah's Islamic Blogs] 7:46:01 PM    comment () # Claire Wolfe - "People Have Started Using the Expressions 'Claire Wolfe Time' and 'half past Claire Wolfe' to talk about how bad our loss of freedom is becoming." Guilty as charged. Claire comments on how sad it is that we've come to the place where normally peace-loving folks can be driven to the realization that they may have to personally shoot the bastards. I hate it too. I just want to be left alone to raise my family. Really. Hey! You! Dickhead! Leave me alone and I'll return the favor. Try to take away my liberty, and I'll stop you. Hard. [claire] Why must anyone be squeezed into making that choice in America, of all places? Nothing is more heartbreaking. Why the hell can't government's just get out of our way and let ordinary people go about their business unmolested? [End the War on Freedom] 7:16:37 PM    comment () Thanks to Lawrence Lee of UserLand, my aggregator is working again. The solution was to reset the aggregatorData.root file. 7:12:16 PM    comment () Radio's news aggregator still isn't working. Since it was the aggregator that got me started writing this weblog, that inevitably means less activity here. I've tried contact Userland about the problem, but they have a reputation for bad-to-nonexistent customer support, so I'm not holding my breath for a solution. 10:29:44 AM    comment () Police State USA. Liberty is lost through complacency and a subservient mindset. When we accept or even welcome automobile checkpoints, random searches, mandatory identification cards, and paramilitary police in our streets, we have lost a vital part of our American heritage. America was born of protest, revolution, and mistrust of government. Subservient societies neither maintain nor deserve freedom for long. [AntiWar.com] Ron Paul on "security" measures. 10:17:39 AM    comment () Frank Ney sent this to the smith2004-discuss mailing list: Here's a little heads-up on a new police tactic happening in my home town (Jefferson County WV). Had an interesting conversation with a victim thereof this weekend when I went down for a visit. Young man from Maryland was taking his grandfather to Charles Town Races http://www.ctownraces.com to play the video slots this past Friday night. While on the road, grandad lights a cigar using the in-car lighter. Unfortunately, they were under observation by a local cop, who decided that the little red glow (basically the only thing he could see) was moving in a manner similar to someone lighting a bong. Lights, stop, and accusation of pot use while driving. Get this: No pot in plain view, no paraphernalia in plain view. Just the cigar. No drug dog available for several hours. You would think that given all the case law that says you can't detain someone for that long for a drug dog would end the matter, right? Wrong. Without any moving violations or drug charges, the vehicle was impounded pending the availability of the aforementioned canine. The occupants were left on the side of the road. So, instead of spending money at the video terminals and having a good time, they had to find a motel room ($65) for the night, call a cab the next day ($12) to go to the impound lot ($100) on Saturday morning to get their car back. No drugs were found, obviously. So now we have two people who will go back to Maryland and tell all their friends and neighbors not to go to Charles Town Races, because the cops are total assholes. This is the kind of word-of-mouth a racetrack needs like a hole in the head. This sounds a bit on the illegal side, but who's going to spend several thousand dollars over this? When I heard this tale, I suggested that they go talk to the ACLU. 10:06:37 AM    comment ()

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