October 19, 2004

The US might be short of flu shots, and Canada might supply some of our extra supply to help bridge the gap. OK, but they have to buy it online! I expect my spam to change from all the Viagra shilling to: "Flu Shotz - online fast and cheap!" 3:32:17 PM

Glenn at Instapundit is pissed.   He doesn't have to be balanced, for all the reasons he states, and one more.... He IS balance to all the 'bad news only' on the Mass Media. I love this part: InstaPundit is not an unbiased news service. It consists entirely of my opinions and such links to factual items as I find interesting. Its whole purpose is as a vehicle for my biases, in fact. It is not unbiased and objective in any fashion, but rather is opinionated and slanted, much like other, more respectable, outlets such as The New York Times and TonyPierce.com. To quote the master:  Heh! 3:28:25 PM

Thousands of Peers. Jeff Jarvis makes a good point about the Jon Stewart/Crossfire confrontation: What's fascinating about the Jon Stewart takedown of Crossfire is not just what he said but how his message got distributed. Terry Heaton reports that there have been almost 400,000 downloads of the segment at iFilm (which is how I saw it) ... in addition to countless (literally, countless) BitTorrent downloads. This was a flood of viral distribution that came from viral promotion.... In old TV, a moment like this came and if you missed it, you missed it. Tough luck. In new TV, you don't need to worry about watching it live -- live is so yesterday -- because thousands of peers will be keeping an eye out for you to let you know what you should watch (we call that metadata now) and they'll record it and distribute it. The really stupid thing is that CNN didn't do this themselves: Hey, we had a red-hot segment with tsunami star Jon Stewart strangling our guys with a bow tie; you should watch; here, please, look at this free download because it will promote our bow-tie boy and our brand and our show and give us a little of that Stewart hip heat. That's what CNN should have done. Instead, they'll charge you to deliver a videotape (what's that?) the next day. [Hit and Run] 2:53:12 PM

Director of charity group kidnapped in Baghdad CTV - The director of the humanitarian group CARE International has been kidnapped in Iraq, and appeared in a video aired on Arab television network Al-Jazeera. Margaret Hassan, who has joint British-Iraqi citizenship, was abducted Tuesday morning on her way to work in Baghdad, CARE International, United Kingdom, said in a statement released in London. Just hours later, Hassan appeared in a video aired on Al-Jazeera. She was wearing a white blouse, and was talking but there was no audio. The video also showed pictures of her passport, credit and I.D. cards. 10:43:42 AM

"It has become clear that we (the democracy embracing Iraqi people) are their (the Islamo-terrorist's) worst nightmare, that ‘their people’ might open their eyes and work for a better future, that we embrace freedom, peace and a better life instead of hatred and death. This would mean that they have lost the war against the world because they have no *people* to support them and believe in their sick dreams. Now they wish they can kill us all, but they can’t, so the best thing they can do is to terrorize us, kill some of us randomly hoping that this would scare us enough to stop doing what we are doing, to stop living and join their craziness. Will they succeed? The answer is so clear to me but I hope that our allies see what our enemies have seen." - Iraq the Model 9:59:27 AM

Cleric Charged With Incitement in Britain ABC News - British prosecutors charged radical Islamic cleric Abu Hamza al-Masri on Tuesday with incitement to murder for allegedly urging followers to kill Jews and other non-Muslims, an indictment that pre-empted a U.S. bid to extradite him on terror charges. Al-Masri, the former head preacher at a mosque linked to several terrorism suspects, faces 11 terrorist charges in the United States. But a lawyer representing the U.S. government asked that the extradition case against him be suspended until the British charges are resolved, a request granted by the judge Tuesday. British prosecutors read out a 16-count indictment against al-Masri, including 10 charges soliciting or encouraging others to murder people who do not believe in the Islamic faith. Four of those 10 charges specify that al-Masri urged the killing of Jews. Prosecutors said the incitement to murder was contained in speeches recorded on tape to be used as evidence. 9:22:26 AM