Well, I thought I was being punked, but I had that gold-standard AP imprimatur on the story. It seemed too absurd to be true, but then, it's AP, baby.

They've now retracted it.

What a douche I am to trust dubious content from AP.

Thanks to Dave In Texas for alerting me.

Posted by: Ace at 02:16 PM | Comments (7)
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The print version:

Moss was on a litter on the helicopterÂ’s floor; other wounded soldiers were positioned on the floor and in seats. Correa and Smith pushed the helicopterÂ’s speed to its limits.

Correa had previously flown medical evacuation missions in Iraq with the 30th Medical Brigade. For Smith, a former Bradley vehicle mechanic who went warrant, it was his first combat zone mission as a helicopter pilot.

“I didn’t really think about it until a couple of days later,” he said. “It was like, ‘wow, we had live ordnance on the helicopter.’”

Staff Sgt. Christian Roberts, the crew chief and veteran of medical evacuation flights in Iraq, said concerns for personal safety took a back seat to saving Moss.

“At the time, we weren’t thinking, ‘This helicopter could blow up,’” said Roberts, 33. “We were thinking, ‘This young soldier’s going to die and we need to get him some help.’”

“I never saw anybody with live ordnance in them,” he said. “I’ve seen decapitations, amputations, gunshot wounds to the head-- I never thought I’d be flying along with a patient who had something in him that could blow up in your face.”

Here's a video report, definitely a must-watch. His friends call him, um, "Rocket Man."

He's missing two thirds of his intestines and part of his hip and will need additional medical help, but he's, well, watch for yourself.

Thanks to William.

Posted by: Ace at 02:13 PM | Comments (22)
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Interesting point by K-Lo. She notes that Thompson doesn't seem particularly interested in serving as a moral leader for the pro-life cause, and wonders whether this actually helps Giuliani -- because, as she says, in practical terms both are vowing to nominate "better judges" and not too much more.

More Thompson Bashing: Well, not really bashing per se, but his trajectory in the polls is bad.

Posted by: Ace at 02:05 PM | Comments (14)
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This alligator is like an amphibious Walker, Texas Ranger.*

* It should be noted that Chuck Norris is in fact an amphibian, if one defines "amphibian" as "capable of surviving on both land and face-kicks."

Posted by: Ace at 01:24 PM | Comments (29)
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Allah commanded him to load the supersized A-380 Aurbus with hookers and foosball:

Once done, the Airbus A380, the world's biggest passenger plane, will be a "flying palace" for Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, the manufacturer announced Monday.

Airbus SAS would not give a specific price tag for the VIP double- decker jet, with its football field-length wings, saying only that it would cost more than the aircraft's list price of $320 million.

That doesn't even include the money the prince will spend to custom fit the nearly 6,000-square foot plane to include whatever he wants. The options include private bedrooms, a movie theater or even a gym with a jacuzzi. He'll also need a flight crew of about 15 to operate the luxury liner.

...

The prince, who is in his early 50s, appears to have a taste for super-sized jumbo jets. He already is the only private owner of a Boeing 747-400, Airbus said.

"It's like buying a new car or a new TV," Velupillai told The Associated Press. "One wants something bigger and better."

In related news, Palestinians are starving, and it's because the Jews won't feed them.

UPDATE/RETRACTION: This story read like a punking from the get-go. Well, it was a punking.

"Darkon." That's the name of their fantasy game.

Well, at least they defy the stereotype that role-playing gamers have fertile imaginations.

Here's a good name -- "Nightblade." I'm sure no one's used that before.

At any rate, if this article is as fresh as Dave from Garfield Ridge assures me, it's on the Independent Film Channel (IFC) tonight at 9 Eastern.

Not from this documentary, but an example of LARPing:

Posted by: Ace at 12:57 PM | Comments (23)
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From Drudge via NRO:

CNN's Wolf Blitzer has been warned not to focus Thursday's Dem debate on Hillary. 'This campaign is about issues, not on who we can bring down and destroy,' top Clinton insider explains. 'Blitzer should not go down to the levels of character attack and pull 'a Russert.''

Jim Geraghty writes:

I can't understand why any "top Clinton adviser" would be heard pre-emptively whining and issuing "warnings" to Wolf Blitzer. This all but guarantees that Blitzer has to hurl a bunch of hardballs Thursday night.

If Blitzer doesn't, he'll face the charges that he knuckled under worse than GQ in the face of Clintonite pressure. And those complaints won't just come from the right — they'll come from John Edwards, probably Barack Obama, and some corners of the MSM.

As the man says, "Developing..." and as that other man (?) parodied: "Leave Hillary Alone!!"

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 12:33 PM | Comments (32)
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Good attack. As a soft Giuliani supporter, I can only hope this impels Giuliani to break with bad record and make more tangible promises on immigration.

Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney, seeking to maintain his lead in this early-voting state, likened GOP rivals Rudy Giuliani and Mike Huckabee to Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton in supporting tuition breaks and broader sanctuary for illegal immigrants or their children.

"There are those people in both parties who are in a sanctuary state of mind, who believe in sanctuary cities, who believe in policies which are sanctuary in nature," the former Massachusetts governor said Tuesday, singling out two of his Republican opponents as well as the Democratic front-runner.

In campaign appearances and advertisements in Iowa and elsewhere, Romney is increasingly using illegal immigration to differentiate himself from the rest of his rivals. The issue is particularly salient in Iowa, given the state's influx of immigrants coming to work in fields and factories in recent years.

Romney contended that Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor, fought for tuition breaks for children of illegal immigrants in his state, while Giuliani, the former New York mayor, provided tuition breaks at the City University for illegal immigrants. He said that Clinton, too, backs such breaks.

"Giving a better deal to the children of illegal aliens than we give to U.S. citizens from surrounding states is simply not fair and not right," Romney told reporters during a one-day visit to western Iowa.

Giuliani spokeswoman Maria Comella, in turn, accused Romney of ignoring his record as governor while he campaigns for president. "Under Governor Mitt Romney the number of illegal immigrants skyrocketed, while he recommended millions of dollars in state aid to numerous sanctuary cities and to companies employing illegal immigrants, not to mention the illegals working on his own lawn," she said.

Eh. I don't care much for this "so are you" line of defense. Get right, or righter, on immigration, Mr. Mayor, or as someone said in an email, you're basically giving up the one strong winning issue the GOP has at the moment.

More campaign headlines under the fold.

more...

Posted by: Ace at 12:25 PM | Comments (11)
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To be honest, I'd forgotten that Tom "Don't Let Them Touch Me!" Tancredo was still running for president. He's been largely ignored in the past few weeks as pundits and the nightly news focus on Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani, and John McCain. This ad, which will be on TV in Iowa starting next week, will certainly get people talking.

The ad explicitly links terrorism and illegal immigration "because someone needs to say it." With a bloody body right in the middle this does not make for family-friendly viewing. It also qualifies as 110% on the Scare-the-Bejeezus-Out-of-Grandma Scale.

I've tucked it into the extended entry because we already have enough videos on the main page.

Oh: And while I'm thinking of it, the Republican version of the CNN-YouTube debate will be Wednesday, November 28th. There's still time to submit a question. I have. more...

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 11:54 AM | Comments (10)
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Hot Air linked this yesterday. In case you haven't seen it, it's mildly funny as it brings you back -- wayyyy back -- to the early nineties, when cell phones didn't really exist as we know them now and when sending a file of 150 KB was a very difficult task for a computer. I'm kind of eh on it myself, but it's amusing.

Incidentally, that post about Surnow's statements about 24 is coming. It's just hard to decide which hour I want to lose writing it up.

Thanks to dri for the link.

Posted by: Ace at 11:31 AM | Comments (14)
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