July 11, 2008
— Ace Maybe a bit more than I thought. Confederate Yankee informs me that of the 21 people killed by the weapons, eighteen were killed due to misfire and detonation on their launchers. (Though 16 of those 18 are civilians -- mostly innocent civilians, I guess.)
That seems like an important bit of information.
Still, General Hammond, in that AFP article linked below, called the weapons the "most serious threat" US troops are currently facing.
So they're still not a joke. But Confedrate Yankee may have it right by calling them "crude, desperate" weapons. And yet even crude, desperate weapons can kill innocents and servicemen.
This does seem to undermine the WaPo's slant here, though, that ingenious, cunning terrorists can beat all our technological prowess and billions of dollars worth of high-tech defensive equipment and armor with their fiendishly crafty and low-tech improvised weapons designs.
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12:28 PM
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— Ace No, really. At least that's the finding of a Japanese study noted in an AHA journal... but note the advice only applies to men.
Heavy drinking may protect men from heart disease, although it raises the risk in women, a Japanese study in the American Heart Association's journal Stroke found.Men who consumed four or more alcoholic drinks a day lowered the risk of dying from heart disease by 19 percent, while women drinking the same amount quadrupled their risk, the study, led by Hiroyasu Iso, professor at Osaka University, found. The risk of stroke increased in both men and women.
You know, these people can't seem to figure out something that seems rather easily determined by experimentation. You have lots of people, you monitor their drinking, you see what it does to their hearts and health. It's all empirical. No "computer modeling" required.
And yet the "science is settled" about global warming.
Oh, and PS, giving up drinking may cause depression. Shut up, really?!?!
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12:03 PM
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— Ace A bit of background on the new weapon:
Suspected Shiite militiamen have begun using powerful rocket-propelled bombs to attack U.S. military outposts in recent months, broadening the array of weapons used against American troops.
U.S. military officials call the devices Improvised Rocket Assisted Munitions, or IRAMs. They are propane tanks packed with hundreds of pounds of explosives and powered by 107mm rockets. They are often fired by remote control from the backs of trucks, sometimes in close succession. Rocket-propelled bombs have killed at least 21 people, including at least three U.S. soldiers, this year.The latest reported rocket-propelled bomb attack occurred Tuesday at Joint Security Station Ur, a base in northeastern Baghdad shared by U.S. and Iraqi soldiers. One U.S. soldier and an interpreter were wounded in the attack.
U.S. military officials say IRAM attacks, unlike roadside bombings and conventional mortar or rocket attacks, have the potential to kill scores of soldiers at once. IRAMs are fired at close range, unlike most rockets, and create much larger explosions. Most such attacks have occurred in the capital, Baghdad.
The use of the rocket-propelled bombs reflects militiamen's ability to use commonly available materials and relatively low-tech weaponry to circumvent security measures that have cost the U.S. military billions of dollars. To combat roadside bombs, known as improvised explosive devices or IEDs, U.S. and Iraqi troops have set up scores of checkpoints throughout the capital, increased patrols and purchased hundreds of armored vehicles that can resist such attacks.
The WaPo seems to be overhyping the IRAM as a terror weapon "capable of killing scores of soldiers at once," even though IEDs have wiped out whole truckfulls of soldiers at once, and so far the IRAMs have only killed two US soldiers this year. But one of those was Bronze-Star medic Bill McMillan, killed by an IRAM just Tuesday.
Even if WaPo is exaggerating its capabilities, it's been called "the most serious threat" our troops now face, and it's becoming the terrorists' weapon of choice.
So it's gratifying that US troops snatched up a guy they're calling a potential "big lead" in rolling up the bomb-makers.
In related news, a captured "insurgent" has led troops to discover the bodies of the first servicemen killed in the surge -- Private Byron Fouty, 19, and Sergeant Alex Jimenez, 25 -- captured in an ambush more than a year ago.
Note a year ago we couldn't find them, despite a massive effort. Now we catch one of the guys who apparently had a hand in their deaths (or at least their burials). Maybe I'm reading too much into what might be pure happenstance, but it does appear that a year ago, the battlefield was filled with red zones and black holes for us, and now, it's filled with red zones and black holes for the terrorists.
Little News is Good News: With one third of July past, only three US servicemen have died in Iraq, and one due to non-battle related causes.
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11:05 AM
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— Ace Obama with an insignificant one-point edge.
Can McCain actually win this thing? I can't help shake the feeling of doom. Well, Hope, Change, and Doom.
Let's just hope McCain doesn't take the lead. In six of the last nine competitive presidential elections, the man ahead in July went on to lose in November.
Related: Michigan's dire economy, and dire leadership, just might flip the blue state red.
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10:48 AM
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— Ace Horror.
The US was listening in as FARC leader Nancy Conde phoned Miami contacts asking them for satellite phones. The FBI arrested the contacts, then double-agented them and coerced them to put Conde in touch with a company which would deliver them their precious phones -- a front company manned by the FBI.
They got their phones -- all wiretapped up, of course.
FARC used them, not realizing all their communications were compromised.
This led to the liberation of the 15 long-held hostages.
I wonder if the freed hostages believe their civil rights were more compromised by the US government or the terrorist FARC army the left is so protective of.
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10:31 AM
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— Purple Avenger ...by decapitation in a 90mph crash driving through someone's yard, hitting a hummer and totaling it.
the 16-year-old was driving at least 90 mph when he crashed...into a wooden fence before hitting a Hummer...decapitated by a wooden fence post...Sgt. S. Wolverton said. "It may just be driver inexperience."I've been driving for decades, but I can't say that I have any experience at all doing 90 through someone's yard. I'm not really sure having a lot of experience doing that sort of thing would have helped him too much with the fence post anyway. Fence posts are notoriously uncooperative and insensitive to the high speed driving training needs of youth. No mention if alcohol was involved, but I'm pretty sure Darwin was.
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10:30 AM
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— Ace Dad?
Authorities have charged a Maysville man they say left behind his severely injured children after a crash and then tried to carjack a vehicle from a couple who stopped to help.
...According to the Highway Patrol, there were six people in a Suzuki Sidekick with Meadows - three adult males and three children less than 10 years old - on the night of July 4 as he drove northwest on Smith Road near Riggs Road.
At 11:30 p.m., Meadows drove off the right side of the road and overcorrected, causing the Sidekick to flip over and land in a ditch, said Highway Patrol Trooper J.L. Morton. The three children in the car with Meadows were not wearing seat belts, and two were ejected from the car as it overturned.
Meadows is accused of causing "amputated arm and serious leg injuries" to his niece and serious injuries to two other children, including a broken collar bone and severe leg injuries, according to multiple warrants.
"The impaired driving offense was the proximate cause of the serious injuries," Morton states in those warrants.
After the accident, Meadows left the children lying on the ground and tried to take a 1998 Trans-Am from a couple who stopped to help, authorities said.
Meadows is accused of assaulting the female passenger in the Trans-Am by "punching her in the face several times, causing a bloody nose and swelling"...
He was unable to gain control of the car by the time the Highway Patrol and Sheriff's Department deputies arrived. Deputies used a stun gun to subdue Meadows after he charged EMS workers who were treating his children at the scene, according to the Sheriff's Department.
The daughter's arm was amputated. Another passenger lost a hand.
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10:00 AM
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— Ace Last week I noted a Boston Globe story about a public-private partnership to build new housing for poor people in Chicago that Obama had championed. The neighborhoods quickly became blighted areas, and in fact wound up turning neighboring areas into slums as well. And Obama's political buddies made money on the project. Just the people of Chicago actually suffered.
Second verse, same as the first. Obama's plan for urban beautification via a lovely botanical garden results in one (1) plywood gazebo and a rich sampling of busted concrete and broken beer bottles as well as the featured display, Weeds and Spent Condoms from All Around the World.
As Captain Ed concedes, Obama is right that it is up to the Executive to actually execute -- up to a point. But has this asshole ever heard of the concepts of follow-through, oversight, lobbying, and taking responsibility for one's own boondoggles?
This guy has done next to nothing in elected office (or prior to elected office, for that matter). And even his shockingly thin resume seems bullet-pointed with nothing but failure.
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09:38 AM
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— Ace That's what they did, or rather, they simply did not air that clip, only airing the "talking down to black people" remarks. I saw O'Reilly was pretty defensive about it; people were writing in to call him a sell-out and etc.
I disagree, but weakly. It should have run; it was part of the story, part of what people were talking about (Wolf Blitzer, for example, alluded to those remarks several times while interviewing Jackson about them), and certainly demonstrates an emotional texture to the remarks that the dry "talking down to black people" statements did not.
On the other hand, FoxNews has a reputation for sensationalism and tawdriness, a reputation due to 1) the constant criticism they get from the rest of the tut-tutting liberal media, which prefers to only sensationalize stories which hurt Republicans and 2) the fact that they are, in fact, sensationalistic and often tawdry, so perhaps they were trying to avoid that charge in this case by soft-pedaling the comments.
But it seems a strange case in which to make that stand -- the comment seemed perfectly newsworthy to me.
Correction: I'm told FoxNews did air the comment, though they bleeped out "nuts" (but ran a subtitle including the word).
Sorry... when I saw the clips aired, I didn't see that. I assumed, wrongly, that that was all that was aired.
So I guess I don't really see the controversy at all.
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09:06 AM
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— Ace His point is that the signals for war aren't military, chiefly, but political, and the politics signal giving Iran six more weeks to show some responsiveness to diplomacy before Israel is given the go-ahead.
I find this part of the analysis unlikely:
I can't say I'm excited about this bill, but I can live with it, perhaps literally. Following an attack on Iran by Israel, Iran is not going to find much success trying to sink the USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72) in the Indian Ocean, but they might have a great deal of success killing you and me here in America. We don't believe for one second that Iran is going to abide by the Geneva Conventions and not intentionally support the killing of American civilians in North America. If war happens, they are as likely if not more likely to attack here than in the Gulf. Whether you like it or not, there was absolutely no way the Democrats, including Barack Obama, were going to leave the possibility open that Israel attacks Iran, and the US gets hit by terrorist attacks inside the US while the FISA bill wasn't passed.This is a key point. The Democratic Party in mass shifted from a core position. This doesn't happen without keen awareness to some strategic condition. Clearly some outside force has produced conditions which are far outside the scope of national politics, because nothing short of insight and real concern for political survival would Democrats find inspiration for such a massive policy shift with virtually no explanation to its core constituency. This is a major reason, and to Democrats scratching still their heads, an obvious sign we believe that Israel has demanded a time table.
But what do I know.
Thanks to Robb.
Related: Arab states hint at "Meh, do what you want" attitude regarding attacking Iran.
Then again, they've also stated there is no plan to ramp up production on an emergency basis should war break out and oil delivery be disrupted, which is a polite way of saying "If you do this, you're screwed."
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08:53 AM
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