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If you 'search the net' for events relating to drones ... take away the EquuSearch related results, you'll find that pretty much EVERY ONE OF THEM is some fucking moron doing something that either DID hurt someone, was dangers as shit, came very close to hurting someone, or certainly had the potential to hurt someone.

I've been paying attention to the almost daily news stories about "drones," and I have not observed what you claim. The vast majority are people spooked by multirotors hovering around.

A commercial drone at a wedding
A creepy guy flying a multirotor around a medical faciltiy
NYPD getting excited about another multirotor
FAA warns a multirotor pilot to stay at low altitude
"Drone" crashes in someones yard
"Drone" videos Pirates baseball game
Drug smuggling with a multirotor
"Drone" reported outside someone's apartment
"Drone" used to spy on French football team
Woman Attacking Teen with "drone"

Some of those were dangerous to aircraft, but most didn't involve manned aircraft, and no one was hurt or killed. There have been plenty of close calls with model planes, but there haven't been many actual collisions and I'm not finding any deaths due to collisions with manned aircraft.

In all likelihood there won't be either. Most of these "drones" are small and light. When they collide with manned aircraft they disintegrate and perhaps scratch some paint. Here is what happens when a aerobatic aircraft slams into a typical model plane. Balsa and foam don't rate against aircraft aluminum. Is a death possible? Of course. Obviously. However, I think the interval between such events will be many years and the fault will not be attributed to the drones in every case, either.

I'm with you in that the stupid among us are creating the need for regulation. Adding to the hysteria of it all with claims of imminent "danger" is not useful.

I've had parking spots that I claimed (blinker was on!) stolen from me. I didn't call the cops.

Jamaica Man Killed in Gun Battle Over Parking Space

Miami Barber Shot, Killed Over Parking Spot

Man Sentenced in Shooting Over Parking Space

Man critically hurt in Gold Coast shooting over parking spot

People are insane. Never forget this.

If Ukraine does go nuclear again they will only be following Putin's advice.

Is Ukraine about to go nuclear again?

Ironically, the notion of reacquiring nuclear weapons as a security guarantee is a position publicly advocated by Putin himself: "If you cannot count on international law, then you must find other ways to ensure your security. ... This is logical: If you have the bomb, no one will touch

Putin: Both causing and suggesting the solution to Ukraine's security problems. Thanks Vladimir Vladimirovich!

And look! He's turning up the heat because in brinkmanship too much is never enough.

Russia Threatens Invasion Unless Ukraine Stops Stopping Separatists

Dutch scramble jets after Russian bombers approach

The Dutch defense department says several NATO member countries scrambled jets Wednesday afternoon after a pair of Russian bomber planes approached their airspace over the North Sea.

The Dutch ministry identified the planes as two Russian TU-95 Bears, and said it had launched two F-16s from Volkel air force base to intercept them. The Russian jets were escorted by aircraft from the Netherlands, Britain and Denmark until they departed.

There is already some flexibility on that front. Cancer immunotherapies like sipuleucel-T (Provenge, approved in 2010) are unique to each patient.

"Some flexibility" my sore back... Life-saving medicine is still denied patients, because of the FDA's approval cycle. And the additional obscenity of it all, it that the (would-be) manufacturer of the drug is portrayed as the villain...

Just be careful your head gets better than a 300 millisecond exemption the next time you implement Darwinian selection this way. :-)

Early this am. I was riding in a truck that nearly took out an owl that swooped right down from a tree beside the road right in front of us. We had just pulled away from a stop sign, might have been doing 20. Any faster and the bird would have been a grill ornament.

I've walked 20 miles along a heavily traveled state highway to a nearby city, once or twice before. Aside from such hazards to foot travel as gulleys, potholes, bottles, tires, and other impediments, I counted dozens of dog, cat, deer, opossum, raccon, fox, snake, turtle, etc. carcasses as well dozens of bird fatalities of numerous species. Very depressing, but my main focus was avoiding joining them. Played hell on my feet, though.

I was trying to get some hard numbers here, with not much luck, but I did find this website that, although it seems to have a pro-industry spin, has probably close to realistic ratios for various forms of bird fatality, although I might question the raw numbers. Seem low to me.

I also came across what appears to be a rare kamikaze deer cue shot twofer with human injuries.

Life is a struggle, indeed.

American superheros are out of style, and will soon be history. The emasculated administration of our schools are trying to have kids arrested for even thinking about anything heroic.

http://www.glennbeck.com/2013/03/04/indoctrination-kid-suspended-for-making-a-gun-out-of-a-pastry/

http://www.myfoxdc.com/story/20970646/ten-year-old-boy-arrested-after-toy-gun-found-in-his-backpack

Sorry, those are not my main, or favorite sources for news - but the liberal media doesn't seem to like those kind of stories.

I don't know where tomorrow's heroes will come from, but I'm afraid they won't be coming from the United States. Maybe Canada will step up to the plate. I can't imagine the UK taking our place, they already live in Orwelle's 1984. The British guy I work with says he tried to enlist. They hammered him with a psyche test, and one of the questions was, "Why do you want to be a soldier?" His honest answer, "I want to have a gun!" disqualified him. Not only did it disqualify him for military service, but apparently, the shrink came unglued on him.

Sad days ahead, I think, for the US and UK.

Parking lots in Phoenix seem to do just fine.

Of course, Phoenix expects 110 degree temperatures so they plan for it when they build things. Unlike other areas that usually don't see those high temperatures.

Make all the jokes you want, but a drone was confused as a UFO just yesterday in D.C. I expect the number of UFO "sightings" to skyrocket.

http://www.myfoxdc.com/story/18785637/beltway-ufo-said-to-be-military-drone-aircraft?clienttype=printable

but as long as you have this "us" versus "them"

You mean the exact mentality the police ADMIT they have?

they are accountable to us, they are accountable to YOU

No, this is a lie. They are accountable to their supervisors, and to accountability boards that are staffed by ex-police, and to Internal Affairs, who are also police.

NOWHERE in that process can a citizen bring accountability. Qualified Immunity prevents lawsuits except in the most egregious, and rare, circumstances. If IA and the accountability boards don't hold a cop responsible, you're out of luck.

You can't elect them out, you can't vote them out, so this "they are accountable to you" tripe is just blatantly false.

not the entirety of the police force

The entirety of the force colludes in protecting the bad apples. And you make excuses for them because they "kiss their kids at night" or some other "think of the CHILDREN" sappy bullshit.

stop talking about them like they invasive inscrutable species out to hurt you for no reason

I will when they stop living up to the description.

http://www.myfoxdc.com/story/18722525/2012/06/06/prince-georges-county-police-officers-under-criminal-investigation?obref=obinsite

FTFA "WALDORF, Md. -Two Prince George's County police officers are under criminal investigation in Charles County for allegedly handcuffing, detaining and assaulting a teenager in order to teach him a lesson."

Now, that's two cops plus every other cop who covered for them. You forget, they have a responsiblity to uphold the law, so every single officer who knew about that incident and didn't turn those cops in is legally culpable. But you ignore that in your rush to paint a portrait even more distorted than the one you're crying about.

maybe you'll actually get something accomplished about their behavior

No, the current "Fuck the Police" attitude has done more to bring attention to these issues than the copsucking you're suggesting ever did. That, and ubiquitous cameras. However, I don't fault you, collaborators always suggest collaboration, it's easier than resistance and you collaborators tend toward laziness and cowardice.

I appreciate your opinion, but as you can see, you really have absolutely no idea what the fuck you're talking about. Frankly, you take a startlingly similar line to cops themselves, and I have to wonder if you have a bit of Stockholm Syndrome.

You're a citizen. It's your DUTY to resist tyranny. Not sit by and defend it because it kisses it's kids forehead at night.

For the same reason that everyone should know what happens when you mix bleach and ammonia: Women in Walmart throw bleach and ammonia at each other. Or that you shouldn't throw certain chemicals in a bowl of water...

Or maybe you have some groundhogs out back you are trying to get rid of? I watched a very interesting piece on the discovery channel where farmers rigged an entire tree line with explosives and blew it up in an effort to kill a flock of birds that were threatening the crops. There are many perfectly valid and legal reasons I would want to blow something up.

The way one of them views this is: "Our generation which has, consciously or unconsciously, approved the construction of the Fukushima nuclear power plants and enjoyed the benefits of the vast supply of electricity ... should be the first to join the Skilled Veteran Corps," said Yasuteru Yamada, the 72-year-old retired engineer who created the group. http://www.myfoxdc.com/dpp/news/japanese-senior-citizens-volunteer-to-work-in-fukushima-plant-ncxdc-052511

You might call him a nuclear zealot, but it is true that the younger people won't get any benefit from the Fukushima plant, only poison and sickness and perhaps death.

Source

"Confession: A Roman Catholic App" sells for $1.99 on iTunes. It is designed to guide Catholics to confession by allowing users to check whether their behavior conforms with the church.

The Indiana-based development company called Little iApps said the app was designed to be used in the confessional and not a replacement for confession with a priest.

Father Kevin Regan of St. Matthew's Cathedral in Washington, D.C. told FOX 5 News he not only thinks the app is a good idea, he downloaded it himself.

"It's an aid and I was thinking about this much like Yelp. It doesn't change the personal relationship it just helps you get there a little quicker. It gives you the menu of the place, but you still have to go there to eat the food. In the same way in confession, you still have to be there to have that personal encounter," Father Regan said.

Lookup thin blue line and perhaps that will be clearer.

I know what thin blue line means, but I’ve not seen the sticker you’re referring to so I don’t know whether the sticker is advocating or opposing the concept.

2nd of all - was she trespassing? Where does it say that?

WTOP: “it was 8:40 a.m. when she was walking her son to school along a path between houses.”
The Week: “a woman cutting through his yard with her son saw Williamson drinking coffee, naked, in his kitchen”
MyFoxDC, after his acquittal: “One of those women was taking a shortcut with her daughter through Williamson's yard”

What’s more, that report by MyFoxDC tells that in the trial, the information came to light that though the woman and police claimed she was ~25 feet from the door when she saw him, defense claims to have proven that she was more than 3 times that distance, 83 feet from the door.

Additionally, “By the time the jury found him not guilty, six months had passed and Williamson had been laid off, lost visitation rights with his young daughter and racked up $15,000 in legal bills.” One would hope that they made right, but that’s an awful lot of grief over drummed-up charges.

And perhaps most worrisome: “police testified that a broken window pane in Williamson's door gave them cause to enter. Williamson and his attorney say nothing was broken.” – as is all-too-typical, police fabricated cause to perform an illegal search without warrant. They have nothing to lose and everything to gain from this sort of behavior: They’re never punished for it if the jury decides the search was illegal, but if they can convince the jury to allow the evidence, they benefit.

A few more details:

Originally it was reported that the incident took place on Monday, Oct. 19, 2009 at FIVE THIRTY in the morning, and the guy appeared first through the window in the front door and then in a front window, and the woman was cutting through his front yard (i.e. trespassing).

In updates to the story, apparently the woman had changed her story... now it apparently happened at EIGHT THIRTY, she WASN’T trespassing in his yard, and he was standing OUTSIDE in his carport.

With respects to the time it occurred: He claimed it was dark. Sunrise for Arlington, VA (~6 mi. from Springfield, where this occurred) was at 7:22 AM on 10/19/2009. If he’s telling the truth about it being dark, there is no way it could have possibly happened at 8:30 in the morning.

From the updated news report by Fox 5 News, a police spokesperson said: “Because this was being spun into a national story, and the idea you can't be naked in your own house – we wanted to come forward and say in this case our officers believed there was probable cause the law had been violated”. I wonder why? Could it possibly have been because the woman who reported the incident turned out to be “a respected member of the community, and just happens to be the wife of a Fairfax County Police officer”?

Man Charged After Making Coffee Naked.

http://www.myfoxdc.com/dpp/news/maryland/031009_motorists_seeing_red_over_red_light_cameras

Amtrak security was even filmed saying filming isn't allowed, when a news crew was interviewing Amtrak's spokesperson, who very clearly was saying there's no policy forbidding filming or taking photographs:
http://www.myfoxdc.com/myfox/pages/ContentDetail?contentId=6664418

A beautiful piece of footage dropped right in their laps there - you've got chief spokesman saying "no idea what the problem is" and security guard saying "stop filming" both in the frame simultaneously and NOBODY says either to chief spokesman "Well, we obviously have an issue here" or to security guard "Do you realise who this man who's just told us this is OK is?"

Amtrak security was even filmed saying filming isn't allowed, when a news crew was interviewing Amtrak's spokesperson, who very clearly was saying there's no policy forbidding filming or taking photographs:
http://www.myfoxdc.com/myfox/pages/ContentDetail?contentId=6664418