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here you go

The destination was Montreal, I believe. Misremembered it. Thanks for pointing that out.

Our enemy appears to have nucluar capabilitys and obviously isen't afraid to use them: http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,2001350025-20 01372097,00.html

Let's hope we can kill them all, before they kill us. These are not people who just have a differing viewpoint than us, or a different way of life. These are human debris that use the fruits of our civilisation to destroy us.

Our well measured response, at home and abroad, will save our lives, as well as save the lives of the vast majority of decent people in Afganistan: if we were sucuessfully attacked with weapons of mass destruction, we would suffer horribly, but many more good people would die in the fires of our retaliation.

A bit of violence and self sacrifice, now, will save lives.

"AMERICAN investigators are considering resorting to harsher interrogation techniques, including torture, after facing a wall of silence..."

The Times is one of the most respected, conservative papers in the UK. The FBI really are considering this abomination. Even Robert Blitzer, a former head of the FBI's counter-terrorism section, has criticized this in public!

The right to trial by jury would be abolished in all instances where the sentence was likely to be less than two years. This would include most prosecutions under sec. 296 of the Copyrights Designs and Patents Act (the UK's DMCA), as well as serious reputation-destroying charges such as theft, assault and drug offences, where defendants can at the moment insist on jury trials. To prevent "perverse" decisions, Auld also recommends that judges should be allowed to ask juries specific menus of questions about the facts of the case instead of innocent-or-guilty verdicts, reserving the final decision for the judge themself.

In a democratic system, the last ditch defence against a really bad law is that a jury can refuse to convict, in spite of the evidence, if they think that the prosecution is unfair or unreasonable. Cases thrown out by UK juries against the evidence in recent years include vandalism charges against GM crop protesters, official secrets charges against civil service whistleblowers and shoplifting charges against confused elderly people. Juries have also tended to be more critical of police evidence than judges and court officials; and to have had more relaxed views in obscenity and pornography cases.

Specific comment: Independent, Guardian
General reports: BBC, Times, Telegraph, Guardian, Independent
(submitted to /. yro yesterday; rejected).

And remember, as this week's NTK points out, bad UK law is often just version 0.1 for bad law in the US.

where the Automobile Association (AA) was found guilty of copying maps produced by the Ordnance Survey, and fined £20million goes to prove that this still happens, as it was used to prove that the offence had taken place.

The article quotes Mr. Clinton directly: "I authorised the arrest and, if necessary, the killing of Osama bin Laden and we actually made contact with a group in Afghanistan to it."

Read the article, it's a lot more credible and amazing than this A.C. could ever hope to be.

If you haven't yet listened to or read President Bush's speech to Congress, I highly recommend doing so.

I'm getting the distinct impression that Bush is planning on liberating Afghanistan. There are even reports that this is the case. Combine that with the ongoing British diplomacy with Iran, Iran's calling for an international fight against terrorism, and unprecedented sympathy towards the terror attack victims. And note how we haven't dropped any bombs yet, 11 days after the WTC mass murder. It looks like we're going to do the job right this time.

Peace with Iran, the liberation and rebuilding of Afghanistan... it's going to be tough to pull off, but if it can be done, wow...

Yes, according to this article, there is indeed some risk. However, according to the same article, the FBI is aware of it, and are stepping up security. In any case, it'll be prudent to avoid planes, high-rises, subways and huge crowds.

Instead the War on Terrorism will resemble the War on Drugs. Read more here.

It disturbs me greatly to see so many apparently intelligent people here whining for peaceful solutions to the present problem. Wake up! It won't happen because it won't work.

At the core of these terror attacks were people, ideologically driven, irrational individuals who believe that America (and Israel) is the greatest evil on the planet. They are not with us anymore, but many of their compatriots are. Those in the attack spent YEARS preparing for their mission. Every day spent in preparation, firming their resolve. They could not be deterred from achieving their objective. They were not rational people.

Ask yourselves, what would appease the groups behind the terrorists? Elimination of Israel? Elimination of the United States perhaps? In short, only the genocide of hundreds of millions of people. Being one of those who would have to be eliminated, I don't think that I would advocate this solution.

The truth is, there is nothing that can be given to the terrorist, or the governments that sponsor them, which would appease them. Nothing!

Tony Blair has just reminded the main-stream media of how well appeasement worked in the 1930's against Hitler's Nazi machine. The same holds today, because we can't give the terrorists what they want.

Also, you non-American folk out there who are convinced that this is a US problem, how many of your countrymen were killed in Tuesday's attack? I would wager that nearly a quarter of those poor souls lost were not Americans, but foreign nationals doing business there. This may turn out to be the largest loss of life in terrorist attacks for six or seven different countries.

Earlier this week, I had thought that an ironic twist of this situation would actually achieve peace in the mid-east. In building a coalition, Bush wanted Arafat on board with the PLO. To get this, Israel (which appeared to be pumped-up and a bit righteous after the attack) would be thumped (have aid decreased) by the US, for attacking Palestinians.

To get Israel and the PLO on the same team in a war against terrorism, you would need some severe concessions. Israel would have to agree to not attack any Palestinians, where the consequence would be elimination of all US aid (guaranteeing a short lifespan for the state). Also, the Palestinians would have to agree to not attack any Israelis, or be considered a terrorist state, and be wiped off the face of the planet. Unfortunately, as I said before, these are not rational people, and this peace agreement would probably stand for about an hour before one or both sides would falter.

-- Len

this British News Site is reporting both that the body of a terrorist and a stewardess have been found, and that the Taleban is holding Osama bin Laden under house arrest in Afghanistan.
I'm not sure if this is accurate or not, since I haven't seen either of these things mentioned on any U.S. news channels today, and this is the first I've heard of these things.

Islamic fundamentalism is just as dangerous to the world as National Socialism (Nazi) ever was.

Be careful -- there may be truth in what you say, but it can be misinterpreted.

This is a good place to point out that Islamic leaders around the world have condemned the attack as inhuman and un-islamic. American Islamic leaders in particular have directed their followers to donate blood, money, to volunteer in the emergency response and to assist law enforcement in any way they can. It is also very likely that some of the victims of this crime were muslims themselves.

The US press has not picked up on this yet, but the foreign press (e.g. The London times) is starting to to report the beginning of a wave of hate crimes in America against Muslims. I even heard one congressinal pinhead libelling Islam as a totalitarian ideology masquerading as a religion. These developments are disgraceful and unworthy.

The real division is not between religions, but between people who believe there can be civilized coexistence between people who have different viewpoints, and those who believe that one side can only enjoy freedom at the expense of the other. Osama bin Laden is one of the latter, and he deivides into two camps: the Christian/Jewish side and the Muslim side. People spreading religious or ethnic hatred are, in effect agreeing with him and doing his work; their personal feelings towards him are simply petty tribalism.

Make no mistake: America was targeted because we are a free, open and pluralistic society where muslims can coexist peacefully with christians, jews and even atheists. This marks us out for special hatred,and with good reason: our success and preeminence in the world shows that all ideologies of intolerance preaching freedom for one viewpoint through the oppression of others are lies.

Islamic fundamentalism is just as dangerous to the world as National Socialism (Nazi) ever was.

Be careful -- there may be truth in what you say, but it can be misinterpreted.

This is a good place to point out that Islamic leaders around the world have condemned the attack as inhuman and un-islamic. American Islamic leaders in particular have directed their followers to donate blood, money, to volunteer in the emergency response and to assist law enforcement in any way they can. It is also very likely that some of the victims of this crime were muslims themselves.

The US press has not picked up on this yet, but the foreign press (e.g. The London times) is starting to to report the beginning of a wave of hate crimes in America against Muslims. I even heard one congressinal pinhead libelling Islam as a totalitarian ideology masquerading as a religion. These developments are disgraceful and unworthy.

The real division is not between religions, but between people who believe there can be civilized coexistence between people who have different viewpoints, and those who believe that one side can only enjoy freedom at the expense of the other. Osama bin Laden is one of the latter, and he deivides into two camps: the Christian/Jewish side and the Muslim side. People spreading religious or ethnic hatred are, in effect agreeing with him and doing his work; their personal feelings towards him are simply petty tribalism.

Make no mistake: America was targeted because we are a free, open and pluralistic society where muslims can coexist peacefully with christians, jews and even atheists. This marks us out for special hatred,and with good reason: our success and preeminence in the world shows that all ideologies of intolerance preaching freedom for one viewpoint through the oppression of others are lies.

The times of London is reporting that the Taleban have put Osama bin Laden under house arrest in Afghanistan. Of course its still too early to conclude who is responsible, but its encouraging to hear of possible cooperation. If no one will harbor the fiends responsible for this, it may be possible to bring them to justice without loss of other innocent lives.

Here is a report on Bin Laden being under arrest.

I found this article at the London Times site. Here are some excerpts.

"Apparently no action was taken by air traffic controllers as they watched the first radar blips head south, instead of west, directly toward New York City."

"When the second aircraft entered New York airspace, it apparently was not challenged about leaving its flight path minutes after the first aircraft, even though the fate of the first flight was already known."

I'll let you all form you own opinions on this.

• New York Times
• Washington Post
• Washington Times
• CNN and CNN Goggle Cache
• The Times of London
• Wall Street Journal

My review of news sources: CNN's site seems to have the latest info, if you can reach it. NYT has more info on WTC (duh), and WP has more news on the Pentagon (duh again). Times of London has an excellent synopsis.

That's not The Times, that's The Times of London . Please do not confuse the Grey Lady with her dismal foreign imitators.

• Official site for the match
• Brain Games network
• CNN report
• CBS News report
• BBC News report
• The Times
• Financial Times
• Daily Telegraph
• Associated Press
• Reuters
• Britannica India
• International Herald Tribune

• Netzeitung report (German)
• Yahoo.de (German)
• ORF Futurezone (German)
• Financial Times (German)
• Chesslines survey (French)
• CNN en Español (Spanish)
• CNN Italia (Italian)
• BBC Brasil (Portugese)
• Express (Swedish)
• El Comercio Peru (Spanish

This just in:

TUESDAY MAY 29 2001

US banks face huge claims over dot-coms

FROM CHRIS AYRES IN NEW YORK

WALL STREET banks are facing an avalanche of expensive litigation, with as many as 100 class-action lawsuits, demanding tens of billions of dollars in damages. The banks are being accused by investors of allegedly rigging the flotations of Internet companies during the dot-com boom of the late 1990s. An investigation by The Times has found that 21 separate lawsuits have already been filed against ten different banks in Manhattan federal courts.

The lawsuits allege that the flotations of Internet and technology companies including Marketwatch.com, MP3.com, DoubleClick and Ariba were rigged.

Securities litigation experts in New York estimate that at least another 60 similar lawsuits are currently being prepared.
...

Property that is Public-Paid ought to be Public-Profit. To to otherwise would be poor politics. I don't want the President to allow some pompous patriarchal person to purloin this petroleum from the people's pockets.

---------Phew----------

I really despise these situations that cultivate political favoritism. For a historical perspective, consider the Teapot Dome Scandal For a contemporary example, refer to George W. Bush's Plans to drill Alaska: The government bought the lands from Russia. The land and the oil in it belongs to the American people. We ought to work out some way to use it's revenues for the public good, but in the past (read:teapot) land like this has been given to political friends. Geoge W. Bush has no shortage of friends in the oil business.

This sort of thing also occurs whenever a local government subsidizes sports arenas.

Now the same corrupt process is taking place with the internet. More public money thrown into private corporate pockets.

I wonder if this corporation was created for this purpose, and if so who created it? I wonder if it existed previously, and if so under what name and what sort of bidding process did it have to go through.

For another example of a multiply negative anti-spam checkbox look at The Times

If the music industry is losing sooooo much money to people pirating music, then why do all the big newspapers GIVE AWAY their news stories on their websites?

Ever heard of:
The Detroit News (My hometown rag)
The London Times
The New York Times
USA Today
The L.A. Times
The Boston Globe

The list goes on and on.

It's obvious to me that these newspapers are generating their own revenue by advertising themselves. Music artists have it easy because the LISTENERS do most of the promotions when they rip/encode to MP3!!!

IMHO, this whole napster thing looks like one ingenious publicity stunt to sell MORE records.

This quote is very telling:

So unlikely does the claim seem to many biologists that she has found it impossible to have it published in leading journals. But now, she says, it has been replicated by one of the world's leading contract research companies, Covance, and a company has been set up to market the idea.

Yes that's right...the journals seem to not want to publish her possibly ground breaking results. If her work is for real, then this is sad. If not, then it's better we find out.

Also see this quote:

One leading scientist familiar with her work, Professor Adrian Newland of the Royal London Hospital Medical School, said that he had repeated her experiments with the same results. "It's fascinating, but there could be other explanations for what is going on," he said. "My own work suggests that it isn't possible to reverse the process of differentiation, but I have repeated her work and got similar results. I think more research needs to be done to eliminate other possible explanations. As it stands, it could be amazing, or it could be inconsequential."

I find it remarkable that another scientist has reproduced her work and gotten similar results and yet he doesn't want to believe his eyes simply because it would invalidate his previous work!

"The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons."
Feodor Dostoevski, Russian novelist, 1821-1881

By this standard, one might be better off in Russia, even with its huge incarceration rate and multi-drug resistant TB epidemic in its prisons, than in the US.

Here's why:

In 1994 there were 14,300 victims in the jails at any time and that 290,000 males were victimized in jail every year, 192,000 of them penetrated. Once "turned out," a victim is earmarked for constant further assaults. With a repeat rate very conservatively estimated at every other day, and counting gang-rapes as a single incident, this gives at least 7,150 sexual victimizations a day in jails.

Nine per cent of the hetersexuals had been raped; 7.8% of them had been anally and 5.7% orally penetrated, but white heterosexuals were 2 to 3 times as likely to have been penetrated than black heterosexuals.

In 1996, released prisoners made up 17% (39,000 cases) of the total number of US AIDS cases and 13.1% to 19.3% of all people with HIV infection (98,000 to 145,000).

Russia and the United States lead the world in their use of incarceration. Russia jails 690 people per 100,000 citizens, while the U.S. rate is 600 per 100,000. The U.S. rate is higher than at any previous time, and it is 6 to 10 times higher than the rate of Western European nations.

The US incarceration rate has more than tripled since 1980.

A THIRD of the Russian prison population, about 350,000 inmates, will be released this year.

An estimated 4 million Americans are infected with the hepatitis C virus (HCV), with between 20 percent to 60 percent of the nation's 2 million prisoners infected.

The rail-line, combined with the fact that Russia will be releasing about 1/3rd of it's ENTIRE PRISON POPULTION this year, makes for a very interesting story. :)