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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Oct 27, 2010 - 06:44pm PT
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Hmmm, 23 of the last 44 posts are by FatTrad. I wonder if anyone cares, or is even listening?
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philo
Trad climber
Somewhere halfway over the rainbow
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Oct 27, 2010 - 06:45pm PT
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Ha haha Ha... No!
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Oct 28, 2010 - 07:21pm PT
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Chinese supercomputer now #1 - all while the globally-impaired obsess mindlessly over the a Mideast which rates no more than strategic resource issue and is not a strategic threat.
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philo
Trad climber
Somewhere halfway over the rainbow
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Oct 29, 2010 - 10:18am PT
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Yeah, SO?
Does this in any way put YOU in danger?
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philo
Trad climber
Somewhere halfway over the rainbow
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Oct 29, 2010 - 05:22pm PT
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Look Fats, Obama (unlike Bushie) stopped a terrorist attack. Give the prez some props.
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philo
Trad climber
Somewhere halfway over the rainbow
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Oct 29, 2010 - 05:47pm PT
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Well at least Obama's intelligence community is actually listening.
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philo
Trad climber
Somewhere halfway over the rainbow
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Oct 29, 2010 - 06:18pm PT
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Why?
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philo
Trad climber
Somewhere halfway over the rainbow
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Oct 29, 2010 - 06:22pm PT
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Pot/Kettle same hue.
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Oct 29, 2010 - 06:25pm PT
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The US delivers explosives to Yemen all the time. Except not in packages on freighters.
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philo
Trad climber
Somewhere halfway over the rainbow
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Oct 29, 2010 - 06:32pm PT
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http://warvictims.wordpress.com/2010/10/07/pakistan-u-s-unmanned-drone-attacks-within-pakistan-record-high-threat-to-civilians/
PAKISTAN: U.S. Unmanned Drone Attacks within Pakistan Record High: Threat to Civilians
October 7, 2010 by warvictims
http://uruknet.com/?p=m70081&hd=&size=1&l=e
Interview with family devastated by US drone attack
Asim Qureshi
The children of Mohammed Asghar
September 24, 2010
EXCLUSIVE - Cageprisoners interview with Haider whose brother-in-law Mohammed Asghar and his friends became the victims of an unlawful US drone attack.
CP: Could you please introduce yourself?
Bismillahir rahmaanir raheem
Haider: My name is Haider. My brother-in-law, Mohammed Asghar, lived in Peshawar and worked as a money exchanger in the markets there.
CP: Where did the drone attack take place?
H: The attacks took place in North Waziristan, Miranshah in District Ahmadkheel. My brother-in-law had friends he was visiting in Waziristan. As he was a guest there - and as is the custom of the people - many of the locals gathered to welcome him into the area. He was sat with a group of these people from the community when everybody gathered to pray the evening prayer ('Isha) together. The drone attack happened in the middle of the prayers and the entire congregation was martyred.
CP: Were there any Taliban or Al Qaeda in the gathering or were they all civilians?
H: All the people gathered were locals from the community who had come to welcome the new guest to the area. The people are renowned for their hospitality and it is unthinkable for them that somebody would come to visit and they would not have a gathering to welcome them. In total, 31 people were killed. Drone attacks are so powerful nobody can escape them merely injured.
CP: How did you find out this happened?
H: Between our area and Waziristan is an 8 hour journey. The drone attack happened at night time and we all knew about it by the following morning. People who had witnessed the attack had come to tell us and described what they saw of the remnants and damage in the aftermath. They said the attack was so severe that they could not even distinguish the bodies from one another- even the bones of the people were completely blown apart. The dead were completely unrecognisable. My brother in law’s coffin was tightly sealed and we were not allowed to open it to view anything. We had the coffin with us for 30 minutes before it was taken away for burial.
CP: Why do you think the US/Pakistan government do this and what do you think they hope to gain?
H: We just don’t know. We don’t know how much authority Pakistan has given the US to attack our areas and we don’t know until when the US are given free license by the Pakistani government to carry out these drone attacks. So far between 1400-1600 people have died as a result of these attacks. Nobody takes responsibility for these civilian deaths. Ask the journalists or officials for the true statistics, we know that it is 1400-1600 civilians, women and children killed. In this, they would have been lucky to even have 11 or 12 'militants’ amongst them. These attacks are so widespread that even my brother in law who lives in Peshawar was made a victim of it. Who do I appeal to? Where can I go? I don’t even know who to hold responsible for his death and how I do it.
I am shocked that the US can come to attack Pakistan in this way and Pakistan does not even have the authority to question them on the deaths they are causing. The civilians in all these regions are extremely frightened and fearful. They can’t work in the day, nor can they sleep during the night. As soon as they hear the slightest sound of an aeroplane, they flee in panic from their homes and buildings trying to find a place for security. The whole community is in a state of fear and I just cannot explain to you how unbearable these calamities are for the people. Every household has at least half of its people martyred (i.e.: killed) as a result of these attacks. I simply do not understand what the understanding between Pakistan the US is on this matter.
CP: Haider, thank you for taking the time to speak with us and we are sorry for your loss.
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philo
Trad climber
Somewhere halfway over the rainbow
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Oct 29, 2010 - 06:40pm PT
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Yeah and the Chicago synagogues are probably harboring Haganah and Stern Gang terrorists.
Goose/Gander
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philo
Trad climber
Somewhere halfway over the rainbow
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Oct 29, 2010 - 07:03pm PT
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http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/one-law-for-palestinian-and-jewish-terrorists-alike-1.321189
Published 01:35 26.10.10Latest update 01:35 26.10.10
One law, for Palestinian and Jewish terrorists alike
The ongoing damage to the olive groves and disruption of the harvesters' work harm the livelihood of thousands of Palestinian families. A state that respects the rule of law cannot abandon them to extremists whose goal is to dispossess their neighbors of their lands.
Haaretz Editorial
The start of the annual olive harvest has been the signal for an onslaught of violence against Palestinian farmers by groups of settler thugs in recent years. Over the last few days, human rights activists - who, as they do every year, have mobilized to protect the harvesters and deter the criminals - have reported countless incidents: torched groves, chopped-down trees, stolen olives, vandalized tools and even physical attacks on farmers. These incidents join a long list of crimes, including torched mosques and vandalized gravestones, euphemistically known as "price tag operations." There have also been a few reports of settlers' groves being vandalized.
Four years ago, the High Court of Justice noted that the military commander of the territories and his agents - Israel Defense Forces soldiers, border policemen and regular policemen - are obligated to ensure the safety of Palestinian farmers both en route to their fields and while they are working there. Specifically, the justices said, the military commander must allocate forces to protect the farmers' property. The court rejected the army's tactic of declaring certain areas closed military zones in order to protect the Palestinians from settler violence. Nevertheless, the IDF restricts the harvesters to certain hours, saying it lacks sufficient forces to offer full-time protection.
The police have also proven impotent in enforcing the law against Jewish hoodlums. Statistics compiled by the Yesh Din organization show that more than 90 percent of investigations opened by the police's Shai (West Bank ) unit into crimes by Jews against Palestinians have been closed on pretexts such as "insufficient evidence" or "perpetrator unknown." The lesson for the criminals is that they can continue running wild without let or hindrance, and with no fear of the law.
The ongoing damage to the olive groves and disruption of the harvesters' work harm the livelihood of thousands of Palestinian families. A state that respects the rule of law cannot abandon them to extremists whose goal is to dispossess their neighbors of their lands.
The government, starting from the very top, must make it clear to the security forces that as long as Israel controls the West Bank, it is responsible for the welfare of all the area's inhabitants - and that there must be only one law, for Palestinian and Jewish terrorists alike.
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ahad aham
Trad climber
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AIPAC now has a US congress of their dreams...
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Nov 16, 2010 - 12:26pm PT
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The UN has become almost unworkable and is approaching irrelevant.
This week's The Economist:
Thinking the UNthinkable
Redesigning the United Nations Security Council might not be easy, but it would be a great prize
Nov 11th 2010
TO DO the right deed for the wrong reason, T.S. Eliot wrote, is “the greatest treason”—a familiar one in the world of politics. This week’s culprit is Barack Obama, who has pledged American support for reforming the Security Council of the United Nations (UN), and giving India a permanent seat on it.
By backing India, the president proved that America rates it as a world power and helped set it against China, which quietly opposes permanent Indian membership. And, since UN reform has long been blocked by regional rivalries and powerful countries with something to lose, America can be pretty sure that nothing will come of it.
Mr Obama’s pledge was all the more forceful because his foreign-policy rhetoric has put store by rules and international consensus. Stoking India’s unfulfilled ambition will only fuel the sense that the UN’s most senior body fails to represent the world as it is. That will do the UN no good at all.
To lessen the chance that his India policy comes at the expense of his UN policy, Mr Obama needs to be as good as his word and to put America squarely behind a reform of the Security Council. Reform would be just, it is overdue, and it would make the UN work better. It might even be achievable.
Pretty much everyone agrees that the Security Council’s permanent, veto-wielding membership reflects a bygone age, when what mattered was who won the second world war. An increasingly unrepresentative, anachronistic Security Council speaks with diminishing authority. It is less able to debate the issues that matter, because important actors may be missing. And it is less able to hand down opinions that count, because they do not bear the seal of all the world’s great powers. Whether you think the UN can accomplish a little or a lot, a better Security Council would be able to get more done.
Who shall come to the ball?
Alas, the consensus ends there. Among today’s permanent members France and Britain worry about their declining influence. China objects to Japan as a permanent member. Mexico and Argentina object to Brazil. Italy objects to Germany. African states cannot choose between South Africa and Nigeria. Do you need a Muslim state? And if so, which?
It is a mess and it has been debated fruitlessly for years. Diplomats roll their eyes and say that talking about reform is a waste of breath. Yet international governance can eventually change—just ask the IMF, where Europe is finally giving up some of its clout, or ask the leaders turning up this weekend in Seoul for a summit of the G20, eclipser of the G7.
Any plausible UN reform starts with compromise. The Security Council needs to be large enough to be representative, but small enough to do business. It should reflect real power in the world, but aim not to reward anti-social behaviour. It should strive for the best council for today, but it cannot start with a clean sheet, because the original membership controls the reform under the original rules. Extending permanent membership would help the council, but extending the veto to a lot of new countries risks making it unworkable.
Such ideas help sketch out a plan. Emerging countries need more say. Brazil is the most plausible candidate from Latin America, as Britain’s foreign secretary reiterated this week. In Africa Nigeria is too anarchic, despite its size and supply of peace-keepers. South Africa would be better. Ideally the European Union would have one seat, but Britain and France would veto that, so Germany makes it by default. As an economic power, but not a geopolitical one, Japan barely scrapes in, despite an American promise to back it. A Muslim country would give the council clout: best would be Turkey or Indonesia, which increasingly see themselves as regional powers. And Mr Obama is right: India has the strongest claim of all.
The case for reform is overwhelming. America’s unipolar moment has passed. Rules help in a world where power is shifting. The longer Britain and France wait, the weaker their negotiating position. Russia could probably live with reform, so long as it kept its veto. If China were faced with a united front, it might go along, however reluctantly. Nobody should think that designing a new UN would be easy. But the alternative is a declining UN in a messy, interconnected world. That would not be easy either.
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rottingjohnny
Sport climber
mammoth lakes ca
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Nov 19, 2010 - 09:44pm PT
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Fattrad..everyone on the taco knows Norton is Sara Palin....if you would pay more attention to domestic politics you would have figured this out...that's how he-she met with Cantor....can't explain the Teller meeting though...?
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