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BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) - A single laptop can reveal much, and so it is with the digital treasure chest that Colombian commandos found in the jungle quarters of slain rebel leader Raul Reyes. Files in the computer seized in Saturday's raid into Ecuador that claimed the lives of Reyes and 23 of his comrades offer an intimate portrait of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's desire to undermine Colombia's U.S.-allied government. If authentic, the documents show that sympathies Chavez first aired publicly in January grew out of a relationship that dates back more than a decade. But Chavez is not one of...

Terrorism: The March 1 death strike by the Colombian army against FARC warlord Raul Reyes broke open a trove of contacts in his computer. So why did the name of Barack Obama turn up there?Admittedly, it pales compared with other material from the dead thug's computer — such as FARC efforts to obtain uranium or Hugo Chavez's $300 million support. But the little Obama reference within the 15 FARC letters released by the Colombian government signals a disturbing pattern of contacts with rogue actors. It's not the first time, and Obama has yet to distance himself. In a Feb. 28...

Letters to Obama from Americans becoming a book 3:23pm EST WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama may have inadvertently stolen an author's thunder on Tuesday when he told the country that someone is working on a book about the 10 letters from regular Americans that he reads every night. Obama has been receiving a folder full of the letters every day of his presidency, chosen from the thousands that the White House Correspondence Office receives every day. The letters reflect the viewpoints from Americans concerned enough about various issues -- or problems in their own lives -- that they take...

The FBI is investigating 13 threatening letters with a white powder and sent to Twin Cities stores. The letters went to eight Home Depots around the metro area and five Renewal By Andersen businesses, the FBI said in a statement released late Friday. The substance in 12 letters, analyzed by the Minnesota Department of Health, has been identified as sodium bicarbonate, or baking soda, and is not dangerous, according to the FBI. The last letter won't be analyzed until early next week. The first letter was received Dec. 31 and the last on Thursday, according to the FBI. The return...

Arts & Letters' founder/editor/curator was Denis Dutton, who died on Tuesday from cancer at the age of 66. He was the scion of the Dutton publishing family, a Californian who had moved to New Zealand to be a professor of philosophy and aesthetics at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch.* I traded e-mails with Denis, then joined him for lunch when he next passed through Manhattan. He was unlike anyone I'd ever met. Denis was a very sly, very funny, supereducated, and widely allusive lunch companion. . . . . . Still, it was not tough to discern, even if...

Inspired by the love story Romeo and Juliet, people actually write to 'Juliet', asking for advice on their love lives. The letters have now inspired a Hollywood film. Duncan Kennedy went to Verona to see how the Italian city responds to these pleas for help.

Note: The following text is a quote: Grand Jury Indicts Two Men for Mailing Hoax Anthrax Letters BIRMINGHAM—A federal grand jury today indicted two men in connection with a series of hoax anthrax letters that were mailed in Alabama this month and in March, U.S. Attorney Joyce White Vance, U.S. Postal Inspector Frank Dyer and Federal Protective Service Threat Management Branch Chief Curtis Huston announced. The first 15 counts of the 24-count indictment charge CLIFTON LAMAR “CLIFF” DODD, 38, of Lincoln, with mailing 15 hoax letters between March 6 and April 5 that contained a threat in the form of...

Why don't we start a letter writing campaign to the court to encourage them to give solid, real sentences to these monsters and not give them a slap on the wrist? By doing that we'll ensure that justice is done.

Click on the link to see the list of winners. No surprises (WaPo won a bag full as usual), though Hank Williams received a posthumous citation.

The black binder arrived at the White House residence just before 8 p.m., and President Obama took it upstairs to begin his nightly reading. The briefing book was dated Jan. 8, 2010, but it looked like the same package delivered every night, with printouts of speeches, policy recommendations and scheduling notes. Near the back was a purple folder, which Obama often flips to first. "MEMORANDUM TO THE PRESIDENT," read a sheet clipped to the folder. "Per your request, we have attached 10 pieces of unvetted correspondence addressed to you." Inside, Obama found crinkled notebook pages, smudged ink, cursive handwriting and...

I‘m glad national health finally passed...

Pajamas Media | Friday, December 12, 2008 The funeral for Shirwa Ahmed last week in Burnsville, Minnesota, punctuated a growing national security threat metastasizing inside the U.S. — one Homeland Security and law enforcement authorities have quickly taken note of. Ahmed, who killed himself in a suicide bombing attack in Somalia in October, is just one of up to 40 men from the Twin Cities area who have disappeared and are feared to have returned to their homeland for training with the al-Shabaab terrorist group to wage jihad. The FBI is investigating similar disappearances in other major Somali communities in...

The effort by Republicans to sue the government for requiring everyone to have health insurance is based on flawed logic. The sponsor of the bill claims that requiring citizens to carry health insurance is like forcing everyone to buy a car. This comparison is false based on how each decision affects other people. If I choose not to have an automobile, that decision affects only me and my immediate family members. However, if I choose not to buy health insurance, and I have a serious illness or injury, guess who pays when I show up at the emergency room —...

"I will tell you, that my staff is very even-handed, because about half of these letters call me an idiot!"

Ellie Light sure gets around. In recent weeks, Light has published virtually identical “Letters to the Editor” in support of President Barack Obama in more than a dozen newspapers.Every letter claimed a different residence for Light that happened to be in the newspaper’s circulation area.

Jany. 16 [1776] Your letters of the 25 and 30 of December & 4th of January have been duly received and laid before Congress.By the enclosed resolutions you will perceive that the Congress, in providing for the defence of Canada, have directed that two batallions be formed out of the troops now serving there. This they did in testimony of their approbation of the services of those brave men, apprehending at the same time, that it would be agreeable both to the officers and men to have the honor of defending a country which their valour had rescued from slavery....

I recommend you read the entire letter -- about five pages -- at its source. I am not among those who fear the people. They, and not the rich, are our dependence for continued freedom. And to preserve their independence, we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and liberty, or profusion and servitude. If we run into such debts, as that we must be taxed in our meat and in our drink, in our necessaries and our comforts, in our labors and our amusements, for our callings and our...

A letter written by the first US President, George Washington, has sold at auction for $3.2m (£1.9m). The sale, at Christie's in New York, was a record for a letter written by Washington. The four-page letter was written in 1787 to the president's nephew, Bushrod Washington, and urges adoption of the country's new constitution. A partially written poem by Edgar Allan Poe sold for $830,500 - a record for a 19th Century literary manuscript. 'Power of the people' Christie's said the Washington letter had been owned by descendants of Bushrod Washington for more than 100 years. The buyer was not...

An impassioned letter penned by George Washington in 1787 about the strengths of the newly written U.S. Constitution was sold at auction in New York on Friday for a record price of $3.2 million. Christie's had estimated that the letter, written from Mount Vernon, could fetch up to $2.5 million at auction, but some experts doubted it would bring that much in the poor economy. The previous auction record for a Washington document was set in 2002, when one of his military reports fetched $834,500, the auction house said. The letter's "hammer" price Friday was $2.8 million, but the buyer's...

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) -- Wide-eyed children around the world will be hearing from Santa's "elves" at the North Pole after all. During Christmas seasons for decades, these dedicated elves responded to thousands of letters addressed to "Santa Claus, North Pole." All that was ending with a U.S. Postal Service decision to discontinue the program based in the small Alaskan town amid privacy concerns. The elves from Santa's Mailbag vowed to fight the decision, while North Pole residents voiced outrage. A reversal of the Postal Service move was announced Friday. "We never wanted to spoil people's Christmas," said agency spokesman Ernie...

The mayor of North Pole, Alaska is calling a recent postal service decision an assault on Christmas. For years, the U.S. Postal Service has delivered thousands of letters to Santa Claus in North Pole, Alaska. Now, in the interest of efficiency and security, the post office has changed its policy. It will no longer deliver letters to Santa here, and requests for a North Pole postmark will be filled through its Anchorage office. The decision has angered many residents, most notably the owner of the area’s primary attraction, the Santa Claus house.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - Starry-eyed children writing letters to the jolly man at the North Pole this holiday season likely won't get a response from Santa Claus or his helpers. The U.S. Postal Service is dropping a popular national program begun in 1954 in the small Alaska town of North Pole, where volunteers open and respond to thousands of letters addressed to Santa each year. Replies come with North Pole postmarks. Last year, a postal worker in Maryland recognized an Operation Santa volunteer there as a registered sex offender.

To say that “Notes Left Behind” is a book about a 6-year-old girl who died is accurate, but woefully inadequate. By filling her family’s house with hidden messages of love and hope, Elena Desserich continues to celebrate life long after she succumbed to pediatric brain cancer.

"Australia: Islamic cleric harasses families of soldiers killed in Afghanistan with haranguing phone calls and letters" SNIPPET: "Mr Sher's father Felix received a phone call and letters, allegedly from self-styled Muslim cleric Sheikh Haron, just before his son's funeral." SNIPPET: "Other Australian families of men killed in Afghanistan have allegedly received similar letters in the past two years. On Tuesday Sheikh Haron was charged with seven counts of "using a postal service or similar service to menace, harass, or cause offence". He was granted bail to appear in court on November 10. [...]"

902 surviving letters by Vincent van Gogh are to be published for the first time this week. Mostly written to the artist's brother Theo, the letters offer personal insights which give lie to the idea that van Gogh was a "reckless and unreflective genius". * ABOVE: letter by Vincent van Gogh to his brother Theo, Arles, c. 21 November 1888 Translated extract from the letter: "What you write about the Dutchmen interests me greatly. I hope one day to get to know both of them personally. How old are they? I dare to believe that in the final reckoning they’ll...

This is a Vanity. If it shows up in the wrong place, would some kindly soul remove it to a better place. I have recently seen the movie "Amazing Grace", with Ioan Gruffudd, about William Wilberforce and his efforts to end British participation in the slave trade. At one point, his friend, PM Pitt, tells him that one of the reasons he's having trouble is that it is rumored that WW was corresponding with Thomas Jefferson. Is it true? Does anyone know what they were writing about? Jefferson had slaves, and WW was against it.

PDF so I can't cut/paste. Grassley letter to Chairman of FCC about problems with Mark Lloyd. Now's the time to take out another czar. http://grassley.senate.gov/upload/Letter-to-FCC-Chairman.pdf

Sweetness and Light is forbidden, where they have the complete text of the letter, so, here's a repost from 2006. Text of KGB Letter on Senator Ted Kennedy Special Importance Committee on State Security of the USSR 14.05.1983 No. 1029 Ch/OV Moscow Regarding Senator Kennedy’s request to the General Secretary of the Communist Party Comrade Y.V. Andropov Comrade Y.V. Andropov On 9-10 May of this year, Senator Edward Kennedy’s close friend and trusted confidant J. Tunney was in Moscow. The senator charged Tunney to convey the following message, through confidential contacts, to the General Secretary of the Central Committee of...

A black sergeant who was at the home of Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. when he was arrested says he’s been maligned as an “Uncle Tom” for supporting the actions of the white arresting officer. Cambridge Sgt. Leon Lashley gave a letter to Sgt. James Crowley to give to President Barack Obama during their so-called beer summit with Gates on Thursday night at the White House. In the letter, which was also sent to CNN, Lashley says Gates “may have caused grave and potentially irreparable harm to the struggle for racial harmony.”

Seven House Democrats have written Attorney General Eric Holder invoking a list of grievances from radical Islamist groups and asking that Holder meet with representatives from those groups to hear their concerns, the Investigative Project on Terrorism has learned. The grievances include the use of convicted felons as informants in mosques, alleged religious profiling of Somali Muslims in Minnesota and elsewhere and allegations that the FBI is working with foreign governments to question American citizens who are terror suspects. In the letter, the representatives said: "These concerns raise legitimate questions about due process, justice, and equal treatment under the law....

Im was an officer in one of North Korea’s elite special forces. He fought for his government, even though it oppressed his people on a scale seldom seen before. Im’s superior had a 12-year old mentally challenged daughter. She was a good girl, but not very intelligent. She needed a lot of attention from her parents; a mother and a father she loved very much. There is no room for the mentally challenged in Kim Jong-Il’s North Korea, however. Im’s superior was told to hand his daughter over to the government. Because the officer knew what happens to such children...

U.S. President Barack Obama delivered a letter from Senator Edward Kennedy to Pope Benedict on Friday and asked the Roman Catholic pontiff to pray for the senator, who is suffering from an incurable brain tumor. Deputy National Security Adviser Denis McDonough said the Pope and the president concluded their half-hour meeting with a discussion about Kennedy, whose brother John F. Kennedy was the first Roman Catholic president of the United States. "The president delivered a letter from Senator Kennedy to the Holy Father. He also asked that the Holy Father pray for ... Kennedy, who as we all know is...

RT @AbahJake: - Robert Fisk: Secret letter 'proves Mousavi won poll' -The Independent http://bit.ly/t5wJq #iranelection (via @DougCurran )Other messages say heavy clashes are under way in locations away from Tehran...

Glenn Beck: The Letter Audio Available: June 17, 2009 - 10:36 ET GLENN: I got a letter from a woman in Arizona. She writes an open letter to our nation's leadership: I'm a home grown American citizen, 53, registered Democrat all my life. Before the last presidential election I registered as a Republican because I no longer felt the Democratic Party represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me. Now I no longer feel the Republican Party represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me. The fact is I no longer feel any political...

Very interesting. When men were men and women, women No corrections made. "I have a great Deal of Leisure, which I chiefly employ in Scribbling, that my Mind may not stand still or run back like my Fortune." John Adams, Letter to Abigail Adams, 29 June 1774, (third letter written on that date) From Adams Family Papers, Massachusetts Historical Society. March 1 1780 My Dearest Friend I had scarcly closed my packet to you when I received your Letters dated Ferrol [John to Abigail, 11 December 1779 ( L17791212ja)] and Corunna [John to Abigail, 16 December 1779] . I am...

BY Richard Sisk DAILY NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU Tuesday, February 17th 2009, 11:38 PM Marine Lance Cpl. Julian Brennan was killed by a land mine on Jan. 24. Related News Articles Obama signs stimulus package into law Bronx boro prez bound for Washington Green is going to grow in wallets of New Yorkers Hillary warns North Korea on missile launch WASHINGTON - President Obama has adopted role model Abraham Lincoln's practice of writing deeply personal letters to the families of troops killed in battle. He signs them "Barack." Bill Brennan, the father of Marine Lance Cpl. Julian Brennan, said at first...

TEXT:TRANSLATOR NOTE (TN): VERBATIM TRANSLATION BEGINS HERE:PAGE 1 OF 3  IN THE NAME OF ALLAH, MOST MERCIFUL, MOST GRACIOUS-TO MY BELOVED BROTHER MUKHTAR -MAY ALLAH PRESERVE HIM.IN THE NAME OF ALLAH, MOST MERCIFUL, MOST GRACIOUS. MAY ALLAH I SPEACE AND MERCY BE UPON YOU.   I ASK ALLAH THAT YOU AND ALL THE BRETHREN BE IN THE BEST OFCONDITIONS, WITH PEACE OF MIND AND IN A STATE OF GRACE, AND I ASKALLAH TO PROTECT YOU FROM EVIL.   FOR A START, I LOVE YOU IN GOD, AND ALLAH KNOWS THAT I CARE FOR YOU.I AM ALSO VERY HAPPY WITH OUR...

Note: The following text is a quote: http://dallas.fbi.gov/dojpressrel/pressrel09/dl020309.htm Man Arrested in New Mexico for Sending Threatening White-Powder Laced Hoax Letters to Banks Across the U.S. DALLAS— At a press conference held today in Dallas, acting U.S. Attorney James T. Jacks of the Northern District of Texas, Robert E. Casey, Jr., Special Agent in Charge of the Dallas FBI, and Randall C. Till, Postal Inspector in Charge of the Fort Worth Division of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, announced that special agents and postal inspectors arrested Richard Leon Goyette, a/k/a Michael Jurek, 47, yesterday at the airport in Albuquerque, New Mexico,...

Blog Link has PDF in downloadable format with attachments referenced below: 2 February 2009 Monday U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell, - (D - WA) Washington, D.C. Office 511 Dirksen Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510 202-224-3441 202-228-0514 - FAX via Fax: 202-228-0514 Re: U.S. Constitution; FIRST CONGRESS; THIRD CONGRESS Dear Senator Cantwell: Your representation as a U.S. Senator is formally requested within this letter. Due to a rapidly growing concern among voters in the State of Washington there appears to be a developing crisis requiring your membership in the U.S. Congress to fully cooperate with the voters and address four questions...

January 21, 2009 # Note: The following text is a quote: http://knoxville.fbi.gov/pressrel/2009/kx012109.htm Suspicious White Powder Letters Postmarked from Knoxville Received in New York and Massachusetts On Wednesday January 21, approximately 13 powder-laden envelopes were received at the office of the Wall Street Journal in New York City. The letters reportedly bear a Knoxville, Tennessee postmark. New York City Police Department's Emergency Services Unit and the FBI responded to the scene and are testing the letters to determine whether they contain a hazardous substance. An additional letter was also received today at Harvard Law School addressed to Alan Dershowitz. This letter...

WASHINGTON, Jan. 9, 2009 – The Army’s adjutant general apologized yesterday on behalf of the Army for a printing error that resulted in the delivery of 7,000 letters without a by-name salutation to family members who lost a soldier in operations Enduring and Iraqi Freedom. Brig. Gen. Reuben Jones expressed his disappointment in the error and his team’s concern for the recipients during a special blogger’s roundtable hosted by the New Media Directorate of Defense Media Activity. The letters, which included the placeholder greeting of “Dear John Doe,” were printed and sent by a contractor in late December to inform...

December 9, 2008 Note: The following text is a quote: http://dallas.fbi.gov/pressrel/pressrel08/dl120908.htm Suspicious White Powder Letters Received Around the United States Robert E. Casey Jr., Special Agent in Charge, Dallas FBI, announces during the last 24 hours, at least seven letters containing a suspicious white powder have been received by the offices of governors around the country. The white powder substance has been field screened and the tests have met with negative results. The white powder substance has been forwarded to local laboratories for further testing. To date, all letters have been postmarked from Dallas, Texas and were received by governors’...

The 2008 election cycle, as endless as it seemed, is over. Emerging from the ashes of Republican defeat is the stark reality that must be addressed if the party is to regain its political viability. The Republican Party must decide who it really is and what it really stands for. Karl Rove, the so-called "architect" of the Bush election victories of 2000 and 2004, suggests that Republicans sit back and calculate their strategy based upon the early policy decisions of the incoming Obama administration. Therein lies the critical flaw of the typical Washington insider: Political posturing at the expense of...

A cache of letters hidden in the basement brings to life a house, a family and the tragedy that would change everything “Dear Folks,” the letter begins, “I think of you when I hear a Beethoven symphony or the words of a childhood hero repeated and more beautiful as I approach my forties. The strength and principles you planted into me at an early age, though inconsistent with the larger culture I grew up in, is now flowering in fertile soil. I see your faces in my mind and remember the courage both of you demonstrated during the McCarthy period...

King children in dispute over their publication in Coretta Scott King biography Coretta Scott King kept the love letters beneath her bed, in a blue Samsonite suitcase. The amorous writings of her husband, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., were among the most cherished possessions of a famously private person, said Lynn Cothren, Mrs. King’s special assistant for 23 years. “That’s why she kept them so close, in her room, underneath her bed.” But Tuesday, those letters and other “intimate correspondence” between the Kings are expected to be in a far less private place: Fulton County Superior Court. The papers...

WBNS TV in Columbus, Ohio is reporting a mysterious powder has been found in a "business sized" envelope in Downtown Columbus. It was delivered to a building and it came from an Ohio doctor. Supposively there was some writing that looked like Arabic writing... I have no more details to report because I'm at work. I just got this from my 14 yr. old daughter.

WASHINGTON, Aug. 7, 2008 – The idea of getting people involved in a letter-writing campaign to reach all servicemembers currently serving in Iraq and Afghanistan -- about 178,000 -- may seem a little far-fetched for the average person, but Cody Anderson is by no means “average.” For several years, Anderson has been collecting, packing, shipping and delivering care packages and phone cards to U.S. troops stationed around the world. Anderson, 53, a resident of Mineral Buff, Ga., has raised $50,000 in supplies, including personal hygiene items, games and snacks; $50,000 in phone cards; and $21,500 in Beanie Babies, to...

Melissa mayor mailing resolutions to fellow mayors to stop state from using gas tax funds for non-road projects BY DANNY GALLAGHER, McKinney Courier-Gazette Melissa Mayor David Dorman said he sits in his office everyday and watches as cars zoom down State Highway 121, a road that will soon start collecting tolls from drivers who use it to get to Dallas, McKinney, Frisco or the Dallas North Tollway and back again. Dorman said before that happens, he wants to know the roads his citizens and drivers are paying the state to use will be maintained and built with those funds. “I...

Forgive me for having a momentary lapse. I forgot that The New York Times was leading the bandwagon in trumpeting why it is we should have gone into an illegal war. The New York Times became George Bush and the Republican Party’s national “blog.” The New York Times played a role in the outing of Valerie Plame. I do not know why I thought The New York Times had actually repented and was going to exhibit a different kind of behavior.

21-Year-Old Message In a Bottle Drifts 1,735 MilesSunday, March 23, 2008 SEATTLE, Washington — Merle Brandell and his black lab Slapsey were beachcombing along the Bering Sea when he spied a plastic bottle among the Japanese glass floats he often finds along the shore of his tiny Alaskan fishing village. He walked over and saw an envelope tucked inside. After slicing the bottle open, Brandell found a message from an elementary school student in a suburb of Seattle. The fact that the letter traveled 1,735 miles without any help from the U.S. postal service is unusual, but that's only the...