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The U.S. Air Force has a morale problem with its combat pilots. The issue is lack of action for the pilots. That, plus the increased use of unmanned aircraft, and the very real prospect that the age of the manned combat aircraft may be coming to an end. This is made worse with hundreds of fighter pilots being assigned to operating Predator and Reaper UAVs. This was not popular duty, even though the pilots still draw flight pay. It is tedious work, although the UAV operators often saw more combat action than they did when piloting F-16s or F-15s. The...

A SATANIST obsessed with teenage schoolgirls invented a fake gothic society online to groom them for sex in the grounds of Sydney's Rookwood Cemetery. Daniel William Peckham, 24, lured at least three girls, aged from 13 to 17, into the cemetery on his MySpace blog, "Rookwood Gothic Society". A message on the site read: "If you have hang-ups about getting naked ... you are not welcome." Peckham pleaded guilty yesterday to the aggravated sexual assault of a 15-year-old girl and to using the internet to solicit and transmit naked pictures of young girls between 2005 and 2007. The opening day...

A predator on the Sex Offenders' Register killed a 17-year-old girl he met and groomed on Facebook after luring her to a secret meeting. The 32-year-old posed as a 16-year-old boy to befriend Ashleigh Hall on the social networking site. But within hours of their first meeting, the teenager was dead...

If only Dave had kept it in his Worldwide Pants. Letterman must be wishing that now, after accused blackmailer Robert (Joe) Halderman said "not guilty" at his arraignment in Manhattan Supreme Court on Friday. After bigtime defense lawyer Gerald Shargel said ominously there are a lot more skeletons in this closet. "This story is far more complicated than what you heard this afternoon," said Shargel, who won a big one for the late mob boss John Gotti.

U.S. charges three men with molesting children in Cambodia They are the first to be charged under an international law-enforcement operation that targets U.S. citizens who travel to Cambodia for illicit sex. They could face 30 years in jail for each victim. Raja Abdulrahim September 1, 2009 Three American men who are suspected of traveling to Cambodia to molest children have been charged in federal court as part of a new initiative aimed at cracking down on the child sex tourism business there, authorities said Monday. Ronald Gerard Boyajian, 49, of Menlo Park, Calif.; Erik Leonardus Peeters, 41, of Norwalk;...

A Taliban leader with a $5 million American reward on his head is thought to be dead from an drone attack in South Waziristan, Pakistan, but a friend says that report is “ridiculous.” Baitullah Mehsud is alive, or he may be dead. See update below. Members of the Mehsud tribe consider Baitullah Mehsud their leader. He is believed to command as many as 20,000 Taliban. So far, reports of his probable death by drone strike have not been disproved. In other words, he has sent no message to prove that he is alive and the West has no concrete evidence...

A new book published by Al Qaeda shows that the terrorist group is under intense pressure and in "deathly fear" of U.S. counterterrorism efforts in Pakistan, terror experts say. The 150-page book, titled "Guide to the Laws Regarding Muslim Spies," was recently posted on jihadist Web sites. It was written by a senior Al Qaeda commander, Abu Yahya Al-Libi, and features an introduction by Ayman Al-Zawahri, the No. 2 man in Al Qaeda. The book accuses some in Al Qaeda's ranks of being spies who provide intelligence, including information about Al Qaeda camps and safehouses, to U.S. forces. According to...

CHICAGO—A McHenry County man was sentenced to more than 23 years in prison for enticing a 13-year-old girl to engage in sexual activity after he lured her to meet him at a park in Carol Stream in 2007, federal law enforcement officials announced today. Marcus Tyms, 25, formerly of Union, Ill., was sentenced to 280 months in federal prison, with 10 years of that sentence being imposed because Tyms was a registered sex-offender when he committed the crime. Tyms was sentenced July 2 by U.S. District Judge Milton Shadur in Federal Court in Chicago, said Patrick J. Fitzgerald, United States...

Kenneth Catania has a new weirdo to add to his collection -- a fish-eating snake that is so clever it can trick its prey into swimming right into its mouth. Catania is a neuroscientist at Vanderbilt University who is becoming a bit of a legend in his field because he specializes in figuring out why some animals are just so strange. Like the star-nosed mole that is ugly enough to scare its own mother. There's a reason why the hamster-sized star nose mole has a snout with 11 pairs of pink appendages that form a fleshy star. The mole, rarely...

Reporting from Washington -- The Pentagon is preparing to graduate its first pilots of unmanned drones from the elite U.S. Air Force Weapons School -- a version of the Navy's Top Gun program -- in a bid to elevate the skills and status of the officers who fly Predators, one of the military's fastest growing aircraft programs.... [snip]

Reporting from Brussels -- Determined to die as martyrs, the French and Belgian militants bought hiking boots and thermal underwear and journeyed to the wilds of Waziristan. After getting ripped off in Turkey and staggering through waist-deep snow in Iran, the little band arrived in Al Qaeda's lair in Pakistan last year, ready for a triumphant reception. "We were expecting at least a welcome for 'our brothers from Europe' and a warm atmosphere of hospitality," Walid Othmani, a 25-year-old Frenchman from Lyon, recalled during an overnight interrogation in January. Instead, the Europeans -- and at least one American -- learned...

Islamabad and the U.S. military team up to carry out Predator attacks on the Taliban and Al Qaeda. The program marks broad new roles for both.Reporting from Washington -- The U.S. military has launched a program of armed Predator drone missions against militants in Pakistan that for the first time gives Pakistani officers significant control over routes, targets and decisions to fire weapons, U.S. officials said. The joint effort is aimed at getting the government in Islamabad, which has bitterly protested Predator strikes, more directly engaged in one of the most successful elements of the battle against Islamist insurgents. It...

Three people were killed Sunday in a suspected US missile attack targeting a militant hideout in Pakistan's tribal area bordering Afghanistan, officials said. "It was a drone attack," local administration official Shahab Ali Shah said. He said two missiles hit a house in Gangi Khel town in the tribal South Waziristan district. Another official speaking on condition of anonymity said the attack targeted a militant hideout where three people were killed. He gave no details. A security official confirmed that death toll, saying that five other people were wounded. The targeted house, belonging to a local tribesman, was "destroyed in...

The US has struck yet again inside Pakistan. The latest attack was aimed at a target in the lawless, Taliban-controlled tribal agency of South Waziristan. An unmanned Predator strike aircraft fired a Hellfire missile at a vehicle in a bazaar in the town of Gangi Khel near Wana. Four Taliban and al Qaeda operatives are thought to have been killed in the strike and four civilians are said to have been wounded, Geo News reported. No senior Taliban or al Qaeda leaders have been reported killed at this time. The town of Gangi Khel is located in the tribal areas...

PORTLAND -- A dangerous and violent sex offender escaped a Portland treatment center Thursday, police warn. William Surrat as shown in a police mug shot. William Dale Surrat, 40, has a long history of sexually abusing young girls and fantasizing about mutiliating others.

With the White House deciding that photos can be taken of the flag-draped coffins of our fallen heroes returning home, it is only fitting that we get to see the video of the dead thugs who are killing them.

2/24/2009 - CREECH AIR FORCE BASE, Nev. (AFNS) -- Airmen of the 432d Air Expeditionary Wing here flew an MQ-1B Predator unmanned aircraft in a combat mission in the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility Feb. 18, and the flight surpassed the 500,000 flight-hour mark for the aircraft. Members of the 15th Reconnaissance Squadron flew the milestone mission in support of operations in Iraq. "A half-a-million flying hours is an amazing accomplishment, and the Airmen of the 15th Reconnaissance Squadron are proud to be a part of this milestone," said Lt. Col. Ken Callahan, the 15th RS director of operations....

The 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing received a new MQ-1 Predator unmanned aerial aircraft and immediately put it to action. The predator took its maiden flight, Feb. 13, 2009. The Predator is a remotely piloted plane used for reconnaissance and for strike missions with laser guided missiles if needed. Photo by Senior Airman Tiffany Trojca, 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing. JOINT BASE BALAD — The 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing received a new MQ-1 Predator unmanned aerial aircraft and immediately put it into action, Feb. 13. “As far as getting a new aircraft, it’s not very often in the Predator community you are...

2/17/2009 - JOINT BASE BALAD, Iraq (AFNS) -- The 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing received a new MQ-1 Predator unmanned aircraft and immediately put it into action here Feb. 13. "As far as getting a new aircraft, it's not very often in the Predator community you are launching a brand-new plane that's never been flown operationally before," said Lt. Col. Debra Lee, 46th Expeditionary Reconnaissance and Attack Squadron commander. "The one we received today only had four hours on it, which includes testing time back in the United States." After arriving here disassembled and packed in a crate, the remotely-piloted plane...

A suspected US missile strike destroyed a major Taliban training camp in Pakistan Saturday, killing at least 27 mainly Al-Qaeda foreign operatives, security officials said. Two missiles fired by an unmanned drone struck the camp of top Taliban commander Baitullah Mehsud in the tribal area of Ladha near the Afghan border, they said, adding Mehsud was not in the camp at the time of the strike. Two Arabs, some local Taliban and a number of Uzbeks were killed in the strike, the latest in a series of such attacks which have drawn strong protest from Pakistan. "The death toll in...

NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — A convicted sex offender pleaded guilty Monday to raping a 6-year-old boy at a Massachusetts public library last year while he was on probation. Corey Deen Saunders, 27, entered the plea Monday to child rape and related charges. He was arrested Jan. 30, 2008, after luring the boy to the magazine stacks in the New Bedford library while the child's mother worked on a computer just a few feet away. At a court hearing last year, prosecutors played a videotaped interview in which the boy told a child welfare official the assault was like being attacked...

Video: Five Taliban ambushed coalition forces. An MQ-1 Predator UAV finds and tracks them afterward. One Hellfire missile later, one survivor runs for the trees.

Acting as super-predators, humans are forcing changes to body size and reproductive abilities in some species 300 percent faster than would occur naturally, a new study finds. Hunting and fishing by individual sportsmen as well as large-scale commercial fishing are also outpacing other human influences, such as pollution, in effects on the animal kingdom.

WASHINGTON/ISLAMABAD: Al Qaeda’s operations chief in Pakistan and a top aide have been killed, Pakistani officials confirmed on Friday. Operations chief Osama Al-Kini was thought responsible for attacks including the bombing of Marriott hotel in Islamabad and an unsuccessful attempt to kill former prime minister Benazir Bhutto. Al-Kini and his lieutenant Sheikh Ahmed Salim Swedan, both Kenyans, were killed in a missile strike in South Waziristan on January 1. Security officials in Islamabad said Al-Kini’s killing would relieve the security apparatus of a ‘big worry’. agencies

War On Terror: Two more top al-Qaida operatives collected their virgins on New Year's Day. Justice may be delayed, but not denied. Look up in the sky: It's a bird! It's a plane! It's a . . . Predator drone!U.S. officials have confirmed that a Jan. 1 missile strike killed two top al-Qaida members long sought for the Aug. 7, 1998, bombings of the U.S. embassies in Tanzania and Kenya. Cross Fahid Mohammed Ali Msalam and Sheikh Ahmed Salem Swedan off the FBI's "Most Wanted Terrorists" list. Msalam, also known as Usama al-Kini, and Sedan both from Kenya. Both are...

The top hierarchy of al-Qaeda has taken such a hit from US missile strikes that Osama bin Laden and his deputy have had to replace people in the terrorist organisation with men they have never met, according to Western intelligence sources. A Predator drone: from as far away as Nevada, in the heart of the US, controllers on the ground are able to strike bases used by the leadership of al-Qaeda in the borderlands of Pakistan. Casualties have been heavy and new leaders are often not well-known A dozen of al-Qaeda’s “senior management” have been killed by Predator drone attacks,...

A suspected pilotless American drone has fired two missiles in a border area of Pakistan, killing seven people, Pakistani officials have said. Reports say the missile destroyed a house in South Waziristan. The identity of those killed is not known.

The US has attacked a Taliban safe house in the lawless tribal agency of North Waziristan, killing two people, according to reports from the region. An unmanned Predator aircraft fired at least one Hellfire missile at a Taliban safe house in the Tapi Tool region near Miramshah, the main town in the Taliban-controlled tribal agency, Geo News reported. No senior leaders have been reported killed in the strike. The al Qaeda-linked Haqqani family and Taliban warlord Hafiz Gul Bahadar operate in North Waziristan. The Haqqani Network has a strong presence in Miramshah region of North Waziristan. The Haqqanis control large...

FARGO, N.D. – After two failed tries, an unmanned aircraft expected to be the first to patrol the northern U.S. border completed a flight from Arizona to North Dakota. U.S Customs and Border Protection officials said the Predator B drone touched down Saturday at the Grand Forks Air Force Base after a six-hour flight from Libby Army Airfield in Sierra Vista, Ariz.

SLAMABAD (Reuters) – Pakistan's air force is fully capable of stopping missile strikes by pilotless U.S. drones but it is up to the government to decide whether to do that, the air force chief said on Tuesday. U.S. forces in Afghanistan have carried out at least 26 air strikes by unmanned aircraft on militant targets in northwest Pakistan this year, according to a Reuters tally, more than half since the start of September. Pakistan supports the U.S.-led campaign against militancy but does not allow foreign troops or strikes inside its territory. It says the attacks violate its sovereignty and undermine...

Al Qaeda Bag of Shit, Rashid Rauf, heads off to see the virgins Gotta love Hellfire packin' Predators. More . . .

BANNU: At least 13 people, including five foreigners, were killed in a missile strike on Friday by a suspected US drone in Pakistan's troubled North Waziristan tribal region bordering Afghanistan. The missile struck the home of a tribesman in Jani Khel area near FR Bannu, 45 km from Miranshah, the headquarters of North Waziristan Agency, early this morning. Five foreigners were among the dead, officials told. Five missiles were fired and one hit the home of a tribesman, Ghani Gul, killing 5 foreigners including a senior al-Qaeda commander. However, their names could not be known. The attack was the latest...

The al Qaeda figure believed to be organizing a new terror attack against the United States is dead, a senior U.S. official tells ABCNews.com. The al Qaeda figure believed to be organizing a new terror attack against the United States is dead,... The al Qaeda figure believed to be organizing a new terror attack against the United States is dead, a senior U.S. official tells ABCNews.com. The official says the U.S. now has evidence that Khalid Habib was killed in an unmanned air strike two weeks ago in the South Waziristan region of Pakistan. Until now, there had been no...

Friday, The Times' Greg Miller and Julian E. Barnes reported that the United States has escalated its war against Al Qaeda and its Taliban allies by "deploying Predator aircraft equipped with sophisticated new surveillance systems that were instrumental in crippling the insurgency in Iraq." It's a story whose significance may extend well beyond the benighted hills and valleys of Pakistan's violent Pashtun hinterlands and onto the hustings of our current presidential campaign. Coupled with Thursday's report in the New York Times that President Bush has signed a secret order permitting Afghanistan-based U.S. special operations forces to cross into Pakistan without...

A U.S. drone aircraft missile attack targeting a militant camp in Pakistan killed at least four people and wounded three, a Pakistani intelligence official in the South Waziristan region said. Officials said the drone fired four missiles as dusk fell on Baghar, a village in the mountains 55 km (35 miles) west of Wana, the main town in the region.

SANTA ANA An American propagandist for Al Qaeda who was raised in Orange County may have been killed along the Afghan-Pakistani border in an air strike by an unmanned U.S. Predator aircraft, according to intelligence experts quoted by a British newspaper. Gadahn has been credited with helping transform Al Qaeda's propaganda wing into a slick operation able to communicate in fluent English and produce professional quality DVDs, including one for Osama bin Laden last year.

Months of attacks by unmanned US predator aircraft have caused carnage among the middle ranks of terrorist leaders in the lawless lands along the border with Afghanistan, where al-Qa'eda remains dangerous despite suffering a serious defeat in Iraq. Their victims have included experienced Arab leaders and, it is now thought, Adam Gadahn, a former heavy-metal fan and so-called "killer computer nerd" originally from California. Nothing has been heard from him for months, leading intelligence experts to conclude that he may be dead. Mr Gadahn has been credited with helping transform al-Qa'eda's al-Sahab propaganda wing into a slick operation which communicates...

The former pop star arrived back in London and tried to avoid signing the sex offenders' register, saying it was breaching his human rights. A judge ordered him to register within three days or face prison.

8/11/2008 - ALI BASE, Iraq (AFPN) -- MQ-1 Predator unmanned aerial system pilots here can now talk over a secure Internet phone line using their headsets thanks to one Airman's ingenuity and one dollar. Staff Sgt. Ray Stetler, the NCO in charge of base information and infrastructure for the 407th Expeditionary Communications Squadron here, received a 2 a.m. phone call that led him to make the modification, which grants pilots access to Voice Over Secure Internet Protocol. The sergeant said the 407th ECS help desk thought he could fill the request because of his reputation for fixing things. After they...

The Air National Guardsmen who operate Predator drones over Iraq via remote control, launching deadly missile attacks from the safety of Southern California 7,000 miles away, are suffering some of the same psychological stresses as their comrades on the battlefield.

A man whose shirt proclaims him as the "world's greatest dad" has been arrested on charges he tried to use the internet to arrange a sexual encounter with a minor.

The United States has a standing agreement with Pakistan that CIA-operated Predator drones may strike Osama bin Laden's hide-out without prior permission from Islamabad, according to people familiar with the arrangement. One source said the free hand - an exception in a country politically sensitive to U.S. counterterrorism operations - was granted by President Pervez Musharraf early in the war if the U.S. locates bin Laden in Pakistan's rugged tribal areas, where he is thought to be hiding.... DRONE

By now, many of you have seen the outrageous comments of Massachusetts State Representative James Fagan, a Democrat. In defending a child rapist, he would tear apart the child on the stand and ruin the child's life forever. He made the comments arrogantly and shamelessly. Watch it here. FAGAN'S WEBSITE SHOWS HOW IS INVOLVED IN SEVERAL CHILDREN'S ORGANIZATIONS. ORGANIZATIONS: Massachusetts Academy of Trial Lawyers; Taunton Boys & Girls Club (Board of Directors); Taunton Little League; Taunton Youth Basketball Coach; Massachusetts Bar Foundation; Massachusetts Waterfowlers, Inc.; Babe Ruth League; High School Umpire; Bristol Ducks Unlimited; Southeastern New England Area Boys' Clubs...

As the Massachusetts State Legislature debates "Jessica's Law" -- named after Jessica Lunsford who was raped and murdered in Florida by a repeat sex offender -- one representative who is against the law expressed his displeasure on the floor of the House. Really expressed his displeasure. The representative, one James Fagan, said he'd “rip apart” 6-year-old victims on the witness stand and “make sure the rest of their life is ruined.” In a fiery soliloquy on the House floor, Fagan said he’d grill victims so that, “when they’re 8 years old they throw up; when they’re 12 years old, they...

On November's ballot in CA we will have two very important propositions. The Marriage Amendment and Sarah's Law which is a parental notification law. Please, please, please view this 60 second video and pass it on to everyone you know. Please go to www.FriendsOfSarah.com for more information. Also see National Organization for Marriage California

Eight militants killed in Bajaur blast Thursday, May 29, 2008 By Mushtaq Yusufzai PESHAWAR: At least eight militants, affiliated with regional militant commander Maulana Faqir Mohammad, were killed and two others seriously injured when a pick-up truck they were travelling in was blown up in the troubled Salarzai subdivision of Bajaur Agency on Wednesday morning. There were conflicting reports about the cause of the blast, as one report said a pick-up truck, carrying militants to Afghanistan's restive Nuristan province for attacks on the US-led Nato forces, was allegedly targeted by an American spy plane.Local residents said the moment they heard...

Texas: Plano man Joe Barron, 52, a minister at Prestonwood Baptist Church near Dallas, was arrested after driving nearly 200 miles to Bryan to meet who he thought was a 13-year-old girl he had been chatting with sexually online for roughly two weeks. The girl was actually an undercover agent leading police to Barron and his car, inside of which they found condoms and a web-cam. He had been with the 26,000-member church for 18 months; they said this was the first incident of this type with Barron. Executive pastor Mike Buster said, "We are disturbed and saddened by the...

One of the more conspicuous silences during the whole Bernie Ward saga has been coming from KGO-Radio (810 AM), his longtime employer. Long the Bay Area's ratings king, the news-talk station has -- on the advice of its corporate parent Citadel Broadcasting says KGO president and general manager Mickey Luckoff -- suggested that its on-air talent not talk about Bernie. Not yet. "It wasn't an edict," Luckoff said Thursday, moments after Ward changed his plea to guilty to distributing child porn. "We have never, ever put restrictions on anybody here. We have never put an embargo on what people could...

SAN FRANCISCO -- Bernie Ward, a prominent radio talk show host and reporter in the Bay Area for more than two decades, admitted today to distributing child pornography in a plea deal that will send him to federal prison for at least five years. Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker was prepared to accept Ward's guilty plea at a hearing in San Francisco to one count of distributing child pornography, but agreed to hold off at the request of Ward's attorney, Doron Weinberg. Had the guilty plea been officially submitted today, Ward could have been sent to prison immediately. Instead,...

WASHINGTON, May 7, 2008 – A significant unmanned aerial vehicle warfighting milestone was reached more than two years ahead of schedule May 1, with the beginning of the 24th MQ-1 Predator combat air patrol in the global war on terror, Air Force officials announced yesterday. This CAP doubles the around-the-clock Predator capability of last year, two years ahead of the Defense Department’s goal of 2010 for 21 Predator CAPs, officials said. Predators now supply more than 13,400 hours of full-motion video to ground forces every month while conducting armed overwatch, force protection and precision air-to-surface engagements with the AGM-114 Hellfire...