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With the two presidential hopefuls arguing over how to fight the Afghan war, and one of them currently in the battle-scarred country - the Bush administration recently held a secret meeting to brainstorm how to win it. U.S. intelligence officials summoned top Afghanistan experts to Virginia, including ex-ground commander Army Lt. Gen. David Barno, to chart a plan for victory, the Daily News has learned. One point several of the experts agreed on: Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama are clueless about the seven-year war, because each wants a troop surge. "Both candidates putting so much emphasis on troop...

It's not easy to find a place to meet the man who goes by the name of Abu Mustafa. A number of places were agreed on and jettisoned. Finally, after hours of cruising around Gaza City with Abu Mustafa's driver, the call came. The meeting would take place on the beach. There are enough people on the beach that one doesn't attract so much attention, the caller explained. How absurd this notion was would soon become clear. Most people don't stick out on the beaches of Gaza to the degree that Abu Mustafa does. He picks his way across the...

I still think the GOP screwed themselves when they failed to take Fred Thompson seriously. The old cat never ceases to amaze me. A Google Alert popped these two stories from the Indian Blogosphere into my in-box this morning: Gandhian self-destruction from Indian Raksa - Defending Secular India, and Gandhi’s Way Isn’t the American Way: Collective suicide is no foreign policy from Islamic Terrorism in India. Both of these posts are based on this March 15, 2007 National Review Online transcript of a Fred Thompson radio spot. Listen to Fred right here. (mp3 file) Doesn't he sound presidential? Here is...

Ongoing weekly - Saturday from 10:30 AM to 1:30 PM, Laguna Beach To confront wacos for Peace in the Middle East and through out the World. these folks are really goofy Main Beach, Pacific Coast Highway and Ocean Avenue. Bring your flags and signs, time to get this state full of nut jobs squared away. If you have any contacts in CA. that do not come to the forums often please forward this alert to them

A depot in France from which a large quantity of powerful explosive went missing was poorly guarded, the regional head of security has said. The storage of 28kg (61lb) of Semtex at the site near Lyon was "not usual and certainly not authorised", Xavier de Fuerst also told the AFP news agency. A search by anti-terrorist officers is under way, and the manager of the site has been suspended pending an inquiry. Semtex is favoured by terrorists as it is odourless and difficult to detect.

The White House this afternoon accidentally sent to its extensive distribution list a Reuters story headlined "Iraqi PM backs Obama troop exit plan - magazine." The story relayed how Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki told the German magazine Der Spiegel that "he supported prospective U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's proposal that U.S. troops should leave Iraq within 16 months … ‘U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama talks about 16 months. That, we think, would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes,'" the prime minister said. The White House employee had intended to send the...

173rd’s fight not symbol of more violent Afghanistan, says Preysler "The sky is not falling," Col. Charles "Chip" Preysler, commander of the 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team, said Saturday from Jalalabad, Afghanistan. Preysler spoke via telephone less than a week after his paratroops and their Afghan allies were involved in a fierce attack at a small post near the village of Wanat. In the July 13 battle, nine of his men were killed and 15 others wounded. But the attack is not a sign of conditions worsening in the country, he said. The battle occurred just after dawn at a...

Following an Islamic court's verdict, Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan Mohmand agency on Saturday publicly shot dead commander and deputy commander of its opponent Islamic militia and captured their 120 armed followers after killing 18 of their fighters, claiming that Shah Group's presence in the agency has been finished. "We arrested Shah Khalid, known as Shah Sahib, his deputy chief Maulvi Obaidullah along with their 120 companions late Friday night after killing their 18 fighters in exchange of gunfire." Dr Asad, spokesman of Taliban amir in Mohmand agency, told this correspondent via phone. "According to the orders of shariah court, comprising of Islamic...

Like a bad dream, the gory images have come back to haunt the land of famished fields and parched valleys veiled in dense layers of dust. Just about when the picture of a woman — covered from head to toe in a blue burqa with a narrow screen in front of her stony eyes — shot in the back of her head was turning grainy, the nightmare revisited Ghazni city last week. Two women, wrapped in blue, were asked to kneel on the ground. And then a few fierce-looking men, with hate dripping from their eyes, nudged the women's bowed...

THESE days in Peshawar, where al-Qaeda was founded 20 years ago, the only glimpse of Osama bin Laden comes on little green packets of safety matches strewn around town by American officials (see picture). They bear the portrait of the world’s most wanted man, along with the promise that America will pay up to $5 million for information leading to his capture. It is an appropriate image. Like one of these matches, Mr bin Laden caused a flash with the September 11th attacks on America in 2001, then vanished into smoke, leaving a burning trail of militancy stretching from Indonesia...

TEHRAN -- Critical talks in Switzerland over Iran's nuclear program began today with both Iranian and United States officials making their highest level diplomatic contacts since the 1979 Islamic revolution. Iran's top nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili and European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana smiled as they posed for pictures before heading into the closed-door meetings which will include U.S. undersecretary William J. Burns, the State Department's number three official.

Last year the Phoenix police department handed 359 extortion-related kidnapping cases, Sgt. Phil Roberts said. The ransom demands in these cases can range from $50,000 to $1 million, he said. Excerpt, read the rest of the related news article here. Click here to watch the video from KPHO news.

In a "Worst person in the world" segment Keith Obermann called Veternan Bud Day a CLOWN because Mr. Day said "he was not prepared to bow the knee to the "Muslims," referring to Muslim terrorists who seek to destroy America.

One recurring question that has been at the forefront of most intelligence agencies since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks by al-Qaida on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon just 1 mile outside Washington concerns the ongoing efforts by terrorist groups to acquire weapons of mass destruction: chemical, biological and mostly nuclear. Each of the NBC (nuclear, biological, chemical) weapons comes with a certain advantage and disadvantage -- for the terrorist, that is. Of the three sorts, biological weapons are quite possibly the easiest to safely reproduce in a lab, assuming one knows what to do. A...

Gitmo Go-Ahead July 19, 2008; Page A8 It has taken nearly seven years, but the men who planned the murder of 3,000 Americans on 9/11 are finally going to face justice in a court of law. The last of numerous political and legal hurdles were cleared this week to put the enemy combatants held at Guantanamo on trial. Federal District Court Judge James Robertson ruled Thursday that the military commissions -- established by Congress in 2006 and applying guidelines laid out by the Supreme Court -- can move forward. A military judge in Guantanamo reached a similar decision. So the...

BEIJING: Chinese authorities have replaced top police and security officials in the Muslim dominated Xinjiang province, which is the hotbed of separatism and political violence. They have also closed down 41 "illegal" places of worship. These places of worship were used as training ground for conducting a "holy war", Chen Zhuangwei Chen, the police chief of Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang province, said.

Hi everybody, I’m excited to be posting on BlogHer. Not only because blogging is something I’ve actually been able to beat my daughters to; but because it gives me the opportunity to tell you a little bit about them, my husband, myself, and our experiences traveling all over this great country. Over the course of this campaign, I’ve been hosting roundtable discussions with working women all across America. I’m there to talk about my husband, of course – but more importantly, I’m there to listen. We talk about what it’s like to play multiple roles at once and what it’s...

Many people across the Arab world are excited and amused that a black man with the middle name 'Hussein', who is pledging to end the war in Iraq, has become the Democrats' nominee for president of the US. But in Iraq, which is preparing to receive Senator Barak Obama this weekend, a sense of realism prevails. He said that he would have all US combat troops out of the Arab country within 16 months of becoming president. All this, however, sparks fear rather than joy among many Iraqis across the political and sectarian spectrum. Withdrawal of US troops is not...

As Sen. Barack Obama prepares for his second visit to Iraq, Iraqis are divided over his plan to withdraw U.S. combat troops in 16 months should he be elected president. "Iraq will be in hell, and we will find ourselves at the gates of civil war," said Maied Rashed al-Nuaemi, a provincial council member in Mosul, a city in northern Iraq where Iraqi forces are battling the Sunni insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq. "The American presence in Iraq is the safety valve to keep this country quiet. If they withdraw, that will lead to calamity." Mohammed Sulaiman, 56, a retired...

Three Bali bombers have exhausted their appeals and will soon be executed by firing squad, according to Indonesia's attorney general.Imam Samudra and the brothers Amrozi and Ali Ghufron have never shown any remorse for the 2002 bombings and have repeatedly said that they embrace death and wish to be martyrs. Indonesia's attorney general Henderman Supanji, in announcing that no further legal avenues are available to the condemned men, said, "the process would not be drawn out". The bombers' lawyer, Fahmi Bachmid, said afterwards: "All of them have repeatedly said they will only ask pardon from God, not the president. This...

PARIS, France (CNN) -- Explosives used to destroy land mines have disappeared from a site near Lyon, France, the French Interior Ministry said Friday. About 62 pounds (28 kilograms) of explosives were stolen from a depot at the civil security site at Fort de Corbas, the ministry said in a written statement, because of an apparent breach in the site's protection. Michele Alliot-Marie, France's minister of the interior, immediately suspended the head of the security center and started an investigation. French anti-terrorism authorities and the Lyon police also are participating in the investigation, the statement

War On Terror: After 9/11, Pakistan promised to close its radical madrassas as part of anti-terror reforms. Now we learn they're not only still open, but also recruiting and brainwashing American boys.All told, 600 American children are being indoctrinated into jihad in 22 madrassas across Pakistan. A U.S. filmmaker stumbled on them while tracing the path of the London suicide bombers. He discovered they attended the same radical Islamic schools. A congressional delegation has confirmed his findings. One particularly radical school in Karachi freely displays a banner at its main gate urging Muslims to join the Taliban. At least 80...

The Air Force's top leadership sought for three years to spend counterterrorism funds on "comfort capsules" to be installed on military planes that ferry senior officers and civilian leaders around the world, with at least four top generals involved in design details such as the color of the capsules' carpet and leather chairs, according to internal e-mails and budget documents. Production of the first capsule -- consisting of two sealed rooms that can fit into the fuselage of a large military aircraft -- has already begun. Air Force officials say the government needs the new capsules to ensure that leaders...

Former Vice President Al Gore, delivering a speech in Washington on environmental issues, said global warming, not terrorism, is the No. 1 threat to America. The former V.P. encourages a national switch to earth-friendly power sources. (Video at Link) *barf alert is standard for algoreWhile he praised both Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain for their stands on environmental issues, Gore challenged the next president to take bold steps to solve the problem. "Both are serious and must be addressed. That having been said, I think that the climate crisis is, by far, the most serious threat we have ever...

A Shia imam in Saudi Arabia has declared his support for Iran and called on supporters to send money to the country to help it fight against the United States and Israel. "We stand by Iran and we will do everything to support this country," said Shia imam Namer Baqer al-Namer during a sermon he gave at the Imam Hussein mosque in the eastern village al-Awamiya on Friday. The sermon was published on the imam's Internet site on Tuesday. A Saudi citizen, al-Namer said that he felt very close to Iran for his Shia belief and called on the faithful...

LYON (AFP) - La disparition de 28 kilos d'un puissant explosif, vraisemblablement du Semtex, a été constatée dans un centre de déminage de la banlieue de Lyon, un vol que le ministre de l'Intérieur, Michèle Alliot-Marie, a imputé à des "défaillances dans la sécurisation du site". LYON (AFP) - the disappearance of 28 kilos a powerful explosive, probably Semtex, was noted in a center of mine clearance of the suburbs of Lyon, a flight that the Michele Al, Minister of Interior Department, charged to failures in the security of the site.

"David Remes, a Covington & Burling partner, lowered his pants on Monday at a conference in Yemen to demonstrate the treatment of the detainees at Guantanamo Bay. Photo: " "“I’d been to Guantanamo in mid-June,” explained Remes, “and there’s a certain amount of normalcy that has settled over the normal miserable conditions of confinement, which amount to solitary confinement without sleep and without sunlight and without anyone to talk to. So at the news conference, I said that, in addition to this torment, which has become so typical that we don’t even talk about it anymore, now the torment also...

Al-Qaeda’s global jihadHow to win the war within Islam Jul 17th 2008From The Economist print editionIn the long run, al-Qaeda will be defeated by Muslims, not foreigners. But the West can still help AMERICA’S “global war on terrorism”, now in its seventh year, has gone on longer than the second world war. Will it ever end? Optimists believe some kind of victory is in sight: Iraq is improving; al-Qaeda has been unable to stage a big attack in the West in three years; and terrorists have shown little sign of using weapons of mass destruction. Jihadists face an ideological backlash,...

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel accused six Arabs on Friday of trying to set up an al Qaeda cell in Israel and said one of them had proposed attacking helicopters used during a visit by President George W. Bush. Israel's Shin Bet counter-intelligence agency said one of the suspects had used his mobile phone to film helicopters at a sports stadium in Jerusalem that was used as a landing site for Bush's delegation. The suspect then posted queries on Web sites frequented by al Qaeda operatives, asking for guidance on how to shoot down the helicopters, the agency said in a...

Al Qaeda continues to grow its network and expand its capabilities in northwestern Pakistan, US military and intelligence officials told The Long War Journal. The peace agreements have given the Taliban and al Qaeda time and space to re-establish their networks, which pose a threat not only to Pakistan, but the West as well.

In a recent interview with the Yemen Observer, David Remes, a Covington & Burling partner who was in Yemen working on his representation of 15 Yemeni detainees at Gitmo, told the journalist that he had “two missions” during the visit: “first to meet the families of the men that I represent in Guantanamo and second, to do what I can to promote the cause of these men.” RemesIt was in the name of this zealous advocacy that Remes (Columbia, Harvard Law) removed his pants at a news conference on Monday. This morning, we caught up with Remes, who had just...

This column will demonstrate how the Democratic Party and its candidate for president, Sen. Barack Obama, base their proposed foreign policy and their approach to the war in Iraq on lies and misconceptions. The Democratic Party and Mr. Obama are simply confused, perhaps deliberately so, about why we went to war in Iraq, and have ignored the clear and unambiguous facts and the record. The Democrats and their candidate are caught up in the sweet sounds of fancy oratory and soaring rhetoric, and have little room for hard facts or cold reality. Ironically, if the Democrats would finally face the...

TEHRAN (FNA) - Iran's Air Force chief announced that the Islamic Republic has successfully launched the production line of radar-evading "stealth" fighter jets. Brigadier General Ahmad Mighani was quoted by press tv as saying Tuesday that the new jets would significantly enhance the Air Force's combat and defensive capabilities. Iran has recently started manufacturing superior "Quick Reaction" tanks to increase its defense self-sufficiency. Iran has also developed an electro-optical surveillance system that acts as a viable alternative when radars fail to cover a particular range. "We have upgraded our air force fleet, radar-systems, and missile systems over the past few...

There is by now only one constant in the entire sad Iraqi saga since the brilliant three-week victory of 2003, and the subsequent violent reconstruction that followed. In our collective exasperation almost all the bad news from the front is due to someone else’s stupidity; any good reports are always the result of one’s own insight and sobriety. The result is irony, but also amnesia about what was written and said in the recent past. Consider the paradoxes we’ve witnessed. We were paralyzed for a year over Ambassador Joe Wilson’s carnival-like mission, in part due to the prompt of his...

News Flash: There's also RACISM in TERRORISM, and siding, apologizing, 'justifying' terrorism is RACISM!   Isn't it amazing how racists Arabists cry 'racism' all the time? The very Arabists who find the most Pallywood-y language on how to coat their criminal rationalization for targeting (Israeli or other) Jews for Arab Muslim terrorists' mass murder. If there's not yet, any real clarity in most media that the Arabist Islamist view, of viewing an entire [men, women, children] race or an entire religion as "legitimate" targets, as nothing but racism and Islamic bigotry, than what is racism?   That includes not only the...

On the night of January 20, 2009, a new commander-in-chief will leave the inaugural podium, parade, and festivities for the Oval Office. A national security staff ready with the latest “threat briefing” will join him there. On his desk, they will place a thick binder of reports, each focusing on real or emerging threats to our national security. In the quiet of the Oval Office -- in the presence of these stern-faced, deadly serious briefers and advisers -- Barack H. Obama, should he be the next president, will come face-to-face with reality. Americans are afraid of this scenario, Barack H....

How are you doing, financially? You’ve probably got a better job than you did five years ago, and you’ll probably have a still better job (or at least better pay) five years from now. Unless, of course, you retire. In that case, your income goes down, yet you have an opportunity to live for your final 20 or 30 years (with help from Social Security and Medicare) without working. Retirement is a prospect today’s Americans take for granted. But it’s a recent invention. It wasn’t all that long ago that most people worked their entire lives. Most jobs were physically...

MANILA, July 17 (Reuters) - The Philippines will hold a plebiscite early next year in more than 700 southern villages to set up an ancestral homeland for Muslims, part of a deal with the country's biggest rebel group, officials said on Thursday. Hermogenes Esperon, the president's peace adviser, told reporters the proposed Muslim homeland would also be empowered to collect about 75 percent of taxes from oil, mines and fisheries in the area. He was speaking in Manila a day after government and Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) negotiators hammered out a deal in Kuala Lumpur, the Malaysian capital. "The...

SNIP Mr. HUNTER. So, Mr. Speaker, thanks for letting me take this time. It's always fun to come down and take a big bite out of somebody else's time, and I want to thank the gentleman from Iowa for letting me take some of his minutes here. I really appreciate it. And the gentleman from Iowa, incidentally, is a very wonderful friend and a great colleague and a guy who really has been working this energy issue with great energy and was a wonderful host to those of us who spent our time in Iowa in that Presidential race, including...

US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Thursday called President George W. Bush "a total failure" who "has no ideas," in an interview with CNN. Responding to stinging criticism from Bush on the Democratic leadership in both houses of Congress and the slow pace of the legislative agenda, as Congress prepares for its one-month summer recess in August, Pelosi let loose: "You know, God bless him, bless his heart, the president of the United States, a total failure, losing all credibility with the American people on the economy, on the war, on energy, you name the subject." Pelosi, 68,...

MADRID — A Spanish court absolved four men and upheld the acquittal of a fifth on Thursday in the convoluted legal proceedings relating to the 2004 Madrid commuter train bombings that killed 191 people in the deadliest attack by Islamic militants on European soil. The rulings followed appeals of some of 21 convictions by a lower court after a five-month trial that ended in October. Seven other people were acquitted at that time. Most dramatically, the court on Thursday upheld the acquittal of one of the bombing’s accused masterminds, Rabei Osman, an Egyptian, who was found guilty in 2006 in...

WASHINGTON — A federal judge has ruled to allow the first Guantanamo Bay war crimes trial to move forward, blocking an appeal by lawyers for Salim Hamdan, a former driver for Usama bin Laden.

Spain's Supreme Court has overturned the conviction of four people found guilty of involvement in the Madrid train bombings in 2004. The four were among 21 people convicted last year over the attacks, which killed 191 people. The court also upheld the acquittal of an Egyptian suspected of masterminding the attacks, because he had already been convicted of the offence in Italy. However it convicted and jailed one of those originally found not guilty. The Spanish man, who was sentenced to four years in prison, had earlier been cleared of helping to supply the explosives used in the Madrid attacks....

What is to be done with Omar Khadr, the Canadian currently being held at the Americans' detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba? Notwithstanding his teary-eyed performances in strategically edited interrogation recordings released by his lawyers on Tuesday in Edmonton, Mr. Khadr is accused of serious crimes against soldiers of our closest ally, the United States. Should the government of Canada bring him home and try him here -- as the opposition Liberals are clamouring for -- or permit him to be tried this October by a U. S. military tribunal, as scheduled? There is evidence -- including eyewitness testimony-- that...

Nearly seven years after the 9-11 attacks, the Bush administration is finally reconsidering its opposition to one of the most effective counterterrorism weapons at its disposal. In the months ahead, FBI agents may be able to profile potential terrorists on the basis of suspicious traits and activities, including their ethnic and religious backgrounds. Those most likely to commit acts of Islamic terrorism will no longer be able to hide in plain sight. It is a modest step. The Justice Department insists that the “FBI is not going to open an investigation simply on the basis of race, ethnicity, or religion.”...

THERE is deepening concern that Australia's intelligence agencies and those of other key US allies could be compromised in the fight against al-Qa'ida and other radical Islamist groups because of a controversial US Supreme Court ruling. The Supreme Court decision last month provided new rights to enemy combatants held at Guantanamo, who include Bali bombing mastermind Hambali. It is dawning on foreign intelligence operatives that it has opened the door to the possibility that the information they share with Washington could be aired in civilian courts. British and European allies are demanding answers from the US security apparatus, according to...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. lawmakers defied a White House veto threat on Wednesday and voted to bar CIA contractors from interrogating suspected terrorists, in the latest clash over detainee treatment in the U.S.-declared war on terrorism. The Democratic-controlled House of Representatives approved the provision in adopting a broad measure to authorize funding of U.S. intelligence agencies for the 2009 fiscal year. A related bill awaits action in the Senate. Passage of the multibillion dollar bill came on a voice vote, indicating broad assent, despite the White House veto threat issued earlier in the day. In addition to the contractor ban,...

Islamic Extremism for Dummies Human Events, DC - Jun 25, 2008 Facing the most challenging and dangerous time in our history, American voters in this year’s presidential election can ill afford to put in office a leader lacking foreign policy experience. Our next president must understand at the outset much of the world’s turmoil today, whether it is Iraq, Afghanistan, the Gaza Strip, Lebanon, the proliferation of nuclear weapons, etc., originates in Iran -- either directly or through proxies. ... Obama’s JFK analogy conveniently omits two important points: it was Kennedy’s perceived weakness that precipitated the Cuban Missile Crisis; it...

A Rochester native has filed a civil lawsuit against an Arab sheik who was convicted of beating him in the bar of a posh hotel in Geneva, Switzerland. In a lawsuit filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in San Diego, Calif., Silvano D. Orsi asks for an unspecified monetary amount from Sheik Falah bin Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan for past, present and future physical pain and suffering, mental anguish and loss of earning capacity. A police tribunal last month convicted the sheik, a member of the ruling family of the United Arab Emirates, of inflicting "bodily harm with the...

On one side of Bragg Boulevard on Wednesday, American flags whipped in the wind, from toothpicks, from veteran’s hands, from the top of a pole attached to a pickup.On the other, American flags were being dragged on the ground.On one side, Army wives, veterans and bikers held signs that read "I Love My Soldier," "Our Husbands, Our Heroes," and "God Loves The World."On the other, four members of Westboro Baptist Church — including a 22-year-old woman and 7-year-old boy — held signs that read “God is Your Enemy” and "America is Doomed." The child’s read: "God Hates the U.S.A."The two...