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Air Force chief: Test weapons on testy U.S. mobs

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Via my friend Ian at [Link deprecated: http://www.socialoracle.com/node/538] Social Oracle, this CNN article:

WASHINGTON (AP) — Nonlethal weapons such as high-power microwave devices should be used on American citizens in crowd-control situations before being used on the battlefield, the Air Force secretary said Tuesday.

The object is basically public relations. Domestic use would make it easier to avoid questions from others about possible safety considerations, said Secretary Michael Wynne.
…

The Air Force has paid for research into nonlethal weapons, but he said the service is unlikely to spend more money on development until injury problems are reviewed by medical experts and resolved. They should not be issues like how people claim for compensation for slip and fall injury .If you are injured in any accident, it is advised to first contact a reputed injury claims law firm serving in Canada to claim compensation for the injury caused and give you legal representation. If you’re interested in helping car accident victims, then you can check for attorneys here! If you are from another country and are finding it difficult to communicate with native lawyers, you may contact expert traffic injury lawyers for Chinese speakers or other languages to help you out legally.

Nonlethal weapons generally can weaken people if they are hit with the beam. Some of the weapons can emit short, intense energy pulses that also can be effective in disabling some electronic devices.

And… Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne is getting fired when?

Wait, wait, what country are we in again? I keep forgetting and thinking we have the right to public assembly. Silly f*%&ing me. Yes, let’s microwave people!

[Link deprecated: http://www.socialoracle.com/node/538] As Ian says:

What’s the setting for this “non-lethal” weapon, defrost?

I’m basically at a loss on the definition of a mob, so I consulted a dictionary which says:

1 : a large or disorderly crowd; especially : one bent on riotous or destructive action
2 : the lower classes of a community : MASSES, RABBLE
3 chiefly Australian : a flock, drove, or herd of animals
4 : a criminal set : GANG; especially often capitalized : MAFIA 1
5 chiefly British : a group of people : CROWD

I’m not entirely comfortable with 2,3 and 5. Number 2 would be the ’70’s version of a pale grey meal not entirely appealing or cooked thoroughly.

Given that the police have a proven tendency to not be respectful of people at people public demonstrations (see the raging controversy about the police laughing about shooting a woman in the face with rubber bullets) I don’t think I want the police to have the ability to MICROWAVE ME.

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links for 2006-09-13

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Journalist under criminal charges for filming Katrina evacuees

A journalist and a TV producer working on a piece about Katrina refugees have been charged with the crime of videotaping a “critical national security structure” in Louisiana… Palast Charged with Journalism in the First Degree:

On August 22, for LinkTV and Democracy Now! we videotaped the thousands of Katrina evacuees still held behind a barbed wire in a trailer park encampment a hundred miles from New Orleans. It’s been a year since the hurricane and 73,000 POW’s (Prisoners of W) are still in this aluminum ghetto in the middle of nowhere. One resident, Pamela Lewis said, “It is a prison set-up” — except there are no home furloughs for these inmates because they no longer have homes.
To give a sense of the full flavor and smell of the place, we wanted to show that this human parking lot, with kids and elderly, is nearly adjacent to the Exxon Oil refinery, the nation’s second largest, a chemical-belching behemoth.
So we filmed it. Without Big Brother’s authorization. Uh, oh. Apparently, the broadcast of these stinking smokestacks tipped off Osama that, if his assassins pose as poor Black folk, they can get a cramped Airstream right next to a “critical infrastructure” asset.
So now Matt and I have a “criminal complaint” lodged against us with the feds.
…
Dectective Pananepinto, in justifying our impending bust, said, “If you remember, a lot of people were killed on 9/11.”
Yes, Detective, I remember that very well: my office was in the World Trade Center. Lucky for me, I was out of town that day. It was not a lucky day for 3,000 others.
Yes, I remember “a lot” of people were killed. So I have this suggestion, Detective — and you can pass it on to Mr. Bush: Go and find the people who killed them.

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links for 2006-09-12

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Real people remember

Joe.My.God’s account of “That Day.”

Ian William’s memories of 9/11: “no one wept except the willow”

3 Quarks Daily’s contributors all write about “Five Years Later.”

I’m so glad to read personal accounts because that was what struck me about the media coverage from that day — and for about a week or so after — the grand hype machine had stopped, and all we heard about were real people. No politicians, no celebrities, no pundits, just news anchors talking to and about real human beings living and dying in the real world. I’d much rather hear what New York residents have to say about September 11th than politicians who were in hiding, running like little girls away from the danger.

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War’s Critics Abetting Terrorists, Cheney Says

article on the Washington Post:

“They can’t beat us in a stand-up fight — they never have — but they’re absolutely convinced they can break our will, [that] the American people don’t have the stomach for the fight,” Cheney said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
The vice president said U.S. allies in Afghanistan and Iraq “have doubts” the United States will finish the job there. “And those doubts are encouraged, obviously, when they see the kind of debate that we’ve had in the United States,” he said. “Suggestions, for example, that we should withdraw U.S. forces from Iraq simply feed into that whole notion, validates the strategy of the terrorists.”

The person validating the strategy of the terrorists is you, Mr. Cheney, by inducing panic and fearmongering while eroding the foundations of freedom and the civil rights of U.S. citizens, none of which makes us safer from terrorists, but all of which plays into your personal political agenda (and coincidentally lines your pockets at the same time.)

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How likely are you to die in a terrorist attack?

Via a friend, this article on Wired News titled “One Million Ways to Die“:

But despite the never-ending litany of warnings and endless stories of half-baked plots foiled, how likely are you, statistically speaking, to die from a terrorist attack?

Comparing official mortality data with the number of Americans who have been killed inside the United States by terrorism since the 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma reveals that scores of threats are far more likely to kill an American than any terrorist — at least, statistically speaking.

In fact, your appendix is more likely to kill you than al-Qaida is.

No shit. Mine already tried. Ripped the sucker right out, I did.

I love the threat chart they provide to illustrate stuff you should probably worry about more than terrorism:

S E V E R E
Driving off the road: 254,419
Falling: 146,542
Accidental poisoning: 140,327
H I G H
Dying from work: 59,730
Walking down the street: 52,000.
Accidentally drowning: 38,302
E L E V A T E D
Killed by the flu: 19,415
Dying from a hernia: 16,742
G U A R D E D
Accidental firing of a gun: 8,536
Electrocution: 5,171
L O W
Being shot by law enforcement: 3,949
Terrorism: 3147
Carbon monoxide in products: 1,554

I think “Dying from work: 59,730” as a high threat is my very favorite statistic.

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links for 2006-09-11

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links for 2006-09-10

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Brad Pitt: I’ll marry when everyone can

via Shakesville, this article on Yahoo:

“Angie and I will consider tying the knot when everyone else in the country who wants to be married is legally able,” the 42-year-old actor reveals in Esquire magazine’s October issue, on newsstands Sept. 19.

That is pretty awesome. I have to admit that at each of the three weddings we’ve been to in the past year, although I was deeply supportive of the happy couple, there was a part of me that resented their ability to get married.

It’s also pretty awesome that Zack, contributor to Shakesville, is proposing a “band together in solidarity” pledge for straight couples to not get married until we can. That is not only helpful, but necessary if we ever hope to make change.

But the most awesome thing of all is what some of the people said in the comments to Zack’s post — how their 80-year old parents got divorced with the help of lawyers for family charges in protest that their gay kids can’t get married. Man alive! That’s cool as hell.  You can contact attorneys help for your family law claims to help you out in this situation. As divorce has negative impacts on child growth,they have suggested that you can consult child custody lawyers serving Richland to help you legally. Hire a Schaumburg divorce lawyer to handle the legal aspects of your divorce while you sort out personal issues.

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