In an example of colossal stupidity, Iraqi officials have called for the killing of the three wild boars in the Baghdad zoo to protect the country against swine flu. This comes on the heals of the Egyptian government moving to kill every pig in the country despite the lack of any evidence that it would help prevent the virus, which passes from human to human.
Continue reading “Iraqi Officials to Kill Zoo Animals to Protect Against Swine Flu”
Meet the America’s Torture Doctors: Bruce Jessen and Jim Mitchell. The names of the two psychologists have been released with a report that they played a critical role in establishing the torture program by attesting to its safety. I will be addressing the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association in Toronto in August on the involvement of doctors in these war crimes.
The Pew Forum has released an interesting poll that the more religious Americans, the more likely they are to support the use of torture against terrorism suspects.
There appears to be an emerging field of wedding torts and crimes this month. Recently, we saw a lawsuit against a woman who ruined a wedding by announcing that she was sleeping with the groom (hint: she was not the bride). Now, in Naples, Florida, Molly S. Collins (left), 19, is accused of stealing make up gifts for the bridesmaids after a wedding reception while in Tampa Lisa Coker is accused of crashing a wedding with a razor and crowbar — and attacking the wedding party.
Continue reading “Wedding Bells and Bars: Women Arrested in Separate Wedding Crimes”
There is an interesting exchange that has surfaced between a Stanford student and former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice who is a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institute at Stanford. The student confronted Rice about whether waterboarding is torture. She responded with a Nixonesque argument that, if the president ordered it, it cannot be a war crime. It sounds a lot like Nixon’s 1977 statement: “When the president does it, that means it is not illegal.” I discussed the Rice comment on this segment of Hardball.
Its official. Saudi Arabia has its newest eight-year-old divorcee, but not due to any problem in Saudi Arabia with a man over 50 marrying an eight-year-old child. The girl’s lawyer reached an out-of-court settlement with the man who finally agreed to the divorce. A Saudi court twice rejected the mother’s effort to get a divorce for her daughter after the father effectively sold her to the older man as a bride for cash.
Continue reading “The Eight-Year-Old Divorcee — Husband of Child Bride in Saudi Arabia Accepts a Settlement and Grants Divorce to Child Sold to Him by Father”
Vice President Joe Biden’s office has had to issue a type of retraction after Biden advised people to avoid airplanes, subways and confined spaces due to the Swine Flu. Of course, you cannot just retract a vice presidential statement, so Biden’s office simply denied what Biden said and offered a new statement that he did not make.
Continue reading “Biden: Avoid Trains, Airplanes . . . And Interviews”
Associate Justice Antonin Scalia publicly lashed out at Fordham Law Professor Professor Joel Reidenberg who having his students compile a 15-page dossier on his private life. For civil libertarians, Scalia’s objections to a lack of privacy is analogous to Rep. Jane Harman’s outrage over being intercepted as part of the NSA warrantless program that she helped approve.
Continue reading “Scalia Slams Fordham Law Professor For Privacy Invasion”
Two elderly sisters — Elizabeth Marie Grube, 70, and Elaine Volkert, 65 — have been arrested for selling heroin in a type of AARP-certified drug enterprise. Pennsylvania Police seized 400 bags of heroin from Grube home and 988 bags from Volkert’s home. Police also seized quantities of Oxycontin and marijuana in the raids.
The Obama Administration is finally getting ahead of this health care crisis: Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack have told reporters to stop calling this virus the “Swine” Flu — suggesting the ever-so-hip “H1N1′ virus. While it was the pork businesses that led to the change in nomenclature, Israel is moving to drop the reference due to religious objections to pork. It appears that even catching a swine-based flu is religiously problematic. The Obama Administration appears to have rejected “the virus formerly known as Swine Flu.”
Continue reading “Bacon Lung? U.S. and Israel Object to the Use of “Swine” Flu As Name of Current Outbreak”
Imam Amadia Rachid has declared in Salerno, Italy that the swine flu virus is proof that the Koran is correct in its view of pigs. He noted that “We believe that what is happening shows the truth of our faith.” I still think a good solid Divinity School paper would be more user friendly on establishing the superiority of one’s faith.
Continue reading “Imam Declares Swine Flu Proof of Koran’s Truth”
A memo has surfaced showing that the Administration expected some New Yorkers would panic at the low-level fly-over of a 747 and F16 in New York. However, they still barred the public release of the “classified” information. It also turns out that the photo op cost the taxpayers $328,835, though no one seems particularly upset about the costs of such a frivolous project at a time when people are being crushed by a recession. President Obama has said that he is furious and has demanded an investigation.
The “No Fly” list of the Transportation Security Administration has long been ridiculed for showing little sense or scrutiny in putting people on the list. Despite years of criticism, the TSA shows little concern about the use of the list for arbitrary or capricious actions. That seems to be the case in a story this week of how the TSA allegedly refused to allow a French flight to pass through (not land but pass through) U.S. airspace on the way to Nicaragua because one of its passengers was Hernando Calvo Ospina, who is an author and journalist critical of the past policies of the U.S. in Latin America. He is not the first journalist to find himself on the list.
In one of the most uniquely stupid acts committed recently by our government, Louis Caldera, Obama’s Director of the White House Military Office, approved an operation where a 747 flew low over New York and the Statue of Liberty with a fighter jet in pursuit. New Yorkers panicked, fleeing buildings and running in the streets — only to be told it was a White House photo op stunt. What they succeeded in getting was pictures of New Yorkers fleeing and screaming what they believed was another attack.
Continue reading “Shudderfly: White House Terrifies New Yorkers With Fly-Over Stunt”
It appears that women in Saudi Arabia will soon be denied the right to work out in athletic clubs. Saudi officials have decided that there is only authority for men’s clubs to be operated and regulated in the Kingdom. Due to the strict separation of men and women, various clubs have started to tailor to women and those clubs now appear close to a shutdown.
Continue reading “No Spinning Zone: Saudi Female Athletic Clubs To Be Shutdown”