Deexan
CS! Silver
Join Date: Aug 2003
Posts: 18,196
Likes: 2,995
Location:
Last Online Nov 13, 2021 19:23:59 GMT -5
|
Post by Deexan on Mar 12, 2015 7:41:31 GMT -5
What ISIS Really Wants
The Islamic State is no mere collection of psychopaths. It is a religious group with carefully considered beliefs, among them that it is a key agent of the coming apocalypse. Here’s what that means for its strategy—and for how to stop it. What is the Islamic State? Where did it come from, and what are its intentions? The simplicity of these questions can be deceiving, and few Western leaders seem to know the answers. In December, The New York Times published confidential comments by Major General Michael K. Nagata, the Special Operations commander for the United States in the Middle East, admitting that he had hardly begun figuring out the Islamic State’s appeal. “We have not defeated the idea,” he said. “We do not even understand the idea.” In the past year, President Obama has referred to the Islamic State, variously, as “not Islamic” and as al-Qaeda’s “jayvee team,” statements that reflected confusion about the group, and may have contributed to significant strategic errors. The group seized Mosul, Iraq, last June, and already rules an area larger than the United Kingdom. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has been its leader since May 2010, but until last summer, his most recent known appearance on film was a grainy mug shot from a stay in U.S. captivity at Camp Bucca during the occupation of Iraq. Then, on July 5 of last year, he stepped into the pulpit of the Great Mosque of al-Nuri in Mosul, to deliver a Ramadan sermon as the first caliph in generations—upgrading his resolution from grainy to high-definition, and his position from hunted guerrilla to commander of all Muslims. The inflow of jihadists that followed, from around the world, was unprecedented in its pace and volume, and is continuing. Our ignorance of the Islamic State is in some ways understandable: It is a hermit kingdom; few have gone there and returned. Baghdadi has spoken on camera only once. But his address, and the Islamic State’s countless other propaganda videos and encyclicals, are online, and the caliphate’s supporters have toiled mightily to make their project knowable. We can gather that their state rejects peace as a matter of principle; that it hungers for genocide; that its religious views make it constitutionally incapable of certain types of change, even if that change might ensure its survival; and that it considers itself a harbinger of—and headline player in—the imminent end of the world. The Islamic State, also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), follows a distinctive variety of Islam whose beliefs about the path to the Day of Judgment matter to its strategy, and can help the West know its enemy and predict its behavior. Its rise to power is less like the triumph of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt (a group whose leaders the Islamic State considers apostates) than like the realization of a dystopian alternate reality in which David Koresh or Jim Jones survived to wield absolute power over not just a few hundred people, but some 8 million. We have misunderstood the nature of the Islamic State in at least two ways. First, we tend to see jihadism as monolithic, and to apply the logic of al‑Qaeda to an organization that has decisively eclipsed it. The Islamic State supporters I spoke with still refer to Osama bin Laden as “Sheikh Osama,” a title of honor. But jihadism has evolved since al-Qaeda’s heyday, from about 1998 to 2003, and many jihadists disdain the group’s priorities and current leadership. Bin Laden viewed his terrorism as a prologue to a caliphate he did not expect to see in his lifetime. His organization was flexible, operating as a geographically diffuse network of autonomous cells. The Islamic State, by contrast, requires territory to remain legitimate, and a top-down structure to rule it. (Its bureaucracy is divided into civil and military arms, and its territory into provinces.) We are misled in a second way, by a well-intentioned but dishonest campaign to deny the Islamic State’s medieval religious nature. Peter Bergen, who produced the first interview with bin Laden in 1997, titled his first book Holy War, Inc. in part to acknowledge bin Laden as a creature of the modern secular world. Bin Laden corporatized terror and franchised it out. He requested specific political concessions, such as the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Saudi Arabia. His foot soldiers navigated the modern world confidently. On Mohamed Atta’s last full day of life, he shopped at Walmart and ate dinner at Pizza Hut. Continued...One of the most engrossing and interesting things I've read on the internet in recent times.
|
|
Nilade
Director
Join Date: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,687
Likes: 426
Location:
Last Online Nov 18, 2024 0:05:59 GMT -5
|
Post by Nilade on Mar 12, 2015 23:15:30 GMT -5
|
|
Dracula
CS! Gold
Join Date: Sep 2002
Posts: 26,101
Likes: 5,731
Location:
Member is Online
|
Post by Dracula on Mar 12, 2015 23:25:15 GMT -5
Doesn't really sound like Anonymous' M.O.
|
|
Nilade
Director
Join Date: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,687
Likes: 426
Location:
Last Online Nov 18, 2024 0:05:59 GMT -5
|
Post by Nilade on Mar 12, 2015 23:39:58 GMT -5
Yeah, I'm a little skeptical about it myself, but I'm very interested to see what his response will be. He's a shit head.
|
|
Deleted
Posts: 0
Likes:
Location:
Last Online Nov 22, 2024 6:11:45 GMT -5
|
Post by Deleted on Mar 19, 2015 1:47:03 GMT -5
hahahahahaha
Oh man. Whether it's Anonymous or not, that was wonderful.
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on Mar 19, 2015 8:41:05 GMT -5
LOL Family Portrait
|
|
Deexan
CS! Silver
Join Date: Aug 2003
Posts: 18,196
Likes: 2,995
Location:
Last Online Nov 13, 2021 19:23:59 GMT -5
|
Post by Deexan on Apr 10, 2015 21:12:35 GMT -5
So...the murder of Walter Scott.
The police of America are not making things easy for themselves.
It's depressing that events such as this are what need to happen to weed out the sour cops from the real ones.
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on Apr 24, 2015 1:17:04 GMT -5
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on Apr 26, 2015 6:21:43 GMT -5
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on Apr 27, 2015 4:41:06 GMT -5
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on Apr 27, 2015 16:53:46 GMT -5
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on Apr 28, 2015 18:38:33 GMT -5
Friend: Joni Mitchell unconscious, unable to care for self
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A longtime friend of Joni Mitchell says in a court filing that the singer-writer is unconscious and unable to make medical decisions for herself.
Leslie Morris filed a petition Tuesday seeking to be named the folk singer's conservator. Morris is identified in a court filing as a friend of Mitchell's for more than 44 years.
A declaration from a doctor states the 71-year-old Mitchell will likely be unable to attend any court hearings for the next four to six months, but it does not provide further details on her condition or prognosis.
Mitchell was hospitalized March 31 after being found unconscious in her Los Angeles home. No updates about her health have been posted to her website or Twitter account since early April, when a message stated she was resting comfortably and improving.
|
|
thebtskink
CS! Silver
Join Date: Jul 2000
It puts the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again.
Posts: 19,462
Likes: 4,984
Location:
Last Online Nov 21, 2024 13:25:50 GMT -5
|
Post by thebtskink on May 15, 2015 18:57:10 GMT -5
Normally against the death penalty, but Tsarnaev I can't argue against.
Good.
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on May 15, 2015 19:17:13 GMT -5
Normally against the death penalty, but Tsarnaev I can't argue against. Good. For sure.
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on May 20, 2015 16:24:55 GMT -5
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on May 24, 2015 16:14:51 GMT -5
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on Jun 8, 2015 15:22:05 GMT -5
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on Jun 9, 2015 3:36:21 GMT -5
Vincent Bugliosi, prosecutor in Manson trial, dies at 80LOS ANGELES (AP) — Vincent Bugliosi, a prosecutor who parlayed his handling of the Charles Manson trial into a career as a bestselling author, has died, his son said Monday night. He was 80 years old. Bugliosi, who had struggled with cancer in recent years, died Saturday night at a hospital in Los Angeles, his son, Vincent Bugliosi Jr., told The Associated Press. Bugliosi Jr. said his father had "an unflagging dedication to justice" in everything he did. As an author, Bugliosi Sr. was best known for "Helter Skelter," which was his account of the Manson Family and the killings of pregnant actress Sharon Tate and six others by followers of the cult leader, Charles Manson. Bugliosi had prosecuted Manson and his female followers, winning convictions in one of America's most sensational trials. He was an unknown Los Angeles deputy district attorney on Aug. 9, 1969, when the bodies of Tate, the beautiful actress wife of Roman Polanski, and four others were discovered butchered by unknown assailants who left bloody scrawlings on the door of her elegant home. The victims included members of Hollywood's glitterati: celebrity hairdresser Jay Sebring; coffee heiress Abigail Folger; Polish film director Voityck Frykowksi; Tate, who was 8½-months pregnant; and Steven Parent, the friend of a caretaker. A night later, two more mutilated bodies were found across town in another upscale neighborhood. The crime scene was marked with the same bloody scrawlings of words including, "Pigs" and "Rise" and "Helter Skelter." The victims were grocers Rosemary and Leno LaBianca, who had no connection to Tate and her glamorous friends. Bugliosi was one of those assigned to the team of prosecutors while the case was being investigated. When members of the rag tag Manson Family were caught and charged with the crimes months later, a more veteran prosecutor, Aaron Stovitz, was named head of the district attorney's team and Bugliosi was assigned the second chair. But before long, a dispute arose between Stovitz and his boss over a remark he made to the media. He was summarily removed from the case and the intense, ambitious Bugliosi stepped into the role of a lifetime. The trial of Manson and three female followers, Susan Atkins, Patricia Krenwinkel and Leslie Van Houten, lasted 9½ months and became a courtroom drama that rivaled any cinematic trial. It cost Los Angeles County $1 million. Bugliosi set the tone in his opening statement and closing argument, denouncing Manson as a murderous cult leader and his followers as young killers willing to do his bidding. He called the women "robots" and "zombies," manipulated by Manson — "a dictatorial maharajah of a tribe of bootlicking slaves." He first proposed the theory that Manson was inspired to violence by the Beatles song "Helter Skelter," which the cult leader thought predicted a race war that Manson and his followers would foment. Determined to show the breadth of the Manson Family's reach, Bugliosi called 84 witnesses, most of them a parade of disaffected young people who joined up with Manson and fell under his sway. The trial became an exploration of the cult and its drug and sex fueled adoration of Manson whom members venerated as Jesus. He introduced 290 pieces of evidence. At times, the defendants sought to taunt the prosecutor, jumping up and singing in court or grabbing at his papers on his lectern. The trial went on for so long that a defense lawyer disappeared and was found dead in the woods. Bugliosi maintained there was foul play but none was found. Bugliosi's death was first reported Monday night by KNBC-TV. Bugliosi was born in 1934 in Hibbing, Minn. He attended the University of Miami at Coral Gables, Fla., on a tennis scholarship and graduated from the law school of the University of California, Los Angeles. After the Manson trial, he wrote "Helter Skelter" with collaborator Curt Gentry, and it became one of the bestselling crime books of all time. He tried running for public office and lost, tried his hand on practicing defense law but ultimately returned to writing books. He wrote a dozen books, including the true-crime books, "Till Death Do Us Part," and "And The Sea Will Tell." His non-fiction efforts, which took on controversial subjects, included "Outrage: The Five Reasons Why O. J. Simpson Got Away With Murder," and "The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder." Bugliosi Jr. said his father was most proud of his nearly 2,000-page examination of the Kennedy Assassination, "Reclaiming History," which took over 20 years to write. But Bugliosi remained most associated with the Manson case for the rest of his life. Reflecting on it 40 years later, he said, "These murders were probably the most bizarre in the recorded annals of American crime...Evil has its lure and Manson has become a metaphor for evil." Bugliosi and his wife of 59 years, Gail, had two children, Wendy and Vince Jr. ___
|
|
Dracula
CS! Gold
Join Date: Sep 2002
Posts: 26,101
Likes: 5,731
Location:
Member is Online
|
Post by Dracula on Jun 17, 2015 22:07:55 GMT -5
Top Ten Reasons Why This is Some Bullshit:
10. The ten dollar bill is the shittiest of all bills save the $50. They don't get spit out of ATMs like 20s, they don't have a prominant role in illicit activities like 100s, they don't routinely get four of them in your change like 1s... they suck and it's kind of a passive agressive insult that this is the denomination that you give out to the ladies.
9. Paper currency is becoming increasingly irrelevant anyway. We should be switching to a plastic only commerce system.
8. We're going to have to endure five years of republicans bitching about money getting changed by "the PC police"
7. I'm kind of struggling to come up with a woman in American history who achieved money-worthy accomplishments. Obviously this has more to do with the fact that women have historically not been given the power to accomplish what men have, but still....
6. The dude never got to be president and got killed by a vice president, and now this indignity?
5. They let women onto the silver dollar and the golden dollar and look how well those turned out... just saying.
4. How much is this redesign going to cost? Is this the best use of our funds?
3. Isn't it people of color's turn? Yeah, I guess the woman on the ten could end up being a POC, but I'm pretty sure that isn't going to be the case. Kind of feel like Frederick Douglas is going to be more deserving than whoever the end up picking.
2. Alexander Hamilton is a ridiculously important figure who probably had more influence on the founding that Jefferson, Franklin, and maybe even Washington combined.
1. Jackson is plainly the one who deserves to get knocked of of the currencey
|
|
Doomsday
Administrator
Join Date: Jan 2001
Posts: 23,295
Likes: 6,761
Location:
Last Online Nov 22, 2024 1:33:13 GMT -5
|
Post by Doomsday on Jun 18, 2015 22:29:00 GMT -5
I think it's kinda funny. I was secretly hoping they would just replace Jackson with another President as their way of saying 'eff you' to the feminists who have nothing better to complain about but I think this is close. I mean they're having the woman SHARE the $10 bill with Hamilton. That's rather insulting isn't it? Clearly they just want to throw the women a bone to get them to stop shouting.
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on Jun 19, 2015 7:24:29 GMT -5
Sybil Ludington - She rode 40 miles (just about twice as far as Paul Revere) warning patriots that the regulars were coming. She was 16 years old at the time.
Jackson is the hero of the Battle of New Orleans, and he balanced the books - when he left office there was no US Debt
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on Jun 23, 2015 10:14:17 GMT -5
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on Jul 20, 2015 11:39:06 GMT -5
|
|
Deexan
CS! Silver
Join Date: Aug 2003
Posts: 18,196
Likes: 2,995
Location:
Last Online Nov 13, 2021 19:23:59 GMT -5
|
Post by Deexan on Jul 22, 2015 14:23:54 GMT -5
Father says he didn’t know his 8-year-old boy was packed in suitcase
Earlier this month, border patrol officials in the Spanish enclave of Ceuta in North Africa made a shocking discovery when a suitcase scanner revealed a small boy curled up tightly inside of a roller bag.
As the child realized he’d been found out, he “poked his head out and said, in French, ‘Hello, my name is Abou,'” reported the Independent.
The 8-year-old boy, Abou from the Ivory Coast, was found in perfect condition inside a pink suitcase belonging to a Moroccan woman, whose name has not been released, as she crossed the border.
The father was intercepted later and admitted the boy was his son, according to Spanish News Today. His lawyer said that while the father had indeed paid to have his son brought across the border, he did not know he would be packed in a suitcase. Both the Moroccan woman and the boy’s father, Ali Ouattara, have been in custody since Abou was discovered.
The father’s lawyer, Fernández Díaz, spoke with the New York Times by phone this week. “Do you think any father would really allow his son to travel in a suitcase?” he told the Times.
Ouattara, who according to Díaz lives legally on the Spanish island of Fuerteventura, had applied for his son to join him but his application had been rejected because Fuerteventura’s salary did not meet the minimum required by Spanish law.
Ouattara then went to Casablanca seeking another way to get his son into Spanish territory, paid for a visa and was under the impression that Abou would cross the border with it. “He is just another victim of the mafias,” Díaz told the Times, referring to Africa’s human trafficking networks.
The shocking scanner image of Abou inside the suitcase underscored the desperation of thousands of African migrants who have embarked on sometimes deadly journeys in search of refuge in Europe.
Díaz, who attended a court hearing in Ceuta on Monday, said that he is confident that Ouattara will soon be released on bail. Díaz reiterated to The Times that Abou’s father had no clue who tried to smuggle his son,” Díaz said “All I know is that my client thought it would be done legally, with a valid visa, and not in such an illegal way.”
www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/05/20/father-says-he-didnt-know-his-8-year-old-boy-was-packed-in-suitcase/
|
|
Ramplate
CS! Platinum
Join Date: Apr 2005
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Hamster
Posts: 30,425
Likes: 493
Location:
Last Online Oct 13, 2020 13:56:48 GMT -5
|
Post by Ramplate on Jul 22, 2015 17:54:04 GMT -5
Father of the year
|
|