2.15.2006

Lasers! (And Passenger Jets) >>> Also mentioned at the NIN. I'm a huge fan of lasers--which is why anything that I write concerning directed energy military hardware is usually accompanied by a heartfelt 'Lasers!' or two--but this is not what they should be used for. Chances are this is a bunch of kids--sounds like me a couple of years ago--who decided to point their new laser pens at passenger aircraft because they were caught pointing them at the cheerleaders at the last high school pep rally and if the principal sees one more red dot on a cheerleader--not counting pimples--he'll call mom and dad. However, it would be irresponsible to assume this is simply benign teenage terrorism. I hate to bring this up cause I know it'll be taken the wrong way, but the area where most of these incidents took place--Dearborn, Michigan--has one of the highest concentrations of American Muslims in the entire country. Now settle down; I'm not suggesting anything malicious here, but it's worth at least noting the apparent coincidence. That's all. Just as assuming innocence would be a mistake, so to would be assuming guilt. You can make up your own mind on this one, but if you read anything into it and get yourself offended, then it's your own damn fault.

Muslim Institute Dares Ahmadinejad To Visit Auschwitz >>> I thought this was pretty cool. Of course, Ahmadinejad wouldn't bother, but it was nice to hear someone--especially a fellow Muslim--call him on his rhetoric. Also, people tend to forget that the Jews weren't the only ones methodically exterminated during the Holocaust. Though the Jews certainly made up the majority, the millions of slaughtered Sinti (Gypsies), Roma, Russians, Slavs, Poles, physically and mentally handicapped, homosexuals, and various religious minorities deserve remembrance as well. (Hat tip: Big Pharoah)

UN Report on Guantanamo Bay >>> Murdoc nails it. Regardless of what you think of Gitmo, any report whose authors declined a visit to the site in question should not be taken seriously. Obviously, if getting to the truth of the matter was important, they'd have 'taken the tour', so to speak. While I agree that the legal quandaries surrounding Gitmo do warrant some criticism, most people have a very misguided view that Guantanamo is some modern-day concentration camp; the Treblinka of the Tropics. Falsified Newsweek stories don't do anybody any favors, either. While I'm sure Gitmo isn't very pleasant, I doubt it's overly uncomfortable either. Anybody that's ever read Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago would never hasten to make such rash comparisons. Remember that a number of people who have been released from this facility have returned to their former 'occupations'. (Note the Afghan teenager in that story who spent two years in Gitmo learning English, playing sports, and watching movies. He was later recaptured with Taliban fighters in Afghanistan.) And I'm pretty sure everybody in Gitmo is eating better than they ever did in The 'Stan.

Israel SAM-Proofs Its Airliners >>> We need to do this yesterday! We'll do it eventually when we get one of our jetliners shot down, but until then we're just going to continue to sweep the threat under the rug. Grrrr....

Saluting the 3rd ACR >>> Just read the thing. It speaks for itself.

New Abu Ghraib Photos >>> Not what you expected, eh? The actual new photos are out there--should you desire to see them--but I won't be linking to them here. Like Michelle Malkin, I find it odd that American media outlets have no qualms about publishing these photos, but the Mohammed cartoons are off limits. (As an aside, I have yet to really address this whole Cartoon Nonsense. Hopefully it will die out--it won't--and I won't have to comment on it--I will--and we can all go back to whatever foolishness we were engaged in before all this happened.) The Mudville Gazette also posted an excellent Abu Ghraib quiz back in April, which is a must-see.