Yes, here it is, not quite “Man Bites Dog,” but nearly the ultimate headline and certainly the stuff for a slew of good law school hypotheticals, Dog Shoots Man. [Update: the link died, but there's a better one.]
ARIS (Reuters) – A French hunter was shot by his dog after he left a loaded shotgun in the trunk of his car with two dogs and one of the animals accidentally stepped on the trigger, police said Wednesday. …
[Update 2: It's a regular epidemic! It happened in New Zealand in December.]
“The first debate will take place Sept. 30, 2004 at the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Fla.” says this article.
Now, how do I get a ticket?
Actually, this isn't as great news as it could be, since rumor has it that U.M. will have to fork out serious cash as host institution….
More about the debate organizers.
Putin reaffirms Russia's right to preemptive strikes
President Vladimir Putin has reaffirmed his position that Russia can resort to preemptive military strikes because the policy is also practiced by the United States.
“If the principle of preventive use of force continues to develop in international practice, then Russia reserves the right to act in an analogous manner to defend its national interests,” Putin said in an interview whose transcript was released Tuesday.
Mind you, this is more bluster than anything else — for now:
But later, speaking in the United States, he assured NATO countries that Moscow was not seeking to adopt a preemptive nuclear strategy.
“Russia still regards nuclear weapons as a means of political deterrence. We do not envisage a scenario or a situation where we would use such weapons first,” said Ivanov on October 9.
Nevertheless, if the Bush Doctrine is to be taken seriously, there's no way to limit its use to invasions by nations we like — or against nations we don't like.
It's probably not too late for the next administration to undo the damage to international legality; given the wide range of candidates, it's quite unclear whether the next administration will consider this a priority, or even want to.
FBI Visits Cryptome: Special Agent “Kelly said such visits are increasingly common as the FBI works to improve the reporting of information about threats to the US.”
I wonder if visiting web site operators to ask them to report stuff to the FBI is really the best use of our federal police force: Two agents for this? Or even one?
Note that while I can't say I'm delighted by the FBI going to web site operators and asking them to be government informants (for the same reasons I wouldn't like the FBI to do this to other types of reporters), as far as I know it is legal. And so long as these meetings are not attempts to intimidate, and as long we don't get people being investigated merely for being uncooperative when asked to become FBI informants, they're certainly something we can live with.
I've long believed that journalists have the same basic duties as other citizens, just as other citizens have the same First Amendment rights as journalists. That means that reporters should sometimes feel morally obligated to share information with the cops, especially if it affects public safety. Nevertheless, I think that the FBI, in an exercise of good taste and resource prioritization, ought to be able to find something more useful to do.
Earlier post of mine about Cryptome is here.
'Something' Felled An Abrams Tank In Iraq – But What? Mystery Behind Aug. 28 Incident Puzzles Army Officials. This story hasn't gotten nearly enough media. The M1A1 and M1A2 tank are mainstays of the US Army. And this M1A1 appears to have been holed by something new and somewhat mysterious.
Shortly before dawn on Aug. 28, an M1A1 Abrams tank on routine patrol in Baghdad “was hit by something” that crippled the 69-ton behemoth.
Army officials still are puzzling over what that “something” was.
According to an unclassified Army report, the mystery projectile punched through the vehicle’s skirt and drilled a pencil-sized hole through the hull. The hole was so small that “my little finger will not go into it,” the report’s author noted.
The “something” continued into the crew compartment, where it passed through the gunner’s seatback, grazed the kidney area of the gunner’s flak jacket and finally came to rest after boring a hole 1½ to 2 inches deep in the hull on the far side of the tank.
As it passed through the interior, it hit enough critical components to knock the tank out of action. That made the tank one of only two Abrams disabled by enemy fire during the Iraq war and one of only a handful of “mobility kills” since they first rumbled onto the scene 20 years ago. The other Abrams knocked out this year in Iraq was hit by an RPG-7, a rocket-propelled grenade.
Experts believe whatever it is that knocked out the tank in August was not an RPG-7 but most likely something new — and that worries tank drivers.
Mystery and anxiety
Terry Hughes is a technical representative from Rock Island Arsenal, Ill., who examined the tank in Baghdad and wrote the report.
In the sort of excited language seldom included in official Army documents, he said, “The unit is very anxious to have this ‘SOMETHING’ identified. It seems clear that a penetrator of a yellow molten metal is what caused the damage, but what weapon fires such a round and precisely what sort of round is it? The bad guys are using something unknown and the guys facing it want very much to know what it is and how they can defend themselves.”
…
The soldiers of 2nd Battalion, 70th Armor Regiment, 1st Armor Division who were targets of the attack weren’t the only ones wondering what damaged their 69-ton tank.
Hughes also was puzzled. “Can someone tell us?” he wrote. “If not, can we get an expert on foreign munitions over here to examine this vehicle before repairs are begun? Please respond quickly.”
His report went to the office of the combat systems program manager at the U.S. Army Tank-automotive and Armaments Command in Warren, Mich. A command spokesman said he could provide no information about the incident.
“The information is sensitive,” he said. “It looks like [members of the program manager’s office] are not going to release any information right now.”
While it’s impossible to determine what caused the damage without actually examining the tank, some conclusions can be drawn from photos that accompanied the incident report. Those photos show a pencil-size penetration hole through the tank body, but very little sign of the distinctive damage — called spalling — that typically occurs on the inside surface after a hollow- or shaped-charge warhead from an anti-tank weapon burns its way through armor.
Spalling results when an armor penetrator pushes a stream of molten metal ahead of it as it bores through an armored vehicle’s protective skin.
“It’s a real strange impact,” said a source who has worked both as a tank designer and as an anti-tank weapons engineer. “This is a new one. … It almost definitely is a hollow-charge warhead of some sort, but probably not an RPG-7” anti-tank rocket-propelled grenade.
…
OK, the M1A1 is a little long in the tooth (mid-80s mostly), overweight, and drinks fuel like crazy. In contrast, M1A2 is vintange 1993, overweight, a fuel hog, but carries improved armor.
Both types of tank have been deployed to Iraq. The idea that the tank has some vulnerabilities is not utterly new.
Coincidentally, another Abrams — the latest model this time — was taken out, a couple of days ago by a “roadside explosion”.
Politicized Memo Incites Row: Gather ’round children. For today’s vocabularly lesson is brought to you by the letter “P”. We have three “P” words today, Patriotic, Plot and Partisan.
If the administration lies to the nation about an imminent threat and drags us into a pre-emptive war that has nothing to pre-empt, then engages in denial and a cover-up, and tries to stonewall a Senatorial committee, all that is Patriotic. It is most certainly not Partisan and never, never, never even think that it might be a Plot. Oh my, no.
But suppose that Senators become concerned that the administration might be hiding something important to our national security like, maybe “misleading, if not flagrantly dishonest, methods and motives of senior administration officials who made the case for unilateral preemptive war”. And suppose those Senators decide that the administration has no intention of ever releasing key documents, and certainly not before the next election, so they start discussing contingency plans to force the documents' release.
Well, that is not Patriotic because George Bush might not like it. No, that is a Plot by those awful Partisan, nay maybe treasonous people.
PS. Don't tell Osama, but according to the Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee — who ought to know — the Global War on Terror™ is going so badly that it can be compromised by publication of a single memo. And who was it who went through the garbage to steal this document with this terrible possible effect on national security, and than ran to the media with it? It was Republicans? Oh. (Think that maybe heading off an independent inquiry is becoming an an important priority for the Republicans, who of course Have Nothing To Hide?)
Well, don't worry, children, it's still the Democrats' fault if you don't think about it too hard.
Accountability is Treason!
Stonewalling is Patriotic!
Fighting Terror Requires Unquestioning Obedience!
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