Conflict

Should we treat terrorists as pirates? What is needed now is a framework for an international crime of terrorism. The framework should be incorporated into the U.N. Convention on Terrorism and should call for including the crime in domestic criminal law and perhaps the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. This framework must recognize the unique threat that terrorists pose to nation-states, yet not grant them the legitimacy accorded to belligerent states. It must provide the foundation for a law that criminalizes not only terrorist acts but membership in a terrorist organization. It must define methods of punishment. ...

Joe Killian went to a Gun and Knife Show at the Greensboro Coliseum and reports back. Good stuff: Apparently people who are selling Nazi flags, bronze busts of Hitler and Rommel and stocking “The Turner Diaries” in the non-fiction section (all of which we saw) don’t like having their pictures taken.

North Korea has a way with press releases, and the NK News site makes sure we all get to share. Some recent samples: KCNA Blasts Military Adventure of U.S. and South Korean Warmongers Agreement on Cooperation in Public Health Inked between DPRK and Zimbabwe Former Unconverted Long-term Prisoner Kim Sok Hyong Dies All Koreans Called upon to Crush For. Aggressor Forces through National Cooperation Japan’s Crime to Exterminate Korean Nation I have a personal favorite from this collection, though: ...

Ah, Greensboro, my hometown… :| Seriously, if groups like the Minutemen think Greensboro, NC, is a good place to stop and garner support, we need to print up some kind of pamphlet about 1979 just so we can hand it to them. Not to put it lightly, but Greensboro is gunshy about controversial protests, for very good reason. BTW, compliments to Joe Killian for working a Red Kryptonite reference into his story. :) ...

Well, congratulations, Bush Administration. You’ve officially made it to the point where the first question in a press conference, from veteran reporter Helen Thomas, was “Is the U.S. going to attack Iran?”

It was a good day for politics and furniture in the Democratic People’s Republic: Kim Jong Il Highly Praised by Russian Poet Koreans Will Surely Force Japan to Pay for Monstrous Crimes Committed against Them U.S. Ambassador’s Endless String of Reckless Remarks under Fire Quality Stone Furniture Produced Kim Jong Il Sends Wedding Table to Kye Sun Hui Courtesy of NK News

London was hit with four more bombs today, but the small explosions just appear to have been detonators. As a result, the the casualty figures so far include one person injured, with no deaths. Speculation is that this was a copycat bombing, run by a more group that didn’t know how to design the bombs. One of the bombs, and least, appears to have been a nail bomb, so it is likely they were intended to cause more death and destruction. ...

The Guardian is running a blog updated throughout the day with more information. It is important however that those engaged in terrorism realise that our determination to defend our values and our way of life is greater than their determination to cause death and destruction to innocent people in a desire to impose extremism on the world. Whatever they do, it is our determination that they will never succeed in destroying what we hold dear in this country and in other civilised nations throughout the world. - Prime Minister Tony Blair ...

Let’s say you’re CIA Director Porter Goss, and you give an interview claiming that you have an “excellent idea” where Osama bin Laden is hiding. However, you then claim that America’s sense of “fair play” concerning state sovereignty is an issue when it comes to actually capturing him. So, how does that work, exactly? Saddam Hussein was such a great threat to the U.S. from 2001 on that we invaded Iraq and are still occupying the country with a sizable portion of our military, but the person who actually ordered the last major attack on our country is safe because of our respect for the nation-state system? ...

Yep, this may be our next Ambassador to the United Nations. If the lack of preparation or basic interest in diplomacy indicated in this article is true, then why is John Bolton even still employed, much less getting promoted? Link courtesy of Obsidian Wings Update: That darned Democrat Voinovich on Bolton. ;)