Update On The Six Imams

Pajamas Media has a lot of exclusive information up about the six imams who were taken off a flight in the Minneapolis airport and have since been making a cottage industry out of their self declared victim status. It turns out that the six imams were behaving very strangely, indeed.

SEE ALSO: The first public publication of the official police report on the incident including handwritten statements from witnesses. Download file — PDF 3.8 Mgb

PLUS: The letter from US Airways passenger “Pauline” to U.S. Airways: Download file PDF 68K

[Bloggers are invited to examine these documents and provide theories for what happened. Please notify Pajamas Media. — Editors]

By Richard Miniter, PJM Washington Editor

The case of U.S. Airways flight 300 gets stranger by the minute. When six traveling Muslim clerics were asked to deplane last week, it looked like another civil rights controversy against post-9-11 airport security.

Now new information is emerging that suggests it was all a stunt designed to weaken security….

Yesterday I spoke with a passenger on that flight, who asked that she be only identified as “Pauline.” A copy of airport police report, which I also obtained, supports Pauline’s account - and includes shocking revelations of its own. In addition, U.S. Airways spokeswoman Andrea Rader also confirmed much of what Pauline revealed…..

The passenger, who asked that she only be identified as “Pauline,” said she is afraid to give her full name or hometown. She is spending the night at “another location” because she does not feel safe at home. She credits reports that one imam is apparently linked to Hamas. “It is scary because these men could be dangerous.”

Pauline said she never wanted media attention. She wrote an email to U.S. Airways and cc:ed her daughter, who unexpectedly emailed it to her friends. As the letter took on an internet life of its own, it made its way to the inbox of a retired CNN executive producer. Then, to her dismay, the feeding frenzy began.

Pauline revealed to the Pajamas Media that the six imams were doing things far more suspicious than praying - an Arabic-speaking passenger heard them repeatedly invoke “bin Laden,” and “terrorism,” a gate attendant told the captain that she did not want to fly with them, and that bomb-sniffing dogs were brought aboard. Other Muslim passengers were left undisturbed and later joined in a round of applause for the U.S. Airways crew. “It wasn’t that they were Muslim. It was all of the suspicious things they did,” Pauline said.

Here is her story, along with corroborating quotes from the U.S. Airways spokeswoman Andrea Rader and the official report, another Pajamas Media Exclusive.

Go over and read the whole thing. It pretty well devastates the imam's claims of how they were abused and such. These guys gave every appearance of trying to manufacture this incident. That we are still writing about it means they succeeded thus far.

But we better not let down our guard.

Coup Attempt In Lebanon?

Reports are coming in that Hezbollah has besieged the government building where the president of Lebanon and members of his cabinet are. They are effectively holding the government in captivity.

Update. The Hizbullah militia has laid siege to the government building, trapping the prime minister and cabinet ministers inside. Roadblocks were set up by Hizbullah members in what can only be described as coup d'etat.

The Lebanese army had to call Nabih Berri, and the Saudi King had to intervene through his ambassador, to "partially" remove the siege. Hizbullah "tents" are still on the roads, isolating the government building.

The Saudi king phoned the cabinet and spoke to all ministers one by one, affirming his support. The only countries NOT supporting this government are Syria and Iran.

Things are getting very ugly for Lebanon. Could it be that Syria and Iran smell the deal James Baker did once before? Abandoning Lebanon to Syria's tender mercies? The rest of the countries in the Middle East better get serious here. They are about to be swamped by a tidal wave if they don't start bailing right now. If Iran and Syria are not pushed back fast, they will take Lebanon and then continue expanding. Reuters is reporting that the protesters will not leave, "Until Siniora falls".

Which will mean Lebanon falls to Syria and Iran.

Emmett Kelly, Jr. : 1923 - 2006 RIP

Bruce Kesler emailed this to me a short while ago. Emmett Kelly, Jr., who carried on the Weary Willie clown character his father had introduced, has passed away in Tombstone, Arizona. Bruce has a nice remembrance of Weary Willie, the clown who swept up the spotlight.

Here's the Emmett Kelly, Jr. Website if you are looking for a biography.

Going Ape Over Beer

AllahPundit has the details.

Why Is It That The Democrats Are Thought Of…..

…..As weak on defense? Oh, yeah. It's because they are weak on defense. They haven't even taken control yet and they promptly go right back to gutting the military and defense programs like it was the Clinton administration all over again. Welcome to a September 10 mindset.

Democratic leaders are poised to gut America’s missile defense - at the same time North Korea and Iran are testing long-range missiles that can strike the U.S. and its allies, including Israel, Japan and Britain.

Meanwhile, sources inside the missile-defense community tell Pajamas Media that the Bush administration is planning to ask Congress to begin funding development of an “orbital battle station.”

With these key developments, 2007 is set to be the biggest battle of space-based weapons since President Reagan proposed “Star Wars” in 1983.

The incoming chairman of the Senate’s Armed Services Committee is Carl Levin. Levin, a Michigan Democrat, has long been a foe of missile defense. In 1980s, he worried that President Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative — which aimed to develop technology to destroy Soviet missiles during all phases of flight — was “destabilizing.”

Today Sen. Levin sings the same tune in a different key. “They’ve not done the operational testing yet that is convincing,” said Senator Levin during a post-election press conference. He was referring to the Ground based Missile Defense [GMD] system being installed in Alaska and California, to defend against North Korean missiles. He added that he favors stalling purchases of interceptor missiles - vital for missile defense — until after testing is complete.

In short, Sen. Levin and other longtime opponents of missile defense plan to use “testing” - set to an unrealistically high level - to stop missile defense.

How the Game is Played

Former Assistant Secretary of Defense Frank Gaffney explains how the game works: “The idea is that we put it [missile defense] on ice until absolutely everybody is satisfied. It is a formula for not having the missile defense we need.”

Critics hope to stop missile defense by devoting its entire budget to testing, which is costly. At $100 million dollars or more per test, a test or two could easily absorb the entire Ground-based missile defense budget.

Certainly testing sounds reasonable. Why not make sure the stuff works before blowing billions on it? But the testing fixation ignores that, like software, most successful weapons systems are best debugged after being deployed. And some weapons systems were never tested at all before deployment.

Complex weapons systems have often been used successfully without proper testing. In 1940, Britain’s new air defenses — radars, ground observers, anti-aircraft guns and squadrons of Spitfires and Hurricanes — had never been tested against even a small scale simulated attack. Yet they won the Battle of Britain. Likewise in the 1991 Gulf War the first two E-8A ground surveillance radar aircraft had only just begun a long testing process when they were shipped to Saudi Arabia. During the war they performed magnificently and now these aircraft are in high demand all over the world.

At a time when lunatics like Kim Jong Il and Mahmoud Amadinejad are trying to get nuclear weapons and the missiles to deliver them, our Democrats want to gut the programs that provide the only defense against these things. Again. Just as the system is showing real progress. Again.

More Tolerance From The Left

"Protesters" violently attacked members of the group that invited Tom Tancredo, Congressman from Colorado, to speak on immigration issues at the Michigan State University College of Law. The "protesters" also pulled a fire alarm and tried to stop the speech.

Violence erupted at a Michigan law school Thursday when protestors tried to block a speech by Colorado Congressman Tom Tancredo.

Police were called after protestors pulled a fire alarm prior to the speech on immigration policies. There were at least three violent incidents with protestors targeting student backers of the event, Tancredo, R-Littleton, said today.

"One was spit on, one was kicked, and one was punched," Tancredo said in an e-mail. "Tires were also slashed."

Michigan State University College Republicans and Young Americans for Freedom sponsored the event.

Tancredo went to Michigan State University College of Law as part of a visit to the state to talk about immigration. He leads the group that opposes legal status for illegal immigrants.

Protestors interrupted the speech with loud shouting.

College newspaper The State News reported that protesters carried signs reading "Ignorant Racist" outside the room where the speech was held. They were not allowed in with the signs, the paper said. It also reported that about 40 people attended the speech.

Tancredo said in the email that protestors organized on the Internet social networking site Facebook.

"They declared ahead of time on facebook that they would not allow me to speak," Tancredo said in the e-mail.

Do read the comments about the story to see the incredible split that is developing in this country. Suppression of free speech is not coming from the right, it is coming from the left. And it is getting worse almost daily.

The New Journalism

Columbia, home of the premier school of the journalism world. Also home, according to reports, of graduate journalism school students who cheat on an ethics examination. You read that right, cheating on an ethics test.

Columbia University officials are lowering the boom on some graduate journalism students suspected of cheating on, of all things, an ethics exam.

The J-schoolers' alleged lapse on the final was reported yesterday by Radar Online.

The exam in question consisted of two essay questions to be completed in 90 minutes any time during a 36-hour period.

Students who took the test early were instructed to avoid discussing the questions with those planning to take it later, but the warning was ignored.

One honorable young scholar got wind of what happened and blew the whistle, sources said.

Vice Dean David Klatell told students in an e-mail that there had been a "serious problem" with the final and ordered them to attend a special session of the class "Critical Issues in Journalism" today - or fail.

The order applies only to the Friday morning section. The evening section is exempt.

It was unclear how many students could be affected.

I haven't really been overly impressed with a lot of the journalism that exists today, but this is even worse than usual When I went to college, this sort of thing was so rare that it was a huge scandal when it happened. And just about everybody, including friends of those caught, really looked down on the offenders. (I can only remember it happening once and the student in question was expelled summarily. I don't remember anyone ever defending him, either.)

I haven't really been overly impressed with a lot of the journalism that exists today, but this is even worse than usual When I went to college, this sort of thing was so rare that it was a huge scandal when it happened. And just about everybody, including friends of those caught, really looked down on the offenders. (I can only remember it happening once and the student in question was expelled summarily. I don't remember anyone ever defending him, either.)

UPDATE: The NYT has also picked this one up - not a good thing for Columbia, I suspect. Best of all, they reveal that the class was a "pass-fail" with no real grade. What in heck possessed these people?

Exciting New Film Project!

We here at Blue Crab Boulevard are proud to be the first to report this completely unbelievable Hollywood rumor! In a complete change of pace from his usual films, Wes Craven has signed on to an exciting new film project for the Disney Studio! This is bigger than big, more colossal than colossal. This will be Oscar material for sure!

Craven will direct the next installment of the Bambi franchise! That's right, we have it on good authority from our usually unintelligible sources that Bambi III: Hell Spawn is in the works! And we have an exclusive picture of the star-to-be of this gripping epic:

Spoiler alert: The hunters are screwed.

Alligators On Crack

It seems that even the Animal Uprising™ has some bad characters. There are some alligators that have taken up with drugs, apparently. Now, they don't have opposable thumbs, so using a butane lighter is out of the question. Not to be deterred, they get their crack cocaine second hand, so to speak.

They eat the addict who just smoked some.

ORLANDO, Fla. — Carlos Mayid couldn't see Adrian Apgar being attacked by an alligator early Wednesday, but he could hear him.

With his cellphone in hand and a sheriff's operator on the line, Mayid left his home near Lake Parker, Fla., and walked down his street in the predawn darkness toward the screams of a man who was fighting for his life in the water.

In the recording of a dramatic 911 call released Thursday, Mayid is heard breathing heavily and walking through wet grass as Apgar's repeated cries grow louder. Finally, he got close enough to yell back.

"Hey. What's up? What do you need?" Mayid hollered.

"A gator's got me," Apgar replied, his voice faint in the background.

Mayid's call shortly after 4 a.m. sent four Polk County, Fla., deputies racing to the 2,150-acre lake just outside Lakeland, Fla., where they jumped into the water and wrenched Apgar's arm from the gator's mouth. The 45-year-old victim, who told authorities he'd passed out nude on the shore after smoking crack cocaine, was rushed to a hospital in critical condition.

Later Wednesday, state wildlife authorities trapped and killed a nearly 12-foot-long alligator thought to be the one that attacked Apgar.

Mayid's call was picked up by operator Josh Fulman.

"There's a guy screaming bloody murder over here, 'Help,' in front of the Moose Lodge," Mayid said. He could not be reached Thursday to elaborate on his experience.

"I can hear him from inside my house … He's screaming, 'Help, help, help, help.' "

A dramatic back-and-forth followed, with Mayid serving as the middleman between victim and operator.

….

Apgar told the deputies he had been smoking crack cocaine and fell asleep on the shore when the alligator attacked him. The area includes a strip of land with a picnic table.

But local and state officials said Thursday they don't know if Apgar was on the land or already in the water when he was attacked.

Sheriff's officials have said Apgar, 45, suffered a broken right arm. His left arm was nearly severed, and he had bites to his buttocks and leg. He underwent surgery Wednesday afternoon at Lakeland Regional Medical Center.

Well, they say crack kills. The alligator found that out. Hopefully Mr. Apgar recovers and has been scared straight by this one.

(H/T J. A. Jance via email).

The Belle Of The Brawl

Mexico has apparently instituted a completely new tradition for swearing in a new president: the The Inaugural Brawl®. Just before the swearing in , a fistfight broke out in the Congressional chamber as leftists tried to stop the ceremony.

MEXICO CITY - Felipe Calderon took the oath of office as Mexico's president Friday amid jeers and whistles, in a chaotic ceremony before congress preceded by a brawl between lawmakers still divided over the nation's tight presidential election.

Physically protected by ruling party lawmakers and flanked by outgoing President Vicente Fox, Calderon quickly swore to uphold the constitution. The national anthem was then played, momentarily stilling the catcalls and shouting. Calderon swiftly left the chamber as congress adjourned.

"He did it! He did it!" chanted ruling party lawmakers.

Earlier, the conservative Calderon took control of the presidential residence in an unusual midnight ceremony with Fox, swearing in part of his Cabinet. In that private ceremony, broadcast live from Los Pinos, Fox handed the presidential sash to a military cadet as his term ended at midnight.

Gee, American inaugurals have souvenirs like programs and such. Mexico has shiners, contusions and abrasions.

Wanna Bet?

Every, single year for the past 40 years, a giant straw yuletide ram figure in the town of Gavle, Sweden has been set afire by vandals. Every year the town tries to tighten security. But even with watchmen and cameras, last year two men, one in a Santa suit and the other disguised as a gingerbread man, used flaming arrows and managed to set the structure ablaze. This year the town decided to really get serious: They doused the giant straw ram with fire retardant.

STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - A town in Sweden this Christmas hopes to win its battle with vandals who almost every year for the past four decades have foiled security measures to burn down the town's giant Yuletide straw ram.

By dousing the 13-metre (43-feet) version of the traditional Swedish Yule ram with flame retardant, officials in Gavle aim to thwart arsonists who target the straw structure, a smaller version of which most Swedes have in their homes at Christmas.

"Not even napalm will get the ram to burn now," tabloid daily Aftonbladet quoted Freddy Klassmo, an official with the company who provided the flame retardant chemicals, as saying.

Now, I don't know about Sweden, but here in America that statement about napalm would be viewed as a challenge by a number of people. But here's a listing of the Akzo Nobel flame retardants. I wonder if there are any environmental issues with these?

Blind Luck

Here comes blind luck swingin' his cane
Wonder what he's going to try & pull today
He's always got a trick or two up his sleeve
I've seen him play a few tricks you wouldn't believe

Here comes blind luck he's calling your name
He's got a new set of rules to a brand new game
He's gonna make an offer that you can't refuse
He's got a way of knowing who's got something to lose.
(Peter Case, Blind Luck)

Two very different stories about blind people in the news today. Item: Esther Medley of Centralia, Washington bowled a 244 the other day. Big deal, right? Well, Medley happens to be legally blind. Still not impressed?

She's 94 years old.

Medley, 94, can't see straight ahead, so her 86-year-old husband Ralph tells her which pins are left after her first ball.

That's how Medley recently bowled a score of 244, which included eight strikes, at Fairway Lanes in Centralia. It was the second-highest score of the year for her league.

The Medleys have been bowling in the senior league since 1979.

Do not bowl for money with this woman. She is the ultimate ringer.

Item: Boy, are they strict over there. A Turkish man failed to vote in an election for his village cooperative. So the state prosecutor sentenced him to take a 26 day reading and writing course. One teeny little problem.

The man is completely blind.

ISTANBUL (Reuters) - A blind Turkish pensioner has been sentenced to a 26-day reading and writing course at his local public library after he failed to vote on time in an election for his village cooperative, his son said Friday.

A prosecutor in the province of Kutahya in northwest Turkey sentenced Ismail Canseven, 73, to the education course after he did not show up for the election of the cooperative's board of directors in May, Isa Canseven told Reuters.

"What am I going to do in a library? I can't see out of either of my eyes, and I can't read or write anyway," Friday's edition of the Hurriyet newspaper quoted Ismail as saying.

Isa Canseven, 42, said he would appeal against the sentence served on his father. "My father can only find the bathroom by holding on to a piece of string we've tied to the (bathroom) wall," he said.

Well, that is certainly a case of justice being blind. And stupid.

More Polonium 210 Poisoning

The Italian man that Alexander Litvinenko met with at a sushi bar has also tested positive for exposure to Polonium 210. The meeting occurred on the same day that Litvinenko first reported that he had been poisoned. This is getting downright scary at this point.

LONDON - An Italian security expert who met with a former KGB agent the day the ex-spy fell fatally ill with radiation poisoning has also tested positive for the substance, British media reported Friday.

Britain’s Health Protection Agency confirmed that one person has tested positive for the poison that killed Alexander Litvinenko, but declined to identify the person.

Sky Television and the British Broadcasting Corp. reported that the Italian, Mario Scaramella, tested positive for a significant amount of polonium-210, the rare radioactive isotope that was found in Litvinenko’s body.

Scaramella met with Litvinenko at a sushi bar in London on Nov. 1 — the day the former intelligence agent first reported the symptoms that ultimately led to his death at a central London hospital.

Both men on hit list?
Scaramella has said he showed Litvinenko e-mails from a confidential source listing potential targets for assassination, including himself and Litvinenko.

In a letter released Friday by human rights activists, a former Russian security officer — now jailed — offered similar allegations, saying he had warned Litvinenko about a government-sponsored death squad that intended to kill him and other Kremlin opponents.

Litvinenko, the former spy turned Kremlin critic who lived in Britain, died Nov. 23 at a London hospital. An autopsy began Friday and doctors carrying out the examination said the would take safety precautions to protect themselves against radiation.

If Russia (and Putin) are definitely tied to this, it could actually push Putin's administration hard enough to make it collapse. The key is whether they will be able to tie it to a Russian hit squad. There have already been attempts to call this the action of rogue agents, so the Russian government is very worried right now if they are already resorting to that smokescreen.

The Syrian Conquest Of Lebanon Proceeds

Well known sock puppet for Iran and Syria, Hassan Nasrallah, has flooded the streets of Beirut with his Hezbollah and other Syrian supporters in an effort to topple the government. This is, of course, following his master's commands and trying to force Lebanon into Syrian control.

The Shiite Muslim Hezbollah and its allies mobilized their bases for the protest, arranging to bus supporters from all over Lebanon and handing out free gasoline coupons to people in remote regions.

The crowd, which police estimated at 800,000, created a sea of Lebanese flags that blanketed downtown. Hezbollah officials put the number at 1 million — one-fourth of Lebanon's population.

Saniora went about his schedule in what appeared to be a tactic to ignore the throngs that quickly filled the streets. With heavy traffic reported on highways leading downtown, pro-government factions urged calm.

"Saniora out! We want a free government!" protesters shouted through loudspeakers. The crowd roared in approval amid the deafening sound of Hezbollah revolutionary and nationalist songs. "We want a clean government," read one placard, in what has become the opposition's motto.

Heavily armed soldiers and police had closed all roads to downtown, feverishly unfurling barbed wire and placing barricades.

Despite Hezbollah's assurances the protests will be peaceful, the heavy security came amid fears the protests may turn into clashes between pro- and anti-Syrian factions or that Hezbollah supporters could try to storm Saniora's government headquarters.

Hezbollah's security men, donning caps, formed two lines between the protesters and the security forces to prevent clashes.

Launching a long-threatened campaign to force Lebanon's U.S.-backed government from office, Hezbollah and its pro-Syrian allies said the demonstration would be followed by a wave of open-ended protests.

We have a number of "realists" in this country that want to sit down and chat with the folks behind these attempts to overthrow the elected government. They are led by a man who has a history of selling Lebanon for political purposes. God help them.

Is There An Antibiotic For That?

In a recent study, people were asked about various sexual matters. Given a list, people were asked to identify the items. Two thirds of Britons identified a spaghetti sauce as a sexually transmitted disease.

The survey, of 1,015 people and released on World AIDS day, also showed nearly half were unable to identify a range of common sexual complaints.

"What is very worrying is the lack of knowledge about sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) revealed in the survey," said sex therapist Emily Dubberley.

"Sixty-three percent in the UK thought an Italian sauce (Arrabiata) was an STD and over 43 percent couldn't identify any of the common sexual complaints we asked about.

"This ignorance has no excuse in today's world."

The survey, conducted by pollsters MYVOICE, also found that 48 percent of respondents found body odour and poor personal hygiene a turn off against just 4 percent who felt the same about a refusal to wear a condom.

Here's a recipe for Penne Arrabiata. It doesn't say anything about getting naked that I can see but it is a spicy dish. We used to get better information than this hanging around on street corners, for heaven's sake. It's hard to believe there is this much ignorance in this day and age. My spell checker did not bat an electronic eye at Arrabiata in fact - it recognized the word right off.