chuckbrown

Anybody doing Francisco Tarrega.

You're impressed easily. If Bush took a crap you'd be impressed by it. Well that certainly contributed to the discourse. As did this post.

Damn, makes me think of that one level from Duke Nukem.

I highly doubt the prison abuse scandal resulted in Nick Berg's death. He was a dead man as soon as he was captured; remember Daniel Pearl? Sure it was used for propoganda purposes related to the scandal. But Berg would never have been released. Does anyone know of any AQ hostages that were taken and then released?

That's your inner ear adjusting to the constant motion of flight. At sea, it's called "sea legs." I lived on a boat when I was a kid, and when I went to school during the day I would sit in my chair and swear that the chair was rocking back and forth. You get used to it. As for fear, currency in the sport will minimize it while lack of currency will increase it. IMHO. Toughest part about learning to skydive is making yourself go to the DZ. After that, you just get in the plane, jump out and have fun.

I wasn't in an imaginative mood when I registered.

Animals are better than these fucking creeps.

My bad. Thanks for the correction.

The AK-47 and it's variants are widely recognized as the finest infantry weapon ever designed. Very accurate in single shot mode. High rate of automatice fire. Extremely resistant to environmental factors. Not to mention a larger caliber bullet. A brilliant weapon. The M16/M4 have become good weapons, but the original deployment of the M16 in the 1960s bordered on the criminal.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=615&e=1&u=/nm/20040511/pl_nm/iraq_abuse_congress_dc Seems to get Rummy off the hook. Next someone'll be saying Taguba is an Army toadie.

My last bout took about 4-6 weeks to fully heal. I wanted to die every time I moved. God did it suck. A buddy gave a presciption patch that helped alot. Some sort of "caine." Ask your doctor about it. My buddy had it prescribed after back surgery and had some spares.

11 days and counting down. This will be SO much fun.

Welcome to the Speaker's Corner. Carry on.

I had a buddy in college who had a mild seizure ... and lost his license for 2 years. State (PA) took it immediately.

I know I will come to regret writing this down ...... but God I hope you're right.

The buck stops at the top. It happened on his watch and it is a MAJOR embarrassment to the US. "Best" CEO's don't make statements like "We know where they are" unless thay actually do know where they are. Rumsfeld would resign if he had a shred of decency. So should Blair. Rummy's not at the TOP. Bush is. Well, actually, God or some Supreme Being is, but I forgive you for not asking them to resign. You still haven't said why no one else in the chain should resign. Only one should be punished? More than one have. And more will follow. No you've got to get Rummy. What does "we know where they are" have to do with the prison abuses? Aren't you confusing this with WMD? Besides how do you know that he didn't know where "they" were when he made that statement. "They" could have been moved. To Syria maybe. Sounds like you just don't like Rummy. I think Rummy's a pansy. Not because he allowed this to happen. But for apologizing. Shit happens in war. They didn't ask for Eisenhower's head when GI's were executing Nazi POWs (and they did). There's no excuse for what happened and the APPROPRIATE people should be punished, but to have the Secretary of Defense resign or be fired is a little disproportionate with the incident.

Would that be the same time that the Army CID started its investigation? Sounds about right. Are you saying that these abuses continued after he was made aware of them? Funny, I haven't heard that reported anywhere. Let's talk about the price of gas instead.

I agree completely that someone bears responsibilty. Where I diverge in opinion is the notion that the supervisor of a mulitmillion person bureaucracy is responsible for knowing what goes on in a stink hole prison in Iraq. Should the commanders of the units directly involved be disciplined? Yes, and I believe the Army investigation is running its course, and I haven't heard anyone chirp about a cover up. Do I believe that Rumsfeld knew or should have known what was going on at Abu Gharib, and, therefore, be held accountable for the abuses? Based on the evidence, no. No one knew what was going on until a soldier complained and the Army CID launched an investigation. Like I said, find another topic to vent against the Administration. This one's pretty weak.

Here's the Red Cross report: http://online.wsj.com/documents/wsj-ICRC_report050904.pdf (someone else who's smarter than me can make it clicky) Just so we all get a proper sense of perspective, the Red Cross reported "shooting of unarmed prisoners" during prison uprisings and escape attempts. Didn't want anyone to think that the Red Cross was reporting that the US was executing prisoners of war. And in case anyone is getting the impression that the Red Cross was reporting abuses to the US and the US wasn't responding to these reports, take note of the date of the Red Cross report (February 2004). The US Army's criminal investigation of the prison abuses began in January 2004. Before the Red Cross report even came out.

Why should Rumsfeld resign? Because it was on his watch? Well then how about everybody in the chain of command below him? Should they all resign as well? I don't hear anybody calling for the resignation of the Secretary of Army or any undersecretaries. What about the commanding general of Central Command or even the commanding general of the forces in Iraq? They was certainly closer to the incident than Rumsfeld. Why isn't anyone asking for their heads? How about the chain of command above Rumsfeld? Should the President resign? Bush is the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces. Doesn't the buck stop at the Oval Office? Why isn't anyone calling for him to resign? Asking for Rumsfeld's resignation is nothing more than a politically opportunistic attack on the current administration hiding behind moral indignation. Those opposed to the Bush administration would do better off harping about the price of f***ing gasoline.

If you were in PA (7 digits) you could go with LTNGBUG.

If us Yanks had spent the last 30+ years worrying about IRA bombs we might have your take on things. Still the problem of criminal intent makes this seem a bit too much.

Please don't attribute comments to me that I didn't say. I was pointing out a distinction between facing criminal penalties for an intentional action (disregarding a LAWFUL order of aircrew) and accidently leaving luggage in an airline terminal. Nothing more, nothing less. Personally, I agree that TSA is pretty screwed up. We could get better security by having pilots armed and cockpits inaccessible from the passenger cabin.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=26447 I think if you read between the lines of that article, he was violating orders from the aircrew to remain seated. You disobey a lawful command from aircrew and you deserve to go to jail.

The New York Times (I think) had a great article this morning about a psychological study done at Stanford in 1971 where students were recruited to role play prison inmates and prison guards -- and then left to their own devices without supervision. The results of the study showed the EXACT abuses that the US guards committed. It was really striking how the study mirrored what happened in Iraq. This doesn't excuse what happened, but it does show that what happened isn't unusual where people are inadequately trained and supervised. BTW, they stopped doing further studies because they deemed them unethical.