There were 190 acts of international terrorism in 2003, a slight decrease from the 198 attacks that occurred in 2002, and a drop of 45 percent from the level in 2001 of 346 attacks. The figure in 2003 represents the lowest annual total of international terrorist attacks since 1969.

Here's an especially good story about an Australian sniper who served during the Korean war.

I suppose I should be grateful that I can't even imagine what this was really like.

(Via TB)

Stop digging.

Oddly enough, I agree with Kerry completely on this topic. This inconsistancy between ribbons and medals is a classic "distinction without a difference", and it is, by itself, utterly unimportant.

The verbal flailing, however, really does hurt him. This whole interview was an embarassing mistake.

(Via IP)

Jonah Goldberg at The Corner:

Hillary Clinton at yesterday's Women are Winners! march declared that the administration is "filled with people who disparage sexual harassment laws." Let it sink in.

Pat Tillman played football for the Cardinals. On the morning of September 11th, 2001, he was in his fourth season, with a $3.6 million contract.

Tillman quit football and became an Army Ranger. I was very impressed with him then, looking at his willingness to walk away from fame and fortune as a real sacrifice. I didn't know the half of it.

Tillman was killed yesterday in Afghanistan. He was a good man. This is a heartbreaking loss.

There is a message here. All of our soldiers, the best among them and the worst, face this same sacrifice. Each is risking something more than fame and fortune, and several hundred have already paid the price.

We owe these guys.

They have working prototypes now. Cool.

You can make your own "shear-thickening fluid" with ordinary cornstarch and water. Put a tablespoon or so worth of cornstarch into your hand, and add just enough water to make a thick, runny liquid. Now put your other hand over the top of the liquid and rub it, as if you were trying to roll it into a ball.

So long as you are applying shear force (side-to-side force), the liquid will magically transform to a solid. It will even fracture into sharp-edged pieces, that quickly melt back into liquid form. Messy, but fun.

(Via FR)

This is just perfect.

It's a real photo (not a photoshop job) although I did have to play around with the brightness and contrast to make it all come out.

Mahmoud Zahar has reportedly assumed the still-smoking, slightly sticky helm of Hamas.

This was almost certainly a poor career decision; I'd expect they wouldn't even bother with the 401k. Nonetheless, he does seems about right for the job. He's already familiar with Israeli airpower, which is certainly a big plus for this position, and besides, he's the kind of guy who always seems to know the right thing to say:

Now this message would be sent for every Israeli. Your children and your women, your husbands, everybody is a target now.

...the march of resistance will continue until the Islamic flag is raised, not only over the minarets of Jerusalem, but over the whole universe.

Atta boy, Mahmoud. Keep your spirits up.

So how long before this piece of shit meets his maker? Put your best guess into the comment thread below, and I'll reward the winner with a link or something.

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That's according to the Brady Campaign's Congressional Voting Scorecard. Kerry voted with the gun-banners twenty times out of twenty, demonstrating what is probably the most consistent stance he has ever held on any legislative issue.

Unsurprisingly, both NRA and the Gun Owners Of America give his voting record an 'F' rating, agreeing that Kerry "he has never missed an opportunity to cast an anti-gun vote".

So what does John Kerry have to say for himself?

"I'm a gun owner. I've been a hunter since I was about 12 years old," Kerry said.

"My position is very clear. I support the Second Amendment."

Oh, blow it out your ass, John.

(Via FR and AN)

Hey, credit where credit is due:

US Senator John Kerry, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, said on Sunday Israel's killing of Hamas leader Abdel-Aziz al-Rantissi was justified because Israel "has every right in the world to respond to any act of terror against it."

"Hamas is a terrorist, brutal organization", he told NBC's Meet the Press. "It has had years to make up its mind to take part in a peaceful process. They refuse to ... and I support Israel's efforts to try to separate itself and to try to be secure."

Wanna-be First Lady Teresa Heinz, on the rigors of being Kerry's wife:

"I can't believe my family left Africa and came to this country, I can't believe I ever even married an American."

You don't like it? I'm sure your private jet can have you home in no time.

(Via FR)

Well, you can shelve your plans for that Rantisi Death Watch - the Israelis just blew his sorry, Hamas-leading ass back to hell where it belongs.

He was running the show for what, three weeks?

Next!

Bin Ladin offers Europe a truce. Seriously.

It seems he never wanted to kill anyone, and his demands are really quite reasonable.

I'd love to hear Kerry's take on this...

Go read it. Seriously, this is not to be missed.

Finally, a government subsidy that I can wholeheartedly support.

According to my accountant, the Bush Tax Cut™ saved us $445.

According to Springfield Armory, that puts me within $40 of the MSRP of this:

According to the April edition of the American Rifleman magazine, this is a hell of a nice gun for the money.

According to my current line of reasoning with my wife, this means the federal government just issued me a militia sidearm.

I've been advocating this for years...

Professor Bainbridge sees it coming:

The Unholy Alliance of plaintiffs' lawyers, health fanatics, bureaucrats, and modern day secular puritans, kill-joys, and spoilsports is coming for us all. If you love liberty, take up smoking and drinking, buy coffee from places that sell it too hot, eat red meat daily, wear fur, and support tort reform.

(Via OTB)

I've recently noticed something, and I wonder if this is just a local quirk or if others have noticed it, too.

I live near a pretty liberal town and it's not uncommon to see anti-Bush bumper stickers on passing cars, or even "Bush Must Go" signs planted in people's front yards. What seems unusual about this is I've rarely seen a sign or a bumper sticker that actually expresses support for John Kerry.

Anti-Bush stuff seems to be everywhere, but you might go a week before you see anything with Kerry's name on it.

Is this just me, or is this part of a larger trend?

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You've heard about those camel spiders that live in the Iraqi desert. You probably heard they were pretty big and gross. You have no idea.

Here's another cool optical illusion, via The Corner.

Finally, here's the solution to a sixty-year-old mystery.

You've always heard that you could slip a few bucks to the maitre d', and quickly get a table in a busy, high-class restaurant. Does it really work?

You bet it does.

(Via BDX)

You may wish to do the same, even if, like me, you don't live anywhere near the place.

Here's the Administration's reply to Clarke. This statement is something of a bombshell, but the commission can easily fact-check it so I'll have to assume it's true:

We also moved to develop a new and comprehensive strategy to eliminate the al-Qaida terrorist network. President Bush understood the threat, and he understood its importance. He made clear to us that he did not want to respond to al-Qaida one attack at a time. He told me he was "tired of swatting flies."

This new strategy was developed over the Spring and Summer of 2001, and was approved by the President's senior national security officials on September 4. It was the very first major national security policy directive of the Bush Administration - not Russia, not missile defense, not Iraq, but the elimination of al-Qaida.

You read that right: the very first major national security policy directive of the Bush Administration was a new and comprehensive strategy to eliminate the al-Qaida terrorist network. And they can prove it, too.

How can Clarke possibly argue that the Bush administration did not make terrorism a major priority before 9/11? Obviously, they did. It's right there.

It'll be interesting to see what happens next.

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Even under the Bush Tax Cuts, the rich still keep paying more:

Econopundit has the full scoop.

This is not only pathetic, it is genuinely hard to believe. What planet is this guy on, commiting resources to something like this when we are in the middle of a damn war?

I've defended Ashcroft occasionally, but now I've had it with him. He's a mutant. Get somebody else in there who can do the job without embarassing all of us.

I'll tell you this much, pal: you can have my porn when you pry it from my cold, dead hand.

We fight wars with a conscience.

We make a tremendous effort to spare non-combatants, of course, but we also avoid targeting culturally important sites. We value these places enough that we are willing pay for them with the vital currency of war - with risk, delay, and blood. We do it simply because we do not want to see precious things destroyed.

We have been especially careful not to damage mosques, and unsurprisingly, our enemies have quickly learned to use these sites as their headquarters, their observation posts, and their firing positions. There is no rule of law that requires us to preserve these sites as the enemy employs them against us, but nonetheless, we have always shown remarkable restraint. That restraint may be well justified when a few of the enemy briefly inhabit a sensitive position, but it was never intended to provide them a guaranteed safe haven which they could incorporate into their strategic plans. I believe we have extended too much protection to these places for too long. Yes, your mosque is safe, but it is not that safe.

Yesterday in Iraq, forty of the enemy didn't get the memo. After much deliberation, we made a much-needed, and long-overdue adjustment to this rules.

Nobody benefits if we encourage our enemies to militarize and desecrate their own religious sites. Nobody will really argue that the enemy ought to have a safe haven where they are free to fire at will into the crowds below. And nobody, I hope, will be surprised when the enemy learns to stop fighting from positions that ought to be spared from the ravages of war.

Check this out:

When the 40,000 subscribers to Reason, the monthly libertarian magazine, receive a copy of the June issue, they will see on the cover a satellite photo of a neighborhood - their own neighborhood. And their house will be graphically circled.

The world has changed, and the more that people understand this, the better. Lots of women I know are still freaked out that people can get computer-generated maps to their houses knowing only their names, but of course this has been available for years.

(Via BDX)

When a three-metre crocodile latched on to the arm of an 11-year-old girl swimming behind his boat, skipper Ray Turner leapt into action. The former crocodile hunter dived from the boat, landed on the back of the reptile and gouged one of its eyes until it freed the girl.

I'd like to be just half that brave. Seriously, I'd happily settle for half...

Ravenwood twists the knife.

Just before the current round of fighting began in Iraq, I recommended this Belmont Club post as a guide to what would happen. I think Wretchard's analysis has held up quite well, particularly his prediction of the lame 'countersiege' techniques that the enemy recently attempted.

Now, we have USSC's typically insightful look at the larger picture, which I believe is similarly prescient. Check it out.

This one came a little too close for comfort:

British authorities believe terror suspects arrested last week were planning to make a bomb that would include a highly toxic, easily obtained chemical called osmium tetroxide, ABCNEWS has learned.

[...] osmium tetroxide is known to attack soft human tissue and could blind or kill anyone who breathed its fumes...

Osmium tetroxide? That's a new one. It seems to be about as dangerous as they said, too.

Sadly, I think it's only a matter of time before they successfully pull off one of these attacks. This is going to be a long, bloody war.

The Israelis know how to handle threats:

Police: Gun license holders should carry arms over Pesach

Israelis with valid gun licenses should carry a weapon with them during the Passover holiday, Police Commissioner Shlomo Aharonishki said Monday. The police have beefed up their deployments for the Passover holiday, which starts Monday night, as all the security services move to boost the already high state of alert.

(Via FR)

Wretchard's analysis of the upcoming fight in Fallujah is one of the best posts I've read in quite a while.

Looks like the Spring Offensive is right on schedule:

Seven U.S. soldiers were killed Sunday in fighting with Shiite militiamen in the Baghdad neighborhood of Sadr City, the U.S. military said.

At least 24 other American troops were wounded, the military said in a written statement.

These losses are terrible, and more will almost certainly follow. My heart goes out to those who were lost, and to those they left behind.

The good news is that the enemy always gets the worst of it when they go face to face with our troops. They are desperate now, trying to force us out before the turnover. A democratic Iraq is their worst nightmare, and they are using up everything they have to stop it before it's too late.

The good news is that they are going to fail. It's already too late to drive us out, too late to turn Iraq into another fascist shithole. It's too late to try to intimidate us with violence.

We don't put up with that shit anymore.

No, really. Thorax cake.

This year I decided to go the whole hog and make an entire thoracic cavity cake. The plan was for each organ to be made out of a different kind of cake and to secrete a different color of fluid when it was cut into.

Probably the Best Halloween Party Ever.

(Via BB)

From The Corner:

Pro Football Hall of Famer (and Notre Dame alum) Paul Hornung is in hot water because he said Notre Dame "can't stay as strict as we are as far as the academic structure is concerned because we've got to get the black athlete." Any fool knows that the right way to say this is that "Notre Dame must adopt a more holistic approach in its admissions in order to achieve greater diversity."

Kevin at The Smallest Minority offers an outstanding post today, inspired in part by a discussion we had here. He illustrates what I believe to be the great Achilles Heel of our republic; the future of our freedom depends utterly upon the opinions of judges who, all too often, allow their own preferences to color their decisions.

As I read Kevin's post, I was reminded of a terrific Antonin Scalia quote on this very same topic:

"There is no respect in which we [the Supreme Court] are chained or bound by the text of the Constitution. All it takes is five hands."

I didn't remember where I'd found this gem, so I had to google around for it. It was posted last week on Kevin's site!

Let's just say I'd prefer to be the donor.

(Via ND)

If you haven't heard about this yet, you will - the 5th Circuit recently upheld a 'warrentless search' of a private home. On the face of it, this suggests stunning breach of civil liberties, to say the least.

The Volokh Conspiracy provides a link to the (surprisingly readable) actual decision. It's a complex issue, but personally, I don't have a problem with it. The gist of the matter is this:

We turn initially to the primary issue now before us, namely whether there is an across-the-board, hard and fast per se rule that a protective sweep can be valid only if conducted incident to an arrest. We hold there is not.

This does not mean that the police can just stop by and search your house! Not even in Louisiana.

Please note that this has nothing to do with either the Patriot Act, or even the Federal government, despite some claims to the contrary.

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