How Muslim US Soldiers Will Suffer More Conflicts Now

There are serious questions to be answered as to why the Fort Hood incident. And the first is: Did the US military take steps to prevent prejudice against muslim US soldiers? If not, that maybe the blunder that caused the Fort Hood massacre:

‘As the American Muslim community takes pains to distance itself from Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the Fort Hood shootings add misery to the already complicated lives of Muslims serving in the armed forces. Drawn to the military by patriotism, Muslim soldiers arrive in Afghanistan or Iraq to find themselves confronting fellow Muslims in battle, while fighting alongside soldiers who spew slurs like “raghead”—then return home to take flak at the local mosque for “killing Muslims,” the New York Times reports.

‘“It’s kind of like the Civil War, where brothers fought each other across the Mason-Dixon line,” one veteran of Iraq tells the Times. “I don’t want to stain my faith, I don’t want to stain my fellow Muslims, and I also don’t want to stain my country’s flag.” The military itself shows ambivalence towards Muslim recruits: Their language skills and cultural expertise are urgently needed, but individual Muslims are suspect, a mistrust likely to worsen in the wake of Fort Hood.’ -New York Times

Deceptive Credit Card Practices

“I think this new Pew report — just out this week — says it all.” –Lowell Bergman, correspondent for the FRONTLINE/New York Times joint report The Card Game, airing November 24th.

‘One hundred percent of credit cards offered online by the leading bank card issuers continue to include practices that will be outlawed once legislation passed in May takes effect next year, according to a new report by the Pew Health Group’s Safe Credit Cards Project.
‘The report also found that advertised credit card interest rates rose an average of 20 percent in the first two quarters of 2009, even as banks’ cost of lending declined. With the Federal Reserve currently developing rules to ensure penalty charges are “reasonable and proportional” as required under the Credit CARD Act, the report also includes policy recommendations for regulators.’

Key findings of the report show that:

– 99.7 percent of bank cards allowed issuers to increase interest rates on outstanding balances — a jump from 93 percent in December;

– 95 percent of bank cards permitted issuers to apply payments in a way the Federal Reserve found likely to cause substantial financial injury to consumers; and

– 90 percent of bank cards had penalty rate hikes with the vast majority imposed by “hair triggers” of one or two late payments in a year. -see full report at FrontLine

A Tool For Investigating Suspicious Activity

Want to trick the tricksters and scammers? Here are tips. But be careful, this is heavy tech:

‘…Basically, I want to poison DNS so that known malicious domains point to the IP of my choosing. Instead of just knowing that a suspect computer has tried resolving the IP of a bad domain, I want the suspect system to now communicate to the server I choose, and continue with the action it would have taken if it were communicating with the real (bad) domain.

‘After trying out a honeypot-specific tool, I found INetSim, the “Internet Services Simulation Suite.” Bingo: I found what I wanted. It acts almost identically to the Metasploit Framework setup I described in “Using Evil Wifi to Educate Users, IT Admins.” INetSim emulates numerous services including HTTP, SMTP, POP3, DNS, FTP, TFTP, and more. The DNS service can be configured to return any IP you tell it to for any DNS request that comes in.

‘So, if a “badguy.com” is requested, it can return the address of the INetSim server. This is where the good stuff happens. The HTTP server can respond to any request with successful HTTP status code and serve up a file that matches the requested file extension. If a request comes in for a JPG, a JPG is sent back. If a text file is requested, a .TXT file is sent back. This is all configurable so you can add all the extensions and fake files you want.’ -Posted by John Sawyer -Dark Reading.com

Sgt. Munley a Hero Even Before Fort Hood.

When she saved her partner’s life before this, Appler called her ‘Mighty Mouse’:

‘Kimberly Munley is being hailed as a hero for bringing down the Fort Hood shooter while taking three bullets herself, and her former partner isn’t a bit surprised. Shaun Appler, who worked with her years ago in North Carolina, tells the Austin American-Statesman that he began calling her “Mighty Mouse” after she leaped through the air to free him from an assailant choking him and trying to grab his gun.‘“She saved my life that night,” Appler says. “When I found out the female officer at Fort Hood was Kim, I wasn’t surprised. Kim not only has the training, I know she was mentally prepared to know what to do when you get into that situation.” He spoke to her by phone yesterday. “She is in good spirits, although she is obviously saddled with the loss of life that occurred there.”‘ – Austin American-Statesman

Top Ten Weirdest Eats

How about foul-smelling, fermented soybeans?:

‘In an adventurous mood? You might want to try one of the world’s top 10 culinary challenges, compiled by Eddie Lin for the Times of London:

Alligator cheesecake, New Orleans: Yes, real alligator, mixed with cheese and shrimp.

Blood tongue, Germany: Exactly what it sounds like: Cow tongue and blood.

Cow udder, Italy: Stewed or fried by the Tuscan poor, when prime cuts went to the rich.

Chicken knee, China and Japan: No bones, just crunchy cartilage in these delicacies.

Haggis, Scotland: Sheep’s heart, liver, and lung mixed with seasoning—then piped into a sheep’s stomach to be served.

Natto, Japan: Foul-smelling, fermented soybeans are said to offer serious health benefits.

Witchetty grub, Australia: Witchetty is a bush, and the wiggly, juicy grubs found under it are consumed raw or charred.
For the complete list visit Times UK

Two in One

Stalin and Washington – two opposing ideologies, one hand gesture:

There is an interpretation as to why the hidden hand from a political weblog at wordpress.com.

Restaurant No-No’s Part II

“Few things are more frustrating than a bowl of hot soup with no spoon.”:‘Bruce Buschel isn’t out of touch. “I realize that every deli needs a wisecracking waiter,” he writes in the New York Times, “and burgers always taste better when delivered by a server with tattoos and tongue piercing(s).” But at his soon-to-open restaurant, these rules (coupled with last week’s) are set in stone:

Educate thyself. “If you serve Balsam Farm candy-striped beets, know something about Balsam Farm and candy-striped beets.”

“Bring the pepper mill with the appetizer. Do not make people wait or beg for a condiment.” And while you’re at it, “do not bring judgment with the ketchup.”

Water glasses don’t need to be full all the time. “You’ll make people nervous.” But also, “do not let a glass sit empty for too long.” Find that golden mean.
Tell the diner what that mouthwatering special costs.
“Do not bring soup without a spoon.” While it’s a great setup for a joke, “few things are more frustrating than a bowl of hot soup with no spoon.”
“Do not disappear.”
For the full list -NY Times

Fort Hood Killing Spree -updated

‘Federal investigators are probing a connection between Fort Hood rampage suspect Nidal Malik Hasan and the Muslim imam who was spiritual adviser to two 9/11 terrorists. Hasan attended the Dar al-Hijrah mosque in northern Virginia in 2001 when it was led by Anwar al-Aulaqi. The US-born imam, who now lives in Yemen, is a major supporter of Al Qaeda. Hasan “connections to Aulaqi would be problematic on many levels,” said a counter-terrorism official, who called the imam “a radicalizer of the first order.”

‘It’s not yet clear how well Hasan may have known Aulaqi. Investigators say they are still operating on the theory that Hasan acted alone when he shot dead 13 at Fort Hood. But they are continuing to investigate his associates and the radical Islamist web sites he visited. “There’s a massive effort here to look at the web sites,” a law enforcement official told the Washington Post. “The jury’s still out on motivation.”‘ -Washington Post

Even an Islamic leader recommended that the mosque reject Hasan’s request to become a lay Muslim leader:

‘The Army psychiatrist accused of the Fort Hood shooting spree was so conflicted over what to tell fellow soldiers about fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan that a local Islamic leader was deeply troubled by it. The co-founder of the Islamic Community of Greater Killeen said Major Nidal Malik Hasan’s persistent questioning prompted him to recommend that the mosque reject Hasan’s request to become a lay Muslim leader at the Army post.

‘Hasan never expressed anger toward the Army, said Osman Danquah, but during the second of two conversations over the summer, Hasan seemed almost incoherent. “What if a person gets in and feels that it’s just not right?” Danquah recalled Hasan asking him. “I told him, `There’s something wrong with you.’” Meanwhile, a former classmate in a public health program says Hasan equated the US war on terror to a war on Islam. “In retrospect, I’m not surprised he did it. I had real questions about what his priorities were, what his beliefs were.”‘ -AP

So this was another case of frustration and rage suddenly exploding?:

‘Nidal Malik Hasan considered himself a victim of anti-Muslim bias and had been trying for 6 months to quit the Army, his cousin says. “I think because he’s a Muslim he didn’t want to go to Afghanistan or Iraq, and he didn’t want to expose himself to violence and death.” a cousin who lives near the West Bank town of Ramallah tells the Times of London.

Fort Hood hero Sgt. Kim Munley

‘Hasan was transferred today from an unidentified hospital in central Texas, near Fort Hood, to Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio. A rep confirmed the transfer and said Hasan was under guard but couldn’t comment on the reason for the move, the Express-News reports.’

Fort hood is the largest US Army base:

‘Twelve people are dead and 31 wounded after a shooting spree at Fort Hood, the Texas Army base. One shooter is among the dead and two more suspects are in custody. All are US soldiers, said an Army official. All the casualties took place at the base’s Soldier Readiness Center, where those who are about to be deployed or who are returning undergo medical screening. The primary shooter opened fire with two handguns about 1:30pm.

‘President Obama called the incident a “horrific outburst of violence” and said his thoughts were with the families of victims. He promised the government would get answers to “every single question.” Fort Hood is the largest US Army base in the world, home to about 40,000 soldiers and their families.’ -AP

Don’t you think it’s safe to think that the CIA’s admission of kidnapping suspected terrorists might have triggered the shooter’s action?

British Council Philippines Announcement

The British Council has partnered with Philippine Association for Language Teaching (PALT) in the 5th PALT conference on 03 – 05 December 2009. The conference aims to highlight the various means of developing leadership potentials in language education in Asia and address the influences and issues that impact language education…BCP.org

JC Dugard Suffered from Stockholm Syndrome -SFC

SF Chronicles suspects JC suffered from Stockholm Syndrome:

‘Kidnap victim Jaycee Dugard lied to a suspicious parole officer in a desperate bid to protect her abductor when she was discovered, according to just-released report of her questioning. Jaycee, kidnapped when she was 11 in her northern California town, called herself Alyssa and presented herself as Phillip Garrido’s wife. She laughingly explained that she was often mistaken as someone young enough to be the sister of her daughters, fathered by Garrido.

‘She became angry under repeated questioning and insisted Garrido was a “great person” and “good” father, despite his previous arrests for rape and kidnapping. She then switched her story, first explaining that she was an abused wife on the run, then finally admitting her real identity as the girl missing for 18 years. The exchange is a chilling revelation of the likely effects of Stockholm syndrome, notes the San Francisco Chronicle.’

Stockholm syndrome is a psychological condition in which the abduction victim, for some reason, switches allegiance to her/his captors.