Month: February 2002

Mistaken Identity Blamed in Soldier Killing. In a case of friendly fire in the homeland, an Army Special Forces soldier was killed by a sheriff’s deputy in a “tragic mistake” stemming from mistaken identity Saturday, the county’s chief deputy said Monday. [Fox News]

The soldiers, who were on a training exercise, jumped the deputy, who wasn’t. Although identified as Special Forces, the soldiers were on a final qualification exercise–which suggests that they really weren’t Special Forces yet. The article gives details of what happened, and frankly I’m alarmed that the soldiers thought that they could get away with what they did, training exercise or not.

I added a new link to the Gun-free Britain collection. It seems that crimes committed using firearms have almost tripled in London in the past year.

DoubleClick Gets Into Spam [Slashdot]

This isn’t surprising, since those annoying banner ads are somewhat spam-like themselves. It’s a lot easier to get rid of banner ads by using iCab than it is to get rid of spam, though.

Palestinian Opens Fire at Bus Stop. A Palestinian gunman opened fire Monday at a bus stop in Neve Yaakov, a Jewish neighborhood in a disputed part of Jerusalem, wounding at least 10 people, rescue officials said. [AP World News]

There’s no mention of any Israeli civilians returning fire in this story in the American press. I haven’t been able to read the story yet on the BBC or Jerusalem Post sites, but it wouldn’t surprise me if they both report there were civilians shooting back.

Help for Overly Frisky Felines. An antidepressant commonly used for humans and dogs is about to undergo a trial in an effort to gauge its safety and usefulness for the ferocious house cat. By Louise Knapp. [Wired News]

Swell. It’s not enough for people to turn their children into drugged-out zombies, now they want to do it to their pets as well. It occurs to me that this if any of the various nutcase animal rights groups want to improve their image, making a fuss about this would be a good way.

Korean workers go on ‘illegal’ strike. Thousands of public sector employees ignore the law to protest against
privatisation plans, disrupting rail services across the country. [BBC News: world]

How can a strike be illegal? As far as I know slavery doesn’t exist in South Korea–or does it? If the government objects to its employees going on strike, it can fire them, but it it forces them to work it sinks to the level of North Korea.

Collectivism Causes Terrorism

The following excerpt is from an article by M. Northrup Buechner in the October 1981 issue of The Objectivist Forum, entitled “The Root of Terrorism.” In the article, Buechner explains how collectivist ideologies lead to terrorism. [Counterpoint]

This is just an excerpt, and I’d like to see the complete article. Given the age of the article, it’s pretty safe to say it’s not on the web.

Hillary and Hamas

The first lady has a long record of association with Islamic militants. [Counterpoint]

This is an article from 2000. Her association abruptly came to an end when she decided to run for Senate in New York–a city with a prominent Jewish population. Still, it’s pretty weird for a socialist to be cozying up to religious fanatics. Maybe it’s an example of the priniciple that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend?” After all, both Islamic fundamentalists and socialists hate America, maybe that makes them friends now?

Israel considers lifting Arafat blockade. Israeli leaders will discuss whether to end Yasser Arafat’s virtual
house arrest on Sunday as talks aimed at reducing violence resume. [BBC News: world]

I don’t know what they think lifting the blockade will accomplish. Blowing up Arafat’s house, with him in it, might do some good. Then again, it might not. But there’s no hope for peace while Arafat is alive, regardless of where he is.

Alert customer shoots terrorist in Efrat supermarket. Further tragedy was averted when a woman shopping in the packed supermarket apparently saw the terrorist trying to set off a second explosion and shot him twice in the head from close range. [Jerusalem Post]

Some additional information on the story I linked to yesterday. Very nice work by the shopper!