What's in the news?

[Lustful Bride]

Senior ISIS leader killed by US Delta Force in a ground raid, his wife has been taken in for questioning and apparently the couple also had a young woman in their household as a slave, she is on her way to being returned to her family.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/senior-isis-leader-killed-in-us-raid-in-syria/ar-BBjRnKt?ocid=HPCDHP

This man was apparently the head of their Oil and financial operations, hopefully this is a good kick in the balls to ISIS.

[TheGlyphstone]

Leaders in those groups are like weeds - cut one down and the next guy in line will take his place. But saving a young woman from slavery is an unqualified victory.

[Heartsink]

He wasn't tried under Massachusetts state law, he was tried under Federal anti-terrorism laws, and Federal law still permits capital punishment.

Oh, that makes sense, thanks for the clarification :-)

[Yukina]

Leaders in those groups are like weeds - cut one down and the next guy in line will take his place. But saving a young woman from slavery is an unqualified victory.

So like H.Y.D.R.A.?

(Sorry, couldn't resist)

[Lustful Bride]

Leaders in those groups are like weeds - cut one down and the next guy in line will take his place. But saving a young woman from slavery is an unqualified victory.

So like H.Y.D.R.A.?

(Sorry, couldn't resist)

Spoiler: Click to Show/Hide

Lets go find two more then.  8-)

[gaggedLouise]

*nods* I've been trying for a while to recall which '90s hiphop track had the drawled line "I'm lookin' out for them leader after leader after leader.."  ???  (or something very close to that)

[BAMF]

A van Gogh painting that was considered a fake for 100 years discovered to be genuine

[Kythia]

*nods* I've been trying for a while to recall which '90s hiphop track had the drawled line "I'm lookin' out for them leader after leader after leader.."  ???  (or something very close to that)

"New Leaders"  by Talib Kweli?  Not really a drawl.  Fantastic song though.  You should go listen to it.

I'm like a Geordie shazam

[gaggedLouise]

"New Leaders"  by Talib Kweli?  Not really a drawl.  Fantastic song though.  You should go listen to it.

I'm like a Geordie shazam

Thanks! The one I'm looking for had a slightly different beat, more like a slowed-down marching band, but "New Leaders" is a great song indeed.

[Oniya]

I was impressed by the lyrics - didn't pull up the audio because I'm a little wary about such things.  (I view profanity like salt - a little bit can be sprinkled around to add flavor and emphasize aspects of a creation, but too much and it becomes unpalatable and raises your blood pressure.  ;D )

The reference to Thoth was delightfully unexpected.

[Dashenka]

Senior ISIS leader killed by US Delta Force in a ground raid, his wife has been taken in for questioning and apparently the couple also had a young woman in their household as a slave, she is on her way to being returned to her family.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/senior-isis-leader-killed-in-us-raid-in-syria/ar-BBjRnKt?ocid=HPCDHP

This man was apparently the head of their Oil and financial operations, hopefully this is a good kick in the balls to ISIS.

Not really. They're fighting for the ancient city of Palmyra now and they look to be winning.

http://news.yahoo.com/seizes-northern-part-syrias-palmyra-monitor-161405661.html

[Lustful Bride]

Not really. They're fighting for the ancient city of Palmyra now and they look to be winning.

http://news.yahoo.com/seizes-northern-part-syrias-palmyra-monitor-161405661.html

Ugh, I might have been spot on with that Hydra joke.

[TheGlyphstone]

Not really. They're fighting for the ancient city of Palmyra now and they look to be winning.

http://news.yahoo.com/seizes-northern-part-syrias-palmyra-monitor-161405661.html

After which they will loot anything that can be carried away from the ruins for sale on the black market, and destroy anything left behind. Because they've learned that it really, really pisses off the West when they obliterate priceless archeological history sites.

[Starkweather]

I'm pretty against the death penalty but I'm conflicted on Tsarnaev for some reason.

On the one hand, killing this young man is the cheapest and shallowest of reliefs. I feel the death penalty always is. Retribution is never the answer to being wronged. But on the other hand, at what point has someone done something so horrible that their life should be ended? Not necessarily because there's an arbitrary criteria but because causing mayhem on the Tsarnaev did feels more heinous than any other crime.

I just can't shake the feeling that what Tsarnaev and his brother did was a crime against more than the people he hurt. Does that make sense? Does anyone else feel like atrocities like what happened in Boston are somehow profound?

[gaggedLouise]

I'm pretty against the death penalty but I'm conflicted on Tsarnaev for some reason.

On the one hand, killing this young man is the cheapest and shallowest of reliefs. I feel the death penalty always is. Retribution is never the answer to being wronged. But on the other hand, at what point has someone done something so horrible that their life should be ended? Not necessarily because there's an arbitrary criteria but because causing mayhem on the Tsarnaev did feels more heinous than any other crime.

I just can't shake the feeling that what Tsarnaev and his brother did was a crime against more than the people he hurt. Does that make sense? Does anyone else feel like atrocities like what happened in Boston are somehow profound?

Yes, it was an attack on the whole community and clearly it left many people shocked and scarred, many who were not directly affected but who felt scared or tainted by it because they had to see it happen in their town (even if just through the media or though friends and neighbours, but that's not a small thing). Events of this kind do rub themselves in the faces of many people who were not involved and make them feel pulled into it, sullied by it. When you see someone being killed, blatantly raped or brutalized and you know you can't do anything about it - even if it's something you watch on the tv, or read about in your local newspaper - you become the unwilling witness and that can hurt in a long-term way.

I'm sure the people in Sicily and Malta who have to watch as hundreds of people a month die on the Mediterranean in crappy boats and vessels trying to reach their shores, and who sometimes hear of bodies being washed ashore, feel that way too sometimes. They're involved witnesses to an ongoing situation where people are trying to escape, risking their lives, and are drowned at sea - and there is no real effort to handle the wider situation. Only yesterday I was talking to my mother over a cup of coffee about the flow of migrants and refugees across Europe and said at one point "we don't want the Baltic Sea to look anything like the Mediterranean, now do we?", hinting at the possibility of a refugee crisis from eastern Europe (Ukraine and the Baltic republics) hitting Scandinavia and Germany with large numbers of people on the run if the hostilities should ramp up a couple of notches and spread out. The mere thought of nameless dead bodies regularly washed up on the islands and shores of the Baltic or small ships being wrecked out there while trying to cross over at a time of war is hard to stomach, and it has just that vibe of powerless shame about it.

[Dice]

http://mobile.news.com.au/travel/travel-updates/mh17-case-mounts-against-russia/story-fnizu68q-1227355693036

I would think this is not going to surprise anyone. Sadly.

[Ironwolf85]

surprising but not unexpected, it's wierd how when I run into Russians they seem to have this myth that "the west" is trying to overthrow their country...
the the whole crimea thing... I found myself unable to object to it other than being pissed.
But then I see this crap in eastern ukrane... and my response was simmilar to this below.

[Zakharra]

surprising but not unexpected, it's wierd how when I run into Russians they seem to have this myth that "the west" is trying to overthrow their country...
the the whole crimea thing... I found myself unable to object to it other than being pissed.
But then I see this crap in eastern ukrane... and my response was simmilar to this below.

Nice comic. :)

There's a guy on another forum I am a member on and he just posted this today: The difference between you and me then is that I consider "international" media to have 0% trustworthyness. Atleast with russian, chinese, iranian, lebanese and omani news you know where their loyalites lies and they're open with their subjectivity while "international" media are deceptive and a hive of lies and subterfuge for whatever agenda their private owners have.
the corporate oligarchy is the least trustworthy entity in the world except for their consistant greed, you can always trust that.
Anyone or anything calling themselves "international" I'll trust as far as I can throw Ayers Rock.
something with a well known bias is easier to trust as you'll know how they'll bend their information. You find the most truth in comparing what facts are presented and referred to.

He just admits he trusts the state run/controlled media of Russian, China and Iran over that of the international press. He's admitted he is a mouthpiece for the Russians now.

[Oniya]

Not exactly.  FOX News has a well-known bias.  I can trust that anything they produce will reflect that bias.  This doesn't mean that I am trusting them to tell the truth - it's actually saying that I 'trust' them to exaggerate certain things and outright lie about others, in accordance with that bias.

[Valerian]

During my morning commute I usually catch two different news broadcasts on the radio, one from a station that I know has a liberal bias and the other from a station with a known conservative agenda.  It's fascinating to note which stories one broadcast leaves out and the other emphasizes, not to mention the different slants they offer when both cover the same story.  ::)

[Zakharra]

 35 years ago today Mount St. Helens erupted. It blew on a Sunday and devastated a large area, killing 57 people. The north face of the mountain slid off in the largest landslide in the US on record, and the blast blew off a large chunk of the mountain off in a pyroclastic blast that spread out in a flow that overtook the landslide. It spread out  in a fan 23 miles across and 19 miles long hit. The blast was heard from British Columbia, to Idaho, Montana and northern California. The mountain lost 1,280 feet.

The ash cloud rose 15 miles into the air and dumped noticeable amounts of ash on 11 US states. My state (Idaho) was one of those. The ash cloud did make its way across the world, but its effects were felt mainly on the closest states and provinces.

That day is one I will remember for a long time still. I remember seeing the ash cloud, huge, dark and covering the entire horizon coming in and the inches of volcanic ash that fell. It was weird and somewhat frightening to a 10 year old, but very much something to remember. And I remember people complaining of the damage the acidic ash did to the finish of their cars.  The forests and farms grew fairly well for some years after that from the ash. Even now you can find people who saved some of the St. Helens ash.

The Mount St. Helens eruption was one of the biggest shows that nature has put on in the US in my lifetime (Hurricane Katrina is up there too). It was immense, powerful and showed us how little effect we can have on the planet itself. There's nothing we can do to stop an eruption. All we can do is watch and wait and prepare to move out of the way.

[Dice]

In Jon Stewart I trust...

I think the point is well made, I do not read a whole lot about ISIS because I know a lot of the history behind their creation. I know that that part of the world has a lot of legitimate gripes and while I know that the group had done many things I will condone without a moment's pause, they are not of their own making. I mean there are no small amount of reporting on crimes made by and for the US but rarely do you get to hear about them in the US. Take for example this lovely bit of info:
http://www.mintpressnews.com/classified-evidence-us-soldiers-raped-boys-in-front-of-their-mothers/200160/ (Masive trigger warning) (Just for the record, the men in question are thought to be Irqi solders and translators not US men, the US "just" has the tapes and plays them.)

I will agree that we will hear much from the media about how Russia is fucking things up and very little from any other side of the story. I do not think that is all that surprising and being willing to look at everything with an equal grain of salt is fair. But the RU, like the US is making its own Monsters. Be it now or some time in the future they will have to pay for the issues they have made for themselves. As for international news, well, it is was far easier to string me a lie before I had the option to check things on the internet but even these days its still able to be done. You just have to read around, thankfully today more than ever we have that option granted to us.

[Oniya]

Even now you can find people who saved some of the St. Helens ash.

*waves hand*  I was in my 'geology' phase, and lived up the street from a collector who would give me his 'extras' when he weeded out his collection.  One of the specimens I still have is a baggie of ash.

[gaggedLouise]

I'll need to do that when Katla erupts next time - it's expected to happen within a couple of years.  ::)

[Zakharra]

Not exactly.  FOX News has a well-known bias.  I can trust that anything they produce will reflect that bias.  This doesn't mean that I am trusting them to tell the truth - it's actually saying that I 'trust' them to exaggerate certain things and outright lie about others, in accordance with that bias.

It's worse than that. He doesn't trust -any- of the international press. Everything except the press of Russia, China, Iran, Omar and Lebanon isn't to be trusted. Which begs the problem of what happens when those news agencies lie as per their orders. How can he not see that they are lying about many things and how will it be possible to disprove said lies if the news agencies don't admit it?

*waves hand*  I was in my 'geology' phase, and lived up the street from a collector who would give me his 'extras' when he weeded out his collection.  One of the specimens I still have is a baggie of ash.

Nice. I think we got a small phial of ash around here.  Those who thought ahead saved some for future remembrance. I can sometimes see a few vendors in flea markets or pawn/second hand shops selling small amounts of ash.