Friday, June 23. 2006
When I read this Time article, I shook my head in disbelief in disgust. The article is entitled, " A Countersuit In The MySpace Case."
A 14-year-old Austin, Texas, girl and her mother filed a $30 million lawsuit against MySpace.com, where the teenager claims she met a man who assaulted her. Now, the college student charged with the sexual assault also is considering suing the popular social networking site.
The defense attorney for Pete Solis, the 19-year-old Texas community college student charged with sexually assaulting the girl dubbed "Julie Doe" in her lawsuit, told TIME that if the Texas courts accept the premise that MySpace is liable because the two met there, then his client also has a claim, since the alleged victim falsely portrayed herself on the webiste as 15 years old.
"He's been, in effect, just as much a victim — if not more," says Adam Reposa, the attorney for Solis, who is facing up to 20 years in prison on charges of second degree felony sexual assault. Since the lawsuit against MySpace also names Solis as a defendant, Reposa said he will "cross-file" and also sue MySpace and its owner, News Corporation. "MySpace wasn't there when they went to Whataburger. MySpace wasn't there when they went to the movie and MySpace wasn't there when they climbed in the backseat," Reposa said. "Meeting on MySpace — if that alone is enough, then we can make the same claim for damages."
So a girl meets some dude on a blogging site, and they get together and the girl gets sexually assaulted. Girl sues blogging site for $30 million because they say the site is liable. Guy who sexually assaults girl also sues site saying the site is liable. WHAT IS WRONG WITH THE WORLD?!?! SANITY CHECK PEOPLE!!!
Firstly, yes getting sexually assaulted is a horrible thing, but why on earth would you sue the MySpace for going out with a guy you hardly know from the Internet? The story says that the two exchanged cell phone numbers and communicated that way prior to the assault. By that logic, shouldn't you sue the cell phone company as well for facilitating a sexual assault?
The even crazier thing is that the guy is ALSO suing MySpace, even though HE ASSAULTED THE GIRL. This is insanity. MySpace didn't hold a gun to your head and ask you to do what you did. They claim that the guy is as much of a victim as the girl. I disagree completely with this statement. Technology is not at fault here, it's human nature.
America has become far too letigious. No one's willing to take responsibility for their own actions any more.
Wednesday, June 14. 2006
When Hurricane Katrina and Rita hit the gulf coast last year, FEMA moved into action to provide aid to hurricane victims. To rapidly deploy aid to people, FEMA gave out debit cards to get cash to people as quickly as possible. Now it seems that $1.4 billion of that aid might have been misused.
From the CNN article entitled, " FEMA cards bought diamonds, erotica":
Debit cards given to people displaced by the storms were improperly used to buy diamond jewelry, a vacation in the Dominican Republic, fireworks, a $200 bottle of champagne at a Hooters in San Antonio and $300 worth of "Girls Gone Wild" videos, the audit found.
According to the GAO, $1,000 from a FEMA debit card went to a Houston divorce lawyer, $600 was spent in a strip club and $400 was spent on "adult erotica products," all of which auditors concluded were "not necessary to satisfy legitimate disaster needs."
The GAO concluded that at least $1 billion in disaster relief payments by the Federal Emergency Management Agency were improper and potentially fraudulent because the recipients provided incomplete or incorrect information when they registered for assistance. [...]
Among the problems found with the registrations, according to the GAO study:
- People signed up for assistance using Social Security numbers that didn't exist or belonged to other people.
- Aid applications contained bogus addresses for damaged property, or gave addresses for damaged property where the applicants did not live when the hurricanes struck. In one case, FEMA paid nearly $2,360 to a man whose allegedly damaged property was in a cemetery.
- Payments were made to people who listed post office boxes as their damaged residences.
That's pretty funny that people used mailboxes as damaged residences.
Saturday, June 10. 2006
This week there was finally some good news from Iraq. The U.S. Military has taken out the head of Al-Qaeda in Iraq, Al-Zarqawi.
From the article " Painstaking operation led to al-Zarqawi"
Betrayal inside his al Qaeda in Iraq terror group led to success in a painstaking U.S.-led operation to kill Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the U.S. military said on Thursday.
The most wanted man in Iraq died in a U.S. airstrike Wednesday evening when two 500-pound bombs slammed into a safe house near Baquba, according to U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Bill Caldwell.
The article also mentions a few other interesting points. There was a $25 million bounty on Al-Zarqawi, so it looks like Al-Zarqawi was betrayed by someone in his organization. Furthermore, there's reports coming out that Iraqi forces arrived at the bombed house first, and they found Al-Zarqawi alive. This is quite amazing considering the house was hit with two 500 pound bombs dropped by fighter planes. When the U.S. military got there, they found Al-Zarqawi on a makeshift stretcher, and when Al-Zarqawi realized that the U.S. military was there, he tried to flee. They put him back on the stretcher but he died shortly after from his wounds. Quite the dramatic end to the story.
In either case, looks like both the Republicans and Democrats are celebrating this victory. They are happy to see this man go, but they're also cautious in their celebration. They know that this will not stop the war in Iraq, and it won't stop the terrorist attacks, but it is a symbolic victory nevertheless.
Anyway, good riddence that Al-Zarqawi is gone. He has been responsible for killing many civilians including Iraqi children. He also violently beheaded many foreign civilians and journalists. Heck, even Bin Laden thought that Al-Zarqawi was too violent in his actions. My take is, if you're going to play freedom fighter against the U.S., fine, do so. But don't target your fellow Iraqi Muslims in the process especially if they're innocent civilians.
The morning after this successful strike, oil prices dropped on the world markets.
Saturday, June 3. 2006
Today, the RCMP along with CSIS were able to nab 17 terrorists in an anti-terrorism raid. From the National Post article, " Alleged Canadian Terror Plot Has Worldwide Links."
A Canadian counter-terrorism investigation that led to the arrests of 17 people accused of plotting bombings in Ontario is linked to probes in a half-dozen countries, the National Post has learned. [...]
At a news conference Saturday, the RCMP announced terrorism-related charges had been laid against a dozen Toronto-area men and five teens under the age of 18.
The group “took steps to acquire components necessary to create explosive devices” including three tonnes of ammonium nitrate fertilizer, commonly used in terrorist bombs, police said.
By comparison, the truck bomb used to blow up the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City in 1995, killing 168 people, contained a single tonne of ammonium nitrate.
“It was their intent to use it for a terrorist attack,” RCMP assistant commissioner Mike McDonell said. [...]
As senior RCMP and Canadian Security Intelligence Service officials spoke to reporters, some of the evidence seized during police raids was displayed on a table guarded by police officers.
The materials included a bag of ammonium nitrate, a handgun and ammunition clip, computer hard drive, and what appeared to be a cellphone activated electronic detonator hidden inside a small black fishing tackle box.
Police also displayed bags of camouflage clothing and boots apparently seized from a camp north of Toronto that some of the members of the group had allegedly used for combat training.
In a speech to new Canadian Forces recruits and their families Saturday, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said Canadians can’t escape a dangerous world by turning a blind eye to it.
“As we have said on many occasions, Canada is not immune to the threat of terrorism,” he said.
“Through the work and co-operation of the RCMP, CSIS, local law enforcement and Toronto’s Integrated National Security Enforcement Team (INSET), acts of violence by extremist groups may have been prevented.”
The Ontario accused made brief court appearances in Brampton, north of Toronto, on Saturday. They face charges of participating in the acts of a terrorist group, including training and recruitment; firearms and explosives offences for the purposes of terrorism and providing property for terrorist purposes.
With the exception of two men, who are aged 43 and 30, the alleged terrorists are all in their teens and early 20s.
They include men of Somali, Egyptian, Jamaican, and Trinidadian origin. All are residents of Canada and “for the most part” all are Canadian citizens, police said.
Charged are: Fahim Ahmad, 21, Zakaria Amara, 20, Asad Ansari, 21, Shareef Abdelhaleen, 30, Qayyum Abdul Jamal, 43, Mohammed Dirie, 22, Yasim Abdi Mohamed, 24, Jahmaal James, 23, Amin Mohamed Durrani, 19, Steven Vikash Chand, 25, and Ahmad Mustafa Ghany, 21. A twelfth man was a youth when some of the alleged offences took place and can’t be named, along with the other five youths arrested.
“For various reasons, they appear to have become adherents to a violent ideology inspired by al-Qaida,” said Luc Portelance, the CSIS assistant director of operations.
I heard on TV that over 400 police officers launched a coordinated raid on these terror suspects. My hats off go to the police, RCMP, and CSIS for doing great work and keeping Canada safe.
At UVIC, I always hear anti-war people argue that Canada is not a terrorist target because we didn't support the war in Iraq. Does this recent event bring home the point that maybe this theory doesn't hold water? I've always said that Al-Qaeda hates the West because of our values and freedom and that's why we're a target. The West is seen as the Great Satan of the world.
In either case, I'm sure the next theory that the academics will pitch is that Canada is now a terrorist target because of our involvement in Afghanistan, and therefore we should withdraw from that nation. My response is that Canada is rightly involved in Afghanistan. It took out the Taliban which was a repressive regime that had no respect for women at all. It provided a safe haven for terrorists to train and to be indoctrinated with hatred, and this breeds trouble for the West. We're in that nation to make sure that the Taliban never comes back, and that the seeds of democracy can grow there.
Once again, hats off to our security agencies for keeping Canada safe and beating the terrorists.
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