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14 Feb 2012 22:01

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World: Americans are beginning to sour on foreign intervention

  • 63% of Americans believed, in March 2011, that the US had no obligation to intervene in Libya
  • 73% of Americans believe, as of today, that the US has no obligation to intervene in Syria source
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink

19 Sep 2011 10:44

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World: Six months in, and with Gaddafi rendered powerless, Libya turns a corner

  • The delay in the new government isn’t important. It’s like a sick man. He has to move slowly before he can walk at a normal speed. We need time to recover. … Look, we finally got rid of that bloody monkey. We are better than before.
  • Libyan engineer Mustafa Shaab bin Ragheb  • Discussing the current situation with the Libyan government, six months into the war. Yes, friends, today is the six-month anniversary of NATO getting involved in Libya’s civil war, which remains controversial for some but has led to the crumbling of Gaddafi’s regime. There are many issues to deal with from here — including a splintering rebel movement — but “we finally got rid of that bloody monkey” certainly seems like a good result of a lengthy civil war. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

25 Apr 2011 22:56

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U.S.: Republicans in Mississippi ambivalent about outcome of Civil War

  • 38% of Mississippi GOPers wish the South had won source
  • » There’s more: If you include the 41% that’s undecided, you get a whopping 79% of Mississippi Republicans who aren’t quite ready to throw their support behind Abraham Lincoln circa 1861. Also, 9% of African Americans in the state aren’t sure whether they like the NAACP more than the KKK; surely, this is the result of a typo, or some sort of methodological error, or perhaps a psychoactive pollutant in the drinking water. Oh well; at least 54% of the state agrees that interracial marriage shouldn’t be illegal. That’s right, a whole 54%!
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink

19 Mar 2011 16:20

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World: Hugo Chavez: Nations in airstrikes “care nothing” about Libyans

  • For those who wanted to see Chavez in a hard hat, here you go. Enjoy. The Venezuelan leader, a key ally of Gaddafi, took some time off from his tour of a road-building project in Caracas to let everyone know what he thinks of the Libyan airstrikes: “They want to seize Libya’s oil and they care nothing about the lives of the Libyan people. These are the men of war … what irresponsibility. Behind this is the hand of the United States and its European allies, instead of taking the path that we have modestly proposed.” In case you were wondering, that peace mission Chavez wanted to make didn’t go anywhere because Saif Gaddafi essentially said Chavez wouldn’t have any idea what was going on. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

10 Mar 2011 10:22

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World: Libya: Pro-Gaddafi forces capture Ras Lanuf, a key oil port

  • We’ve been defeated. They are shelling and we are running away. That means that they’re taking Ras Lanuf.
  • A rebel fighter in the Libyan city of Ras Lanuf • Discussing how Gaddafi supporters took over the oil port city. It’s just one front in which Gaddafi’s folks have been trying to gain lost ground. The capture of this town, by the way, completely follows the playbook Gaddafi has been pushing lately. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

07 Mar 2011 16:00

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World: Libyan rebels fight to hold front line territories

  • Libya may be in for a long haul: As the conflict drags on, battles to establish and maintain front lines are becoming increasingly chaotic and difficult for the Libyan rebels to manage, spread as they are across a broad swath of the country’s east. And based on the unstable, defiant personality dictator Muammar Gaddafi’s been flashing, this has the look of a protracted, bloody civil war unless something critical soon breaks. source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

06 Mar 2011 10:54

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World: Libya: Pro-Gaddafi troops’ gains cheered, then disputed

  • Today, there was celebration in Tripoli by pro-Gaddafi supporters who heard that troops made significant gains over the rebel forces throughout the country. Guns were everywhere, even in the hands of little kids – as you might notice in the utterly shocking photo above. The BBC, however, reports that the excitement appears misguided, as the gains against rebel forces weren’t nearly as successful as originally reported. “Tripoli is full of rumours, and versions of the truth,” writes BBC Middle East editor Jeremy Bowen. “Some are closer to reality than the others.The regime does appear to feel much more secure than it did 10 days ago when I arrived, even though it is more isolated. More of day-to-day life in Tripoli has resumed.” (Photo by Ben Curtis/AP) source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 

29 Dec 2010 00:50

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U.S.: Virginia has laughably awful history textbooks, just an FYI

  • mistake A Virginia-oriented history book called “Our Virginia: Past and Present” suggested that African-Americans fought for the South in the Civil War, causing a huge uproar over the claim, which has long been refuted.
  • f*#&-up A study of the history book by professional historians found that there were many obvious facts that were simply wrong in the book and others with the same publisher. The book, by the way, was not written by a historian. Oops. source
  • » A couple random examples: Peer reviewers found that “Our Virginia” and other books from the same textbook publisher said that the U.S. entered World War I a year earlier than it actually did, that Civil War soldiers commonly wore full suits of armor, and that New Orleans began on a U.S. harbor (instead of a Spanish one). It’s a book so good, it makes you feel dumber when reading it.
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

15 May 2010 13:08

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World: How bad is the fighting in Bangkok right now, anyway?

  • 25 have been killed since the
    Thai government ordered a
    crackdown on Red Shirt protesters
    in Bangkok a few days ago
  • 150 have been wounded in the
    crackdown; Prime Minister Abhisit
    Vejjajiva suggests the Red Shirts are
    trying to cause a civil war source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

07 Apr 2010 20:41

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Politics: Bob McDonnell is sorry if you’re offended he forgot about slavery

  • bad Breaking nearly a
    decade of tradition,
    Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell restarted the controversial practice of making April Confederate History Month.
  • worse In his proclamation, he forgot to mention that the Civil War had a lot to do with slavery and stuff (not just states’ rights), which is why it’s controversial in the first place.
  • oops Today, McDonnell
    apologized (kinda): “I apologize to any fellow Virginian who has been offended or disappointed.” What about non-Virginians? source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
 
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