Good Charlotte rocker Benji Madden is convinced he could run America more successfully than the “idiots” currently in charge under President George W. Bush’s leadership.
The guitarist, who’s dating socialite Paris Hilton, is appalled at many of the decisions made by U.S. politicians, who he accuses of lacking the intelligence required for such a high-powered job.
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My dad was stabbed to death when I was three years old. That is one of the reasons that I now carry a knife. It’s for protection. You never know who else will have one. This way, if someone is going to stab me, I will stab them first. It does not matter how tough the laws are. So many people are carrying knives, there’s always the risk that someone will pull one out on you. It’s purely protection. I wouldn’t pull mine out unless someone else pulls one on me first. I have slashed someone in the face, but I wouldn’t want to stab someone to kill them.
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The files contain e-mails and other documents that show how Venezuela’s populist leader had formed such a tight bond with guerrilla commanders that his key lieutenants had offered help in obtaining sophisticated weaponry such as surface-to-air missiles while delivering lighter arms. The files also document links between the FARC and Ecuador’s president, Rafael Correa, a close ally of Chávez.
At a news conference in Caracas, Chávez questioned Interpol’s impartiality, called the report “ridiculous” and mocked Noble as “ignoble” and a “gringo policeman,” referring to his American citizenship. Chávez also called the Interpol chief corrupt and an “international bum.”
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It was one of the most arresting images of last year. A majestic male mountain gorilla, his body flecked with blood, splayed out lifeless on a stretcher that 15 park rangers were struggling to bear through the jungle of eastern Congo.
The massacre of the silverback Senkekwe, along with five other rare apes, made the cover of US magazine Newsweek under the headline “Gorilla Warfare”. In Britain, the “Murders In The Mist” prompted The Sun to launch its own campaign, and around the globe people wrote in to media outlets, telling of the sleepless nights and trauma the images had caused.
For Anneke van Woudenberg, the Congo specialist for Human Rights Watch, it was a case of gritting one’s teeth. “Kill a mountain gorilla in Congo and it gets much more coverage than five million dead,” she says. “It irks me every time.”
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Two weeks ago, The Observer revealed how 17-year-old student Rand Abdel-Qader was beaten to death by her father after becoming infatuated with a British soldier in Basra. In this remarkable interview, Abdel-Qader Ali explains why he is unrepentant – and how police backed his actions. Afif Sarhan in Basra and Caroline Davies report
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A Cedar City photographer was sentenced Tuesday to serve 10 days in jail and pay more than $5,500 in restitution for shooting out the windows of a rival’s studio last fall. Kurtis Leo Leany, 52, must also pay a $1,000 fine, write a letter of apology to the victim and complete an anger-management class as part of a 36-month probation.
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The job offer was tempting.
It was printed on a 16-foot-wide banner and strung above one of the busiest roads here, calling out to any “soldier or ex-soldier.”
“We’re offering you a good salary, food and medical care for your families,” it said in block letters.
But there was a catch: The employer was Los Zetas, a notorious Gulf cartel hit squad formed by elite Mexican army deserters. The group even included a phone number for job seekers that linked to a voice mailbox.
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Almost eight years after al-Qaeda nearly sank the USS Cole with an explosives-stuffed motorboat, killing 17 sailors, all the defendants convicted in the attack have escaped from prison or been freed by Yemeni officials.
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“We had convenant. We caused evil wherever we go. I had four powers.There were hidden in my hand, heart, vagina and legs. I used to do evil. If I come to your house and cross my hands, something bad will happen. I used my heart for negative thoughts. Any evil thing I wish for comes through. I’ve destroyed so many men with my vagina. Any man who makes love to me must suffer. I still remember how I dealt with one man. He was good. He used to help me in school but he left me for another girl. I cried for him at night and the man died.
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Chris McGreal has reported from Zimbabwe for the past 20 years and watched its slow slide into despair. But who is at fault? Here, he blames British ministers, white farmers and the country’s opposition for misunderstanding the Mugabe regime – and for the complacency that laid the ground for his brutal dictatorship
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I want all of you to know that I totally empathize with everything you’ll soon be going through. Nobody likes to learn that their lives are about to be snuffed out for no reason save that of random, irrational violence. It’s a terrifying proposition, I know. But everyone’s going to have to sacrifice a little here, and, for what it’s worth, I’m not going to survive this upcoming murder spree any more than you are. So take solace in the fact that, right after I gun you all down next week without warning, I will immediately be shooting myself in the head, as well.
Remember: We’re all in this crazy mess together
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On where he got the human skulls, he claimed he got them from a cemetery, adding: “I did not kill anyone. I just got them from a burial ground. I swear, I did not kill them.”
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An artist who was put on trial for her role in a controversial exhibition titled “Caution, Religion!” has disappeared in Berlin, where she had been living since November, German police said.
Anna Mikhalchuk, 52, left her home in the Charlottenburg district of the German capital on March 21 and has not been seen since, Berlin police said in a statement posted on their web site Wednesday.
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Chances are if you aren’t emo, you hate emo. But you likely don’t hate this straight-haired, massacre-lined subculture as much as the Mexicans do. In recent weeks, a wave of emo bashings has swept across Mexico, several news agencies have reported, fuelled by punks, rockabillies, goths, metalheads and basically anyone who’s not emo.
According to Daniel Hernandez, who’s been covering the anti-emo riots on his blog Intersections, the violence began March 7, when an estimated 800 young people poured into the Mexican city of Queretaro’s main plaza “hunting” for emo kids to pummel. Then the following weekend similar violence occurred in Mexico City at the Glorieta de Insurgents, a central gathering space for emos. Hernandez also reports that several anti-emo riots have now also spread to various other Mexican cities. Via the Austin American Statesmen, several postings on Mexican social-networking sites, primarily organising spot for these “emo hunts,” have been dug up and translated. One states: “I HATE EMOS!!! They are not even people, they are so stupid, they cry over meaningless things… My school is infested with them, I want to kill them all!”
Check it out here. Via BoingBoing.
At the time, sectarian riots were raging over the partition of the subcontinent into India and Pakistan, and the men of Singh’s family decided it was better to kill the women than have them fall into the hands of Muslim mobs.
“None of the women protested, nobody wept,” Singh, 78, recalled as he stroked his long, flowing white beard, his voice slipping into a whisper. “All I could hear was the sound of prayer and the swing of the sword going down on their necks. My story can fill a book.”
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It is the world’s fifth poorest nation with no prisons and few police. Now this small west African failed state has been targeted by Colombian drug cartels, turning it into a transit hub for the cocaine trade out of Latin America and into Europe. Grant Ferrett and Ed Vulliamy tell the remarkable story of how the cocaine cavalry arrived three years ago and transformed the life of Guinea-Bissau
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Although I use four rotating routes to drive to and from work, I am still vulnerable during the walk to and from my car. This is the time that I load up on the trauma plates because I DO NOT WANT TO BE SHOT DEAD!Also, someone said that my Tac Team doesn’t get training. Not true. We meet at the range every night and shoot 400 rounds each through weapons that closely resemble our duty setup. We also practice unarmed combat. I am a Master of three martial arts including ninjitsu, which means I can wear the special boots to climb walls. I don’t think any of you are working as hard as I am to be prepared. I asked a serious question about tactical armor and I wanted a serious response. If you want to laugh at somebody, try laughing at the sheep out there who go to the mall unarmed trusting in me to stand guiard over their lives like a God.
Check it out here. Via BoingBoing.
Photo by Lynsey Addario for The New York Times
As I went to get some hot chocolate in the dining tent, the peaceful night was shattered by mortars, rockets and machine-gun fire banging and bursting around us. It was a coordinated attack on all the fire bases. It didn’t take long to understand why so many soldiers were taking antidepressants. The soldiers were on a 15-month tour that included just 18 days off. Many of them were “stop-lossed,” meaning their contracts were extended because the army is stretched so thin. You are not allowed to refuse these extensions. And they felt eclipsed by Iraq. As Sgt. Erick Gallardo put it: “We don’t get supplies, assets. We scrounge for everything and live a lot more rugged. But we know the war is here. We got unfinished business.”
For sanity, all they had was the medics’ tent, video games and movies — “Gladiator,” “Conan the Barbarian,” “Dogma,” Monty Python. Down the road in the Pech Valley, soldiers played cricket with Afghan kids and had organized boxing and soccer matches. Lt. Kareem Hernandez, a New Yorker running a base on the Pech River, regularly bantered over dinner with the Afghan police. Neighbors would come by with tips. But here in the Korengal, the soldiers were completely alienated from the local culture. One night while watching a scene from HBO’s “Rome” in which a Roman soldier tells a slave he wants to marry her, a soldier asked which century the story was set in. “First B.C. or A.D.,” said another soldier. The first shook his head: “And they’re still living like this 800 meters outside the wire.”
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Close to my home, the hooligans are in some pitched conflict with the police. Should I remove my name from my own door? No; when things really get bad in Serbia, the police arrive in company with the hooligans.
The American embassy is attacked right now, 7 00pm, no police around there; the reporter sounds really afraid as he reports the smashing and burning.
The German bank in downtown Belgrade is attacked too: gosh this is like during the NATO bombings, but in reverse.
Tonight at 2 am it will be a full moon eclipse — Earth Moon and Sun in alignment, a perfect excuse for madness.
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