While I’m ruminating about various things here are some items that caught my eye in the past couple of days. We’ll start with the political…<\/p>\n
Reported by the New York Times<\/p>\n
\nJERUSALEM, Aug. 4 – An Israeli Army deserter dressed in a military uniform opened fire today aboard a bus carrying Arab passengers in northern Israel. Four Arabs were killed and at least a dozen wounded before an angry crowd beat the gunman to death, according to Israeli authorities and witnesses.<\/p>\n
The shooting was one of the deadliest by a Jewish extremist in recent years and appeared to be an attempt to sabotage Israel’s planned evacuation of Jewish settlers from the Gaza Strip, which is set to begin on Aug. 15.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
– Israeli Army Deserter Opens Fire on Bus, Killing 4 Arabs<\/span>, by Greg Myre, August 4, 2005 NYTimes.com<\/a> | pdf<\/a><\/p>\n
This follows a week of furious coverage by the news media of the Bush administration’s rebranding of the wars in the Middle East.<\/p>\n
From the Daily Telegraph<\/p>\n
\nOfficials are instead starting to favour the rather less snappy phrase “struggle against violent extremism” as the administration puts increased stress on longer term initiatives – diplomatic, economic and educational – to defeat terrorism.<\/p>\n
The phrase “war on terror” was “very simple, easy, concise”, the official said. “The definition lends itself to images of those in uniform combating extremism and terrorists but the struggle is broader than that.”\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
– Don’t mention war on terror, say Bush aides<\/span>, by Alec Russell, July 27, 2005 [ Daily Telegraph<\/a> (for an excellent roundup of coverage see The Christian Science Monitor<\/a>) ]<\/p>\n
Does this mean that in our struggle against violent extremism that we’re now going to invade Israel? After all, extremism is extremism and shooting up a bus full of commuters is most certainly violent.<\/p>\n
Moving on to the just plain neat…<\/p>\n
Create your own logo to go with Google<\/a>. Sent to me by Jonathan<\/a><\/p>\n
And, finally, the ridiculous…<\/p>\n
Courtesy of Bruce over at Amphetameme.org<\/a> (which you should be reading anyway)… News Hunter 2: Beat the Press<\/a> (you’ll need Shockwave)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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