Category Archives: News

In the line of fire

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The International Herald Tribune has a fascinating look at the headaches/near-heart-attacks that the Secret Service endured in securing Bush’s visit to Pakistan. It also includes a particularly insightful comparison to Bill Clinton’s 2000 trip. This may go a ways in providing an answer to a post on The Acorn a few days ago that posited some notions that I found a bit far-fetched.

How did it happen that the president spent a night in Pakistan, the assumed haven of Osama bin Laden and one of the one most dangerous countries in the world?

The short answer is that Pakistan’s president, General Pervez Musharraf, insisted. The long answer is a tale about the nightmare scenarios of the Secret Service and the calculated risks of presidential travel…

The fuzziness [of the travel plans to Pakistan] was to keep terrorists guessing about the timing of motorcades and the arrival of Air Force One, basic precautions passed down from a cloak-and-dagger trip that President Bill Clinton made to Pakistan in 2000 that had the Secret Service in an uproar. Six years later, accounts of the trip from former Clinton administration officials are far more harrowing than was known at the time.

“In the preparations for the 2000 visit, the service dug its heels in, repeatedly confronting the top NSC officials with horror scenarios,” Benjamin and Simon write. “There was danger to Air Force One from ground fire. No one trusted the Pakistani military to keep travel routes in the country secret or secure. The service said it could not perform its mission: It could not protect the president. In a meeting with Clinton, Larry Cockell, the head of the presidential detail, told him so.”

Clinton overruled the Secret Service, although he decided that his daughter, Chelsea, who was to accompany him to India on the same trip, should not make the stop in Pakistan. Clinton ended up slipping into Islamabad for less than six hours on a small military jet owned by the CIA while an Air Force One decoy flew in to draw a possible attack. It was a dramatic and, for Musharraf, embarrassing difference to the five previous days that Clinton had spent out in the relatively open in India. [Link]

Very cool. I would love a job planning out stuff like this. Especially after watching 24 last week. I like seeing gutsy calls where the President overrules his bodyguards at his own peril. Continue reading →

Are you ready for some "Football?"

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There still aren’t that many desis on the field in U.S. sports. However, that hasn’t stopped us from being an important part of the game. We’ve mentioned young Paraag Marathe in the 49ers front office. Over the weekend Sunil Gulati was elected the head of U.S. Soccer:

U.S. Soccer’s membership elected long-time U.S. Soccer executive Sunil Gulati as president of the U.S. Soccer Federation by unanimous consent on Saturday at the Flamingo Hotel in Las Vegas. Gulati succeeds Dr. S. Robert Contiguglia, stepping down after two successful four-year terms. Gulati, who ran unopposed in the election, has served as U.S. Soccer’s vice president since 2000.

“I am honored to serve our membership in this capacity and look forward to helping to continue to guide our sport through the most prosperous period in our history,” said Gulati. “Across the past decade, a platform for this sport has been built that did not previously exist, and we now have an opportunity in the coming years to achieve more for soccer in the United States than anyone could have ever envisioned 15 or 10 or even five years ago.” [Link]

Gulati has spent many years in the trenches, including in the front office of the New England Revolution. It is no fluke that he was elected to this position.

Gulati, a native of Allahabad, India, has played a major role in the development of U.S. Soccer since the early 1980’s and is currently U.S. Soccer’s Executive Vice President. Previously, amongst a number of roles, Gulati has served as Managing Director of National Teams, Chairman of the International Games Committee, Chairman of the Technical Committee and Managing Director of U.S. Soccer’s Project 2010. [Link]

In addition to his soccer job, Gulati is also a professor in the Economics Department at Columbia University. I happened upon a website where students get to rate their professors. This is what they have to say about Gulati:

# Ratings: 5
Average Easiness: 1.8
Average Helpfulness: 4.2
Average Clarity: 4.6
Hotness Total: 0
Overall Quality: 4.4

Also check out our frequent commenter Kush Tandon’s picture. These two must be long lost brothers 🙂

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News tab gets its own feed

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If you use a blog reader, we now have a subscription feed for the reader-submitted stories on the News tab:

Subscribe

You can use a blog reader to track all the blogs you read automatically and see only the new posts every day. It lets you easily track 50 blogs instead of five:

Related posts: Really Stuck on Shiva

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Liberté, Égalité, montrez les cheveux

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The French turban ban – it’s not just for school children any more. [Thanks to Greg and Al Mujahid]

Chirac: You can’t drive in my country. But you should take our toxic waste, and buy our goods. And keep that Mittal guy away from us! We’re civilized and you’re the natives, remember?

Manmohan Singh: [Must not slap guest across the face. Must not administer thapad with my left hand …]

France’s highest administrative body ruled Monday that Sikhs must remove their turbans for driver’s license photos, calling it a question of public security and not a restriction on freedom of religion. [Link]

This, of course, is unequivocally full of steaming hooey. Firstly, it clearly is an abrogation of religious freedom for Sikhs. Secondly, it doesn’t even make sense! Unless they’re planning on banning driving while turbanned, this is going to make it harder for the police to compare drivers license photos with the individuals driving.

This ruling is a reversal of an earlier ruling that sided with the Sikh plaintiff on a technicality, and means that any future appeals will have to be conducted at a pan-European level:

The Council of State’s ruling reversed its own decision in December in favor of Shingara Mann Singh, a French citizen who refused to take off his turban for a license photo in 2004… Singh’s lawyer, Patrice Spinosi, has said they could take the case to other tribunals, such as the European Court of Human Rights. [Link]

None of you can drive in my country either! Off with all of your turbans!

The ruling comes just after Chirac’s visit to India, where he was greeted by protesting school children. Personally, I can’t believe the gall of this faint Gallic shadow of De Gaulle, shaking hands with the Prime Minister while pushing policies that would make it virtually impossible for Manmohan Singh to get a license there.

Then again, this entire trip was about jointly selling French goods and French merde, so I shouldn’t be surprised. France is hoping to supply India with nuclear technology, warplanes and civilian aircraft:

France is … hoping to strike key defence deals with India which is in the market for 126 new warplanes, a purchase worth billions of dollars. A deal for the supply of 43 Airbus commercial aircraft to state-run Indian airlines was also signed during the visit in a deal estimated at $2.5bn. [Link]

At the same time, Chirac defended efforts to prevent Mittal from taking over Belgian based steel maker Arcelor, saying that there was no racism involved:

Mr Chirac said on Monday that in principle France had absolutely “nothing against a non-European taking over a European company”. “The concerns that have been expressed are entirely legitimate. I do not understand what the fuss is about,” he said. [Link]

It’s the old dual standard – free trade for you, but not for us, right? Keep this up, Jacques my boy, and you’ll be eating Freedom Fries with your humble pie the next time you visit India …

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“…an important part of growing up there”

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Many of you may remember my previous post about the two Lodi, CA men (father and son) being tried for terrorism:

U.S. v. Hamid Hayat and Umer Hayat

Federal criminal charges alleging that a 47-year-old California father and his 22-year-old son lied to the FBI about training at and/or visiting al Qaeda terrorist and jihadi training camps in Pakistan. (June 7, 2005)

The Los Angeles Times provides details from their ongoing trial:

In a 2004 visit to a clandestine camp in Pakistan, Umer Hayat said he witnessed nearly 1,000 terrorist trainees — masked like “ninja turtles” — slashing curved swords at dummies with images of President Bush, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and former Secretary of State Colin Powell.

In a videotaped interrogation by FBI agents shown in federal court Tuesday, Hayat said trainees at the camp allegedly attended by his son also practiced pole vaulting “like 50 feet” so they could leap rivers.

Hayat, 47, an ice cream truck driver, and his son Hamid, 23, both of Lodi, are on trial in Sacramento. Hamid Hayat is accused of attending a terrorist training camp, and both are accused of lying to federal agents.

The son is the one who the FBI thinks visited the terrorist training camp and he faces up to 39 years in prison. The dad, who faces up to 16 years in prison, is basically accused of trying to protect his son by covering up the facts. Here is the part that got my attention though. I have seen this a thousand times on episodes of NYPD Blue or The Shield, but it caught me off guard to see it in real life, even though I know how it’s done. Check it out:

As in the videotaped interrogation of Hamid Hayat shown earlier in the trial, the FBI agents did most of the talking and sometimes appeared to reassure the Hayats, who speak halting English, about their actions.

FBI agent Timothy Harrison described attending training camps in Pakistan as “an important part of growing up there.” FBI agent Gary Schaaf characterized terrorist camps as a rite of passage for Pakistani males. Another agent described Umer Hayat’s visit to the camp as the equivalent of a father inspecting a child’s college campus.

Defense attorney Johnny L. Griffin said Umer Hayat was “psychologically bullied and emotionally pressured into doing whatever the FBI agents wanted him to say or do.”

Why the hell didn’t they have a lawyer present? Were they tricked into speaking on the record without one because they didn’t understand English too well, or because they just didn’t want one? Continue reading →

Anyone using Google Desktop?

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If you use Google Desktop or a browser which snapshots pages, could you please paste the last few days of our News tab into an email for me?

I’ve thoroughly b0rked some of the summaries on our News tab while carelessly editing the database by hand. Right now I’ve got only the last couple of pages saved.

The perpetrator will be thoroughly self-abused. Thanks in advance!

Update: Now fully restored using Google Desktop cache (thanks, Ashvin and others).

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Wicked Googly, Mr. President

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In President Bush’s most brilliant photo op ever, he invited members of the Pakistani national cricket team to the US embassy for a private lesson in cricket.

President Bush met Pakistani cricket captain Inzaman-ul-Haq and opening batsman Salman Butt amid tight security at the US embassy in Islamabad.

Watched by a crowd of schoolchildren, he was shown the correct way of holding a cricket bat before being led to the crease to face some bowling.

One of the balls from the Pakistani captain bounced high, striking the president on the shoulder.

Mr Bush also tried his hand at bowling. [Link]

No word as to whether batsman Butt was bestowed one of the President’s honorary nicknames when he was standing in the crease, but we can only hope.

Those of you concerned about the President’s safety while learning cricket will be pleased to learn that they replaced cricket balls with tennis balls for the purposes of this demonstration, so while the President was hit by a ball, he was not injured.

See a fuller squence of photos here; my favorite is this one of President Bush holding the tennis ball as if it were really heavy before bowling. And yes, he maintains his trademark tight lipped grin in most of the photos.

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Doing Your Homework Can Get You Arrested

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Only Indian kids would go to such lengths to finish a class assignment.

The University of Maryland’s student paper, the Diamondback is reporting that three graduate students from India (two men and a woman) were detained and questioned for nearly four hours by Montgomery County police early Tuesday morning for using a device to track wireless communication signals for a class assignment (thanks masked tipster). Neighbors reported the three to the police for suspicious activity because they had been driving through Silver Spring, Md (a suburb of Washington DC) at about 15 miles per hour with elaborate equipment in their rental vehicle.

Yeah, it sounds shady. If a car was constantly roaming around my neighborhood from about 10 pm to 2 in the morning, I too would probably be a little suspicious, especially at that hour. Well, so were the police.

At about 2 a.m. early Tuesday morning while driving through a residential Silver Spring neighborhood, the students noticed a police car following them and flashing its lights. The students were stopped and answered questions about their identities, equipment and assignment, and were then escorted by police back to I-495 and sent home.

You would think it would have ended at that. It is kind of funny, a trio of Indian students geekily get pulled over, not for partying or do something illegal, but for doing their homework. The crappy thing is, it didn’t end there.

Police from Montgomery and Prince George’s counties rejoined the students at their Berwyn House Road apartments, where after more questioning, an officer copied down the equipment’s serial numbers and informed one of the male students his laptop appeared on a list of stolen electronics.Officers detained them there for nearly two hours, questioned them, photographed them, recorded detailed descriptions of their physical appearances and inspected their visas, passports, university identifications and international driving permits.

Now I am a bit confused. Why would the police need to follow them home? The students showed the police their ids, equipment, and explained to the police the class assignment. What was the point in following them home and recording all of their personal data? And the bit about taking the laptop I am not too clear on.

“Everyone was shocked, dumbfounded, speechless,” the female student said. “This has never happened before in our lives. I was very angry. I didn’t appreciate the harassment.” The students were released by officers about 5 a.m. Tuesday and later informed their professor and department.

And yet, it all could have probably went away had they called their professor earlier. The good Indian students that they are, they didn’t want to bother him.

They said they didn’t want to call us in the middle of the night and wake us up,” said Steve Tretter, director of the program. “I told them they were crazy and should have called us immediately.” Tretter said he and administrators were upset for the students.
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Because they hate freedom! And debt!

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It seems that there’s a new way to become suspected of being a terrorist – try to pay off your credit cards. At a time when debt is all-American, the Department of Homeland Security gets called in if you try to balance your personal budget.

The balance on their JCPenney Platinum MasterCard had gotten to an unhealthy level. So they sent in a large payment, a check for $6,522. And an alarm went off. A red flag went up. The Soehnges’ behavior was found questionable… They were told, as they moved up the managerial ladder at the call center, that the amount they had sent in was much larger than their normal monthly payment. And if the increase hits a certain percentage higher than that normal payment, Homeland Security has to be notified. [Link]

DHS got notified for a measily $6,522 payment? I mean, I’m sure that Al Qaeda loves shopping at J.C. Penny, but still. And this happened to a white family with nothing else “suspicious” in their background. Heck, they were even from Texas (although they left after they retired). Can you imagine if they had an accent? Or a furrin’ name?

Here’s my favorite part:

After sending in the check, they checked online to see if their account had been duly credited. They learned that the check had arrived, but the amount available for credit on their account hadn’t changed…the money doesn’t move until the threat alert is lifted. [Link]

That’s right – not only does DHS get involved, but they stop your payment from going through. You’re performing a legitimate commercial transaction, and they’re preventing it. Do they pay your interest during the period that they’re pondering how much of a threat you pose to the country? What happens if they don’t get around to making a decision right away? Hey, if you have nothing to hide, why are you complaining? [Via Ishbadiddle]

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They’ll let anyone in these days…even ex-”Tangoes”

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Not since that hottie Natalie Portman has a freshman at Yale an ivy-league freshman created this much buzz. Meet 27-year-old former Taliban spokesperson Sayed Rahmatullah Hashemi:

The Before and After pictures (via the NY Times)

The University of Yale has a freshman who is thankful to have landed up in the prestigious institution rather than the Guantanamo Bay prison.

Sayed Rahmatullah Hashemi, a former Taliban spokesperson, who has the dubious distinction of having come in contact with terror mastermind Osama bin Laden has joined a non-degree course, which includes a class on terrorism… Turned away initially from a Taliban office in Kandahar, Hashemi had offered his skills as a computer operator because of his “high proficiency in English”, the New York Times quoted the freshman as saying.

But later, adding a couple of years to his age, he was accepted and became a part of the hardline Islamic regime that also brought him in contact with 9/11 mastermind Laden.

“I saw bin Laden after he was brought to Kandahar in 1997,” Rahmatullah told the Times.

Hashemi fled Afghanistan for Pakistan after the September 11 bombings. [Link]

Hashemi has had a brief flash of fame once before. He appeared in Michael Moore’s film Fahrenheit 9/11:

As the chief spokes-terrorist for the Taliban, Hashemi traveled extensively throughout Europe and the United States. While speaking at the Atlantic Council in 2001, Hashemi was confronted with a woman who detailed the horrors facing the women of Afghanistan at the hands of the Taliban. He dismissed her as if she were an insolent child and announced to the woman: “I’m really sorry for your husband. He might have a very difficult time with you. Hashemi’s disgusting comments were immortalized in Michael Moore’s “Fahrenheit 911…” [Link]

Over a week ago the New York Times did a fantastic 12-page in-depth story on Hashemi (a must read article). Continue reading →