Website and automated forms processes, Copyright
2007, Matthew August LeFande.
All
rights reserved. No claim to original government forms
Website and automated forms processes, Copyright
2007, Matthew August LeFande.
All
rights reserved. No claim to original government forms
Leap Day Espresso Ride
I was just taking the pictures today. These are low resolution for the page. If you want a hi res copy of something, just send me an email.
http://www.lefande.com/espresso.htm
posted by Matthew LeFande 6:05 PM
matt@lefande.com
After chase, large guy brandishes a tiny dog
After leading an Oakland County sheriff's deputy on a high-speed chase Thursday, a burly contractor got out of his pickup and attacked the officer with his tiny French poodle, swinging the dog on his leash.
"I've seen people ram cars. I've seen people fight," Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard said. "But to take a poodle on a leash and make it a weapon -- that's a new extreme in bizarre behavior."
The 5-foot-8, 226-pound suspect, a 37-year-old Shelby Township man whose name was not released by police, was arrested in Oakland Township and is likely to be be arraigned today. He was taken to North Oakland Medical Centers in Pontiac for psychological observation.
He faces five felony and two misdemeanor counts. Police said he rammed the deputy's car with his pickup before swinging his pet.
The dog was taken to the Oakland County Animal Care Center in Auburn Hills and was fine, police said.
http://www.freep.com/news/locoak/eyelp27_20040227.htm
posted by Matthew LeFande 11:08 AM
matt@lefande.com
Armed Citizen of the Week
There was a robbery and shooting at a jewelry store in West Seattle Friday evening at the intersection of SW Alaska Street and California Avenue SW.
Seattle police say around 4:45 p.m., two men went into the Western Jewlewry and Coin store armed with guns and tried to rob it.
The storeowner pulled out a gun and shot one of the suspects.
The suspects took off in a green Jeep Cherokee, and we understand a short time later a man was dumped at Harborview Medical Center by a car matching that description.
No other details were available.
http://www.komotv.com/stories/29920.htm
posted by Matthew LeFande 8:19 AM
matt@lefande.com
London's cops look to New York
This week, the London Assembly approved the first stage of a plan that will greatly increase the uniformed presence on the capital's streets. In April, around a hundred neighbourhoods will get three extra coppers and three community support officers each. Mr Livingstone's eventual goal is to raise police numbers to 35,000—meaning one in every 115 employed Londoners will be a police officer.
It will be a different kind of police, spending more time walking the beat and paying attention to the sort of minor offences that are thought to encourage more serious stuff. Sir Ian Blair, deputy commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, talks about disrupting the “criminal habitat”, deterring villains before they start.
The ambitions, and many of the methods, come from New York, which has a similar population to London. As Mr Livingstone likes to observe, a city that once exemplified lawlessness has cut robbery and murder rates by almost three-quarters since the early 1990s. That compares well to London, where recorded street robberies have almost doubled in ten years.
Initially, the idea was to copy the “zero tolerance” approach of New York's former mayor Rudolph Giuliani and William Bratton, the police commissioner from 1994 to 1996. This interventionist method, also known as “broken windows policing” assumes that minor, unpunished crimes encourage more law-breaking. It's a sensible notion, but results in Britain have so far disappointed. The thinking now is that the new techniques worked in New York because police numbers rose a lot too.
New York's recovery certainly started with a clampdown on anti-social behaviour—graffiti writing, street drinking, turnstile jumping, and so on. But these low-level miscreants were then shackled, fingerprinted, and (if they didn't have identification) often held overnight in police cells. Over time, the police built up a store of information that they used to solve all sorts of crimes. British police, with their milder approach and heavier form-filling burden, will find these methods hard to copy.
http://www.economist.com/world/europe/displayStory.cfm?story_id=2447123
posted by Matthew LeFande 4:38 PM
matt@lefande.com
Bin Laden Top for U.S. Pay-Per-View Execution?
One in five Americans would likely pay to watch a televised execution of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden if he were found guilty and sentenced to death a poll released on Monday said.
Bin Laden, accused of masterminding the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, was named by 21 percent of those polled. Former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was named by 11 percent.
http://news1.iwon.com/odd/article/id/386963|oddlyenough|02-23-2004::16:12|reuters.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 4:17 PM
matt@lefande.com
Six security screeners caught riding thru X ray machine face disciplinary action
The Transportation Security Administration is not saying exactly who x-rayed themselves or when because of privacy reasons, but a source tells 9NEWS the six screeners were working at passenger checkpoints when they decided to x-ray their own bodies.
Like a piece of luggage, the screeners would have rolled down the conveyor belt into the opening, about 2.5 feet high and a foot and a half wide.
"There's enough training, enough education available in the public domain, let alone the circumstances of the TSA, to know this is a foolhardy thing to do,” said David Forbes, president of Boydforbes, Inc. “The questions that come out of this though are what is the level of supervision?"
Forbes, a security expert, says this highlights a lack of good management and training. But TSA spokesman Mike Fierberg says it was just someone doing something stupid. He insists it did not interfere with security.
As for the screeners’ health, the manufacturers of the x-ray equipment say the exposure is actually too low to hurt anyone. They say a chest x-ray at a hospital would be 50 times stronger than an x-ray from an airport system.
http://www.9news.com/storyfull.aspx?storyid=24705&1
posted by Matthew LeFande 3:52 PM
matt@lefande.com
Nader Says He's Running for President Again
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=578&e=1&u=/nm/20040222/pl_nm/campaign_nader_dc
posted by Matthew LeFande 1:56 PM
matt@lefande.com
Armed Citizen of the Week
Henry "Junior" Rodriguez, the victim of two recent burglaries at a house he has been renovating for years near his home, decided he was going to be ready to act in case of a third break-in.
Keeping a loaded shotgun near his bed, his chance came early Saturday.
Rodriguez, awakened at 4:30 a.m. by an alarm tripped by a motion detector he'd put in the vacant house, confronted a man he recognized carrying a vacuum cleaner out of the house.
When the man threw the vacuum at Rodriguez and fled, Rodriguez fired one shotgun blast into the ground and another into the air, according to a police report of the incident.
Rodriguez, who said he flashed a light at the man as he was coming out of the house and got a good look at him, told sheriff's deputies who he was.
An arrest warrant on a charge of simple burglary has been issued for Rodney Sanchez, 48, 3762 Bayou Road, said Maj. John Doran, Sheriff's Office chief of detectives. Sanchez has a record of 14 felony arrests and six convictions, Doran said.
Doran said, "You have every right to defend yourself" during a home burglary, adding that no shots were fired at the fleeing man.
http://www.nola.com/news/t-p/index.ssf?/base/news-1/107596807716420.xml
posted by Matthew LeFande 2:57 PM
matt@lefande.com
Japan goes on Highest Terror Level Alert. Won't say why.
Japan raised its terror alert to its highest level on Friday, mobilizing heavily armed police around airports, nuclear plants and government offices to guard against a possible attack, an official said.
It the was first time the government went on such a heightened alert since the U.S.-led military attack on Iraq in March 2003.
A National Police Agency official refused to discuss whether the government had new information about a possible terror strike.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/02/20/world/main601386.shtml
posted by Matthew LeFande 12:22 PM
matt@lefande.com
Build your own Dynamic Entry Ram.
This video requires:
Divx Codec
and includes:
(2) Stoner Gangsta wannabes
(2) 40oz bumpers of Malt Liquor
(1) Incomprehensible and otherwise domestically violent Yella Habibi
(1) 3"x3' PVC pipe
(2) end caps
(2) handles
(4) lag bolts and nuts
(1) bag Sakrete mix
With subtitle goodness.
Mix well, let set, salt to taste.
http://homepage.mac.com/kevinrose/thebroken_15.avi
Broadband only (27.3 Mb)
posted by Matthew LeFande 11:30 AM
matt@lefande.com
California picks birds over National Security
A California state agency has rejected the Homeland Security Department's effort to fortify the U.S.-Mexico border to safeguard defense facilities from terrorists and ebb the flow of illegal aliens, saying it would harm endangered species.
Congress mandated the Bureau of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to build secondary and triple fences along the 14-mile stretch from the Otay Mesa Border to the Pacific Ocean, dubbed "Operation Gatekeeper."
However, the California Coastal Commission concluded Wednesday that the last phase of the project "does not properly balance border patrol and resource-protection needs." The independent, quasi-judicial state agency voted unanimously against the project.
The report said the "environmentally sensitive habitat" is home to three endangered birds: the least Bell's vireo, Southwestern willow flycatcher and coastal California gnatcatcher.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20040219-115620-9400r.htm
posted by Matthew LeFande 10:15 AM
matt@lefande.com
Mr. bin Laden, you're clear to fly.
Imagine if the world's most notorious fugitive, Osama bin Laden, attempted to board an airliner in the United States. Suppose he were clean-shaven, sporting short hair, wearing a pinstriped business suit and looked like so many other travelers that no suspicions were raised. How far might he get? If he used aliases such as names of family members, he would be nabbed instantly and whisked away for questioning. That's because many of his relatives are on the FBI's secret "no-fly list," according to intelligence sources.
But suppose he boldly decided to use his own name. Would he be cleared to fly? That scenario was tested at a U.S. airport in the South during January. The result was troubling: America's most-wanted fugitive is cleared to fly. According to airline-security documents, the name Osama bin Laden was punched into the computer by an airline official and, remarkably, that name was cleared at the security checkpoint all passengers must pass through before being issued a boarding pass.
http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=37167
posted by Matthew LeFande 10:11 AM
matt@lefande.com
Dopey Dope Dealer
Another one from John Ashley,
posted by Matthew LeFande 5:17 PM
matt@lefande.com
Changing faces: statue honors fallen heroes
The statue was made by an Iraqi artist named Kalat, who for years was forced by Saddam Hussein to make the many hundreds of bronze busts of Saddam that dotted Baghdad.
This artist was so grateful that the Americans liberated his country, he melted 3 of the fallen Saddam heads and made a memorial statue dedicated to the American soldiers and their fallen comrades. Kalat worked on this night and day for several months.
To the left of the kneeling soldier is a small Iraqi girl giving the soldier comfort as he mourns the loss of his comrade in arms. It is currently on display outside the palace that is now home to the 4th Infantry division. It will eventually be shipped to and shown at the memorial museum in Fort Hood, Texas.
http://www4.army.mil/ocpa/read.php?story_id_key=5563
posted by Matthew LeFande 5:10 PM
matt@lefande.com
Washington Post reports on 35 arson fires in area, doesn't help again.
The serial arsonist who has been targeting the Washington area for nearly a year has now hit two more suburban counties, authorities said Wednesday.
Members of the Arson Task Force said apartment fires this month in Fairfax County, Va., and Montgomery County are considered similar in nature to 34 other cases dating back to March.
One fire has been deadly. A Northeast Washington blaze on June 5 -- one of two that day -- killed Lou Edna Jones, 86. A total of 10 people have been injured.
Also Wednesday, the task force released a new sketch of the suspect by Lois Gibson, a renowned sketch artist for the Houston Police Department. It was based on the description of one witness who was at the attempted arson in Northeast Washington on Sept. 14.
1.2 MB pdf file of flyer
"We're very excited about the sketch that has been produced," said Mark Brady, a spokesman for the Prince George's County Fire/EMS Department. He said Gibson was extremely pleased with the sketch.
The Washington Post, of course, did not bother to post the sketch on its website. MPD hasn't bothered either.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A51055-2004Feb18.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 1:55 PM
matt@lefande.com
New Mexico votes for ignition interlocks on every vehicle
The House has approved a measure that would require ignition interlocks on every vehicle sold in New Mexico.
It would require the devices on new vehicles by 2008 and on used vehicles offered for sale by 2009.
Ignition interlocks prevent vehicles from being started when the driver is drunk.
The measure’s sponsor, Grants Democrat Ken Martinez, says it would save lives.
He says putting ignition interlocks on every car, truck and commercial vehicle would shift the focus from punishment to prevention.
New Mexico already requires ignition interlocks for some convicted drunken drivers.
Opponents complain that requiring them on every vehicle would be costly to businesses and to the vast majority of citizens, who obey the law.
The bill now goes to the Senate.
http://www.kobtv.com/index.cfm?viewer=storyviewer&id=8646&cat=HOME
posted by Matthew LeFande 5:02 PM
matt@lefande.com
eBayers face "bidder" disappointment with cop-union cards
"Get out of jail free" cards may work in Monopoly - but don't expect the police-union wallet cards being offered on eBay to do the trick in real life.
The Internet auction site has been offering up hundreds of New York Police Department union "courtesy cards" originally intended as keepsakes or as a way of raising money for a fund benefiting police widows and children.
Many people buy the cards because they falsely believe flashing one will help them dodge a traffic ticket or other minor infraction - and city police unions are crying foul.
"The people buying it are gullible," said Sergeants Benevolent Association president Ed Mullins.
That hasn't stopped entrepreneurs from advertising them as "get out of jail free" cards on the site.
"I sell tens of thousands of them a year," said one eBay seller who uses the handle "visionaryrecords."
"We try to discourage [the sale of cards] by telling them that they are taking money from the widows and children," said Vic Cipullo, treasurer for the Detectives Endowment Association. "Anybody selling our cards on eBay is doing it for themselves. It's pretty low."
http://nypost.com/news/regionalnews/18017.htm
posted by Matthew LeFande 9:22 PM
matt@lefande.com
The NCVC Marshall to Mount Weather Death March
Hey, its Matt off the front on the big NCVC ride today!
http://www.lefande.com/marshall.htm
Here was our route today.
http://bikewashington.org/routes/bluerdg/
posted by Matthew LeFande 10:02 PM
matt@lefande.com
Brutal Bass
More fun than you could ever imagine with some speaker drivers, a minivan and a bunch of silver spray-painted super soakers.
http://www.somarecords.com/media/video/funkdvoid.ram
posted by Matthew LeFande 4:00 PM
matt@lefande.com
Charges Rejected Against Armed Citizens in PG
A Prince George's County grand jury declined yesterday to indict two men who, in separate incidents last month, fatally shot people who authorities said were trying to break into their homes.
The grand jury declined to file charges against Ronald B. Holmes, 63, of Adelphi and Glenn D. Bivens, 79, of Mitchellville.
County State's Attorney Glenn F. Ivey said he agreed with the grand jury's decisions. Ivey said prosecutors presented the evidence in both shootings without asking for or recommending indictments.
"I'm certainly comfortable with the grand jury's decisions to decline to bring charges in these cases," Ivey said. "There were elements of self-defense in both cases."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A38218-2004Feb12.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 8:59 AM
matt@lefande.com
Tough Drunken Driving Bills Advance in Va.
The Virginia House of Delegates gave preliminary approval Thursday to a set of bills that would give the commonwealth one of the nation's toughest arrays of laws punishing motorists caught drunk.
The dozen measures approved Thursday include bills that would set mandatory jail time for first-time offenders and increase punishments for those caught a second or third time. The penalties include revocations of driver's licenses.
Legislation has also been offered to require offenders to pay $70 a day for jail time served. They also could forfeit their automobiles.
"You're seeing an all-out assault on drunken driving -- no question about it," said Del. David B. Albo (R-Fairfax), a member of the House Courts of Justice Committee and state Crime Commission.
Albo sponsored the bill that would require offenders to pay for their jail time. He said that the state could raise nearly $200,000 a year to offset the cost of arresting and prosecuting drunk drivers.
"We're tired of hearing about the deaths, and we think it's time to lay down the law," Albo said.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A37708-2004Feb12.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 8:51 AM
matt@lefande.com
Armed Citizen of the Week
Richard Bussey says he drove up to his father's rural residence last summer and found a man loading furniture and other items into a pickup truck.
Bussey held a gun on the would-be thief and ordered him to return the furniture. Bussey didn't have a telephone, so he made 45-year-old Roy Andrew Gendron mow the lawn with a push mower until he could think of a plan to alert authorities.
Bussey ultimately took Gendron's driver's license and turned it in to police.
Assistant District Attorney Brian McVeigh says Gendron had been arrested 19 times and was on parole when Bussey caught him.
At sentencing Tuesday, Circuit Judge Samuel Monk says the case stands out for its comical twist, calling it "one of the better ones."
And McVeigh says if he ever gets in that situation, "I'll try to get some yard work out of the guy."
http://www.local6.com/news/2830379/detail.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 8:36 AM
matt@lefande.com
Can bags of pig fat deter suicide bombers?
Jerusalem - Israeli police have come up with plans to place bags of pig lard on buses in a bid to deter Palestinian militants from carrying out suicide attacks, the Maariv daily reported on Thursday.
Rabbinical authorities have given the idea its approval on the grounds that it could be a life-saving measure even though pigs are also considered impure by Jews.
Authorities believe that the move could discourage Palestinians from carrying out attacks as pieces of their exploded body could come into contact with the pig fat, prejudicing their chances of entering into paradise.
http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=79&art_id=qw1076573887833M323&set_id=1
posted by Matthew LeFande 12:18 PM
matt@lefande.com
Found: A Smoking Gun
In the town of Kalar, about a hundred miles northeast of Baghdad, Kurdish villagers recently reported suspicious activity to the pesh merga.
That Kurdish militia has for years been waging a bloody battle with Ansar al-Islam, the terrorist group affiliated with Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and supported by Saddam Hussein in Iraq. It captured a courier carrying a message that demolishes the repeated claim of Bush critics that there was never a "clear link" between Saddam and Osama bin Laden.
The terrorist courier with a CD-ROM containing a 17-page document and other messages was Hassan Ghul, who confessed he was taking to Al Qaeda the Ansar document setting forth a strategy to start an Iraqi civil war, along with a plea for reinforcements. The Kurds turned him over to Americans for further interrogation, which is proving fruitful.
Although The Washington Post the next day buried it on Page 17, the messages' authenticity was best attested by the amazed U.S. official who told Reuters, "We couldn't make this up if we tried."
The author of the lengthy Ansar-to-Qaeda electronic message is suspected of being the most wanted terror operative in the world today: Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, long familiar to readers of this space as "the man with the limp," who personifies the link of Ansar and Al Qaeda.
On Oct. 7, 2002, President Bush said "We know that Iraq and Al Qaeda have had high-level contacts that go back a decade. Some Al Qaeda leaders who fled Afghanistan went to Iraq. These include one very senior Al Qaeda leader who received medical treatment in Baghdad this year."
The leader whose leg was treated, perhaps amputated, in Baghdad was identified as Zarqawi. The presence of this international terrorist for two months in a Baghdad hospital required the approval of Saddam's ubiquitous secret police.
In his U.N. speech the following month, Colin Powell publicly identified the Palestinian, born in Jordan, as one who oversaw a terrorist training camp in Afghanistan three years before: "Iraq today harbors a deadly terrorist network headed by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, an associate and collaborator of Osama bin Laden."
Now we have documentary evidence of Ansar's current operation: employing suicide bombers to foment a civil war in Iraq that would reinstate safe haven for terrorists. The notion that these serial killers are not central players in the global network that attacked us — that the Ansar boss in Iraq must be found carrying an official Qaeda membership card signed by bin Laden — is simply silly.
Of the liberation's three casus belli, one was to stop mass murder, bloodier than in Kosovo; we are finding horrific mass graves in Iraq. Another was informed suspicion that a clear link existed between world terror and Saddam; this terrorist plea for Qaeda reinforcements to kill Iraqi democracy is the smoking gun proving that.
The third was a reasoned judgment that Saddam had a bioweapon that could wipe out a city; in time, we are likely to find a buried suitcase containing that, too.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/11/opinion/11SAFI.html
Registration required.
posted by Matthew LeFande 7:32 AM
matt@lefande.com
Cross-Border Church Visit Costs Man $10,000
Crossing the U.S.-Canada border to go to church on a Sunday cost a U.S. citizen $10,000 for breaching Washington's tough new security rules.
The expensive trip to church was a surprise for Richard Albert, a resident of rural Maine who lives so close to the Canadian border the U.S. customs office is right next door to his house.
Like the other half-dozen residents of Township 15 Range 15, crossing the border is a daily ritual for Albert. The nearby Quebec village of St. Pamphile is where they shop, eat and pray.
There are many such situations in rural areas along the largely unguarded 8,900-km (5,530-mile) border between Canada and the United States -- which in some cases actually runs down the middle of streets or through buildings.
As a result, Albert says did not expect any problems three weeks ago when he returned home to the United States after attending mass in Canada, as usual.
The local U.S. customs station is closed on Sundays, so he just drove around the locked gate, as he had done every weekend since the gate appeared last May, following a tightening of border security.
Two days later, Albert was summoned to the customs office, where an officer told him he had been caught on camera crossing the border illegally.
Ottawa has granted special passes to some 300 U.S. citizens in that region so they can enter the country when Canadian customs posts are closed, but the United States canceled a similar program last May.
That forces local residents to make a 200-mile detour along treacherous logging roads to get home via the nearest staffed border checkpoint.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=573&ncid=757&e=2&u=/nm/20040210/od_nm/crime_canada_border_dc
posted by Matthew LeFande 11:49 AM
matt@lefande.com
I had a good time at Guantanamo, says inmate
An Afghan boy whose 14-month detention by US authorities as a terrorist suspect in Cuba prompted an outcry from human rights campaigners said yesterday that he enjoyed his time in the camp.
Mohammed Ismail Agha, 15, who until last week was held at the US military base in Guantanamo Bay, said that he was treated very well and particularly enjoyed learning to speak English. His words will disappoint critics of the US policy of detaining "illegal combatants" in south-east Cuba indefinitely and without trial.
In a first interview with any of the three juveniles held by the US at Guantanamo Bay base, Mohammed said: "They gave me a good time in Cuba. They were very nice to me, giving me English lessons."
Mohammed, an unemployed Afghan farmer, found the surroundings in Cuba at first baffling. After he settled in, however, he was left to enjoy stimulating school work, good food and prayer.
"At first I was unhappy . . . For two or three days [after I arrived in Cuba] I was confused but later the Americans were so nice to me. They gave me good food with fruit and water for ablutions and prayer," he said yesterday in Naw Zad, a remote market town in southern Afghanistan close to his home village and 300 miles south-west of Kabul, the capital.
He said that the American soldiers taught him and his fellow child captives - aged 15 and 13 - to write and speak a little English. They supplied them with books in their native Pashto language. When the three boys left last week for Afghanistan, the soldiers looking after them gave them a send-off dinner and urged them to continue their studies.
"They even took photographs of us all together before we left," he said. Mohammed, however, said he would have to disappoint his captors by not returning to his studies. "I am too poor for that. I will have to look for work," he said.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;?xml=/news/2004/02/08/wguan08.xml
posted by Matthew LeFande 3:27 PM
matt@lefande.com
Armed Citizen of the Week
Firing nine rounds from two handguns, a 53-year-old Rancho Cordova woman fended off an intruder Thursday night after he crashed through her sliding glass door.
William Kriske, a 47-year-old parolee, was treated for a gunshot wound to the arm, then taken to jail and arrested on suspicion of burglary and resisting arrest, according to Sacramento County Sheriff's Sgt. Lou Fatur.
"It was one of those nights. I have a few holes in my glass out front," Carolyn Lisle said Friday.
"That's OK, I don't think he'll be back," said Lisle, who emptied one .357 revolver at the intruder before she retrieved a second one and he crashed through another window to flee.
"I was trying to miss my furniture. Priorities, right?" Lisle said.
http://www.sacbee.com/content/news/story/8228308p-9159238c.html
http://www.a-human-right.com/
posted by Matthew LeFande 8:34 PM
matt@lefande.com
Abusing Islam
Consider the case of Abdul Qadeer Khan, known to his compatriots as AQK — the physicist regarded as the father of Pakistan's atomic bomb.
Some Pakistanis consider him a second father of the nation (after Muhammad Ali Jinah, who led Indian Muslims into secession at the end of British colonial rule).
Until recently, AQK was worshiped as almost a saint by quite a few Pakistanis. Last month, however, he was arrested and charged with the illegal transfer of Pakistani nuclear technology and materiel to Iran, Libya and North Korea. This week, he made a televised confession, admitting the charge and taking sole responsibility. The confession came after a tete-à-tete with Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf.
If AQK acted without official authorization, he broke Pakistan's national-security laws and could be charged with espionage and high treason. But if he was ordered to sell nuclear technology and materiel to Iran, Libya and North Korea, then successive Pakistani governments would be implicated.
Long known as an ardent Islamist, AQK claims he was only trying to help brotherly Muslim nations acquire nuclear weapons to defend themselves against "the Zionist entity," meaning Israel.
That claim is hard to sustain.
To start with, North Korea, which does not have a single Muslim citizen, can hardly be regarded as a "brotherly Islamic nation." As for Iran and Libya, although their leaders have spoken of their desire to "wipe Israel off the map," there is no indication that their peoples share that obsession.
What is alarming, however, is the reaction of many Pakistanis. AQK has received thousands of emails and letters telling him that, regardless of what the law might say, they approve of what he did. Pakistani media are full of op-ed pieces and editorials praising his devotion to Islam and claiming he was "doing his duty as a Muslim" by helping other Muslim states acquire weapons available to "Jews and Crusaders."
This is a scandalous claim.
A Muslim's duty is to believe in the oneness of God, Muhammad's prophecy and the Day of Judgment. A Muslim is also required to pray every day, fast in Ramadan and live a life of good deeds and decency. Helping others make atomic bombs is certainly not part of those duties.
Efforts to explain away AQK's behavior highlights the moral bankruptcy of the Islamist philosophy. That philosophy divides humanity into Muslim and non-Muslims. It then transforms Muslims into a tribe whose members must remain loyal to it and to one another regardless of moral imperatives common to humanity.
Such an approach abolishes ethics, leaving us not with such concepts as good and evil but "Muslim" and "non-Muslim." It also abolishes politics.
Thus nuclear proliferation, a political issue, is transformed into a theological one. One need not bother about whether the people of Iran want the bomb. What is important is that Iran's Islamist regime must have it to use against real or imagined enemies.
Nor need one worry about the morality of selling nuclear technology to Libya, a country headed by an unstable megalomaniac.
Having reduced religion to a political ideology, the Islamist has no qualms about considering North Korea's militantly atheist regime as an honorary Muslim state.
All that North Korea, Iran and Libya (at least until recently) have in common is a pathological hatred of the United States. And that echoes the late Ayatollah Khomeini's claim that today it is "impossible to be a Muslim without hating America."
Libyan dictator Moammar Khadafy now says he no longer hates America and welcomes U.S. investment and trade. Would that transform Libya into a non-Muslim nation?
The message of the Islamist is stark: No matter how faithfully you perform your religious duties, you cannot be regarded as a "good Muslim" unless you hate America and help its enemies.
This is a recipe for religious and moral chaos.
http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/15958.htm
posted by Matthew LeFande 8:32 PM
matt@lefande.com
