A US soldier has been charged with “waterboarding” his four-year-old daughter because she could not recite her ABCs, police in the state of Washington say.

In a fit of rage and under the influence of alcohol, 27-year-old Joshua Tabor and his girlfriend pushed his daughter’s head, face up, under a running tap in the kitchen sink, says Yelm police chief Todd Stancil.

“And to make it only worse, the daughter is afraid of water,” the police chief said.

“She would not recite her ABCs, is what we gathered. So according to him (the father), that was a perfectly fine punishment,” he said.

Police found the girl hiding in a bathroom after responding to reports of a disturbance early on January 31.

“The suspect was intoxicated, walking around the neighbourhood with a kevlar helmet, threatening to break out windows in the neighbourhood,” he said.

Read this rest of this disgusting and disturbing tale here. (We taking bets on if the US media will pick this story up?)

Live coverage on KCEN

Updates in chronological order as they come in.

The Red Cross needs blood donors. Donations will be taken till 11:30 PM tonight in Waco. redcross.org

Scott & White Hospital also looking for donors. If you are in the area please call and donate. 253-725-4376

Via Raw Story:

Federal officials are saying that the shooting at the army post in Fort Hood, Texas, is an “all-military” incident, dispelling fears that it may have been a terrorist attack.

Unnamed officials told MSNBC that all the victims are military service members, as are the alleged shooters, of whom one is in custody and reportedly two more are still on the loose. Latest reports indicate seven people have been killed and 20 others wounded.

Update: Kay Bailey Hutchison’s sources now report 30 injured. KCEN has unconfirmed reports of shootings at two villages on base. These are in a different location from the previous shootings.

Update 4:48 PM EST : AP reports 9 dead.

Update 4:52 PM EST Press Conference :  One confirmed shooter shot dead, two suspects in custody. All three are U.S. Soldiers.

Update 5:22 PM EST: MSNBC coverage has ended. Live coverage continues at KCEN.

Update 5:36 PM EST: KCEN reports the confirmed shooter is Major Malik Nadal Hasan. Toll updated to 12 dead, 31 wounded. Scott White Hospital to hold press conference soon.

JERUSALEM (CNN) — Israel started its biggest emergency drill in the nation’s history Sunday to prepare civilians, soldiers and rescue crews for the possibility of war, the defense force said in a statement.

The five-day drill, nicknamed Turning Point 3, comes amid the nation’s rising tensions with Iran.

It will be conducted in public facilities, including schools, military bases and government offices. Students, soldiers and other civilians will practice how to gather at protected places during an emergency.

Officials said the drill will include simulated rockets, air raids and other attacks on infrastructure and essential facilities, and use of weapons on civilians.

Everyone is expected to go to a protected place at the sound of sirens, the defense force said, adding that more instructions will be broadcast on a public channel.

Israel has conducted emergency drills the past two years, but officials said this is the biggest so far.

Article continues at CNN.

Feb. 23, 2009 | President Obama will almost certainly touch down in Baghdad and Kabul in Air Force One sometime in the coming year to meet his counterparts in Iraq and Afghanistan, and he will just as certainly pay a visit to a U.S. military base or two. Should he stay for breakfast, lunch, dinner or midnight chow with the troops, he will no less certainly choose from a menu prepared by migrant Asian workers under contract to Houston-based KBR, the former subsidiary of Halliburton.

If Barack Obama takes the Rhino Runner armor-plated bus from Baghdad Airport to the Green Zone, or travels by Catfish Air’s Blackhawk helicopters (the way mere mortals like diplomats and journalists do), instead of by presidential chopper, he will be assigned a seat by U.S. civilian workers easily identified by the red KBR lanyards they wear around their necks.

Even if Obama gets the ultra-red carpet treatment, he will still tread on walkways and enter buildings that have been constructed over the last six years by an army of some 50,000 workers in the employ of KBR. And should Obama chose to order the troops in Iraq home tomorrow, he will effectively sign a blank check for billions of dollars in withdrawal logistics contracts that will largely be carried out by a company once overseen by Dick Cheney.

Questions for the Pentagon

If Obama wants to find out why KBR civilian workers can be found in every nook and cranny of U.S. bases in Iraq and Afghanistan, he might be better off visiting the Rock Island Arsenal in western Illinois. It’s located on the biggest island in the Mississippi River, the place where Chief Black Hawk of the Sauk nation was once born. The arsenal’s modern stone buildings house the offices of the U.S. Army Materiel Command from which KBR’s multibillion dollar Logistics Civilian Augmentation Program contract (LOGCAP) have been managed for the last seven years. This is the mega-contract that has, since Sept. 11, 2001, generated more than $25 billion for KBR to set up and manage military bases overseas (and resulted, of course, in thousands of pages of controversial news stories about the company’s war profiteering).
Even more conveniently, Obama could pop over to KBR’s Crystal City government operations headquarters in Arlington, Va., just a mile south of the Pentagon and five miles from the White House. On Crystal City Drive just before Ronald Reagan National airport, it’s hard to miss the KBR corporate logo, those gigantic red letters on the 11-story building at the far corner of Crystal Park.

Many people who know something about KBR’s role in Iraq and Afghanistan might want Obama to question the military commanders at Rock Island and the corporate executives in Arlington about the shoddy electrical work, unchlorinated shower water, overcharges for trucks sitting idle in the desert, deaths of KBR employees and affiliated soldiers in Iraq, million-dollar alleged bribes accepted by KBR managers, and billions of dollars in missing receipts, among a slew of other complaints that have received wide publicity over the last five years.

But those would be the wrong questions.

Obama needs to ask his Pentagon commanders this: Can the U.S. military he has now inherited do anything without KBR?

And the answer will certainly be a resounding no.

Keeping a Volunteer Army Happy

-Article Continued here, courtesy Salon.

Pay attention to this speech folks!

YouTube Link

Courtesy El Paso Times:

EL PASO – Mexico is one of two countries that “bear consideration for a rapid and sudden collapse,” according to a report by the U.S. Joint Forces Command on worldwide security threats.

The command’s “Joint Operating Environment (JOE 2008)” report, which contains projections of global threats and potential next wars, puts Pakistan on the same level as Mexico. “In terms of worse-case scenarios for the Joint Force and indeed the world, two large and important states bear consideration for a rapid and sudden collapse: Pakistan and Mexico.

“The Mexican possibility may seem less likely, but the government, its politicians, police and judicial infrastructure are all under sustained assault and press by criminal gangs and drug cartels. How that internal conflict turns out over the next several years will have a major impact on the stability of the Mexican state. Any descent by Mexico into chaos would demand an American response based on the serious implications for homeland security alone.”

-Article Continues @ Sourced Site.

Courtesy The London Times Online.

The next two decades will see a world living with the daily threat of nuclear war, environmental catastrophe and the decline of America as the dominant global power, according to a frighteningly bleak assessment by the US intelligence community.

“The world of the near future will be subject to an increased likelihood of conflict over resources, including food and water, and will be haunted by the persistence of rogue states and terrorist groups with greater access to nuclear weapons,” said the report by the National Intelligence Council, a body of analysts from across the US intelligence community.

The analysts said that the report had been prepared in time for Barack Obama’s entry into the Oval office on January 20, where he will be faced with some of the greatest challenges of any newly elected US president.

“The likelihood that nuclear weapons will be used will increase with expanded access to technology and a widening range of options for limited strikes,” the 121-page assessment said.

The analysts draw attention to an already escalating nuclear arms race in the Middle East and anticipate that a growing number of rogue states will be prepared to share their destructive technology with terror groups. “Over the next 15-20 years reactions to the decisions Iran makes about its nuclear programme could cause a number of regional states to intensify these efforts and consider actively pursuing nuclear weapons,” the reportGlobal Trends 2025 said. “This will add a new and more dangerous dimension to what is likely to be increasing competition for influence within the region,” it said.

The spread of nuclear capabilities will raise questions about the ability of weak states to safeguard them, it added. “If the number of nuclear-capable states increases, so will the number of countries potentially willing to provide nuclear assistance to other countries or to terrorists.”

-Article Continues @ Sourced Site.

Courtesy Lloyd’s List (UK)

BLACKWATER Worldwide — the US private military contractor embroiled in controversy over its actions in Iraq — has sent a private sector warship equipped with helicopters to the Gulf of Aden, and is offering its services to shipowners concerned with Somali piracy.

The vessel, McArthur, is described as a multipurpose unit designed to support military and law-enforcement training, peace-keeping and stability operations.

The ship and its helicopters have the ability to patrol a commercial vessel’s route, thereby avoiding the need to hire security contractors to ride on board.

Blackwater’s move came just hours before the Indian government confirmed that it intends to deploy a warship in the Gulf of Aden to guard its merchant ships from Somali pirates. The Indian ship will join assets from Russia, Malaysia and a multinational western-dominated coalition in the troubled waters.

Article Continues @ Sourced Site.

Courtesy Wired

After years of testing, the Active Denial System — the pain ray which drives off rioters with a microwave-like beam — could finally have its day. The Army is buying five of the truck-mounted systems for $25 million. But the energy weapon may face new hurdles, before it’s shipped off to the battlefield; a new report details how the supposedly non-lethal blaster could be turned into a flesh-frying killer.
The contract for the pain ray trucks is “expected to be awarded by year’s end,” Aviation Week notes. “A year after the contract is signed, the combination vehicle/weapons will start be fielded at the rate of one per month.”
It’s been a very long time coming. As we’ve previously reported, there have been calls to deploy the Active Denial System in Iraq going back to 2004. But it’s always been delayed for legal, political, and public relations reasons. Anything that might be condemned as torture is political dynamite. Interestingly, the version being bought is not the full-size “Version 2,” but a containerized system known as Silent Guardian, which Raytheon have been trying to sell for some time. They describe Silent Guardian as “roughly 1/3 the size and power of the other Active Denial Systems,” and quote it’s range as “greater than 250 meters.” The larger system has a range somewhere in excess of 700 meters.
Silent Guardian weighs a shade over 10,000 pounds all up, and will be mounted on an “armored ruggedized HEMTT [Heavy Expanded Mobility Tactical Truck].”

The announcement arrives on the same day as a new report from less-lethal weapons expert Dr. Jürgen Altmann that analyzes the physics of several directed energy weapons, including Active Denial, the Advanced Tactical Laser (used as a non-lethal weapon), the Pulsed Energy Projectile (a.k.a. “Maximum Pain” laser) and the Long Range Acoustic Device (a.k.a. “Acoustic Blaster”).
Dr. Altmann describes the Active Denial beam in some detail, noting that it will not be completely uniform; anyone unlucky enough to be caught in the center will experience more heating than someone at the edge. And perhaps more significant is his thorough analysis of the heating it produces — and the cumulative effect if the target does not have the chance to cool down between exposures. In U.S. military tests, a fifteen-second delay between exposures was strictly observed; this may not happen when the ADS is used for real.
“As a consequence, the ADS provides the technical possibility to produce burns of second and third degree. Because the beam of diameter 2 m and above is wider than human size, such burns would occur over considerable parts of the body, up to 50% of its surface. Second- and third-degree burns covering more than 20% of the body surface are potentially life-threatening – due to toxic tissue-decay products and increased sensitivity to infection – and require intensive care in a specialized unit. Without a technical device that reliably prevents re-triggering on the same target subject, the ADS has a potential to produce permanent injury or death. “

Article Continues @ Sourced Site.

YouTube Link