Comments:

1. Sue W on November 8th, 2009 at 2:48:

   Well, a very large number of central bankers are ex-Goldman people. Just because I’m not a conspiracy theorist doesn’t mean that markets are not fixed…

Comments:

1. Rob on November 7th, 2009 at 18:42:

   I haven’t read anywhere that this was referred to as “jihad”. The man is said to have been “mortified” at his deployment to Afghanistan. If you’re mortified of deployment, the army is not the best organization to join. As a major, a psychiatrist, and a highly educated man, he is going to have difficulty blaming anyone else for his actions. Benjamin is wrong. The army is not responsible for Nidal. Muslims aren’t responsible for him, either. He has full responsibility and he’ll face the full consequences … alone. Rightly so.

2. Dave on November 7th, 2009 at 22:16:

   The army is most certainly responsible for allowing/encouraging that anti-Muslim atmosphere. The one which made it OK for his fellow soldiers to harrass him. The one which makes it OK for them to treat Iraqi and Afghani civilians as sub-human because they are Muslim. OK to torture them to death. OK to murder families for sport.

   Other army personnel have done such things. This one gets attention because it’s in Texas and the victims are US citizens … instead of in Iraq or Afghanistan, where most folk are brown skinned and non-American. I would love to see Justice be done … for those other victims before these, since they have been waiting for a lot longer.

   I’m not saying that the blame is 50%/50% on the Army (or that it isn’t) … but let’s not be blind about what that organization is doing. It’s far from the proud organization it once was. And it’s way overdue to recognize that reality, and start fixing it.

   One more point: The shooter did try to resolve this problem before shooting. He tried to leave the army. He was not allowed. That’s a really direct link to army actions worsening this problem. It’s reasonable to believe that if he had been allowed to leave, as he asked, then we those particular soldiers would not be dead today.

3. Dave on November 7th, 2009 at 22:36:

   One more point: I wrote that “It’s reasonable to believe that if he had been allowed to leave, as he asked, then those particular soldiers would not be dead today.” Or put in therapy, or … lots of other things.

   The army is extremely desperate for warm bodies. So desperate that it doesn’t pay attention to red flags. In this case, psychological flags, self-raised. But there are a lot of other examples.

   And where thirty years ago there were all kinds of safe roles such folk could take within the army, now a huge chunk of those roles are outsourced to private contractors. Soldiers’ job descriptions are devolving to “cannon fodder”. It’s no wonder that craziness gets amplified, not reduced. And that’s another structural issue that can only be blamed on the Department of “Defense”, and its corporate “partners”.

4. Roland Hesz on November 8th, 2009 at 9:47:

   I find it suprising that they have been watching him – because of praising suicide bombers and such -, they knew he did not want to go oversea, and still he could pull it off.

   To the “did not want” part. He was a psychiatrist. He has been listening to soldiers who came back from the war a bit “broken”. I am sure that would discourage anyone.
   He repeatedly said he does not want to go to kill other arabs.

   They should have let him go, or take him off the deployment list.
   And most of all, if they were already suspecting him sympathizing with insurgents, they should have isolated him – Dr Nadik, we have a project where we need your expertise.

   But it will run it’s course, eyewitnesses will testify that he was shouting “Allah akhbar” – did he shout that? Are you sure he did not shout that? So, he may have shout that? Are you sure he did? Ok, so pleaste take it on record, he did shout “Allah akhbar” – and it will be on record as someone already stated “He was a jihadist. Simple as that”.
   No need to look into the reasons, the roots of the problem. Much easier and cheaper.

   And of course if every soldier were carrying a bazooka and an assault rifle, it would have never happened.

Comments:

1. Rob on November 7th, 2009 at 19:41:

   I’ve been curious about those commercials for a long time. When we first started seeing them, they would only tell you to ask your doctor if their product was right for you but they didn’t mention anywhere in their ad what their product was for. Now that they do provide information on their product, they have to give warnings on potential side effects and they do it very slowly and deliberately, which leads me to believe that a government oversight body either monitors them closely or signs off on them before they’re aired. Personally, I think ads aimed directly at patients undermine doctors and they should be removed.

Comments:

1. Roland Hesz on November 8th, 2009 at 9:37:

   Well,they inject us with H1N1, Polio, and a host of other diseases too. Just in case.
   Nothing new there.

2. Patricia on November 9th, 2009 at 0:07:

   HIV != viral vector derived from HIV. Vectors used in microbiology/molecular biology are often derived from bacterial and viral nucleic acids. Viruses are perfect vectors for gene therapy: as long as the pathogenic component is neutralized, they will still have all the necessary machinery to penetrate cells and tissues that would otherwise be impenetrable, and deliver whatever you want – like healthy genes.

3. John Sinteur on November 9th, 2009 at 7:49:

   as long as the pathogenic component is neutralized

   Yes. Now you understand my “Wow”.

4. Mr. N on November 9th, 2009 at 8:24:

   ”Viruses are perfect vectors for gene therapy: (…)they (…)have all the necessary machinery to penetrate cells and tissues that would otherwise be impenetrable, and deliver whatever you want.”

   Sounds borgish.
   Resistance is Futile. Prepare to be Assimilated.

5. Patricia on November 9th, 2009 at 13:08:

   John, I’m not sure I understood your wow, hence my comment. Was it “Wow, they could neutralize HIV and use it for gee therapy, but not for fighting HIV infection itself” or “Wow, the stuff people can do nowadays, awesome”? Because if it’s the first case, I should point out again that a vector can be very different from the virus it was derived from in the first place, and that neutralizing it in vitro and reusing it is several orders of magnitude easier than fighting it in vivo. If it’s the second, then yes I agree with you
   If anyone is interested, I can read the article and see _how_ derived it is. My experience with such headlines is that buzzwords are inserted to make things more appealing than they are to the general public.

6. John Sinteur on November 9th, 2009 at 13:10:

   Shows what I know… I was not aware that HIV could easily be neutralized in vitro… if you manage to write something about the how, feel free to send it to me and I’ll make a post out of it…

Comments:

1. Isaac Eiland-Hall on November 7th, 2009 at 18:33:

   He’s already changed the contact info and the nameservers so the domain doesn’t resolve. However, you can still reach the site at http://gb1990.com/

   It was only registered for a year – so check back around September 1, 2010 to see what happens then!

Comments:

1. Maarten on November 7th, 2009 at 20:00:

   Ha ha ha ha. I wonder what distro it runs.