The Barbara 'Olsen' Story Has No Legs

The current internet appearance of the story claiming Barbara 'Olsen' has been arrested in Europe is devoid of substance. There is not one micron of proof. The story is simply not journalism at this point in time.

Extraordinary claims DEMAND extraordinary proof. There is nothing in the 'Olsen' story to substantiate it.

First, her last name is or was misspelled 'Olsen'. It is 'Olson' and may by now be corrected.

Even more lamentable is the claim she was arrested at the 'Polish-Austrian' border.

Unfortunately, these two countries do not share a common border...as a quick look at any map of Europe will show.

The Barbara 'Olsen' Story Has No Legs

The Village Voice: The Bush Beat

Army PR officer posed as "soldier" on Bush's "impromptu" teleconference.! Hillarious and sad at the same time. Sigh.... -- law



Bush — what a newsmaker. In the true sense of the word. This morning, he made it up.

The videoconference his handlers set up with U.S. soldiers in Iraq was staged, as the AP's Deb Reichmann just pointed out.

But here's another part of the flack attack you may not know: The soldier on the left side of the front row was actually a flack herself, though she didn't reveal it during the regime's 24-minute infomercial.

Her name is Corine Lombardo.. [who] as my sharp-eyed colleague David Axe tipped me ..probably sees more action watching CNN than action: "I'm glad Lombardo is safe, and I mean her no harm, and it's nothing personal, but I don't believe a fucking word she says, because her job is to make the Bush regime look good"

(For a sample of her work, see Iraqi army graduates mark transfer of responsibility from Task Force Liberty, By Master Sgt. Corine Lombardo, 42nd Infantry Division Public Affairs)

The Village Voice: The Bush Beat

Kansas Biologist Discovers New Species of Lizard - Yahoo! News

Go Kansas science!! -- law

KANSAS CITY, Mo. - What's black, white, red and green all over? It's something Avila University professor Robert Powell will announce sometime in December

Powell, a biologist who has been at the Kansas City-based university for 30 years, and Robert Henderson, a curator at the Milwaukee Public Museum, have discovered a new species of lizard in the south Caribbean that Powell will get to name in the December issue of the Caribbean Journal of Science.

Powell, who recruits students from around the country each summer to take a research excursion with him to the Caribbean, found the new lizard in June after being tipped off about its existence.

The Rev. Bob de Silva, an amateur naturalist from St. Vincent who had visited Union Island, had been the only person to ever report seeing the geckolike lizard, and told Powell about it.

"It is indeed spectacular in its appearance," Powell told The Kansas City Star by telephone from Guana Island in the British Virgin Islands, where he is studying other reptiles. "The lizard is greenish with bright red, black and white spots that seem to jump out at you when he is placed against a plain background. But in its natural habitat, it is hard to see."

Powell said the tiny lizard, which is about the size of a large caterpillar or half a cigarette, probably has been seen before and mistaken for a bug.

Biologist Discovers New Species of Lizard - Yahoo! News

Daily Kos: A Week Before Vote, US Seeks Changes In Iraqi Constitution

A Week Before Vote, US Seeks Changes In Iraqi Constitution
by Armando
Sun Oct 9th, 2005 at 19:04:30 CDT

Kinda late in the day for this ain't it?

One week before Iraqis vote on a constitution intended to remake their nation, U.S. and Arab diplomats are scrambling to broker last-minute concessions from Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish faction leaders that would persuade the Sunni Arab minority to drop its opposition to the proposed charter and defuse the country's Sunni-led insurgency.

The mistake was to insist on the damn thing in the first place, just like the January elections. Iraq was not ready. And the rush for phony "corner turning" made a horrible situation that much worse.

The constitutional referendum has been described by Iraqi and foreign observers as the most significant milestone so far in the development of Iraq's nascent democracy. Completion of the drafting process on Aug. 28 -- two weeks behind schedule -- was supposed to be a unifying process, and parties and activists were to have used the subsequent two months to make their cases for and against the proposed document.

But the version endorsed in August by the Shiite- and Kurdish-led National Assembly was immediately condemned by Sunnis, who had seen their political dominance of Iraq evaporate with the fall of Saddam Hussein in April 2003. As Shiite and Kurdish officials attempted to bring holdout Sunnis on board, negotiations never fully halted. Their goal, according to American diplomats, is a broad national accord to bridge the divide.

Fat chance now. Just idiotic how this was done. Insistence on artificial deadlines. Phony celebration of meaningless milestones.

All of a piece with this disastrous mistake. A Debacle from the outset from the worst Administration in history.

Daily Kos: A Week Before Vote, US Seeks Changes In Iraqi Constitution