TheObiBlog

This adaptation of an old Hagar the Horrible comic strip was created by my father, probably as a way to tick off all the Mormons he knew. He liked doing that.

Since 2003, Coalition forces in Iraq have recovered approximately 500 weapons munitions which contain degraded mustard gas or sarin nerve agent. Some of these, Saadam had once admitted he had, and then claimed to have destroyed. Others, Saadam never admitted having in the first place.

Saadam was not telling the truth when he claimed to have destroyed all his WMD.

These are older, pre 1991 munitions, like the shells he used to murder 5000+ Kurds.

Ramifications:
* Since we now have proof that Iraq did not get rid of all it's prewar weaponized WMD, chances just went up that some of it has seeped into the black market, putting WMD into the hands of other groups. Possibly terrorist groups, operating in and possibly outside of Iraq. (Various insurgents and Iraqi groups are widely reported as desiring to acquire and use chemical weapons.)

* The legitimacy of the Iraq war just went up - or at least it should for anyone who considers themselves informed and intellectually honest. (How much legitimacy it adds, remains a subject for honest debate.)

See the news story here: www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,200499,00.html

From the comic strip Pearls Before Swine, found here: http://www.comics.com/comics/pearls/archive/pearls-20060620.html

Start with a couple of Venus Fly traps.
Add 3 smooshed flies.

End result - fascinated kidlets that are also maybe a little frightened.

Done with These Happy Golden Years, 7th book of the Little House on the Prarie series.

Now we're reading Little Women.

I'm not one to dance in the streets at the death of anyone, but there is no denying the significance of his death.

In the best of all possible worlds, the Sunni involved in forming the new govt had a hand in this. It would mean we've dealt with the right group of Sunnis, and those people can and will help dismantle the insurgency and give the Iraqi govt a chance.

After all these years, I'm trembling at the prospect of being optimistic, but here it is.

Iraq has a new govt. Zarqawi's death is an indication that the Sunnis calling the shots are now looking at abandoning the insurgency and participating in this government.

Hopefully, the coming months will provide more such indications.

[update - 9:17 am]

So, it was the Jordanians. Well, good for them.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,198655,00.html
"AMMAN, Jordan — Jordan provided the U.S. military with information that helped in tracking down and killing Al Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian official said.

Some of the information came from Jordan's sources inside Iraq and led the U.S. military to the area of Baqouba, the region northeast of Baghdad where Iraq's prime minister said Zarqawi was killed in an airstrike Wednesday night, said the official, who has knowledge of the operation."

It's not hard to understand why they did it:
http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/11/10/jordan.blasts/

Oh, and are we sure Zarqawi needed killing? Well, according to http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/08/AR2006060800191.html , here's a list of things the guy did:

Major attacks, killings claimed by Jordanian terror suspect Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and his followers (probably needs to be updated for 2006):

2005:
-- Dec. 27: Volley of rockets fired from southern Lebanon into Israel.
-- Nov. 9: Triple suicide bombing against hotels in Amman, Jordan, killing 60.
-- Aug. 19: Rocket attack in the Jordanian port city of Aqaba, killing Jordanian soldier. One Katyusha rocket lands in neighboring Israel -- causing no casualties -- and another misses a U.S. Navy ship docked at Aqaba.
-- May 7: Two explosives-laden cars plow into an American security company convoy in Baghdad, killing at least 22 people -- including two Americans.
-- Feb. 28: Suicide car bomber strikes crowd of police and Iraqi National Guard recruits in the southern city of Hillah, killing 125 people.

2004:
-- Dec. 19: Car bombs tear through funeral procession in Najaf and main bus station in nearby Karbala, killing at least 60 in the Shiite holy cities.
-- Oct. 30: Body of hostage Shosei Koda, 24, of Japan, is found decapitated in Baghdad, his body wrapped in an American flag.
-- Sept. 30: Bombings in Baghdad kill 35 children and seven adults as U.S. troops hand out candy at the inauguration of a sewage treatment plant. Al-Zarqawi's group claims responsibility for attacks that day, but it is unclear if these include the explosions that killed the children.
-- Sept. 16: British engineer Kenneth Bigley, and U.S. engineers Jack Hensley and Eugene "Jack" Armstrong kidnapped in Baghdad. By Oct. 10, 2004, all three men have been confirmed beheaded.
-- Sept. 14: Car bomb rips through a busy market near a Baghdad police headquarters where Iraqis are waiting to apply for jobs, killing 47.
-- Sept. 13: Video purportedly from al-Qaida in Iraq shows Durmus Kumdereli, a Turkish truck driver, being beheaded.
-- Aug. 2: Video from followers of al-Zarqawi showing shooting death of hostage Murat Yuce of Turkey.
-- June 29: Bulgarian truck drivers Georgi Lazov, 30, and Ivaylo Kepov, 32, are kidnapped. Al-Zarqawi's followers suspected of decapitating both men.
-- June 22: Kidnappers behead South Korean hostage Kim Sun-il; Al-Jazeera television says the killing was carried out by al-Zarqawi's group.
-- June 14: Car bomb attack on a vehicle convoy in Baghdad kills 13, including three General Electric employees.
-- May 18: Car bomb assassinates Iraqi Governing Council president Abdel-Zahraa Othman.
-- May 11: Kidnapped American businessman Nicholas Berg is beheaded while being videotaped, and the voice of the knife-wielder is identified as al-Zarqawi's.
-- March 2: Coordinated blasts from suicide bombers, mortars and planted explosives strike Shiite Muslim shrines in Karbala and Baghdad, killing at least 181. U.S. and Iraqi officials link the attacks to al-Zarqawi.

2003:
-- Aug. 29: Car bomb in Najaf kills more than 85 people, including Ayatollah Mohammad Baqr al-Hakim, leader of the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq.
-- Aug. 19: Truck bombing of U.N. headquarters in Baghdad kills 23, including top U.N. envoy Sergio Vieira de Mello.

2002:
-- Oct. 28: Laurence Foley, a diplomat and administrator of U.S. aid programs in Jordan, is gunned down outside his home in Amman.

I was going to get a picture lined up with me sitting there in a hammock while the critters mowed my lawn, but that would be too much work.

Xerxes himself, came from his palace at Shushan, to review his troops, and to have bridges built over the Hellespont. This was done by Phœnician and Egyptian engineers. But when the work was finished, there arose a great storm, and the bridges were destroyed. Xerxes was very angry at this accident, and not only did he order the engineers to be beheaded, but commanded that three hundred lashes of the whip, should be inflicted on the waters of the Hellespont. Those who scourged the sea were ordered to address it in these words:

"O bitter water, our lord lays this punishment upon thee for having done him wrong, who never did wrong to thee. King Xerxes will cross thee whether thou wilt or not, thou treacherous and briny river."