- This next story makes me shudder and squeam, so if you too are squeamish, you may want to proceed with caution. Ladies, if I can be so bold as to give you some relationship advice when it comes to choosing who you date, it would be this: ask yourself whether the guy you’re considering going out with is the type of guy who would attempt to slash your throat open on the kitchen table as part of some twisted human sacrifice ritual. If the answer is no, go ahead and go on the date. If the answer is yes, politely decline and keep on moving….quickly in the other direction. Otherwise you might end up with a guy like Oumar Lam of Seattle, whom authorities allege tried to sacrifice his live-in girlfriend using a kitchen knife. It’s alleged that Lam attacked his girlfriend of six months with a kitchen knife when she came home from work on Jan. 25. He jumped her while she was changing in the bedroom, grabbing her while stark naked and proceeding to put a pillowcase over her head and cover her mouth. That’s when he put a kitchen knife to his her throat and sliced it open, with the woman trying to fight him off. Unfortunately, psychopaths bent on human sacrifice can be quite strong and resilient, so Lam pulled her into the living room and in front of an altar he had set up. Yes, dude erected an altar in his living room. That’s another sign for you, ladies: if a potential date has an altar for human sacrifice erected in his living room, that’s a guy you’re going to want to pass on dating. If all of this wasn’t bizarre and disturbing enough, once in the living room Lam began yelling in another language and again had to fight off an escape attempt. At that point, he’d had enough and stabbed his lady friend in the chest, lower back and shoulder. Still fighting for her life, the woman managed to reach her cell phone and call 911, then rushed to the bathroom to rinse off. The chase continued as Lam followed and tried to throw her in the bathtub, repeating "Die, die and go alone. You have to go by yourself." And yes, my blood is curdling just reading those words; I can’t imagine hearing them in person. I’m glad to relay that the woman was able to grab her coat and run out the apartment, where she began knocking on neighbors’ doors. But there was her psycho boyfriend, catching up with her and dragging her back to the apartment. While none of the neighbors came out to help, several did call 911 and when officers showed up at Lam’s door and tried to arrest him, he began ranting in an unknown language. The woman was taken to the hospital and rushed into surgery but is expected to make a full recovery. As for Lam, when questioned about the incident, he refused to explain what he was trying to do to his girlfriend or why. Never have I been more supportive of a request from prosecutors to request $1 million bail for a suspect. They describe Lam as an "immeasurable threat of the community," and never has there been a more apt description of a person. Charging this whack job with
assault in the first degree and domestic violence doesn’t do justice to his act………
- Wassup wit dat, Iraq? How can you possibly justify the decision to dent an operating license to security firm Blackwater Worldwide? What in the world has Blackwater done to merit you barring them from operating within your borders? Leave it to Maj. Gen. Abdul Karim Khalaf to explain the denial of the request. He cited a September 2007 shooting incident in which security guards -- then employed by Blackwater -- fired on a crowd and killed 17 Iraqis. What, one little killing - of 17 people - means you can no longer to business in a country? Damn, that’s a bit strict. After all, for some time now Blackwater has been in possession of one of the biggest security contracts in Iraq, contracted by the U.S. State Department to murder innocent Iraqi civilians, er, to protect American diplomats and other employees. Sure, earlier this month
five former Blackwater security guards pleaded not guilty to charges of voluntary manslaughter and other serious crimes stemming from their involvement in the September 16, 2007, shootings in a Baghdad square and a sixth former security guard has pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and attempted manslaughter, but that’s ticky-tack stuff. If Blackwater says its employees were returning fire after they were attacked by armed insurgents, dammit, I believe them. Why would they lie about something like that? A shady investigation conducted by the Iraqis may concluded that the guards randomly fired at civilians without provocation, but figuring out who allegedly fired at who without provocation is an inexact science at best.
In no way does murdering 17 people (allegedly) show a blatant disregard for the lives of the civilians in the country where you’re contracted to provide security. Heck, these five trigger-happy fools are pioneers, becoming the first to suffer prosecution as non-Defense Department contractors under the Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act (MEJA). The act was amended in 2004 in order to allow the Justice Department to prosecute such personnel providing services "in support of the mission of the Department of Defense overseas." So while I appreciate the Iraqi government taking the stance that all private defense contractors looking to operate within its borders be licensed, denying that license to a fine, upstanding group like Blackwater is simply unthinkable……
- You might recall a few months ago that I spoke on behalf of the United States in telling the International Olympic Committee that the bid submitted by the city of Chicago to host the 2016 Summer Olympics was best ignored, because in reality, we don’t really want the headache of hosting the Olympics. Well, far be it from me to overstep my boundaries, but I’m going to do it again. Apparently the United States plans to submit simultaneous bids to soccer's governing body for the right to host the World Cup in either 2018 or 2022. Leading that ill-fated charge is the U.S. Soccer Federation, which said that USSF president Sunil Gulati will hold a conference call on Monday to announce the group's intentions to bid for the tournament in both years. I’ve just gotten over not giving a crap when the U.S. held the World Cup in 1994, so I don’t need that kind of strain on me again in 9 to 13 years. I’m not sure if there is still time to back out, as Monday is the deadline for submissions to FIFA, but in case there isn’t, just get ahead and find some way to invalidate both American bids. Pick one of the four other worthy bids from across Europe: England, Spain/Portugal, Netherlands/Belgium/Luxembourg and Russia. Heck, select one of the other bids from around the world, places like Indonesia, Australia, Qatar, China or Japan. All of those nations give a damn about soccer and more importantly, they’re not the United States. Leave the hassle of hosting this event to a nation where your sport isn’t ninth on tenth on the depth chart when it comes to sports that people care about. For example, selecting South Africa for the 2010 World Cup and Brazil for 2014 are great choices. Soccer is huge there, for reasons I don’t quite grasp. Just because the overzealous soccer governing bodies here in the U.S. don’t know better, don’t penalize the rest of us for their stupidity by actually awarding us the World Cup in 2018, 2022 or any other year ever again…….
- Now this is the kind of college education I think we can all say that we would want to have. No students anywhere in the world are more fortunate than the 1,000 students at South Devon College in Paignton, England, who received a unique and amazing gift as part of the school’s "Be Healthy Week". The students were taught…..to pole dance! That’s right, the school invited a pole dancing company, The Art of Dance, to give lessons to students during lunchtime. First off, I didn’t know colleges had lunch breaks, but I digress. Who doesn’t want a nice pole dancing lesson to go with their turkey on rye and ramen noodles? Any doubts about the wisdom of this decision should be silenced by the fact that 1,000 students aged 14 to 19 packed in the main public area of the school for the first performance by company owner Sam Remmer. Furthermore, many students recorded video of the performance on their mobile phones. Inexplicably, infuriatingly, several teachers at the school deiced to throw a fit over the display - without even seeing them. According to Remmer, most of the complaints came from staff members “who had not actually seen our displays but had just assumed that they were inappropriate for their students.” I think we all know what happens when we assume, right? So what if after seeing the performance, staff members claimed that students were more interested in watching videos of it on their phones than in paying attention in class. In case you all hadn’t noticed, students are generally more interested in doing anything that doesn’t involve actually paying attention in class. Sam Remmer was nice enough to conduct the sessions at no cost to the school, but feel free to look this gift horse in the mouth, South Devon staff members. Not only that, the school is also reneging on another part of its deal with Remmer which stipulated that she be allowed to post videos of the performances online. After the alleged litany of complaints (none of them official), the school is back-tracking and requesting that Remmer the videos from her Web site and not make the event public. Rightfully, Remmer is refusing to take the vids down and says she is outraged by the way the school is treating her. Believe it or not, she has a bigger mission in mind than just training the next generation of skanks to swing on brass poles in G-strings to cheesy ‘80s rock. Yes, Sam Remmer believes that unless people are educated about the differences between modern fitness pole dancing and lap dancing, then "negative stereotypes will not go away." She goes so far as to declare that pole dancing is perfectly appropriate for teenagers because it mixes dance moves with gymnastics and is good fitness. See, and you thought stripping/pole dancing was just for ho’s in the basements of expansive mansions owned by rappers or to finance your drug habit……..
- So what is the appropriate length of time to wait before you begin erasing all traces of a disgraced former governor from your states’ capitol building? Judging by the state of Illinois’ handling of ousted leader Rod Blagojevich, the answer is a few minutes. That’s how long it took for workers to begin removing traces of Blagojevich from the Illinois Capitol building after the Illinois Senate voted 59-0 remove Blagojevich from office. Not content to rip him from office, they went on to vote unanimously to prevent Blagojevich from ever holding political office in the state again. Gov. Pat Quinn took Blagojevich’s place, and moments after the switch, the "welcome" sign with Blagojevich's face, which visitors saw as they entered the Capitol in Springfield, was taken down. They ripped the gold nameplate with Blagojevich's name, then broke out their ladder and power drills and brought down the 5-foot-high sign to make the official change. Heck, even Blagojevich’s official state picture, stationed atop a state outline and a silhouette of Abraham Lincoln, was fair game and it too was removed. Then again, I can see how you wouldn’t want any reminders around of a man who presided over possibly the biggest corruption scandal in the history of a state renowned for its history of political corruption. And no, I don’t buy Blagojevich’s assertion that he did "absolutely nothing wrong,” even if he actually bothered to show up for a token appearance at his own impeachment trial and tell the senators there his lie. At this point, he probably couldn’t move to North Dakota and get himself elected to the city council in Bismarck, so low and disrespected is Blagojevich’s political reputation……..
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