Well, the suicide minivan atttack on the Shi'ite town of Musayyib Nov. 2 that killed 20 and injured 60 (AP, Nov. 3) failed to rate even a mention on the front page of the next day's NY Times. It was only referenced deep on page 12—albeit in a story that jumped from the first page on the Iraqi regime's overture to the purged junior officers of Saddam's army to return to posts in the reconstituted military. (NYT, Nov. 3) Particularly perverse is that these bloody atttacks are continuing through Eid ul-Fitr, the holy day marking the end of Ramadan. Remember how aghast all us lefties—including this blog—were that the US continued to bomb Afghanistan through Ramadan in 2001? Well, we have no regrets at our protests—but we are also appalled that the poorly-named "anti-war" movement has no outrage to spare for these atrocities, and that certain segments of the idiot left continue to act as if al-Qaeda were the Viet Cong. See our last post on Iraq.

By the way, a week later we're still trying to figure out what this was all about, and we note with trepidation that there have been no follow-up stories. WW4 Report's chief blogger became aware of the smell at around 7.30 PM Oct. 28 on Whitehall Street in the Financial District. It was still evident, although fainter, upon arriving by bicycle in the Lower East Side, some two miles uptown. The immediate association for this observer was butterscotch. Is it just us, or does anyone else think it might have been a clandestine test of a dispersal agent to simulate bio-chemical attack, such as have been held (overtly) in the city in recent weeks? Or, ominously, an actual attack with some kind of slow-acting bio-chem agent? From the NY Times, Oct. 29:

Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiev defends his use of force to put down unrest in the country's prisons, which cost four lives on Nov. 1. "Police did the right thing when they demanded that suspects and other inmates leave the prison for interrogations," said Bakiev. "[The inmates] refused to come out. [Law-enforcement officers] approached them to meet and they [the convicts] started shooting. Should they have been presented bagels in response?" (BBC, Nov. 2)

Well, the White House already appears to be at war with the CIA. Is the Energy Department next? The latest doom-and-gloom predictions on global climate change are coming from Livermore Labs, Ed Teller's old stomping grounds... Not exactly Greenpeace... From Science-a-Go-Go:

Two new studies released this week paint a gloomy picture of a planet changed beyond recognition by the impact of climate change. The first study, from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, looked at the likely outcomes if fossil fuels continue to be used as they are now until depleted. Using a coupled climate and carbon cycle model to look at global climate and carbon cycle changes, the researchers found that the earth would warm by an average of 8 degrees Celsius (14 degrees Fahrenheit) by the year 2300. The big increase in temperatures would cause the disappearance of the polar ice caps and sea levels would rise by around 7 meters (22 feet).

Ethiopian police have killed at least 40 since protests erupted Nov. 1 over disputed parliamentary elections in Addis Ababa, the capital. Violence continues as protests are now spreading to other cities, including Dessie, Gondar, Bahar Dar, Arba Minch, Awassa, Dire Dawa—all opposition strongholds. The vote gave Prime Minister Zenawi Meles' Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Democratic Front control of nearly two-thirds of parliament. Opposition parties say the election and vote count were marred by fraud, intimidation and violence, and they accused the ruling party of rigging the elections. (AP, Nov. 4)

Simultaneously, as if by chance, renewed border tensions with Eritrea. Also note Eritrea's claim (mirroring that of Niger a few weeks back) that the UN is using claims of a "humanitarian crisis" in the country as a cover to undermine its sovereignty. From IRIN Nov. 3, via AllAfrica.com:

As unrest in the Muslim immigrant suburbs of Paris enters its ninth night, violence appears to be spreading to other towns such as Dijon, Marseille and Normandy, and into the capital itself. Trouble has now been reported from almost 90 towns around the capital, more than twice as many as the previous night, according to police. France's notoriously hardline Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy is now seeing conspiracies. "What we have been witnessing ... has nothing spontaneous about it. It was perfectly organized. We are trying to find out by who and how," he said. (The Hindu, Nov. 5)

Israel is continuing its collective punishment of the Gaza Strip with sonic booms from low-flying aircraft. Now that there are no longer settlers living in Gaza, this tactic is being used to pressure militants who fire mortars at Israel. The Israeli Air Force (IAF) started using sonic booms on Sept. 23.

Palestinians hit by sonic boom air raids: UN condemns night noise attacks as indiscriminate
Agencies say they cause trauma and miscarriages

A Kurdish PKK prisoner died on Nov. 1 after what Turkish prison officials claimed was a suicide. Prison officials claimed that the prisoner, Serdar Ari, captured had Antalya in 1998, had set himself on fire. But a delegation of observers from the Turkish independent Human Rights Association (IHD) who traveled to the Kiriklar F-Type Isolation Prison in Izmir and demanded to witness the autopsy were turned down by the authorities. The preliminary autopsy report shows that Ari had smoke and soot in his lungs, but made no reference to burn injuries. (DozaMe.org, Oct. 26 via Kurdish Info)