Sadder Still

OSLO (Reuters) - Polar bears are drowning and receding Arctic glaciers have uncovered previously unknown islands in a drastic 2006 summer thaw widely blamed on global warming.

[snip]

On a trip this summer "We saw a couple of polar bears in the sea east of Svalbard -- one of them looked to be dead and the other one looked to be exhausted," said Julian Dowdeswell, head of the Scott Polar Research Institute in England.

He said that the bears had apparently been stranded at sea by melting ice. The bears generally live around the fringes of the ice where they find it easiest to hunt seals.

NASA projected this week that Arctic sea ice is likely to recede in 2006 close to a low recorded in 2005 as part of a melting trend in recent decades. A stormy August in 2006 had slightly slowed the 2006 melt.

[snip]

Ian Stirling, a researcher with the Canadian Wildlife Service, said polar bears were finding it harder to find food, threatening their ability to reproduce.

"In 1980 the average weight of adult females in western Hudson Bay was 650 pounds (300 kg). Their average weight in 2004 was just 507 pounds," he said in a report this week. Numbers in the Hudson Bay region dropped to 950 in 2004 from 1,200 in 1989.

This really makes me sad. This is going to be a painful and slow death for these glorious creatures. It makes me even sadder to know that this is just the beginning of our slow and inevitable suffering because of Global Warming. Sadder still that we aren't even close to taking the steps necessary to slow it down and reverse it. Sadder still knowing that if Al Gore were President we would have been doing something for the last 6 years.

It's About Torture, Plain and Simple

I posted the following in the comments this morning over at Morning Martini and PoP suggested I repost it here. This is not the whole response but it is the meat of it.

It was in response to a commenter there who spent several paragraphs building the strawman (you lefties want to pamper the people who are trying to kill us or I am scared shitless of the terrorists and anything you want to do is OK by me) in response to PoP's post about the sorry state affairs with respect to Bush and Co. trying to "clarify" Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions.

[snip]
The purpose of this "clarification" as they call it is to allow them to perform acts of interrogation that under the present understanding of Common Article 3 are, in fact torture. The following is what 33 military leaders including Colin Powell, Stansfield Turner and Generals John Shalikashvili and Joseph Hoar wrote in a letter to Congress...

Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions provides the minimum standards for humane treatment and fair justice that apply to anyone captured in armed conflict. These standards were specifically designed to ensure that those who fall outside the other, more extensive, protections of the Conventions are treated in accordance with the values of civilized nations. The framers of the Conventions, including the American representatives, in particular wanted to ensure that Common Article 3 would apply in situations where a state party to the treaty, like the United States, fights an adversary that is not a party, including irregular forces like al Qaeda. The United States military has abided by the basic requirements of Common Article 3 in every conflict since the Conventions were adopted. In each case, we applied the Geneva Conventions -- including, at a minimum, Common Article 3 -- even to enemies that systematically violated the Conventions themselves.

We have abided by this standard in our own conduct for a simple reason: the same standard serves to protect American servicemen and women when they engage in conflicts covered by Common Article 3. Preserving the integrity of this standard has become increasingly important in recent years when our adversaries often are not nation-states. Congress acted in 1997 to further this goal by criminalizing violations of Common Article 3 in the War Crimes Act, enabling us to hold accountable those who abuse our captured personnel, no matter the nature of the armed conflict.

If any agency of the U.S. government is excused from compliance with these standards, or if we seek to redefine what Common Article 3 requires, we should not imagine that our enemies will take notice of the technical distinctions when they hold U.S. prisoners captive. If degradation, humiliation, physical and mental brutalization of prisoners is decriminalized or considered permissible under a restrictive interpretation of Common Article 3, we will forfeit all credible objections should such barbaric practices be inflicted upon American prisoners.

This is what this is all about [deleted] [ed.]. The above gentlemen are not "liberal appeasers" and I sure wouldn't call them "weak and dishonest" to their faces. These are men that can see beyond the petty "spoiled frat boy" motivations of George Bush and Dick Cheney and all of these men had the guts and morals to fight for their country. These are courageous men and brave enough to support what we as Americans have always held most dear.[snip]

To quote PoP "We must show this president that America is brave enough to remain free. We will not lose our souls to the enemy or to his administration."

Fried Green Tomatoes

Steve of YDD asked me for my recipe.

You'll need:
Green tomatoes (duh!)
a cup or so of buttermilk (you can use plain yogurt thinned with a little milk but the buttermilk is best)
Tobasco
Stone ground corn meal (not self rising) about a cup and a half (I use white meal but yellow is fine)
1/4 - 1/2 tsp Cayenne pepper (or to taste)
1 tsp Seasoned salt or just plain salt, paprika and onion and garlic powder instead.
3 or so Tablespoons of all purpose flour
Canola or peanut oil for frying (enough to put about an 1/8 think film of oil in your pan)
I like to use a nice heavy non stick pan as well.

Get the greenest tomatoes that you can find. You can only get about 4 or 5 good slices 3/8 inch think out of them so plan accordingly.

Soak the tomato slices in the buttermilk for an hour or two or so before cooking. I usually put a few dashes of Tobasco in the buttermilk to give it a little punch

Mix the cornmeal, flour, cayenne, seasoning. You are going to have to adjust the seasoning depending on how much dredge you are making.

After the tomatoes have had their swim take them out one by one and dredge them in the cornmeal mixture, coating thoroughl, and set aside on a piece of wax paper. After all the slices have been through the dredge do it again. Not much will stick the second time but some will.

Fry them carefully in the oil making sure not to crowd them, cooking on the first side until nicely browned and then very carefully turn them and finish the frying. It is best to try and only turn them once. Do them in batches and keep the cooked ones warm in the oven on a pan with a wire rack so they will drain and not get soggy while the others cook.

You have to be gentle with these things as the breading will come off if you are too rough and if you let them sit stacked together in the oven...moisture is their enemy.

BTW this recipe also works with eggplant and catfish filets and probably anything else that you would like to cook this way.

Wrong In Every Sense

I have been quite busy today and just now (5pm) am wrapping up and getting an opportunity to blog around and see what has been happening on this fine Friday.

It appears that there are some sane people still left in the Senate and they teamed with the Dems and passed their own version of the military tribunal bill. Good for them.

Sept. 14 (Bloomberg) -- A Senate committee, in a bipartisan rebuff to President George W. Bush, approved military tribunal legislation that would give more legal protection to suspected terrorists than the administration wants.

Four of the 13 Republicans on the panel joined the 11 Democrats to pass their version of the measure, rejecting Bush's proposal to bar defendants from seeing classified evidence prosecutors may want to use in court. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell endorsed the Senate approach, warning that the Bush administration is risking the safety of U.S. troops and worldwide opinion by permitting harsh treatment of detainees.

The committee acted just hours after the president made an unusual visit to Capitol Hill to urge support for his proposals on domestic eavesdropping and military tribunals. Meeting with House Republicans, Bush said he reminded them that ``the most important job of government is to protect the homeland.''

Giving Bush what he wants on this is not acceptable for a multitude of reasons. It is not American. It is not civilized. It is not the way we want our troops treated if and when they are captured. I am just sick that this whole concept of how we torture is even managing to be an ongoing dialogue. What has this country come to for this to happen?

Bag 'O Spinach Warning

If you are in to Bag 'o Salad you might want to at least hesitate. Seems Bag 'O Spinach is not agreeing with some folks. That's a shame too since a lot of us small families with only two or so in the household use these convenience foods all of the time. Don't need an E.Coli sparring match though, so I intend to refrain.

Shoot Self in Foot--Reload

Interesting concept, If we protect ourselves from terrorism the terrorists win. Only someone in the Bush cabal could say this in public and keep a straight face.

The argument goes like this…OBL's goal is to bankrupt us, make us spend all our money trying to protect ourselves and then our economy collapses and then they win. This means that if we scan cargo coming into the US to make sure it doesn't contain nuclear material we’ll be spending money and that is just what the terrorists want us to. Therefore, the financial wizard and terrorist thwarting Chertoff is foiling Osama by not spending any money on checking for nukes in cargo containers. Brilliant! And we thought your Katrina response was your finest moment.

We are not, of course, supposed to notice or comment on the disastrous adventure in Iraq that's costing us nearly $100 billion a year. A couple of week’s worth of the spending we are doing in Iraq would cover the inspection of all the cargo.

It is the Constitution After All

Just taking a quick break from the mountain of stuff I have in front of me today.

There are some excellent posts over at Firedoglake today. Christy is especially fired up (it must her brush with the "Big Dog" yesterday) and as usual the commenters are kicking in some great stuff as well. Here is part of a comment that Christy reposted from Peterr

Dems need to plainly tell the truth about what we believe:

We believe that the Geneva Convention works. We do not believe in torture.

We believe in accountability and the rule of law. We do not believe in secret prisons or warrantless wiretaps, outside the scrutiny of the courts.

We believe that our morality is not dependent upon the morality of others. We do not believe in giving up our moral stature in times of war.

We believe that no one is above the law - not the president, not the CIA, not the Justice Department, not the Congress, not the courts, not corporations, not unions, not lobbyists.

We believe that no one is beneath the law - not the poor, not the non-English speakers, not the immigrant (legal or not), not the ill, not the outcasts of our society.

We believe that the military and the officers of the intelligence communuity are safer with the Geneva Conventions in place. We do not believe in cutting and running from the protections of Geneva.

Most of all, we believe in three branches of government that hold each other accountable as they do the people’s business.

We do not believe in King George. Not in 1776, and not in 2006. (emphasis mine)

I will second this in spades.

Ann Richards Died Yesterday

Sad news from Texas. One of the great ladies of Texas and even American politics Former Texas Governor Ann Richards died today. She had cancer. I liked this lady... she was tough and feisty and it was a tragedy that she lost the governorship to George Bush because Texas really suffered and in the long run we all did and are. Take the time to read her memorable speech to the 1988 Democratic Convention.

Condolences to her family.

WTF?

What does one say about this kind of thing?

WASHINGTON (AP) — Nonlethal weapons such as high-power microwave devices should be used on American citizens in crowd-control situations before they are used on the battlefield, the Air Force secretary said Tuesday.

Domestic use would make it easier to avoid questions in the international community over any possible safety concerns, said Secretary Michael Wynne.

h/t to Susie

More School Paintings

Meanwhile, it's another day In Iraq:

Iraqi police say they have found in the space of one day 60 bodies of people bound, tortured and shot in the capital, Baghdad.

They were found all over the city, from Sunni areas in the west to Shia districts in the east - but most were found in largely Sunni west Baghdad.

Sectarian killings are not unusual in the city but this is a large number for one day, a BBC correspondent says.

Meanwhile, car bombs killed at least 22 people in Baghdad.

One device near the national sports stadium in the eastern Shaab district exploded in a parked car during the morning rush hour, killing 14 people including two policemen and wounding at least 57.

A bomb later went off near a police patrol in the Zayona district, also in the east, killing eight people and injuring at least 17.

Phony War

Good stuff in the current issue of Rolling Stone and just posted at RollingStone.com.

The Phony War
President Bush not only created a fake "War on Terror" to scare voters into supporting his policies -- he is failing to address the real threat facing America

ROBERT DREYFUSS

In August, even before the official announcement that some two dozen would-be terrorists had been arrested in London, President Bush and his top advisers swung into action. Their goal was not to stop the terrorists, who were already safely behind bars, but to use the threat to justify the president's seemingly endless "War on Terror."

Vice President Dick Cheney, who had known in advance about the pending arrests, hinted darkly about the threat posed by "Al Qaeda types." The president, standing on an airport tarmac in Wisconsin the next morning, warned that the arrests were "a stark reminder that this nation is at war with Islamic fascists." And that afternoon, Peter Wehner, the director of the White House's Office of Strategic Initiatives, declared that America is engaged in nothing less than a "civilizational struggle" with enemies who seek "to establish a radical Islamic empire that spans from Spain to Indonesia."

Fortunately, Wehner added, the country has a leader who knows exactly how to combat terrorism: "George W. Bush understands, with extraordinary clarity, the great struggle of our time."

The problem is, almost everything that President Bush understands about his own war on terrorism is wrong.

Continue reading "RollingStone: Bush's Phony War"

h/t to Hoffmania

Boehner Gets Roughed Up

It's about time we were seeing a little "give 'em hell"

"I wonder if [the Democratic Party is] more interested in protecting the terrorists than protecting the American people," said House Majority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio. "They certainly do not want to take the terrorists on and defeat them."

Trading barbs, House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi, who had criticized the president's speech as inappropriately political, called Boehner's criticism "cynical tactics."

"Rather than try to defend their own failed record, Republicans have resorted to the desperation politics of fear," said Pelosi, D-Calif. "It is long past time for Republicans to be honest with American people and stop questioning the patriotism of those who recognize that the president's Iraq policy has not worked, is making us less safe and must be changed."

Any Questions?

From the Sun Herald

WASHINGTON - Humans are largely to blame for the recent trend toward more powerful hurricanes, a group of 19 American and European scientists declared Monday.

In a paper appearing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the scientists claim to have established a solid chain linking human burning of fossil fuels, global warming, higher ocean temperatures, and the intensity and duration of recent hurricanes such as Katrina and Wilma.

The scientists' key finding was that as sea surface temperatures rise and fall, the maximum wind speed of hurricanes goes up and down in step with them.

"Human-caused changes in greenhouse gases are the main driver" of warmer waters in the tropical Atlantic and northwestern Pacific oceans, where hurricanes and cyclones are born, the paper says.

Its principal author was Benjamin Santer, a senior climate researcher at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif. Other contributors come from 11 different laboratories in the United States, Germany and England.

One Chance

Dear Leader tonight...

"If we do not defeat these enemies now, we will leave our children to face a Middle East overrun by terrorist states and radical dictators armed with nuclear weapons," Bush said. "We are in a war that will set the course for this new century and determine the destiny of millions across the world."
[snip]
"We are fighting to maintain the way of life enjoyed by free nations, and we are fighting for the possibility that good and decent people across the Middle East can raise up societies based on freedom and tolerance and personal dignity," Bush said. "By standing with democratic leaders and reformers, by giving voice to the hopes of decent men and women, we are offering a path away from radicalism."
[snip]
"We will defeat our enemies ... we will protect our people .. and we will lead the 21st century into a shining age of human liberty," Bush said.

Once again Bush/Rove play the fear card. They want you to believe that without their diligence you are lost and without them a horde of Muslim fanatics will beat down you door and rape your daughter and eat your dog. It is them or us.

If you buy into this then I recommend you lock your doors and wait for the towel headed hordes to crash your door and ravage your family. Stop your life and crawl quivering into your basement. Just wait, because it is only a matter of time before the end draws nigh.

On the other hand you might reject this defeatist rhetoric and decide that America wasn't founded by lily livered cowards afraid of their own shadow and that the sacrifice of your self respect and personal liberties is too high a price to pay for the "Global War on Terror".

Either way, this November is the acid test. Do you want to cower in your closet or stand free and proud knowing that the price of freedom is real and requires a committment. There ain't no such thing as a free lunch. You are either a proud American that believes in the founding fathers and their gift of our Constitution and form of goverment or you are a coward and not willing to face the responsibility of being free. Your choice...it's a free country.

Here is my recommendation...
Stay focused on one and only one thing and this is the message.
You, as a voter have one and only one opportunity to do your job. As a voter you have only ONE DAY to hold the Bush Administration accountable for what’s happened in Iraq, Afghanistan, Abu Graib and Guantanamo not to mention what has happened here at home with Katrina and everything else. You only have ONE DAY — election day. If you like the way things are going, vote Republican. If you think things need to change, VOTE DEMOCRATIC. Seize the day. It’s your very last chance.”

No Fear

I remember September 11, 2001. I remember where I was and what I felt. I was shocked and angry mostly. All my years of work in military intelligence were flashing before me and I was absolutely incredulous that this was happening. We should have seen this coming months and months before execution. It turns out I was right to be mad and disgusted in addition to being shocked at the tragedy. We did see it coming as did our allies. Bush and company were warned but chose to ignore it and we suffered an unneccessary attack and loss as a result.

That's water under the bridge and it can't be fixed so I remember and acknowledge the loss. What I won't do is be afraid it will happen again. I expect my government to take adequate precautions and I'll put up with the extra airport security but I refuse to live in fear that it will happen again. I can't do better than the following excerpt to explain...

"What has changed, grotesquely, is the aftershock," Simon Jenkins writes in The Guardian, delivering a splash of cold reality. "Terrorism is 10% bang and 90% an echo effect composed of media hysteria, political overkill and kneejerk executive action, usually retribution against some wider group treated as collectively responsible. This response has become 24-hour, seven-day-a-week amplification by the new politico-media complex, especially shrill where the dead are white people. It is this that puts global terror into the bang. While we take ever more extravagant steps to ward off the bangs, we do the opposite with the terrorist aftershock. We turn up its volume. We seem to wallow in fear.

"Were I to take my life in my hands this weekend and visit Osama bin Laden's hideout in Wherever-istan, the interview would go something like this. I would ask how things have been for him since 9/11. His reply would be that he had worried at first that America would capitalise on the global revulsion, even among Muslims, and isolate him as a lone fanatic...

"In the event Bin Laden need not have worried. He would agree, as did the CIA's al-Qaida analyst in Peter Taylor's recent documentary, that the Americans have done his job for him. They panicked. They drove the Taliban back into the mountains, restoring the latter's credibility in the Arab street and turning al-Qaida into heroes. They persecuted Muslims across America. They occupied Iraq and declared Iran a sworn enemy. They backed an Israeli war against Lebanon's Shias. Soon every tinpot Muslim malcontent was citing al-Qaida as his inspiration. Bin Laden's tiny organisation, which might have been starved of funds and friends in 2001, had become a worldwide jihadist phenomenon.

"I would ask Bin Laden whether he had something special up his sleeve for the fifth anniversary. Why waste money, he would reply. The western media were obligingly re-enacting the destruction and the screaming, turning the base metal of violence into the gold of terror. They would replay the tapes and rerun the footage ad nauseam, and thus remind the world of his awesome power. Americans are more afraid of jihadists this year than last. In a Transatlantic Trends survey, the number of them describing international terrorism as an 'extremely important threat' went up from 72% to 79%...

"Bin Laden might boast that he had achieved terrorism's equivalent of an atomic chain reaction: a self-regenerating cycle of outrage and foreign-policy overkill, aided by anniversary journalism and fuelled by the grim scenarios of security lobbyists. He now had only to drop an occasional CD into the offices of al-Jazeera, and Washington and London quaked with fear. The authorities could be reduced to million-dollar hysterics by a phial of nail varnish, a copy of the Qur'an, or a dark-skinned person displaying a watch and a mobile phone."

To be able to live in absolute certainty that no terrorist will get another chance...to win the war on terror means that I/we will have to give up every freedom we have and all our privacy. I'm not willing to do that. There can be no secrets from government and the police if we are to be truly free of the threat of terrorism...think about what you are willing to give up to be totally free from the possibility of another attack.

Sunday Chat

Nice day here in Atlanta. The news is reporting that we had an earthquake here at 10:56a but I can’t say that I noticed anything. The epicenter was down in the gulf off of Tampa but a lot of people reported it here in Atlanta, evidently. I think I was just finishing the paper at the kitchen table about that time so it must not have been too vigorous.

About the same time as the reported shake I was standing at the kitchen window watching an immature Cooper’s hawk sitting on the deck railing. He sat there for at least a half hour while a couple of brave squirrels twitchily ate sunflower seeds just a few feet away. He watched them closely but never really attempted to go after one. Finally he or she spotted its desired prey and shot across the yard and took a chipmunk I think. It was very fast and the action was blocked by azaleas and irises. We are overrun with the cute little guys and I think that is why the hawk is a frequent visitor to the yard that plus I think he or she also has a taste for mourning doves which gather here in droves. I keep all the bird feeders full year around with all sorts of goodies so I have a pretty much constant parade of wildlife in the yard. I can throw an ear of dried corn on the deck and a couple of chipmunks can have it clean in less than a half hour and hauled off and stored somewhere nearby underground. With dozens of them running back and forth from the feeders with their bulging cheeks full of sunflower seed or corn I wouldn’t be surprised if there weren’t a couple of tons of stuff stored in my yard at any given time.

Getting some “honey do’s” done this weekend. Built two new platform feeders for the deck out of rough cut cedar and replaced the existing ones. Between the raccoons, squirrels and chipmunks I only get about six months out of them before they look so disreputable that Madam insists they be replaced. I also replaced all the light fixtures in the upstairs hall and stairway. Madam decided the globe fixtures had to go so now there are low profile things in their stead.

If the weather holds I think it is chicken on the grill tonight and probably some grilled baby yellow squash and red peppers along side. Last night we decided to do all veggie as the market had some beautiful organic green tomatoes so yesterday I surprised Madam with one of her favorites…fried green tomatoes. Don’t get me wrong I love them too but she had never had them until I made them once some twenty years ago and she decided it was one of her favorite foods. I must say that I have never tasted anyone else’s that are tastier than my FGT’s . If anyone wants my secret recipe just let me know. They are even better than the ones at the Whistle Stop Café in Juliette, Georgia where they filmed the Fannie Flag movie “Fried Green Tomatoes”.

It's Too Late

Blogger is eating posts today and I have lost two. I should know by now to keep a copy on the clipboard until I verify the post happened. I am slow, what can I say.
Now that it is over I will announce that I turned 57 today. There was little fanfare and only a few cards from faithful friends. Tragedy is best left unnoticed.

Madam and I did treat ourselves to a new bed today. I have noticed that I sleep better in hotels than I do at home and after checking found that the mattress we were sleeping on was 13 years old. Crikey!

We bought a new Beautyrest super-duper mattress and box springs for way too much money and it was delivered today. Madam is already asleep(watching TCM) so that is a good sign. I am about to indulge and will report in a couple of days if the mattress is as good as it's price. (I should sleep for days.)

Good Question

Thank the Goddess that Froomkin is back. He is on target today and taking apart the lies as only he can do.

A skeptical view on what Bush said yesterday suggests that under the cover of some impressive-sounding but fragmentary and in some cases dubious disclosures, the president was actually making some very controversial demands.

He was, in fact, calling for the CIA to continue to be allowed to use interrogation tactics that many people would reasonably consider torture; he was demanding retroactive legal immunity for American interrogators who used tactics that many people would reasonably consider torture; he was calling for the unprecedented admission of coerced evidence in an American legal proceeding; and after all those years of refusing to give Congress any role in this matter, he was insisting that they take action in a matter of days.

I especially liked the section of quotes from military lawyer types.

Richard Simon writes in the Los Angeles Times, quoting Brig. Gen. James C. Walker, U.S. Marine Corps staff judge advocate: "I'm not aware of any situation in the world where there is a system of jurisprudence that is recognized by civilized people, where an individual can be tried and convicted without seeing the evidence against him. And I don't think that the United States needs to become the first in that scenario."

David Welna of NPR reported the following priceless exchange between Rep. GK Butterfiled (D-N.C.) and Steven G. Bradbury, the Justice Department Office of Legal Counsel's acting chief.

Butterfield: "Would the administration find these procedures that you've put forward to be acceptable to one of our members if they were being tried by a foreign government?"

Bradbury: "I think probably not."

I guess the question that I have is why this question isn't the first question always asked when we start discussing the prisoners being held in Gitmo?

One More Thing

I overlooked this little tidbit in the last post. This is after the unprecedented security crackdown by American troops and Iraqi security forces last month. This kinda' flies in the face of what we are hearing from our side....

Washington Post

Baghdad's morgue almost tripled its count for violent deaths in Iraq's capital during August from 550 to 1,536, authorities said Thursday, appearing to erase most of what U.S. generals and Iraqi leaders had touted as evidence of progress in a major security operation to restore order in the capital.

This is Progress?

While Doofus Bush is wandering the nation telling us what a fine job he is doing on the GWOT the wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq are continuing to devolve into deeper and deeper quagmires and/or civil war. Somebody needs to take him by the shoulders and give him a good shaking and try and wake him up.

"We're not leaving Iraq until we win." he says yesterday in Atlanta. Hello! For all intents and purposes we have already lost and are now just fighting a holding action and trying to minimize American casualities.

From Afghanistan...
As the American general heading up NATO forces issues a plea for help saying they underestimated the strength of the Taliban in southern Afghanistan, a suicide bomber sets off a huge explosion near the US embassy in Kabul.

The driver of a car packed with explosives rammed into a U.S. military convoy in downtown Kabul on Friday, killing himself and at least 18 other people, including two American soldiers. Two other American soldiers were among 31 people wounded.

But not to worry because Opium production is up 40% over last year.

Meanwhile in Iraq it just keeps getting worse...the following are from yesterday.

KIRKUK - A roadside bomb exploded on Wednesday near a police patrol in Kirkuk, wounding four policemen, including an officer, police said. . .

MOSUL - The bodies of six men with multiple gunshot wounds were found in the northwestern suburbs of Mosul, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, sources at the morgue said. . .

BAGHDAD - A suicide car bomber killed 10 people and wounded 17 at a petrol station used by police vehicles in eastern Baghdad, police said. The casualty toll included police and motorists caught in congested traffic nearby. . .

BAGHDAD - Two bombs planted in a market killed two policemen and four civilians in Zaafariniya in southern Baghdad, police said. . .

BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb targeting a police patrol exploded in Karrada district, central Baghdad, killing one civilian and wounding two others, police said. . . .

BAGHDAD - Four people, including two policemen, were wounded when a police patrol was struck by a roadside bomb in al-Qahtan intersection, western Baghdad, police said. . .

BAGHDAD - A suicide car bomber targeting a police patrol killed three people and wounded 10 in a tunnel in Bab al-Sharji district, central Baghdad, an Interior Ministry source said. . .

BAGHDAD - Gunmen killed two policemen and wounded four civilians when they attacked Shi'ite pilgrims crossing a southern Baghdad bridge, police said. . .

BAGHDAD - Two roadside bombs exploded in different areas of the mostly Shi'ite Amil neighbourhood in southwestern Baghdad, killing two civilians and wounding seven others, an Interior Ministry source said. The target of the bombs was unclear. . .

BAGHDAD - A suicide car bomber detonated his explosives at an Iraqi police commando checkpoint in western Baghdad's Yarmouk district, wounding seven police commandos, an Interior Ministry source said. . .

NEAR SUWAYRA - The bodies of three people, including a beheaded woman bearing signs of torture, were retrieved from the Tigris river near town of Suwayra, south of Baghdad, police said. . .