Joe Klein, in an otherwise decent column:
There is the fear that he won’t have the strength to stand up to the Israelis (or the Iranians) or to the left wing of his party on health care or to the porkers on the defense budget. On the other hand, there are three dead Somali pirates who attest to this President’s ability to make tough decisions in a timely fashion.
Somali pirates are not the scariest menace evah and Obama is not the greatest American hero for authorizing Navy Seals to attempt a rescue (as John has pointed out before). It starts with gushing over a president’s ability to outwit a band of teen-aged pirates and it ends with awe over a flight suit that makes “the best of his manly characteristic“.
In for a penny, in for a pound.
(And if Joe Klein thinks that the “left wing of his party” is the 800 pound gorilla in the health care room, he’s a bigger idiot than I thought.)
John Cole
I almost wrote a Shorter Joe Klein post on that Time cover that said nothing but “fap fap fap” but I got distracted by work.
The Grand Panjandrum
You might be a Villager:
… if you fawn over politicians at the drop of a hat.
(I am an Obama enthusiast but giving the Navy permission to take out three pirates carrying small arms isn’t quite the same thing as the Normandy invasion.)
Matthew Hooper
*shrug* The Somali pirate incident is really more of a useful anecdote than anything meaningful. Politics and the media are full of these things in recent decades: Bush the Elder’s “Message: I care”, Nancy Reagan’s daffy expenditures, Jimmy Carter’s rabbit attack, etc. It’s an incident that defines character in the American public’s eye. The fact that it’s actually true and has some genuine meaning makes it that much more useful.
It’s not a huge deal by any stretch, but it helps Obama deflect the typical “weak leader” meme from Republicans. Note how the “Obama bowed/didn’t bow/kowtow/curtsy/whatever” attempts at this Republican talking point have vanished.
Of course, I like to think that the American public latches onto the incidents that contain a kernel of truth that needs a definition. But that’s just me.
DougJ
I didn’t think the rest of it was *that* bad.
Warren Terra
The need of some insecure people on the left to say that Obama Is So a tough guy is really funny and says a lot more about the sort of playground victim mentality (“Colmes Syndrome”?) that a lot of us lefties have suffered from in recent years than it could ever say about Obama. The best cure, of course, is just to be competent and confident and to ignore the taunts rather than overreacting to prove them wrong; fortunately, Obama seems to understand that.
But I also think that we can also agree that the circa 2002-3 George W Bush, if he were President in the aftermath of the Somali episode, would have gotten into his codpiece-enhanced flightsuit and posed with the SEALs on deck as if he had personally directed the whole thing, and that Noonan and Assrocket and all the usual suspects would have written epic paeans to the steely determination with which he faced down this Teenage Dinghy Terrorist Menace.
MikeJ
At some point in the next 3.75 years something bad will happen involving the US military. Chances are it will have nothing to do with any decision made by Obama, but he will take all the blame.
He doesn’t deserve credit for this (other than having enough sense to stay out of the way) and he won’t deserve blame for whatever bad thing he’s going to get blamed for.
ts
Joe’s turning into Kathryn Sister Mary Lopez, circa 2003.
Let us pray that Obama never dons a flightsuit, or TIME will have to purchase Mssr Klein a new flatscreen.
John Cole
It was pretty gushing all the way through- maybe it was nice to read when you consider some of the catty nonsense out there, but I just didn’t find anything too insightful in the piece. Klein is better than that piece.
The Grand Panjandrum
OT: Is Tedisco getting ready to concede?
cleek
Howard Fineman sure noticed:
i’ve seen him with a hat; i’ve seen him with a cat; i’ve seen him on a plane; i’ve seen him on a train.
…
…
El Cid
In the days after the rescue by shooting the pirates, I was rather shocked — though of course I shouldn’t have been — by several colleagues spontaneously making statements along the themes of how tough and macho this was, and man, we sure shot them pirates, we blew their f***ing heads off, blah blah, and then I heard the same shit from right wing AM radio.
My god, it’s really, really f***ing pathetic if you find yourself making proud and leg-tingling statements about how awesome it was that our forces shot these pirates.
It’s like reading a story about how police had to shoot a kidnapper and going, “BAM!! POW!!! BOO-YAH!!! MAN WE FRIGGIN’ SHOT HIM THRU THE HEDD!!! YEAHHH!!!!”
Catpain Haddock
Klein says that because the full page Pfizer ads in Time that pay his salary prevent him from saying anything else.
Legalize
But what about zombie pirates? Huh? What about them?
El Cid
And let’s never forget the implicit requirement that all Presidents get “blooded” at some point. Until they publicly and proudly order some sort of dramatic killing, they could possibly be cowardly subversive America-hating pacifist extremist pussies, and we must be dissuaded from this fear.
Jim
As a member of that “left wing” (I think I’d be center to center-right in pretty much every other industrialized country in the world), when has Obama ever caved in (to use Kleinesque Beltwayese) to the left?
That cracked me right the hell up. “I’ve seen him in a car, but never in a bar”
wilfred
Since Obama has been President at least 56 Afghan children have been killed in drone attacks in Afghanistan and the NWFP, attacks whose continued authorization was one of his first acts as President. This is besides the horseshit support he spewed during the Israeli invasion of Gaza, which killed over 500 Palestinian women and children, and the ongoing blockade.
He was a well credentialed pig before Somalia – you just didn’t notice it.
tomjones
Good points all, Doug. But although the pirate story does impart a mythological war-making prowess on President Obama, we need to just let it slide.
Remember, there is the pernicious myth that Democrats are “soft” on defense, and if the pirate myth can take the weak myth down a peg or two, it’s all for the greater good.
There you go, Republicans, even we libs can give in to the utilitarian temptation!
Cat Lady
@Jim:
As Atrios would say, Joe Klein’s afraid of the dirty fucking hippies that live under his bed.
John S.
Wilfred-
Not that I disagree with the thrust of your point, but do you have any moral outrage for egregious acts committed against non-Muslims? Or are you simply a one-note jukebox?
Dennis-SGMM
The press was conditioned to this sort of gushing by Bush, who never missed an opportunity to cast whatever he was doing as The Most Important Thing Ever. The gushing is now reflexive.
Andrew
The Somali pirate incident resolution is only useful in that it stopped the right wing from going off on a 24/7 hand wringing crap fest about yet another trivial issue.
argh
Cole: “Klein is better than that piece.”
Cole is better than this statement.
El Cid
By the way, the concern that “the left wing of the [Democratic] party” is the greatest threat never ever varies.
The establishment and their punditariat worshipers always see the left as the greatest threat to the nation.
It doesn’t matter the time or the subject — look what the establishment and punditariat declare as the greatest threat, though from time to time not the most immediate threat.
Banks and investment institutions are being run into the ground such that we gotta rush to hand them trillions, but the real threat is angry populism which might limit executive pay and slow down our awesome financial innovations we’ve ‘achieved’ over the last couple of decades and impose too many regulations.
Obama’s release of information to we, the god-damned citizenry of this country, of what our government was doing in our name is a threat because it might cause crazy idiot hawks to slightly hesitate from launching some other idiot hawk policy which supposedly is in ‘the national interest’ but which, as usual, ends up making the nation and the world worse off for people like me and my loved ones.
wilfred
@John S.:
I’m against all thuggery. However, for the past 7 years or so the only victims of American thuggery have been Muslims. Longer than that actually.
As I said, 56 Afghan children are nameless and invisible.
JL
OT According to TPM
Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.
Dennis-SGMM
@El Cid:
Who can forget those halcyon days when the anti-war left was a fifth-column bent on undermining Bush’s heroic struggle to save us from Saddam’s nuclear weapons and germ-spreading balsa wood drones? Good times.
tomjones
@Matthew Hooper: Oops. What he said.
Dennis-SGMM
Wilfred:
Lo, the poor
IndianMuslim! whose untutor’d mind. Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind; His soul proud Science never taught to stray …wilfred
Wow, Macauley?
Montysano (All Hail Marx & Lennon)
@Andrew:
So instead, the right wing radio yappers go off on “Obama murdered three black teenagers.”
Michael
On the pirates, what I appreciated was that the White House was actually pretty quiet about the whole thing. From the beginning, there wasn’t a bunch of “fill yer hand, you sonofabitch” talk, nor was there a bunch of handwringing. A decision was made, it was executed competently, and there wasn’t a bunch of crowing about it after the fact.
It was a decision that just was and had to be, then everyone moved on to the next task (except for the Village – they can never move on from anything).
I appreciated that more than you can imagine, and was precisely what I voted for: No Drama Obama.
harlana pepper
OT, but the House is having a hearing on climate change with Al Gore and . . . wait for it . . .
Newt Gingrich!
(head/keyboard)
Dennis-SGMM
@wilfred:
Pope; “Essay on Man.”
wilfred
@Dennis-SGMM:
Thanks – minus the lyric, it reminded me of Macauley’s Minute on Education.
El Cid
@Michael: Clearly Obama should have followed up the rescue / pirate-killing by parachuting onto a U.S.-flagged, nay, ultra-flagged cargo vessel as confetti rained down from balloons floating above, Aerosmith playing live on the deck, and Obama wearing a Hollywood version of a Texas Rangers outfit complete with 10 gallon hate, pearl-handled… Well, part of that movie has been made.
El Cid
@harlana pepper: In honor of Al Gore’s testimony, I remind us of one of my favorite historical moments ever, that from March of 2007 when Barbara Boxer got tired of James Inhofe being a complete ass to Al Gore, and had to teach Senator Jackass (R-Okiedokey) who it was that ran the committee now.
The Moar You Know
@El Cid: What, you don’t do this?
tomjones
Also, there are some revealing pics in the photo essay that accompanies the Klein essay.
The one in particular that struck me is a picture of a contemplative Pres. Obama at the table, assuming an almost prayerful position.
It is not until you read the caption that you learn the picture was taken as Obama was weighing the merits of some decision or another.
Apparently, he takes a few minutes of quite contemplation before decidering.
I was impressed.
The Moar You Know
@El Cid: I know that was an accident but it’s a lot funnier this way.
tomjones
@wilfred: Thanks for the copious linkage. Verily, those were well-supported assertions.
*sigh* I still can’t get over the fact that people throw around numbers in the internet age without backing it up with so much as link.
joe from Lowell
The pirate incident would be completely unworthy of mention, except for the fact that the wingnuts spent days hyping it, as evidence of Obama’s weakness and indecision.
The Moar You Know
@wilfred: Not so. I understand the Iraqis took the war as an opportunity to rid themselves of their troublesome Christian minority (as well as quite a few others) and there are at least 5,000 US soldiers dead because of our “thuggery”, some who were Muslim, but mostly not.
War kills everybody, no matter who you’re praying to when the bombs start falling.
Montysano (All Hail Marx & Lennon)
@El Cid:
I don’t feel proud or awesome about it, but I am impressed by the skill it took to shoot from one boat bobbing in the ocean to another boat bobbing in the ocean, at night, simultaneously. I’m glad we have people like that in our military.
MikeJ
Front page at GOS now:
Strong, decisive leader. And when asked what he’d done that they liked best, shooting pirates didn’t come up. They liked him paling around with Chavez and spending lots of money.
NonyNony
@El Cid:
That’s because for the establishment and punditariat as far as the Democratic Party is concerned it’s ALWAYS 1969 and the dirty fucking hippies are threatening to tear the nation apart.
Someday these folks will finally retire or die off and maybe we can move the conversation up a few decades. I’m not holding out much hope that it will advance up to, say, the current year or anything, but maybe up to the 1990s or something?
passerby
@cleek:
Thanks, I needed that to jump start my day. It’s just the right accompaniment for my first cup.
WRT healthcare, here’s hoping we can have a modern system that assures that people get whatever it is they need. Should it be run by the government? I’m having trouble seeing it any other way. Seems as long as insurance companies and corporations are involved, people will always be used as cash cows and the system will always devolve into what we have now.
Hyperion
@John Cole:
please make a note of this.
and refer to it when you write your next “i can’t believe what an idiot Joke Line is.”
WereBear
Obama could cure cancer and the right wing would be all, “He’s thrown pharmaceutical employees out of work! And messed up our health insurance tables! Work of the Devil!”
etcetera
Bootlegger
@harlana pepper:
Do you think Newt will talk about how cow farts are natural and thus so is carbon emission? I like that one.
SGEW
Sounds like someone has a case of the “shouldas.”
demkat620
@Bootlegger: I think Al should ask Boehner if he uses lotion or aerosol spray on tan. You know, for the environment.
Chinn Romney
While looking at that picture of the captured pirate it dawned on me that there’s a very easy solution to the whole thing. With that big grin on his face I thought at first I was looking at this year’s Boston Marathon winner. Then I put 2 and 2 together: Make the prizes bigger, and more of them! Problem solved.
We’re solving all the world’s problems, right here on BJ. It’s better than any egghead think tank. We just need to get the Pols to start listening.
MNPundit
Well like I’ve said elsewhere, it’s a huge relief to have somebody it’s okay to just kill.
It’s been open season on Pirates for 10,000 years!
Fwiffo
I’m really sick of the 800 pound gorilla metaphor. Gorillas simply do not get that big. The heaviest male gorillas are like 400 pounds, and the only ones even that big are those who’ve grown obese in captivity.
omen
why couldn’t zbig be part of the administration? have they picked somebody to replace chas freeman?
kay
@Chinn Romney:
He’s scared. He’s 16 years old, and they brought him to another country for trial. That rigid grin makes me sad. It’s fear, and it’s not uncommon. “Experts” say it’s a way of communicating to people that’s he’s non-threatening, so it’s defensive, on his part. He doesn’t want you to be frightened of him, hence, the smile.
He started crying at the hearing to determine if he was entitled to protection from the press. Juveniles have that protection from the press in the US. I don’t know if the judge determined he qualified.
I don’t object, at all, to him being charged and brought to trial. It’s a serious charge, though, he’s looking at a long time, and he’s so young. I can’t imagine what I would be thinking if I surrendered, and was brought before our insane press, at 16, alone, and so far from home.
Dennis-SGMM
Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus (Pompey the Great) made his bones going after pirates in the Mediterranean. I figure that piracy was invented about two weeks after flotation was discovered.
omen
@Dennis-SGMM:
pompey the sailor man?
Brachiator
@El Cid:
Excellent point! Just cannot add anything to it.
Another geat point, and one that provides context for the praise that Obama has been getting on this issue. I clearly remember watching Newt on one of the Sunday pundit shows ennumerating all the signs of Obama weakness, complete with faux historical context (Jefferson and the Barbary pirates), all building up to Newt’s grand finale — that the president’s inability to deal with the Somali pirates clearly demonstrated an inability to lead.
And then, poor Newt’s delusional reveries were blown out of the water.
This kinda goes with the territory if you decide on piracy as a career choice.
Dennis-SGMM
@omen:
He was the first to state, “Sum id quod sum.”
(I am what I am.)
passerby
@kay:
This.
And may I say kay, you are one of the most reasonable voices here. Your comments are always slap full of quiet consideration. My opinions are shoot-from-the-hip, freeform, from the gut musings.
Quiet consideration is not my style, and cannot be everybody’s style–that would be boring–so, thanks for bringin’ it. It’s somehow refreshing.
omen
not on the wall street species.
passerby
@Dennis-SGMM:
Wish I’d have come up with this.
harlana pepper
El Cid: I remember that moment, it felt good – however, just from the snippets I’ve seen, looks like repubes still can’t help being rude and disrespectful to Gore. Fuck.Them.Raw.
Cat Lady
@El Cid:
You mean this:
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3008/2571752536_54e583c3e7.jpg
omen
what the hell is wrong with klein? he equates desire to seek accountability on torture with media hype surrounding the obama dog and shaking hands with chavez.
kay
@passerby:
Thanks. I deal with 16 old boys a lot. I know this one has had a different sort of life than “mine” but that pleading smile always kills me. He has that unique to boys out-of-body walk, too, because he was much smaller not too long ago. He hasn’t figured out to manage his height yet.
He’s going away for a long time. He won’t “get it” until sentencing, because they don’t have an adult sense of time, or, really, reality.
From boy-pirate to notorious US defendant, in days.
D. Mason
Al Gore is in a pretty tragic position really. He believes to the bottom of his soul in the things he is trying to communicate, and he sure seems to be right. His belief drives him to keep going back for more punishment from the same crowd that stole his Presidency in 2000. He will always be a chump in their eyes, and until a few months ago they held all of the keys.
itsbenj
yes, god forbid the “left wing” get control of the healthcare debate and actually … pass … healthcare. America would never forgive the “left wing” for that! I’m almost sure!
JK
@Chinn Romney: Funny, funny, funny
passerby
@kay:
I can’t imagine what I would be thinking if I surrendered, and was brought before our insane press, at 16, alone, and so far from home.
The US, et al, needs someone to be made an example of and this Somali was in the wrong place at the wrong time. He’s happlessly become the poster boy for, as noted upthread, a problem that has existed since flotation was discovered.
After all, is it his fault that Europe has used his homeland as a dumping ground for nuclear waste? Is it his fault that, on such an abundant planet, that Somalia has been used, abused and discarded as a “failed state”?
He is 16 years old. Here’s hoping he’s being treated well and not being used as the goat for this whole mess.
DonkeyKong
I remember when Michael Caine killed loads of pirates on that coast guard cutter and rescued his son, that was some serious ass kicking…..Let’s see Obama do THAT!
Tattoosydney
@omen:
Hee.
harlana pepper
D. Mason, I think the visceral hatred comes from insecurity and fear of such a brilliant, accomplished, virtuous man — e.g., the antithesis of what they are. That’s the only explanation I can come up with, frankly, this hatred is so deep and abiding, he must be demonized, humiliated and “French-ified” at every turn.
I haven’t seen Newt, but no kiddin’, that’s what CSPAN said – maybe he’s testifying in the next round or something. But honest to god, if this is the best repubes can do to oppose climate change legislation, that’s all the evidence I need that they are completely lost in the wilderness without a compass and nothing but leaves with which to wipe their asses.
JK
@DougJ: If you think Joe Klein got carried away with the Somali pirate story, you should have watched Chris Matthews last night. He had an orgasm while mentioning it. The way Matthews referred to it, you’d think that taking down those 3 pirates was on the same scale of importance as the D-Day landings at Normandy.
The hype surrounding the Somali pirate incident is just one more example of how totally fucked up the MSM is in its inability to report stories within any proper perspective. If the Navy Seals had been unsuccessful, Matthews and the other useless idiots in the punditocracy would have been wailing and wringing their hands declaring that Obama was hopelessly impotent.
kay
@passerby:
So far, I think he’s been treated well. I expected more of a circus. Maybe the press tired of the whole pirate story, or maybe a judge put the kibosh on photographing his appearances.
Chinn Romney
@kay – I imagine the kid is terrified. But my sympathies don’t go very far, he and his cronies were packing automatic weapons and rpg’s. They were pointing them at crew members.
But He is definitely now being used, one thing that bothers me is this insistence that he’s 18,not 16. How do they know this, how can they be sure? What, they checked his pirate license?
Dennis-SGMM
@harlana pepper:
Newt is going to call for a War on Climate Change. It will consist of equipping wildlife with lasers so that they can kill climate change wherever they confront it. This will be followed by a Surge, where trees are equipped with lasers and thrown into the fray to secure our victory.
JK
@passerby: Criminal defense attorney and Air America radio host Ron Kuby said on the air a few days ago that he was approached about the possiblility of joining the defense team representing the Somali pirate. Kuby said that another prominent defense lawyer was already planning to join the defense team. I’ve listened to Kuby for many years. He’s a very forceful and passionate advocate for his position. If he joins the defense team, the pirate will have a powerful voice in his corner. From the way Kuby spoke about the case, it sounded like the pirate will end up well represented in terms of his defense team.
John S.
Good, but I want to point out that:
1) Not all forms of thuggery are perpetrated by America. You may be surprised to learn that a few Muslim countries are themselves perpetrators of thuggery.
2) The only victims of American thuggery certainly have NOT only been Muslims. There are many forms of thuggery, and American citizens – of all religious stripes – have been far more the victim of it than anyone residing on foreign soil.
TenguPhule
I’d have more sympathy if he was only accused rather then completely guilty of a crime that should by all rights have gotten him the death penalty.
kay
@TenguPhule:
I’m not in favor of the death penalty, but I think it’s a serious crime and he’ll get serious punishment.
I do have some sympathy for him, though. The two things aren’t mutually exclusive.
passerby
@JK:
Thanks for the info JK. I need to tune in to AA more often. I’m glad to hear this news. It gives me hope that the circus trial that is to follow will put the necessary focus on the effects of neglecting the problems of indigent nations and, for starters, the causes (and remedies) of piracy.
I can’t help but observe that the horn of Africa is inhabited by third worlders while, across the Gulf of Aden (and the Red Sea), we see nations of untold wealth on the Saudi Peninsula:
Stark representation of “haves” and neighboring “have-nots” and the inevitable tensions engendered by this imbalance of prosperity and global support.
Got oil? we’ll kiss you, hold your hand and bow to you and have you over to the White House. Got pirates with AK-47s? we’ll ignore you until you cross some (unspecified) line.
passerby
@TenguPhule:
I’d have more sympathy if he was only accused rather then completely guilty of a crime that should by all rights have gotten him the death penalty.
@kay
I’m not in favor of the death penalty, but I think it’s a serious crime and he’ll get serious punishment.
In my view, bring the hammer down on this young man is equivalent to locking up a corner drug dealer for 20 years. Doesn’t get to the heart of the matter…but it looks great on the evening news.
Turgidson
@JK:
Ron Kuby?!?! You mean the lawyer the Dude asks for when he gets hauled into the Malibu police station in the Big Lebowski? I never realized that was a real person.
WIN!
TenguPhule
I understand that.
Just pointing out that I personally can’t feel empathy for the guy.
TenguPhule
It also gets one more of them off the street, er sea.
Scum of the earth, your average corner drug dealer.
wilfred
@tomjones:
Here:
http://www.rawa.org/temp/runews/2009/04/12/americaand-8217-s-afghan-war-the-real-world-versus-obamaand-8217-s-marketed-imagery.html
RAWA is the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan – completely forgotten by American ‘feminists’ but never by those with memories.
kay
@TenguPhule:
I know. I have trouble mustering any sympathy for pedophile sex offenders. “Trouble” probably isn’t accurate. I’m incapable of any sympathy in that case, at all, so I see your point.
I’m curious about what convinced him to surrender. Is he just a little brighter than his pirate comrades? He knew this wasn’t ending well?
wilfred
@John S.:
Whatever. Since I’m an American citizen I’m concerned with the actions of my country. Besides, the current uproar over torture underlines the point that every single one of all detainees, abu Ghraib victims and torture sufferers has been a Muslim.
People get upset with general things – ‘Torture is bad’ while forgetting that the United States has targeted only one group of people these past few years. Things start to change when we move from the general to the specific, from the abstract to the concrete.
The Muslim is the possessor of absolute negativity, a burden held most recently by Black people and Jews, both of which have murdered tens of thousands of people, too.
I’m concerned with what the United States does, and right now it is killing an awful lot of innocent people.
Obama, whatever his pretensions to the status of Philosopher King, has already got plenty of blood on his hands.
passerby
@TenguPhule:
Yeah, but…
TenguPhule, what about the hundreds more who are lined up to take his place? From the standpoint of resources–time, energy and money–how many more could be locked away until progress is made deterring the continued practice of piracy?
Their fishing waters have been virtually rendered forever toxic, some shadowy arms dealer is more than happy to continue supplying the village chiefs with weaponry, and little to nothing has been done to demonstrate that any one in the world gives a damn about their plight.
So far, the answer has been for dozens of countries, worldwide, to dispatch their navies to the Gulf of Aden but, piracy continues to go on.
I read this week that various navies, international in scope, have gathered to practice pirate management in the sparkling waters off Florida (IIRC). Shouldn’t there also be a strategy for undercutting the tyrannical chiefs or at least make them an offer they can’t refuse?
JK
@Turgidson: Yes it’s the same Ron Kuby. He was an apprentice to civil rights lawyer William Kuntsler. This is the website for his radio program http://airamerica.com/doingtime.
The Big Lebowski is a classic
tomjones
@kay: He was injured. One of the crewmembers stabbed him in the hand with something or other.
TenguPhule
I think the men with guns surrounding him did the trick.
TenguPhule
*Shrugs*
It won’t ever stop, but we won’t stop policing because of that.
As always, it’s a two part solution and we as a nation really only want one part, the shooting. Not the assistance to get them to find alternatives to piracy.
We haven’t the funding or the political capital to help them now. When in hock, the first step is to get out of it before worrying about the other guy worse off.
kay
@TenguPhule:
Funny. Touche.
I considered that. I decided it was more complicated. We’re not going to ever know what happened on that ship.
They can’t get a reliable read on how old he is, because his home country is the definition of chaos. US court process is so dry and paper-dependent. I can’t get my head around the Somali boy-pirate with his 17th century crime and the dull-as-dust paper-gathering going on.
GeneJockey
@TenguPhule:
Not only that, but the last time we tried to help turned out less than satisfactorily.