Arming civilian vessels?

"As Dr. Ikle' observes the reason that crews have not already been armed is that the shipping companies have been advised not to by lawyers and by their insurance companies."

Is that REALLY the only reason crews have not already been armed? Do armed crews really change either the "cost of entry into piracy" or the "prospective rewards?" Pirates already have enough weaponry to inflict a great deal more damage than they have to date. If that is primarily because ships have limited their ability to defend themselves, then changing that dynamic might simply lead to more violent pirate actions. Shooting your way on to a ship that you most certainly outgun is probably still better than barely surviving as a fisherman. 

I think that's more likely the fear of shipping companies. I'm not saying that arming civilian ships isn't the answer...but I don't think it's as easy an answer as is currently being presented.

Huh?

Talk about jumping to conclusions. Pirates collect ransom. Pirates come from Somalia. Somalia has some connections to Islamic terrorism. Therefore, ransom money is funding terrorism. You think he could at least TRY to offer a bit of proof here:

"And worse than this ongoing demonstration of cowardice is the financing of terrorists that results from the huge ransom payments these pirates are allowed to collect."

Seriously...?

Dude writes an article about Boeing and can't even figure out he's got the wrong nomenclature for their "new flagship?" And this is in TIME?

"The impression among investors who follow Boeing is that boneheaded management had allowed poor labor relationships and a slowdown in the launching of the company's new 777 flagship, which has been set back by well over year, to undermine the tremendous demand for the firm's planes."

As Cuts Loom, Will Working From Home Lead to a Layoff? - washingtonpost.com

Ouch. Another example of companies and employees doing the exactly WRONG thing in response to hard times. Workers are going to be paid less, transportation costs are still likely to rise in the mid-to-long term, commuting will continue to waste the time of employees, and physical infrastructure will continue to be a substantial burden for companies that haven't figured out how to harness the tools that information technology are providing at lower and lower price points.

At the same time that technology is making a lot of physical infrastructure unnecessary, companies are cutting employees (the part of a company that actually, you know, DOES stuff) in order to hold on to it. Sad.

Expect a cycle of violence

The sort of adversarial relationship that's only likely to get worse. Two cops get shot during a traffic stop and "The Associated Press reported Saturday that people lingered at the scene of the traffic-stop shooting. About 20 bystanders taunted the police."

Legitimacy continues to fade

Militarily speaking, Israel gained next to nothing from the Gaza
incursion. As in Lebanon, they did, however, seek to differentiate
themselves from their opponents through careful documentation and
highlighting of both the immoral actions of their enemies and the
risks they were willing to take to maintain the moral high ground. Now
even that is slipping away.

In Lebanon, Israel let Operational concerns outweigh Strategic
objectives. In Gaza, it appears Tactical - perhaps even individual -
concerns trumped all other objectives.

From The New York Times:

"Soldiers' Accounts of Gaza Killings Raise Furor in Israel"
By ETHAN BRONNER

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/20/world/middleeast/20gaza.html

Dancing the bailout shuffle

Http://m.apnews.com/ap/db_7736/contentdetail.htm?contentguid=Frsq5hkF

The problem affecting the entire industry is overcapacity. But the
individual companies struggling for survival are all interested in
maintaining or expanding their own capacity - even if that means
building false demand by making dealers sit on cars they can't sell.

I think this is called the "bailout shuffle." Step 1: Company goes out
of its way to appear financially sound in order to appease private
investors. Step 2: Company pivots 180 degrees and goes out of its way
to appear financially strapped in order to access government bailout
funds. Step 3: Company pivots back to step 1 in order to convince the
government that the money has been used effectively. Although we
haven't really seen it yet in the car industry, I'm guessing step 4
looks a whole lot like step 2. Repeat until company and government are
both out of money.

This starts to scratch the itch...

...but I think the problems with the bailout may run deeper. Demand
for vehicles in the US has been artificially inflated for years by
easy credit. I think it's logical to assume those days of easy credit
are gone for the foreseeable future.

With demand reduced and unlikely to grow, money spent to artificially
prop up supply seems pretty damn stupid. Does that mean the next step
is federal dollars committed to building make-believe demand as well?

I think the ugly truth is that we're dumping money into a system that
is tying down labor and capital more than it is aiding the economy. At
this point, the only benefit in dragging out all three companies seems
to be that we are delaying their collapse until a time when perhaps it
won't be so devastating to an already reeling economy.

An interesting dilemma in Minnesota

If the separation between the two candidates is within the margin of
error, how can we expect to fairly determine the winner? Seems like a
run-off vote would make a lot more sense. Throw out the third party
candidate and let's figure this one out for real.

Pirates open fire on U.S. cruise ship - Somalia- msnbc.com

Navies can't commit enough resources to stop pirates through patrolling. There simply aren't enough ships to cover the distances or the traffic involved.

There isn't enough international consensus to stop piracy through aggressive intervention in Somalia. Maybe, in the long term, international assistance can help settle some of the domestic issues tearing Somalia apart but that doesn't help in the short and mid term.

In both the short and the mid-term, ships traveling through the region will have to either accept that they are responsible for their own safety and well-being or both the navies and the vessels transiting the region will have to consider convoying in a manner similar to that used during the U-boat campaigns of WWI and WWII.