New detection technology is helping in Iraq.
Jack Linthicum
Friday, February 10, 2006
Stopping Roadside Bombs
New detection technology is helping in Iraq.
By Kevin Bullis
The advanced technology of the U.S. military has so far met its match
in Iraq in the form of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) triggered by
garage-door openers, cell phones, and washing-machine timers. But this
situation could be changing. New technology may make it easier to find
explosives and bomb makers long before they can trigger a deadly
roadside bomb.
One device the U.S. military now uses in Iraq can detect TNT vapors
through bomb casings and even in land mines buried six inches
underground. At checkpoints, it can smell explosive residues on the
skin of bomb makers -- even if they used gloves and washed their hands
several times after working with TNT. Furthermore, a second generation
of the detector, based on technology at least thirty times more
sensitive, could be available within one to two years, says Aimee Rose,
a research scientist at R&D firm Nomadics, who's working on the new
device.
According to U.S. Department of Defense releases, fifteen soldiers have
been killed by IEDs since one such device seriously injured ABC news
anchor Bob Woodruff and his cameraman on January 29. In fact, IEDs are
the leading cause of U.S. combat deaths in Iraq, says deputy defense
secretary Gordon England. The bombs have recently received more
attention, as last month 600 military, industry, and academic leaders
gathered in Washington, DC, to learn about and consider new solutions
to the problem. IED efforts have come under the watch of a $3 billion
organization led by a senior commander, retired four-star general
Montgomery Meigs, former commander of NATO peace-keeping operations in
Bosnia.
The TNT detector, first tested in Iraq in 2004, is now also being used
in Afghanistan and in "homeland security" applications, according to
Nomadics, the Stillwater, OK, company that makes the device. Instead of
sensing particles of TNT, like other explosives detectors, the
2.7-pound handheld device sniffs vapors as effectively as a trained
dog.
But the sensors have their limits. They cannot be mounted on a Humvee
and used to detect IEDs as the vehicle drives around on patrol. Unless
there is a favorable wind, the detector has to be right next to the
TNT, Rose says -- close enough that the IED might be detonated before a
signal is read.
For that reason, the device is used primarily to find bomb makers and
their explosives before a bomb is planted. "There are far fewer bomb
makers than there are bombs," says Melissa Brechwald, marketing
projects manager at Nomadics. "If you get one bomb maker you're
stopping exponentially more bombs from being laid."
Soldiers can use the devices at checkpoints, for example, to sample the
air inside vehicles for traces of explosives, then either detain
suspects or follow them in the hope of finding bomb-making factories,
Brechwald says. The devices have also been mounted on robots for remote
surveys of suspected bomb sites and weapons caches, she says.
The heart of the detector is a semiconducting polymer, originally
developed by MIT chemistry professor Timothy Swager, that fluoresces
when exposed to ultraviolet light. As air is pumped over this material,
any TNT vapors will interfere with the fluorescence, causing it to dim.
Electronics detect this change and relay the information to soldiers in
the form of a bar graph and Geiger-counter-like sounds. The process
takes just a few seconds, and after detecting TNT, the sensor can
refresh itself in a few more seconds and be ready to test the next
vehicle at a checkpoint.
The next-generation device should extend the distance at which TNT
vapors can be detected and allow operation in cold temperatures, such
as in the mountains of Afghanistan. It will use a polymer-based sensing
element, also developed at MIT, that instead of merely glowing,
produces a much more intense light in the form of a laser. When TNT
vapors touch the material, it suddenly stops lasing, causing a dramatic
drop-off in the amount of light. "As a consequence, you can amplify the
recognition of the presence of TNT," increasing the detector's
sensitivity, says Vladimir Bulovic, an electrical engineering professor
at MIT who was involved with developing the more-sensitive device.
Rose is now adapting the device, described last April in the journal
Nature, for low-power applications, by containing the polymer in micro-
or nano-sized structures that lower the amount of light needed to
trigger the lasing. Nomadics is also making the detector more
versatile, with the goal of being able to sense more kinds of
chemicals, such as the RDX used in plastic explosives. According to
Rose, RDX, the second-most common explosive, after TNT, has three
orders of magnitude less vapor around it than TNT, requiring the higher
sensitivity for detection.
As good as bomb-detection technology may get, however, it alone will
not be able to solve the IED problem. Loren Thompson, CEO of the
Lexington Institute, a nonpartisan think tank in Arlington, VA, says
the effectiveness of Nomadics' technology will be limited by soldiers'
ability to control traffic in a city, which, in turn, is limited by the
number of troops available. "To create a checkpoint, to continuously
monitor a neighborhood for a bomb factory -- we just don't have enough
personnel to do that," he says. "You would have to rely on some sort of
prior intelligence-gathering or sensor surveillance to reduce the
number of prospective areas where you are going to apply the
technology, otherwise it would be an insurmountable challenge."
The U.S. military is thus pursuing efforts that can complement
detection. By Thompson's estimate, there are a somewhere around a
hundred different concepts -- most of them classified -- for defeating
IEDs. Right now, he says, the most prevalent technologies in Iraq are
devices for detecting magnetic anomalies created by
artillery-shell-based IEDs or jamming the signals from garage-door
openers and cell phones.
The U.S. is also working to improve the way its military communicates.
On the army's Company Command website, thousands of army commanders are
sharing their experiences in responding to the rapidly changing
techniques of terrorist bombers.
All these combined efforts might be helping. At the end of December,
Major General William Webster, commander of the Multinational
Division-Baghdad, said the military is "finding nearly half of the
roadside bombs, the IEDs, that the enemy is emplacing, and we've had a
92% increase in weapons caches found." He said their efforts had forced
insurgents to try different, less deadly tactics, such as drive-by
shootings. Indeed, in January, according to the nonprofit
icasualties.org, which compiles data from DOD releases, 25 soldiers
died from IEDs, down from an average 40 in several previous months.
Whatever solutions work for fighting IEDs, it's clear they will have to
adapt constantly to new tactics by the bombers. The decrease in
IED-related deaths in January could turn out to be a temporary
downturn, if the pace of such deaths this month continues. "The basic
problem you have with the IED threat," Thompson says, "is it
continuously morphs in order to circumvent solutions that we've
developed."
La N
"Jack Linthicum" <jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:1139602149.2...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com...
> http://www.technologyreview.com/NanoTech/wtr_16310,303,p1.html
>
> Friday, February 10, 2006
> Stopping Roadside Bombs
>
> New detection technology is helping in Iraq.
>
> By Kevin Bullis
>
> The advanced technology of the U.S. military has so far met its match
> in Iraq in the form of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) triggered by
> garage-door openers, cell phones, and washing-machine timers. But this
> situation could be changing. New technology may make it easier to find
> explosives and bomb makers long before they can trigger a deadly
> roadside bomb.
>
>
Thanks for posting this, Jack. Kudos to nanotechnology. I have had several
friends injured by IEDs, and a good friend will be returning to Iraq in the
not too distant future.
- nilita
PS: Jack, what's on your wine list this weekend?
Jack Linthicum
Funny you should ask, my wife just said the same thing. Sometimes she
plans the meal around the wine sometimes we make the wine fit the meal.
Last night, for instance, she fixed a pasta-bean soup for which a steak
knife is appropriate. In honor of Miles from the movie we had some
fucking Merlot. Toad Hollow Katrina 2001. From the discard bin at our
local market, $4 off.
No football and travel isn't until next week so we will make our way
through the Sears wine cooler, nothing fancy, probably a Benzinger
chardonnay or Hanna SauvB if fish or such, several Cab Savs and a
Belle Valle Pinot from Oregon, "It's a naive domestic Burgundy
without any breeding, but I think you'll be amused by its
presumption".
Arved Sandstrom
news:1139602149.2...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com...
>
> Friday, February 10, 2006
> Stopping Roadside Bombs
>
> New detection technology is helping in Iraq.
> Whatever solutions work for fighting IEDs, it's clear they will have to
> adapt constantly to new tactics by the bombers. The decrease in
> IED-related deaths in January could turn out to be a temporary
> downturn, if the pace of such deaths this month continues. "The basic
> problem you have with the IED threat," Thompson says, "is it
> continuously morphs in order to circumvent solutions that we've
> developed."
I wish them luck, the "them" being the US troops, but I think they are
fighting a Sisyphean battle against IED's.
Bomb sniffers are all well and good, but all you need to do is to start
using decoys. If these new devices (and dogs' noses, for that matter) are so
sensitive, just plant tens or hundreds of thousands of sources of explosive
vapours in spots that will tie up bomb-detection teams forever...cars (the
driver doesn't need to know), peoples' clothing, roadsides, buildings etc.
In the midst of these decoys you can plant the real things - assuredly
either (a) the detection rate (location of true positives) will go way down,
and/or (b) the troops will be swamped by the effort. How much explosive, as
a decoy, would it take? I don't know, but if the detection devices are
getting that sensitive, I'll bet it ain't much.
Change the nature of the IED's, or devices, as another approach. Not all
explosives are TNT and RDX and so forth.
Also, make these sniffer devices too sensitive, and too capable of detecting
too much, and false positives will skyrocket. It seems to me that military
personnel carry and handle lots of explosives on a routine basis...are we
going to have three showers a day, daily drycleaning of clothing and
webgear, and steam cleaning of ammunition, weapons and vehicles?
Jamming cellphones or garage-door openers? The insurgents will just use
other methods for command-detonation. What's wrong with landline? Just make
it look legit...no way can you check every wire or cable in the country. Or
use lasers - any jerkwad with a year or two of electronics experience could
build a cheap receiver/transmitter combo for setting off IED's with coded
laser pulses. It wouldn't necessarily even have to be coded.
Magnetic anomalies from arty shells or mortar bombs used for IED's? Heck,
start buying or obtaining pipe; cut to lengths and plant in so many places
that the US troops have coronaries trying to deal with all the dummies.
Every so often plant a real one.
I think this is largely a losing battle. Much better is HUMINT - find the
people doing this.
AHS
La N
"Arved Sandstrom" <asand...@accesswave.ca> wrote in message
news:Xq9Hf.4919$bd4.1092@edtnps84...
Geeze, Arved, you have burst my bubble just a couple hours after I thanked
Jack for making a feel-good (to me) poast ...%)
- nilita, waving *hi* to Arved who lives at the other side of our country
...
PS: I think that Robots should be built to fight this kind of war, but
that's just *moi* ....
Jack Linthicum
I don't know how to break this to you Nilita but the robots are
commenting on the war, the people are fighting it. It's called
"policy". The way to stop the IEDs killing Americans is to stop driving
around in vehicles looking for IEDs. We have two large treatment
facilities for people who have suffered limb loss and burns in Iraq,
looking for non-government money because there doesn't seem to be any
government money. Haliburton won't contribute and neither will GE.
La N
Could you clarify the bit about there being no government money for people
who have been burned and lost limbs in Iraq? And, why would Halliburton or
GE be expected to contribute? I'm not being skeptical at your response.
It's just that I'm Canadian, and we have socialized medicine.
- nilita
Jack Linthicum
The main push behind the Texas facility is from the Intrepid Fallen
Heroes Fund, its director has gotten a radio-cable TV "star" Don Imus
to push the funding drive. They are at about half of the $10m in
claimed donations. The drive is hitting several (2 CNN, MSNBC) of the
cable news operations with their "stars" being shown in ads for the
drive. Imus says he asked GE, owner of NBC and the MSNBC cable channel
that Imus is on, and Haliburton to contribute and they turned him down.
There has evolved a lot of the "rivalry" that seems to be part of the
existence of U.S. commercial media operations with claims flying around
about who is giving and who isn't.
Whole campaign basically started with Sen. McCain last year asking Imus
and his crew to come down to Walter Reed and see the sorry facility
(Likened to the work out room at a large Holiday Inn) and the need for
more facilities. Interesting point someone raised is that the Intrepid
fund is not tax-deductable, ie is not a charity in the eyes of IRS.
Might explain the big corporation reluctance to put money into
something they can write off.
http://www.fallenheroesfund.org/fallenheroes/about/
and
http://securingamerica.com/ccn/node/3802
but the facility at Walter Reed has been soliciting private money,
$10M, while the internet press all says it is being built with
government funds.
http://www.military.com/NewsContent/0,13319,85527,00.html
but some are asking what is being built
http://www.defensetech.org/archives/cat_money_money_money.html
The "Walter Reed Amputee Center" might have a need for an extra
$5.5 million, sure.
Regardless, Wheeler argues, they're still pork.
The real problem is that nobody knows the real merit of these and
other earmarks, even when they have relevant and useful sounding names.
For example, could the $5.5 million for the Walter Reed Amputee Center
actually be for a new cafeteria there, or is it for proven-quality
wounded veterans' care? You are not likely to find a meaningful
answer by reading the "Joint Explanatory Statement" for the 2006
DOD Appropriations Act or, for that matter, any other report from the
House or Senate Appropriations Committee.
Variation on Jack Nicholson in Chinatown, "It's politics"
Dale Farmer
the Walter Reed property and building a new one from the ground up
someplace else near DC. It's been years since I've been there,
but the place was full of run down buildings dating back to WW2
when I saw it.
--Dale
Jack Linthicum
They broke ground in November 2004, diddled and then scheduled a
restart of the facility after the McCain-Imus air time. The BRAC sort
of ignored what to do with the Army part of Walter Reed saying that a
$2B facility would be built on the grounds of the Bethesda Naval
Hospital which also has many other medical facilities like NIH.
http://www.defenselink.mil/releases/2005/nr20050513-3144.html
http://www.hcpro.com/content/54673.cfm
It could be that the Brooke facility was meant to replace the one being
closed down but the embarassment of the TV coverage forced a relook at
the facility. In any case the District of Columbia is eyeing the 113
acres WRAH occupies but the US is asking for about 70+ of those for
embassies.
La N
Sad. Maybe somebody should organize a telethon or something.
- nilita, who her own self has been a producer scriptwriter for a couple of
telethons in the past ....
Jack Linthicum
There was a movie back in the Carter era which captured the feelings of
the country called Americathon. They sold San Diego to Mexico as
Tijuana del Norte.In the opening we see the residents of California
living in permanently parked cars and commuting to work via various
bicycles, skateboards, and people-powered scooters (First energy
crisis). John Ritter plays President Chet Roosevelt, a thinly veiled
spoof of then California governor and presidential hopeful Jerry
"Moonbeam" Brown (he dated roller skating rock star Linda Ronstadt and
slept on a futon). This movie asks the question, what if Jerry became
president and Linda the "First Girlfriend?" John Ritter's real life
wife Nancy Morgan plays Lucy Beth, President Chet's roller-skating
girlfriend. In the eighties the United States is broke and the
President decides to throw a telethon on television (What better place
to stage a telethon?) to raise money. At the time this film was made,
most television markets had no more than a few stations and watching
Jerry Lewis struggle to keep awake during the MDA telethon was an
interesting phenomena. Here Harvey Korman hosts an endless list of bad
acts that foreshadows the humor of SCTV. Most of the humor here would
be lost on anyone too young to remember the 70's or for those who don't
really want to remember. Though the film takes place in the "future"
eighties, for campy fun Americathon is an interesting time-capsule of
the issues ripe for spoofing at the time.
Colin Campbell
<jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> The real problem is that nobody knows the real merit of these and
>other earmarks, even when they have relevant and useful sounding names.
>For example, could the $5.5 million for the Walter Reed Amputee Center
>actually be for a new cafeteria there, or is it for proven-quality
>wounded veterans' care? You are not likely to find a meaningful
>answer by reading the "Joint Explanatory Statement" for the 2006
>DOD Appropriations Act or, for that matter, any other report from the
>House or Senate Appropriations Committee.
Another problem is that Walter Reed is scheduled to be closed. Seems
like a waste of money to spend it just in time for the place to be
torn down.
--
There can be no triumph without loss.
No victory without suffering.
No freedom without sacrifice.
John P. Mullen
> http://www.technologyreview.com/NanoTech/wtr_16310,303,p1.html
>
> Friday, February 10, 2006
> Stopping Roadside Bombs
>
> New detection technology is helping in Iraq.
>
> By Kevin Bullis
>
> <snip>
I've seen the prototypes. It is good to know they've worked the kinks out.
John Mullen
Jack Linthicum
Very long article just in (1515) from the New York Times. Sounds about
right for the sort of treatment and prothetics.
February 12, 2006
The Wounded
Healing, With New Limbs and Fragile Dreams
By JULIET MACUR
It was a victory for Lance Cpl. Matthew Schilling to walk into the
upper gallery of the House of Representatives on Jan. 31 for the State
of the Union address. He wore his dress blues and a prosthetic leg.
Five months earlier, he had been carried on a stretcher, wounded and
bleeding, into a hospital in Iraq after a roadside bomb exploded 10
feet from him.
The blast tore through his right foot and calf and blew a hole through
his left hand. But hearing President Bush speak confidently of victory
in Iraq, Corporal Schilling, a smooth-faced Marine reservist and
college student from Portersville, Pa., who grew up on a cattle farm,
felt again that his sacrifice had been worth it.
"I felt really proud when all those people I met that night thanked me
for my service," said Corporal Schilling, 21, who attended with his
wife, Leigh Ann, as guests of their congresswoman, Representative
Melissa A. Hart, a Republican.
Yet when the Schillings returned to the Mologne House, a hotel at
Walter Reed Army Medical Center for wounded soldiers and their
families, Corporal Schilling found that wearing his prosthesis that
night had taken a toll. Blood blisters had formed on his stump, and he
was soon back in a wheelchair facing more surgery.
The next day, a member of Corporal Schilling's Marine Corps unit and a
victim of the same blast, Lance Cpl. Mark Beyers, wheeled up to him at
the Walter Reed physical therapy clinic. Corporal Beyers's right arm
and leg were amputated in Iraq. "We should go into surgery together,"
Corporal Beyers joked. "They can give us a two-for-one discount."
A boisterous 27-year-old construction worker from Buffalo, nicknamed
Big Buck, Corporal Beyers has had his own difficulties.
Since Aug. 26, when they were wounded, the two marines each have
endured some 20 surgeries in three countries. Charting their care over
the ensuing months, beginning just hours after the blast, has revealed
a journey of medical setbacks and emotional turmoil.
Explosions have killed 1,123 American service members in Iraq and have
wounded at least 10 times more, often with a devastating combination of
injuries - ruptured organs and severed spines, obliterated limbs and
burst eyeballs.
Among the more than 16,653 Americans wounded in Iraq are 387 amputees,
including 62 who, like Corporal Beyers, have lost more than one limb,
said Lt. Col. Paul Pasquina, chief of physical medicine and
rehabilitation at Walter Reed. The amputations, traumatic though they
are, are often accompanied by painful complications. "It's not as easy
as putting on even the most high-tech prosthetic and just walking off,"
Colonel Pasquina said.
Artificial limbs are increasingly sophisticated - legs with
microprocessors that help provide stability and a normal gait, or arms
with attachments shaped to catch baseballs or flip pancakes. But the
psychological effects of losing a limb, particularly for young, active
military members, can be deep and lasting, a constant reminder of the
war.
For Corporals Beyers and Schilling and the other marines of India
Company, makeshift bombs were so common, and the fear of losing limbs
so real, that many of them devised personal survival plans. Staff Sgt.
Michael Tracey said that because he is right-handed, he patrolled on
the left side of streets. If a roadside bomb went off, he reasoned, he
would rather lose his left limbs.
While Corporal Schilling was dealing with his recovery, Corporal Beyers
surged ahead. In early October, weighing 146 pounds, down from 195, he
joined dozens of other amputees in rehabilitation at Walter Reed, one
of two military amputee care centers. The second opened in January 2005
at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio to meet the rising demand.
After 19 operations and 63 days in hospitals, Corporal Beyers went home
in October for a visit. He attended a parade in his honor in his
hometown, Alden, N.Y. He drank Labatt beer and played poker with
friends. He jokingly called his right leg Stumpy.
<more>
La N
You know? We have all seen these young men and women amputees and burn
patients, veterans of the Iraq war, on the news. Almost to a person they
have said that they support the mission. Almost to a person, they have
shown almost super-human bravery and stoicism.
Having said that, when the cameras are off their courageous faces, I know
they are experiencing physical pain, frustration, and psychological trauma.
Many of their relationships are undergoing changes, the lives of their loved
ones have changed dramatically.
Let us hope that they continue to receive the pain relief, medical support,
and ongoing psychological support - not only for themselves - but also for
their families that they have earned and deserve.
- nilita
Jack Linthicum
What better place to test this thing than good old Anbar Province, the
poster child for Sunni resistance and U.S. hopes for turning that
resistance around, and making the province a model of democracy.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-ied12feb12,0,288814.story?coll=la-home-headlines
>From the Los Angeles Times
Bomb Buster for Iraq Hits Pentagon Snag
Army brass says a device that destroyed 90% of roadside explosives in
tests needs further study. Marine Corps decides to bypass the
bureaucracy.
By Mark Mazzetti
Times Staff Writer
February 12, 2006
WASHINGTON - A new high-tech vehicle that destroys roadside bombs has
passed a series of U.S. military tests but has not yet been sent into
battle, prompting charges that Pentagon bureaucracy is slowing the
effort to protect American troops in Iraq.
Last April, Army Brig. Gen. Joseph Votel, the commander of a Pentagon
task force in charge of finding ways to combat the makeshift bombs
known as improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, endorsed development of
the vehicle, called the Joint IED Neutralizer. The remote-controlled
device blows up roadside bombs with a directed electrical charge, and
based on Votel's assessment, then-deputy Defense Secretary Paul D.
Wolfowitz recommended investing $30 million in research and sending
prototypes to Iraq for testing.
But 10 months later - and after a prototype destroyed about 90% of
the IEDs laid in its path during a battery of tests - not a single
JIN has been shipped to Iraq.
To many in the military, the delay in deploying the vehicles, which
resemble souped-up, armor-plated golf carts, is a case study in the
Pentagon's inability to bypass cumbersome peacetime procedures to meet
the urgent demands of troops in the field. More than half of U.S.
combat deaths in Iraq have been caused by roadside bombs, and the
number of such attacks nearly doubled last year compared with 2004.
The Pentagon has identified the improvised bomb problem as one of its
top priorities. Two years ago, the top U.S. commander in the Middle
East, Gen. John P. Abizaid, called for a "Manhattan Project" to cut
down on roadside bombing casualties, but many believe that his level of
concern has not been matched in Washington.
"There's a bureaucracy that really slows things down, and sometimes
people don't have the same sense of urgency," said one officer involved
in the effort to counter the bombs. "That's where my frustration comes
in."
The officer declined to be identified for this article because he
feared retribution from superiors.
"The decision has been made that it's not yet mature enough," said Army
Brig. Gen. Dan Allyn, deputy director of the task force, which was
recently renamed the Joint IED Defeat Organization. Iraq is "not the
place to be testing unproven technology."
But the Marine Corps believes otherwise and recently decided to
circumvent the testing schedule and send JIN units to Al Anbar province
in western Iraq. Marines have been deployed in the restive area, home
to the cities of Fallouja and Ramadi, since February 2004.
The Marines are now making final preparations to deploy a number of JIN
prototypes to Al Anbar. Based on their performance, Marine commanders
said, they hope the device can eventually be used throughout Iraq.
The Joint IED Neutralizer, built by a private contractor in Arizona,
can be driven in front of a military convoy or operated separately to
clear roadways of homemade bombs. The vehicle has a remote-control
console that troops can use from a safe distance, directing it like a
radio-controlled car.
A metal boom that extends from the vehicle's chassis emits high-powered
electric pulses - military officials call it "man-made lightning" -
that set off the detonators on the bombs. The JIN is a spinoff
technology of a larger U.S. government effort to develop energy-based
weapons that include lasers, electric shocks and microwaves.
"The Army isn't saying no to this. They are just saying yes very, very
slowly, and it's a tragedy," said a former senior Pentagon official who
was involved in the development of the JIN last year and who requested
anonymity because he feared that revealing his identity might endanger
the future of the program.
Consequently, the Pentagon announced in December that retired four-star
Army Gen. Montgomery C. Meigs would assume control of an expanded task
force that might ultimately number more than 350 people. The Pentagon
also plans to triple the organization's budget to approximately $3.5
billion per year.
Officials on the IED task force said they were apprehensive about
deploying new technology to Iraq before it had been thoroughly tested.
Allyn, the task force deputy director, said that in the past the
Pentagon had made the mistake of sending technology to combat zones too
early.
"It puts the burden on people who have a mission to perform and puts
them at risk," Allyn said.
i2p6 west
As one who is enjoying watching the unfolding U.S.Klusterfuck, I say yes! send
these "JINs" to Iraq...by the boatload.
Ha Ha Ha!!!
ya fuckin moron...besides the cost...even *I* can defeat these "JINs"...
sheesh...
roadmapmike
roadmapmike
Jack Linthicum
As long as someone revived this thread I'll point out that the Center
in San Antonio reached its $10M goal. People from the Intrepid Fund
were on Don Imus show this morning thanking him for his efforts for the
fund drive.
La N.
Yay! btw, there was an interesting profile on Don Imus in last month's
Vanity Fair.
- nilita
Jack Linthicum
People like Imus need reaffirmation. He has some interesting and
informative friends and acquaintances and I tape the program and play
back the interviews. His solo act is too predictable so I skip over
that. Senator McCain dragged him down to Walter Reed to see that rehab
center, described as about what you would expect at a large Holiday
Inn, and got him started on that side of the issue. The Intrepid people
played off of that.