] The Pentagon has asked all chemical suit manufacturers to
] boost their production by 42 percent by month's end.
. . .
] The boost is needed to replenish supplies used up by the
] deployment of thousands of personnel to the Middle East,
] said Frank Johnson, spokesman for Defense Supply Center
] Philadelphia.
]
] About 90,000 of the chemical suits were manufactured last
] month by five manufacturers with plants in Texas,
] Kentucky, Michigan and Maine, and the Pentagon has
] initiated an increase to 128,000 a month by the end of
] April. That's the maximum capacity for the available
] fabric.
]
] Creative Apparel is doing its part by expanding
] production to 24,000 suits a month at plants in Belmont,
] Eastport, Indian Township and Dover-Foxcroft, in addition
] to Harmony.
]
] The company, which is certified as a small, disadvantaged
] business, is owned by the Passamaquoddy Indian tribe.

American Chemical Suit Makers Work Overtime

] Large sections of Baghdad lost power for the first time
] since the war began after huge explosions rocked the
] capital. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
] Staff, said the U.S. Central Command has not targeted the
] city's power grid.

(tongue in cheek) Maybe it was one of the special ops squirrels?
 http://www.memestreams.net/thread/bid6006/

Baghdad Power Grid Taken Down

] "The decision also included that Tayseer Allouni should
] leave Iraq as soon as possible. The ministry did not
] provide any reasons for that decision. Al-Jazeera network
] is sorry for this unpredictable and unreasonable decision
] by the ministry," the statement continued.
]
] "Therefore, the network decided to freeze, until further
] notice, the work of all of its correspondents in Iraq.
] However, it will continue to air live and recorded images
] provided by its offices from Baghdad, Basra, and Mosul."

I saw another headline yesterday that Iraq is trying to ban all satellite phones, too:

Iraq Bans Satellite Phones:
 http://news.ninemsn.com.au/Sci_Tech/story_47307.asp

So, given time, they'll probably try to take down the cameras of Al Jazeera and Abu Dhabi TV as well. Those pesky images just keep directly contradicting the messages of the Iraqi Information Minister. Must be a conspiracy. ;)

Al-Jazeera suspends correspondents' work in Iraq

] Most of the new information comes from handwritten
] documents and computer hard drives seized during the
] March 1 capture of Khalid Sheik Mohammed, regarded by
] some government analysts as al Qaeda's most important
] operational planner. Known inside al Qaeda as "the
] Brain," Mohammed has acknowledged being the principal
] author of the Sept. 11, 2001, plot. Significantly, one
] official noted, Mohammed was arrested at a Rawalpindi,
] Pakistan, home owned by Abdul Quddoos Khan, a
] bacteriologist with access to production materials and
] facilities who has since disappeared.

More info from Mohammed's laptop.

Al Qaeda Near Biological, Chemical Arms Production (washingtonpost.com)

] CNN Ordered Out of Baghdad - Accused of being propaganda machine.

Heh, somebody's not happy with the detailed news coverage. I wonder if they're going to try ordering Al-Jazeera to get out too? ;)

Yahoo! News - CNN Ordered Out of Baghdad

This is another article about the arrest of the Al Qaeda communications chief, Jazeeri (aka Jaziri, aka Jazairi). It's probable that by "sophisticated monitoring equipment", they mean "Echelon".

] As in previous arrests, FBI technicians helped to locate
] Jazeeri's location through sophisticated telephone
] monitoring equipment, but there was also a bit of
] old-fashioned subterfuge.
]
] Pakistani authorities released the arrested sons of Dr.
] Khwaja only last week. By keeping Khizr Khwaja and Omar
] Khwaja under surveillance and monitoring their phone
] calls, Pakistani security officials and FBI agents
] quickly located Jazeeri in the posh Gulburg neighborhood
] of Lahore.

I also got a kick though out of a section towards the bottom of this article:

Pakistani officials say Jazeeri's arrest could be a significant blow to Al Qaeda's operations, since most Al Qaeda fugitives need outside sources of money to pay for food and shelter in hiding. More important, it is easier to find a soldier than it is to find a good accountant.

Indeed. :)

Easier to Find a Soldier Than to Find an Accountant

] Al-Jaziri is thought to be involved in al Qaeda's
] business operations, and the intelligence source
] described him as a US-educated "computer whiz."
]
] Intelligence sources said local experts were still trying
] to crack the security codes on two laptops and some CDs
] which were found at the one-room apartment.
]
] Another source said travellers checks and maps of
] "various installations" around the country had also been
] seized.

My guess is that if anyone in al Qaeda was using high-tech cryptography, it would be this guy. I look forward to learning more about what he was using!

Pakistan Arrests al Qaeda Communications Chief

] Khalid admitted he was in contact with Osama Bin Laden as
] late as this year, but insisted he was unaware of his
] whereabouts
...
]
] The contacts were made through messengers.
]
] He and Bin Laden had communicated through a complex chain
] of messengers, involving a combination of e-mail and
] couriers
. . .
]
] Some of those messages were in the form of handwritten
] letters from Bin Laden, found in the room where Sheikh
] Mohammed was sleeping when he was nabbed in a pre-dawn
] raid Saturday.

Bin Laden Communicated via Handwritten Letters

] KARACHI, Pakistan -- A laptop computer used by al-Qaeda
] operational planner Khalid Shaikh Mohammed has yielded a
] list of at least half a dozen hiding places along the
] Pakistan-Afghan border used by Osama bin Laden and
] his supporters, U.S. and Pakistani intelligence
] officials said Wednesday.
. . .
] Much of the information on Mohammed's laptop computer
] was protected by an encryption code that CIA analysts
] cracked easily, U.S. intelligence officials said.
]
] The analysts said the code was surprisingly simple.

Arabic ROT-13, perhaps? ;)

Seized laptop lists al-Qaeda hideouts

Rattle wrote:
] The only way things could get more surreal these days is if
] SETI@Home finds aliens.
]
] I just had another one of those "what the hell is going on?!"
] frenzies. This time, it was brought on by the end of Lou
] Dobbs Moneyline on CNN. I had mostly been ignoring the TV, I
] picked up on things here and there durring the commentary..
] It was going into how the UN is useless, Libia and Iraq
] heading counsels, France, etc, etc. What you'd expect.. Then
] right after, it broke to a musical molment.. A country singer
] was doing some tune that I think was called "Did You Forget",
] while video was going of Sept 11th's greatest hits, broken up
] by shots of troops getting on planes, walling thru the desert,
] helicopters buzzing around, etc.. The country song is what
] really did it to me though.. I could get over the Bush'ness
] of it all. I wish I could like a video or mp3 of this.

Yeah, I ran across that on TV last night too. *Really* strange, and it made me very uncomfortable. Especially one line in the song like, "If after 9/11 they think we're looking for a fight, well, I guess they're right." I'm completely against any idea that we should attack Iraq as some kind of "payback" for 9/11. Regardless of whether there's any Iraq-Al Qaeda link (and I don't think there's any strong one), the "payback" idea is not where I'm coming from at all!

RE: Propaganda Moment