Friday shorts

Space Command’s headquarters  may once again move. Donald Trump originally selected Huntsville, AL’s Redstone Arsenal as the headquarters, but after Alabama passed a restrictive abortion law, a Biden-caused pissing contest between Colorado and Alabama ensued. Each state has legitimate cred as a center for space-related headquarters given the NASA presence in Alabama and NORAD in Colorado.

Military.com also first reported that the issue of abortion, following the Supreme Court decision in 2022 overturning Roe v. Wade, was also a major concern among Colorado lawmakers who feared that service members’ reproductive rights would be limited by moving from their state, where abortion access is unrestricted, to Alabama, where it is illegal with limited exceptions.  Military.com

Because nothing affects military readiness like whether a possible female service person may someday want an abortion for a pregnancy that hasn’t occurred yet.

You probably recall that recently that someone leaked a bunch of classified info on Israel, including things like their plans to attack Hezbollah? The FBI busted someone for it.

Asif W. Rahman was indicted last Thursday for willfully retaining and transmitting national defense information, according to court documents. He was arrested Tuesday in Cambodia and will first appear in court in Guam, though the department has asked a federal judge to move him to Virginia to stand trial.

Rahman was employed by the CIA, according to a person familiar with his employment. Court documents indicate he was employed by the US government.

Rahman held a top secret security clearance and could access sensitive compartmentalized information. CNN

Be a pity if the plane door was left unsecured and Mr. Rahman escaped. Should we set a pool for the preferred altitude at the time?

And in unrelated but similar news, a teenager who has SWATted hundreds of people has been arrested.

Alan Filion, 18, of Lancaster, California, pleaded guilty to four counts of making interstate threats, the Justice Department said. Filion faces a maximum penalty of five years in prison for each charge, federal prosecutors said.

From August 2022 to January, Filion made more than 375 swatting and threat calls, including calls in which he claimed to have put bombs in place, threatened to detonate bombs or carry out mass shootings, officials said.

He became a “serial swatter” — making false accusations to send law enforcement officers rushing to a location — for profit and entertainment, court documents said. Prosecutors said he turned swatting into a business by advertising his swatting services on social media for a fee.

Note the disparity – four charges for almost 400 calls.  And what got the feds’ attention was when one of his calls targeted a mosque he threatened to shoot up. Sure am glad he did that, if he just endangered normal folks’ lives and Christian churches he’s probably still be walking the streets.

And proving the law of unintended consequences – the UK is known nowadays for being extremely touchy feelie and letting their lunatics run the island asylum. One of the early aspects of that was the huge anti-hunting outcries and protests in the last few decades. Well, they have forced fox hunters and deer hunters to cut back, and now they have a result.

There are now more deer in England than at any other time in the last 1,000 years, according to the Forestry Commission, the government department looking after England’s public woodland.

That has had a devastating impact on the environment, officials say. Excessive deer foraging damages large areas of woodland including young trees, as well as the habitats of certain birds like robins. Some landowners have lost huge amounts of crops to deer, and overpopulation means that the mammals are more likely to suffer from starvation and disease.

The Covid epidemic is also partly to blame, as venison’s main markets, restaurants, saw poor if any trade during shutdowns.

Making wild venison more widely available in supermarkets and beyond will motivate more stalkers to cull the deer and ensure the meat doesn’t go to waste, Edwards (local deer stalker – ed.) said.

Forestry England, which manages public forests, is part of that drive. In recent years it supplied some hospitals with 1,000 kg (1.1 tons) of wild venison, which became the basis of pies and casseroles popular with patients and staff, it said.

The approach appears to have been well received, though it has attracted some criticism from animal welfare group PETA, which advocates veganism.  AP

What a radical idea, culling herds to keep overpopulation down. And of course PETA is agin’ it. Jut for once, PETA: what’s YOUR  solution?

Category: Crime, Israel, Reality Check, Space Force, UK