A few additional links

[tangaroa]

• A man who the government accuses to be a member of al-Qaeda had $50,000 in unsecured credit card debt. This reminds me of the phrase "the Capitalists will sell us the guns we will kill them with". If al-Qaeda starts tapping credit cards for a funding source, it could lead to a new counter-terrorism tactic: we can send pugnacious bill collectors to track down Osama bin Laden. On second thought, maybe that's not a good idea. They would only find him after turning every other person in South Asia into a terrorist by repeated dinnertime telephone calls accusing them all of being Osama.
• The mayor of a small town in South Carolina has forbidden the police from "chasing after any suspects whatsoever". The carte blanche for criminals is said to be a side effect of the U.S. health care crisis, as the health insurance costs for police officers skyrocketed to "more money [...] than most citizens here in the city of Wellford are even earning", after "an officer twisted his ankle while chasing a suspect a couple of weeks ago".
• Here is a perfect example of how the U.S. legal system is inaccessible to the public. A company sued a whistleblower, so the whistleblower responded to the company's complaint and filed the response with the court's clerk. The company was then able to obtain a default judgement because the whistleblower's response to the complaint was not an official response! The whistleblower had to hire a lawyer.