Further food for thought -

Read what Wiki says about JDAM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Direct_Attack_Munition#General_characteristics

"In its most accurate mode, the JDAM system will provide a minimum weapon accuracy CEP of 13 meters or less when a GPS signal is available, though Boeing and the Air Forces report less than 10 meters CEP in testing. If the GPS signal is jammed or lost, the JDAM can still achieve a 30 meter CEP or less for free flight times up to 100 seconds"

CEP is Circular Error Probability. The point is that in ideal conditions, the bomb will fall upto 10 meters from target and that is sufficient for the bomb to be effective. Presumably the 30 meter CEP is also effective. That means that one of these bombs can clear somewhere between an acre and nine acres of human life.

Why they were scrambling to find the bomb is perhaps because of the enormous "collateral damage" it could cause by exploding somewhere at random.

This story from 2005

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb3031/is_2_29/ai_n29181926/

(or click on signature)

"The much heavier (4765 kg) turboprop-powered Predator-B (MQ-9B) can carry an external load of up to 1360 kg (e.g., six 225 kg bombs or 14 Hellfires) on six pylons. Drop tests with the 230-kg Raytheon GBU-12 Paveway II have been successfully completed with an MQ-9B at the US Naval Air Weapons Center at China Lake, California. Ongoing trials there will also clear its use of Hellfire, the 130-kg Boeing GBU-39/B SDB (Small Diameter Bomb) and that company's 225-kg GBU-38 Jdam (Joint Direct Attack Munition)."

225 kg is roughly 500 lb. The MQ9B is also apparently called the Reaper. The 225-kg GBU-38 Jdam is a bomb (GBU = Guided Bomb Unit) and the Raytheon GBU-12 Paveway II is a laser guided bomb. (all from Wikipedia and Google)

Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MQ-9_Reaper

says:

"As of 2009[update] the U.S. Air Force’s fleet stands at 195 Predators and 28 Reapers"

---

This took no more than about 15 minutes of googling (would have been faster if I had turned off my brower's Javascript, lousy thing.)

---

It seems rather clear from omoeex's story that the USAF is dropping 500 lb bombs in Pakistan and that bombs have fallen off prematurely from the Reaper. Omoeex's story is as forgiveably vague as the notion that Predators carry only hellfire missiles.

is the boycott. I am glad to not have read Marc Ambinder, so this particular post by GG does not give me anyone to add to the list.

"By the mid 1600s Protestants began to write treatises declaring that all Jews should leave Europe for Palestine. Oliver Cromwell as Lord Protector of the newly established Puritan Commonwealth, declared that Jewish presence in Palestine would be the prelude to the Second Coming of Christ."

{from Prophecy and Politics, Militant Evangelists on the Road to Nuclear War, Grace Halsell, 1986 }

Another history changing mistranslation:

http://syrcom.cua.edu/Hugoye/Vol6No1/HV6N1PRPhenixHorn.html

or click on the signature.

Not easy reading, but worth the effort.

"Skipping Towards Armageddon - The Politics and Propaganda of the Left Behind Novels and the LaHaye Empire", Michael Standaert (2006)

"According to the Barna Research Group, which regularly polls the Christian community in the United States, the theological gap between Protestants and Catholics is quite wide -- with Protestant groups twice as likely to believe the accuracy of the Bible; twice as ready to attempt to proselytize, twice as likely to believe in Christ's infallibility, twice as likely to believe in Satan as an actual being and not allegorically, and nearly five times more likely to reject the idea of faith through good works -- one of the core tenets of Catholic spirituality, and one roundly rejected by LaHaye in the Left Behind novels and his other writings. {emphasis added}

Evidently mainline churches were dismayed by the Left Behind series.

Michael Standaert in a book (2006) on the topic tells us:

"Most recently, mainline churches have been attempting to fight back against the premillennialist theology as represented in the Left Behind novels. In 2001, an overwhelming resolution was passed at the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church to declare the theology in the Left Behind series, "not in accord" with the church's reading of the New Testament book of the Revelation. Late in 2000, the Missouri Synod of the Lutheran Church officially noted that the books contained "very serious errors about what the Bible really teaches" and published a critical analysis of it on its web site. Roman Catholic bishops in Chicago condemned the series as "anti-Catholic" in 2003 and sent out a statement to all the dioceses in the state saying the theology about the Second Coming was not in accord with Catholic beliefs on the Revelation, which don't fall in line with the dispensational rapture theology...Mainstream Baptist theologians have also been very critical of the "beam me up theology" of the Left Behind series and dispensational premillenialism in general as a "massive misunderstanding" of scripture.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3741299,00.html

How dare he?

Quote:

"In reality, Obama is only pro-Israel when it fits in to his view of America’s national interests which now seem to be on a definite collision path with Israel’s vital security concerns."

"No doubt Obama would not want to see genocide in Israel. And he may even be pro-Israel and pro-Jewish to an extent. But to him America’s interests take precedence and in his view they no longer necessarily coincide with Israel’s. Taken to its extreme, if obtaining widespread Islamic support for America could only be achieved by the non-violent dissolution of Israel it seems that Obama would support (albeit reluctantly) that disintegration. Jews who supported Obama did not see this coming simply because they were not paying attention."