From the Telegraph…

Gonzales was a real-life hit man and just the sort of violent bad guy whom Bond had no compunction dispatching in his celluloid adventures.

He is a ruthless mass killer who ran the notorious armed wing of the Gulf drug cartel, according to the Mexican authorities.

After deserting from the Mexican army in 1999, he switched sides in drugs war and helped found the Zetas, an execution squad made up of rogue former soldiers and police officers.

He was eventually captured without a shot being fired when security forces burst into a house where he was staying, officials said. His men then launched a brazen bid to free him near Reynosa airport but police fought off a gang of assailants in a lengthy gun battle.

In a separate raid in Reynosa, Mexican agents also seized 540 rifles, 165 grenades, 500,000 rounds of ammunition and 14 sticks of TNT.

From the Telegraph…

He said gangs repeatedly vandalised his car, causing £5,000 damage, and threw bricks and eggs at his window.

The retired lorry driver, who suffers from a heart condition, finally “snapped” on Halloween when fireworks rained down on his terraced house in a quiet cul-de-sac in Hertford.

Several rockets exploded against his front window just inches from his gas meter.

Mr Parker, a keen game shooter who holds a shotgun licence, took out his .177 air rifle, marched across the street and confronted a group of eight to ten teenagers who then fled.

But minutes later armed police arrived at his home, surrounded the house and cordoned off the road.

Four shotguns, for which Mr Parker had a licence, and cartridges from his gun cabinet were seized by police, as well as the air gun.

The grandfather-of-four was arrested and taken to a police station where he was given a caution for possessing a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence.

These kinds of stories come out of Great Britain all the time. But they never cease to make me sick.

From the Telegraph…

Around 70 per cent of the African-American voters who overwhelmingly backed Mr Obama also approved Proposition 8, helping pass the controversial ballot measure despite a small majority of whites voting against the ban on same-sex unions. Hispanic and Asian voters were split on the issue.

The state’s black turnout jumped to 10 per cent of the electorate, up from 6 per cent in 2004, as voters inspired by Mr Obama flocked to the polls for the first time. The Democratic candidate took the state with 61 per cent of the popular vote.

Although the president-elect opposed the gay marriage ban, it appears his supporters may have helped pass the measure that was vociferously opposed by many white Democrats.

I think the thing that most surprised me about Obama’s win is how small of a margin of victory that he got in the popular vote. It’s kind of hypocritical of me to say that, because only a couple of months ago I thought that the election was going to be close. But that was Click Here to continue reading.

From RedBlueRichPoor comes an excellent snap analysis of the election. Nothing much to say about it except read it.

From Calculated Risk comes a discussion of who the next Treasury Sectary will be. I am suprised to see Larry Summer’s name mentioned. I thought he was on a black list.

From Rod Dreher comes a story about a direct decedent of a slave voting for Obama. It drives home how much has changed in a short amount of time. Me being me, this kind of worries me. Rapid change can be for the worse as well as for the better.

From the Economist…

After storming into a police station on July 1st and stabbing six officers to death and injuring three others and a security guard, Mr Yang was shown remarkable understanding by China’s voluble internet users.

How do you pull something like that off? I can see stabbing one or two police officers to death. But 6?

Are the police in China so used to facing no resistance that they have no training or equipment to deal with one man with a knife? The article says that the police were unarmed, but still…..

From The New York Times…

On a rainy Friday evening in early August, six Taliban fighters attacked a police post in a village in Buner, a quiet farming valley just outside Pakistan’s lawless tribal region.

The militants tied up eight policemen and lay them on the floor, and according to local accounts, the youngest member of the gang, a 14-year-old, shot the captives on orders from his boss. The fighters stole uniforms and weapons and fled into the mountains.

Almost instantly, the people of Buner, armed with rifles, daggers and pistols, formed a posse, and after five days they cornered and killed their quarry. A video made on a cellphone showed the six militants lying in the dirt, blood oozing from their wounds.

And why did the people of Buner take matters into their own hands? Because they did not want the Taliban and the Pakistan army to use their hometown as a battle ground.

Good luck to them. But I don’t think they will be able to escape. Still, one should never make the mistake of thinking that ever one in Pakistan is the same or that none of them are trying to avoid the catastrophe that is overtaking their nation.