The Pentagon Estimates Operations in Iraq Cost $7.5 Million Per Day.

$7.5 million a day. We're 3 weeks and we're escalating and there is no end in sight.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/08/30/pentagon-airstrikes-islamic-state/14886141/

Senegal (6th African conntry) confirms first Ebola case (1,552 deaths total)

he West African country of Senegal has confirmed its first Ebola case one week after closing its borders with Guinea over fears that the deadly outbreak could spread, the Senegalese Press Agency reported Friday.

Senegal's health minister, Awa Marie Coll Seck, confirmed that a 21-year-old university student from Guinea was infected with the Ebola virus and placed in quarantine in the Fann Hospital in Dakar, the news agency reported.

Officials in Guinea alerted Senegal on August 27 after losing track of the young man, the agency reported.

The young man, who doesn't have any signs of bleeding, went to the hospital for a check up, the agency said. His condition is stable.

On August 21, Senegal closed its borders with Guinea over fears of the Ebola outbreak, the deadliest ever. The closure includes any aircraft and ships traveling to Senegal from Guinea, Sierra Leone or Liberia.The Ebola outbreak "continues to accelerate" in West Africa and has killed 1,552 people, the World Health Organization said Thursday.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/08/29/health/ebola-outbreak-senegal/

This marks the 6th country in Africa to report a case of Ebola. The Congo reported cases earlier this week, but it is believed to be an independent outbreak.

Ebola outbreak could lead to food crisis, U.N. says

The Ebola health crisis threatens to turn into a much broader "food crisis" in some of the world's most impoverished countries, according to the United Nations' World Food Program.

The program is scaling up its operations in West Africa to provide food to 1.3 million people in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. The food will go to people being treated for Ebola; their relatives; and those who have been quarantined by their governments, in an effort to halt the spread of Ebola.

"The food chain is threatened at many levels," the World Food Program said in a statement. Hundreds of families have lost loved ones, many of whom were their family's breadwinners.

Farmers are leaving their crops as they flee areas ravaged by Ebola, according to a statement from the food program. People are not able to travel and trade freely, as countries close borders and international airlines cancel flights, says Michael Stulman of Catholic Relief Services. People are also not able to hunt for bush meat, a practice that has been banned in some places due to the high risk of contracting Ebola while butchering the animals. Bats and apes can carry Ebola.

"We have already seen alarming price increases on imported food commodities such as rice," Stulman says. "The harvest this season is going to be seriously compromised because many people have been unable to access their farms due to the travel restrictions and other emergency measures in place."

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/08/28/ebola-food-crisis/14737281/

Liberia troops fire on protesters as West Africa's Ebola toll hits 1,350

Security forces in the Liberian capital fired live rounds and tear gas on Wednesday to disperse a stone-throwing crowd trying to break an Ebola quarantine imposed on their neighborhood, as the death toll from the epidemic in West Africa hit 1,350.

In the sprawling oceanfront West Point neighborhood of Monrovia, at least four people were injured in clashes with security forces, witnesses said. It was unclear whether anyone was wounded by the gunfire, though a Reuters photographer saw a young boy with his leg largely severed just above the ankle.

Liberian authorities introduced a nationwide curfew on Tuesday and put the West Point neighborhood under quarantine to curb the spread of the disease.

"The soldiers are using live rounds," said army spokesman Dessaline Allison, adding: "The soldiers applied the rules of engagement. They did not fire on peaceful citizens. There will be medical reports if (an injury) was from bullet wounds."

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/27/us-health-ebola-liberia-protests-idUSKBN0GR12X20140827

Nigeria Has Reduced Number Of Ebola Cases To One

At a press conference, Professor Chukwu said that only one Ebola patient remained in isolation in Nigeria, down from the 13 cases confirmed since the outbreak of the virus in July.

The deadly virus was first brought to Nigeria by a Liberian-American man, Patrick Sawyer who died on July 25.

After Mr Sawyer’s death, health workers who treated him tested positive.

Professor Chukwu said: “So far Nigeria has had 13 cases including the index case”.

“Five of those infected, including Mr Sawyer died, while seven have successfully recovered and were discharged.

* * *

According to him, All the 129 people, who were under surveillance, have completed the 21-day observation incubation period and only one person was found to be symptomatic and is still being observed.

http://www.channelstv.com/2014/08/26/nigeria-reduced-number-ebola-cases-one-minister/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

The alleged robbery is as insignificant as the alleged jaywalking

Regardless of whether Wilson knew about the alleged robbery or whether he was initiated his interaction with Brown because of alleged jaywalking, what happen after that is all that matters.

The initial interaction, or stop, was likely legal whether it was to investigate a robbery or to enforce a jaywalking violation. The release of the robbery information today was coordinated solely to distract from the release of Wilson's name, and has worked.

All that matters is why Wilson shot Brown.

The cop that responded to the robbery stayed on scene for 7 hours

The police reports on the robbery are interesting, as they always are. The responding officer arrived on scene at 11:54, but did not depart until 18:54 (6:54pm), the same time which the event was "closed."

In that time, both Brown and Johnson are identified by name, complete with their driver's permit or ID numbers and addresses.

In other words, it seems that the responding cop stayed on scene until it was relayed to him that the "suspect" had been killed, including his identifying information.

The responding officer's report says that the dispatch was of "a D/M in a white t-shirt that was walking northbound on W Florissant." That dispatch likely came from the call operator who took the 911 call. Once inside, the suspect was identified as wearing yellow socks, and a red Cardinals hat and khaki longer shorts. He gave out that information on the radio.

That being so, today is the first time that the cigar robbery has been mentioned in public. All accounts up until today were that the stop of Brown began because the cop told them to get on the sidewalk.

http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2014/images/08/15/ferguson-police-report.pdf

EDIT to update dumbass math.

All 10 Persons Who Had Direct Contact With Patrick Sawyer Infected With Ebola; 4 Have Died

Patrick Sawyer, you remember, is the Liberian-American who traveled to Liberia where his sister died of Ebola. He contracted Ebola from her, apparently when dealing with her body after her death. The below report says that all ten people who had direct contact with Sawyer after he arrived and collapsed in Nigeria are infected with Ebola.

Obama weighs strategy against Islamic State

The Obama administration is grappling with how to bridge the gap between its increasingly dire assessment of the threat posed by the Islamic State group and the limited, defensive air campaign it has so far undertaken, which military officials acknowledge will not blunt the group's momentum.

For months, administration officials have been divided about the threat posed by the Islamic State as it seized parts of Syria and advanced on towns in Iraq. Now, amid new intelligence about its growing strength, a consensus is forming that the group presents an unacceptable terrorism risk to the United States and its allies.

* * *

A strategy to destroy the Islamic State would not require large numbers of American ground troops, but it would amount to a significant escalation from the recent air operations, analysts say. It might also require military action in western Syria, where the group has its headquarters in the city of Ar-Raqqah.

Proponents of doing so argue that the Islamic State must be stopped because it will destabilize America's allies in the region and eventually export terror to Europe and the U.S. Critics of the idea are urging the president just as strongly not to get sucked into another Middle East war, arguing that years of American micromanagement in that region have ended in tears.

Obama himself has said the U.S. "has a strategic interest in pushing back" the Islamic State, but he has also insisted he will not send American combat troops back to war in Iraq. He has not shied away from using targeted military force in other places, such as Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia, when he decided that terrorists there threatened the U.S.

* * *

Smashing the Islamic State, military and intelligence analysts say, would require a sustained campaign of American airstrikes, combined with a U.S.-backed ground force of Sunni tribesmen — the same approach that rooted al-Qaida in Iraq out of the Sunni tribal areas in 2008.

But such a campaign would be "orders of magnitudes more difficult" than Yemen because of how well-armed and well-trained Islamic State fighters are, said Peter Mansoor, a retired army colonel who helped oversee a turnaround in Iraq in 2008.

"We have a mismatch between our goals and our strategy at the present time," said Mansoor, now a professor at Ohio State. "The goal eventually is to eliminate (the Islamic State), but the president has laid out a very restrained military option which can't accomplish that goal."

Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said during a security forum in Aspen, Colorado, last month that the military is "preparing a strategy that has a series of options to present to our elected leaders on how we can initially contain, eventually disrupt, and finally defeat (the Islamic State group) over time."

http://www.news-sentinel.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20140814/NEWS/140819774/-1/LIVING

US ground troops land on Iraq's Mt Sinjar to evacuate trapped Yazidis