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Your Mack dealer can sell you a "kit" to make the conversion.

Paul, they are claiming virtually all of the South China Sea as their territory (good luck with that), but not Micronesia (includes the Northern Marianas, Marshall and Caroline Islands), the Philippines, Hawaii and Antarctica.

Of course BC Mack is the expert, but one can sense the decline of investment in the Royal Navy, and Royal Air Force, was first felt in 1982 when Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher on short notice had to send the fleet, fleet air arm and air force to a far corner of the globe and evict Argentinian trespassers. This superb video reflects a small part of that brilliantly executed operation, and the challenged caused by a lack of reinvestment. Two of the three V-Force members, the Avro Vulcan and the Handley Page Victor, were instrumental in sending a clear message to the invading army (The Vickers Valiant has already been retired in 1965). As the film mentions, the RAF's aging Vulcan bombers, that with their mechanical post-WW2 systems were suddenly called upon to save the day, were in a state of disrepair due to being just three months away from being scrapped! There's no more beautiful aircraft in the sky than a Vulcan. Note that the V-Force manufacturers were the same brilliant bomber designers of WW2, with the Avro Lancaster, Handley Page Halifax and Vickers Wellington (The Short Stirling, older and slower, was replaced by the Lancaster and Halifax as soon as possible). .

Rare photograph Paul. A captured Focke-Wulf 190A-5 (WkNr. 150 051) undergoing comparison testing during the war at NAS Patuxent River (down the river from the Glenn L. Martin plant). Not every day you see a 190 with a U.S. Navy tri-color paint scheme. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/01/Captured_Focke-Wulf_Fw_190_in_flight_near_NAS_Patuxent_River_in_1944.jpg

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Steve Brooks, Owner/Driver / August 11, 2016 Despite troubled beginnings, S. & S. Tyquin Bulk Haulage continues to see the benefits of PBS trailers Victorian tipper operator Steve Tyquin takes great pride in all his gear but perhaps none more than a new A-double combination operating under Performance-Based Standards (PBS). From any angle it’s an impressive outfit and Steve is obviously convinced of the potential for big benefits but after almost a decade of complying with PBS requirements for truck and dog trailer applications, and enjoying the commercial advantages it provides, he wonders why the process continues to be so frustrating. The founding principal of S. & S. Tyquin Bulk Haulage, Steve splits his time between a home office in Keilor East on Melbourne’s north-western fringe and a truck depot on 12 hectares of rural property little more than a stone’s throw off the Calder Highway near Sunbury. There are 12 trucks in the business ranging from water trucks and a couple of Isuzu 4x2 rigid tippers through to a Kenworth T359 eight-wheeler and a mix of Kenworth T909 and K200 body trucks hooked to three and four-axle dog trailers, plus a pair of K200 prime movers towing semi-tipper combinations. It is, without exception, one of the best presented tipper fleets you’re likely to find anywhere. The latest member of the Tyquin team is a new K200 ‘Big Cab’ hauling the equally new Hercules A-double tipper set, believed to be the first A-double combination to operate within the 26m overall length limit of B-doubles. His first introduction to PBS came in 2007 and he concedes it was the threat of encroaching competition that first influenced him to give serious thought to combinations working under Performance-Based Standards. At that point he was largely running 19m truck and quad dog combinations grossing up to 50.5 tonnes. However, the prospect of PBS compliance providing a jump on the competition by allowing a gross weight of 57.5 tonnes on the same number of axles arranged within an overall length of 20m was too good to ignore. However, the timing for his first foray into PBS wasn’t perfect. In 2007 PBS was in its infancy, with compliance sure to demand any number of bureaucratic checks and balances. What’s more, the Global Financial Crisis had kicked in and any investment had to be carefully considered. Still, the potential benefits ultimately drove him headfirst into the cost and confusion of the PBS process, singlehandedly working his way through the seemingly endless hoops and hurdles of VicRoads and the National Transport Commission. "It was a bloody stressful nightmare," he says with cold conviction. "The costs were scary and the whole process was daunting to say the least." "It was bloody ridiculous," he said sharply. Still, the commercial attributes of a truck and quad dog combination able to carry seven tonnes more payload were quickly realised when his first unit finally started work in early 2008. The costs of compliance were recouped in a matter of months, he asserts. In fact, so prompt was the payback that 12 months later he went through the whole PBS process again, admittedly a tad wiser, to put an identical unit on the road. Today, PBS is the norm for all his front-line truck and trailer combinations. "The process is a still a pain in the arse but for what we do, PBS pays off," a resolute Steve Tyquin confirms. As for development of the A-double, he says it all started over a dinner with leading compliance engineer Ken Cowell and Hercules Engineering sales manager Kevin Wright. The conversation revolved around a combination able to deliver inherently high levels of manoeuvrability, operational flexibility, and of course, maximum payload potential. It was eventually concluded that an A-double built within an overall length of 26m would satisfy all requirements, including access to the B-double road network. Four months passed from the time of the initial design through to the PBS application and assessment process, build time for the truck and trailers, and final certification and approval. Then, just when everything appeared ready for the A-double to start work, there was a delay in receiving the final road access permit from the National Heavy Vehicle Regulator (NHVR). Despite the frustrations and setbacks, Steve concedes that productivity stands as the key to the combination’s commercial merit, with gross weights up to 74.5 tonnes delivering close to a 50 tonnes payload. "There’s nothing to complain about as far as earning capacity goes," Steve says earnestly. As he candidly states, "There’s no way I would’ve invested so much on this combination if I wasn’t absolutely sure of a good payback." Related reading - http://www.ownerdriver.com.au/product-news/1608/pbs-builds-hercules-strength .

If you're displeased with this dealer's response to your concerns, I suggest you call Volvo Group's Mack brand "customer satisfaction " hotline for the U.S. and Canada at +1 (866) 298-6586 and speak to them about it.

Canadian police kill radical Islamist CBC News / August 10, 2016 A suspect being sought in connection with a terror threat, 24-year-old Aaron Driver, has been killed in a confrontation with police in Strathroy, Ontario. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) shot Driver after he detonated an explosive device that injured himself and another person. Police shot Driver after seeing he was going to detonate a second device. The suspect planned to use a bomb to carry out a suicide bombing mission in a public area, but was killed in a police operation. The RCMP were conducting an operation in a residential southwestern Ontario neighbourhood of Strathroy on Wednesday evening after it said credible information of a potential terrorist act was received earlier in the day. "A suspect was identified and the proper course of action has been taken to ensure that there is no danger to the public's safety," the RCMP said. Driver, a known ISIS supporter, agreed to the conditions of a peace bond in a Winnipeg court earlier this year after being arrested in June 2015. By agreeing to the peace bond, Driver was "consenting or acknowledging that there are reasonable grounds to fear that he may participate, contribute — directly or indirectly — in the activity of a terrorist group." Driver caught the attention of CSIS, Canada's spy agency, in October 2014 when he was tweeting support for the militant group ISIS under the alias Harun Abdurahman. He also said the Parliament Hill attack in October of that year by Michael Zehaf-Bibeau was justified. The Mounties planned to hold a news conference on Thursday to provide details. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ BBC / August 11, 2016 A man killed by police in the Canadian province of Ontario planned an attack within 72 hours, police said. The United States FBI sent the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) a video appearing to show a person preparing for an attack. Police quickly identified the suspect as Aaron Driver, 24, and apprehended him in a taxi in Strathroy, Ontario. Driver, who was known to authorities for supporting ISIS, was killed by police. Mike Cabana, RCMP deputy commissioner, said the FBI alerted Canadian authorities early on Wednesday about an "unknown individual that was clearly in the final stages of planning an attack using a homemade explosive device" in Canada. "Obviously it was a race against time," Mr Cabana said. "How quickly this was all established is actually a testament to the level of collaboration that exists between law enforcement agencies." The tip included a "martyrdom" video showing a masked suspect, later identified as Driver, saying he planned to detonate an explosive device in an urban centre during morning or afternoon rush hour. Police played the video at a news conference, showing a masked man denouncing Western "enemies of Islam," making reference to the attacks in Paris and Brussels and pledging his support to IS. "You will pay for everything you brought against us," Driver said in the video. Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) first learned of Driver when he tweeted his support for IS under the alias Harun Abdurahman in October 2014. Mr Cabana added that Driver had been in contact with a 15-year-old British boy who plotted to behead police officers at an Anzac Day parade in Australia. Driver, who was arrested in Winnipeg last June for supporting IS on social media, was under a peace bond, or a court order restricting his movements. Conditions of his peace bond included restricting access to a computer, cell phone, mobile device, social media and prohibiting him from having any contact with IS or other terrorist groups. He was ordered to wear a GPS tracking device, but it was removed earlier this year. Though his movements were restricted, RCMP officials said that he was not under constant surveillance. Police said Driver detonated a device in the back of a taxi, injuring him before he was killed by police. The taxi driver was also hurt. Driver was about to detonate a second device when police shot him. .

Yes, a running prototype was built. The program was mature.

The key questions that all the 2016 presidential candidates only faintly skimmed over: 1. How do you intend to stimulate and grow the economy above its dismal 1.2% growth? 2. How do you intend to spark private-sector job growth? 3. How do you intend to secure our borders? 4. How do you intend to defeat ISIS? 5. How do you intend to reduce the crushing national debt? 6. How do you intend to balance the budget? 7. How do you intend to improve foreign relations with our allies?

Take the time to watch this video in its entirety. Your government (of the people, for the people and by the people), your employees in Washington, D.C. refuse to tell share with you..........anything. Your State Department’s spokesperson, Elizabeth Trudeau, refused to answer even the most reasonable and basic of questions. Reporter: I’m sorry, are you – am I not speaking English? Is this – I mean, is it coming across as a foreign – I’m not asking you if – no one is saying it’s not okay or it’s bad for the department to get a broad variety of input from different people. Asking – the question is whether or not you have determined that there was nothing improper here. Trudeau: “We feel confident that all the rules were followed.” Sarah Westwood of the Washington Examiner adds that Trudeau “also dismissed inquiries about whether Cheryl Mills, Clinton’s former chief of staff, lied under oath when she denied involvement in the botched handling of a 2012 Freedom of Information Act request for documentation of the email accounts Clinton used for official communication.” Asked why Mills didn’t respond correctly to the FOIA request in the first place, Trudeau answered, “Yeah. It’s a good question. I don’t have an answer for you.” .

Commercial Motor / August 10, 2016 NHS Supply Chain, which is operated by DHL, has begun taking delivery of 120 new Dafs from dealer Ford and Slater in Leicester as part of its fleet renewal programme. The new equipment includes 49 DAF LF 14-tonne rigids, 50 DAF CF 18-tonners, 16 DAF CF drawbar units, five DAF CF 6x2 tractors and 19 new Gray and Adams trailers including three double-decks. DHL will manage the day-to-day operation of the fleet through its central maintenance control facility in Manchester and the vehicles will be introduced over the next few months across NHS Supply Chain’s seven UK locations. The trucks all come with DAF MultiSupport compliance contracts, covering vehicle servicing, tachograph calibration, MoT inspection/certification and legal inspections. They feature birds-eye view 360° camera systems, near side detection systems for vulnerable road-users, left turn audible warning systems, four-camera monitoring systems and front/rear proximity warning systems. NHS Supply Chain is operated by DHL and managed by the NHS Business Services Authority, providing more than 300,000 products to 1,000 different customers. DHL recently extended its contract for a further two years until October 2018. Tim Slater, CEO at NHS Supply Chain, said: “Our investment in the new vehicle fleet reinforces our commitment to deliver a great service with vastly increased safety and environmental credentials.” .

Volvo Trucks USA has withdrawn the video.

International Truck introduces Accelerator Write-Up mobile application Truck News / July 28, 2016 Navistar announced today that it will provide its new Accelerator Write-Up – a mobile application that will expedite customers’ service visits by streamlining the write-up and diagnostic process – to its service departments at all 700 International Truck and IC Bus locations. “The Accelerator Write-Up Tool was designed with extensive dealer input with the goal of saving time, removing ambiguity and standardizing procedures during the service check-in process,” said Mark Reiter, Navistar vice-president, Customer Support. “The goal is to maximize customer uptime and provide a best-in-class customer experience.” The Accelerator Write-up is an Android mobile application that simplifies the customer experience at an International Truck or IC Bus dealership by collecting customer vehicle issues using a multiple-choice questionnaire to assign corresponding complaint codes, then linking these issues to action plans that provide service technicians with clear direction on how to diagnose and repair specific vehicle issues. The application allows the customer and dealer collaborate to 1) confirm customer information; 2) collect the customer vehicle issue by assigning it a code; 3) capture photos of all four corners of the vehicle; 4) connect to the vehicle to capture a health report and 5) agree to the terms of service. This write-up data then becomes accessible to customers subscribing to OnCommand Connection, Navistar’s remote diagnostics system, giving customers the ability to view their vehicle’s complete service history and health reports from their own computer or mobile device. “The new Accelerator Write-up application supports our leadership in the connected vehicle space,” said Terry Kline, chief information officer, Navistar. “This is just one of an entire marketplace of high-tech tools that are currently in development to better meet the needs of our customers.” Dealerships will begin implementing the Accelerator Write-up on July 28, 2016. To find an International Truck or IC Bus dealer, visit www.internationaltrucks.com or www.icbus.com.

International Trucks Press Release / August 10, 2016 .

No sales marketing literature was ever printed because Volvo killed the program.

Much thanks to your friend for sharing these photographs. The black engine appears to be a "display" unit. Does it have unit pump injection? Mack Trucks had planned to re-launch the E9 V-8 in 2003 with Bosch electronic unit pump (EUP) injection. Revisions allowed it to meet the latest EPA standards The military spec units were probably built in 2003.

U.S. complains after Philippines president uses homophobic slur to describe envoy The Washington Post / August 10, 2016 The first rule of diplomacy? Don't use a homophobic slur when referring to a foreign dignitary. But that's exactly what Rodrigo Duterte, president of the Philippines, did in televised remarks Friday. Washington reportedly summoned Manila's charge d’affaires in Washington on Monday to complain, in what must have been a rather awkward meeting. Duterte, a fast-talking former mayor who swept to power this spring, was telling reporters about his relationship with U.S. Ambassador Philip Goldberg when he made the wildly homophobic — and utterly undiplomatic — remark. "As you know, I’m fighting with [U.S. Secretary of State John F. Kerry’s] ambassador. His gay ambassador, the son of a whore. He pissed me off,” Duterte said. (He was speaking in Tagalog, the main language of the Philippines, and the word for "son of a whore" isn't quite as pointed as it seems in English. It might be compared to calling someone an S.O.B.) During this year's election campaign, Duterte drew national and international condemnation for saying he wished he had "been first" to rape an Australian missionary who was assaulted and killed during a prison riot. The Australian ambassador objected, as did Goldberg. Duterte told them both to "shut up." The not-so-presidential comment came at a sensitive time. With China pressing its claims to virtually the entire South China Sea, the Philippines and the United States have moved to deepen their long-standing military alliance. A defense pact upheld this year allows the U.S. military to build facilities at five Philippine bases, and more U.S. ships than ever are stopping by the former U.S. naval base at Subic Bay. But Duterte has gone back and forth on his relationship with the United States, a fact that has raised questions about how he would handle a potential conflict in the South China Sea. During his campaign, Duterte said he might be willing to make a deal with China in return for major infrastructure spending on his home island, then quixotically vowed to ride a water scooter to the disputed Spratly Islands in the South China Sea and plant the Philippine flag. As president, he has thus far taken a more restrained approach, potentially laying the groundwork for better ties with China. Duterte is also facing criticism from the United States and others over a bloody crackdown on alleged drug dealers. [‘Shoot him and I’ll give you a medal’: Duterte urges public to kill drug lords] Since Duterte took office, more than 400 suspected drug dealers have been killed, 4,400 have been arrested, and more than 600,000 people have surrendered themselves to authorities to avoid being killed, the Associated Press reported. [In this area, he’s effective] “We are concerned by these detentions, as well as the extrajudicial killing of individuals suspected to be involved in drug activity in the Philippines,” U.S. State Department spokeswoman Elizabeth Trudeau said Monday. Goldberg is not the first dignitary to be subjected to crude comments from Duterte. The now-president once made headlines for using the same "son of a whore" word to describe the pope. Duterte later issued a letter of apology and said he would fly to the Vatican to apologize. He then backpedaled on the visit bit.

David Axe, Reuters / August 10, 2016 Britain used to boast the most powerful navy in the world. No more. That’s a serious problem for allies like the United States. Traditionally, Britain’s Royal Navy has been the U.S. Navy's closest partner. The two have fought together against most every foe. So any weakening of the Royal Navy also erodes Washington's naval power. Today, however, the Royal Navy is a shadow of its former self. Government budgeteers have repeatedly, and excessively, cut the numbers of its ships, planes and manpower. It can barely patrol the United Kingdom’s own waters, much less project British influence abroad. Though London officials now vow to reverse the decline, it might be too late. With morale plummeting, and its few remaining ships frequently malfunctioning at sea, the Royal Navy’s suffering might be terminal. The timing couldn’t be worse. The West is mobilizing to defeat Islamic State, deter an increasingly aggressive Russia and manage China's meteoric rise as a world power. The British fleet's collapse is an object lesson for cash-strapped governments struggling to balance competing budgetary needs in a seemingly ever more volatile world. Yes, navies are expensive. They require long-term planning, work and funding. In peacetime, the fleet’s benefit is often invisible, marked by the absence of overt conflict. Yet navies remain crucial to national defense. Patrolling international waters with sophisticated sensors and powerful, long-range weaponry, they can respond more quickly to crises and bring more firepower to bear than can air forces (which require nearby runways) and armies (which move slowly). Navies that die from neglect leave a void that rogue states, terrorists and criminals can quickly fill. It takes navies to keep an eye on vast ocean regions. Remove what was once the world's leading fleet, and you create a virtual security vacuum. During World War Two, the British fleet was still dominant. On D-Day in 1944, it was able to send more than 900 British warships across the English Channel to escort the Allied troops who would liberate Europe from Nazi Germany. As recently as 1982, the Royal Navy could quickly muster no fewer than 115 ships — including two aircraft carriers carrying jet fighters, plus 23 destroyers and frigates — to retake the Falkland Islands from Argentina. Today, the British navy doesn’t even have jet fighters. It mothballed its last Harriers in 2010. It possesses just 89 ships. (By comparison, the U.S. Navy and Military Sealift Command, the Pentagon's fleet of support ships, have roughly 400.) Britain’s fleet has declined amid steady defense budget cuts, from 4.1 percent of gross domestic product in 1988 to 2.6 percent in 2010. Reductions in 2010 sliced another 8 percent in real terms. As part of a defense review in 2015, London vowed to stop cutbacks on the fleet. But the damage has been done. On paper, the Royal Navy's 89 ships include one helicopter carrier, six amphibious assault ships, six destroyers, 13 frigates, seven attack submarines and four ballistic-missile submarines. The rest are minesweepers, survey ships and other support vessels, many no larger than the U.S. Coast Guard's small patrol ships. Only the six destroyers, 13 frigates and seven attack submarines can be considered true frontline vessels, with adequate sensors, weapons and protection to fight and survive in a battle with a sophisticated foe. The other ships require escort through dangerous waters. Roughly half the ships are in routine maintenance or training at any given time. Several others are committed to small standing patrols, which leaves just a handful of vessels to respond to emergencies. But that's assuming there are enough sailors to operate the ships. The Royal Navy has shed people faster than ships. Britain had 39,000 sailors in 2000. It now has a little more than 29,000, at least 2,000 short of its authorized strength. Fleet planners tried to address the personnel shortage by sidelining two of its most powerful ships. This summer, for example, the Royal Navy placed the large Type 23 frigate HMS Lancaster in “extended readiness”: It was tied up pierside, its crew assigned to other vessels. Meanwhile, the new Type 45 destroyer HMS Dauntless suffered serious problems with generators and entered port for repairs that could last at least until 2019. As with Lancaster, the fleet dispersed Dauntless' sailors to other vessels. With those vessels out of action, the Royal Navy's real strength dropped from 26 fighting ships to an unprecedented modern low of 24 [just 24 fighting ships available to call on!]. Last month, the new attack submarine HMS Ambush collided with a merchant vessel off Gibraltar. The sub suffered serious damage and limped back to Britain for repairs that could take months, if not longer. That accident reduced the Royal Navy's undersea combat strength by nearly 15 percent. It was a stark reminder that Britain has almost no naval strength in reserve. As budget reductions cut deeper, the British fleet withdrew from much of the world. Before 2010, the Royal Navy played a leading role in efforts to curb piracy off the Somali coast. British frigates formed the core of various international task forces that patrolled the Indian Ocean and Red Sea. But in 2012, London quietly ended its permanent role in the counter-piracy efforts. Britain also felt the dearth of ships much closer to home. In January 2014, the resurgent Russian navy, which under President Vladimir Putin has embarked on an extensive modernization program, sailed a missile-armed cruiser through the North Sea. The Russian ship approached to within 30 miles of Scotland. The Royal Navy's crucial job is safeguarding British home waters. But the only available warship, the destroyer HMS Defender, was at Portsmouth on England's southern coast. Defender took 24 hours to make the 600-mile journey to Scotland. It eventually located the Russian ship and, after the two crews exchanged a few radio messages, Defender escorted the cruiser away from British territory. A few months later, Islamic State fighters swept through northwestern Iraq. The world mobilized air and sea power to help Baghdad push them back. The U.S. and French navies deployed aircraft carriers to launch air strikes on the militant forces. The U.S. Navy even occasionally positioned two flattops in Middle East waters. But for the first time in a century, Britain could do little to help. It had no aircraft carriers capable of supporting fixed-wing planes. London had decommissioned its last — HMS Illustrious — in August 2014. Illustrious' Harrier strike jets had preceded the vessel into retirement. Perhaps most damning, in 2016 the Royal Navy withdrew from the South Atlantic after 34 years of deploying at least one large warship to deter Argentina from again trying to seize the Falklands Islands. Under successive Labour and Conservative governments, London has consistently cut the Royal Navy for more than a decade, while denying that the cuts were detrimental to national security. The government pointed to several multibillion-pound shipbuilding programs for new frigates, destroyers and submarines, as well as an ambitious plan to build two new large aircraft carriers and outfit them with F-35 stealth fighters. But the new ships are too few, too late. They are also too lightly armed to adequately replace older vessels. Much less to expand and enhance the fleet. In recent years, the Royal Navy has replaced 12 old Type 42 destroyers with just six new Type 45s, which are larger and more heavily armed than the Type 42s but mechanically unreliable. In addition, there are too few to handle all the missions the older vessels once undertook. The fleet is getting just seven new Astute-class attack submarines, to replace 12 old Swiftsure- and Trafalgar-class subs. As with the Type 45 destroyers, the Astutes are bigger and pack more firepower than the ships they're replacing. But like the Type 45s, the Astutes have proved difficult to operate. In any case, there aren't enough to cover all the areas the older submarines once patrolled. Today there are 13 old Type 23 frigates in the fleet. The government has approved just eight new Type 26 frigates. Meanwhile, it is promising to build at least five smaller Type 31s to help keep up the fleet's strength. But the lighter Type 31s could lack the firepower and protection to be a credible deterrent to Russia's far heavier vessels. Indeed, many of Britain’s newest ships are remarkably light. London has placed orders over the past two years for several small, lightly equipped patrol vessels. The net effect is a Royal Navy that's increasingly made up of small, underarmed vessels that maintain the official ship count, but continue the hollowing-out trend that has steadily sapped its real strength. The new aircraft carriers are perhaps the best examples. The two Queen Elizabeth-class ships, which are 920 feet long and displace more than 60,000 tons of water, are the biggest warships Britain has produced. When they enter frontline service in 2020, they should restore the at-sea aviation capability that the Royal Navy lost when it retired its Harrier jets in 2010. The Queen Elizabeths, however, were planned for a larger fleet. An aircraft carrier requires more planes and escorts than Britain can provide. The U.S. Navy, for example, never deploys a carrier without 60 aircraft aboard and a convoy of three or four destroyers and cruisers, a submarine and several supply ships. The Royal Navy expects to deploy just one carrier at a time and keep the second at home. It projects that its new carriers will only deploy between 12 and 24 F-35s — too few to use the ships to their full potential. In addition, assigning the vessels needed to accompany and supply the carrier — three or four frigates and destroyers as escort and a several supply ships to sustain it — would monopolize the Royal Navy's entire deployable strength. A 60,000-ton carrier can accommodate 50 or more aircraft. London plans to buy just 48 F-35 fighters, which means many could be in maintenance or training at any given time. Navies are indeed complex and expensive. Stop paying attention to your fleet, and it will go away. For Britain’s allies, there’s a powerful lesson in that.

CNN / August 10, 2016 US Marines need to put away their cell phones, forget about their fancy coffees and get back to doing what Marines used to do -- dig a foxhole, cover up, stay quiet and be wary, the Corps' top officer says. Speaking at a conference on the future of expeditionary warfare at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies on Tuesday, Gen. Robert B. Neller, commandant of the Marines Corps, said today's Marines have gotten a little too comfortable with modern conveniences in a way that could prove disastrous on the battlefield. Neller said the Marines and Navy had seen exercises in which their personnel's use of mobile devices could give away positions to adversaries. One involved a Marine Expeditionary Force (MEF), a large unit designed for front-line combat operations. "What do you think the largest electromagnetic signature in the entire MEF headquarters emanated from? The billeting area. Why? Because everybody had their phone on. So we're going to have to take everybody's phone away from them?" he asked. "I know that sounds silly, but it's not silly," Neller said at the conference. "So, okay, Marines: We're going to go to the field for 30 days; everybody leave your phone in the car and tell your significant other or your mom, your aunt, your uncle, that you're not going to get 75 texts each day and answer them." The Navy has come up with plans to reduce its reliance on modern electronics to make its force harder to trace, going so far as to have sailors re-learn navigating by the stars instead of using the Global Positioning System, he said. But present-day society's most common tendencies can compromise those plans, the general said. "We realized that we didn't have the right solution because, you know, Seaman Hicks decided she wanted to check her Facebook page, and so she walked out on the weather deck at night with her phone, and what's that phone got? It's got GPS. So anybody in the world is going to know there's some GPS somewhere out floating across the ocean, most probably on a ship," Neller said. At the same time, Marines need to go back to basics as to what it means to be in the field, he said. That means leaving fixed bases, being on the move and doing so as covertly as possible. "When was the last time ... when you saw Marines or soldiers operating in Iraq or Afghanistan when they camouflaged their face or they broke up the outline of their helmet with camouflage so they couldn't be seen? When was the last time you saw that?" he asked. "We've been operating out of fixed positions. We have not moved across the ground. We have not maneuvered. We have not lived off the land," Neller said. "We've been eating in chow halls and drinking green bean coffee. That's pretty nice." But that's not where the Corps needs to be on the battlefield, he said. "You're living out of your pack, you're going to stop at night, you're going to dig a hole, you're going to camouflage, you're going to turn off all your stuff, and you're going to sit there, and you try to sleep," he said. "And you've got to be careful to not make any noise, and you're going to try to have absolutely no signature. Because if you can be seen, you will be attacked. That's the difference, and that's where we've got to get."

'Truly a piece of evil': 'Grim Sleeper' sent to death row Associated Press / August 11, 2016 A serial killer known as the "Grim Sleeper" was sentenced to death Wednesday for the murders of nine women and a teenage girl that went unsolved for years as the body count grew in a poor section of Los Angeles haunted by the scourge of crack cocaine. The moment of reckoning for Lonnie Franklin Jr. came after those whose lives were altered by his violence questioned how he could have been so cruel and shown so little remorse. "You are truly a piece of evil," said Enietra Washington, who managed to survive after being shot and testified against him at trial. "You're right up there with Manson." The killings occurred over more than two decades. Prosecutors presented evidence at trial linking Franklin to 14 slayings, including four women he wasn't charged with killing. They have said he may have had as many as 25 victims. Franklin, 63, avoided suspicion for decades, working as a city trash collector and onetime garage attendant for Los Angeles police. He denied any role in the killings to investigators but didn't utter a word in his defense during his lengthy trial or address the judge at sentencing. Judge Kathleen Kennedy, a 28-year veteran of the court, said she concluded Franklin preyed on defenseless women because of deep-seated hatred toward them. "I can't think of anyone I've encountered in all my years in the criminal justice system that has committed the monstrous crimes that you have," she said. The judge didn't buy the defense argument that California's death penalty was unconstitutional and should be set aside. She also rejected a motion for a new trial. Deputy District Attorney Beth Silverman said Franklin was irredeemable. "He is a psychopathic, sadistic serial killer who takes joy in inflicting pain on women and killing them," she wrote in her sentencing brief. Franklin showed no emotion throughout trial and six years of court hearings. Franklin was connected to the crimes after a task force that re-examined the old cases discovered that DNA from Franklin's son, which was in a database because of an arrest, showed similarities to genetic evidence found on some of the "Grim Sleeper" victims. A detective posing as a busboy at a pizza parlor collected utensils and crusts while Franklin was attending a birthday party. Lab results connected him to some of the bodies and led to his arrest. Investigators found a gun used in one of the killings and Polaroid photos of victims — including one of Washington, partly nude and bleeding in Franklin's garage after his arrest. Nearly three decades after the attack, she pointed him out in court, saying, "That's the person who shot me." Franklin killed seven women between 1985 and 1988 and a 15-year-old girl and two women between 2002 and 2007. Most were fatally shot at close range, though two were strangled and two were shot and choked. The killing of Thomas was later found to have occurred during that gap and police now say they don't think Franklin stopped killing until his arrest in 2010. Franklin's conviction will be automatically appealed. The likelihood he'll be executed is slim because of challenges over the state's lethal injection procedure. No one has been put to death in San Quentin State Prison since 2006 and there are nearly 746 inmates on death row. .

The New York Times / August 10, 2016 A new batch of State Department emails released Tuesday showed the close and sometimes overlapping interests between the Clinton Foundation and the State Department when Hillary Clinton served as secretary of state. The documents raised new questions about whether the charitable foundation worked to reward its donors with access and influence at the State Department, a charge that Mrs. Clinton has faced in the past and has always denied. In one email exchange, for instance, an executive at the Clinton Foundation in 2009 sought to put a billionaire donor in touch with the United States ambassador to Lebanon because of the donor’s interests there. In another email, the foundation appeared to push aides to Mrs. Clinton to help find a job for a foundation associate. Her aides indicated that the department was working on the request. Mrs. Clinton’s presidential campaign, which has been shadowed for 17 months by the controversy over the private email server she used exclusively while at the State Department, said that the emails released Tuesday had no bearing on the foundation’s work. The State Department turned the new emails over to a conservative advocacy group, Judicial Watch, as part of a lawsuit that the group brought under the Freedom of Information Act. The documents included 44 emails that were not among some 55,000 pages of emails that Mrs. Clinton had previously given to the State Department, which she said represented all her “work-related” emails. The document release centers on discussions between Mrs. Clinton’s aides and Clinton Foundation executives about a number of donors and associates with interests before the State Department. Tom Fitton, the president of Judicial Watch, charged that Mrs. Clinton “hid” the documents from the public because they appeared to contradict her official pledge in 2009 to remove herself from Clinton Foundation business while leading the State Department. The documents indicate, he said in a telephone interview, that “the State Department and the Clinton Foundation worked hand in hand in terms of policy and donor effort.” “There was no daylight between the two under Mrs. Clinton, and this was contrary to her promises,” he added. A number of the email exchanges released Tuesday included Huma Abedin, who was a top adviser to Mrs. Clinton at the State Department and later worked at the Clinton Foundation. In April 2009, Douglas J. Band, who led the foundation’s Clinton Global Initiative, emailed Ms. Abedin and Cheryl D. Mills, another top adviser to Mrs. Clinton, for help with a donor. Mr. Band wrote that he needed to connect Gilbert Chagoury, a Lebanese-Nigerian billionaire who was one of the foundation’s top donors, with someone at the State Department to talk about his interests in Lebanon. “It’s jeff feltman,” Ms. Abedin answered, referring to Jeffrey Feltman, who was the American ambassador to Lebanon at the time. “I’m sure he knows him. I’ll talk to jeff.” Mr. Band asked her to call Mr. Chagoury immediately if possible. “This is very important,” he wrote. In a separate email exchange, Mr. Band passed along to Ms. Abedin and Ms. Mills a request for “a favor” from an associate who had recently been on a Clinton Foundation trip to Haiti and was apparently seeking work at the State Department. The State Department deleted much of the information about the associate, including his name and the outcome of the job referral, in turning over the emails to Judicial Watch. In one undeleted section, however, Mr. Band wrote that it was “important to take care of” the associate’s request. A short time later, Ms. Abedin wrote back to say: “We all have him on our radar. Personnel has been sending him options.” The Clinton campaign suggested [nice try] that Mr. Band was acting in his capacity as former President Bill Clinton’s personal assistant, not in his role overseeing the Clinton Global Initiative. Regarding the exchanges between Mr. Band and Mrs. Clinton’s aides, the campaign said in a statement: “Neither of these emails involve the secretary or relate to the foundation’s work. They are communications between her aides and the president’s personal aide, and indeed the recommendation was for one of the secretary’s former staffers who was not employed by the foundation.” The campaign did not elaborate. The FBI spent more than a year examining Mrs. Clinton’s use of a private email account, but it is not clear how the work of the Clinton Foundation figured into that investigation. James B. Comey Jr., the FBI director, was noticeably circumspect in an appearance last month before the House oversight committee when Republicans questioned whether the investigation had looked at the Clinton Foundation. Twice asked, he refused to say. The FBI approached the Department of Justice earlier this year, requesting that the DOJ open an investigation of the Clinton Foundation. But the DOJ declined, stating that it had looked into the Clinton Foundation a year before and didn't find enough evidence.

You're 100 percent right on the reduction of North American truck choices. No, the new shared cab does not share any architecture with the DAF LF, CF or XF.

Associated Press / August 9, 2016 Speaking in Wilmington, North Carolina on Tuesday, Rudy Giuliani said that Hillary Clinton caused the death of Shahram Amiri, an Iranian national who was hanged on Sunday “revealing secrets to the enemy.” Hillary Clinton used her private email server to discuss details of the Iranian nuclear scientist who was put to death for giving information to the CIA on Tehran's nuclear program during Clinton's tenure as secretary of state. “Today it was revealed that some of those Hillary Clinton emails contain the name of a man named Amiri,” Giuliani said. “Amiri was executed by the Iranians several days ago.” “Remember Hillary told us there was no top secret information on her emails? Remember she told us that?” Giuliani asked. “Well, she lied!” “And I don't know the connection between that and the death of Mr. Amiri, but what I do know is it put a lot more attention on him. When they found those emails, it put a lot more attention on him. It certainly put him at great risk, even if they didn't find them.” Trump said Monday that “many people are saying that the Iranians killed the scientist who helped the U.S. because of Hillary Clinton's hacked emails.” Giuliani said that when FBI Director James Comey declared that Clinton was “extremely careless” with classified information in her private emails, “he was being kind!” “I used to be a U.S. attorney,” he said. “If she applied for a job with a U.S. attorney with me, I wouldn't be able to hire her. You know why? She wouldn't pass an FBI background check.” At the time, Clinton stressed that Amiri was in the U.S. of his “wn free will”. She described him in her emails as “our friend.” Amiri maintained he had been kidnapped by U.S. intelligence agents. Trump and Giuliani both lashed out at Clinton for maintaining an email server in her home while she was secretary of state, and then deleting over half of its contents. “She's not a leader. And she is a liar,” Trump said. “Thirty-three thousand emails are gone, okay? ... How do you get rid of 33,000 emails? Who sends 33,000 emails?” Giuliani said Clinton cares more about her Wall Street speaking-engagement paydays than about middle-class Americans, and leveraged her government influence to guarantee those windfalls for her husband. “She's thinking about the $1.2 million that UBS gave Bill Clinton when she made a call to the IRS to try to help UBS,” he said. “In the old days when I was a prosecutor, you went to jail for that!” “We need someone to come in with a broom and clean the damned place out,' Giuliani said of Washington. 'Clean it out!” . .