Panicky Annie Jacobsen, the prophetess of doom who lived through the frightening “dry run” in the sky by a bunch of Syrian musicians and lived to tell about it, appears to be officially discredited.

Did, as a passenger reported, 7 of the 13 Syrian musicians whose behavior was terrifying some passengers stand up in unison and take strategic positions by the lavatories and the exit door during final approach to Los Angeles, an act that would have been a frighteningly overt and unambiguous provocation?

They did not, according to the Federal Air Marshal Service, which had previously left unchallenged assertions by Annie Jacobsen, a freelance writer on the flight, that they did.

“What happened was, they were already standing up in the aisle before the seat belt signs became illuminated,” said Dave Adams, a spokesman for the agency, which represents air marshals who travel undercover on airplanes.

“The flight attendants asked them to sit down and the men respected the orders and sat in their seats. Two gentlemen asked why they had to, and a flight attendant told them ‘Because, so please take your seats.’ And they obeyed,” he said.

The new information, he added, came from “subsequent interviews of flight attendants on this matter by our personnel.”

So there was absolutely no sudden move by the men on final approach?

“None,” Mr. Adams said.

Annie is sticking by her story and insists that two other passengers have corroborated it — but she refused to say who they are. Needless to say, I’m extremely skeptical.

As usual, World O’Crap has the best analysis of this, plus many more links debunking Annie’s silly story.

No, I haven’t read it yet, but I know enough about it to wonder whether all of her drum-beating over Annie Jacobsen wasn’t just a way to slyly promote her book.

I’m not going to argue whether or not interning America’s Japanese population on the West Coast was a bad thing or not. I think it was, and another blogger has already taken the time to lay out in extraordinary detail just how weak Malkin’s thesis is. Go there for the facts. Go there to learn who her publisher is.

Meanwhile, another site has done some magnificent photoshopping of Malkin and her bookcover. Don’t wait; if you want a good, thought-provoking laugh, just go there. Here’s one I liked. (Update: I took down the original graphic, for fear it might offend.)

Malkin pitches and defends her book here.

Very exciting news. Finally, some peace of mind and security, and a decent weekly paycheck. Not as good as the dot-com days, but certainly respectable. And it’s the kind of work I enjoy. I won’t dread getting up in the morning and going to work.

Needless to say, the blogging will be sharply decreased, but I certainly won’t give it up. I’ve been going full speed ahead the past several weeks, and that can’t go on forever.

The HR department will be calling me in a few hours to discuss when I’ll start. I’m hoping to take a badly needed vacation before I report for duty. A whole new life….

This story sickens me.

MEMPHIS, Tenn. – Iraqis visiting on a civil rights tour were barred from city hall after the city council chairman said it was too dangerous to let them in.

The seven Iraqi civic and community leaders are in the midst of a three-week American tour, sponsored by the State Department to learn more about the process of government. The trip also includes stops in Washington, Los Angeles and Chicago.

The Iraqis were scheduled to meet with a city council member, but Joe Brown, the council chair, said he feared the group was dangerous.

“We don’t know exactly what’s going on. Who knows about the delegation, and has the FBI been informed?” Brown said. “We must secure and protect all the employees in that building.”

Elisabeth Silverman, the group’s host and head of the Memphis Council for International Visitors, said Brown told her he would “evacuate the building and bring in the bomb squads” if the group entered.

“They are in charge of setting up processes in their country. They have to educate themselves about how it works in this country,” Silverman said.

This is symptomatic of the Annie Jacobsen mentality so prevalent in America today. It makes me ashamed to be an American. Why don’t we simply outlaw Muslims altogether, and round them up, Michelle Malkin-style? While we’re at it, we might as well go for all dark-skinned people. (Be sure to visit that last link; it is priceless.)

No doubt the LGF crowd will cheer the Memphis councilmen as heroes. I have a more intimate word for them, and it begins with “a.”

There’s more great commentary, photographs and translations over at ESWN, this time in regard to police cracking down on peasants in Henan province. Their crime: petitioning the government because their land is being stolen from them. For this, the police surrounded their village before dawn and beat them, shot them with rubber bullets and used tear gas against them. The story got out on the Internet, which is the best thing that could have happened.

Fate so often plays strange tricks. This is an intriguing story of how Pu Yi’s cousin learned the value of silence during the Cultural Revolution, and how he ended up working in, of all places, the Summer Palace, as a clerk in the complaints department. For anyone following the Manchu lineage, this article is a must-read.

Well, why not?

China is giving the beauty pageant a surgical makeover with plans to anoint its first Miss Plastic Surgery this October, state media said on Tuesday.

Open to women from any country, the only requirement in the made-to-order competition is proof of inauthenticity – in the form of a doctor’s certificate of cosmetic surgery, the China Daily said.

The idea for the pageant came after one woman was barred from a traditional beauty contest because she had spent more than ¥110 000 yuan (R82 000) on plastic surgery that gave her a whole new face, it said.

Don’t forget, just last year China barred transexual Chen Lili from the Miss Universe contest. Does this mean they’ll soon have the first Miss Sex Change Pageant ?

Via the inimitable Patriot Boy

Now we all know: those terror warnings, so dire that press conferences were called and the terror level raised to “orange” in NYC and DC, were based on evidence that was years old.

More than half a dozen government officials interviewed yesterday, who declined to be identified because classified information is involved, said that most, if not all, of the information about the buildings seized by authorities in a raid in Pakistan last week was about three years old, and possibly older.

“There is nothing right now that we’re hearing that is new,” said one senior law enforcement official who was briefed on the alert. “Why did we go to this level? . . . I still don’t know that.”

Looking at that article, Billmon opines in an absolutely magnificent post:

Ordinarily, that kind of talk would make me wonder whether the Bush administration isn’t shamelessly manipulating dubious intelligence data in order to score a few political points and stampede the voters into supporting the GOP agenda.

But of course, we know this administration never does things like that.

I’m sure the threats were real, that the data wasn’t manufactured. But considering they were from years ago, they were not so urgent that Re-election Security Minister Tom Ridge had to hold a press conference saying the new threats were uncovered as a result of bush’s war on terror. Nor did they merit Andy Card holding another press confrence at which he constantly referred to bush’s “bold leadership.”

It’s all part of Karl Rove’s winning formula for bush: keep the war on terror top of people’s mind, especially when it appears Kerry is making headway in the race. We’ll be hearing more and more about threats like this in the weeks ahead, and also about more captures of “high-ranking Al Qaida operatives.” It’s bush’s only hope; if he can’t perpetuate the myth that he’s winning his war on terror, there’s nothing else to point to.

God forbid there’s ever a real threat they need to warn us about. By using national security for political advantage, bush has forced us to view the warnings with extreme cynicism, if we even notice them at all.

UPDATE: This is precious. Tom Ridge, then and now:

Now:

“We don’t do politics in the Department of Homeland Security,” he told reporters. “This is not about politics.

Then:

Administration sources tell TIME that employees at the Department of Homeland Security have been asked to keep their eyes open for opportunities to pose the President in settings that might highlight the Administration’s efforts to make the nation safer. The goal, they are being told, is to provide Bush with one homeland-security photo-op a month.”

Via Pandagon.

I don’t know why, but for the past 24 hours or so I’ve been gripped by the worst case of writer’s block I’ve ever experienced. Ever. Maybe it’s my current work: I have in front of me a deadline project that I find so difficult and uninspiring, I’m practically at wit’s end. For the first time, I may have to call a client and tell them I just can’t do it. (I suspect that won’t happen; knowing me, I’ll probably find enough to work with come the 11th hour, and I’ll pound something out minutes before the deadline — 24 hours from now.)

I mean, how can I write thrilling copy about a photography business? The one thing that speaks to the reader are the photographs, not copy that describes the photographs. Pure torture.

There is so much to blog about — the new bad news about Abu Ghraib and the charge that the military’s covering it up, the audacity of Tom Ridge raising the threat level to orange based on evidence that’s 4 years old, the forgotten war in Iraq, complaints that Chen is provoking war with China…. But all I can think about is this brochure and how I can possibly fill up four pages with copy about how great a photographer is.

Work brain, work. You’ve had more difficult assignments in your life. You can do it….

This week National Public Radio is presenting reporter Rob Gifford’s observations on life in China as he travels across the country in a bus. This is something Sinophiles will definitely want to listen to. A new program will be broadcast every morning, and there’s also a photo gallery, with pictures of those Gifford interviews.