I have been AWOL the last two days after re-opening the gg B&B for the backpackers plus a wife. Two of these people I had never met before. There are some things that are out of my comfort zone and entertaining house guests is one of them. I was exhausted yesterday after they left.

Yesterday afternoon we did take a ride on the Blue Ridge Parkway and saw some great autumn color. Unfortunately, the decision to do so was impromptu after taking one of the back packers back to Asheville so I did not have a camera, and that means no pictures. The colors were best at the mid elevations of 4500 feet or lower. At the upper elevations, the peak had passed, but overall, very nice fall colors.

Tim, I am thinking of you and your sweetie. I hope you both have a better week.

link

A new study from security consultancy IHS warns that ISIS attacks are spiking at an alarming rate, up 42 percent in the past quarter. They counted 1,086 attacks attributed to ISIS worldwide from July to September, about 12 attacks per day.
IHS terror head Matthew Henman also said ISIS’ focus seems to be shifting away from trying to capture new territory and are rather aiming to consolidate their control over existing territory and eliminate the ongoing resistance by some in their territory.

For all those attacks, not much has changed.

First one

An amendment to a controversial cybersecurity bill will allow US courts to pursue and jail foreign nationals even if the crimes they commit are against other foreigners and on foreign soil.

The main aim of the amendment to the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act (Cisa), which passed a key Senate hurdle on Thursday, is to lower the barrier for prosecuting crimes committed abroad. But the amended law would make it a crime punishable by US prison time not merely to clone the credit card or steal the Netflix password of an American citizen, but to take unauthorized information from any American company, no matter where it happens.

In other words, if a French national hacks a Spanish national’s MasterCard, she could be subject to 10 years in US prison under laws changed by the bill.

Can you say "world cop"?
Second one

The Additional Protocol to the Council of Europe Convention on the Prevention of Terrorism, signed on Thursday, will criminalize participating in a group for the purpose of terrorism, receiving terrorism training, travelling abroad for terrorism, funding travel abroad for terrorism and facilitating travel abroad to engage in terrorism.

"For the first time in international law, we have an instrument that criminalizes early preparations for acts of terror," said the Council of Europe Secretary General Thorbjorn Jagland on Thursday. "It is the vital, missing piece of the jigsaw."

Can you say "pre-crime"?

I have so much respect for your work and hope things are getting a bit better for you and your sweety. Always love your music selections and just wonder what it takes to get your musical ear and musical memories.

Makes me feel comfortable to listen in here and talk my mind freely. Thanks to all for that.

I was not a Hillary supporter, but admit that she is very strong and sharp and yesterday I admired her composure. For me foreign policies of the US are one of the most important issues (and I am a bit critical about what you are doing since I became aware of US policies) and the main reason I was no Hillary fan was her ways she talked about FP. But I know it's the hardest part of US policy to handle or control, so yesterday I gave her credit for having had the courage to "handle" it at all, she has been too often and too much "bombarded" with stinky eggs. But I am unhappy with all the political outcomes that the US has created outside its own territory.

The last good thing I can figure out for the US foreign policies to be successful, was the fact that no US troops got into a shooting match or a nuclear exchange with Russia over the cold war times in the fifties and sixties on German soil. I think I grew up in a generation that had the luck to have never been confronted with real bombing warfare, but being reminded through the past WWII how that may have felt to my parent generation. It always was possible to start again and was literally always just a step or minute away (living just a mile or so from the Berlin Wall). I am so lucky to have had lived under good constitutional laws and a democracy that didn't feel "rigged" and all of that even after we had created the horrors of the past two world wars and the holocaust.

Somehow I just start to appreciate that more than ever, when I watch the current times and how all of the anxieties and hatred just seem to be close to come back and haunt the next generations.

Let's hope US foreign policies will change dramatically, no matter who will be elected. It's one of the hardest issues for any candidate, I believe.. I feel more comfortable with less hawkishness and less adoring leadership addiction, which is based solely on US military and money powers to get anybody to do what the US wants. That should stop or at least get diminished, I believe. Too many people get corrupted or get hateful (especially in Africa) over that.

Both HRC and Sanders have to ask themselves why they really want the US to be the leaders of the world. I think that's overreaching. You got your land, you brains, your people and I just don't understand why you need to be an international super power.

Let other peoples find their own ways to handle their affairs and survival. Intervene less, leave your religious zealotry at home, don't export it to foreign countries. Leave the troops at your home. Don't make profits with weapon sales. Invest in your own energy resources and technologies. Just stay out of other people's mess. Of course the same I say to any of the European appeasers and willing allies. People should all stay in their home turf and stop messing with other people's territory and customs and internal troubles.So far you haven't prevented in any country the atrocities that those countries' government have engaged in with their own citizens. That should be enough of a sign that whatever you have done hasn't worked. So, how about changing it instead of doing the same thing over and over again and expect a different outcome, when the outcomes haven't been that different in the past?

That's just how I feel right now this morning. A lot of people got kind a depressed and hopeless in the last couple of weeks. I am not alone.

But now I am going to leave and do something that's actually useful. Get my papers in order...
My father used to say that "Orderliness is half of life". After all he wasn't that wrong...

sorry to hear about the tough week, i hope that things ease up on you.