As you are no doubt well aware of by now, the I35W bridge spanning the Mississippi River in Minneapolis collapsed during rush our this evening.

Dozens of vehicles have fallen into the river or the ground below; others have been crushed by the falling span. As I write this, authorities are stating that they can confirm seven people have died, that more than 30 are injured, and that 20 people or more are thought to be missing.

My heart goes out to those who have loved ones involved in this disaster, and I ask those readers who are religious to please consider saying prayers for those involved in this disaster, their families, the first responders, and attending medical personnel.

Update: James Lileks is continuing to update the story.

Worth noting are the stories of the heroism of ordinary people amid the disaster, as many people nearby and on the bridge rushed to aid others.

From Lileks at 10:21 PM:

I’m listening to a story on the news about a man who survived the fall – then ran to help the kids on the bus. I’d guess the fellow never considered what he might do in such a situation. Never thought about it much. Who would? But then you find yourself on a bridge that’s crashed down into the Mississippi, and you’re struggling with the seat belt buckle. It works , but your hands feel thick. You’re alive – which doesn’t seem that odd, really, you’ve always been alive, so this is just different, but you have strange thoughts about insurance and a mad swirl of panic and there’s blood in your hair but you can stand – and then you see a school bus. So you go to the bus. Of course you go the bus.

Most of us would. ItÂ’s a remarkable instinct that wells up and kicks in, and itÂ’s something you never expected to experience. As someone said about humans: WeÂ’re at our best when things are worst.

Would you have run to the bus? I'll answer for you: yes.

And from what I'm hearing, many did exactly that.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 11:15 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Democrat Presidential candidate Barack Obama seems to have, as my father might put it, "engaged his mouth before putting his mind in gear."

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said Wednesday that he would possibly send troops into Pakistan to hunt down terrorists, an attempt to show strength when his chief rival has described his foreign policy skills as naive.

The Illinois senator warned Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf that he must do more to shut down terrorist operations in his country and evict foreign fighters under an Obama presidency, or Pakistan will risk a U.S. troop invasion and losing hundreds of millions of dollars in U.S. military aid.

"Let me make this clear," Obama said in a speech prepared for delivery at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. "There are terrorists holed up in those mountains who murdered 3,000 Americans. They are plotting to strike again. It was a terrible mistake to fail to act when we had a chance to take out an al-Qaida leadership meeting in 2005. If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won't act, we will."

CNN provides us with this:

According to excerpts from the speech released by his campaign, Obama, D-Illinois, will say: "When I am President, we will wage the war that has to be won, with a comprehensive strategy with five elements: getting out of Iraq and on the right battlefield in Afghanistan and Pakistan; developing the capabilities and partnerships we need to take out the terrorists and the world's most deadly weapons; engaging the world to dry up support for terror and extremism; restoring our values; and securing a more resilient homeland."

Let us presume for the sake of argument that Obama is elected President, and as Commander in Chief, feels he has no choice but to invade Pakistan.

In his mind, what constitutes an "invasion?"

Does Mr. Obama mean periodic cross-border air raids by UAVs, attack aircraft, and special forces soldiers when intelligence assets identify specific targets, or does he mean what most of us would take way from these articles, which is a larger, full-spectrum invasion by land, air, and perhaps even naval forces?

What part of Pakistan would he invade?

Would he invade only the Taliban-controlled tribal areas of North and South Warizistan where we have seen most of the terrorist-related activities, or would he advocate a wider invasion of the Islamic nuclear state?

If a President Obama felt that an invasion of Pakistan was warranted, would he take preemptive steps to dismantle or destroy the Pakistani nuclear arsenal to prevent these munitions from possibly being used against American forces? He seems to suggest this when he states "we need to take out the terrorists and the world's most deadly weapons."

Does he realize that if he take such a step he would be attacking official Pakistani military bases and likely kill Pakistani soldiers, airmen, and other personnel that are not terrorists, forcing Pakistan directly into war with the United States?

Should efforts to destroy the Pakistani nuclear arsenal fall short of success, what are his contingencies? How would he keep any surviving Pakistani nuclear weapons from being used against invading U.S. soldiers. Does Obama realize that he would be responsible no only for any U.S. military losses, but for thousands of more lives in the region affected by the blast and its residual fallout effects?

This stance also brings up other issues.

If he truly believes that risking an assault on a nuclear state to suppress terrorism if diplomacy doesn't work is a viable option, why doesn't he join Senator Leiberman in saying that we must use all of our resources, including military force, against Iran, an aspiring nuclear country with a clear track record of the state sponsorship of terrorism throughout the region? Put bluntly, how could his policies be said to have any consistency if he advocates invading one state (Pakistan) for allowing terrorism, while failing to address another state (Iran) for directly supporting it throughout the region?

And how does he square his stated approaches to Iran and Pakistan with his advocating a withdrawal from Iraq, where we are already engaged with Islamic extremists who wish to create precisely the same kind of state that he says he would invade?

For quite some time--and due in no small part to the apparent lack of other strong primary candidates--I'd been rather confident that the 2008 Democrat Presidential ticket would be some combination of Hillary and Obama.

This frankly daft mash-up of contradictory foreign policy positions seems to indicate that the freshman senator from Illinois simply isn't ready for higher office, and very well may give John Edwards a fighting chance of getting on the ticket... then again, maybe not.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 10:29 AM | Comments (24) | Add Comment
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