Masshole

172 Wannabe, I was selected for a scholarship/contracting in the Spring semester of my 100 year and it was largely because of my majors (both tech),GPA, and SAT scores. It will be a lot harder to get the scholarship now being a non-tech major unfortunately. We have a lot of non-tech students through the crosstown schools and only one of them was selected last year because he agreed to switch his major from political science to meteorology. That is not to say it is impossible, I am just saying it is going to be difficult. As far as standing out goes, your GPA and performance in LLab will do that for you so long as you maintain your grades and do what you're supposed to. I feel like some students go to great lengths to stand out to the cadre and it ends up being detrimental to their ranking because they put their peers down. You will make a lasting impression by sincerely helping out your classmates. Each month before finals I would set up tutor sessions in our Det lounge for anyone that needed help, or get everyone together to study the FT manual before a quiz your 200 year. Also, volunteer your time to the Det if you are available. I did not have a whole lot of time, but I participated in Drill Team. Yes, this! In China we called it the empty rice bowl approach. There are a number of cadets that go into ROTC thinking they know everything there is to know about the military and their arrogance is cancerous to the class. Help everyone out and do not boast any knowledge you come with, remember that you are all a team.

I would never give the bag a thought, but depending on where you are it is not that big of a deal. If you are out of your seat, standing there, waiting for the people in front of you to proceed to the emergency exit, and your bag is under your seat, then you are not holding anybody back by picking it up. Also, it obviously depends on what is in the bag. My little brother has some health issues and if I were on the plane with him I would be taking my bag because that is where his medicine is. The problem would arise when people see you getting your bag, and then they start taking the time to open the overhead.

I thought M2 liked to collect Kalashnikovs. Wouldn't that make him a commie?

Great signing, we need some coverage LBs.

Hold up. Who is being framed in this case? Was someone wearing a Dzokhar mask while throwing explosives at the police from a stolen car?

Kurdistan now? Or Kyrgyzstan? According to all of the information being thrown out there they have lived in every country from Armenia to Mongolia.

Our detachment has cut out pretty much everything, including the base visits/shadowing. It might be worth a shot to pay for it myself, but I am not sure anyone is doing that anymore.

It's possible, but usually when extremists bred in Chechnya or Central Asia strike it is against Russia. That being said, Kazakhstan has slowly become a huge melting pot for all kinds of Asian groups. Maybe there is a resurgence in extremists especially with our withdrawal in Afghanistan. That I do not know. I am also not sure why they would think Boston is a favorable place for their agenda since there is not a sizable Russian population relative to other large cities. That is why I think the older brother was just acting out against his inability to adapt to American culture under the pretense of Pan-Islamist ideology. You have probably read a lot about this, but if not there is a really good short book on Central Asian security issues by Alexander Cooley. It is called Great Game, New Rules. He has also published some articles online, one recently in Foreign Policy magazine called The League of Authoritarian Gentlemen. There is also a good book by Ahmed Rashid covering the early stages of the IMU. I am originally from Asia, so this kind of stuff is of interest to me.

The whole story is so convoluted. Some news outlets report Kyrgyz connections, others say the older brother moved to Kazakhstan. Kazakhstan has painted itself as a bastion for religious tolerance in the past decade or so. It probably has very little attraction for an extremist. Out of the five post-Soviet republics in the region, Kazakhstan is probably the least fertile land for recruiting extremists. Kyrgyzstan is a bit different because the IMU has launched a spate of attacks on the country prior to 2001 and it has often teetered on political collapse (suffered two regime-ousting revolutions in a decade). It could be a breeding ground for extremists, but most dissent is focused on political issues or ethnic tension between Uzbeks and Kyrgyz in Southern areas like Osh.

Intentional omission because Islamist group presences in Central Asia are relatively weak right now. Not even the IMU really operates there anymore.

No one is pretending to have it figured out, so throttle back grandpa. We are just discussing our thoughts and speculations like most people do. Although the media would buy into it. "This just in, North Korean paratroopers in Watertown. Shots fired."

Seconded, at least what is allowed to be discussed. It seems like we never get anyone with this background for career day. I was able to pick Col.Dunlop's brain a little but I still have a lot of questions about it.

The younger one was probably influenced by his older brother. I am guessing that since the older brother was so socially disenfranchised and isolated that he started to subscribe to some Pan-Islamic sentiment that is not necessarily tied to any particular cause, but gave him justification and meaning. He recently spent six months in Russia and was previously investigated for extremist beliefs. The younger brother was probably convinced to help if the older brother had some broad picture ideology and was not just acting on his own personal isolation. The father is a suspicious character too. He was making threats to the US if his other son was killed, and why did the uncle estrange himself from the family? Maybe the father played some role in implanting some extremist ideas in the older brother's head.

Let's tie him up in Southie, give everybody one punch at a time, and the person to deal the final blow gets a free bottle of Jameson.

No worries, they are popping up everywhere. https://boston.craigslist.org/bmw/boa/3754395122.html

Supposedly he has 40 gallons of fuel and may have a bomb vest. I think every squad car in a 30 mile radius has come out this way.

They got him. Edit: It's official.

I had left about an hour prior to the incident and was at the Miracles of Science restaurant when the incident happened. I just heard the commotion of the emergency vehicles. The building I work out of is down Vassar from the Stata Center where it happened. Since we are all just throwing assumptions out there, I am going to guess that these two were consistently disenfranchised socially in the U.S. and were falling further and further into isolation. I do not think they are connected to any particular group, and after reading the one guy's Vkontakte page he had a very typical Islamist view.

I do not understand why they robbed the 7-11 and in Central Sq. of all places. I cannot think of a place with more cops. YoungerDbag: We better not go to the ATM, they will trace us. OlderDbag: Good thinking, Borat, let's just go rob that 7-11 in the heart of Cambridge.

Link to article written on the older brother in a Boston College student magazine. The photo essay is on pages 17 and 18 in the magazine, or page 10 on the top bar.

The reduction is $50 for GMC and $100 for POC. The cuts will start in October 2013.

Very well said. More on the person of interest in Revere: Authorities searched an apartment in the nearby Boston suburb of Revere as part of the investigation into the explosions. FoxNews.com saw federal, state and local law enforcement entering the building late Monday night and early Tuesday morning. Sources confirmed to FoxNews.com that the apartment being searched in connection to the bombings is on the fifth floor of the building. A source close to the investigation confirms to FoxNews.com the man whose apartment was searched is considered a person of interest in the case, and is the same person of interest Fox News confirmed earlier authorities are guarding at a local hospital. The source confirmed to FoxNews.com that the person of interest is Abdul Rahman Ali Alharbi, a 20-year-old Saudi. His Facebook page identifies him as a current or former student at the New England School of English. He is believed to have entered the country on a student visa. The source stressed that Alharbi is a person of interest, not a suspect, and said he suffered serious injuries in the explosion. Read more: https://www.myfoxboston.com/story/21987838/2013/04/16/fox-news-authorities-guarding-man-at-local-hospital#ixzz2QcyzBi00

Splitting hairs, but it was an 8-year-old boy. 3 dead; 141 injured, 17 of which are critical and 25 are in "serious condition."

They would not do anything to provoke an automatic military response from us that would ultimately result in the destruction of their regime. Although no one knows how coherently their military functions so there is always the possibility for miscommunication or a commander going rogue.

How Americans live according to North Korea.