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USMC 234th Birthday Tribute!

WASHINGTON (Nov. 6) — The shooting rampage at Fort Hood could make life noticeably more difficult for Arabs and Muslims serving in the U.S. military.

Soon after the killings, witnesses said that Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the alleged gunman, had shouted “Allahu Akbar,” the Arabic phrase for “God is great,” as he fired. Meanwhile, a video played repeatedly on cable television of him wearing the white dishdasha and skullcap of an observant Muslim. The clip was recorded just hours before the attack that killed 13 people and wounded at least 28 others, reports said.

For those who believe Muslims and Arab-Americans — Hasan’s parents were Palestinian — constitute a dangerous “fifth column,” the tragedy provided further evidence.

Fox News host Brian Kilmeade suggested that all Muslim Army officers should face special debriefings. “If I’m going to be deployed in a foxhole, if I’m going to be sticking in an outpost,” he said, “I got to know the guy next to me is not going to want to kill me.”

Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences / AP

Nidal Malik Hasan

Allen West, a Republican recruit for a House seat in Florida and a retired Army officer who served at Fort Hood, was more blunt, saying that the attack “is proof the enemy is infiltrating our military.”

Similar rhetoric was heard two years ago when the U.S. Military Academy at West Point dedicated its first Muslim prayer room. Investor’s Business Daily criticized the Army for “a show of blind tolerance” that increased the chances of “Islamist infiltration.”

Some of the suspicions about Muslims in uniform arose after Army Sgt. Hasan Akbar, an African-American convert to Islam, killed two officers and wounded 14 others in a grenade attack in Kuwait a few days before the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq. Akbar, who was later sentenced to death by a military court, said he was upset that U.S. troops planned to kill his fellow Muslims.

Relatives of Hasan, a psychiatrist about to be deployed to Afghanistan, said he was often harassed for being a Muslim after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and wanted to leave the military.

The Pentagon says there are 3,546 self-identified Muslims in the military. Muslim groups say there as as many as 15,000 because many list no religious preference in their records. Hasan is among nearly 300,000 of 1.4 million active-duty service members who didn’t list a religion.

Ray Hanania, a Chicago radio talk show host and co-founder of the Association of Patriotic Arab Americans in Military, condemned Hasan’s alleged actions as the work of a troubled individual. But he said many Arab-American and Muslim service members can tell stories of prejudice in the ranks.

“There are jokes about Arabs,” said Hanania, who is Christian. “Or someone saying, ‘Why did your people attack us?’ Or it’s a lack of knowledge about Islam. Do you guys believe in a different God? Or, ‘If we go to war, can I really count on you stand with me?’ I don’t think everybody gets those questions.”

Former Army Capt. James Yee, who served as Muslim Army chaplain at the U.S. prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, said harassment can take a toll on Muslim service members. Yee himself was accused of espionage in 2003 and spent 76 days in solitary confinement in a Navy brig before all charges were dropped.

“There is absolutely no excuse justifying the criminal actions” at Fort Hood,” he said. “But the military also needs to better address racial, religious and gender harassment issues. They all do occur much more than is ever reported. That I know from firsthand experience as a chaplain who often dealt with these issues from soldiers, as well as experiencing it for myself.”

Life in the military has been tough for those with Middle Eastern backgrounds for years, says James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute. “In every war, the enemy ‘gets generalized,’” he said. “We did it with the Hun and gook and Japs and now it’s hajis and rag heads. It is hard but it’s a special tribute to these young men and women that they’re able to weather that and continue to serve with distinction.”

In 2003, Gen. John Abizaid, the grandson of Lebanese immigrants and a fluent Arabic speaker, was promoted as head of U.S. Central Command, managing the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Five years later, Michael Monsoor, who died throwing himself on a grenade to save his fellow Navy SEALs in Ramadi, Iraq, in 2006, became the first Arab-American to be awarded the Medal of Honor.

When Colin Powell went on “Meet the Press” to endorse Barack Obama for president amid Internet rumors that the candidate was a Muslim, he noted a photo of a mother grieving in Arlington National Cemetery’s Section 60, final resting place for the dead from Iraq and Afghanistan. She clutched a grave marker that “had a crescent and star of the Islamic faith. And his name was Kareem Rashad Sultan Khan,” said Powell, the first African-American to serve as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. “And he was an American.”

Despite Thursday’s attack, Arab-American and Muslim soldiers are likely to remain in high demand as language and cultural translators in both war zones.

“I watch the news and know what they’re saying” on right-wing talk shows about Arabs and Muslims, said Souhaid Elkoun, a Marine Corps reservist who served as a translator in Fallujah, Iraq, in 2004. “Reality is another thing.”

Elkoun, 27, a U.S. citizen who was born and raised in Morocco, said he was treated well by other soldiers because of his language skills. Commanders always gave him days off to observe Islamic holidays.

Indeed, the military has made great strides in educating troops about the culture and religion of the lands in which they are fighting, said Louay Safi of the Islamic Society of North America. But isolated instances of abuse are still reported, and he said Muslim military chaplains — all 14 of them — are concerned about a backlash after the Fort Hood shootings. “Their fear is somebody will try to blame it on the community and not look at it as an individual case,” he said.

Eric Rahman, 35, isn’t worried. An Iraqi-American who grew up with Muslim traditions, the Army reservist from Louisville, Ky., took part in the U.S. invasion of his parents’ homeland. “The military couldn’t carry on the operations they have without the skill sets” brought by soldiers like himself, he said.

But when asked why he and others like him serve in uniform at a time when the image of Arabs and Muslims has taken a beating, his answer is clear: “All these people who have raised their right hand to serve from the Arab-American community are doing it as Americans, not just as Arabs.”

http://www.sphere.com/2009/11/06/arabs-in-military-try-to-rise-above-massacre/

Humans are marvelous at self-organization — it’s how we get nomadic tribes and cities like Tokyo, it explains how New Yorkers avoid each other and actually get places on the sidewalks in midtown, and it leads to things like book-of-the-month clubs. It also explains how we avoid accidents at intersections when the red light stops working. Given our choice, we will find ways on our own to live together, mostly safely.

The blackest and whitest versions of the speed limit debate put “Speed Kills!” on one side and “No it doesn’t!” on the other. Because both sides have metric tons of paperwork to prove their positions, the chance that the debate will be settled in our lifetimes is intergalactically remote. A recent speed limit trial in Utah, though, appears to be another scrap of evidence for those on the side of “No it doesn’t.”

“The Utah Department of Transportation (UDOT),” began an article in TheNewspaper.com, “announced last week that the experimental increase in the state’s maximum speed limit to 80 MPH has been a success in terms of safety. UDOT Deputy Director Carlos Braceras testified before the state Interim Committee on Transportation that that there has been no increase in accidents as a result of the higher number printed on the speed limit signs on certain stretches of Interstate 15.”

Barring any other considerations, a speed limit is determined by studying the behavior of 85% of traffic over a given stretch of road. That 85th percentile is given credit for self-organizing into a group that moves at the safest and most efficient speed. There doesn’t appear to be any clear-cut study that proves this, but it has been gospel for so long that it is now the precedent for deciding limits, and in some instances, court cases.

The UDOT measured the speed of that 85th percentile before and after raising the limit. When the maximum allowable speed was 75 mph, it reported most drivers doing between 81 and 85 mph. Given another five miles an hour to legally play with, a year of observation found that most drivers doing between 83 and 85 mph. The vehicular carnage that some suspected didn’t materialize, nor did drivers automatically begin driving 90 or 95 mph. As was the case before the limit was raised, people liked going about 85 on the stretches of road in question. They probably also enjoyed not getting tickets for it.

Without taking sides, Utah’s findings do match recent findings and decisions in other states. When the North Texas Tollway Authority (NTTA) studied speed limits on six sections of roads it maintains, it changed the speed limits on five of them: one saw a decrease of 5 mph, the other four were increased from 5 to 10 mph.

When Montana had no daytime speed limit, fatalities not only went down but Montana recorded the state’s fewest road fatalities during that period. Internationally, the number of fatalities per billion vehicle kilometers has been higher in the U.S. for about the past seven years than anywhere in Western Europe except for Ireland. Even Germany and its unrestricted autobahn suffer fewer injury incidents than the U.S.

Outside of the safety issue, some folks have chosen to see Utah’s DOT results as proof that higher limits mean less speeding. That could be cheating a bit by using a relative definition of speeding — people didn’t actually slow down, the law just happened to catch up to them. Almost.

It could be more informative to see the issues of speeding and safety as follow-on effects of the widely held but as-yet-unproved instinct at work: 85% of people found a speed range at which they can drive mostly safely. And as that range didn’t really change after the posted limit was changed, we can assume that the instinct for a safe speed has nothing to do with what the posted and enforced speed limit happens to be.

People want to get where they’re going quickly and alive. If the powers that be would set limits more in accordance with that fact, perhaps the national blood pressure – and that of drivers – would flow more efficiently and just as safely. At least, it wouldn’t hurt to try it out here and there.

It gets back to that self-organizing thing we’ve been perfecting for thousands of years. As a herd, we will find ways on our own to live together, mostly safely. Even in the fast lane.

http://autos.aol.com/article/utah-speed-limit-tests

This is pretty crazy..

The 4 minute park job is hilarious!!

When the dealer services your car, they are supposed to reset the oil or service interval warning light that comes on in place of your trip odometer when you start your car. It can be temporarily reset, by pushing the odometer reset. But when the ignition is turned off, the service warning will reappear when you restart your car. To reset it permanently, follow these instructions:

1. Insert your key into the ignition.
2. Push in the odometer reset button, hold it in, and turn the key to the first click.
3. The display should read either “oil” or “service” if it does not, repeat steps #1 and #2.
4. To reset, pull out your instrument light dimmer button at the bottom of the tachometer.
5. Turn the ignition to the off position. When the ignition is turned back on, the display should be back to the trip odometer.

Note: This procedure has been confirmed on ‘98 and ‘99 model year A4’s.

http://www.audiworld.com/tech/elec.html

When the dealer services your car, they are supposed to reset the oil or service interval warning light that comes on in place of your trip odometer when you start your car. It can be temporarily reset, by pushing the odometer reset. But when the ignition is turned off, the service warning will reappear when you restart your car. To reset it permanently, follow these instructions:

1. Insert your key into the ignition.
2. Push in the odometer reset button, hold it in, and turn the key to the first click.
3. The display should read either “oil” or “service” if it does not, repeat steps #1 and #2.
4. To reset, push the clock adjustment knob the bottom of the tachometer.
5. Turn the ignition to the off position. When the ignition is turned back on, the display should be back to the trip odometer.

http://www.audiworld.com/tech/elec.html

Usual disclaimer applies here, I am not responsible for any of your work. This procedure is done at your own risk, and my write-up is merely a guide to help you do it (as model years and options vary).

Big thanks to SScott for filling in all the bolt sizes. Also, I must metion my partner in crime here, JustDave did most of the replacement of the timing belt and tensioner.

And one more thing, this is not the only way to change the belt. It can be changed without removing the A/C condensor and radiator, however I wanted to have plenty of room to work….so I took it all off.

TOOLS/SUPPLIES LIST:
Metric sockets: 10mm, 13mm, 14mm, 19mm (12 point).
Allen sockets: 5mm, 6mm, 8mm
Breaker bar
Torx sockets: T45, T30
Set of metric wrenches
Timing Belt “kit” from PureMotorsports (www.pureMS.com ) ~$180
Fresh G12 Coolant (2-3 bottles if you change the coolant)
2 Buckets to catch coolant and windshield washer fluid if you want to reuse those

That’s definitely not everything, but I don’t think there’s anything else out of the ordinary you’ll need. Screwdrivers, socket wrench, extensions, etc…just normal stuff. A lift would help if you have access to one, but it’s not necessary….jackstands will suffice.

FRONT BUMPER REMOVAL:
1. Remove the plastic underpan; 6 screws underneath and 2 plastic screws in each wheel well.

2. Remove two small grills and fog lights (if applicable) on front bumper; the grills come out just by pulling.

3. Disconnect the hose to the headlight washers by reaching through the hole where you removed the driver’s side grill; it disconnects at the lightened area of the picture below. If you can’t reach it, see step 6. Washer Fluid will SPLASH out, so catch it in a bucket in case you want to reuse that

4. Remove the two long 6mm hex bolts (see above picture).

5. Now grab the side of the bumper, almost to the wheel well and pull BACK (towards the rear of the car) and DOWN then UP. It takes a little finesse, but it’s really not that hard. Have someone else hold the bumper while you do this so it doesn’t come crashing down and scratch the paint. See the picture below, notice how the two clips at the top and one at the bottom grab the bumper like a claw. So if you pull it down, and then up (or vise versa), then you should be able to work it loose.

6. If you haven’t disconnected the hose for the headlight washers, you’ll be able to do it much easier now; have someone to hold the bumper while you do it.

A/C CONDENSOR AND RADIATOR REMOVAL:

1. Drain the coolant. Loosen the cap on the filler tank in the engine compartment. See the red screw at the bottom on the driver’s side of the radiator; open it just a bit and you’ll see where the coolant will come out. Either connect a hose (as depicted by the green line in the picture below) or put a bucket underneath to catch the coolant. You can also remove the screw to drain the coolant out rather fast

2. Disconnect the upper and lower radiator hoses, as well as the sensor just above the lower radiator hose. First, pry up the clip around the radiator fitting with a flathead screwdriver:

Do this for the top and bottom hoses. Now, just pull firmly (read: HARD) to get the hoses off. See the sensor above the lower radiator hose in the picture below

3. Remove the two “air guides” attached on each side of the A/C condensor. They’re blocked in the picture, but the Phillips head screws would be where the green dots are in the picture.

4. Now pull the P/S cooler that runs in front of the A/C condensor out of the way. The two 10 mm bolts are shown by the red dots in the picture above. Check the clamps connecting the rubber hoses to the P/S cooler while you have it loose, mine were leaking upon reinstallation of the cooler

5. Remove the two brackets that hold the A/C condensor in place, they’re held by four 10 mm bolts. See the picture, where the bracket is actually already removed

6. Disconnect the sensor that connects on the passenger side of the A/C condensor (see above pic).

7. Now; pull up and then out on the condensor; “peel” the A/C condensor to the passenger side.

8. To remove the radiator, pry the small tab in the circular pin up, as shown here:

to the position shown here:

9. Now pull the top of the radiator out towards you (as if the bottom edge were a hinge), then up. The radiator is now free. Its a good idea to flush the radiator out with a garden hose at this time and let it dry while finishing up with the rest of the tbelt change

REMOVING LOCK CARRIER:
1. First unplug the horn(s) on the passenger side, as shown by the lightened ovals (on a 2000 there is one horn per side )

2. Remove the bulbs from the turn signals (see dangling bulb in above picture) and
disconnect the plugs to the headlights.

3. Remove the bumper post bolts with a Torx T45 bit. The passenger side will have 4 bolts while the drivers side will only have 3 which are holding the bumper posts

4. Remove the two Torx T30 bolts at the front edge of the hood on each side.

.

5. Remove one Torx T30 bolt underneath each headlight; see green arrow.

6. Slowly slide the lock carrier out towards the front of the car; be careful it is heavy and  there are still wires running to the lock carrier (around the fan shroud), as you will see. Remove the hood release. Do your best to unclip the wires routed around the fan housings, so that you can lay the lock carrier off to the driver’s side.

TIMING BELT:

First, let’s make sure we’re on the same page as far as the parts in the “kit.” As seen in the picture below, you should have (1) timing belt, (1) tensioner, (1) tensioner pulley, (1) bolt, (1) washer, and (1) metal collar/sleeve. By the way, DO NOT PULL THE PIN ON THE TENSIONER, until the instructions say to do so.

1. Remove the upper timing belt cover by releasing the two “clips” and moving the hose that runs in front.

2. Remove the viscous fan; have someone hold the plastic blades firmly, while you remove the 5mm hex bolts, circled in yellow.

3. Remove the A/C compressor belt by loosening the tensioner with two 6mm hex bolts. You will later upon re installation use a wrench attached to the red circle to tension the new belt back up

4. Remove the main serpentine belt by rotating the spring-loaded tensioner; use a crescent wrench and rotate clockwise, hold it while you remove the belt. If needed, remove this tensioner–three 13 mm bolts. You like my yellow crescent wrench?

5. Remove the dampener pulley; have someone hold the pulley with a 19mm 12pt. socket on a breaker bar, while you remove the four 6mm hex bolts (allen keys won’t cut it here, you’ll need a socketed hex).

6. Remove the lower timing belt cover; there are two hex bolts the top: one is a 6 mm and the bottom one is a 5 mm (green arrows), a 10 mm bolt (red arrow), and a 10 mm nut (black arrow).

7. This step is the very critical. Carefully align the 2 timing marks (one on the cam sprocket, the other on the edge of the valve cove) by turning the engine by hand, clockwise, using the 19mm bolt on the crank (where you removed the dampner pulley from earlier). While you have the belt off, you must make sure that these marks remain perfectly aligned. DO NOT use the top cam to turn the engine, always turn at the crank when the tbelt is installed!

Also make your own mark the lower toothed sprocket on the crank, just for your
own comfort of knowing that the sprocket remained in the same position throughout the
install. We scratched an arrow on the sprocket; as you can see in the picture that our arrow aligns with the tip of that protrusion in the metal above it. So after you have marked the top cam and the bottom crank continue to the next step you will also notice that the top cam is very hard to turn by hand so it wont most likely not move but marks are critical!

8. Remove the old tensioner and pulley. First remove 13mm the bolt holding the “guide pulley” (that’s what we’ll call it) on to the tensioner (green arrow); remove this pulley–save it. Now remove the two 10mm bolts holding the tensioner to the block (red arrows). Remove the 10mm nut holding the pulley on (as circled in yellow, partially hidden from view). The pulley/tensioner complex should now be free.

9. Remove the old pulley “stud” from the block; you won’t need it with the new tensioner/pulley. It’s 17mm.

WATER PUMP and THERMOSTAT change (5 steps total)

10. The engine should look like this now, the tensioner and timing belt had been removed. The water pump sits in the red area circled in the picture. Its not that hard to change so do it while you are in there, if you dont want to do this step skip to step # 16 and continue with the Timing belt change instructions

11. Use a screw drive and go through the whole in the P/S pulley there is a perfect crack that the screwdriver fits into so you can remove the 3 hex bolts that are attached to the waterpump. You might need to slightly hold against the belt so it doesnt slip on the pulley itself. The pulley attached to the waterpump is shaped like 2 plates against each other )( and will come off after the hex bolts are removed.

12. Now you need to use your screwdriver again and pry it in the whole of the other pulley for the oilpump and remove the red bolt circled in red. You dont have to worry if this pulley spins, it runs the pump and it very easy to turn. After you have removed that one you will have full access to the waterpump. The green dots indicate 10mm bolts that are holding the pump inside the housing, you will remove those after the next step.

13. The engine will still have coolant in it, so get your bucket from earlier ready again and remove the red waterpump drain plug. The coolant will drain out, now remove the 2 green 10mm bolts that are holding that black hose in the picture that is allready bended away in mine. This hose houses the thermostat and there will still be some coolant left splashing out so be prepared. Remove the old thermostat and remember that the spring part goes inside the pump housing then you reinstall it, the gasket comes in between the thermostat and the hose not the housing!

14. Bolt the hose back to the housing and remove the 10 bolts that are holding the waterpump to the housing, the pump should drop right out, now remove the old metal gasket and clean around the gasket area. Install the new gasket and pump in the same order as you removed it and reinstall the drain plug as well. Make sure that the gasket has a good seat and is not kinked anywere.

15. Reinstall the big pulley that you had taken off earlier in order to remove the bolts that were holding the pump in and where unreachable before. Tighten that one back up and move down to the newly installed waterpump. I hope you ordered new belts as well, use the new P/S belt and slide it over the P/S pulley and attach your )( plate pulleys with the belt. The new belt should be tight on those when you are tightening the pulley back onto the waterpump. You should now have a brand new thermostat and brand new pump installed with a brand new belt that powers both, arent those new belts nice looking compared to the old ones? You are now ready to continue with the timing belt install

16. Time to assemble and install the tensioner and pulley. First, attach the “guide pulley” to the new tensioner–hand tighten for now. Now install the new tensioner to the block. See below for assembly of the pulley and the misc. hardware. I forgot to snap a pic during the installation process, thus you get this VERY crude attempt at a 3D rendering.

Using a 14mm socket in your hand, slowly tighten the center bolt attaching the pulley to the block (careful not to cross-thread, if you feel resistance back it out and try again). The pulley setup should look like it does below. Now remove the brass-colored piece that hangs off the pulley; one bolt (blue arrow) attaches it to the pulley. The pulley should now be free to rotate, more on that later. You will need to remove this one so you can slide the new belt on and will reinstall it later on

17. Install the timing belt. Carefully slide the belt over the toothed sprockets, making sure that you don’t move the sprockets. I found it easier to wrap the large sprocket up top first, then the smaller ones at the bottom, then around the tensioner pulley. Be sure there is no slack in the area outlined in yellow

18. Almost done. Now it’s time to put that brass-colored piece back onto the pulley. See that hex hole in the pulley? Put an 8 mm allen key in that hole, and pull clockwise. This will allow you to align the hole on the brass piece with the hole on the pulley so you can put the bolt through and tighten it up. Go back and double check all the bolts for the tensioner and pulley, be sure they’re all tight (no torque specs at the moment).

19. Make sure your setup looks like below. If so, PULL THE PIN! (BTW, that’s Just Dave’s finger…..it’s the best pic I could get of him; he’s very elusive when the camera comes out

20. With the belt and tensioner now properly installed, hand-crank the engine around one full rotation to make sure your MARKS  on the top cam sprocket line up at the same time your mark on the bottom crank sprocket. Turn the bottom crank sprocket one full time and get back to your original mark you made earlier, if the bottom and top mark match up = everything is fine

21. That’s it…reverse the process and re-install all of the above. You do remember how it all went together, right? It is easier if you but the bolts you had taken off or loosened up back into the whole where they came from to make it easier during reassembly

There, you’ve just saved yourself roughly $900 in labor @ the stealership. All I ask is that you let me know you’ve completed it successfully (hey, if you want to send donations that’s fine as well

If you have any problems, questions, etc, you’re welcome to email me: andytn.a4@gmail.com. Good luck.

Andy wrote the original timing belt writeup

Stephan (BSK) added the the water pump and thermostat replacement Nov 2005, After using this article to change his own timing belt.

http://www.audiworld.com/tech/eng.html

Porsche to investigate forced labor under Hitler

Porsche was founded two years after Hitler took over Germany

After already admitting to using minimal forced labor during the Nazi regime, new investigations of Porsche’s role under Hitler have produced accusations of widespread slave labor.

Porsche says it is taking the allegations seriously after a report published by a German economics journalist suggested that hundreds of people were forced to work at Porsche for little or no pay.

“We need to process the subject; we are just at the start of the procedure,” a Porsche spokesman said.

The issue came to light after Ulrich Viehoefer, an economics journalist based in the city of Stuttgart, conducted research on Ferdinand Porsche’s role in Germany during the Nazi era.

“In contrast to other German industrial families, the Porsche-Piechs have not completely come clean on their dealings in the Nazi period,” Viehoefer told Deutsche Welle.

 Viehoefer claims that over 300 people were forced to work for Porsche, over half of the luxury car maker’s workforce at the time. He published his findings in the book, “Nazi Culprits in Stuttgart.”

 Porsche has already admitted to implementing forced labor at its factories under Hitler’s rule. So far, Porsche has admitted to using only minimal slave labor. It has acknowledged that 50 people had been subjected to forced labor. They were said to be Poles, Russians, Dutch, Flemish, Belgian, Czech, and Italians.

Porsche added, meanwhile, that it has paid reparations for those offenses. It said the company had given 2.5 million euros to a German fund aimed at compensating victims of slave labor.

“Money isn’t all that counts,” Viehoefer said, adding “I asked a former forced laborer at Porsche from Poland whether the company had ever apologized to him for his suffering, but he said that nothing of the kind had ever happened.”

http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,4783359,00.html