Nothing is ever black or white, the world is all different shades of grey.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/johann-hari/you-are-being-lied-to-abo_b_155147.html

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2008/10/2008109174223218644.html

One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter is being replaced by one man's pirate is another man's coats guard?

LOL, now that's funny.
"Somali pirates have accused European firms of dumping toxic waste off the Somali coast and are demanding an $8m ransom for the return of a Ukranian ship they captured, saying the money will go towards cleaning up the waste."

We just need to send lots of Rum, eye patches, peg legs, and parrots to somalia to appease the pirates...

And before some rediculous person starts crafting a response defending the pirates against the Western colonizers dumping garbage, let me just say 'Yes, there is probably toxic waste on the shores of Somalia and yes, it probably came from the West, but no, I don't think one single dime, pence or shekel of ransom will be spent on environmental causes.'

"Environmentalist Pirates" that's a good one. I think the dumping of waste is a crime, but these pirates are more interested in making lots of cash for themselves then the waste.

It's a "let's adopt a cause to make us sound righteous" situation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrwgiprDBtA

First terrorism, and now piracy.

Dang, them Muslims done it again.

IF that is what the money is used for I fully support them.

if not, then I still support them, but it becomes way more complicated and circumstantial.

I support the pirates, mostly because pirates are awesome, matey...

Maybe they all have a Letter of Marque from the Queen of Somalia? Than they would not be pirates, but privateers, instead ;)

This is a classical case of "why does the dog lick his own balls? because he CAN!". When piracy becomes unprofitable and really, really dangerous in Somalia, it will die out.

pirates are somalias heros.
all the children dream of growing up to become a pirate.

I dream of one day becoming a pirate, too.

Sicarius "IF that is what the money is used for I fully support them.

if not, then I still support them, but it becomes way more complicated and circumstantial.

if they drink blood from the skulls of dead children, I still support them, but it becomes even more convoluted and nonsensical

I liked Ron Paul's solution. Give out Letters of Marque and have privateers patrol Somalia. Costs less than having the navy do it.

http://www.house.gov/paul/press/press2001/pr101101.htm

Why didn't we do that in the first place? Put a large bounty on these people's heads, and wait for someone to bring them in...?

Sent from: Sicarius (692 ) Sent: 06:16 PM
IF that is what the money is used for I fully support them.

if not, then I still support them, but it becomes way more complicated and circumstantial.
______________________
Actually, scrap that... IF they don't contribute to society in any way whatsoever, I support them.

"The difficulties in getting food aid delivered could leave some Somalis hungry.

World Food Program spokesman Peter Smerdon said more food aid was to have been delivered by another cargo ship hijacked Tuesday, the Lebanese-owned MV Sea Horse. It was headed to Mumbai, India, to pick up 7,327 tons of WFP food for Somalia.

"WFP is also extremely concerned that people in Somalia will go hungry unless the Sea Horse is quickly released or a replacement ship can be found," he said.

One comment and I'll be done:

Gary Roughead (current ADM of the USN) is a moron. One easy answer to the pirate question:

Reactivate a WWII era battleship. Blow the pirates out of the water. I'd like to see a little motorboat try to survive a direct hit from a 406mm (16 in) shell. Hint: There wouldn't be a motorboat left.

Well, you morons are probably going to say that that would be too expensive. Not true. Navy regulations require all inactive ships to be combat-ready "rapidly in the event of a national emergency". That includes decommissioned ships and museum ships.

At first I thought the only way to deal with kidnappers is (1) never negociate (2) shoot on site; anything else would lead to more kidnappings etc, etc. but how many oil tankers would be sunk before we realised that there would probably be more potential kidnappers than oil tankers and the impact could be catastrophic for the whole planet.

As I'm now in two minds I'm going to stop thinking about it and grab me a cutless and eye patch, I'll see you all walk the plank before the day is out. Shiver me timbers!

Can I be your first-mate?

you can be seaman staines :p

"Taking a wasps' nest... is more effective than catching the wasps one by one," Attack the so called "motherships" and chase the pirates into port.

I would like to point out that, according to one religion, number of pirates and global warming are an inverse relation. Along this logic, the somalians are actually very, very eco-friendly, and should be whole heartedly supported by all of us!

Ah, yes... the piarates bring about springtime?

@S.P.A.O have you ever heard of spurious correlation.
There is of course an easy way of getting rid of both Somalian pirates and the companies dumping in Somalia.
Nuke Somalia. We all win.

For once, diplomat1824 is totally right. We need to have a serious naval assault on these pirates.

The problem can't really be solved until Somalia has a government again, but these pirates can't be allowed to harass international shipping with impunity. Just blow them out of the water. They're criminals.

The UN will need to move into Somalia and restore some kind of government to get rid of the pirates. There could even be a pirate political party, peg legs and all.

LoL Boris. And next the UN will declare multiple marriages legal in my zipcode and force the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders to move into my home.