Local politics, the county, and the world, as viewed by Tammy Maygra
Tammy's views are her own, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Bill Eagle, his pastor, Tammy's neighbors, Earl Fisher, Betsy Johnson, Joe Corsiglia, Rita Bernhard, her grand kids, Tony Hyde, Pat Robertson, Corsiglia's dog, or Claudia Eagle's Cat.
This Tammy's Take (with the exception of this disclaimer) is not paid for or written by, or reviewed by anyone but Tammy and she wont' take crap off of anyone.
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The Somali pirates were back in action on the high seas shortly after several of their own were shot dead by navy sharp shooters. The pirates seized four more ships and have about 60 captives, these persons are being held for ransom. The pirate's immediate assault on ships show that they are not deterred by United States president Obama's pledge to confront and stop pirates on the high seas.
The pirates are now acting for pure revenge for the deaths of 5 of their comrades since last Friday, stating they are not afraid to die and will continue to lay siege to any vessel that enters their waters. The estimate ransom that has been paid to the pirates for crew and ships in the last year well exceeds $150 million, and by the latest attacks the ransom price tag may even be higher by the end of 2009 unless the US and other countries work together to coordinate safe guards for the traveling ships in the shipping lanes.
If the US wanted to help solve this problem along with other countries they would consider why these people are willingly to commit such crimes. The people have no hope for their future, there is no food, no jobs, and the main industry to provide jobs to the now turned pirates is fishing, but fishing is so bad that they cannot earn an honest living; this is one of the main reasons why these people have turned to pirating.
Somali does not have a working government; all they have is a bunch of guerrilla warlords ruling over segments of the country and chaos rules, with skirmishes between the different areas, and most likely receiving a huge share of the ransom payments.
I think the ship-owners need to come up with a plan to protect their ships and crews, I would hire well trained and highly armed security people to stand watch 24 hours per day, with orders to shoot to kill any one trying to commandeer the ships, or any one shooting at the ships or crew.
What I do not understand is why the shipping companies are willing to pay these ransoms in the first place, would it not be cheaper to hire security people to protect your ship, and its crew and cargo?
This will be an on going saga and it will be interesting what the US will do to protect their own vessels and crews in the future.

TAMMY






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