I have a solution to the pirate problem.  Load up a boat with a team of Navy Seals.  Let them float around the general area, while waiting for the pirates to show up and try to take the boat...bloodbath ensues. 

And videotape it, god knows I would pay to see it, and it would win an award on failblog.org

Warship arrives as pirates’ options dwindle
Relatives of American captain held hostage remain on ‘pins and needles’
The Associated Press
updated 6:54 a.m. ET, Thurs., April 9, 2009

NAIROBI, Kenya - A U.S. destroyer on Thursday reached the waters where Somali pirates held the American captain of a hijacked cargo ship that was later retaken by the ship's crew in a riveting high seas drama.

Kevin Speers, a spokesman for the ship company Maersk, told AP Radio that the USS Bainbridge had arrived off the Horn of Africa near where the pirates were floating near the Maersk Alabama.

The Bainbridge was among several U.S. ships that had been patrolling in the region when the 17,000-ton U.S.-flagged cargo ship and its 20 crew were captured Wednesday.

In an hours-long drama, the unarmed sailors managed to capture a pirate and use him as a hostage to secure their own release, but the pirates took Capt. Richard Phillips with them as they escaped into a lifeboat.

Although hundreds of sailors from other nations have been held hostage, sometimes for months, Wednesday was the first pirate attack on American sailors for around 200 years.

Phillips' family gathered in his Vermont farmhouse, anxiously watching news reports and taking telephone calls from the U.S. State Department to learn if he would be freed by the pirates.

"We are on pins and needles," said Gina Coggio, 29, half-sister of Phillips' wife, Andrea, as she stood on the porch of his one-story house Wednesday in a light snow. "I know the crew has been in touch with their own family members, and we're hoping we'll hear from Richard soon."

Phillips surrendered himself to the pirates to secure the safety of the crew, Coggio said.

"What I understand is that he offered himself as the hostage," she said. "That is what he would do. It's just who he is and his response as a captain."

Pirates in a ‘very, very tight corner’
With one warship nearby and more on the way, piracy expert Roger Middleton from London-based think tank Chatham House said the pirates were facing difficult choices.

"The pirates are in a very, very tight corner," Middleton said. "They've got only one guy, they've got nowhere to hide him, they've got no way to defend themselves effectively against the military who are on the way and they are hundreds of miles from Somalia."

The pirates would probably try to get to a mothership, he said, one of the larger vessels that tow the pirates' speedboats out to sea and resupply them as they lie in wait for prey. But they also would be aware that if they try to take Phillips to Somalia, they might be intercepted. And if they hand him over, they would almost certainly be arrested.

"If I was a pirate at this point, I think I'd resign and take up gardening," Middleton said.

Other analysts say the United States will be reluctant to use force as long as one of its citizens remains hostage. French commandos, for example, have mounted two military operations against pirates once the ransom had been paid and its citizens were safe.

Sixth vessel seized in a week
The Maersk Alabama, en route to neighboring Kenya and loaded with relief aid, was attacked about 380 miles east of the Somali capital of Mogadishu. It was the sixth vessel seized in a week.

Many of the pirates have shifted their operations down the Somali coastline from the Gulf of Aden to escape naval warship patrols, which have had some success in preventing attacks in the Gulf of Aden.

The string of attacks follow a lull during a period of bad weather. The Maersk Alabama was the 66th attack on shipping this year so far this year, already an increase on the 111 attacks reported off the Horn of Africa last year.

International attention focused on Somali pirates last year after the audacious hijackings of an arms shipment and a Saudi oil supertanker. Currently warships from over a dozen nations are patrolling off the Somali coast but analysts say the multimillion dollar ransoms paid out by companies ensure piracy in war-ravaged, impoverished Somalia will not disappear.

More on Pirates | Somalia

The Associated Press, Reuters and NBC News contributed to this report.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30125386/

Teen's phone meets dad's hammer after mega-bill

CHEYENNE - In one month, a Cheyenne teenager sent 10,000 text messages and received about the same - all while her family's plan did not include texting.

That means the family's provider - Verizon - charged them for each incoming and outgoing text.

The girl's parents, Gregg and Jaylene Christoffersen, thought texting had been disabled, so one can imagine their surprise when they got the monthly phone bill and it asked for $4,756.25.

"It just hit us like a rock, like you're stepping into a bus," Gregg Christoffersen said.

The bill was legit.

Dena Christoffersen, 13, had apparently been sending most of these messages at school. That's more than 300 texts within an eight-hour period every day for the whole month.

Needless to say, it drew attention away from what she should have been doing: paying attention in class.

"She went from As and Bs one semester to Fs in two months," Dena's dad said.

Hours after the enormous bill arrived, Gregg Christoffersen took a hammer to his daughter's phone.

He and Jaylene also grounded Dena until the end of school.

"I felt really bad and I have learned my lesson," Dena said with her head down.

Since she lost her phone, Dena's grades have gone up and the texting is down to zero.

As for the phone bill, the family says Verizon has been willing to knock it down to a reasonable level.

The Christoffersens are now asking school administrators at Johnson Junior High School to crack down on cell phone use during school.
(Copyright KUSA*TV, All Rights Reserved)

http://www.9news.com/news/article.aspx? … &catid=188

Just posted on his twitter and facebook pages:

----------------

I called it and while there is nothing mentioned about a ringtone, it is a message from slash.  He says something along the lines of "I'll check this periodically so leave me a message"

And THIS is why slash is and always will be the man.