Your task is to extract the thesis of an opinionated news article by selecting some of its text segments. The thesis is a summarization of what the author wants to persuade the reader of. Your answer should consist of segments of the given text. Note that you are not allowed to combine different sentences.

[Q]: The hostage rescue dilemma. Saturday's failed hostage rescue mission in Yemen was indeed tragic . While the official details as to exactly what happened have not yet been released , it appears Luke Somers, an American journalist, and Pierre Korkie, a South African teacher, were killed by their captors during a night-time rescue attempt carried out by US Navy SEALs . Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) had been holding Somers and Korkie captive for over a year . It was the second such attempt to rescue Somers in two weeks . On November 25, a SEALs team hit what they thought was the compound holding Somers , who, as it turns out, had been moved from there just hours before . In Saturday's operation, the SEALs knew Somers' exact location . To maintain stealth, they landed by V-22 Osprey several kilometres away, and then made the trek overland to the compound where Somers and Korkie were being held captive . But something went terribly wrong in the final approach . Perhaps it was a barking dog or some other noise , but the SEALs came under fire as they approached the compound's main entrance . The element of surprise, which is so critical to rescue operations, was lost , and a fierce firefight ensued . Within 30 minutes, the SEALs had secured the compound and put Somers and Korkie, who were both still alive on a V-22 that had a surgical team standing by . Unfortunately, medics were unable to save them . Plainly necessary . For Somers, Saturday's rescue mission was as urgent as it was plainly necessary . Late last week AQAP released a video stating he would be killed in 72 hours unless unspecified demands were met . Those demands have not been made public, but likely involved payment of a ransom or release of AQAP captives, something the US is prohibited by law from doing . For Korkie, the sense of urgency in attempting the rescue operation is more controversial . According to the South African charity Gift of the Giving, a deal had been made with AQAP to release Korkie in just a matter of days, suggesting to many that it would have been better to wait . Maybe there was a deal that would have gone through in the end . Maybe there wasn't . But in rescue operations, hope is not figured into the equation , where planners and decision makers have to weigh the risks of action against the consequences of inaction . By their very nature, hostage rescue operations are among the most difficult and risky military missions to carry out . With little margin for error, either in intelligence or the operation itself, they demand highly trained and equipped special operations units that only a handful of countries have . Are they dangerous and uncertain? Absolutely . Are they impossible? No . In 2012, US Navy SEALs rescued Jessica Buchanan, an American aid worker, and Poul Hagen Thisted, a Danish aid worker , who had been held hostage by Somali pirates for 93 days . The pirates were demanding a $45m ransom for their release . In this particular case, precise intelligence as to their exact location, along with concerns about Buchanan's rapidly declining health, were major factors in moving forward with the rescue mission . Under the cover of darkness, the SEAL Team parachuted 19km from where they were being held, and then moved cross-country to conduct the rescue . Nine pirates were killed during the operation , and Buchanan and Thisted were unharmed . In 2009, US Navy SEAL snipers ended the hostage ordeal of American Richard Phillips, captain of the cargo ship Maersk Alabama , which had been hijacked by Somali pirates in the Indian Ocean five days earlier . Talks with the pirates ended when they threw the phone used to communicate with negotiators into the ocean . When one of the pirates pointed his rifle at Captain Phillips' back , snipers shot and killed all three in near simultaneous fashion . Captain Phillips was unharmed . Heartbreaking failures . In 2005, US Delta Force operators rescued Roy Hallums, an American civilian contractor kidnapped by an al-Qaeda cell in Iraq, after 311 days in captivity . Again , the intelligence as to Hallums' location was exact - pull up the kitchen carpet and open the faux cement trap door leading into his one room cell . Hallums was unharmed in the operation . But , as was all too evident on Saturday, there are heartbreaking failures, too . This past July, US special operations forces attempted to rescue James Foley in Syria . Unfortunately, the intelligence as to where he was being held was incorrect . Foley was brutally murdered by ISIL just a few weeks later , the videotape of which was released on the internet for the world to see . In 2010, the US special operations team attempting to rescue her in Afghanistan accidentally killed Linda Norgrove, a British citizen . There are other failures, all tragic, as well . But there are also other successes , where hostages like Jessica Buchanan, Poul Thisted, Captain Phillips and Roy Hallums, all of whom faced indefinite captivity or even death, are home with their families because decisions were made to rescue them based on calculated risks . No guessing, no maybes, no "let's keep our fingers crossed and hope for the best" . Rescue missions are risky, both for the hostages and for the operators who carry them out . Lives are at stake , and it's never an easy choice to give the "green light" . But given the circumstances, particularly when dealing with terrorist organisations, leaders can't always sit back and wait to see what happens . Sometimes, it's less risky to act than not to . And in the case of a hostage rescue operation, I'd place my life in the hands of men dedicated to the task before taking my chances with the likes of a terrorist in the hope that maybe they'll let me go .
[A]: Saturday's failed hostage rescue mission in Yemen was indeed tragic


[Q]: The Guardian view on talks between Angela Merkel and David Cameron. If politics were like boxing , meetings between national leaders would be arranged according to weight . In the asymmetrical world of international relations, however, disparity is the norm rather than the exception . So it is with Angela Merkel and David Cameron , who confer together in London on Wednesday . The chancellor is the heavyweight contender , while the prime minister would rate as middleweight at most . The difference, unfortunately, is not just a reflection of the strength and size of the two countries concerned . It is also a measure of the stature of these two politicians . Mrs Merkel's characteristics - her steadiness, her careful thinking through of problems, her solid control of her party, her reluctance to move until she is sure of the right course, her refusal to play to the gallery - enhance Germany's influence in Europe and the world . With Mr Cameron, the reverse is true . He has charm and a certain decency , but he is too easily blown off course by adverse winds arising within his own party and outside it . This has led him to take positions on Europe and immigration that could have been expressly designed to reduce our influence on our neighbours, ones that could lead to Britain departing the European Union . That would leave the United Kingdom in an isolation which it can be guessed Mr Cameron does not want but which he could nevertheless end up having brought about . So it is that , as our former Berlin correspondent argues, he looks to Germany for rescue, hoping that Mrs Merkel's government will help craft changes in European regulations that Mr Cameron will then be able to present to his own party and to voters attracted by Ukip's nostrums as helping Britain control the flow of immigrants . Whether such changes actually would have that effect in any longer term is another matter . Mr Cameron may not care too much about that, wanting only the appearance of concessions to help him out of the political corner into which he has painted himself . Contrast Mrs Merkel's forthright remarks on the anti-Islamic demonstrations with which Germany is currently coping, with Mr Cameron's skirting of the moral aspects of the immigration debate to see the difference . Mrs Merkel has to manage a crammed portfolio of European problems . Britain's difficulties are not at the top of the heap . The most important general issue she faces is whether to stick with an unalloyed austerity programme that is becoming more and more politically explosive in southern Europe . The most immediate specific question is how to cope with a possible change of government in Greece . A more fundamental problem, in terms of the dynamics of the union, is how to prop up the old partnership with France . And the most obvious external problem is how to manage Ukraine and Russia . Here, at least, Britain and Germany seem to be on the same page . Mrs Merkel is the strongest and most important leader in Europe . She is hardly beyond reproach . The contradiction in her position is that at home she essentially governs as a social democrat, yet she operates as a neoliberal hawk abroad . Her austerity drive can be said, at the very least, to be causing as many problems as it solves . Her insistence on reform in Greece is vague when it should be detailed, leading to the suspicion that the problem is that, in German eyes, Greece can do nothing right . Domestically, she often manages to "solve" political problems by simply sitting them out , while her parliamentarians squabble and everyone gets bored of the subject and moves on . That is how she dealt with the scandal of the NSA monitoring her mobile phone : she largely kept quiet when many were hoping that she would raise her voice more loudly . But in broader foreign policy matters, that is not a working strategy in the long run . Her dealings with Russia's President Vladimir Putin over the past year show signs of a learning curve : she has been not just quiet but quietly firm . The world is still waiting for her to show similar leadership in the eurozone crisis . But at least she is in a position to do so . Mr Cameron, however, has all but written himself out of the European script . He is not a problem-solver, as Mrs Merkel is or could be, but a problem in himself for Europe, and yet another cross for the chancellor to bear .
[A]: Mrs Merkel is the strongest and most important leader in Europe


[Q]: Expert: Blacks trust police more than whites do. Do blacks trust police more than whites do? Given the anger over events in Ferguson and New York City, the very question seems absurd . But it is not . Behind the polls and demonstrations, there is evidence that blacks trust police at least as much as whites do . The poll results are hardly surprising . A new Gallup poll confirms blacks place less confidence in police and the criminal justice system . Using survey data from 2006 through 2014, Gallup found 31 percentage points more blacks than whites believe black males are more likely to go to prison than white males primarily because of discrimination(50 percent versus 19 percent) . *7 percentage points more blacks believe the honesty and ethics of police are low/very low (17 percent versus 10 percent) . Similarly , a 2013 Pew Research Centersurvey reveals that 70 percent of blacks believed police treated whites better than blacks . By contrast, only 37 percent of whites agreed . But what people say and what they do are often different . And there are both victims and criminals in black communities . Victims may trust the police for the same reasons that criminals dislike them . Blacks are not a monolithic group: blacks who who have been through the criminal justice system as criminals could answer these questions quite differently than those who have relied on police as victims . The polls don't distinguish between these two groups . As Charles Barkley recently said:"[Police] are the only thing in the ghetto between this place being the wild, wild west." Most violent crime victims don't report crimes to police . For example ,  only about half of rapes are reported to police . That has a lot to do with how victims believe they will be treated by the police . In the case of rape, victims who think that the police are unsympathetic to rape victims or are unlikely to solve the cases are even less likely to report rapes . If black victims really believe police are racist , why would they report the crime to the police? Blacks victims don't want other blacks locked up simply due to their race ; they want the criminals who actually committed the crime punished . Of course people are more likely to report crimes to police if they believe the police will solve them . Why waste time filling out forms and being interviewed if the crime isn't going to be solved? If blacks think police are incompetent or dishonest or just don't care , again there is little reason to turn to the police for help . Yet ,  blacks don't shy away from reporting crimes to the police . Data compiled by the Bureau of Justice Statisticsfrom 2008 to 2012 shows that blacks are actually more likely than whites to report violent crimes to the police-- 9 percentage points more likely than whites (54 percent to 45 percent) . Blacks consistently report violent crimes at a higher rate than whites do . That applies to all income groups as well as for victims living in urban and suburban areas . This higher rate of reporting is true in areas where blacks face higher violent crime rates than whites and also when the reverse is true . The Bureau of Justice Statistics reports that whites who are below 200 percent of the poverty level face a higher violent crime rate than blacks with the same income , yet blacks still report those crimes at a higher rate . For incomes above 200 percent of poverty, blacks are more frequent victims of violent crime , but again they are still more likely to report them . On average, blacks are victims of violent crime at much higher rates than whites , but the gap isn't as large as many people think . Typically, crime rate comparisons are in terms of the FBI crime data-- data relying on the number of crimes reported to police . But , as we have just noted , that is misleading , because blacks report violent crimes at higher rates . While the FBI crime numbers show blacks to have a 40 percent higher violent crime rate , the actual difference is about 30 percent . When it comes to crime, the demonstrations and pundits don't reflect how most blacks feel most of the time . There appears to be a silent majority of blacks who trust the police . Many blacks may get angry about particular cases in the news , but when they have to turn to someone for help, they turn to the police . Blacks apparently trust the police to do their job more frequently than whites do . John R  Lott, Jr  is a columnist for FoxNews.com . He is an economist and was formerly chief economist at the United States Sentencing Commission . Lott is also a leading expert on guns and op-eds on that issue are done in conjunction with the Crime Prevention Research Center . He is the author of eight books including "More Guns, Less Crime." His latest book is"Dumbing Down the Courts: How Politics Keeps the Smartest Judges Off the Bench" Bascom Hill Publishing Group (September 17, 2013) . Follow him on Twitter@johnrlottjr .
[A]:
Behind the polls and demonstrations, there is evidence that blacks trust police at least as much as whites do