...Jim Thompson
-- | James E.Thompson, P.E. | mens | | Analog Innovations, Inc. | et | | Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus | | Phoenix, Arizona Voice:(480)460-2350 | | | E-mail Address at Website Fax:(480)460-2142 | Brass Rat | |
Trust Jim not to recognise a new pork barrell.
Dubbya is just getting ready to give his military-industrial friends another bunch of cost-plus contracts for another batch of space weapons that will never work.
Physics Today keeps on publishing articles on the fantasy content in the whole Star Wars missile shield boondoggle, but Dubbya's consituency doesn't seem to reead Physics Today - or anything containing polysyllabic words.
-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen
C'mon Bill, they know it wont work, they just have a few manufacturing contracts they need to sell for votes
martin
:)
That was my principal take on it, too.
A side-bar comment I have comes from this, though:
"The notion that you would do defence from space is different from that of weaponisation of space. We're comfortable with the policy", White House spokesman Tony Snow said.
I would like to know what it is, exactly, that can act as a practical (assuming 'practical' is possible for the moment) defense (note US spelling) from space while not simultaneously having offensive capabilities. I don't recall seeing even a proposition of a defensive capability that wouldn't also be threatening as an offense. It's like strapping on a pistol and saying it's only for "defense," so "trust me."
Of course they are "comfortable with it." It's offensive and they get to act like it isn't.
What's worse, if a system really _did_ work, it would move the viable timeframes for dealing with "mistakes in understanding" from the 10 to
30 minutes category to the "15 to 45 seconds" category, which pretty much means there's no time to bring in manual processes.Jon
Trust Slowman to still be on the dole. Bill, why is it again that you are not able to earn an honest living ?:-)
Yay TEAM!
I don't read the announcement as "shield", I read it as "splat" if you attempt to launch.
...Jim Thompson
--
| James E.Thompson, P.E. | mens |
| Analog Innovations, Inc. | et |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC\'s and Discrete Systems | manus |
| Phoenix, Arizona Voice:(480)460-2350 | |
| E-mail Address at Website Fax:(480)460-2142 | Brass Rat |
| http://www.analog-innovations.com | 1962 |
I love to cook with wine. Sometimes I even put it in the food.
I'm collecting a perfectly honest unemployment benefit. If Dutch employers are - as they seem to be - totally unwilling to consider
63-year-olds for jobs for which they are emminently qualified, it seems entirely just that they contribute to the unemployment benefit that compensates the victimns of their irrational prejudice.The situation is peculiarly frustrating at the moment - the Dutch economy is running close to flat out, and there is a real shortage of experienced electronic engineers, so I get to apply for about two or three jobs a week that I really ought to get, but I never "fit the profile" that the employer is looking for.
That is what Regan wanted.and that is what Dubbya's team also wants. The problem is that with the technology currently available, this option doesn't happen to be accessible. Try reading back numbers of Physics Today to find out why, rather than consulting your gut feelings about what you'd like to be possible.
You seem to think that you can renegotiate the laws of physics by holding your breath until you turn purple, and presumably you are being rude about my incapacity to find myself a job on the basis that I could reprogram Dutch employer prejudices in the same way.
-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen
Do you know why he wants to drill in Alaska? It's not for the oil, the oil companies aren't that interested. The real payoff is to a bunch of companies that sell drilling equipment and supplies - they will be the real beneficiaries.
Set up your own contracting company, produce a brochure with a bunch of youngsters, then you turn up to do the job!
Jonathan Kirwan wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:
Defeatism/negativism that has no real-life support. If we can hit-to-kill in atmosphere(already done),we can do it in space(already done). The Russians can send a unmanned supply ship to the ISS and dock with it automatically. IIRC,the F-15 launched ASAT made successful intercepts before we signed away the capability.
Space is already "weaponized";those nuclear-armed ICBMs will not be falling down without transiting space.
What's the full,complete cost of having a major US city nuked? And who's DUMB enough to trust without verification or backup plans? (ans;Liberals/Democrats/Socialists:"Agreed Framework" for one example.)
It's only offensive to liberals/socialists/Democrats.
Space ALREADY is militarized. Recon sats,commsats(relays for unmanned drones),GPS for targeting,and when ICBMs are launched,they enter and travel through SPACE before deorbiting.
Only fools would ignore a major strategic battle area. (with their Utopian thinking)
-- Jim Yanik jyanik at kua.net
All for stuff that wasn't exactly taking evasive action or shedding decoys. You've been taken for a sucker.
I don't think that this is all that relevant tp the argument.
And what is the sense in investing huge amounts of money in a defence that isn't going to work?
And who is dumb enough to invest in a defence that isn't going to work. Left or Centre stupidity is at least cheaper than right-wing stuoidity.
This is hardware that works. Star Wars and its clones have the disadvantage that they aren't going to work, no matter how enthusiasticlally the military-industrial complex puffs smoke and waves mirrors.
Ignoring it would be foolish, but investing huge amounts of money in weapons that aren't going to work is extravagant foolishness - if the fools involved are honest - and just another scam for ripping off the tax-payer if they are not.
-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen
A .3030 bullet in the head of the Dear Leader is the cheapest anti ballistic missile system. What is needed is a plan to get it there.
On 19 Oct 2006 15:15:15 -0700, snipped-for-privacy@ieee.org wrote in Msg.
It's a program to funnel billions of $$$ into hightech industry. That in itself isn't even so bad; it creates lots of jobs for highly qualified technicians, engineers and scientists (as well as huge piles of money in the banks of a selected few of dubious qualification). Of course this money could be funneled into programs that generate similar amounts of work and knowledge while creating something *useful*, but that would be a lot harder to sell to the US public. Remember that the (probably) largest and most expensive scientific and technological program ever realized, the Apollo program, was nothing more than the US contribution to a pissing contest (and as such quite succesful).
Of course all space and military activity generates a lot of interesting and useful spin-offs. But that is like the stupid argument of my old Latin teacher, which, unfortunately, I fell for back then: If you learn Latin you gain an important foundation to learn every modern Roman language. That is true; however, had I learnt Spanish or Italian back then I would have got the same foundation *plus* a modern, useful language to boot.
"Defence" is just a marketing buzzword to get the American public to buy a lot of dysfunctional hightech toys.
That is blatantly obvious to anybody with half an analytical mind. It simply boils down to a matter of cost-effectiveness: The technology to defeat any type of space weapon, typically using decoys or chaff, costs a tiny fraction (a millionth, maybe?) of the waeapon it renders useless.
Of course the people who make a good living developing those weapons know that, because they are not stupid. But who can blame them for not cutting off the branch on which they're sitting?
If shooting at dead cows from ten feet away, and hitting one out of three, is going to get me a $1b government grant for the development of a combat rifle I'd sure take the money and run (and, in ten years, hit a dead cow from 20 feet to prove the money was well-spent).
robert
They have just brought in an age discrimination law here in the uk (oct
06). Be interesting if it actually works or not.Kevin Aylward B.Sc. snipped-for-privacy@anasoft.co.uk
"There are none more ignorant and useless,than they that seek answers on their knees, with their eyes closed"
BARF!
[snip]Looks like you guys needs a "if you can't hack it, you die" law ;-)
...Jim Thompson
--
| James E.Thompson, P.E. | mens |
| Analog Innovations, Inc. | et |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC\'s and Discrete Systems | manus |
| Phoenix, Arizona Voice:(480)460-2350 | |
| E-mail Address at Website Fax:(480)460-2142 | Brass Rat |
| http://www.analog-innovations.com | 1962 |
I love to cook with wine. Sometimes I even put it in the food.
martin
I'd love to get the chance to prove that I can still hack it. But to get that chance I'd probably need to slaughter all the personnel officers in the Netherlands involved in hiring electronic engineers, which really would be terrorism, even though the offence would fall under the laws involving the protection of the rights of non-sentient animals. Just for the record, I'm not planning any such act, or anything remotely like it.
In fact Europe has experimented with at least one "if you can't hack it, you die" law, but the governemnt involved proved ephemeral. If Jim wants an example to pass on to his Republican friends in the legislature, he should to check out the German legislation on the subject, drafted in the 1930's. It hasn't been in force since 1945, but it did get rid of a lot of useless mouths before then. Henry Ford's collected papers probably include an English language version, if the Republicans can't find anybody who can read German.
-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen
Dubyah's core constituency is being sold "god smiting the wicked from the sky". They barely read, not even their own bible.
-- JosephKK Gegen dummheit kampfen die Gotter Selbst, vergebens. --Schiller
Even if they could read it, they have no clue what it means and cannot understand it in context.
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