unix_jedi

4 different newspapers had worked out that there was an atomic weapons program at Los Alamos in early 1945 by noticing certain information - and lack thereof.

I understand what they've done, now that I see what's going on.

Item the first:



Looks innocous enough. Breda. Alan. The Atomic Nerds.

How nice. In front of the Atomic Bombs, no less. Then off to "Blogorado".

Item the second.
Where they met up with, among others, the aeronautical engineer Jim.

Who (Jim) instructed breda to shoot like:



Well, now. That's odd. Why would you need to train like that?
Unless...

Oho.

The engineers and Nerds are building a powered suit of armor for the Bredalucion!! Haha! Mecha Breda!

I figured it out!
Wait, who's that at the door....

DON'T ENCOURAGE CALEB!!!!

http://gunnuts.net/2009/10/26/dont-bring-a-knife-to-a-coffee-fight/#comment-13759

Congrats to Caleb on his quick thinking.

But next time be sure to get the hot chocolate.

Much more stopping power than the French Roast.

To her own well-deserved spot on Badass of the Week.

Seen on #GBC a bit ago:
http://www.badassoftheweek.com/kauser.html

A truly badass story. Indian girl objects to her impending rape and murder and the beating and impending murder of her family by playing Paul Bunyan, and then "easily taking away" an AK-47 and "turning it on" the person with the gun.

And lo and behold as they're using images to depict the story:


I HAVE A MACHINE GUN
HO – HO – HO
(original caption)

Kit!

Coming into work this morning, I heard a airline radio commerical touting their new low-cost flights to the Bahamas.

Then the low-voiced disclaimer kicked in, ending with:
{low announcer voice fast disclaimer} "... Government approval for Bahamas routes is pending"...
{Cheery Announcer} Fly [Airline]! There's nothing stopping you!

You mean.. other than.. that... governmental approval thing?


Then I just read this which re-reminded me of that: Lone Star Energy: Why Texas Will Resist the Call for a Unified Grid

"If you go to either of the other two grids you've got to get 20-something state utility commissions to agree on something," B.J. Stanbery, the founder of the Austin-based solar manufacturer HelioVolt, says. "In Texas, we've only got one to persuade. Now, that's a big benefit."

Yeah. And if you make that to 40+... I can't imagine why there would be resistance to that. In ~48 other states, you'd have to convince the commissions - and assuming there's not resistance, or worse local competition to your plan...

via #GB_C:

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2009/10/13/romney-endorsing-toomey-tuesday/

Mitt Romney is set to officially endorse Pennsylvania Senate candidate Pat Toomey Tuesday in Philadelphia, a move that marks the progress Romney has made in shoring up bonds with some key conservative constituencies.

Uh, no it doesn't. It marks the progress Romney has made to try and do that. That's a whole nother concept that he's succeeded. (Which he hasn't.)

Other than missing that whole point there's the caption to the photo, screenshotted here in case CNN notices their "error" (HA!):

Not that either of them are "selfish pigs"!
But I found this series of cartoons with some excellent examples, and I thought immediately of

breda:


But for Breda, it's because of the delicious bacon. OMNOMNOM (Her bacon proclivities are well known!)

And then there's the Nerds:

For obvious reasons.

(There are some other good ones in the series: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturepicturegalleries/6255182/Selfish-Pigs-by-Andy-Riley-creator-of-The-Bunny-Suicides.html )

TD told me something recently that I didn't know: SimCity has been released as free software! The free version is now called Micropolis. It was released as part of the "One Laptop Per Child" (OLPC) project.

Mission Statement: To create educational opportunities for the world's poorest children by providing each child with a rugged, low-cost, low-power, connected laptop with content and software designed for collaborative, joyful, self-empowered learning. When children have access to this type of tool they get engaged in their own education. They learn, share, create, and collaborate. They become connected to each other, to the world and to a brighter future.

Wow. Now that's some sort of cool right there. With this kind of love, we can fix the world!

Right?
Huh. Well, I downloaded and built it (with the work laptop, it took finding this guy's patched source to build on Mac OS X) and was thrown back to the heady days of SimCity on the Amiga...

But being older I notice a few things.

A 20% tax rate produces riots? What? I think Will Wright needs to take some classes with Al Sharpton. (Sharpton was quoted about tax rates once, that he thought they were 5%, and they should be at least 10%.)
20% rate outrageous? I'd riot for a 20% tax rate!

So as I was commenting on the GBC about that, it occured to me. Wait a minute. We're sending these laptops to the poorest nations of the world. The laptop is built for schools that literally have no building.

How much of a taunt is that when they get to play a "American" game, where the first thing you put down.. is a Nuclear Power Plant? Magically! (In 1900!)

So the kids are going to play a game where you disdainfully toss in a Nuclear Power Plant. And *just* build roads. *click click click* Roads! And where police departments lower crime. Next to industry? Not stick up the industry for bribes?

The Western ethnocentrism inherent in this thought process is rather interesting. Kids who might never see reliable electricity - hence a hand-cranked laptop! - get to just plunk a power plant down! Tada! Want to built residential areas, *click*! No worries about centuries or millennia of tribal strife and territorial lines!

... I'd kind of like to hear what the kids have to say about the SimCity world.
(Hell, I'd like for us to live in a country where a 20% tax rate is the max possible and you *can* build nuke plants in less than 30 years....)

When Wolf Blizter is asked his opinion, you'll always say "Hmm. I wonder what Andy Richter thinks about it, though?"

(HT to LabRat who posted it into the GBC)

We're in the middle of the biggest recession in recent memory, and Obama has only filled 233 of his top-paying 543 FTEs?

Because this is ironic.

http://sandiego.craigslist.org/csd/msg/1311700078.html

Looking for Stolen Equipment (San Diego)
Date: 2009-08-07, 5:49PM PDT

The Che Cafe (www.checafe.ucsd.edu) was broken into sometime between August 3 and August 5. ALL of our mics, xlr cables, direct in boxes, monitors, the sound board itself, ALL of it has been STOLEN. We're looking at 8 to 10 thousand dollars worth of equipment gone.

The plus side is shows WILL go on. We've been through too much already this year to let this even possibly end the Che Cafe. If you're scheduled to play and are concerned please reply or get in touch with the person that has booked your show.

Please repost and spread the word. Its a beyond messed up situation and we're going to need help in getting everything back up to normal. If anyone hears anything, your friend suddenly has a sweet PA, sound system, plethora of mics and cables or notice what is probably our equipment on ebay or craigslist, etc, please please please contact us.

Gee, maybe they were confused by the "Che" name and picture.... Power (and sound equipment!) to the people!

http://waterloolabs.blogspot.com/2009/08/fps-with-real-guns-episode-02.html

This time we are playing Half-Life (well, the flash version at least), with a real gun. Using accelerometers and LabVIEW, we can triangulate the position of where a bullet hits a piece of drywall and use that location to generate a mouse click in the game, which has been projected onto the wall.

What might be the stupidist comment ever written.

I'm not going to bow to any social program initiated by scientists. Are we all going to settle for GM crops because the science is demonstrably sound?

Reason always sounds reasonable. Doesn't mean it isn't constrained by our human limitations.

I'm not going to bow to any social program initiated by scientists.

OK, that's not stupid off the bat... Scientists can quite often lose sight of the big picture, or are working for some small point, and or/be in error themselves.

Are we all going to settle for GM crops because the science is demonstrably sound?

If the science is demonstrably sound, we'd be fools not to.

There are some competing arguments, and it depends on what your goals are and what you're trying to achieve. But let's also not forget that "Genetically Modified" crops are 99.99% of what we eat now Without them, we'd have a much harder time feeding the world.
Right now I've got a blight attacking a tomato plant in my garden. One of them in the midst of several. "Why'd it only hit that one", I wondered for a couple of seconds. "Oh, right, that's the one 'heirloom', and all the others are blight resistant hybrids." There are issues with monocultures and unexpected consequences - right.
But if the science is demonstrably sound, what fool would then say "No, no, let's go with something that's rather more unsound, it'll make me feel better?"

Been busy commenting at Kevin's, dealing with Technocrats and idiots who don't know the meaning of words (Like "slavery"), and the ever-ongoing conspiracy at GBC...

But yesterday, Breda was asking for callers to the Gun Nuts Radio show, the topic was "What would you say if you had 30 seconds to talk to the President."

I'm not exactly considered to be terse or brief in my comments, as some people comment on quite often... So I thought it was worth trying.

How could you actually in 30 seconds get enough information across?

Then I had a brainstorm. So I worked on it, and told my wife, the lovely Dixie about my attempt to help Breda. "30 seconds? You? Hah! You? Never!"

...

Then I read her my draft attempt. "That's AWESOME! ... So where'd you get it?"

...

Her faith in me is unbounded. Amazing! Unshaken!

...

Well, so I did my best, and got some decent reaction from it, but according to Ahab and his shot-timer, I need to shave 3 seconds off...:

Breda's posted my attempt.

Plus you get to see Breda wearing the perfect T-shirt!

Michael Yon's ego has driven him to double down on his previous stance.

Perhaps it's his military training - "attack into an ambush". The only problem with seeing it like that is that rather than our ambushing him, he ran full tilt by himself into the "gun fanatic" camp - as we were peacefully minding our own business and roasting marshmallows.

Sunday, he posted another indirect attack to incite the "gun fanatics", labeling it "Truth or Dare".

How many of the guns in Mexico are coming from the United States? Good question that will prove extremely contentious if the number of weapons proves to be high.

He doesn't answer how much he thinks. If he's really upset about being "misquoted" and "misunderstood", why wouldn't he lay out his thinking, his chain of facts, and his conclusions?

Perhaps he's not as misunderstood and misquoted as he'd like to claim. Politicians has a line for that "... taken out of context ..."

Yesterday, another post. Tons of arms.

Nobody seems to dispute that tons of weapons apparently are flowing into Mexico. A big question is, where are they coming from? The only casualties assured to occur are those people who are shot by the real guns from the questionable sources, and the truth. There are almost certainly people within the U.S. government who would fit the facts to fit their agendas, and there are vast numbers of citizens who would do the same. Iraq and Afghanistan provide stark international reminders of this on the global scale. It seemed that every cranny of government and civilian political organizations, overtly lied or spackled over inconvenient facts that did not lead to pre-determined outcomes for Iraq, in particular. Personally, I don't trust any government, nor do I trust the amorphous "gun lobby" in the United States.

Amorphous? I believe this means that the Big Bad NRA hasn't said anything (as they didn't in L'Affaire de Zumbo until the dust had long since settled.)
Instead it's individuals - lots of us. All of whom are disagreeing, yet there's no good way to dismiss us. To lump us into an "amorphous" lobby allows Yon to avoid dealing with the fact that we're not paid, we're not corrupted by money.
So he claims we're just part of a lobby. Thus money's at the root of it. Not to be trusted. Yon's initial dispatch said "... lets be honest... "
You First, Mr. Yon.

All are filled with overt and hidden agendas. Huge money flies around.

Where's my check?

Having grown up in America, I'm not sure which to disbelieve more: the government agendas, or the private agendas.

Mr. Yon? You just gave away your viewpoint again.

I grew up in the South, and was shooting and hunting as a young boy. By my young twenties, I had become intimately familiar with perhaps a hundred types of small arms. Having lived in places like Florida, North Carolina, California and Massachusetts, I am extremely well aware of the gun arguments -- from various sides -- and the high emotions surrounding them. That intimate knowledge causes me to suspect the gun-fanatics as much as the anti-gun fanatics. Neither camp can be counted on to tell the good, the bad and the ugly. None are to be trusted with mere facts, even when actual facts can be found.

Ah, damn all their eyes, trust nobody, and ignore all the facts. Very logical of Yon. Too bad he's unable to actually defend this, preferring instead to stick to passive-aggressive attacks, smears and slanders.

(I haven't forgotten his email note on this: It's just fascinating to see apparent gun-fanatics misquote a document that is just inches away on the same computer screen. If they invest only that minimal level of attention to the guns they are apparently packing, it's just a matter of time before they accidentally shoot themselves or someone else. Attention to detail is an important component of gun safety.)

Some of the comments on these posts are very informative and illustrative. The first (starts from the bottom) comment does the sort of number crunching that is apparently "not to be trusted with facts":

"John": Finally! some numbers. 1547 guns in a year. That is "tons" now? they still don't say how many were traced, just 90% of the TRACEABLE ones were traced. Even if 100% were traceable, that means that 1392 were from the USA. ATF stats for 2007 say that 2.7 MILLION guns were sold that year. (http://www.atf.gov/firearms/stats/afmer/afmer2007.pdf)
Not only that, but 207,000+ guns were legally exported. So 90% of the guns that were traced to the US turns out to be 1392 guns, that is less than 1 tenth of 1 percent (0.67%) of all exported guns, and less than 5 hundredths of a percent (0.05%) of all of the guns sold in the us in 2007. That isn't TONS, of guns, that is POUNDS of guns.


"ctone" lays the smack down in the original comment thread at comment 64.

Gen. McCaffrey in 1996 -
Gen. Barry McCaffrey, the White House drug policy director, traveled to Mexico in March 1996 smoothing the way for an agreement between the two governments which has resulted in Mexican soldiers beginning to train at Ft. Bragg and other American bases, and in the gift of 73 "surplus" helicopters, four C-26 surveillance planes, night vision goggles, radios and other military equipment. In addition, the White House has requested $9 million in military aid for Mexico for fiscal year 1998 (up from $3 million in fiscal year 1996) for the purchase of new weapons from U.S. arms manufacturers. - http://www.fas.org/asmp/profiles/mexico.htm

Gen McCaffrey 2009 -
The outgunned Mexican law enforcement authorities face armed criminal attacks from platoon-sized units employing night vision goggles, electronic intercept collection, encrypted communications, fairly sophisticated information operations, sea-going submersibles, helicopters and modern transport aviation, automatic weapons, RPG’s, Anti-Tank 66 mm rockets, mines and booby traps, heavy machine guns, 50 cal sniper rifles, massive use of military hand grenades, and the most modern models of 40mm grenade machine guns. - http://www.mccaffreyassociates.com/pdfs/Mexico_AAR_-_December_2008.pdf

There's some great reporting going on on Yon's site - in his comments, not by Yon.

Let me repeat part of ctone's McCaffrey quote:
electronic intercept collection, encrypted communications, fairly sophisticated information operations, sea-going submersibles, helicopters and modern transport aviation, automatic weapons, RPG’s, Anti-Tank 66 mm rockets, mines and booby traps, heavy machine guns, 50 cal sniper rifles, massive use of military hand grenades, and the most modern models of 40mm grenade machine guns.

Yon's question was: Tons of Arms Flowing into Mexico, But From Where?

According to McCaffrey, which was Yon's original source for his screed, the (current) Mexican Civil War is being fought with:
* sea-going submersibles
* helicopters and modern transport aviation
* automatic weapons
* RPGs
* Anti-Tank 66 mm rockets
* mines
* heavy machine guns
* 50 cal sniper rifles
* hand grenades
* 40mm grenade machine guns

Of those, only one might have been bought in the US. (And probably by the US Government and supplied to the Mexican Government.)

But Yon claims that we "gun fanatics" are misquoting him. Misunderstanding him.

Look at that list above, and then remember what Yon said to start this Zumboish story:

but we must be honest here and help curb flows that are killing Mexicans and Americans. The idea that "guns don't kill people, people kill people" should be saved for someone who will buy it. That's like saying IEDs don't kill people, people kill people. Nuclear weapons don't kill people...

Guns kill people. I'm not giving up my guns and I'll stand shoulder to shoulder with other Americans who want to keep theirs. But we must be honest about the problems to face them.

Be honest? Mr. Yon, I think there's only one very dishonest person here.


[update: Yuri is fired up too]

Skimming some headlines, I saw:
Man Flown To Hospital After Pickup Hits Bobcat

Wait. WHAT? I mean, bobcats can be nasty critters, but after hit by a pickup? What, did it flip into the cab or something?

http://www.newsnet5.com/home-backup/19036967/detail.html

Troopers said a 64-year-old man was driving a Bobcat on the highway just after 3 p.m. when a pick-up truck hit him from behind. Both vehicles flipped over. The driver of the Bobcat was flown to MetroHealth Medical Center for treatment.

Oh.
A Bobcat. Dozer.

Not a Bobcat. Cat.


It got me to click on it - I wonder if it was on purpose. (Not used to seeing smart and clever in the MSM these days.)

Not for his initial post, which was nonsense enough and well rebutted in the comments, but for his followup to his email list.

As Zumbo did, he tries to claim that it's the "gun-fanatics" who can't read, and are dangerous and inattentive to the weapons we "presumably pack".

My work is misquoted around the world every day, but nowhere as often as on my own site. Some readers seem to think that I wish to ban firearms in the United States, or that I claim that automatic weapons are flowing to Mexico. Automatic weapons almost certainly are flowing to Mexico, which would explain how they got there. But I didn't write it. Nor would an easy reading of the short dispatch reveal that I am calling to ban guns in the United States. It's just fascinating to see apparent gun-fanatics misquote a document that is just inches away on the same computer screen. If they invest only that minimal level of attention to the guns they are apparently packing, it's just a matter of time before they accidentally shoot themselves or someone else. Attention to detail is an important component of gun safety.

I wonder what we're supposed to have misunderstood about those latest slanders.

Other than Yon's apparently yet another "Only One" elitist who doesn't trust us with guns. And isn't honest enough to admit it, just like most of the gun banners he claims he's not part of. *He's* not going to give up *his* guns. But he's not a fanatic. It's the rest of us that have to give up our guns, our freedoms.

The idea that "guns don't kill people, people kill people" should be saved for someone who will buy it.

I've asked how RPGs and fragmentation grenades factor into that. Since that's what's currently the top weapon in the battles. I don't expect an answer.

His webmaster posted a "defense". He claimed to be a former cop and soldier, actually mentioned grenades, and that "Michael of course knows that those aren't coming from America", and that Michael prefers semi-automatic ... This is from memory, because that note is down the memory hole now. I quoted some of it, as did some others. It was "posted with Michael's permission." Notably, at no point did it give any clarification or real defense. The fact it's now down the memory hole I think says a good bit. In the meantime, I've started screen-shotting the comments spanking Yon. I suspect they're all about to get disappeared... (Just dangerous nuts who are probably about to accidentally shoot themselves... Not really that valuable... No loss, right?)

Via the IRC chat and conspirator C-90:



Wow, so Europe "can too", as long as they hold onto his... Wait, do they think he's [Bill] Clinton? And isn't that a bit sterotypical and racist about the...

Maybe it's just a bad angle.



Maybe not.

(Prompted directly by a post at TSM, and something I've been meaning to post for a long while, I've typed it into IRC several times.)

When I was in college, the group I hung out with was almost all physics majors.

The advisor for the Physics Majors was a stereotypical, absentminded physics Ph.D. I'd had 3 classes he taught with my friends his advisees, and he'd seen me around campus with the physics majors and got it stuck in his head I was a physics major, too.

I had to take over 2 years of physics for my major, plus some labs, and the physics building was a good way to cut through campus if you knew how to navigate it... Around advising time, 4 times a year, he'd see me, and demand that I come to see him for advising.

"Doc, I'm not a physics major." "Oh, right, right."

One day I'm walking through the building and he sees me down the hall and yells for me to come see him in his office.

Geez, not again.

So I walked in, prepped and ready to say, again, "I'm not a physics major..." and he says "I want you to sign up for my meteorology course!"

Which caught me totally off guard. While I was still kind of getting back to mental equilibrium, he gave me the hard sales pitch. Promised a easy B if I showed up. No math, he promised.
But he was pushing it hard. Actually, in hindsight, really hard. But at the time it seemed reasonable. I did have some spare hours I needed to fill.

So I said, well, OK, and signed up with one of the aforementioned physics majors I hung out with. He was a likable prof, meteorology's interesting, and I had to fill the hours somehow, and would be more interesting than most electives taught by the Liberal Arts sort.

Over Christmas break I log into the system, check the class schedule, and find that it's in the... Physics building auditorium?
Huh? Bwahuh? A "Senior level" (4xx) class.. In the *auditorium?*

First day of class, arrive with my friend. There are a couple of chemistry majors I've had classes with, and a couple of physics majors I know.

And a LOT of cute girls. Room's filled with them. Few guys I don't know. But, wait, wait, wait, wait. Cute girls? Physics class? I haven't seen a lot of cute girls since it was elective time... *DANGER DANGER WILL ROBINSON DANGER DANGER*.

In comes Doc and we start the preliminaries Yadda yadda, This is Meteorology, Phys 4xx, if you're expecting something else....

Then with about 1/2 the classtime left, he starts on "dimensional analysis". Simple. Look: If you keep your units together, you can make sure you're doing it right. So, for instance: if you do a acceleration question, and end up with meters.. you know you did it wrong!

*yawn*. I mean. Really. This is a senior-level class!

The class explodes. People are waving their hands, there's screeching and yelling, and those of us who know each other from Organic, Physics, or Calculus are looking at each other with astonishment, and looking at the rest of the class.

Soon, I'm turned around trying to explain the the girls behind us, and my friend is leaning over explaining to the girls in front of us. The people I know are all writing, and talking to the people around them as the Doc is trying to handle questions.

This isn't that hard. I mean, if you don't get this in high school you'll get killed in Chemistry 101. What is going on? My friend and I were thinking this had to be a Candid Camera setup.

We spent the next two freaking days on Dimensional Analysis. At the end of the third class, I followed Doc to his office. Walked in, pointed at him and exclaimed "You're using us!"

He slumped in his chair, said "Close the door" and as soon as I closed it, he covered his face with his hands and said "Oh, god, I can't make it without you guys."

As I was figuring out, and he confirmed, that class was required by the Education seniors ... with Science Concentrations. Required for teaching High School Science.

After his first year of trying to explain basic science to the Education, Science majors, he'd come up with a plan: find friendly hard science majors, and promise them a B if they'd be his Teaching Assistants. Seed the room with people who knew what Dimensional Analysis was. (Obi-Wan Kenobi felt the disturbance when he tried to explain Adiabatic Lapse Rate...)

These "kids" - after at least 7 semesters at a University, within 6 months would be teaching High School Science - didn't know basic science.

So we were the unpaid TA's to get them up to speed enough to pass a 3 hour class that had barely (by our standards) math.

He was brilliant, utterly brilliant. It was a cunning, perfect plan, that worked well. We got all the Education, Science majors out to train the next generation. We got our A's and B's, and a trauma that we couldn't talk about for years.

Thanks to the Xman:

http://www.ajc.com/opinion/content/opinion/stories/2009/01/16/ajc_conservative_columnist.html

He emailed me this this morning and said I was a "wuss" if I didn't "go for it".

Well, I'm not. Nor am I a wuss!


However, a weekly on-time column would be very hard for me to deliver.

Especially to a organization that's demonstrated it's lack of ethics and morals many times, and is actively running itself out of business. But that's more secondary to the fact that I'm not all that "conservative".

But the biggest problem is the fact that they're looking to replace their Token Conservative.

For more than 20 years, one of the most well-read columns on our opinion pages has been written by Jim Wooten, our conservative columnist. [We certainly wouldn't want to offend or confuse our (constantly diminishing, for some strange reason) readership with too many opinions or diverse takes, after all] After a long and distinguished career, Jim will be leaving the editorial board, effective June 30.

Which strikes me as being pretty offensive overall, especially for a position I'd consider taking. This is from an organization that will fight tooth and nail from being described as "liberal", "very liberal", or more accurately, "press wing of the Democrat party". (More importantly and directly to me they've yet to ever find any problem with anything claimed to be "anti-gun", and will slant coverage past "slippery slope" to "wall" immediately.)

Yet, they have one solitary spot... for.. a "conservative".


A few years back, Jonah Goldberg described why he stopped answering the phone for the Sunday Morning shows. Sadly, I can't find his description right this second, but it was to the effect that they wanted some token towards "both sides", no matter his actual opinion, and so it would be him, 2 left-wing guests, and 1 or 2 "hosts" ganged up against him.

No, even if I was that "Conservative", I don't think that's a job I want.

Talk about the definition of walking into a "Hostile Work Environment"....

Ronald Reagan used to say, 'The seven most feared words in the English language are, "I'm from the government and I'm here to help."'


I think that's possibly to be overtaken by "Obama Umbrella".

Obama's political staff is deciding whether to create a service organization that would use the vast corps of its grass-roots campaign supporters. As described by one source knowledgeable with the discussions, this nonprofit arm would be used to help victims of natural disasters, but would do so under the Obama umbrella

The proposal is now starting to sound like what happens when project meetings get out of control. "They'll help elect Democrats to Congress! And they'll pressure wavering lawmakers! And, hey, what if we promised they'll mobilize in natural disasters! And they could fight crime! And they'll have special uniforms!"