Idiotarians Abound

Vegard Valberg’s excellent MiSTing of a true blue idiotarian brought back fond memories of meeting a group of adolescent idiotarians a few years back. Not that I believe my encounter with them changed their minds, but if nothing else I showed them that they didn’t know as much as they thought they did.

This is a mostly true story – though one name has been changed to protect the innocent and some of the actual dialog has been compressed for brevity and ‘enhanced’ for clarity.

****

My friends and I were out on our motorcycles on one of those spur of the moment “Hey let’s go riding!” kind of day trips. Not that we had any particular destination in mind, but chance brought us to the campus of Dartmouth College on that late summer Saturday afternoon.

The fall semester had started, so there was no lack of students walking here and there, doing whatever students do on a day off.

Our group of seven stopped not to far from the quad, parking our bikes in such a fashion as to minimize the number of parking spaces we’d take up. Kickstands were down, engines were silent, and a few of us, including me, pulled of our jackets to enjoy the warm sun.

It was a few moments later that I realized that a couple, looking like Dartmouth students, was looking our way, talking to each other and gesturing in our direction. It wasn’t until they started walking toward us that I realized that they had been looking at one particular person.

Me.

Their interest in me puzzled me until one of them approached and asked a question.

“Do you really believe what the slogan says?” asked the girl, pointing to my tee shirt.

Blazoned across the front of my tee was this rather provocative phrase:

“Politically incorrect, and right!”

Not that I had worn that particular shirt deliberately, but it was rather serendipitous.

“Darn tootin’,” I replied. “Do you have a problem with that?”

Her demeanor soured at that point.

“How can you believe that? How can you be so unfeeling?”

“Unfeeling? What makes you believe I’m unfeeling? You don’t even know me!”

It was at this point that she launched into her diatribe, telling me that other people have feelings and that I shouldn’t offend people with my uncaring attitude. She went on to imply that probably ate babies, tripped blind people, drowned kittens, and committed other horrifying acts just because I proclaimed my insensitivity by admitting that I was politically incorrect. How could I be allowed to continue offending all right-thinking people? I listened to this for three or four minutes, my friends looking on in amusement, knowing what was coming.

As she was taking a breath to continue her polemic discourse, I struck with a barb of my own.

“As I live and breathe, a real live fascist! Your parents must be so proud!”

It took her a second to realize what I had just said. She had trouble breathing, obviously confused about what to do. It was then that her boyfriend (at least I assumed he was) jumped in to the fray.

“Who are you calling a fascist, you pig!”

“Why this young lady right here! After all, she was espousing the fascist line. She wants to silence anyone who disagrees with her. She wants complete loyalty to a bankrupt and morally reprehensible ideology. I’d say that pretty well defines a fascist, wouldn’t you?”

The invective that followed would have made the proverbial longshoreman blush. The fellow recited a rather inaccurate lineage of my family (my parents are married), denigrated my education, my politics, my religion (how he knew I even had one I’ll never know), and my profession (ditto). In the mean time a group of other students had gathered around, drawn to the confrontation.

Then he made a big mistake.

He started going on about how Big Oil had wanted the Gulf War to get all of the Iraqi oil, how we had no business in the Persian Gulf, and that we had vilified Saddam Hussein to justify it. It was then that one of my friends with the group started yelling at this clueless fellow…in Arabic.

Ramzi was an Iraqi exile.

When he finally calmed down enough to start speaking English again, he cross-examined the clueless idiotarian.

“If America is so evil, let me ask you this: Has your family ever been dragged out of their home in the middle of the night by the police?”

No answer.

“Well, have they?” demanded Ramzi.

“Uh, no. What’s this got to do with anything?”

“It’s got everything to do with it! Now, has anyone in your family been imprisoned and tortured for standing up for their political beliefs?” Ramzi asked.

“Of course not!”

“Has anyone in your family ever been executed as an enemy of the state because they spoke out against their government and their leader?”

“Well…uh, no.”

“No? NO?! Then what right have you got to tell me or anyone else about how misunderstood Saddam is or how America is bad? You don’t know shit!” Ramzi turned away and went back to his bike.

It was then that the clueless one finally realized the mistake he’d made.

Ramzi had made it out of Iraq just ahead of the secret police. His father, mother, sister, and two brothers were all dead, executed by the Iraqi regime. Ramzi’s youngest brother had managed to get a warning to him before being arrested, allowing him to escape. The only family he had left was an elderly uncle and aunt in Boston. Everyone else was gone.

“Well, boy, I’d say you put your foot in it this time,” I said. “There’s a difference between the crap they shovel out here in the halls of academia and what happens out there in the real world. Once you get out there yourself, you’ll realize that everything isn’t so cut and dried. It’s easy, being nice and safe back here in the U.S., to be able to denounce everything you think is an injustice. It’s a different thing to be someplace where the things that you’re used to don’t exist. Little things like freedom of speech.”

It was at this point that we decided to get back on our motorcycles and continue on our way. We’d all had enough of the idiotarian indoctrinated know-nothings. It was time to hit the road and clear our minds.

It was time to re-enter the real world.

A Day Of Not Much

These are the kinds of days I dislike - days of not much happening. I check the news on the TV and in the papers, and there’s not much new happening. I check some of my favorite blogs and it seems that they’re experiencing the same kind of day that I am.

But I'm also cognizant of that old proverb, “Be careful what you wish for.”

So, with that in mind, I’m not even going to try to sound profound. It would be a waste of time. Not that I’ve ever been profound, to the best of my knowledge. (This is where you’re supposed to say something like, “But of course you are! We all hang on every word you write and are nothing without you!”)

The most ambitious thing I did to day was rake leaves. Hmm. Maybe I could write something on the Zen of raking leaves?

Nah. Too insipid.

Maybe I’ll think of something tomorrow.

A War Easier To Prevent

After World War II was over, Winston Churchill said that never was there a war that would have been easier to prevent. Will some great leader be saying something very like that after the Second Gulf War?

Comparisons have been made between Saddam Hussein and Adolph Hitler more than once. More than once the comparison has been frighteningly too accurate. The signs that Saddam is playing for time to get all of his war preparations completed are there, just as they were there while Hitler was doing the same thing.

Thomas Sowell, in his October 10th column, outlines many of the parallels between Saddam’s actions today and those of Hitler prior to World War II.

Sowell writes:

”What Saddam Hussein is doing is nothing new. Hitler played all these kinds of games during the 1930’s, while he was building up his military forces until he reached the point when he was ready to strike. He understood that he needed to buy time above all and that, when he became powerful enough, many would see the futility of resistance.”

The same kinds of people in the West who refused to see the crucial importance of time in the 1930s are today saying that we should ‘wait until’ this or that happens before we take military action ‘as a last resort.’

Military action is already a last resort. Where have these people been during the past 11 years, while Saddam Hussein played cat and mouse with the United Nations and their inspectors, who were allowed "unfettered" access until Saddam Hussein decided otherwise? “

Saddam Hussein’s so-called capitulation to the UN in allowing weapons inspectors to return to Iraq is just so much smoke and mirrors. In my opinion, it’s not much different than Hitler’s signing a 25-year non-aggression pact with Neville Chamberlain, guaranteeing “peace in our time.” The agreement was nothing more than a ploy by Hitler to gain time and was more useful to the British as toilet paper than anything else. That ‘agreement’ was just one more factor that made it possible for Nazi Germany to conquer most of Western Europe.

” Maybe it would be useful to see how this game was played by Hitler, in order to understand why time is crucial.

Germany's ability to attack other nations in Europe was stifled by a treaty which required them to station no troops in their own industrial center in the Rhineland. This meant that, if Germany attacked any other country, French troops could easily seize German industry and paralyze its economy.

Because the French army was then much larger than Germany's, since the German army's size was limited by treaty, the threat of aggression from Hitler was thwarted, so long as he lived up to these treaties. Otherwise, as the potentially strongest nation on the continent, Nazi Germany was a threat to all its neighbors.

After Hitler took the desperate gamble in 1936 of sending troops into the Rhineland, in violation of this treaty, he remarked privately, ‘If the French had then marched into the Rhineland, we would have had to withdraw with our tails between our legs, for the military resources at our disposal would have been wholly inadequate for even a moderate resistance.’

Moreover, Hitler understood that such a fiasco would have brought down the Nazi regime. He took this huge gamble precisely because he was convinced that the French did not have the guts to act. Neither did Britain -- especially after Hitler appealed to the wishful thinkers by offering [the] 25-year non-aggression pact.”

Sound familiar? Just change a few names and places and it sounds just like what Saddam is trying to do today.

” Those who deal with the gritty life and death choices of the real world as if they were discussing abstract questions around a seminar table said that Hitler had "just gone into his own backyard." Other nations station their troops anywhere they want, inside their own borders, why not Germany?

By the time they realized why not, Hitler had devastated half the continent and had come within a hair of destroying Britain.”

Will we make the same mistake with Saddam Hussein? Will we wait until Iraqi biological, chemical, and/or nuclear weapons have devastated some part of the world before we act?

” President George W. Bush's speech on Iraq in effect reiterated what Edmund Burke said more than two centuries ago: ‘There is no safety for honest men except by believing all possible evil of evil men.’ Today, in a nuclear age, those words apply more strongly than ever.”

You’ll get no argument from me about that. If such a war and its consequences are easier to prevent by acting now, then I say act now. If we wait then the appeasers and overly cautious may not live long enough for us to say to them, “We told you so.”

More Fall Ramblings, Part Deux

The Eddy Parents have successfully completed this round of reconnaissance, settling on one or two towns west of Concord, New Hampshire.

Traveling around to the various small towns was actually quite pleasant, leaf-peepers not withstanding. One of the towns hosts a small liberal arts college, meaning that there is quite a bit of social activity in the town when classes are in session. Of course, Dad Eddy relishes the collegiate mayhem he could wreak on campus, he being a curmudgeonly conservative (with a Harvard MBA) and a lot of time on his hands. Should that come to pass, Academia will never be the same.

One more bastion of leftist-think could be changed beyond recognition.

****

The shooter has struck again. Haven’t the news media twits realized that every time they say, “The sniper hasn’t done ‘xyz’ so far,” they cause him to react as if to say, “Oh yes I have!”

Maybe they should shut the f**k up! Don’t give this guy any more ideas, okay?

****

My friend Jane’s computer is all squared away. There is still quite a few software apps she needs to install, but her system is all better now.

She and her family stopped by on their way home from Vermont just to pick up her machine. I did give her a not too subtle warning about installing a certain utility suite. She knows that if she does it again I won’t have to fix it because she’ll be D-E-D, dead. She’ll be dead because I will have beaten her to death with her keyboard.

No jury in the world would convict me. No way.

****

At least the New England Patriots didn’t lose this weekend.

Then again, they didn’t play this weekend, did they?

****

The weekend is almost over, which means that when I get home from work tomorrow I get to rake leaves! Oh frabjous joy! I can hardly wait!!

(If you believe that, I’ve got a certain bridge in Brooklyn to sell. Interested?)

More Fall Ramblings

It feels like fall in New England for a change, with somewhat cooler, windier days, and cold nights. The leaves in the Lakes Region of New Hampshire are changing colors – bright reds, yellows, and oranges sandwiched between the greens of late changing foliage or evergreens. The down side to all of this is that the leaves are also falling off the trees which means that someone – in this case, me – will be busy over the next two weeks raking them from the yard, hauling them to the compost heap, and mowing the lawn one last time.

****

The ‘summer people’ are long gone. Though there are many boats still in their slips at the marinas here on the lake, many of their owners haven’t taken them out for a couple of weeks. I expect that will be different this weekend because all of the fall colors surrounding the lake. Goodness knows there have been a lot of leaf-peepers up here taking in the foliage. Despite the less than perfect weather up this way last week, the state tourism office figured that 500,000 people visited New Hampshire over the Columbus Day weekend. Figure a like number for Vermont and Maine.

At least the leaf-peepers aren’t nearly as troublesome as the summer people. They tend to stay here for a weekend (or maybe a long weekend), driving around and looking at the sights. They aren’t inclined to get drunk and cause trouble. They’re more likely to get cantankerous when they run out of film after taking dozens of snapshots of some picturesque scene that they’ve only seen on calendars or in Yankee Magazine.

The only problem with this part of the season is the traffic. Many of the leaf-peepers take their time driving along the country roads, looking at the pretty leaves. Under normal circumstances something like that might piss me off, but I have oodles of patience when someone is admiring the beauty of the place I call home. They can take all of the time they want and spend as much money as they have.

All I ask is that once they’ve run out of money, they go home.

****

With the cooler weather, most of the outdoor activities have turned indoors. The political silly season is in full swing, with less than three weeks until the November 5th elections. One of the tighter national races is for one of New Hampshire’s U.S. Senate seats. 1st Congressional District Representative John E. Sununu defeated the incumbent, Republican Bob Smith, in the primaries. Sununu is running against Democrat Governor Jeanne Shaheen. You know it’s a tight race when NPR, MSNBC, FOX News, ABC and others are all looking closely at a contest that could decide control of the Senate. So far the polls show Sununu and Shaheen neck-and-neck.

It’s going to be an interesting, and dirty, fight.

****

There’s been so much talk about the shooter in the metro Washington, DC area. There are all kinds of theories about whom, how, why, and so on. One thing that many people assume is that the shooter is an American. They also assume that ‘he’ (a most likely assumption) has had military training. It could be. But if so, which military trained him - ours, or someone else’s?

Some have wondered why the shooter hasn’t selected high profile targets. What’s the best way to spread terror amongst the populace, assuming that’s your goal?

Shoot ordinary people minding their own business, not politicians or police officers or religious leaders. If you shoot ordinary people, then the populace won’t be able to say, “Well, I don’t have to worry. I’m not a politician, etc.” Now everyone has to worry that they’ll catch a bullet going to the post office, gassing their car, loading groceries into their SUV, mowing the lawn, or sitting at a sidewalk café sipping on a double light decaf latte.

****

Have any of you out there (and I mean the 5 or 6 regular readers of this blog) ever wondered what it would be like to live out in the country? I hear this quite often from visitors to this state. Usually it’s from someone spending a week or two of their vacation time at the lakes, up in the mountains, at some campground in one of the many forests, or at one of the ski resorts. All they’ve seen or experienced of New Hampshire (or Vermont, Maine, or upstate New York) in the limited time they’re here is what is aimed at the tourist trade.

Many have no concept what it means to live someplace where pizza parlors and Chinese restaurants don’t deliver; where the nearest convenience store might be 20 miles away down a dirt road; where winters can be harsh and deadly; and where you haul your own trash to the dump. There are no Starbucks, Taco Bells, or tofu burgers. The closest thing to a Sak’s Fifth Avenue is the L.L. Bean outlet store in one of the shopping meccas in the heart of tourist country.

Most have never experienced cabin fever after being stuck inside for a week or more because of the brutally cold temperatures and heavy snowfalls in the winter. The same can also be said of mid-spring – the black flies are out in force making any time spent outside uncomfortable to an extreme.

Few are cut out for small town life, where everybody knows your business. For some of us hardy Yankees, it’s no big thing. But for others it can be quite trying. Up here, neighbors watch out for neighbors, even if that neighbor lives on the other side of town.

Some people have trouble with the concept of town meeting, where the residents of the town gather once a year to decide how the town will or will not spend their tax dollars. It can be a very personal thing, town meeting. Though it is local government at its best, people also have to contend with egos, feuds, and the ubiquitous anti-flatlander mentality. Most new folks make the almost fatal mistake their first time speaking at town meeting by starting their remarks with, “Back where I come from….”. Most folks at town meeting could care less about where you come from or what you did there, unless you’re going to use the reference to show how something the town is thinking of doing is a bad idea. Then they might let you get away with it. Maybe.

Something many others moving to the country end up learning the hard way is this: Never piss off the Town Clerk, the Road Agent, or the Police Chief (assuming the town actually has a police department). Getting on their bad side can make living in a small town an extremely uncomfortable and frustrating experience.

One thing anyone wanting to move out to the country will have to get used to is guns. Lot’s of folks around here own guns for hunting, protection, or just plain plinking. By association, they’ll also have to get used to the various hunting seasons. Getting all misty-eyed about the Big Bad Hunters out stalking Bambi so they can carve him in to venison steaks will earn you no points up here. It’s more likely to get you talked about.

And one other thing: You are expected to take responsibility for your own actions. It’s not ‘society’s fault’. It’s not because your mother didn’t breastfeed you. It’s not because you ate too many Twinkies. That kind of pseudo-psychological BS won’t fly out here in the sticks. Folks out in the country don’t have time for it. We’re too busy making a living, raising our kids, working on our homes, and paying our taxes.

If all of that sounds appealing to you, then we’ll welcome you with open arms. Otherwise, don’t even think of moving to any place like this. You’ll hate it.

****

Sometimes there’s an advantage to being somewhat knowledgeable about computers. Other times it’s a pain in the butt. This past week was one of those pain-in-the-butt times.

My friend Jane phoned me last weekend, her voice stressed in a barely controlled panic.

“My computer won’t boot. There’s something wrong!”

“Oh?” asked I, “What do you mean it ‘won’t boot’? “

“It gets to the Windows 2000 flash screen and stays there. I can’t even boot to Safe Mode.”

Oops. This didn’t sound good.

After continued Q&A, I was finally able to pinpoint the problem -- Norton Utilities.

It appears that Jane was having problems with the anti-virus application and couldn’t fix it by re-installing it. So she did the worst possible thing she could have done with Norton Utilities – she uninstalled it. Of course she had every intention of reinstalling it, but the damage was done. From that point on, her machine was unusable.

I’ve heard horror stories from others about uninstalling Norton from their machines and it always ends the same way – the machine won’t boot.

Even using the Emergency Repair Disk and backed up registry files won’t help. The uninstallation process for Norton does some nasty things to some of the system files. It’s almost as if it’s Norton’s way of saying, “Uninstall us, will you? We’ll show you!”

So now I have opened her computer, backed up all of her work files, and started a low-level format of her disk drive. I’ve got to reinstall everything from scratch. Once everything is done I’ll get her machine back to her.

I’ll give her the same warning I’m going to give you: “Don’t install Norton Utilities unless you believe you’ll really need them, otherwise I’ll break every one of your fingers. If you do install it, then never uninstall it. Disable it, Yes. Uninstall it, No!”

****

The ever-popular Eddy Parents are here from south of the border (Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut ‘south of the border’, not the Mexico kind) for one of their many regular visits. In case you wonder where my brother and I get our wonderful senses of humor, our political bent, and our intolerance of idiotarians, you need look no further than Mom and Dad Eddy. Well, you could look further, but you’d need someone like John Edward to channel the Eddy Grandparents to get an even better idea of how our respective outlooks came to be.

Though the Eddy Parents are here to visit the Brothers Eddy and enjoy the foliage, they are also here to scout out a future town of residence. They haven’t had a chance to visit their area of interest, but yours truly that will guide them through their reconnaissance. They have a list of towns they want to visit, and fortunately for me they are all in the same part of the state.

Stay tuned for further developments.

Bali- A Major Miscalculation

As I write this, possibly 200 or more are dead in Bali due to a terrorist bombing outside of two tourist nightclubs in that tropical paradise. A majority of the dead are believed to be Australians.

The perpetrators of this terrorist act are thought to be members of Jemaah Islamiyah, a militant fundamentalist Islamic group believed to have close ties with Al Qaida. Whether the bombers thought to drive out the westerners or to send a message to Australia that ties with the U.S. is a bad idea, they have only partially succeeded.

They succeeded because the westerners are leaving in droves, crippling Indonesia’s $5 billion a year tourist industry. This is something that Indonesia can ill afford because their economy is shaky enough as it is.

If their thought was to send a message to Australia, then they sent the wrong one. If they had hoped to frighten the Aussies into staying out of the war on terrorism, they failed. What they’ve done is show Australia that their decision to support the war on terrorism is the right one. Now the terrorists have made themselves the target of righteous Australian anger and retribution. The very ones seeking to weaken them have strengthened the forces working against the Islamofascist pinheads.

As with the attack on the U.S. on September 11th, Al Qaida and its minions have miscalculated the response to their attack. Rather than causing their enemies to cower in fear, it has given them purpose. And as before, Al Qaida’s enemies are now gunning for them.

One thing you can say for the pinheads is that they constantly underestimate their enemies. They have no true understanding of their enemy’s psychology, and that will be their undoing.

The Libertarians Are Coming! The Libertarians Are Coming!

In an article in the New Hampshire Sunday News, it appears that a movement based upon libertarian ideals has set the state of New Hampshire in its sights.

The Free State Project plans to move thousands of people from a number of other states to a state where they would have political sway, being able to influence, if not take control of local and state politics.

"On the checklist of freedom, New Hampshire shines consistently, say activists intent on migrating en masse to a state where their influence could bring a day of reckoning.

The plan is to have 20,000 like-minded people - many view themselves as libertarians in principle - settle in a state and use ballot power to win elective office, change local and state laws, challenge the pervasiveness of big-government and 'negotiate' with the federal government for 'appropriate political autonomy.' "

At present the organization has approximately 1200 adults signed up. When Free State's membership reaches 5000, they will take a vote to decide which state will best serve their needs. So far, New Hampshire is high on their list.

There are 10 states the project's Research Committee is looking at, all of which meet certain criteria the project feels will help them meet their goals. All of the states have populations under 1.5 million. Other criteria the Research Committee is looking at include tax structure, schools, drug, gun, and school laws, crime rate, climate, politics, and 'livability'.

" Among the ten, New Hampshire tops the field with regard to 'quality of life.' The project's benchmark is the annual 'Most Livable State' award handed out by the Morgan Quitno publishing and research firm. This year, New Hampshire was third in livability, trailing only Minnesota and Iowa, neither of which are in contention as an FSP destination."

One of the more subjective sides of the decision may be New Hampshire's state motto, "Live Free or Die", taken from a quote from Revolutionary War hero General John Stark's farewell address to his former comrades.

"In New Hampshire, people think, 'Live Free or Die,' " said Elizabeth McKinstry of Hillsdale, Mich., the project's vice president. McKinstry referred to the motto in a telephone interview where she compared some of the states on the short list.

There are detailed reports on each of the 10 states being considered at FSP's website. New Hampshire's report was researched and written by Michelle Dumas of Somersworth, a district vice chairman of the Libertarian Party of New Hampshire.

Dumas wrote:

"Combining its high ranking in most of the objective data categories, its geographic advantages of offering both a seacoast and an international border, its possibilities for expansion into two neighboring states also under consideration by FSP, its native culture historically known for orientation toward liberty and its viability as a state where the immediate quality of life is likely to be most comfortable for free staters, we believe that New Hampshire should be considered one of the top contenders in the final decision."

In an interview, when asked about why New Hampshire rises to the top of the list, Dumas also cited the symbolism of the state's motto.

"I think 'Live Free or Die,' is really still a part of the values of the people of New Hampshire. We're known for our independence. And I think there is still a great deal of the population that would be welcoming what the Free State Project wants to bring here," she said.

So what will all of this mean to the Granite State should the FSP attain its goal, select New Hampshire and get 20 to 30 thousand people to make the move there?

Political chaos.

Not that such chaos would necessarily be a Bad Thing. As more exiles from the People's Republic of Massachusetts (or PRM) have moved to New Hampshire, many of them have also brought their 'Nanny State' mentality with them, wanting the same services and government institutions as 'back home'. Some of these geniuses still haven't figured out that someone has to pay for all of it. The political climate in New Hampshire has taken a firm shift towards the left, making it somewhat more left-moderate than in the past. A good political shake-up may be just what state needs to turn things around and get things back on an even keel.

The size of state government has grown far faster than the population, and with it, state spending. Maybe it's time to trim that back. It's possible that the FSP could help that along. I can certainly agree with libertarian sentiments when it comes to the size and reach of government. A government "that governs least, governs best."

One of the gubernatorial candidates in New Hampshire has made that a part of his campaign. "Clicks, not Bricks" is Republican Craig Benson's take on what state government should be. He believes that a well-designed computer network can handle many state government functions, eliminating many of the drones presently performing those functions. I agree with his assessment, despite weaknesses in other areas of his politics. I think many FSP members would agree, too.

Historically, New Hampshire has always been fiercely independent when it comes to politics. Granite Staters tend to lead, not follow some of the political trends within the U.S. Other times they are quite contrarian, thumbing their noses at the conventional political wisdom and going their own way. But over the past 20 years, that has diminished. Some of that can be attributed to the aforementioned exiles from the PRM.

Richard Tomasso, secretary of the New Hampshire Libertarian Party, states about the FSP:

"The goal is to create a freer state, where individual rights are respected, where there are low taxes and a growing economy. Essentially, and I guess I'm partial, the goal of the project is making more of the country like New Hampshire."

Amen to that.

But there are aspects to some of the Free State Project supporter's goals that I disagree with. One of those is secession from the Union, a possibility brought up by noted libertarian commentator and writer Walter E. Williams - an economics professor at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va.

Though there have been talks from time to time about resurrecting the Indian Stream Republic and seceding from the U.S., it has been more tongue-in-cheek than a serious proposal. Apparently Professor Williams is serious.

Williams wrote:

"Are there any signs that those Americans who want to unconstitutionally control the lives of others are going to let up soon? I say no, but there's a peaceful resolution proposed by Free State Project. . . . Twenty or 30,000 Americans who love liberty would move to one state, possibly New Hampshire, peaceably take over the legislature, negotiate with Congress to obey their oath of office to uphold the Constitution, and if necessary secede from the Union."

Williams caught quite a lot of flak for suggesting such a step.

"They are really talking about negotiation with Congress to have it abide by the Constitution," he said of the project's leaders. "I'm more pessimistic. I see no evidence of Americans in general wishing to let others live free. I don't see signs on the horizon that they are willing to let Walter Williams take care of his own retirement, as opposed to Congress deciding what percentage of my income I must put away for retirement."

Personally I'd prefer to remain part of United States and work from within to change the course that was set for our country by FDR and those who follow his vision of what America should be.

If nothing else, the next few years ought to be interesting. We'll have to keep an eye on the Free State Project and its progress.

What’s Next?

Let’s see.

Dubya gave his speech at the UN and warned them they’re in danger of becoming superfluous.

Check.

Dubya got his way with Congress and received authorization to use force against Iraq if needed, with or without UN sanction.

Check.

The UN is getting nervous, seeing that Dubya wasn’t kidding about dealing with Iraq with or without the UN’s blessing.

Check.

Dubya’s talking with Vladimir, working that good ole Bush voodoo on him, letting him know that we can work something out in regards to Iraq’s debt to Russia.

Hmmm. I’ll have to get back to that one.

The Pentagon has been moving troops and materiel here, there, and everywhere. Where they’ll stop, nobody (outside of the military) knows.

Check.

The anti-defense ‘peace at all costs’ leftists are in a tizzy now that they have come to realization that not many people are listening to them and aren’t interested in listening to them.

Check.

Now Dubya goes back to the UN saying ‘Put up or shut up’.

Hmmm. Looks like that one should be on the ‘To Do’ list. Maybe take care of it on Monday.

Examples of a Free Iraq

I was listening to NPR on my way home from work yesterday and chanced to listen to a report from northern Iraq that gives a preview of what life in that country might be like without Saddam Hussein and the Ba’ath Party.

The Iraqi Kurds have been living under the protection of U.S. and British armed forces since shortly after the Gulf War in 1991. In the past the Kurds have been the target of Saddam’s efforts to stifle all opposition to his rule. Chemical and biological weapons have been used against the Kurds as well as more conventional military weapons. But once the No-Fly zones were established and enforced, the Kurds were able to spend their time rebuilding the thousands of villages destroyed by Saddam’s forces.

It took time, but the various Kurd factions were finally able to work out their differences and institute a democratic government about six years ago. Free enterprise and entrepreneurs flourished, creating a vibrant and growing economy. What was once the poorest region of Iraq is now the richest. The per capita income in northern Iraq is many times that of the rest of the country. There is a free press and open education. Women are treated as equals.

This is a picture of what Iraq should have been. But the Ba’ath Party decided that they were better suited to run things and the citizens be damned. In the rest of Iraq it is the state that controls every aspect of life. There is no such thing as freedom of speech. Anyone speaking out against Saddam or the Ba’ath Party is imprisoned and killed. Their families are often imprisoned, tortured, or executed. Yet Saddam is glorified in huge murals everywhere one looks.

So was Adolph Hitler.

The torture, murder, and thievery continue unabated.

Maybe we should ignore the weapons of mass murder as a reason to invade and do something about freeing the rest of Iraq.

War, the Clueless, the Anti-Defense Weenies, and Some Answers

Jane Galt over at Live From The WTC has an interesting series of posts about Iraq, nuclear weapons, and the anti-defense forces. Her view on these and related issues are lengthy, but well thought out. I don’t necessarily agree with everything she espouses, but she has put a lot of thought into her post. She also treats us to some interesting responses to those who believe that we shouldn’t go to war with Iraq under any circumstances.

Make sure to read all five parts of her post.

Even The Left Gets Tired OF The Leftists

There's an excellent article by Ron Rosenbaum of the New York Observer on his disgust with the Marxist apologist-America Is Always Wrong and Evil leftists. While Rosenbaum leaves no doubt that he is not a conservative, he "makes it clear that his belief that today's Left is morally and intellectually obtuse in a manner sure to warm the hearts of most bloggers."

(Thanks for the link from PejmanPundit)

The Iraq Debate

Over the past two days I’ve had the opportunity to listen to both the U.S. Senate and House debates on the resolution authorizing the President to use force against Iraq if it does not disarm and destroy all weapons of mass destruction. Despite some posturing by members of both the Democrat and Republican parties, it seems that the resolution will come to a vote and pass before the November elections.

One Democrat in the House surprised me with his take on the whole thing. Though I can’t remember who it was, he was a representative from New York. He brought up an interesting question that at first made me wonder if he was going to spout the liberal line and say that any thought of military action was premature. But he showed that he was a thinking man and was reacting with his heart and his head.

“Why attack now? Why not attack three months ago? Why not six months from now? These are questions I would have asked, but September 11th changed all of that. I was in New York when the World Trade Center fell. I lost constituents among the 3000 people who died that day.” He went on to say that he believed that Congress should give the President the authority to use force against Iraq, with or without UN sanction.

Despite the bleating of some of the ‘peace at any cost’ lefties, it looks as if the resolution will pass in some form by the end of the week. Though Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia has vowed to delay any vote until well after the November election, I believe he lacks the support to pull it off. He dislikes the pressure being put on the Senate by the President and the electorate, feels as if he and the rest of Congress are being railroaded into voting for something he disagrees with. But it appears that the American public disagrees with him.

By some polls, anywhere between 51 (Time/CNN) and 62 (Newsweek) percent of the public supports the President in his effort to gain authorization from Congress to deal with Saddam Hussein and Iraq’s weapons of mass murder.

I’ll be one of the first to say that I hope all of this can be settled without the need to go to war, to send our sons and daughters in to harm’s way. But if it comes down to a choice between war to defend ourselves, or letting the Iraqi strongman continue to defy UN Security Council Resolutions that he agreed to and continue to create and stockpile weapons of mass murder, then I can support war.

And if it should come to war, best that it be done quickly and without hesitation.

Technology and Star Trek

Dave Marinaccio has it right. Everything we need to know we can learn from watching Star Trek in all of its incarnations.




One of the latest, though not the first, clue was the announcement by Fraunhofer of what some people have been incorrectly calling transparent aluminum. It might more accurately be called transparent sapphire (alumina). First introduced in the movie Star Trek IV: The Journey Home, transparent ‘aluminum’ certainly has some interesting applications. Three times stronger than steel, very hard, transparent (though it only transmits approximately 50% of the light), and able to be cast into complex shapes, it can be used in applications we’ve barely begun to think about. Maybe portholes in space craft?

In 1998, scientists at Cal Tech, Aarhus University in Denmark, and the University of Wales were able to prove that teleportation is possible, if only on a quantum level. While not exactly teleportation of the “Beam me up, Scotty” variety, we’ve got to start somewhere.

During one episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, physicist Stephen Hawking guest starred as his holographic self, playing a game of poker with Albert Einstein, Sir Isaac Newton, and Data. Before shooting his scenes, Dr. Hawking, a long time fan of Star Trek, was given a tour of the various sets, including Engineering. Looking at the warp core, Dr. Hawking’s comment was, “We’re working on it.” Though the fictional warp core requires antimatter as fuel to power the warp engines, the antimatter itself is not fictional. Though science has not been able to create large quantities of antimatter, it has managed to create and store it in magnetic containment fields.

There is something called zero-point energy, which will allow us to obtain energy from the vacuum of space. Apparently it also might explain how inertia works, the premise being controlling the zero point energy will also allow control of inertia. Think inertial dampers, or better yet, ‘impulse’ engines, which if I remember properly stands for Inertial Magnetic Pulse. We won’t have to lug a lot of rocket fuel to get around in space. There are also hints that zero point energy has a link to gravity. Could antigravity and artificial gravity be possible?

For those of you who remember the original series, what communications appliance do we carry around these days that resembles the communicators of old? How about cell phones? Being able to communicate with anyone on the planet with something that you can hold in the palm of your hand certainly fits the bill, wouldn’t you say? With enhanced 911 capabilities being built in to them, you’ll also be able to ‘lock on’ with your sensors and ‘beam them up’.

Medical science certainly seems to be catching up with Star Trek. Diagnoses that once required exploratory surgery can now be done with CAT scans, PET scans, ultrasound scans, and Functional MRIs. There’s rarely a need to open up the patient to have a look around. Organ replacement is becoming more common, with work on artificial organs continuing apace. Artificial hearts or cardiac assist pumps are being used in patients otherwise doomed to die. Work on artificial eyes to restore sight continues. Laser scalpels are being used more often, causing less pain and shorter recover times. Treatments to strengthen the immune system and turn it towards treating otherwise deadly diseases like cancer and AIDS are getting better and more efficacious every day.

Even weapons technology is looking more and more like Star Trek. High-powered lasers to destroy enemy missiles are becoming a reality. Particle beam weapons are also in the works, though probably at a much lower priority than back in the days of the Strategic Defense Initiative. Rail guns, using hyper-velocity projectiles, are also in the lab. Whether they will be practical in a military application is unknown.

Now if we could just get those replicators running…….

Cell Phone Wars

Normally I wouldn’t comment on such now mundane things as cell phones. But a chance conversation with a friend of mine, and Stephen Den Beste’s dissertation about cell phone technology, compelled me to at least put a small blurb on the blog today.

My friend Art travels quite a bit. In his business he needs to keep in touch. The other day he was showing me his new cell phone, one that lets him go from country to country and not have to worry about having cell service. It’s GSM based and does what it’s advertised to do. Too bad it might become obsolete in the not too distant future.

I think I’ll keep that to myself for a while. I don’t want to dim Art’s enthusiasm for his new tool.

Early Fall Ramblings

I had thought to write something about how everything we’ve seen in the various Star Trek series is coming true, one by one. Though my thunder was stolen a couple of weeks ago with the announcement by Fraunhofer of the creation transparent aluminum, I still have a number of things I’d like to ruminate about. I’m just going to do it later. Right now I have other, less important things to ramble on about.

****

With the unseasonably warm summer weather here in New England extending itself in to October, I still have that ‘summer’ feeling. It’s weird to see many of the summer attractions closed for the season when the temps are still in the 80’s during the day and the 60’s at night. Kids should be swimming in the lake, boats should be out and about pulling water skiers behind them, and jet skis should be making a nuisance of themselves. But the days are too short and there aren’t many charcoal or gas grills running, barbecuing up hamburgers, hot dogs, steaks, chicken, or whatever. Folks aren’t sitting on lawnchairs in the shade of oaks or maples, or out on their deck as they consume the barbecued delights and partake of a cold brew. Where’s the potato salad? The sliced veggies with dip? The Cheetos? It’s too damn early for fall!

****

Of course the political silly season is upon us, just as it is throughout the rest of the U.S. of A. The Democrats problem with the U.S. Senate race in New Jersey has a slight resemblance to a similar problem in New Hampshire.

Fergus Cullen, Republican candidate for the New Hampshire State Senate, was ruled ineligible to run for the seat by the Ballot Law Commission. The commission stated Cullen did not meet the residency requirement. State law says that a state Senate candidate must have been a resident of New Hampshire for seven years before being eligible to run. Unfortunately, though a long time resident of New Hampshire, Mr. Cullen resided in Connecticut between 1998 and 2000 and was a registered voter in that state.

Oops.

****

I’ve mentioned in other posts that I work in the fiber optics industry, specifically fiber optic test equipment. The telecommunications industry collapsed big time during the first quarter of 2001 when it was discovered that much of the optical fiber that had been laid along the ocean floors and buried in the earth in anticipation of a telecommunications boom was going unused. Why?

It seems the giants of the telecommunications industry forgot one thing: How to actually fill all of those high-speed fiber pipelines with data. With much of the optical fiber capable of carrying up to 1.6 terabits per second (that’s trillions of bits per second), the thought of how to actually fill all of that capacity never occurred to these geniuses. Most of the telecommunications infrastructure in the US and Canada relies on the same technology that existed at the turn of the century. The last century. A vast majority of telephone and data communications makes the trip between the telephone central offices and residences and businesses the same way they did in 1902: copper wire.

Copper wire is fine for voice communications and low speed data, but doesn’t do such a great job for things like high-speed data over distances greater than a couple of miles, despite the promises of DSL providers. The twisted pair of copper wires that presently connect to what is called ‘the last mile’ isn’t really capable of handling the types of services that had been foreseen to fill the optical fiber network that has been built all over the world. How many of you out there in the blogosphere still use dial-up connections to access the Internet? How many of you out there only have a high-speed connection at work? And what do you consider ‘high-speed’?

Some of us are fortunate enough to have Internet access through our local cable TV companies. I’m not sure, but I think you’ll find that most people with high-speed Internet access in the U.S. receive that access through their local cable company rather than DSL supplied by the phone companies.

Some of the Regional Bell Operating Companies (the ‘Baby Bells’) are looking to upgrade the last mile with what is called Fiber To The Home, or FTTH. A couple of them are already deploying FTTH.

What does FTTH mean to the consumer? How about a 100 to 1000 megabit per second connection to the Internet? Would you like 1000 TV channels in HDTV? How about being able to call up any movie you want at any time? It would be great. But there are a few downsides.

A high speed Internet connection means that some of us can be dumped by women on the ‘net even faster than before. We might have 1000 channels of HDTV, but there will still be nothing on!

****

One thing I never seem to be able to escape is clueless out of state drivers. Why is it that their driving skills deteriorate the farther they get from home? Do they think that the driving laws here are so much different from their home state? Even British drivers used to driving on the ‘wrong’ side of the road drive better here in New Hampshire than some of the out of state folks. From some of their reactions you’d think they’ve never seen anybody use a turn signal before. Maybe the only hand signal ever directed towards them was a single finger rather than a friendly wave or a ‘be my guest’ motion at an intersection.

Today was no exception.

It seems this woman from New York (well, her car had New York plates on it, so I assumed…) either didn’t realize or didn’t care that had she parked her car across the end of a road at an intersection. People trying to turn on to the road from the main road or trying to enter the main road were blocked. She got out of her car, oblivious to the fact that she was blocking traffic, and entered the convenience store on the corner. She was in the store for almost 10 minutes (I know this because I couldn’t leave -- she was blocking me in). As she came out of the store and headed to her car one of the local police cruisers pulled up. As the officer was getting out of the cruiser, she quickly got in to her car, started it, and tried to pull around the cruiser and on to the main road. She almost made it. Almost.

She hit the police car.

There was no horrific crash, no rending of metal. But there was a lot of paint scraped off. The dumfounded police officer watched as she put her car in reverse and tried to back away, but she had turned the front wheels the wrong way, causing her car to grind harder against the police cruiser. This also had the effect of totally blocking the road and backing up traffic all the way through to the next intersection.

It took almost 20 minutes to get a tow truck to the scene and another 20 minutes to get the cars apart. All during this the police officers (about another half dozen arrived after the first officer called in the collision) were directing traffic and questioning the woman. It wasn’t until this point that she even realized that she had parked her car across a road, blocking traffic. She had thought that the other motorists were just being rude, honking their horns because she had pulled into the last good parking space.

****

Has any one out there in the blogosphere ever seen the movie ‘Stir Crazy’ with Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor? I happened to catch it on the TV the other night. I had forgotten how funny that movie was. It also reminded me of one of Richard Pryor’s stand-up routines where he talked about making the movie.

The movie was shot on location at the Arizona State Penitentiary. Richard had plenty of opportunity to talk to quite a few of the inmates while shooting the movie because quite a few of them were used as extras. The only thing he could about the experience was “Thank God they’ve got penitentiaries! I asked this one brother why he had killed all of the people in this one house he’d robbed. He said ‘Cuz they was home.’ “

****

That’s it. No more ramblings. We now return you to your regularly scheduled blog.

They Want To Have Their Cake And Eat It Too

It seems the Democratic Party has managed to pull off a fast one in New Jersey. After pressuring Senator Robert Torricelli into withdrawing from the election 36 days before election day, they tried to replace him with former Senator Frank Lautenberg. The fact that New Jersey law forbids changing the ballot within 51 days of an election didn't bother them at all. They went before the New Jersey Supreme Court to get their way, and they succeeded. Hopefully the Republicans will go before the U.S. Supreme Court to have the decision overturned. It is apparent that the Democrats choose to ignore the democratic process that this nation was founded upon. It is the legislature that decides what the rules of the election process will be and not the courts. The courts shouldn't be deciding the outcomes of elections. Only the electorate should be deciding that.

You can bet that if the shoe had been on the other foot and the Republicans had tried such a thing, the Democrats would have been screaming bloody murder. They would have been using every liberal media outlet to decry the circumvention of the New Jersey law by the evil Republicans. It appears that it's OK only if it's the 'benevolent' Democrats that want to get around the law. It's like Florida 2000 all over again. There, they thought nothing of trying to violate Florida election law by demanding recount after recount because the first recounts didn't provide the results they wanted.

I guess the Democratic Party is incapable of playing by the rules unless it is to their advantage to do so. Otherwise anything goes.

Self Absorbed Scribblings

While my brother has been more forthcoming in some aspects of his life, it turns out I have not. While I have no illusions that any aspects of my life could possibly be fascinating to the 5 or 6 regular readers of this blog, it can’t hurt to put a somewhat more human face to the mysterious ‘DCE’.

I am a Yankee, through and through. Born in Connecticut, and schooled in Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania (an anomaly, I know, but my parents insisted that I move with them -- after all, I was only 10 years old), back to Massachusetts, then Connecticut, and finally New Hampshire. Somehow I survived the trials and tribulations of childhood, adolescence, and adulthood to become what I am today – a somewhat surly curmudgeon of the type that only northern New England welcomes and encourages.

I finally made the move to New Hampshire on a permanent basis back in 1980. Except for the occasional business trip or trips to England to see my then fiancée (now my ex-fiancée), I pretty much stay close to home (‘home’ being the entire state of New Hampshire). I still get over to England from time to time. I really like the people, but the driving still scares the hell out of me!

My sisters live in Massachusetts. My parents live in Connecticut, though they are planning to move up here once their place in Connecticut is sold. From my dear brother’s postings, you know he recently escaped from the People’s Republic of Massachusetts and now resides here in the ‘Live Free or Die’ state.

I have been accused of being a raconteur, but I have to admit that many of the stories I tell I stea…uh….borrow from better storytellers than I. That doesn’t change the fact that I can tell ‘em pretty well, including the downeast Maine “Can’t get there from here” kind of stories. I’ve got a million of ‘em.

Some parts of my life I have no desire to remember, let alone relate, but let me just say that my luck has been abysmally poor when it comes to the opposite sex. If I didn’t have bad luck, I’d have no luck at all. It isn’t that I’m an ogre: I bathe daily; I’ve got a great personality (which, as everyone knows, is the Kiss of Death when it comes to meeting a friend of a friend); a somewhat twisted and perverse sense of humor (or humour, as they say in Jolly Olde); good manners (my parents would not allow me any other kind); and my visage is not unpleasant to look upon (at least when I walk down the street, mothers don’t pull their children closer to them and say “My god, what is that thing?!”). I admit to the occasional short-term membership in the He-Man Women Hater’s Club, but I like women too much to stay mad at them for more than a week or two. One thing I will share with you -- The worst experience I ever had (that I am willing to mention) was watching the woman I loved more than anyone in the world marry someone she didn’t love. Talk about ripping your heart out.

My girlfriend is moving out of state, as her job demands it. Not that she minds leaving New Hampshire (she really hates it here), but she’s a Southern gal and she wants to head back down to the Carolinas where she feels she fits in better. She knows I won’t fit in down there (I’m too much of a Yankee), so she didn’t even bother asking because she knew what my answer would be.

I don’t know what it is about me, but I always seem to hook up with women that are workaholics and live too damn far away. Too many of them feel they’re slacking if they aren’t putting in at least 70 hours a week at work. What is up with that? When I do meet them, I meet them here, but they’re always from someplace else! I’m beginning to wonder what I need to do to find a local woman willing to put up with me.

My parents despair of me ever settling down again. It’s not like I’m not trying.

By profession, I am an electrical engineer. I work for a small fiber optics test equipment manufacturer located in the beautiful Lakes Region of New Hampshire. I also put in 20 years in the defense industry, plying my trade at Raytheon, working on many different defense systems. Some including phased array radar like PAVE PAWS, missile systems such as Sparrow, Sidewinder, AMRAAM (the ‘Slammer’), Patriot, Hawk, and other projects I could tell you about, but then I’d have to kill you.

By avocation, I am a writer. I write a lot. Too much of it is for work as it appears that I am the best writer they’ve got, hence I get to do much of the scut work such as writing up evaluations of equipment or new electronic devices, rewriting technical papers for one or two of the Ph.D.’s at work (their native language isn’t English, and their second language is Bad English), some technical writing (Engineering Design and Test Specifications….one of my favorites *yawn*). But I love writing for myself, either for the blog, or for my books. I’ve written two books so far and am working on a third. There are also quite a few short stories out there written under my nom du wordprocessor. My worst writing is for the blog. My best is for the books. Writing for work is somewhere in between.

None of my computers is store-bought. With one exception, every computer I’ve owned I’ve built myself. The exception was a machine that is still being used in an extreme environment, built by a friend of mine. Mostly, I use Windows 2000 at work and home, but I also have a Linux machine and an older Pentium machine running Windows NT and OS/2 Warp 4, a vastly underrated operating system. (It’s my opinion that if IBM had pushed OS/2 Warp, we’d be saying “Windows what?” these days. It was far superior to Windblows 95, 98, and maybe ME, but Microsoft did the marketing and IBM didn’t. Too bad.)

In an earlier post, I mentioned that I live on the shores of Lake Winnipesaukee. It’s not that I’ve got loads of cash, but I was fortunate enough a find a place that was very inexpensive in comparison to all of the other residences on the lake. The house is a Victorian with a wonderful wraparound porch. Unfortunately the house is slowly lapsing into genteel decay, but the owners don’t seem to care. What a shame. The view is nothing to brag about as the house overlooks the southern end of one of the bays, which happens to be the home to not one, not two, but three marinas. I get to see lots of very expensive boats heading out in the morning or coming back in afternoon or evening. There are boat slips along the edge of my back yard. I wish I could say that one of the boats docked there belongs to me, but I can’t. That doesn’t stop me from getting out on the lake throughout the summer, but I end up renting a boat for the day. In the long run it’s a lot cheaper than owning. As the old saying goes, a boat is a hole in the water that you keep pouring money in to. I prefer to rent the hole, not own it.

Well, I figure that’s enough about me for now. There’s no need to bore the 5 or 6 of you out there with any more details for the moment.

War, The Price of Figs, and Other Issues….

There’s a good guest post over on Winds of Change by Sage McLaughlin. It’s a thoughtful piece, bringing up issues that not too many have thought about (including yours truly).

One thing that stopped me from reading further as I pondered its import was this paragraph in Sage’s post:

”What I'm getting at, in essence, is that I am yet to be convinced of the case for altering President Bush's immediate strategy. Specifically, I have not seen a single thoroughly well-considered reason to put the brakes on an obviously impending military conflict with Saddam Hussein. This concerns me. War of the preemptive type endorsed by most conservatives is not usually a self-evident course of action, and the fact that it seems so at this juncture has given me pause. Armed conflict ought not be favored in the manner of a prejudice, having never been sufficiently considered in lieu of a realistic alternative.”

Though I may not entirely agree with Sage’s thought, it certainly has caused me to consider the reasoning behind it. A realistic alternative? Is there one besides armed conflict with Iraq? Is there something else that we haven’t thought of that has a chance of attaining the goal of an Iraq free of weapons of mass murder? Is there something we’ve overlooked? I don’t know of any, but then I’m not as smart as I wish I was, nor as smart as a lot of people seem to think I am.

Give Sage’s post a look. Maybe you’ll think of something.

Why We Hate Them

Anne Coulter has an interesting view about why we hate them.

No, not the Islamofascist pinheads.

The Democrats.

It appears that some of the more out-of-touch Democrats believe that the Islamofascist pinheads that hate us and want to kill us should be mollified, otherwise they might get mad and try to kill us. They can’t seem to grasp the idea that the Islamofascists don’t give a rat’s ass about being mollified by anything other than the destruction of America and its culture, its way of life. No amount of hand wringing, finger pointing, or braying to the skies will change the Islamofascist pinheads aim of trying to kill us.

The only thing that the Democrats' actions prove is that they’ve lost touch with the public and in their arrogance are trying to impose their views of the way things should be. They are ignoring the American public at their own risk, alienating the very people they’ll need in November.

It’s no wonder why we are disgusted with them.

The Realities Of Nuclear Power

As promised in my earlier post, I will delve into the politics (i.e. realities) of nuclear power in the U.S. and the forces that may make it difficult to revive the nuclear power industry.

Despite many of the uninformed or false claims made by those opposed to nuclear power, it may be one of the best hopes that we have to ensure a stable and reliable supply of energy for the foreseeable future. It has the advantages of being non-polluting, generating no greenhouse gasses, except of course for those created by the machinery used to mine, refine, and transport the nuclear fuel. New technology and better designs make the idea of expanding nuclear power attractive to many, but not to all.

A very vocal minority has twisted the facts, exaggerated the risks, and downplayed the benefits. They have played upon the people’s fears, knowing that many of them have little understanding of nuclear technology. All the people know is that nuclear power is a Bad Thing. They may not know why, but someone told them it was bad. These are the same people that think nothing of living downwind from a coal-fired power plant, even though the effluvia from that plant is affecting their health every single day.

Let’s take a look at the various arguments that have been used to stifle the further use of nuclear power.

It’s too dangerous. A meltdown like Chernobyl or Three Mile Island could kill millions.

This is the most often used reason cited as an argument against nuclear power. The two worst nuclear accidents known (There were others during the early years of nuclear energy research in the Soviet Union that were hushed up) did not kill millions of people. Though the potential for many times the deaths that actually occurred at Chernobyl was there, they didn’t happen. Nobody died and nobody was injured at Three Mile Island.

Chernobyl is the perfect example of how not to build a nuclear reactor and how not to staff it. Whether it was Soviet arrogance, cost containment, or outright incompetence, the RBMK type reactor at Chernobyl was an inherently unstable design, had inadequate safety systems, a flammable moderator (graphite), and no containment vessel. It was a disaster waiting to happen. The staff ignored safety procedures, disabled the emergency cooling systems, and shut down the primary cooling in the core. It seems they did everything they could to cause the fire in the core that led to the meltdown and release of radionucleides.

Three Mile Island showed that U.S. designs did what they were supposed to do, in spite of the errors made by the humans in the control room. There was little radiological release, and what there was was low-level gas vented from the containment. Less than a mile away it wasn’t even detectable. The system worked.

Systems in the remaining nuclear plants in the U.S. have been upgraded, making the possibility of a repeat of the accident at Three Mile Island extremely small. Newer technology has been added, making for more positive control and for better backup systems. Older second-generation plants have been decommissioned rather than upgraded.


Then there’s all of that nuclear waste. We have no way to deal with it, therefore we shouldn’t create any more of it.

The matter of nuclear waste and how to deal with it is purely a political issue, not a technical one. The best way to get the most bang for the buck when it comes to nuclear fuel is to reprocess it, making even more fuel available. Instead, we hold it in pools at power plants, or bury it.

Though many think that burying it is a poor idea, there are ways to do it safely. The technology exists to glassify the waste, rendering it solid and insoluble. Though the glassified waste won’t remain that way forever, it will stay that way long enough for the radioactive elements to decay to less harmful elements. Of course, if the fuel were reprocessed, most of the waste to be disposed of would be relatively short-lived radioactive isotopes. Most would decay away in a single human lifetime rather than 25,000 years (the half-life of plutonium).

Terrorists could steal the nuclear fuel or nuclear waste and use it to make atomic bombs.

First, the nuclear material of the type used in power plants is not the same as is used to make nuclear warheads. The nuclear fuel for power reactors is uranium oxide. Warheads use either highly enriched uranium or plutonium. Second, the spent nuclear fuel does have plutonium in it, but it is still mixed in with the uranium oxide making up the fuel assemblies. It takes a lot of equipment to separate out the plutonium from the uranium. Third, unless the terrorists direct have access to the power plants and a lot of time while they are there they will be unable to obtain any fissile material from the U.S.. Hijacking a fuel shipment is damn near impossible.

Before you ask why, have you seen how fuel assemblies are moved to and from nuclear power plants? The fuel assemblies are inside large steel and lead casks about the size of a one-car garage. The casks are moved about on a low boy trailer at low speed (probably not over 25 or 30 mph on a straight and level road). The fuel assemblies and cask weigh between 25 and 40 tons, not something easy to steal or hide. If the fuel is being moved by rail, then the cask and assemblies weigh up to 125 tons. It’s not like a terrorist group can hold up the convoy, unload the fuel assemblies into the back of a panel truck, and then drive off. Stealing the tractor-trailer itself might buy them some time, but it isn’t something that they will be able to speed away in, is it?


Nuclear plants are too damn expensive and they never pay for themselves.

I’ve heard this one again and again. It wasn’t until the 1980’s that construction costs for nuclear plants soared out of control. The question is, why? There were a number of factors.

One of the more obvious, though less of a factor in the cost spiral, was simply, politics.
Anti-nuclear groups fought the planning, construction, licensing, and running of nuclear power plants. Court orders, ex post facto government hearings, demonstrations, attempted occupations of construction sites, and other delaying tactics caused the owners and constructors of the plants considerable sums of money to counter. State governments and politicians also got into the act.

In one instance, the New Hampshire gubernatorial race was won by a man promising to lower the electric rates in his state by outlawing what was called CWIP (pronounced “quip”) charges, or Construction Works In Progress charges. CWIP was a way for the local electric utilities to finance the construction of new generation facilities. A small additional fee was added to the monthly electric bill and the monies collected used for construction projects. In this case the man, Hugh Gallen, became the governor and followed through on his campaign promise: he pushed through legislation that abolished CWIP charges. That meant that the utility now had to borrow far more money than it had originally planned at a time when interest rates were above 16%. The electricity rates did go down for a little while. But by the time the project was completed, New Hampshire ended up with some of the highest electric rates in the lower 48 states (17 cents per kWh!).

Another factor that added to the cost of building nuclear plants was the construction method. Each plant in the U.S. was built on site, one beam, one bolt, and one weld at a time. Each plant built in the U.S. was a custom design, with no two plants alike. With few exceptions, prefabricated modular construction of a standardized design was not used. If automobiles were built that way, very few people could afford them and they would be difficult to repair because each replacement part would be hand crafted. Some of what drove the ‘custom built’ approach was scale. Modular construction lends itself to smaller plants, under 900 megawatts in capacity. Many of the plants built after the 50’s and 60’s were 1000 megawatts or larger. This is a case where economy of scale doesn’t apply. Using modular construction of standardized design, two plants could be built for the cost of one ‘mega’-plant, with the total capacity of the two smaller plants being greater than the single large plant. Construction time is also far less, and as any economist knows, time is money.

A third factor was what I call ‘redos’. This is what happens when a plant under construction has to redo a portion of the plant already completed or near completion because the U.S. government decides that this new widget or that new gadget must be installed, or something must be moved over 3/16” to the left. The construction firm must redo the work, adding to the costs and pushing out the time of completion. It’s one thing if the design change was critical to the safe operation of the plant, but in too many cases it was a matter of “Because we told you to do it!”

Not exactly the way to run any business, is it?

Many of the third (present) generation plants have exceptional operational records. Other than shutdowns for routine maintenance and refueling (about once every 18 months to two years) the plants run 24/7 at up to 100% power. Oil, coal, and natural gas fueled plants have nowhere near that kind of operational record. Greenhouse gas emissions from the nuclear plant power generation is zero. The only other type of large scale power plant having that kind of record is hydro, and we’ve built hydro just about everywhere it is feasible to do so. The cost of operation for nuclear plants is less than that for fossil-fueled plants. In fuel costs alone, nuclear is cheaper than fossil by a factor of three (0.52 cents per kilowatt-hour for nuclear versus 1.56 cents per kilowatt-hour for fossil). Overall operating costs (operations, maintenance, and fuel) for nuclear power plants in the U.S. were 2.13 cents per kWh in 1998, with a downward trend since 1988. That trend is expected to continue.


But nuclear power is bad for children and other living things!

This is the emotional factor, not backed up by any data or anything resembling the truth. Nuclear power makes people nervous because they’ve been told it’s bad, that it will rot their bones, make everyone sterile, cause them to go bald, cause impotence, give them bad breath, erase their computer’s hard drive, cause their daughter to pierce her navel, and make disco come back. They consider any risk of nuclear power too risky, no matter how low the probability of a problem.

It’s a matter of perception, of perspective, and not reality. No amount of data will convince them that at any minute the nuclear plant near their home isn’t going to explode and spew invisible death. These are the same people that think nothing of getting in to their car and driving, even though the risk of them getting injured or killed in an accident is many millions of times greater than being injured or killed by a meltdown. The Big Mac they eat at lunch is a far greater risk to them than a nuclear power plant. But that doesn’t stop them from driving their gas guzzling SUV or eating at McDonald’s.

The future of nuclear power is up in the air. New power plants will be less expensive because the technology has gotten better, cheaper, and does more. New reactor designs are less expensive to build and even safer than the third-generation reactors. Some fourth-generation designs are meltdown proof. Some of these new technologies include:

- Gas cooled fast reactors
- Lead alloy liquid metal-cooled reactor systems
- Molten salt reactor systems
- Sodium liquid metal-cooled reactor systems
- Supercritical water-cooled reactor systems
- Pebble bed very high temperature gas-cooled reactor systems

It is not a question of if new nuclear plants will be built, but a question of when. Despite what many of the anti-nuclear groups say, the only viable high-density power sources that can power our modern era are nuclear. Too many of the alternative technologies have deficiencies, as Stephen Den Beste has pointed out.

Fuel Cells

In this post I mentioned fuel cell technology. The October 2002 issue of Scientific American has a good article about the transition from internal combustion engines to fuel cells for autos. The article looks at the practical applications, advantages, and problems associated with switching from petroleum based to hydrogen based personal transport.

Energy Technologies

Stephen Den Beste brought up one of my favorite subjects in a couple of his posts today. Both this one and this one take a rather dispassionate look at the pros and cons of a number of energy technologies.

I’ve seen the arguments and read the diatribes and outrageous claims of energy efficiencies, costs, and “perpetual motion” schemes ad nauseum in the sci.energy Usenet group. Many of the points that Stephen brings up for and against various technologies or energy policies are the same I’ve read, commented upon, or written myself over the years. One of the more lucid and knowledgeable contributors to sci.energy is Dr. Gregory M. Greenman, Ph.D., a nuclear physicist at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Many times he made concepts difficult for the layman to understand understandable. He is a proponent for nuclear power, as am I.

While Stephen has made it clear that he believes that nuclear power is a dead issue in the U.S. due to the political realities and economies, I have to disagree with him (thought not entirely).

On the economic side, the biggest problem with the costs of constructing nuclear plants in the U.S. has been that, with very few exceptions, every nuclear power plant built here has been custom built. No two plants are the same, even those built at the same time at the same site. It’s damn expensive to do it that way. Instead, the U.S. nuclear power industry should take a lesson from France.

The French decided early on that the least expensive way to build a large number of nuclear power plants was to use a standardized design, one that lent itself to modular construction. With this construction model, the cost of each individual plant was less because he various pieces of the plant were built off-site, then moved to the plant under construction. Though this limited the size, or generating capacity, of each plant to something under 900 megawatts, it was possible to build two or more power plants at each site for less than building one big plant. One other advantage was that each plant was identical. That made maintenance, upgrades, refueling, and ultimately, decommissioning easier and less expensive. John Q. Nukeplantworker could go from plant to plant and everything would be in the same place as any other plant. It certainly reduces the learning curve.

To be accurate, I must say that one part of the U.S. nuclear power ‘industry’ does use standardized modular designs: the U.S. Navy. There are a small number of reactor designs used over and over again in various surface ships and submarines. They can be installed and removed in one piece. The Navy must be doing something right, as I believe they have the best nuclear safety record in the world. Maybe the commercial nuclear power industry can take some lessons from them.

When it comes to the politics of nuclear power, it is mostly fear and a lack of understanding of nuclear power that causes the greatest grief. I could go in to a lengthy diatribe about the politics of nuclear power, but I think I’ll save that for a follow up post.

One of the other things that the good Mr. Den Beste goes into is alternative energy sources. For the most part I have to agree with most of his assessments, particularly when it comes to wind and solar power. It’s great for small-scale deployment, such as to power and heat a residence or small business, but it doesn’t scale up very well and is not a demand type of power generation. Both require some kind of storage capacity in order to be truly useful, regardless of the scale of the installation. Small-scale storage (batteries and thermal mass) is pretty easy to do and is relatively inexpensive.

When it comes to fusion, I wholeheartedly agree with Stephen: Call me when it’s working. I’ve been hearing “We’ll have useful fusion power in twenty years!” for almost 30 years now. And it still ain’t here.

One area that Stephen didn’t touch upon is fuel cells. Though they have existed for well over 100 years, it wasn’t until the late 50’s and early 60’s that they came into use. The U.S. space program first used fuel cells in the manned space program during project Gemini. But they were very expensive and could only be fueled by hydrogen. Today, the cost of fuel cells has dropped and is still dropping. Already there are a number of companies, such as GE, Plug Power, and others, offering residential and small commercial fuel cells with a generating capacity of 7 kilowatts or greater, more than enough for the average home or small business. As the costs continue to drop, they might become less expensive to use than the existing power grid. LPG or natural gas fuels most of these small fuel cells, though gasoline, diesel, or kerosene can also be used. Though the cell itself still uses hydrogen for the reaction, reformers break down the gaseous or liquid fuels, which releases the hydrogen in the hydrocarbon chains. There are also fuel cells capable of running directly off of methanol, though those are mostly the micro fuel cells, designed to be used in cell phones, PDAs, and laptops. It is hoped that these cells will scale up adequately, making them useful for automotive applications. Being far more efficient and less polluting than internal combustion engines, they are probably the future power source for automobiles. If one of the liquid fuels like methanol or gasoline is used, then the existing fuel distribution system can used. If some form of gaseous hydrogen storage is used, then a new distribution system will have to be created to handle the transport of the hydrogen gas.

The Big Three automakers have all been working on fuel cell vehicles. Ballard Power Systems has been a leader in automotive fuel cell technology and has been working with the automakers for some time to develop the technology.

Though I am something of a gear head, and a former race driver, I will be more than happy to see the internal combustion engine go the way of the Edsel. My feelings wouldn’t be hurt if most of the power lines running through residential areas were to disappear as well (as long as the power stays).

Iraq’s Capability

A column by Deroy Murdock at NRO clearly outlines the dangers of waiting for the smoking gun when it comes to Iraq’s weapon capabilities, in particular “Weapons of Mass Murder”. As National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice so aptly put it, “We don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud.”

Deroy outlines what we might expect to see in the way of casualties if biological, chemical, or nuclear weapons are used against the West. One of those who Deroy contacted to estimate the death toll from such attacks is Dexter Ingram, a threat-assessment analyst for the Heritage Foundation located in Washington, DC. Using the Consequence Assessment Tool Set, or CATS, to forecast the effects of weapons of mass murder, his findings are chilling.

Take a look. I think you’ll find it interesting.

Peace At All Costs?

Like quite a few of you out there, I listened to British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s report to the House of Commons on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction. It certain seems the UK is convinced that Saddam Hussein has them, has continued producing them, and wants even more destructive weapons.

Yet despite this, it seems some few deluded souls still believe that Saddam is not threat to anyone, that going to war to eliminate a threat to our survival is a Very Bad Thing, that we are above such things. I had the misfortune to spend some time earlier today with one such individual.

It was during one of the regular drills run by the state Office of Emergency Management that I was discussing Saddam, Iraq, Al-Qaida, etc. with one of the other staffers that this individual overheard the discussion and felt he had to add his two cents worth.

“What is it about you people that you want to go to war? There’s nothing great about war. It’s horrible. There’s got to be a better way to deal with this.”

“Oh, such as?”

“Well, the Iraqis said they’d let the weapons inspectors come back. That ought to prove to everyone that they don’t have chemical or biological weapons,” said the clueless one.

“Hmm. I could have sworn they said they’d allow unconditional inspections of military installations. No where else.”

“But isn’t that where they’d hide those kind of weapons?”

“I wouldn’t. I’d hide them anywhere but military bases or installations.”

“That’s you. But you’re not them,” announced the clueless one.

“You’re right. I’m not ‘them’. Be thankful that I’m not ‘them’. In Iraq, someone like you would either be a useful mouthpiece to parrot what ‘we’ want said, or you’d be in a prison or an unmarked grave.”

From that point on the discussion got ugly. No matter what, this clueless twit thought that war was bad, no matter what. I brought up World War II, and this twit actually said, “We could have found another way to deal with the Japanese and Nazis.”

At that point I realized that the clueless twit was a lost cause. I did tell him that there are times when war is the lesser of two evils, that peace at any costs can have too high a price. He wasn’t convinced, though I did get him to pause for a moment when I asked him this:

“So, you’d be willing to allow your daughter to become the plaything of a dictator, a government whore, or worse, be put to death because she disagrees with the government rather than fight a war that would liberate her and everyone else? You’d be willing to bow down before a foreign ruler, live in a theocratic police state, be imprisoned or killed at the whim of a government bureaucrat than fight for your freedom?”

He pondered what I’d asked him for a moment, looked a little confused, and then answered:

“But I don’t have any children!”

I hope to God that he never does. The stupid should never be allowed to breed.

A Slumbering Giant

Reading Dale Amon’s post over at Samizdata got me thinking about America’s response to the attacks on September 11th. He makes a number of good points about what we’ve already done, in this case against the Taliban and Al Qaida, and what we might do if ever weapons of mass destruction were used within the United States. However, I think he may have understated what America's response would be to a nuclear, biological, or chemical attack on U.S. territory. All one has to do is look back to December 7, 1941 to get an idea of what that response might be.

Once Admiral Yamamoto knew that all of the designated targets had not been destroyed (the aircraft carriers weren’t there) and then informed that the formal declaration of war had not been delivered until after the attack on Pearl Harbor, he realized Japan was doomed. He knew nothing would rile the American people more than that act of perfidy. He knew what the United States was capable of, knew well American industrial might, and the American the will to fight. He had a better understanding of American culture and beliefs than almost anyone else in the upper echelons of the Japanese military. That realization left him with one dread thought:

” I fear all we have done is to awaken a slumbering giant and fill him with a terrible resolve.”

Japan had already lost the war by December 8th. All that was left for us to do was fight it out and prove it to them. With grit, determination, courage, smarts, anger, and a whole lot of luck, the U.S. finished Japan as a military power in less than 4 years. What had been one of the mightiest military forces on the planet was reduced to nothing.

It’s something the Islamofascist pinheads (IFPs) got a little taste of in Afghanistan. I doubt very much that they ever expected that kind of response, considering our lack of response after the embassy bombings and the rather lame response after the attack on the USS Cole. After the attacks on September 11th, they probably figured that we’d run away and hide. Instead, they pissed us off and we came gunning for them.

And the thing of it is that we actually had very little in the way of military forces in Afghanistan.

What would happen if the IFPs did try something bigger? What if hundreds of thousands or millions of Americans were left dead or wounded in a large-scale terrorist attack using WMDs, what would we do?

There are a couple of scenarios I can think of, neither of which is attractive.

In either case, I doubt that much the Middle East as we presently know it would exist after we were through. What we did in Afghanistan or in Iraq during the Gulf War would be nothing compared the onslaught we would unleash. The kid gloves would come off, and a whole lot of really pissed off Americans would be out for blood.

Scenario One: A massive build up of forces of the type not seen since the Cold War. Then entering and taking Iraq. Any resistance would be met with maximum force. Once secured, we would then turn our attentions on Saudi Arabia, routing out the Wahabbi wherever they are. If the House of Saud gets in the way, they too will go the way of Saddam. Then Somalia, another safe haven for Al Qaida and the Wahabbi. It won’t be anything like the Somalis experienced the first time we were there. It will be all out war. They will experience first hand what the Iraqi army experienced during the first Gulf War. From there it will be a matter of routing out the IFPs wherever they may be hiding: Yemen, Qatar, Egypt, Libya, Syria, Sudan, Lebanon, Iran, Pakistan, or wherever. It will end when the IFPs are dead or imprisoned.

Scenario Two: A smaller build up of forces, leaning heavily towards engineering and decontamination brigades. Before that, a launch of tactical nuclear weapons, taking out every stronghold or hidey-hole for the IFPs that we can identify. If they’re hiding in cities in nations friendly to their goals, we take those cities out, but not until we give the respective governments an ultimatum:

Hand them over, or die like the rest. There will be no negotiation.

It would be very much like what the Roman Legions did to rebellious provinces after uprisings. The Legions salted the earth, burned crops, poisoned wells, and slaughtered livestock, leaving the area devastated and incapable of supporting life. Much of the Middle East would be like that – a wasteland where nothing alive remained. The land might have a slightly glassy and burned texture. There might even be the slight glow of Cherenkov radiation visible at night. There would be peace in the Middle East, but only the peace of death.

It would be the only version of ‘Paradise’ the extremist Islamic fundamentalists would experience.

Harsh? You bet. But if these loonies ever use weapons of mass destruction, any response other than ‘surrender or die’ would be suicidal for the U.S. and for the West. At that point we would know there is no appeasing them until we are all dead or under some kind of harsh, twisted Islamic theocracy. If comes to a choice of them dying, or us, I choose them.

To quote General George S. Patton, “No bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. You win a war by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his.”

Nice Guys vs. Jerks

Normally we don't post about such mundane things as relations between men and women (unless of course we're talking about Feminazis), but Dawn Olsen has a pretty decent analysis about why women date jerks, but blow off the 'nice guys'. I'd say she's pretty much nailed it.

Iraq Giving In? Not Likely

At first it appeared that Iraq was giving in to the UN. But once the text of the letter given to Secretary General Kofi Annan was made public, it became evident that it was business as usual for Iraq. Rather than repeat what has been better said, read this by Stephen Den Beste. You might also want to check this out, courtesy of Maarten at Live From Brussels.