The 2nd amendment, or Can Lawyers Read?

"A well regulated militia being necessary to the security a free state" proceeds the "Right to keep and bear arms" clause of the second amendment. Various lawyers have argued this qualifying clause reduces the second amendment to merely the right to join the National Guard. That idea merely displays ignorance on the part of lawyers. Militia was always a bring your own gun thing. Militiamen (all able bodied men of the community) were required to take the musket down from over the mantle piece when the militia mustered. The town, county, or state did not issue arms, members had to furnish their own. In fact there were laws requiring all citizens to possess serviceable firearms in case Indians, pirates, redcoats, rebellion, oppression, or riots caused the militia to be mustered.
The second amendment should be read as "In order to have a militia, the citizens must be allowed to keep and bear arms, because mustering the militia without arms is pointless."

Life imitates science fiction

Years ago Mack Reynolds wrote science fiction about a war between massive dictatorial Betaland and small outnumbered and democratic Alphaland. To compensate for their numerical inferiority, a squad of daring Alphaland commandos attacked the Betaland national databank center and erased the entire Betaland database. The ensuing chaos was the downfall of Betaland.
Now a days it doesn't require highly trained commandos, apparently plain old burglars can do the same thing. Thieves broke into country offices in Tennessee and swiped laptops containing the country voter list, names, addresses and social security numbers.

Is the Wall St Journal getting smaller for 2008?

Now that Rupert owns the paper, is he going to shrink it to save money on paper? They reduced the height and width of the paper last summer by a couple of inches. Up til last week the A-section was around 20 pages long. Last few days the A section is down to 12-14 pages. And next year?

Shoot 'n Scoot Lenders, WSJ

On Wednesday's Wall St Journal op ed page, John W. Snow, former treasury secretary wrote:
"Fifth, banks should be required to stay on the hook after making an asset backed loan . While the securitization has clearly been an important cost saving financial innovation, an important source of discipline is lost when a loan originator simply sells off a loan to an unwitting investor without any continuing stake.
" Requiring banks to hold onto some portion of these loans would be a good safeguard against improvident lending practices. It would also help avoid the duplicitous behavior of publicly marketing an asset based security while privately betting it will fall in value. "

With these words Mr. Snow becomes the first, and perhaps only person to write about the real cause of the "subprime" crisis. Banks and mortgage operators hve been writing super bad junk mortgages left and right and then selling them off to more gullible investors. The mortgage originators don't care if the mortgage defaults and forecloses, just sell it fast before it goes belly up. Hence the teaser rate mortgages that will only last as long as the teaser rate lasts.

Earmarks

Aviation Week reports that the 3400 page omnibus appropriations bill has enough earmarks to choke a pig.

Troublesome Young Men by Lynne Olson

An account of how the British dumped Neville Chamberlain and called upon Winston Churchill to fight WWII. A crucial turning point in history. Chamberlain represented a sizable group in the British establishment who were as anti war as the America Firster's over here. These people were sympathetic to the Nazis, closet anti-semitics, and upholders of class privileges. Their war policy was that of a turtle, keep your head down, wait for it to blow over. Had this happened, history would be all different.
Hitler came very close to winning WWII. Had Britain withdrawn from the war in 1940, it would have freed up a lot of German military power which would have been added to the assault on Russia in June 1941. That offensive reached the outskirts of Moscow. Just a tiny bit more fighting power and Guderian's panzers would have taken the Soviet capital. It is unlikely that the Soviets would have survived that blow, leaving Hitler master of Europe all the way to the Urals. Following the Pearl Harbor attack, the Americans would have turned all their force upon Japan. Why intervene in Europe when the British had given up?
After smashing Japan, the United States would have then used nuclear weapons to deal with any back talk from the 3rd Reich.

Chevy Volt

Long story about Volt development. Has lots of interesting things but says nothing about the battery. Chevy is hoping for "triple digit" fuel mileage. Battery mileage is more of interest. Car batteries here and now last 4 winters and then need replacement for 50 bucks. Lithium ion laptop battery life is not well established, but they cost 50 bucks to replace. If a laptop lithium battery costs that much, how much does a car sized lithium battery cost? And how long will it last?
And what about the fire hazard? There is some neat video floating around of a lithium battery laptop bursting into flames on a conference room table. What's that chances of a Chevy Volt doing the same? Especially after hitting a pothole at speed?
Electric cars aren't difficult to make, it's just they are low performance. Golf cart is about the best anyone has managed so far. Better batteries are needed to exceed the golf cart level of performance. Without better batteries, for get it.
Question, are the better lithium batteries going to be available?