Friday, November 20, 2015
Let's change the name to confuse the ignorant
We used to call 'em ISIS or ISIL. Now Obama and the newsies are calling them Daesh. Wonder why that happened? Has ISIS been so successful that they want to stop talking about 'em? So change the name and who is the wiser. Good work Obama.
Where do I stand on Republican Presidential Candidates?
Well, actually I am still standing on the fence. I have some problems with some of them, others are still pretty much a blank slate.
1. The Donald. Fun to watch on TV, a great showman putting on a good show. But he is a bull in a China shop and his mouth runs faster than his brain. He has already offended a lot of people, and I figure if elected he would alienate everyone in the US in about two days, and everyone overseas in another few days. How can a US president get anything done when everyone in the world is scheming how to get even with him? The president's bully pulpit is one of the strongest things a US president has going for him. It doesn't work so well when everyone is all mad at him. Plus, early (not too reliable) polls show him loosing to Hillary.
2. Rand Paul. He is an isolationist. He plans to pull back to North America and let the rest of the world go to hell in a handbasket. This didn't work last time, in the 1930's the isolationists prevented us from dealing with Hitler while he was small enough to slap down. That caused WWII. Once is enough.
2. Ben Carson. Helova nice guy. I'd go with him except he is so soft spoken I have trouble seeing a President Carson telling a Bashar Assad where to get off, let alone a real tough nut like Putin. And he occasionally says things that make him look ignorant or naive.
4. Ted Cruz. Good talker. Made a good impression at the Grafton County Lincoln Reagan dinner up here this spring. Kimberly Strassel at the Wall St Journal thinks he is a opportunistic flip flopper. She claims he is trying to woo Rand Paul isolationist voters by talking up isolationism. She calls him a grandstander, who worked for a government shutdown over Obamacare, tried for a filibuster in defense of gun rights, and holding the Senate in session to protest Obama's immigration orders. He has voted against defense authorization bills and voted to shut down NSA metadata collection. Kimberley follows this stuff more closely than I do.
5. Marco Rubio. Not bad. Good talker. Kinda young, but that might be OK
6. JEB Bush. I'm not ready for a third President Bush no matter how meritorious JEB may be. Seemed kinda lackadaisical on the campaign trail up here.
7. Carly Fiorina. Made a fine impression speaking at the Littleton VFW in Sept. She is smart, well informed, dresses appropriately (especially important for women), and knows her audience. She was saying want the voters wanted to hear in Littleton. Impressive resume, running Hewlett Packard puts her in the big leagues.
8. All the rest of 'em. Who knows?
1. The Donald. Fun to watch on TV, a great showman putting on a good show. But he is a bull in a China shop and his mouth runs faster than his brain. He has already offended a lot of people, and I figure if elected he would alienate everyone in the US in about two days, and everyone overseas in another few days. How can a US president get anything done when everyone in the world is scheming how to get even with him? The president's bully pulpit is one of the strongest things a US president has going for him. It doesn't work so well when everyone is all mad at him. Plus, early (not too reliable) polls show him loosing to Hillary.
2. Rand Paul. He is an isolationist. He plans to pull back to North America and let the rest of the world go to hell in a handbasket. This didn't work last time, in the 1930's the isolationists prevented us from dealing with Hitler while he was small enough to slap down. That caused WWII. Once is enough.
2. Ben Carson. Helova nice guy. I'd go with him except he is so soft spoken I have trouble seeing a President Carson telling a Bashar Assad where to get off, let alone a real tough nut like Putin. And he occasionally says things that make him look ignorant or naive.
4. Ted Cruz. Good talker. Made a good impression at the Grafton County Lincoln Reagan dinner up here this spring. Kimberly Strassel at the Wall St Journal thinks he is a opportunistic flip flopper. She claims he is trying to woo Rand Paul isolationist voters by talking up isolationism. She calls him a grandstander, who worked for a government shutdown over Obamacare, tried for a filibuster in defense of gun rights, and holding the Senate in session to protest Obama's immigration orders. He has voted against defense authorization bills and voted to shut down NSA metadata collection. Kimberley follows this stuff more closely than I do.
5. Marco Rubio. Not bad. Good talker. Kinda young, but that might be OK
6. JEB Bush. I'm not ready for a third President Bush no matter how meritorious JEB may be. Seemed kinda lackadaisical on the campaign trail up here.
7. Carly Fiorina. Made a fine impression speaking at the Littleton VFW in Sept. She is smart, well informed, dresses appropriately (especially important for women), and knows her audience. She was saying want the voters wanted to hear in Littleton. Impressive resume, running Hewlett Packard puts her in the big leagues.
8. All the rest of 'em. Who knows?
Thursday, November 19, 2015
Can you read my code?
True Allele is a computer program that separates mixed up DNA samples. For example a blood sample from a crime scene where both the victim and a suspect were cut and bled in a struggle. Now we have defense attorneys, a disreputable bunch, claiming that True Allele is falsely pointing the finger at their clients.
To fix this, the attorneys want to look at the source code of the program. The program's developer, Mark Perlin, says "No way. It's a trade secret".
This is a baloney argument on the attorney's part. My day job for 40 years was looking at other guy's computer code and fixing the bugs in it. It's tough. And there is no way an outsider can look at the C source code and know anything. Computer code is opaque to the point of unreadable, and there is no way any number of lawyers and their hired computer scientists can tell anything by reading the code of the program.
Mark Perlin has brought the program's test suite, and the test results into court, and he, correctly, says that tests and test results are the only way to know that the program works as advertised.
Far as I am concerned, the attorneys want to look at the code as a way to delay justice being done on their clients.
To fix this, the attorneys want to look at the source code of the program. The program's developer, Mark Perlin, says "No way. It's a trade secret".
This is a baloney argument on the attorney's part. My day job for 40 years was looking at other guy's computer code and fixing the bugs in it. It's tough. And there is no way an outsider can look at the C source code and know anything. Computer code is opaque to the point of unreadable, and there is no way any number of lawyers and their hired computer scientists can tell anything by reading the code of the program.
Mark Perlin has brought the program's test suite, and the test results into court, and he, correctly, says that tests and test results are the only way to know that the program works as advertised.
Far as I am concerned, the attorneys want to look at the code as a way to delay justice being done on their clients.
John Kerry is a total disgrace. Rationale for Charlie Hebdo??
John Kerry let his real thinking slip out the other day. He said the Paris massacre is different from the Charlie Hebdo massacre because there was a "rationale" for the Charlie Hebdo murders.
He is saying that people who publish stuff that ISIS doesn't like are fair game for ISIS. And this turkey is an American secretary of state. And we have a president who appointed him and who has not fired him for the "rationale" remark. Kiss freedom of speech goodbye.
He is saying that people who publish stuff that ISIS doesn't like are fair game for ISIS. And this turkey is an American secretary of state. And we have a president who appointed him and who has not fired him for the "rationale" remark. Kiss freedom of speech goodbye.
How to stop ISIS
ISIS is a movement, an ideology, trying to become a nation state. It's strength is ideological. ISIS is strong enough to draw young people from Europe and the US to travel to Syria and take up arms with them. It's strong enough to get Western useful idiots to cover for them. It's ideals and motivation are unspeakably vile. Stopping ISIS is not only a military problem. We have to name their ideals, their ideology, and motives as anathema thru out the world.
For openers, people who travel to ISIS lands and take up arms with ISIS are levying war against the United States, adhering to our enemies, and giving them aid and comfort. That's treason, Article III Section 3 US constitution. We should at least lift their US passports, put them on the no-fly list, revoke any security clearances they might have, or hope to obtain, and put their names on a public traitor's list. Or anything else that the law allows.
We need a good comedy movie, making the ISIS people look like uncouth barbarians, and stupid to boot. Not to say ugly and gross. Some TV episodes on the same vein would be good.
We need to get Muslim clerics of some seniority to publicly condemn ISIS. And repeat for each new ISIS atrocity. And we need to apply some heat to our own intellectuals when they make excuses for ISIS.
We need to clear them off the Internet. I've mentioned this before.
We need to cut off their access to banks, credit cards, time payments, traveler's checks, wire transfers. And embargo them. And prevent them from selling oil.
We need to put a no fly zone over any friends or allies in the ISIS lands. Enforced by USAF and Patriot missiles.
We need to have Christian clerics preach the words of Jesus after each ISIS atrocity. Make the points about thou shalt not kill, love thy enemies, and contrast it with ISIS brutality.
We need to close down madrassa's, world wide. Madrassa's don't teach reading, writing, and arithmetic, they teach hatred.
Then we need to do the military things, invade the ISIS lands, depose the ISIS government structures, prosecute and punish ISIS criminals, set up a decent system of elementary education, set up honest and fair courts, set up a humane police force, do land reform so the peasants who work the land have good title to it. Establish a democratic free enterprise capitalist government. We vet the candidates and select for honesty, at least a high school education, a clean record in regards to ISIS activity, drug running, smuggling, and protection racketeering. We write the constitution and we enforce it when necessary. We include strict term limits on all officeholders. We count the votes in elections.
To do the military things we need US forces, and we need local allies. Just having troops from Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, carrying their national flags, will do a lot to quell ISIS resistance. Skip Turkey or Israel, too many hard feelings from past times.
For openers, people who travel to ISIS lands and take up arms with ISIS are levying war against the United States, adhering to our enemies, and giving them aid and comfort. That's treason, Article III Section 3 US constitution. We should at least lift their US passports, put them on the no-fly list, revoke any security clearances they might have, or hope to obtain, and put their names on a public traitor's list. Or anything else that the law allows.
We need a good comedy movie, making the ISIS people look like uncouth barbarians, and stupid to boot. Not to say ugly and gross. Some TV episodes on the same vein would be good.
We need to get Muslim clerics of some seniority to publicly condemn ISIS. And repeat for each new ISIS atrocity. And we need to apply some heat to our own intellectuals when they make excuses for ISIS.
We need to clear them off the Internet. I've mentioned this before.
We need to cut off their access to banks, credit cards, time payments, traveler's checks, wire transfers. And embargo them. And prevent them from selling oil.
We need to put a no fly zone over any friends or allies in the ISIS lands. Enforced by USAF and Patriot missiles.
We need to have Christian clerics preach the words of Jesus after each ISIS atrocity. Make the points about thou shalt not kill, love thy enemies, and contrast it with ISIS brutality.
We need to close down madrassa's, world wide. Madrassa's don't teach reading, writing, and arithmetic, they teach hatred.
Then we need to do the military things, invade the ISIS lands, depose the ISIS government structures, prosecute and punish ISIS criminals, set up a decent system of elementary education, set up honest and fair courts, set up a humane police force, do land reform so the peasants who work the land have good title to it. Establish a democratic free enterprise capitalist government. We vet the candidates and select for honesty, at least a high school education, a clean record in regards to ISIS activity, drug running, smuggling, and protection racketeering. We write the constitution and we enforce it when necessary. We include strict term limits on all officeholders. We count the votes in elections.
To do the military things we need US forces, and we need local allies. Just having troops from Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, carrying their national flags, will do a lot to quell ISIS resistance. Skip Turkey or Israel, too many hard feelings from past times.
Wednesday, November 18, 2015
Reuters doesn't know the difference between mirrors and lenses
Telescopes are getting bigger. Back in the day (1940's), the 200 inch Mt Palomar telescope was the absolute last word. Today, under construction in Chile, is the Giant Magellan Telescope, (GMT) with 327 inch mirrors, seven of them ganged together, yielding a combined aperture of 981 inches. That's really really big.
Funny, the Reuters people, in this article , describe the GMT as using lenses. That's not right. Big telescopes have used mirrors for better than the last 100 years. Reason, chromatic aberration. Mirrors reflect light of all colors the same way. Lenses don't, red light bends differently than blue light, causing color fringes in the image. The extreme case is the rainbow of colors you get when sunlight shines thru a glass prism. Just to double check, I googled up the GMT website, and as I knew, GMT uses mirrors.
Translation, the Reuters people don't know the difference between mirrors and lenses, and are ignorant of the development of telescope art over the centuries. This is fairly typical of newsies, a profound ignorance of everything technical.
Funny, the Reuters people, in this article , describe the GMT as using lenses. That's not right. Big telescopes have used mirrors for better than the last 100 years. Reason, chromatic aberration. Mirrors reflect light of all colors the same way. Lenses don't, red light bends differently than blue light, causing color fringes in the image. The extreme case is the rainbow of colors you get when sunlight shines thru a glass prism. Just to double check, I googled up the GMT website, and as I knew, GMT uses mirrors.
Translation, the Reuters people don't know the difference between mirrors and lenses, and are ignorant of the development of telescope art over the centuries. This is fairly typical of newsies, a profound ignorance of everything technical.
Long Range Strike Bomber (LRS-B)
Aviation week had two opinion pieces (Commentary) on the LRS-B. Neither of them breathed so much as a word about the contract challenge that they emailed to magazine subscriber's last week. The two commentary pieces called the program well managed, the bids reasonable. Nothing about the contract award. They did say that the costing was based upon "Average Procurement Unit Cost" as opposed to "Unit Recurring Flyaway Cost". Av Week says the Average Procurement Unit Cost includes spares, support equipment and other essential stuff, which the Unit Flyaway did not. Spares can cost. Engines make up roughly a quarter of the cost of an aircraft. Back in the day, we had four spare J75 engines on base to support 20 single engine fighters. If LRS-B is spared to the same level, that increases the price of the engine buy by maybe 20% over the life of the program. Spare gyros, spare radars, spare landing gear, all that is expensive. Support equipment, we used to call that "ground power", air compressors, generator sets, hydraulic mules, tractors, bomb lifts, cockpit ladders, air conditioning sets, tow bars, it all adds up.
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