$22 million for a UFO study??

The newsies have been talking this one up.  The Air Force had a UFO project going with a $22 million budget.  This ain't news.  The Air Force has had UFO studies going since 1948 (Project Blue Book).  There was the Condon report in the 1970's.  UFO's were first mentioned in the public press in 1947, so a 1948 Project Blue Book is getting right with the times. 
  And, when people see UFO's they tend to telephone someone, and someone is usually the Air Force.  Or other agencies refer callers to the Air Force.  And a lot of people see UFO's.  I saw one myself years and years ago in Franconia Notch NH.  For that matter I was on the flightline in Duluth MI the night we scrambled nuclear armed jet interceptors against a UFO that showed up on SAGE radar.  So there are a lot of reports, and the Air Force, as a good bureaucratic organization, feels a duty to do something with all those reports, if only to file them.  
   So I don't find the latest $22 million UFO study to be unusual.  The Air Force has been doing these studies for better than 65 years.

In the Air Force we always had backup generators

Apparently the civilians at Atlanta airport did not.  When their power went out, they shut down, closed the field for landings and takeoffs.  That's not right.  There could have been an airliner low on fuel needing to land right now, before the tanks went dry.  It could have been after dark with airliners on final approach, following the runway lights, which suddenly go dark
  The Air Force always had engine driven generators on base, enough to run essential stuff, the runway lights, the tower and its radios, the instrument landing system (ILS), the ground controlled approach (GCA) radar, the beacon, the nav aids, TACAN and VOR, and some flight line lighting.  We could fly even with a power outage.
   I think the civilian airports ought to be required to do the same.  Having a huge airport go dark and shut down with out warning is dangerous.

Trump Tax plan hits "the rich"

 All though the top rate ($500,000 and up) drops from 39.6% to 37%, the next rate, 35% used to start at $425,000. Under the Trump tax plan, you hit the 35% bracket at $200,000. In short a whole bunch of reasonable well off taxpayers got boosted up into the 35% bracket, whereas under current law, they paid 32%.   The really rich save 2.6% but the quite well off get hit for 3% more.
   The middle class ($38,701 to $93,701) get a 3% to 4% cut.
This is just looking at rates, I did not figure in the effects of doubling the standard deduction.  

How to tell an advanced economy when you see one

Simple.  Advanced economies can export automobiles to the United States.  All others have to import cars from the few advanced economies that can make them.  This year only Germany, Japan, and South Korea make the cut.  Over the years the British, the French, and the Italians dropped out of the US car market.  The Chinese are clearly thinking about getting into the US market but they are not here, yet. 
   That's a remarkably small list.  Nice thing is that they are all three solid US allies (now). 
   The British had a nice US export business in sports cars in the '40s and '50s.  Road and Track magazine was started for sports car owners, owning mostly Austin Healey, Jaguar, MG, Morgan, and Triumph sports cars.  The imported sports car business finally began to fade in the '70s partly due to competition from Ford Mustangs, and partly due to the truly awful reputation for flakiness that British quality control (or lack of it) created.  "Lucas, Prince of Darkness" was the slam directed at British electrical systems (all built by Lucas).  The Italians had the same problem, Fiat was said to stand for "Fix it Again Tony".   The French tried to sell the Citroen DS-19, a distinctively styled car, very low, tail lights mounted on the roof, and an enormously complex hydraulic system that was virtually unrepairable.  Later they tried with Peugeot sedans.  I can remember car pooling out to Raytheon with a guy who drove a Peugeot.  In the winter he had to open the hood, remove some strange engine part and bring it inside to keep it warm so the car would start at 5 PM.

Flying a V2 rocket out of wartime Poland

This story comes from Antony Beevor's  "The Second World War".  The Polish resistance found a V2 rocket that had crashed in the Polish marshes.  The resistance got to the V2 before the Germans, took it apart and spirited it away.  The resistance contacted their Allied support in Britain, and a specially modified C47 transport was flown into Poland to fly the V2 rocket back to England for examination by Allied scientists.
   That must have been one awful hairy flight.  From Britain to Poland was just about the limit of a Gooney bird's range, even with extra fuel tanks.  The flight path either had to cross Germany, which was crawling with fighters and antiaircraft guns, or fly around Germany, presumable over the Baltic sea.   Find a landing strip, big enough for a C47, in the dark, with no electronic navigation aids.  Then they had to get the V2 rocket inside the Gooney bird, a tight squeeze.   And they had to find gasoline in Nazi occupied Poland to refuel the Gooney bird for the return trip.  And get off the ground before the Germans arrived to arrest them all.
   All  in all, flying a B17 to Schweinfurt, or a B24 to Ploesti would be less dangerous. 

Chromebooks for children

Article in the Wall St. Journal yesterday.  What sort of computer to get for a 12 year old.  Answer: a Chromebook.  Looks like a laptop, does NOT run Windows, and costs $300-$400. 
  Not cheap.  I bought a brand new HP Pavilion laptop running Windows down at Staples a little while ago for $300. 
   And for a 12 year old?  I can remember doing a lot of stuff when I was 12, all of it a lot cooler than websurfing on a laptop.  Fishing, skiing, bicycling, electric trains, building tree houses, playing guns with the neighborhood kids, toy soldiers, plastic models, wood working in Dad's shop, hiking, shooting bow and arrow... 

Cops should be fair minded and open minded.

This FBI guy, Peter Strzok, clearly is not.  And he is a cop.  The text messages between him and his girl friend, lawyer Lisa Page show hatred, minds made up, and a desire to influence elections, and possible thoughts of doing a political assassination, which no cop ought to do.
   How did this turkey get to be a senior FBI guy?  He was senior enough to be in on interviewing Hillary about that email server,  senior enough to be loaned out to the Mueller "investigation".  He's been at the FBI for years.  Surely FBI does yearly performance reports like we do in the armed services?  Over all those years nobody mentioned that Peter Strzok was a deep left screwball?  And they promoted him? 
   And there are enough deep lefties at the Bureau for Peter to hook up with a lawyer who shares his warped views?  God help anyone that lawyer prosecutes. 
   The only difference between the police force of a democracy and a Gestapo is the quality of the agents.  Clearly Peter Strzok, and his girlfriend lawyer are the dregs.  Both of them ought to be fired, ASAP.