burchismo

Saturday, August 30, 2008

ALL ATWITTER

Little-known facts.

GB

posted by Greg 9:11 PM

TOO UTTERLY DELICIOUS

Mark Steyn on Sarah Palin:
Governor Palin is not merely, as Jay describes her, "all-American", but hyper-American. What other country in the developed world produces beauty queens who hunt caribou and serve up a terrific moose stew? As an immigrant, I'm not saying I came to the United States purely to meet chicks like that, but it was certainly high on my list of priorities. And for the gun-totin' Miss Wasilla then to go on to become Governor while having five kids makes it an even more uniquely American story. Next to her resume, a guy who's done nothing but serve in the phony-baloney job of "community organizer" and write multiple autobiographies looks like just another creepily self-absorbed lifelong member of the full-time political class that infests every advanced democracy.
I'm happy.

Contrast Palin's record and biography with this.

I'm happier.

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 8:01 AM

Friday, August 29, 2008

WOW

I hope this is true.

UPDATE: -- Wow. It's true. Amazing. What McCain loses in not being able to hit the "inexperience" notes as hard, he picks up with solid support on his right and, well, the woman thing. Damn. You gotta hand it to the Mav man.

Plus, she's a serious babe.

UPDATE: As of right now, the dems don't even have Palin listed on their Veep attack site. HAH!
UPDATE: Dumbasses -- the dems still haven't updated their veep attack site. They got caught sound asleep.

posted by Greg 8:55 AM

Saturday, August 23, 2008

BLAH, BLAH, BIDEN, BLAH, BLAH

BUZZ! IT'S BIDEN! My reaction? So what? He's not really adding much of anything to the Obama ticket. Big deal.

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 8:18 AM

Friday, August 22, 2008

LINK-O-RAMA

I've been busy with work-work, so the browser's stuffed. Time for a link dump:

AIR POWER: A number of more or less unrelated items have caught my eye over the last couple of weeks. Here's a detailed piece about production techniques and facilities for the F-35 that is getting closer to reality. The flexibility of production techniques described here is very impressive, as are the raw numbers. I suppose I should be happy that, even with all this manufacturing ingenuity being applied to the program, the unit price of an F-35 is still very high. That means we're still the only folks in the world who can afford a program like this, despite all the gloom one hears about what terrible shape the US economy is in. Then there's this item about mounting a laser weapon on a C-130 gunship. I've been reading more and more items about this kind of thing, which indicates to me that there have been some real breakthroughs in implementing practical directed-energy weapons. And this item indicates that missile defense is also swiftly becoming a reality. Twenty five years ago, both of these ideas were considered to be unrealistic fantasies that an evil military-industrial-scientific establishment had sold to a credulous and ignorant Ronald Reagan. I don't suppose we'll be hearing any acknowledgments from the people who said this that they were wrong. Finally, here's an article that talks about the very serious issues that have been coming to the surface in the policy and program management within the Air Force.

SEA POWER: I'm obviously more knowledgeable about air power than sea power, so an article like this, that talks about a recent biting critique of US Navy policy leadership is a good primer. There may be a connection to the preceding link: The entire military endeavor is facing a challenge to its basic assumptions about role and method as fundamental as almost any in history, so it's perhaps not surprising that it's taking a while to figure out what's right and what's not, and what works and what doesn't. The problem, of course, is that with decade-long program lead times (at least), and multi-billion dollar program costs, getting it right is kind of important ...

THE RETURN OF HISTORY: Here's a good article about how recent events in Georgia point out a general reality: Fukuyama couldn't have been more wrong.

RED MEAT: Finally, if you're a Christian who doesn't have a strong stomach for criticism of some of your basic beliefs, don't go to this website, a blog maintained by a former evangelical minister who has ... changed sides. He still has the fiery rhetoric of his previous vocation, and is armed with detailed knowledge of the Bible and Christian theology.

OK -- coffee break's over; back on your heads!

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 6:43 AM

Thursday, August 21, 2008

NPR ... AS USUAL

A comment I sent to Morning Edition this morning:
Your piece this morning about Russia and Georgia and the role that NATO expansion played in the conflict between the former was incredibly pro-Russian.

Old habits die hard.
GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 7:07 AM

Thursday, August 14, 2008

SPACE POLITICS

Here's a note I've been expecting to see: Russia's military action against Georgia is almost sure to have an impact on access to the International Space Station, as a minimum effect on that program.

The context and implications of this bit of news are really too depressing for me to explore.

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 7:23 AM

ACCIDENT RECONSTRUCTION

Here's a little item about a recent public presentation by a SpaceX person about the failure of the third Falcon 1 launch. It looks like the 1st-stage residual thrust after separation is being accepted as the immediate cause of the failure. One interesting note is the mention of how telemetry contact with the second stage and payload bus was maintained after the Bad Things started happening -- a bright point in the otherwise dark picture, because it indicates that the systems involved had to have been very robust to continue functioning in the, errrh, off-nominal conditions experienced after the "rear ender."

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 7:18 AM

HMMMMMM .....

Sounds like the opening scenes of an action-thriller ... More likely just another nutcase inspired by his imaginary friend, though.

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 7:13 AM

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

RUSSIA AND THE OIL WEAPON

This item pretty well sums up my thoughts on the sad situation in Georgia. Russia has become a thug-ocracy, and this has only been made possible by the oil and gas wealth that Putin and his gang have pulled together into their hands.

When will the civilized world wake up and realize that it's all about energy?

We can do it. We can become energy independent and starve the religious fanatics and thugs. But only after we wake up and realize that it has to be our number one priority as a civilization, and that nuclear power is the ONLY realistic solution to the problem. Every second between now and the time we come to this realization is wasted. Every day that goes by that we don't wake up and do what's necessary is a gift to the enemies of civilization.

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 9:14 AM

MISSSION ACCOMPLISHED

As this item makes clear, it is really possible now to say that “the war in Iraq” is all but over, and that we won. Five years after the infamous “Mission Accomplished” banner, that mission – the mission of deposing an insanely cruel and dangerous tyrant and replacing him with something stable and better – has been accomplished; at least for now.

While the politicians “debate” how quickly we should draw down our military forces in Iraq, I look back and ask, could it have been done more quickly and at a lower cost in American blood and treasure? Until fairly recently, I was all but certain that the answer had to be “yes”. Now, I’m not so sure.

That certain “yes” was premised on the assumption that the initial invasion was carried out with too small a force, and that the immediate aftermath of the fall of the Saddam regime was mishandled in many ways, not least of which in disbanding the Iraqi army, total de-Baathification, and a general failure to impose security throughout the country. Clearly, so this thinking goes, the surge in troop numbers and implementation of General Petraeus’ anti-insurgency tactics that have proved so successful in the last year could have and should have been implemented much sooner.

But is this right? I can at least make the case that the changes in general approach and specific tactics adopted in the last year would not have been nearly as successful before then. Perhaps Iraq had to “bottom out” into the bloody chaos and civil war of 2005 to 2007 before the native ethnic groups and traditional tribal and religious centers of power would have been willing to make the sacrifices and compromises that have been the foundation of the success of the last few months.

Perhaps the various Shiite gang leaders never would have given up their dreams of seizing complete control of the country if they hadn’t had to face the reality of just how violent and self-destructive such a power grab would be. Perhaps the Sunni tribal leaders never would have given up their hopes of regaining power if they hadn’t had to see the practical results of the kinds of devil’s bargains they would have to make with the likes of al Qaida and the Tikriti mob to achieve a return to minority control of the country. And it seems certain that al Qaida and Iran would have both maintained their hopes of infiltrating and dominating Iraq by playing a waiting game if we’d been more effective in containing sectarian and ethnic violence in the country before now. We certainly wouldn’t have had the opportunity to inflict such massive damage to a major al Qaida initiative as we’ve had these last two years or so, if we’d put a tighter lid on the country at the very beginning. Instead, we might well be facing now the prospect of having to go back in to do the same job we’ve now largely accomplished in that regard.

I don’t claim that these thoughts are original to me. I’m not sure, but I don’t think I’ve seen them expressed elsewhere. And I’m all but certain that this point was not an intentional part of the over-all plan for the liberation of Iraq from Saddam – much more likely is the possibility that it is an accidental result of what would have been perceived even by the central figures of the Bush Administration as a “mistake” if they could have known in the first quarter of 2003 what 2006 would be like.

But maybe not. I’m reading Doug Feith’s book War and Decision. Depending on how you look at it, Feith was the number three person in the Pentagon at the time of the invasion and has been demonized by the anti-war left as one of the chief “neocon warmongers” and by Bob Woodward (and apparently Tommy Franks) as a bumbler. Naturally, this book will have no impact on the mainstream discussion of the decision to go to war in Iraq and how post-invasion activities were handled. What Feith has to say – for instance, that hunting for existing stockpiles of WMD was not one of the primary aims of the war – simply doesn’t “fit the narrative,” so it will be ignored.

I’m thinking here, though, of one of the main themes of the book: That Rumsfeld and his crew consistently opposed taking a “strong-arm” approach to the US post-invasion role in Iraq, because, they argued, to do so would only create animosity toward the US as an occupying, imperial power and, perhaps more importantly, because it would create long-term dependency on US forces to provide security. This isn’t speculation or after-the-fact rationalization. Feith documents that this was a consistent policy position of the Pentagon in pre-invasion discussions with other agencies and within the highest counsels of the Bush Administration. Again, this evidence will have no influence on popular perceptions, because it’s inconsistent with the view of the neocons as imperialists out to dominate the world. Of course, this doesn’t make sense in terms of logic, since under-manning the post-invasion occupation is inconsistent with the idea of dominating the country on behalf of Halliburton and Exxon. But never mind the lack of logic and the evidence to the contrary – we KNOW what the truth is, right?

For now, I offer these thoughts merely as something to put into the category of historical speculation. In one sense, of course, we’ll never know the answer to the question of whether adopting the “salvation and surge” strategy would have worked had it been adopted earlier – history is what it is, and we have to live with the fact that alternatives always exist in the netherworld of alternative “if-history.” But perhaps, someday, when the horror of MoveOn.org and “General Betray-Us” are dim memories, perhaps, there will be a chance for a sober second look that perceives the pain of 2005 and 2006 as the necessary precondition for what was the real goal of the 2003 invasion – breaking the terrible negative balance of terror and hopelessness in the Middle East.
GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 7:36 AM

Sunday, August 10, 2008

SMARMINESS

There's so much to say about John Edwards' much-deserved public melt-down, it's hard to know where to begin or end. I'll only make one point -- Edwards is and always has been a smarmy, oily, obvious fake. The question is, how does someone like that do what he's done?

Of course, in terms of politics, Edwards really hasn't done much. He was an undistinguished one-term senator (hmmm), who ended up not even being able to carry his home state as John Kerry's running mate. But Edwards made a large fortune as a personal injury plaintiff's lawyer, and had a loyal following in politics. How does such a nasty, shallow, preening huckster do this?

This isn't the first time I've asked this question. Edwards is of a well-known type in the world of trial lawyers. In any jurisdiction, you can find near-perfect clones of him: Typically young, good-looking, well-dressed, typically personal injury plaintiff's lawyers, who use an unctuous, TV-preacher rhetorical style in the courtroom. You see them and think, "There's no way this kind of crap can win!" But it does -- over and over again. These guys use an exaggerated "gosh darn it, we little people need to stick it to those rich corporations" kind of style, while making the most childish kind of emotional appeals for their clients -- and wearing two thousand dollar suits and glossy Italian loafers. Anyone who's spent any time in a courtroom in America immediately recognized John Edwards as one of these fake, over-the-top showmen.

So what is it about these kind of men that leads to success? Is it just the outward trappings of alpha-male-dom that triggers basic monkey-troop submission among the betas? Do they plug into some pre-programmed groove already plowed by the equally smarmy and ridiculous mega-church televangelists? I honestly don't know, but there it is: In the right circumstances, the outrageously smarmy guy can succeed.

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 6:18 AM

Saturday, August 09, 2008

WHOA!

This story about the murder of an American in Beijing for the Olympics is bizarre in the extreme. To begin with, Beijing is an extremely safe city for its size under normal circumstances. Added to that is that foreigners are usually treated very well by almost everyone. beyond that, though, is the context of the Olympics: EVERYONE in China has gotten the message that this is all about putting on a good face for the world. The murder must have been one seriously deranged person ...

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 5:19 PM

LINK-O-RAMA

Last week, I was working toward a milestone at work on a case I've been dealing with for eight years. As tempting as it is to write about what happened, I'll keep to my rule of not writing here about my professional work as a lawyer -- suffice it to say that things turned out very well. At any rate, one result of having been so busy and keeping the kind of unusual hours that come with a litigator's life is the buildup of links in my browser, which means ...

Space Cadets: The Air Force will be launching its unmanned orbital spaceplane demonstrator, the X-37. Something like the X-37 should have been the direction we went after Apollo, instead of the expensive and unwieldy political pig trough that the Shuttle system turned out to be. Good luck to the USAF! With success in the X-37 program, somebody could be very close to the dream of a truly reusable, practical spaceplane for human access to space.

Our War: As opposed to "their war," is going very well, indeed. Here's an item about Francis Fukuyama having to pay up on bets that Iraq wouldn't get better. Very satisfying indeed because, having written one great book, Fukuyama has since pretty much proved himself to be a very shallow thinker, in my book.

posted by Greg 6:05 AM

Monday, August 04, 2008

THE MORNING AFTER THE MORNING AFTER

A round-up of commentary on the SpaceX launch failure. Ugh ...

GB, THHotA

UPDATE: That link doesn't seem to be a real "permalink" ... just look down a little or the listing of items about the launch.

posted by Greg 6:33 AM

BRACE YOURSELF

A mild hurricane is heading this way. Must be global warming.

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 6:01 AM

SOLZHENITSYN DEAD AT 89

Alexander Solzhenitsyn has died. I worked through most of the fiction he had written when I was 13-16-years old. his books were very influential on me -- opening up the world of Russian literature for me, and opening my eyes to what the Soviet Union really was. I think Cancer Ward was my favorite book; I think I read it at least twice in those years.

And then, when he got out of the Soviet Union, he set the paradigm for the crotchety old man for me -- an important precedent for who I am becoming now, I suppose ....

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 5:55 AM

Sunday, August 03, 2008

BUST FOR MUSK

Second stage failed to separate. Serous bummer.

Let the finger pointing begin.

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 5:22 AM

Saturday, August 02, 2008

GO ELON!

I noted a few days ago that SpaceX was getting ready to attempt the third launch of their Falcon 1 rocket. SpaceX plays these kinds of things close to the chest, having announced a pretty wide launch window just a few days ago.

Well, it looks like today's the day, and they're just a couple of hours away from launch. There's live video feed from the Kwajalien Atoll launch site at the SpaceX website here. I've got it on a couple of monitors here at the Batcave as I'm working on work-work ...

You're our only hope, Obi-wan.

GB

posted by Greg 4:55 PM

GOOD NEWS?

On two different -- but related -- fronts on the same day?
MIT researchers have developed a cheap, clean catalyst technology that massively improves the efficiency of electrolysis of water into oxygen and hydrogen. If viable, this technology would allow solar generation to produce around-the-clock power by feeding a fuel cell during peak hours and drawing on the fuel cell when the sun isn't shining.
And then there are somewhat decent rumors that we bagged al Qaida numero two-o Zawahiri, in a recent missile attack.
If you don't know how these two stories are related, then you haven't been paying attention for the last eightyears.

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 5:51 AM

Friday, August 01, 2008

JOHN GLENN TO THE RESCUE

He's trying to get money to keep th Shuttle flying after its currently scheduled decommissioning. Rand Simberg' got the right line on this.

What an incredible cluster of screw-ups our space policy "leaders" are.

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 7:12 AM

MORE DRILLING?

Here's an issue in which I don't line up with the Republicans: Whether we should push heavily for more exploration and drilling in the US. I don't actually oppose it, I just think it's a more or less futile gesture for the following reasons:
Unless we're willing to engage in protectionism, the incremental increase in supply that new drilling in the US will provide will be a relatively small part of global supply, and therefore will have very little impact on consumer prices.
It will take years for the fruits of new drilling to have any impact at all on consumer prices.
Generally, it's more of the same activity that has gotten us to the sad pass in which we now find ourselves, i.e. dependence on hydrocarbon-fueled energy, most of which (with the exception of coal) comes from Bad Places.
I don't oppose new drilling on environmental grounds -- the incremental environmental impact would be negligible.

GB, THHotA

posted by Greg 6:14 AM