They’re developing a magnetic shield to protect space travelers from radiation. This is a critical technology for a spacefaring civilization.
Geezersat
A commercial comsat is being retired after thirty-two years. The original design life was five. Space hardware tends to be overdesigned, but I wonder how they had enough propellant to go that long?
The Audacity Of Fascism
Not that this is anything new:
Denying access to the minority (in this case Republican) poll watchers and inspectors is a violation of Pennsylvania state law. Those who violate the law can be punished with a misdemeanor subject to a fine of $1,000 and prison of between one month and two years.
Those on site as describing it as “pandemonium” and there may be video coming of the chaos.
Some of the precincts where Republicans have been removed are: the 44th Ward, 12th and 13th divisions; 6th Ward, 12th division; 32nd Ward, Division 28.
“Election board officials guard the legitimacy of the election process and the idea that Republicans are being intimidated and banned for partisan purposes does not allow for an honest and open election process,” said McCain-Palin spokesman Ben Porritt in a statement to Townhall.
Expect a lot of this kind of thing today. Especially in the Windy City.
My Condolences To The Obama Family
…on the death of Senator Obama’s grandmother.
Beware The Bandwagon
Of all the dumb reasons to vote for Barack Obama (and they are legion, even if there are a few smart ones interspersed), one of the dumbest is simply because the media is telling you he’s inevitable. The bandwagon effect is a classical logical fallacy, that many fall for nonetheless (because most people are untrained in logic).
Don’t let them herd you like a sheep into voting for someone just because you want to vote for the winner. If you’re going to drink the redistributionist koolaid, at least do it because you actually believe it.
You Couldn’t Make This Up
Don’t you think that, after all these years, even if New York Times copy editors continue to suffer from Alzheimers’ on this issue, they would at least have had the prescience to program their final editing software to flag things like this?
Greg Packer, 44, of Huntington, N.Y., drove in for Game 5 of the World Series and stayed for the celebration. He arrived on Broad Street near City Hall at 5 a.m. to secure what he considered the best spot.
Simply amazing. (Link mine.)
Why Isn’t Detroit A Paradise?
Because long ago, it (and other parts of the upper midwest) embraced Obamanian policies. If things go the wrong way tomorrow, the nation will be Detroit writ large.
[Update a while later]
This reminds me of a post I wrote about the rise and fall of General Motors a while ago. As I noted there, my dad was a GM exec, and I grew up in southeast Michigan (well, to the degree that I’ve grown up at all…). In 1973, about the time I graduated from high school, we were deep in a recession (a real one–not what the people whining about today’s economy are describing, with 20+ percent unemployment in Flint), and the golden era was over, never to really return to what it had been.
It’s Getting Harder And Harder To Surprise
The Orion spacecraft program was reviewed with the wrong configuration. There’s more here:
So an older, immature design of the Orion capsule is brought up for review and passes muster, when it fact it lacks many of the features a flight worthy capsule would have (e.g., a weight that would be liftable, a means of landing that won’t kill the occupants) along with several that a real vehicle wouldn’t have (e.g., extra amounts of hot water for BroomHilda’s cauldron).
That’s not the way the process is supposed to work.
Unfortunately, the IG’s office, not known for their brilliance or their ethics, took the ESMD Viceroy’s non-concurrence with their findings and said, “ok, so sorry to have bothered you,” and moved on.
Can’t anyone here play this game? How much longer before this misbegotten program augers in?
Blood Suckers
No, this isn’t a political post, despite the potential upcoming ascendancy of the leech class in DC. Alan Boyle has an interesting article about them in nature, and why human vampires don’t work.
Well, that’s a relief. But then, the author in question probably never spent much time in DC.
What Happens To The Posters After The Election?
Virginia Postrel has some thoughts:
In an interview Fairey assured Smith that his imagery “anti-propaganda propaganda” that, he suggested, is “coming from a position of moral integrity.” In other words, he believes it, or at least believes it’s in a good cause. The Obama posters were, of course, based on the famous propaganda image of Che Guevara. John McCain may suggest that Obama is a socialist. Fairey, a man of the left, literally paints Obama as a communist–which may involve much wishful projection as the belief in other quarters that the candidate is a secret free-trader.
Although campaign posters are surely a form of propaganda, the Obama imagery is so empty of specific exhortation that we do better to think of it as a manifestation of the candidate’s glamour–a seductive illusion in which the audience sees whatever they themselves desire. Glamour is manipulative, but not coercive. It requires the audience to suspend its skepticism and the object to maintain his mystery, a tacit form of cooperation. Give the object the power to compel devotion, and glamour is suddenly neither sustainable nor necessary.
Yes, though there’s actually a more accurate, more encompassing word than “socialist” or “communist” for this kind of political iconography (relating back to the thirties). It starts with an “F.”