War Commentary

Deja Vu

There was another summer of shark attacks, and young women missing. It abruptly ended as much of America awoke one morning to television images of airplanes flying into buildings, and people jumping from them as they first burned, then fell.

Once again, during a summit in which the hot topics are not the religious extremists who wish us to convert or die (and are indifferent as to which, or would in fact prefer the latter), but global warming and African poverty (the latter a condition that has generally been worsened, not ameliorated by such international gabfests), the early morning news is filled with images of sundered buses and subway cars and broken British bodies. This time it’s in London, the capital of one of our most steadfast allies in the war.

Once again, we’re reminded that this is a war of a kind unfamiliar to any American for the past hundred and forty years, and to almost any American from the northern tier of the country for almost two centuries, in that we at home are at risk of our property and lives. We’ve fought many wars, but the bombs and the injuries and the dying have been endured by those in our military, and largely occurred in the foreign lands in which we waged them. But as on that sunny September day almost four years ago (a time now greater than the span between Pearl Harbor and victory over Germany and then Japan) we are reminded that we’re all in the army now, and we’re all, at least metaphorically, in the sniper’s scope.

It’s not clear what the goal of this latest atrocity was. The timing with the G8 Summit seems too close to be coincidental, but it’s hard to imagine what these people thought the effect on that event would be, other than to strengthen the resolve of the G8 against them. Certainly the British people are no stranger to such things, and have shown their mettle, as they did in the eighties against the IRA, and against the original Nazis during the Blitz. In the words of Winston Churchill, I’m confident that, once again, they will not falter, or fail. And even if they were the type to be cowed, there’s no upcoming election here to sway, as there was in Madrid. If they were trying to hurry the British troops out of Iraq, I suspect that it would be more likely to have the opposite effect now. If nothing else, I hope that it encourages a real crackdown on the Islamist hatemongers, so many (indeed far too many) of whom have taken up residence in Britain, and preached and proselytized their neonazism unmolested for too long amidst a misplaced multicultural overtolerance.

Is it part of a larger plot, still to play out?

I’m in Washington. I walked to work from my hotel this morning, because it was quite close. But I have a lunch scheduled with an editor in the district near the White House, and I was planning to take the Metro to get there. Should I, will I now take a cab instead?

No.

That’s what they want. There are many who cannot afford cabs, or cars. For them the subway is their lifeline. At least one of the goals of these creatures is to scare them away from it, to once again damage our economy (as I watched the coverage of the London carnage, all of the st0ck index futures were down steeply this morning). To once again strike fear into our hearts. To once again prevent us from doing the things that we want, and often must do.

No, when I go downtown today, I’ll ride the train under the river, with those who must, just as I would had I woken up this morning to normal–the latest shark attack and insipid interviews with friends of neighbors of one of the Aruba accused. Though I love life, it must be a life worth living, and that is not one cowering in fear from impotent madmen who rejoice in death, and would force our participation in a misogynistic and deranged medieval fantasy. I will carry on.

They will not win.

[Update at 10:15 AM EDT]

Not all Brits are maintaining a stiff upper lip. The odious Islamic stooge, George Galloway, has already issued a call to surrender:

We urge the government to remove people in this country from harms way, as the Spanish government acted to remove its people from harm, by ending the occupation of Iraq and by turning its full attention to the development of a real solution to the wider conflicts in the Middle East.

[Another update a few minutes later]

“Red” Ken Livingstone, the leftist mayor of London, has a stouter spirit:

I want to say one thing, specifically to the world today

General

Never Give Out Your Creditability

Have you ever gotten a call from a credit card company purporting to be from their security department asking to verify a charge? Asking to call a special number for the fraud/verification department? With the person who answers asking for personal identifying information such as mother’s maiden name?

I have multiple times. I ask the credit cards to authenticate. Do the credit card companies authenticate? No.

They tell customers never to give out such secret personal identifying information to strangers. Now a stranger calls and asks for it. Oops.

A credit card fraud department, should ask the card customers to call the main customer service number on the back of their cards and press a button for the fraud department.

Otherwise, the bank may find its fraud department outsourced. Without permission.

Space

If You Don’t Like Nukes on the Moon

Mike Griffin has been calling for using nuclear power for Earth’s rocky Moon exploration rather than Jupiter’s Icy Moon exploration. Anti-nuclear activists should propose a cost-effective non-nuclear alternative.

Here’s an old idea for lunar nighttime power worthy of rediscovery: laser illumination of solar cells from Earth.

Space

If You Don’t Like Nukes on the Moon

Mike Griffin has been calling for using nuclear power for Earth’s rocky Moon exploration rather than Jupiter’s Icy Moon exploration. Anti-nuclear activists should propose a cost-effective non-nuclear alternative.

Here’s an old idea for lunar nighttime power worthy of rediscovery: laser illumination of solar cells from Earth.

Space

If You Don’t Like Nukes on the Moon

Mike Griffin has been calling for using nuclear power for Earth’s rocky Moon exploration rather than Jupiter’s Icy Moon exploration. Anti-nuclear activists should propose a cost-effective non-nuclear alternative.

Here’s an old idea for lunar nighttime power worthy of rediscovery: laser illumination of solar cells from Earth.

Satire

Blowback

Still not much time to post, but I have to note that David Burge, Evil Comedy Genius, has been having fun with the Kos Kidz.

I don’t know why they don’t just concede the field. Oh, yeah, that’s right–they’re too clueless.

Hint, guys. Next time Iowahawk beats up on you, just take it. If you try to fight back, it only gets worse. It’s like one of those monsters that, the harder you fight it, the stronger it gets, because it actually feeds on your pathetic swats. Just stop giving him ammo, and maybe he’ll leave you alone for a day or two.

General

Careful What You Wish For

London has “won” the right to be bankrupted and disrupted by a bunch of athletes and their fans. I watched all of the cheering, and couldn’t figure out whether it was because they had gotten the bid, or because France had lost it. I have mixed feelings on the matter, because while having an Olympics is one of those things that I’d wish on my worst enemy, the French (particularly in Paris) seem much too unhappy about it for me to truly feel angst about their “loss.”

Unsurprisingly, at least one poster at Samizdata is quite unhappy, as he so eloquently expresses.

Space History

Saturn V a Cost Barrier?

Alan Wasser and I think that space property rights are the main thing holding back development of the Moon. Dwayne Day says (last paragraph) that launch cost is the main thing that is holding us back. I don’t think that was true when Saturn Vs were in production.

While high launch costs as a barrier may be temporarily true today, I think that cheap access would be developed to the Moon if it could be claimed legally and the property rights enforced (and may anyway if Elon Musk is to be believed).

The Saturn V Wikipedia entry cites these cost numbers. They add up to $6.42B peaking in 1966-7. The launch cost estimate in Astronautix of $431M is just $6.42B/15. While they list a bunch of R&D contracts that precede the Saturn V line item, they were sunk costs at the time of Saturn V deployment. If someone has a better number please comment. A summary of Schmitt comes up with $3B per launch including $500M in capital costs. Those costs should be written off as sunk (i.e., a company that incurred them would declare bankruptcy and emerge with no debt). The $2.5B remaining is the 2005 price of $431M in 1967 dollars.

Am I missing something? Is pad construction, tooling, design and so on not included in the original $6.4 billion? If non-recurring costs made up a good fraction, then it’s a way overestimate.

Griffin puts the marginal cost at $100M in 1970 dollars or about $500M today. That would give us $2000/lb to LEO. If we had continued to put $15B/year in current dollars into Lunar development, that would be about 87.5 million pounds to LEO in the last 35 years if 1/3 of the money was spent on launches or over 15 million pounds to the Moon assuming no improvement over 1960s technology (and to be fair no bureaucratic price inflation beyond the consumer price index). That is about 75 international space stations worth of mass.

No, I think the main reason we abandoned the Moon was lack of national will, not price. The price point for colonization can be achieved if the national (or subnational or even rich guy) will comes back. My proposition is that Lunar property rights would be the impetus to set these wheels back in motion. I dare you to prove me wrong.

Satire

Seeking Justice

[Note the following was posted at sci.space.policy this morning by sci.space.* moderator George William Herbert]

———————————–)
The People of Ziquikcikty )
(also known as Comet Tempel-1); )
A class, seeking )
certification as such; )
Plaintiffs )
)
v. )
)
Michael A’Hearn, )
Rick Grammier, )
Alphonso Diaz, )
Michael Griffin, )
Karl Rove, )
Andrew Card, )
Richard Cheney, )
George W. Bush, )
Does 1-100, )
and Does 101-600,000, )
1 et Prcpui 50 n 1 abrat 05135, )
Government of Bars and Stripes; )
Defendants ) FILED:
———————————–) Minxktaquicky 43, Year Nipathatep
(July 3, 2005)

STATEMENT OF FACTS

1. The matter before the court regards loss of life and limb, injuries, mental anguish, and property damage suffered on the early morning of Minxktaquicky 43, Year Nipathatep (July 3, 2005) at or around Mong 54 (10:52 PM PST).

2. At or around that time, inhabitants of Ziquikcikty (Comet Tempel-1) were awoken by a large explosion. They awoke to find that a large segment of the surface of Ziquikcity had been destroyed by an unknown agent, leaving a large crater in the surface. Ejected debris caused serious damage to approximately half the surface of Ziquikcity, and minor damage to all remaining areas of the comet.

3. A veritable flood of injured sentients reached medical attention after the explosion, and preliminary estimates are that 105,000 sentients were treated for injuries of some sort. Hospitals report over 2800 cessations of sentient function, with another more than 5,200 sentients undergoing major medial care with significant ongoing risk of cessation of sentient function.

4. Rescue parties are still combing through the debris as of this filing, but 1,952 formerly sentient organisms have been recovered as of this filing, and at least 4,700 remain unaccounted for.

5. Initial estimates of property damage (still preliminary at this time) indicate that in excess of 58,000 residences were destroyed or rendered uninhabitable, in excess of 7,500 places of business were destroyed or rendered uninhabitable, and at least 125,000 other buldings suffered serious damage including at least a partial lsos of pressure. Purely cosmetic damage estimates have not been received to date, but are expected to be severe.

6. Special scientific teams investigating the source of this damage identified debris from a metallic object in the crater at the point of origin of the damage.

7. Subsequent analysis and recovery included large quantities of Element 29.

8. Smaller fragments recovered included a small, square metal plate bearing inscribed text, and many pieces of a micro-representational disc structure.

9. Upon closer inspection, the small, square metal plate was found to have a manufacturers mark (“1 et Prcpui 50 n 1 abrat 05135”) and unit designation (“D33p 1 mpact”).

10. Upon closer inspection, the fragments of a micro-representational disc contained squiggly lines which are associated with pre-infoputational civilization identification rituals.

11. Upon information and belief, based upon Galactic Registrar data and other sources, we believe that defendant
“1 et Prcpui 50 n 1 abrat 05135”
(hereinafter referred to as “1 ET”) is an organization subservient to the defendant “Government of Bars and Stripes”.

12. Upon information and belief, we believe that defendant 1 ET is engaged in interplanetary warfare. Its electronic presences contain information regarding a number of interplanetary weapons systems and military reconnaissance systems which it has employed in past military campaigns against other planetary bodies within the Sol Solar System and nearby interplanetary space.

13. Upon information and belief, we believe that defendants A’Hearn and Grammier were employed by defendant 1 ET as primary assault managers for the D33p system deployment.

14. Upon information and belief, we believe that defendants Diaz and Griffin are direct supervisors within the Government of Bars and Stripes department charged with waging interplanetary warfare.

15. Upon information and belief, we believe that defendants Rove, Card, Cheney, and Bush are senior war-leaders of the Government of Bars and Stripes.

16. Upon information and belief, we believe that defendants Does 1-100 inclusive are members of the strike team which operated the D33p unit which struck Ziquikcikty.

17. Upon information and belief, we believe that defendants Does 101-600,000 are members of the support units which helped assemble and launch the D33p unit which struck Ziquikcikty.

CLAIMS

18. Claim 1:
Plaintiffs claim that Defendants intentionally launched a Weapon of Mass Destruction, D33p unit “1 mpact”, towards Ziquikcikty, causing loss of life, limb, sentience, and property, in contravention of the Galactic Environmental Modification Convention, and Defendants own collaborative agreement contravening the use of environment altering space objects and weapons.

19. Claim 2:
Plaintiffs claim that Defendants launched unprovoked military action without proper notifications or warnings of threat or exclusion zone.

20. Claim 3:
Plaintiffs claim that Defendants neglegently utilized a Weapon of Mass Destruction in proximity to civilian habitation areas without a valid military target within the targeted area.

21. Claim 4:
Plaintiffs claim that Defendants have caused great mental anguish to the peoples of Ziquikcikty, including loss of sleep, disruption of marital congress, premature larval stage spawning, and subversion of extrapotentiary quik.

22. Claim 5:
Plaintiffs claim that Defendants failed to register D33p unit “1 mpact” properly as an exported weapons system under their own legal system.

23. Plaintiffs reserve the right to file ammended compaint as further iformation becomes available to us.

DEMANDS

24. Plaintiffs demand that Defendants be enjoined from further unprovoked military action against spatial bodies.

25. Plaintiffs demand that suitable disaster aid be made available to the beings of Ziquikcikty.

26. Plaintiffs demand monetary damages for loss of sentience, mental anguish, injury, property damage, and the plague of premature larval stage spawning, in an amount to be determined.

27. Plaintiffs demand urgent assistance with approximately one million prematurely spawned larvae who are rapidly denuding all plant life in the affected areas.

28. Failing the above, Plaintiffs demand the right to send the approximately one million prematurely spawned larvae to the vicintity of defendant 1 ET under the doctorine of transferred headache.

29. Plaintiffs demand all movie, television, internet, mind-send and telesmell broadcast rights to all images resulting from the deployment of D33p unit “1 mpact”, under the doctorine of confiscatus felonuis copyrightus.

30. Plaintiffs demand an Intergalactic War Crimes Tribunal for all Defendants for Great Assault and Grand Felony Littering.

SO MOVED

/s/ #@23842*)*dsfe#@dsf#}#@

Illeb Nivlem, JD
Counsel for the Plaintiffs
Minxktaquicky 43, Year Nipathatep (July 3, 2005)

CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE

I, the undersigned, delivered a true and accurate copy of this document to the defendants by: [check one]
[ ] certified mail
[ ] precision planetary delivery probe
[*] class V mindsend

/s/ {}{{{{{}}}{{}}}
Ima Lifpy

[Copyright 2005 by George William Herbert]

On a less light note, I think (but am not entirely sure–(s)he may be trolling) that this nutcase is serious.

Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!