SCO’s Unix licensing revenues were down a little in the second quarter.
99%, in fact.
Maybe they should have a going-out-of-business sale.
What If?
I don’t know if people have speculated about this previously, but as an alternate history, what if Reagan had beaten Ford for the nomination in 1976? Would he have beaten Carter then, or did we have to live with him for four years to realize what a lousy president he was?
It’s not clear to what extent Ford lost because of general backlash over Watergate, or because of the Nixon pardon, or because of the debate gaffe, in which he said that Poland wasn’t under the thumb of the Soviets. Reagan would have likely suffered only from the first factor. If he did lose to Carter, would he have gotten the nomination again in 1980 and beaten him then (I suppose the answer to that depends partially on how close the race was in ’76)?
And if he’d won, would the Cold War have ended that much sooner as well? Would we have avoided the stagflation, the sky-high interest rates? Would we have avoided the Iran hostage crisis, which was arguably our first of many acts of irresolution toward Islamic aggression, which ultimately led to September 11?
One more thought–one wonders how much different things might have gone if he hadn’t been shot. That was what gave him the political momentum to get much of his agenda passed in his first term. Ironically, while Reagan didn’t fire a single shot to win the Cold War, perhaps John Hinckley’s single shot was responsible…
Not With A Bang, But A Whimper
Has the anti-globo looniness run its course?
…the demonstrations have been nothing short of a dud, and the 20 or so protesters who quietly rallied yesterday were unable to hide their disappointment at the meager turnout.
“I think we overestimated ourselves,” Sandra Kwak, 22, said with a laugh in a light drizzle in expansive Forsyth Park. “But even if the few people who are here learn something, it’s not a total loss.”
Denied access to Sea Island for security reasons, two groups of around 150 people each gathered in the cities of Savannah and Brunswick on Tuesday to kick off three days of planned protests. But by the second day of the summit, only a fraction remained out in force.
“It’s a victory just to have this event,” protest organizer Kellie Gaznik said Tuesday. “If we didn’t have a place for people to do their art and make their statements, they would just walk around and maybe break things, which doesn’t accomplish anything.”
No, Kellie. No it doesn’t.
Traditional Mindsets
Michael Mealing has some interesting commentary (similar to what I might say if I had the time) to a conventional-wisdom article from James Burk. Yes, it is a fisking, but a gentle one, and a needed one.
How’s Daisy Doing?
Donald Duck is seventy years old today. He’s still looking good, but at his age, he should watch that temper–he could give himself a stroke.
How’s Daisy Doing?
Donald Duck is seventy years old today. He’s still looking good, but at his age, he should watch that temper–he could give himself a stroke.
How’s Daisy Doing?
Donald Duck is seventy years old today. He’s still looking good, but at his age, he should watch that temper–he could give himself a stroke.
Reagan Was Right Again
Steve Hayward has unearthed a nice quote from Reagan’s sixties debate with Bobby Kennedy:
One of my favorite bits of this exchange was the rhetorical question Reagan asked about America
Seasteading
Sooner or later pretty much everyone with libertarian leanings comes up with the idea of living on the sea in international waters, and I’m no exception. This came up in a conversation with Sean Lynch at the Space Access Society conference, and he pointed me to a very interesting site by some people who are actually making serious plans to do just that. I was on the Oceania project mailing list for most of its life, so I got a chance to see one way not to do this. The greatest value of the Seasteading site is its list of things that have been tried, a much larger list than you might expect. The only real success so far is Sealand, but it’s not for lack of trying.
Why June 21st?
I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this previously. I’ve been thinking it, but may have been too busy to post.
Here’s my theory on why they picked the solstice. It has nothing to do with the fact that it’s the solstice. I think that it’s because thirty days later is the thirty-fifth anniversary of the first moon landing. Burt (and perhaps Paul Allen) seem to be big on anniversaries.
[Update at 3:30 PM PDT]
Andrew Gray has an even better theory in comments:
Unless I’m miscounting, thirty days *less one*; isn’t Apollo 11 generally taken as being July 20th? (which is also the anniversary, I note, of the eventual recovery of Liberty Bell 7…)
But on that note, July 21, 1961 – Liberty Bell 7’s flight, being the second suborbital flight, might be considered not inappropriate as a date?
That aside, this does beg the question… what is in the two weeks after that, if he’s so keen on anniversaries? It’d be unusual to not have one for the second flight, if this is his plan as you suggest…
He’s right on the arithmetic–I forgot about the old “thirty days has September, April, June, and November.” And it would be an appropriate anniversary.
But as for the fourteen-day one, they would be foolish to wait fourteen days for the second attempt. They’ll do it as quickly as they can, so they have some margin in case they have weather or other problems. The first time you have the luxury of choosing an anniversary date, but the second one has to be driven solely by winning the prize.