Month: July 2010

The Latest Country to Ban the Burqa is……

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Syria.

No, really:

The Syrian minister of higher education has prohibited the entrance of veiled female students into universities and colleges throughout the country, news agencies reported Sunday.

Dr. Ghitath Barakat explained that the donning of face veils, which cover everything but the woman’s eyes, “opposes the morals and values of the academy”.

Barakat’s decree followed similar ones approved by a number of European parliaments, including Belgium and France.

Obviously, while Syria is a part of both the Arab world and the Islamic world, it is in a number of ways atypical. Its rulers are Alawites, who are not considered normative Muslims by Sunni or Shia, and the government is rather stridently secularist, it is the sole remaining Ba’athist regime, but it does provide an interesting counterpoint to European bans.

Shakespeare?

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The Sun Glasses Conceal the Tears

After using a non-existent word, “Refudiate,” in a twitter post, Sarah Palin compares herself with William Shakespeare, who she notes may have made up some words too.

In related news, it now turns out that Sarah Palin knows nothing about Alaska either, claiming that Kodiak is the largest island in the United States. (It isn’t, it’s Hawaii, aka the “Big Island,” where Palin lived briefly)

Oh for the day when she gets a few wrinkles, and fades into well deserved obscurity, so that I can put her on my list of They Who Must Not Be Named, but as she is still a political figure about which people speculate on her Presidential prospects, I do not feel comfortable putting my hands over my ears and saying, “I can’t hear you!”

Because the Banks and Insurance Companies Own Us

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Hungary has just broken off talks with the IMF and the EU, because the IMF and EU only want deficit reduction on the backs or ordinary people, so throw pensioners into the streets, destroy your healthcare and education systems, and raise the VAT, but whatever you do, don’t raise taxes on banks and insurance:

Mr Orban had intended to raise some half a billion euros (187 billion forints) via a new tax on banks and insurance firms. The IMF however said this “”is likely to adversely affect lending and growth.”

More subtlely, the EU’s Mr Rehn said: “Care will also be needed to ensure a stable environment for both domestic and international investors.”

Brussels and the IMF will be hoping a swift sharp spanking from the markets will chasten Mr Orban’s government, but the move will also unnerve investor thinking about the condition of economies across the bloc, particularly in eastern Europe.

The truth here is that the bailout package is more a bailout of western banks than it is of Hungary, which is why the EU and the IMF find it unacceptable that banks actually pay taxes in Hungary.

If I were the Hungarian PM, I would start drawing up plans to reverse Hungary’s commitment to joining the Euro, and start immediate preparations to exit the European Exchange Rate Mechanism and allow the Forint to float.

It is clear that the deal with the Euro is that if you join, you don’t just lose sovereignty to the EU institutions, but to French, German, and British banks as well.

A Foreseeable Result of Pandering to the US Nuclear Industry

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Now that the US deal to sell nuclear technology to India is pretty much a done deal, the Chinese are selling nuclear power plants to Pakistan:

China is expected to formally announce the plans to build the 650-megawatt reactors in Punjab province at a meeting in New Zealand of the Nuclear Suppliers Group – the 46 countries that dominate and try to control the world’s atomic trade.

The US has already voiced its disapproval before the meeting, which starts today, and will try to forge a consensus on updating the rules designed to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons.

US officials say that the plan requires special exemption from the NSG, [Nuclear Suppliers Group] which China joined in 2004, as Pakistan has not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and could, therefore, divert some technology to its nuclear weapons program or to another country.

China and Pakistan disagree, pointing out that the US set a precedent by sealing a deal to sell civilian nuclear fuel and technology to India in 2006, even though Delhi had yet to sign the treaty.

That someone would sell nuclear reactors to the Pakistanis in response to the US making a joke of the NNPT was pretty much a done deal, and a predictable consequence of this decision.

I made note of this some time ago, and when my predictions prove true, it implies a level of blatantly obvious that buggers the mind.

The original deal with India was all about Bush and His Evil Minions™ wanting to reward their friends in the US domestic nuclear power industry, US interests be damned, and the consequences are potentially disastrous.

We’ll probably see a few more blips on Isao Hashimoto’s animations.

Sorry, But the Numbers Do Not Work

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The USAF is looking at an air launched missile to intercept ballistic missiles during boost phase. (paid subscription required, but you can find a shorter version here)

Raytheon is pitching something called the Network-Centric Airborne Defense Element (NCADE), a, “two-stage missile with an extended-range Amraam solid-fuel rocket motor as the first stage, a separation joint, and a second stage with a divert attitude control system and guidance-unit electronics and an AIM-9X seeker.”

It’s unclear to me what the range would be, but an AIM-9X (Sidewinder) missile seeker head does give us an idea as to the maximum speed of the missile: about Mach 2.5, about 850 m/s, because of the hemispherical seeker head at the front of the missile. (see picture of AIM-9X forebody courtesy of Wiki)

Beyond that speed, the drag, to say nothing of the heat generated, would be excessive.

It’s why higher speed radar guides missiles have a conical or ogival nose cone.

Well, if we work with the basic information for the launch performance of a Minuteman ICBM, 2 Gs at launch, this gives you 42 seconds until the ICBM is flying faster than the interceptor.

In reality, the time for the ballistic missile to reach mach 2.5 would be less, as acceleration increases as fuel is burnt.

This is not a viable interception time unless you know exactly when and where the launch is occurring, and you are close enough to make the intercept within 30 seconds from launch, about 25 km.

Also note that the Minuteman is an old missile, and newer designs, such as the now retired LGM-118A Peacekeeper, flew out faster, and were ejected from the silos with an expulsion charge at a not insignificant speed, so the interception time is realistically far less than 30 seconds.

This really does not sound to me like a viable platform.

OK, This is Simply Despicable

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One of the conflicts between the Obama administration and Congress has been the Obama administration’s “Race to the Top” education program, where the Obama has insisted this program, an unproven experiment which consists largely of bribing state education departments to attack job security for teachers.

The problems is that Congress is using pay-go, and the money isn’t there for it, so Congress cut 15% from the program, which has led to veto threats.

Well, David Obey, who is now retiring from Congress, gave an interview about how he is leaving “discontented,” and he drops a bombshell.

When the administration protested, Obey told that they needed to suggest where the budget cuts would be made, and Barack Obama and His Evil Minions™ suggested cutting food stamps, apparently because people on food stamps are getting a “good deal”:

We were told we have to offset every damn dime of [new teacher spending]. Well, it ain’t easy to find offsets, and with all due respect to the administration their first suggestion for offsets was to cut food stamps. Now they were careful not to make an official budget request, because they didn’t want to take the political heat for it, but that was the first trial balloon they sent down here. … Their line of argument was, well, the cost of food relative to what we thought it would be has come down, so people on food stamps are getting a pretty good deal in comparison to what we thought they were going to get. Well isn’t that nice. Some poor bastard is going to get a break for a change.

I am used to this administration making me nostalgic for Richard Nixon, but I am now feeling nostalgic for Dick Cheney,and I don’t like this feeling.

At least Dick Cheney was honest about being an evil rat-f%$#.

Quote of the Day

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Kevin Drum’s take may very well be accurate:

Here’s the good news: this record of progressive accomplishment officially makes Obama the most successful domestic Democratic president of the last 40 years. And here’s the bad news: this shoddy collection of centrist, watered down, corporatist sellout legislation was all it took to make Obama the most successful domestic Democratic president of the last 40 years. Take your pick.

I’m a glass half empty kind of guy myself.

Deep Thought

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Victor Stenger, noted atheist, has come up with the following ad for London buses.

Speaking as someone who is religious, I wholeheartedly agree: science does fly you to the moon, and religion does fly you into buildings.

Whatever benefits an individual, or a society, might derive from religion, there are real dangers associated with people assuming that a supreme being sanctions their actions.

I would also add that the socialist critique of religion, that it is used to maintain the power of the powerful, Karl Marx said that, “Religion is the opiate of the masses,” is yet another concern.

I would argue that most of these problems are more an artifact of religion than they are of private and personal faith, and, interestingly enough, the majority of the founding fathers, including George Washington, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson, would wholeheartedly agree on this point.

Ah, This is Obviously Some Strange Usage of the Phrase “Not an Aircraft Carrier” With Which I Was Previously Unfamiliar

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This is not an “Aviation Destroyer”
(Background)

The next generation of Japanese naval aviation will be the 22DH ships, which are the size of the Essex Class fleet carriers of World War II.

The kicker here is the fact that they are looking at deploying the F-35B STOVL fighter on the ship.

I understand why the Japanese are leery of saying that they have an aircraft carrier.

It makes them nervous.

Hell, it makes me nervous.

That being said, this is not a helicopter carrying destroyer.

In the Annals of Troubled Military Programs, This One Takes the Cake

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As I have mentioned a number of times that I spent some time working on the recovery and maintenance vehicle for the now-canceled Future Combat Systems (FCS).

Well, no matter how misbegotten, it appears that the program reappears with a different name a few years later.

Case in point is the replacement for the FCS, the Ground Combat Vehicle, GCV, which is different largely in only one area, it no longer needs to fly on a C-130, so the 20 ton maximum weight for shipping has gone by the wayside.

This is not surprising. After all replacing the 30 ton weight class M2/M3 with a vehicle with superior mobility and protection is difficult to do in ⅔ the weight of its predecessor, all while reducing the cost of operation, is a tough nut to crack.

It’s clear that they will be going with a remotely operated turret, and without the space for the gunner and commander and the turret penetration, it makes it rather simple to fix a rather prominent shortcoming of the Bradley, its inability to carry a full 9 soldier infantry squad.

So the Pentagon is are back to square, which means fighting the wheels/tracks war yet again, though it appears that the military is favoring a tracked vehicle.

The advantages of tracks are better off road mobility, better performance in an active city conflict, since it can go over a road block made from cars or trucks, and a wheeled vehicle cannot, and more volumetric efficiency, since the wheel travel is less, and you do not need to accommodate the swept volume of the wheels which pivot to steer.

The disadvantages are operating costs, noise, weight and speed on roads.

That being said, one huge advantage for tracks is that if your infantry fighting vehicle grows into a 70 ton behemoth, wheels just won’t work at all:

The U.S. Army’s chief of staff wants to put the service’s Ground Combat Vehicle program on a diet.

Gen. George Casey said he thinks the future replacement for the Bradley Fighting Vehicle needs to be much lighter than the estimated 70 tons program officials are projecting that the new GCV will weigh.
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“I keep saying, ‘Look, man, an MRAP [mine-resistant ambush-protected] is about 23 tons, and you’re telling me this is going to be 70 tons, which is the same as an [M1] Abrams. Surely we can get a level of protection between that, that is closer to the MRAP than it is the M1,’ ” Casey said June 7. “It’s not going to be a super heavyweight vehicle.”

It would also be unaffordable. I would suggest that if the army really needs a better vehicle, that it procures new-build/rebuilt Bradleys, with the crewed turret replaced with something like the CTI tele-operated turret, and with enhanced armor based on the non-homogeneous armor technologies developed for the M-1 Abrams and the original FCS program.

You would still probably end up with less than a 40 ton weight, and you would get the capability you need at a much lower cost.

Meanwhile in the somewhat less sexy areas of folding in a few drones and an advanced network-based radio called JTRS as part of what is now called the, “Brigade Combat Team Modernization, the House Armed Services Committee is cutting this because of poor performance and cost escalation.

Once again, it’s over budget, behind schedule, and not performing.

So on the little things, where the Pentagon knows what needs to be done, they are not executing, and on the big programs, they don’t have a clue as to what they want.

Count me in Barney Frank’s and Ron Paul’s corner. We need to slash military spending.

I would also add that we need to somehow or other put adults in charge of the procurement process.

Not Gonna Happen……

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Now that financial reform is due to become law, the word is that gadfly for the common folk Elizabeth Warren is the most likely candidate to head up the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CPFB, it was originally going to be a full agency called the CPFB).

This is not going to happen.

The Obama administration, particularly Timothy “The Bankers’ Bitch” Geithner, hate her.

She has embarrassed then by publicly reporting on how the TARP has been too easy on big banks, she has embarrassed them by advocating for real reform, and she has embarrassed them by lobbying aggressively for the CPFAB, which the Obama administration does not really want as a meaningful entity, because they actually believe the talking points from the finance industry about the need for “innovation”.

I should note that Something Awful is reporting that Ben Nelson asked for, and got, a veto on the head of the CPFB in exchange for his vote on financial reform, and that Nelson has flatly stated that Warren is not acceptable.

Honestly, I can see members of the protesting Nelson’s as vehemently as Br’er Rabbit asked not to be thrown into the briar patch.

It’s Bank Failure Friday!!!!

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And here they are, ordered, and numbered for the year so far.

  1. Woodlands Bank , Bluffton, SC
  2. First National Bank of the South, Spartanburg, SC
  3. Metro Bank of Dade County,Miami, FL
  4. Turnberry Bank, Aventura, FL
  5. Olde Cypress Community Bank, Clewiston, FL
  6. Mainstreet Savings Bank, FSB, Hastings, MI

Full FDIC list

Great Googly Mooogly, back up to 6 banks.

So, here is the graph pr0n with trendline (FDIC only):

I would note that are now at the point where the utility of the least squares trendline is diminishing, but I’m keeping it here for historical purposes.

Even a Stopped Clock…………

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And Alan Greenspan are actually correct every so often:

Former Federal Reserve chief Alan Greenspan believes Congress should let the tax cuts enacted by President George W. Bush expire for all Americans in order to address the widening deficit, according to a TV interview airing Friday.

“They should follow the law and let them lapse,” Greenspan told Bloomberg TV’s Judy Woodruff.

The 2001 and 2003 tax cuts are due to expire at the end of the year. President Obama had promised to make them permanent for families making less than $250,000.

As to Obama’s promise to people making less than 250K, it would necessarily involve deal cutting which would require some sort of very expensive sop to the rich, so just put this in the category of another Obama promise not kept, and let the rich pay more.

The amount saved by folks making less than 250K amounts to just a few bucks a week.

Of course, that is not what is going to happen. Instead, Obama will propose an extension on the lower income tax cuts, and then he will propose tax cuts for the wealthy, basically giving away the store at the start of negotiations, and then the Republicans, and Ben Nelson, and various Blue Dogs, will go and lard it up with more give aways for the rich, most likely give aways on interest, capital gains, and dividend income, and Obama will declare victory, and sign it.

My suggestion would be to make the proposal, and raise the marginal tax rate for folks over 250K, to something on the order of 85% for income over $10 million a year.

Start there, and you may actually get a good tax bill.

Seriously, soaking the rich is good policy and good politics.