Author: Matthew G. Saroff

Finally, Some Sanity on Security Classifications

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The Public Interest Declassification Board is calling for a streamlining of the declassification process.

Speaking as someone who has held a secret clearance*, the biggest problem is complacency, and this is driven by over-classification.

When everything you touch, even things that are ordinary and are actually publicly known, is classified, are classified, nothing is classified. It becomes background noise.

*Just in case you are wondering if the fact that a complete and total pratt like me got a secret clearance means that we are all doomed, the answer is yes.

When the Department of Defense Homeland Secrity Wants It’s Money Back, You’ve Screwed Up

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So, the Coast Guard wants to to stretch and improve some (49) patrol boats, and the contract goes out to Lockheed-Martin and Northrop-Grumman, with the former doing the new systems, and the latter doing the hulls.

Small problem though, the systems don’t work, and the stretched boats buckle and leak. What’s more they leaked more than water. They used unshielded cables on the upgrade, meaning that your average Russian fishing trawler could listen in to a secure military network.

So the Coast Guard is asking for its money back:

The U.S. Coast Guard has asked a joint venture of Lockheed Martin Corp and Northrop Grumman Corp to pay $96.1 million for eight patrol boats that it modified, but that cannot be used.

I’m shocked, but less so than if it happened on a DoD, as opposed to a DHS contract*.

The coast guard is decommissioning (basically scrapping) the boats in question, and is taking back management of the program from the LSI (see my rundown on the LSI process, and why congress is moving to ban the process, here) of the , “$24 billion, 25-year modernization program known as Deepwater”.

Wouldn’t happen in the DoD. Too many generals who plan to work their retirements with the defense contractors.

*The strikethrough in the title is irony, not a correction.

New Chinese Short Range AAM

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Ares recently posted a description of a new Chinese short range air-to-air missile.

Seeing as how I actually spent some time working in rockets and missiles (SAMs mostly) I though I’d look at their thoughts and add a few of my own:

First, the missile clearly has thrust vectoring, but it does not have any forward fins. These seem to run counter to each other.

A missile lacking forward fins typically has better long range kinematics (the ASRAAM, for example actually has beyond visual range capabilities), but the thrust vectoring shows a bias toward shorter engagement distances.

It should be noted that the fore body strakes probably contribute a quite bit to aerodynamic maneuverability, particularly at high speeds (you will note that the ASRAMM below lacks them)

The rocket motor is almost certainly relatively low thrust at launch, to allow for the vectoring paddles to work with relatively small actuators (the AIM-9X does not do this, but it is reusing an old motor). Additionally, since the thrust vectoring has little benefit at higher speeds, where aerodynamics work better, it’s likely that they are jettisoned shortly thereafter in flight.

The report states that the missile is an Imaging Infra Red system, and my guess would be that uses a scanning array, rather than a staring array (go to the Wiki link, it explains the difference fully). While there are applications where a staring array is crucial, such as astronomical devices, for AAMs, the advantages are in dispute, staring arrays are much more difficult to manufacture.

One possibility is that this is the product of South African and Chinese cooperation though, it looks a lot like the Denel A-Darter (see below). Note that the A-Darter has a 6″ diameter (166mm) as compared to the 5 inches of the Sidewinder, which implies superior kinematics because of greater fuel volume).

The Best Slashdot Post Ever

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You can read it, in all of its awfulness, here, in a discussion of a professor who bemoans the fact that students are learning Java, as opposed to “real” computer languages.

University should be about people (Score:2, Funny)
by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 08, @03:22AM (#21951018)

I’m concerned about the narrowm view of the world IT people and engineers have these days. I think the problem starts at college – There’s a culture that somehow science is more rational and usefull then the humanitities. Lecturers encourage students to joke about arts students, and humilaite them whenever possible. This encourages eliteism, and I for one am sick of it.

Let’s tell it like it is. ‘science’ is just as much about opinion as the humanities. Research simply follows the fad of the day. Take dieticians for example. These men and woman believe that just because they have degree in medical science that they are all knowing. Why, what they recommend one day may kill you the next! (see the DDT story for more information.) Science is 95% opinion then facts, lets face it. What about astrology, the most rediculious of the sciences! But I degress…

Another example is music. We know what sounds good. Everyone agreed that Valves for instance sound great. But knowitall engineers use trensastors with inferious sound quality just to save a few bucks. They argue with numbers. Hey, I don’t want to do maths just to listen to music. I know what I like. You cannot apply objective reasoning to a subject which is intristically subjective. But try telling those recent grads with their useless piece of paper that and they go all
mightier–then-thou.

The problem with you technical guys are that you are all so eliteist. Whilst you want to trun collage into a trade school with yore narrow minded views that collage should be a job training centre, Humanities are focused on making you a well rounded person who is actually interesting to be with, not a boringfocused geek. Really, it makes me so mad when people say “oh, he’s doing a humanities degree, that’s easy”. I have to read *3* *books* *a* *week* on average. Not picture books either I assue you. It is a lot of work, but the upshot is improved grammer and spelling skills that are lacking in the technical. As for those that say “you will be working at mcdonalds” , I’m going on to so a PhD in socialolgy where I’ll be line for tenure where I have a much more rewarding job then being a science freak or an engineer. Anyways, all I have to do to be a engineer wold be to get my MSCE and how hard couyld that be? Technical stuff is simply whatever fad the market thinks is hot at the moment, but all great things were done by humanities.

You technical types are far to narrow minded and cynsical. You should learn to enjoy life.

Peace be to god, he transcends all.

Ummmm….Amazing. I’ve marked all the misspellings, and least I think that I did.

Three whole books a week, huh…I’m so impressed.

FWIW, I am a product of two liberal arts majors, my dad did sociology/city planning, and my mom did English, but started in mathematics.

I respect the social sciences.

I just don’t respect this particular social scientist.

Spectacular self-ownage.

Markets Don’t Work as Predictive Instruments

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Paul Krugman has an rather interesting insight into the New Hampshire primary results, specifically he gives us this picture of the Intrade price for “Clinton wins the Democratic nomination” bidding:

These investors in this market, you know the one that is supposed to predict the future, got it completely wrong. In fact, as time went on more and more of them got it wring (the bar graphs are at the bottom). Dr. Krugman notes, “There’s no hint that the market saw either Iowa or New Hampshire coming, or knew anything beyond the bloviations of the talking heads.”

That is the little picture, but there is a bigger picture, and that is that markets are not some sort of magically predictive tool. They are simply a sort of group guessing game.

One of the arguments for the increasing use of arbitrage is that by creating derivatives, like futures market, help the economy, because of their ability to predict future market swings.

The answer is that they don’t. What more, as can be seen on an almost weekly basis, these instruments contribute to price swings, and make commodities more active, by adding another layer of profit taking on the way to market, though, to be fair, they employ no-account Harvard MBAs.

There are cases where futures markets are essential. Without the ability to buy rubber for delivery at a later date, for example, bidding on OEM tires for a car manufacturer would be risky and more expensive, but now we have entities like stock futures, which are unnecessary, make the market more volatile, and encourage speculation at the expense of investing.

The Effect of Proposition 13 On the California Real Estate Market

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A friend of mine pulled a graph from an old story in the Orange County register where they predicted that home prices were expected to fall in 2007. (Well I did say it was an old story, dated 19 October 2006.

What I found interesting was the graphic, what we can learn from it with a bit more data:

Ignoring the obvious, that they underestimated the drop like every other real estate ad supported media entity, we can learn something about the effect of Proposition 13 on the California real estate market.

Proposition 13, passed in 1987, says that a house can only be taxed at 1% of property evaluation, and that absent a sale, that the evaluation can not increase by more than 2% per year.

So that $62,290.00 house in 1977 would now be assessed, absent any intervening sale, at $112,830.00 in 2007, while the true market value would $550,000.00 in 2007.

Truth be told, it would probably be less, if just because houses are getting bigger (McMansions), so let’s call it $508,000.00.

So if you stay in the house, and improve it, and don’t down size it, and leave it to your kids, right now you will be paying 22% the taxes you would if it has been assessed at fair market value.

Under those circumstances, it makes no sense to move to a bigger house when your family gets bigger, you just add on to the existing one, and if you sell to move to a smaller house when the children move out, your profit are wiped out by the tax hike.

There are a whole bunch of people sitting on houses that they would otherwise sell, because of the tax consequences.

So less housing reaches the market, you see less of the empty nesters moving into townhouses, etc., more sprawl, and through supply and demand, prices rise.

You also have the side effect that commerical property is corporate owned, and the corporation is sold, rather than the property, which raises the burden on new home purchasers.

It’s one of the reasons that California is so screwed up.

Diner Diving

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My job shop took me out to lunch and gave some schwag, a pencil cosy, pen, and sticky pad.

They also took me out to lunch at the Silver Diner.

I like diners, I find them to be a bit of an adventure, as opposed to chains, though this is a local chain with 20 restaurants in Maryland and Virginia.

I had a burger, and it was pretty good. The shoe string fries were very nice, maybe next time I’ll do onion rigs, and the coffee was good, in a “this is a diner, not a latte house” way, which is my preference.

Both the restaurant, and my job shop are recommended, and for the latter, I’d say that even if they hadn’t just fed me.

Military Ignoring “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” At Least Until You Come Home

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Actually the soldier in question is suggesting that the Military’s policies on gays serving may be changing, because he told his CO’s that he was gay, and because he’s been out for years.

Nope:

“This particular soldier’s unit only recently returned from the war to Fort Hood, Texas, so it’s premature to speculate on any future actions until the young man’s situation can be considered by his chain of command,” Boyce said in a statement.

Translation: Now that you’ve done your tour, and we no longer need you, you will be separated, you will have no benefits, and we want that enlistment bonus back.

God, What Miserable Excuses for Human Beings

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The thing that surprises me is that it’s that this is a Maureen Dowd Op/ED, and I’m not referring to her as a miserable excuse of a human being.

When I walked into the office Monday, people were clustering around a computer to watch what they thought they would never see: Hillary Clinton with the unmistakable look of tears in her eyes.

A woman gazing at the screen was grimacing, saying it was bad. Three guys watched it over and over, drawn to the “humanized” Hillary. One reporter who covers security issues cringed. “We are at war,” he said. “Is this how she’ll talk to Kim Jong-il?”

Another reporter joked: “That crying really seemed genuine. I’ll bet she spent hours thinking about it beforehand.” He added dryly: “Crying doesn’t usually work in campaigns. Only in relationships.”

Though let me say, that MoDo does not come across as any great testimony to humanity in this article either.

Atrios calls them, “…all broken. Complete monsters”, and I’m inclined to agree.

I’m beginning to think that we should abolish Journalism schools, and go back to the old way, paperboy to copy boy to cub reporter to reporter, because the products of Journalism schools seemed to have missed “Humanity 101”.

Of course, these days, I’m not sure how you do the “copy boy” bit.

US Healthcare Sucks

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France, Japan and Australia rated best and the United States worst in new rankings focusing on preventable deaths due to treatable conditions in 19 leading industrialized nations, researchers said on Tuesday.

I am totally not surprised. The US has coasted for 50+ years on the fact that we as a nation were so damn wealthy that we could subscribe to a system that is inefficient and cruel.

That time has passed. There are transactions, healthcare being one, where the classic free market simply fails.

Whether its single payer or a National Health Service (my favorite), it’s clear that, to quote Pete Townshend, The Music Must Change.

Dewey Defeats Truman

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Let me just offer Ramesh Ponnuru, and the rest of my “friends” at the National Review a hearty:

Ha Ha!!!

BTW, with the exception of Jonah Goldberg, you folks was robbed. Bill Kriston can’t write, can’t think, and can’t get the facts straight. If the NY Times wanted a another reactionary in its OP/ED page, they could have selected someone better, though I find his first column so laughable, it amused me.

Like I’ve said before, I’m not classy. I’ve nearly broken 40 posts using the “schadenfreude” tag.

The Rep Doolittle Corruption Scandal Continues

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It appears that everyone is telling Rep. John Doolittle (R-Calif.) not to run for reelection.

They are afraid that he would turn the district blue.

I don’t know why…Hip deep in Abramhoff, at least one aide already sentenced for corruption, and…oh yeah…that bit where he’s paying his wife large sums of money to fund raise for him.

Even if the last one is not illegal, it won’t play well in November.

Run Johnny, run!!

Air Force Attempts Blackmail to Get More F-22s

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The USAF has been trying any means possible to keep the F-22 production line open.

This time, it is using the structural problems of the F-15 to do so.

Let’s be clear, this is a serious issue, but the USAF permanently grounding 180 aircraft is unnecessary.

It appears that the problem is the result of two things, the age of the airframe, and the fact that some of the longerons are defective.

That being said, the USAF personnel running around crying that the sky is falling, and so you get quotes like this:

“Do you try to patch a 25-year-old airplane that has been patched and patched and patched?” another senior Air Force official asked. “After the repairs, it will not be the same aircraft it was before.”

The answer, of course, is that it will be the same aircraft as before. The repairs are not cheap, my guess would be on the order of $200,000 to $300,000 per aircraft, and with a weight hit of somewhere between 50 and 100 kg.

Compared to something north of $150,000,000 for an F-22, it is an inexpensive solution.

One of the things that USAF is studiously quiet about is the fact that the F-15 is a superior platform for the interception of cruise missiles, because it has a larger antenna for its radar (Physics is a bitch, ain’t it).

OH MY GOD

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Rich Toscano has a post on December home prices in the San Diego Area, and if this does not scare you, are dead:

For the month of December, the size-adjusted median price was down 4.6% for single family homes, 5.8% for condos and 5.0% overall. That’s right, for the month. The graph below shows the declines from the peak.


FWIW, the housing market is collapsing from the bottom up, so the houses not selling are cheaper, and the already bad figures become even worse when corrected for square footage.

OK, the Results in New Hampshire McCain & Clinton Win

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And I’m pulling down the polling spreadsheet, you can find it here.

McCain beats Romney. I figured that it would be closer.

Clinton beats Obama. This one shocked me.

And yes, my prediction that Huckabee would break 17% was wrong.

If I continue to get my predictions this wrong, I expect a job offer from the Bush White House.

My analysis: First, I wish that Paul had out polled Giuliani. Just because Mr. 911 deserves to be humiliated, like he did to his last wife by announcing the divorce on Mother’s day at a press conference. The man is a human stain, and the only candidate out there worse than the Avignon President, and his VP, the human snarl.

The American public supported Rudy because they did not know him, but over the past 2-4 months, they have who he is, and they would sooner French kiss a cow than vote for him.

As to McCain, it must be great for the press corps to have a “man crush” on you. He’s too damn old, and he’s hated by the Evangelicals and by the Wall Street Republicans…He won’t win.

Huckabee did OK, and will crush the opposition in South Carolina, notwithstanding Freddie Thompson’s clown show line in the sand down there. He may not have the nomination locked up, but he if he does not get the nomination, he comes in 2nd.

Clinton-Obama, I don’t know where it’s going. According to exit poll reports, the older voters were what put her over the top, and so I would give her a slight edge.

I don’t know the effect of her being misty-eyed at that rally. I just saw it as her being tired and a bit overwhelmed, and so I did not comment on it, but perhaps people wanted to see her in a slightly less reserved mode.

It certainly didn’t hurt.

An interesting phenomenon can be on the front page of Josh Marshall’s TPM there were a lot of people who do not care for Clinton who were incensed at the way the press went after her. It’s only 2-3 letters but I assume that it represents at least a segment of the population.

I can’t see Edwards getting any traction unless either Obama or Clinton crash and burn, which depresses me.

With Obama, you have a content free campaign (and dog whistle gay baiting), and with Clinton you have potentially disasterous dynastic issues. We’ve already had 20 straight years of presidents Bush and Clinton, which is too damn much.

I’m in Maryland, so if my vote counts, I’ll be amazed, but I’m pulling the lever for Edwards.

DOJ Report: U.S. Civil Rights Commission Appointments Illegal

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Bush and His Evil Minions™ wanted to stack the Civil Rights commission. The problem? The law forbade any more than 4 of the 8members being of one party.

Bush’s solution was to have two of the Republicansregister as independent, and then appoint two more Republicans.

Well, now the non-partisan Congressional Research Service has reviewed the 1957 Civil Rights Act that established the commission, along with the 1983 changes designed to forstall Ronald “What me, Racist” Reagan doing what Bush just did.

In sum, the situation that precipitated Congress’ 1983 revision of the Civil Rights Commission – the presidential firing of five of the then six sitting commissioners – is arguably indistinguishable from the changes in party registrations that has effectively allowed the President to establish a majority of his political in control of the Commission. The intent of the 1983 restructuring, as confirmed by the Wilson decision, was to preclude similar juggling of the of the Commission’s statutory appointments process. In light of that history, together with the recognition of the Wilson court of the central importance of independence of the central importance of independence to the accomplishment of the Commission’s mission, it is likely that a reviewing court would find the OLC opinion unpersuasive and the recent appointments violative of the political balance requirements of the statute.

In English, it’s pretty clear that they just ignored the law because they felt like it.