Author: Matthew G. Saroff

Crap! I Was Hoping for a Cain/Colbert Victory

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Pass the Popcorn!

Newt Gingrich won the South Carolina primary by a large margin:

Former House speaker Newt Gingrich scored an easy victory Saturday in the South Carolina primary, blowing a hole in Mitt Romney’s aura of inevitability.

The 14-point win represented a swift and extraordinary turnaround in Gingrich’s fortunes — thanks largely to strong performances in two debates. In those forums, he issued a stirring appeal to the state’s strident conservatism, convinced its voters he would be a formidable opponent against President Obama and threw Romney off his stride.

I don’t think that Newt can win.

First, he really doesn’t have a campaign organization.

Second, he won South Carolina for blatant and explicit appeals to racism, because many, if not most, of the Republicans in South Carolina are unrepentant racists who give Gingrich props for, “putting Mr. Juan Williams in his place.”

He has a knack for the basest parts of the Republican id, but there are a lot of racists, outside of South Carolina anyway, who find such blatant appeals to racism to be excessive.

This is Called Circling the Drain

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It looks like yet another capability is being removed being removed from the JSF (Paid subscription required):

The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, long touted as the follow-on to the EA-18G Growler electronic attack aircraft, is no longer heir-apparent as the king of nonkinetic warfare.

The often-delayed Lockheed Martin JSF program is being more narrowly focused on its conventional attack role. Jamming is no longer a priority for the stealthy fighter. The airframes expected to carry the Next Generation Jammer (NGJ) are conventional-signature unmanned aerial systems and will be followed by stealthy unmanned designs.

The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, long touted as the follow-on to the EA-18G Growler electronic attack aircraft, is no longer heir-apparent as the king of nonkinetic warfare.

The often-delayed Lockheed Martin JSF program is being more narrowly focused on its conventional attack role. Jamming is no longer a priority for the stealthy fighter. The airframes expected to carry the Next Generation Jammer (NGJ) are conventional-signature unmanned aerial systems and will be followed by stealthy unmanned designs.

One of the sales pitches for the JSF was that it’s engine, because it carried a lot of extra hardware to drive the lift fan, which would have allowed for it to be a stealthy platform with a few dozen megawatts of capability.

The can’t make the program work, so they are removing bits to ease the cost, weight, and schedule issues.

It will eventually enter service, but it’s going to be a lot less capable than it has been billed.

Ghod What a Geekfest!

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From Halloween 2010

Charlie, my son, is going to his first cubing competition, the River Hill Winter 2012, and I am his escort / videographer. (I won’t be posting the videos, Charlie will, on his Youtube™ channel, PostalCode74.)

He’s in hog heaven, and I’m using the local WiFi to go online. We brought my laptop so that we could unload the camera’s memory card if needed.

The venue had to move at the last minute, the high school they were using got closed due to snow and freezing rain, but thankfully, there are plenty of little community centers in the Columbia area.

He showed up in his Rubik’s Cube Halloween costume, which was well received, but he is taking it off to compete.

A couple of his fellow partners in crime offered to solve him.

Defense.gov News Article: Panetta Lifts F-35 Fighter Variant Probation

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In a move that surprised no one, SecDef Leon Panetta has lifted the probation for the F-35B variant:

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has ushered the F-35B out of the penalty box, after the short-takeoff-and-vertical-landing (Stovl) version of the stealthy fighter was sidelined for poor performance for more than a year by prior Defense Secretary Robert Gates.

Standing in a hangar in front of BF-4, one of two F-35Bs to conduct testing on the USS Wasp amphibious ship last fall, Panetta spoke to a small audience of government and industry workers on the Joint Strike Fighter test team.

“We now believe that because of your work the Stovl variant is demonstrating the kind of performance and maturity that is in line with the other two variants of JSF,” Panetta said here Jan. 20. “The Stovl variant has made — I believe and all of us believe — sufficient progress so that as of today I am lifting the Stovl probation.”

……………

George Little, Panetta’s spokesman, said the secretary’s decision to lift the probation was underpinned by improvements in five key areas: structural shortcomings in the Stovl bulkhead, flutter in the auxiliary inlet door, problems in the lift-fan clutch, unexpected wear and tear on the drive shaft, and heating on the roll-post actuator.

The writer also notes that, “Thus far, the F-35B has been flown to Mach 1.4,” which must have been before one of the “A” model test articles flew to Mach 1.6, and suffered significant damage, and the entire fleet was prohibited from supersonic flight.

The fact is that the real reason for the probation, and the one that Panetta and the Pentagon have neglected to mention, is that the F-35C is still significantly over weight, and for an STOVL aircraft, that doesn’t just mean a few percent drop in performance, it means that it cannot perform its allotted missions, because it cannot make a vertical landing.

This was why the British, before switching to the catapult launched and arrested recovery F-35C, were looking at a Shipborne Rolling Vertical Landing at about 100 km/h forward speed.  They were afraid that the lack of performance would require aircraft to jettison (multimillion dollar) munitions before landing.

Those problems are still there

Full Pentagon press release after the break:

Panetta Lifts F-35 Fighter Variant Probation

By Army Sgt. 1st Class Tyrone C. Marshall Jr.
American Forces Press Service

NAVAL AIR STATION PATUXENT RIVER, Md., Jan. 20, 2012 – Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta announced today he’s lifted probation from the Short Takeoff, Vertical Landing variant of the fifth generation F-35 Lightning II joint strike fighter which is absolutely vital to maintaining air superiority.

Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta and U.S. Rep. Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland look at the cockpit of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter with Navy Capt. Erik “Rock” Etz on Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Md., Jan. 20, 2012. Panetta and Hoyer toured several facilities related to the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, which is in its test phases at the base. DOD photo by Erin A. Kirk-Cuomo
(Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available.!

Speaking during a town hall-style meeting here, the defense secretary discussed the latest development in the progress of the joint strike fighter program as service members, politicians and the civilian workforce listened.

“Early in 2011 DOD was compelled to put [the Short Takeoff and Vertical Landing] … on probation,” he said.

“Over the course of last year, you here at Pax River helped make an incredible difference by completing tremendous amounts of STOVL testing,” Panetta noted. “You demonstrated that we’ve made real progress towards fixing some of the known problems that we had with STOVL.”

Panetta lauded the joint strike fighter’s workforce at NAS Patuxent River for their efforts to bring the STOVL variant up to the standards of the two other existing versions of the F-35, the Conventional Takeoff and Landing and Carrier Variant.

“We now believe that because of your work, that the STOVL variant is demonstrating the kind of performance and maturity that is in line with the other two variants of the JSF,” Panetta said.

“As a result of your hard work and the hard work of JSF’s government and industry team … the STOVL variant has made, I believe and all of us believe, sufficient progress so that as of today, I am lifting the STOVL probation,” he announced.

Panetta commended the crowd for their hard work, but cautioned that the JSF program still has more work to do. “We’ve got a long way to go with the JSF testing, and it’s obviously not out of the woods yet,” he said.

“But I am confident that if we continue to do the hard work necessary … that both the Carrier and the STOVL Variant are going to be ready for operations and are going to be ready for doing the work that they have to do, which is to help protect this country,” Panetta said.

“I want you all to know that as secretary of defense, my department is committed to the development of the F-35,” he said. “It’s absolutely critical … that we get it right. And that’s why you’re here. The developmental testing that’s going on here will ensure that we get this right.”

Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James F. Amos called Panetta’s decision to lift the probation of the F-35B “hard-earned.”

“Secretary Panetta’s decision to take the F-35B Lightning II Short Takeoff, Vertical Landing variant off probation was a hard-earned and rewarding announcement for the entire DOD/industry team that worked very hard last year,” he said.

“Successful F-35B performance ashore and at sea has very positively advanced the state of demonstrated capability in 2011,” Amos said. “The positive momentum generated during 2011 will continue as testing proceeds, production aircraft are delivered, and fleet training begins in 2012.”

Panetta said it is important that the U.S. military maintains its technological edge into the future.
“That’s where we have to be,” he said. “We’re going to have a strong defense; we have got to be there.”

Panetta praised the capabilities of Patuxent’s workforce.

“Because of you, because of the very unique testing and capabilities that are offered here, we are able to maintain that technological edge,” Panetta said. “And I want to thank you again for your dedication, for your commitment, for your great skills.”

Panetta lauded the Patuxent River installation calling it “a very unique facility” and “a national treasure” that is important to maintain.

“These are world-class facilities … that [are] important to our military, important to our men and women in uniform who have to put their lives on the line, and it’s important to our national security,” Panetta said.

“Please accept my deepest thanks for your work and dedication,” he said. “I couldn’t do it without you.”

It’s Bank Failure Friday!!!!

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We now have the first bank closings of the year by the FDIC.

It’s a pretty busy week, 3 closings, but the last time that banks were closed was December 23, 4 weeks ago, so overall, it’s been pretty sparse, even with the holiday doldrums.

So far, it looks OK, but it’s not enough data to make any sort of projections.
And here they are, ordered, and numbered for the year so far.

  1. Central Florida State Bank, Belleview, FL
  2. The First State Bank, Stockbridge, FL
  3. American Eagle Savings Bank, Boothwyn, PA

Full FDIC list

So, here is the graph pr0n with last years numbers for comparison (FDIC only):

And here is the detail, since it is early in the year:

Props to Obama

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He told the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops to go Cheney themselves, and he approved a rule that requires employers to cover birth control in their insurance under almost all circumstances:

Today, in a huge victory for women’s health, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced that most employers will be required to cover contraception in their health plans, along with other preventive services, with no cost-sharing such as co-pays or deductibles. This means that after years of trying to get birth control covered to the same extent that health plans cover Viagra, our country will finally have nearly universal coverage of contraception.

Opponents of contraception had lobbied hard for a broad exemption that would have allowed any religiously-affiliated employer to opt out of providing such coverage. Fortunately, the Obama administration rejected that push and decided to maintain the narrow religious exemption that it initially proposed. Only houses of worship and other religious nonprofits that primarily employ and serve people of the same faith will be exempt. Religiously-affiliated employers who do not qualify for the exemption and are not currently offering contraceptive coverage may apply for transitional relief for a one-year period to give them time to determine how to comply with the rule.

Twenty-eight states already require employers, including most religiously affiliated institutions, to cover contraception in their health plans. The only change is that now they must cover the full cost.

I’m truly shocked.

I expected them to split the baby yet again, and cave to the anti-abortion zealots.

I’m not sure if this is an outbreak of good policy making, or if it’s just because it’s an elections year, but I’ll take it.

Quote of the Day

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Warren and Brown are jockeying back and forth on the best method of keeping outside groups out of their race. Here’s a novel concept: Both candidates could just buy up all the television air time themselves. After all, based on their ludicrous fundraising pace, it looks like they’ll be able to afford it.

—Reid Wilson upon observing that Elizabeth Warren had a 24-hour money bomb that raised over $1 million

Meh

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I just watched the Nightline interview with Marianne Gingrich, Newt’s 2nd wife, where she alleges that Newt, when caught in the affair, asked her to have an open marriage, and bedded future 3rd wife Callista in her (Marianne’s) bed:

Newt Gingrich lacks the moral character to serve as President, his second ex-wife Marianne told ABC News, saying his campaign positions on the sanctity of marriage and the importance of family values do not square with what she saw during their 18 years of marriage.

In her first television interview since the 1999 divorce, to be broadcast tonight on Nightline, Marianne Gingrich, a self-described conservative Republican, said she is coming forward now so voters can know what she knows about Gingrich.

In her most provocative comments, the ex-Mrs. Gingrich said Newt sought an “open marriage” arrangement so he could have a mistress and a wife.

I was hoping for a bit more. 

This is basically old news, and it wasn’t particularly squicky.

About the only thing that surprised me was that Gingrich wasn’t even man enough to deny it himself.  He peddled his daughters (by his first wife) to ABC to issue the denials.

In the short term, I expect it to help him in South Carolina, because the ‘wingers there will assume that it is an artifact of some sort of liberal conspiracy, as opposed to Newt just being a contemptible hypocrite.

Did the CFTC Just Call Louis Freeh’s Corrupt?

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Because this sounds a lot like them saying that he is either corrupt or criminally incompetent:

MF Global Inc. (MFGLQ) commodity customers must be paid before all other claimants, including the bankrupt parent company, according to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

Court papers by the trustee for MF Global Holdings Ltd., Louis Freeh, contain “errors and misstatements of law” in arguing that commodity laws, which require that customers be “made whole” first, don’t apply to brokerage liquidations, the regulator said in a court filing today. Freeh, representing the parent company creditors, has said money due to them shouldn’t be “diverted” to customers.

If Freeh was right, “the senseless result would be to render inapplicable the key regulations of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission in the largest commodity broker bankruptcy in U.S. history,” the CFTC said. The result would “strip” customers of a remedy, after they entrusted their assets to the brokerage relying on rules for segregating customer money, it said.

What is going on here is that someone *cough* JP Morgan Chase *cough* looted customer accounts as MF Global as the company circled the drain, and they hired Freeh to cover up the theft.

Here’s an analogy about US law for former judge and FBI director Freeh:  If you buy a stolen car, you don’t get to keep it.

Am I the only one who thinks that not only is Freeh is being paid to cover up for the thieves who plundered this company in its final days, but that he’s being completely incompetent about covering their tracks.

H/t Atrios.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot??!!??!!??

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OK, I get the optics.

Having Obama give his nomination acceptance speech in a huge outdoor stadium, with a much louder and more enthusiastic crowd, as he did in 2008.

It gives his speech more excitement.

I get it.

But to give the speech in Bank of America Stadium?!?!?!?

First, he chooses an anti-union right to work state, and now he’s testifying in an edifice named after a bank?

And it’s not just a bank.  It’s one of the “too big to fail” banks that got billions (trillions?) in taxpayer bailouts.

Great googly moogly!

Jon Stewart is the Best Journalist in America

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Brilliant!

Stewart looks at Foxconn and what it does to its workers in order to make the iPhone.

He plays it for laughs, but he absolutely nails just how horrific the conditions are, and how little we actually save for the pain that we inflict.

He takes a complex issue, researches it, provides documentary evidence, and puts it all in context better than anyone in the news media today.

He is a national treasure.

So, the Keystone XL Pipeline Is On Hold

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The ‘Phants forced a decision in the payroll tax bill, and so he denied the application:

President Obama on Wednesday rejected, for now, the proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline, saying the $7 billion project could not be adequately reviewed within the 60-day deadline set by Congress. While the president’s action does not preclude later approval of the project, it sets up a baldly partisan fight over energy, jobs and regulation that will most likely persist through the November election.

The president said his hand had been forced by Republicans in Congress, who inserted a provision in the temporary payroll tax cut bill passed in December giving the administration only until Feb. 21 to decide the fate of the 1,700-mile pipeline, which would stretch from oil sands formations in Alberta to refineries on the Gulf Coast.

The State Department, which has authority over the project because it crosses an international border, said there was not enough time to draw a new route for the pipeline and assess the potential environmental harm to sensitive grasslands and aquifers along its path. The agency recommended that the permit be denied, and Mr. Obama concurred.

“As the State Department made clear last month,” the president said in a statement, “the rushed and arbitrary deadline insisted on by Congressional Republicans prevented a full assessment of the pipeline’s impact, especially the health and safety of the American people, as well as our environment.”

The Republicans think that they have an issue, but it will be long forgotten by election time.

As to the final outcome, it will be approved after the election, and Obama will tweak the route a bit, and claim some sort of post partisan victory, all while basically selling out to big oil.

And as SOPA/PIPA Goes Down, the Supreme Court Decides to F%$# the Concept of Public Domain

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The Supreme Court just ruled that the public domain can be taken away whenever Congress wants to:

We’ve been talking about the Golan case, and its possible impact on culture, for years. If you’re unfamiliar with it, it’s the third in a line of cases, starting with the Eldred case, to challenge aspects of copyright law as violating the First Amendment. The key point in the case was questioning whether or not the US could take works out of the public domain and put them under copyright. The US had argued it needed to do this under a trade agreement to make other countries respect our copyrights. Of course, for those who were making use of those public domain works, it sure seemed like a way to unfairly lock up works that belonged to the public. It was difficult to see how retroactively taking works out of the public domain could fit into the traditional contours of copyright law… but today, on the day of the big SOPA/PIPA protests… that’s exactly what happened (pdf).

The ruling is ridiculously depressing. The Justices basically just keep repeating the mantra they first set forth in Eldred, that as long as Congress says it’s okay — and that the “fair use” and the “idea/expression” dichotomy remain — all is just dandy. They also claim that since the very first copyright law took works from the public domain and gave them copyright protection, clearly there’s nothing wrong with removing works from the public domain. This decision reinforces why the Eldred decision was a complete disaster, and just keeps getting worse. The Eldred ruling basically ignored the fact that copyright had changed entirely in a way that went against the First Amendment… by retroactively granting copyright extension. Now that ruling is being used to take works out of the public domain as well.

First, as with Eldred (and the second case in the trilogy, the Kahle case), I believe that the Court is greatly mistaken in its analysis of copyright law. First it claims that there’s little fight between copyright and the First Amendment because the two things were put in place at about the same time. That’s a specious argument for a variety of reasons. First, the original copyright law was significantly limited in a way that it was unlikely to really come into conflict with the First Amendment. It was limited to just a few specific areas, and for a very short period of time. It’s only now that (1) copyright law has been totally flipped to make just about everything you create covered by copyright, (2) the law has been massively expanded in time and (3) changes in technology make us all create tons of “copyrighted” material all the time — things have changed an entirely. It’s hard to see how the Court can reasonably argue that the traditional contours of copyright law have not changed… but that’s exactly what it does. Stunningly, the majority decision here, written by Justice Ginsburg, seems to suggest that there’s no First Amendment issue here, because if people want to make use of the works that were previously, but are no longer, in the public domain, they can just buy those rights:

This ruling sucks wet farts from dead pigeons.

IP increasingly resembles the Enclosure Acts in England, with a similar outcome. The ordinary people get f%$#ed, and the nobility makes out like raped apes.

Needless to say, this does not serve, “To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts,” as the constitution states.

Oh My F%$#ing Ghod!

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The Obama administration is floating Larry Summers as the next head of the World Bank:

President Barack Obama may put his mark on the World Bank by nominating Lawrence Summers, his former National Economic Council director, to lead the bank when Robert Zoellick’s term expires later this year, according to two people familiar with the matter.

While a Summers nomination may draw criticism from some Democrats who disagree with his past stances on deregulating the financial industry, he has support inside the administration from top officials, including Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and current NEC Director Gene Sperling, said one of the people.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is also being considered, along with other candidates, said the other person. Both spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal White House deliberations.

Larry Summers’ record was too toxic for Obama to nominate him as secretary of the treasury, and the parts of his record that aren’t rife with incompetence or corruption show that he is completely incapable of operating in an environment like the World bank, which requires consensus.

There is no eleventy dimensional chess.  This is just stupid and arrogant.

H/t Felix Salmon.

It’s Been the SOPA/PIPA Protest Day Today

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Click for full size


Wikipedia Went Dark

Well, it looks like the rent seekers who normally win this stuff (the “Mickey Mouse” Sonny Bono Copyright Act anyone?) are getting at least a temporary brush-back over their attempt to turn the internet into a gated community:

When the powerful world of Old Media mobilized to win passage of an online antipiracy bill, it marshaled the reliable giants of K Street — the United States Chamber of Commerce, the Recording Industry Association of America, and of course, the motion picture lobby, with its new chairman, former Senator Christopher J. Dodd, the Connecticut Democrat and an insider’s insider.

Yet on Wednesday this formidable Old Guard was forced to make way for the new as Web powerhouses backed by Internet activists rallied opposition to the legislation through Internet blackouts and cascading criticism, sending an unmistakable message to lawmakers grappling with new media issues: Don’t mess with the Internet.

As a result, the legislative battle over two once-obscure bills to combat the looting of American movies, music, books and writing on the World Wide Web may prove to be a turning point for the way business is done in Washington. It represented a moment when the new economy rose up against the old.

“I think it is an important moment in the Capitol,” said Representative Zoe Lofgren, Democrat of California and an important opponent of the antipiracy legislation. “Too often, legislation is about competing business interests. This is way beyond that. This is individual citizens rising up.”

Legislation that just weeks ago had overwhelming bipartisan support and had provoked little scrutiny generated a grass-roots coalition on the left and the right. Wikipedia made its English-language content unavailable, replaced with a warning: “Right now, the U.S. Congress is considering legislation that could fatally damage the free and open Internet.” Visitors to Reddit found the site offline in protest. Google’s home page was scarred by a menacing black swatch that blotted out the search engine’s label.

Phone calls and e-mails poured in to Congressional offices against the Stop Online Piracy Act in the House and the Protect I.P. Act in the Senate. One by one, prominent backers of the bills dropped off.

It should be noted that the Republicans are walking away from this faster than the Democrats.

Even Orrin Hatch, the MPAA and RIAA’s bitch,* has withdrawn his support of the bill.

BTW, this debacle is largely the fault of the entertainment industry, because until now they have refused to meet with the tech companies to work out differences, though they are begging for that now.

Here’s a suggestion to the tech companies:  keep your boot on the MPAA’s.

You’ll be doing them a favor.  You might remember then MPAA chair Jack Valenti claiming that the VCR would destroy the studios, when the video rental revenues actually saved their bacon.

Here’s a thought to the unproductive leeches who are entertainment executives, whose business, after all is to rip off the artists who actually produce this stuff:  Do less cocaine, fire your worthless brothers-in-law, and invest in treating the actual creative people, and in producing better content.

*For which he has been richly paid through record contracts from the labels.

Like a Bad Penny

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Un-Dirty-Word Believable

She keeps coming back.

Sarah Palin has endorsed Newt Gingrich, and Newt Gingrich has said that Sarah Palin would have a “major roll” in his administration:

Newt Gingrich said Wednesday he would consider former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin for a “major role” in his administration if he is elected president.

“Certainly, she’s one of the people I’d call on for advice. I would ask her to consider taking a major role in the next administration if I’m president,” Gingrich said on CNN. He added that he has not discussed the idea with Palin, who he called “a very good reform governor.”

Palin told Fox News on Tuesday that she would vote for Gingrich in South Carolina “in order to keep this thing going.”

Palin has not endorsed a candidate in the Republican race, and her comments Tuesday weren’t exactly an endorsement either, although Gingrich characterized them that way on CNN.

You see, Sarah Palin is saying that the problem is that in 2008, there was a candidate who was not properly vetted (@ about 1:10 in the vid), and she’s referring to Barack Hussein Obama, not Sarah Louise Heath Palin.

Who says that Irony is dead?

It’s A Start

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Love the mug shot

You know, it’s refreshing when a billionaire ignores a judge, and the judge throws his ass in jail:

The elderly billionaire owner of Detroit’s Ambassador Bridge has been jailed today for failing to meet court-ordered deadlines on a multimillion dollar construction project.

Manuel ‘Matty’ Moroun, along with company president Dan Stamper, has been sent to jail until his company complies with a 2010 court order to get the work on the $230m Gateway project done.

It is not yet clear how long the men will stay behind bars, but the work could take up to a year.

Well, were freed on appeal, so they only spent one night in the clink.

That being said, I want Wayne County Judge Prentis Edwards on the Supreme Court.

Ha Ha!

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The latest PPP (pp)polling, Rick Perry is in third place in Texas.

Normally, even in losing a Presidential primary contest, one tends to pick up a bit of stature both locally and nationally, in the case of Rick Perry, I think that it may very well have destroyed his future prospects in the state.

Rick Perry has three big problems: Collapsing poll numbers, worse debate performance than J. Danforth Quayle, and … let’s see … I can’t … The third one, I can’t … Oops.