Author: Matthew G. Saroff

The Truth About the Surge: It’s Ethinc Cleansing

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A study of satellite imagery, finding vacant houses by the absence of lights noted that ethnic cleansing was essentially complete by the time that the surge began, and is in fact a major reason for the reduction of ethnic violence. (see here and here)

“Our findings suggest that the surge has had no observable effect, except insofar as it has helped to provide a seal of approval for a process of ethno-sectarian neighborhood homogenization that is now largely achieved,” Agnew’s team wrote in their report.

(emphasis mine)

Heck of a surge, Davie.

So Sambo Beat the Bitch!

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That’s what Sarah Palin is reported to have said about the end of the Democratic primary fight this year, among other bits of casual bigotry:

Besides insulting Obama with a Step-N’-Fetch-It, “darkie musical” swipe, people who know her say she refers regularly to Alaska’s Aboriginal people as “Arctic Arabs” – how efficient, lumping two apparently undesirable groups into one ugly description – as well as the more colourful “mukluks” along with the totally unimaginative “f**king Eskimo’s,” according to a number of Alaskans and Wasillians interviewed for this article.

FWIW, this does not surprise me.

While I have very little in the way of first hand recollections of bigotry in Alaska, (I actually have fond memories of living there, I left there just before I turned 7 in 1969), my mother occasionally related a story about her brush with movie making, specifically a movie called Joniko and the Kush Ta Ta, which was a fairly standard wilderness adventure, where a kid has to travel a great distance in a boat to get help for an injured man, and faces an Tlingit* equivalent of a demon known as the Kush Ta Ta (or maybe it’s his imagination) along the way.

In any case, the child actor playing Joniko, Tony Tucker Williams, broke his arm, and they needed a stunt double, and somehow or other my mother got a call, there were only about 400K people in the state at the time, so it was a small place, from a local working for the production, asking if she knew of a “breed” about 12 years old or so who could work as a stunt double, as the “full bloods” weren’t photogenic.

These attitudes are not, or at least were not, that common in the late 1960s, and I don’t imagine that the oil wealth entering the state has helped, if the House of Saud is any example.

*Don’t call a Tlingit an Eskimo, it would be viewed in the same manner as someone calling a Spaniard a Frenchman, which is to say not well at all.

I Wish This Were My Congresscritter

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Matt Stoller, of Open Left, got the following missive from an unnamed Congressman:

Paulsen and congressional Republicans, or the few that will actually vote for this (most will be unwilling to take responsibility for the consequences of their policies), have said that there can’t be any “add ons,” or addition provisions. F$#@ that. I don’t really want to trigger a world wide depression (that’s not hyperbole, that’s a distinct possibility), but I’m not voting for a blank check for $700 billion for those mother f$#@ers.

Nancy said she wanted to include the second “stimulus” package that the Bush Administration and congressional Republicans have blocked. I don’t want to trade a $700 billion dollar giveaway to the most unsympathetic human beings on the planet for a few f$#@ing bridges. I want reforms of the industry, and I want it to be as punitive as possible.

Henry Waxman has suggested corporate government reforms, including CEO compensation, as the price for this. Some members have publicly suggested allowing modification of mortgages in bankruptcy, and the House Judiciary Committee staff is also very interested in that. That’s a real possibility.

We may strip out all the gives to industry in the predatory mortgage lending bill that the House passed last November, which hasn’t budged in the Senate, and include that in the bill. There are other ideas on the table but they are going to be tough to work out before next week.

I also find myself drawn to provisions that would serve no useful purpose except to insult the industry, like requiring the CEOs, CFOs and the chair of the board of any entity that sells mortgage related securities to the Treasury Department to certify that they have completed an approved course in credit counseling. That is now required of consumers filing bankruptcy to make sure they feel properly humiliated for being head over heels in debt, although most lost control of their finances because of a serious illness in the family. That would just be petty and childish, and completely in character for me.

I’m open to other ideas, and I am looking for volunteers who want to hold the sons of bitches so I can beat the crap out of them.

Making a Bad Situation Worse

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Well, it appears that the American House fetish and the lobbying of predatory realtors is getting results, as the House Financial Services Committee has approved the markup of H.R. 6694, which re-institutes the insane downpayment assistance program, in which sellers make a payment to non-profits, plus a “service charge”, and the non profits “gift” this to a potential home buyer, so that they can qualify for a FHA loan.

Typical scenario: a home owner has a buyer who has no downpayment for a $100K house, so the home seller “donates” $6000 to to a “non-profit” group, which takes a $500 fee, and “gifts” the remainder to the home buyer, so the home buyer now buys the house at $106,000, which the FHA recognizes as 5% down, and so qualifies for a loan.

Of course, the buyer has still put no money down, and they owe more on the mortgate, and the statistics show a much higher default rate.

It does not put people in houses. It creates a default/foreclosure timebomb.

Foreign Relations Committee Tells Condi to Go Cheney Herself

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Condoleeza Rice has negotiated agreements with the UK and Australia to allow for smoother transfers of defense technologies between the nations, as ITAR (International Traffic in Arms Regulations) can be a rather ponderous apparatus.

After repeated delays in the State Department supplying information regarding the impact of these treaties on existing statute, U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee has decided to defer consideration of the compacts until after Bush and His Evil Minions&trade are out of office.

Payback is a bitch, bitch.

The Cause of the 777 Crash at Heathrow

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BA038 crashed when it lost power on descent on January 17 of this year, and it appears now that the problem was caused by ice accumulation in the fuel system impeding fuel flow.

It flew over Siberia at relatively high altitudes and low fuel flows, and so ice accumulated, and when the throttle was added during descent, ice broke loose, and plugged the fuel lines.

If it wasn’t a one in a million thing, it was close.

It’s an interesting read.

Replacing the M16/M4 and Possibly the 5.56 Round

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Well, this is one of those issues that leads to heated discussions, so let’s start with my position:

The 5.56 round is just find, and any lethality issues are an artifact that the barrel on the M4 carbine, at 14.5 inches, is too short. The M-16 with its 20 inch barrel does not have the lethality issues.

The solution is to replace the M4 with a Bullpup design with a barrel length of at least 18 inches.

Such a design will still be shorter than the M4, and hence easier to handle in enclosed spaces, such as city warfare.

I would also go with a piston arrangement, as opposed to a gas tube, which to bring too much fouling.

‘Nuff said.

In any case, the Army is now looking at an M4 replacement, and is considering going with something like a 6.5mm or 6.8mm round.

This has all the hallmarks of a fiasco to my mind though. They are bidding a new weapon and allowing for a new caliber at the same time, which means that they will not really be able to compare apples to apples.

It should be interesting on the boards for a while though as various gun religions engage in Jihad.

Boo Yah!!!!

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I was reading this article about the spate of aerial encounters between Russian bombers and NATO aircraft, and it appears that it gets pilots pumped up on both sides.

Regardless of the political fallout of the situation, pilots on both sides just love this stuff.

In any case, a commenter at this article, after noting that the Russian pilots get only about $800/month, said something very wise:

[R]ather than build JSF or Raptors, why not just take that money, and recruit Russian pilots away? We can move them into foreclosed condo’s down in So Beach, pay them twice what they make, and I think save the American Taxpayer a ton of money.

Very wise.

Malaysia Looking at Airborne Radar Purchase

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When you consider their airforce, a mix of MiG-29s, Su-30 MKMs, and F-18s, it seems inevitable that they would start to consider some sort of airborne command and control capability, particularly given Thailand’s purchase of Saab’s Erieye, Australia’s oft delayed Wedgetail, and Singapore’s E-2Cs and future deliveries of Phalcons.

I think that over the next few years, we will see a lot posturing, both on the part of the Malaysians and on the part of the companies who want to make a sale to them.

Boeing Shows off Bomber Proposal at AFA Convention

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So, now we have some models of the competing Boeing and Northrop Grumman concepts to compare:

Boeing Above

Northrop Grumman Above

Both are clearly designed with stealth in mind, and Boeing’s design is rather similar to the B-2, though they have made comments about laminar flow designs to reduce drag. The outer wings, given their narrow chord would likely be laminar flow naturally.

N-G’s design looks as if it would more easily accommodate a large weapons bay, which might make it easier to carry ultra heavy bunker busters.

Based on my estimates of scale, both appear to carry less in the way of bombs than a B-52 (20-30 tons), and more in line with something along the line of the B-47 (10-15 tons).

My guess is that given miniaturization of nuclear weapons, and the available of relatively small guided weapons, a larger capacity is considered redundant.

The Undeniable Lightness of Being a Rich Pig

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We are now seeing sob stories out of Wall Street like this:

‘A lot of those people will have to sell their homes, they’re going to cut back on the private jets and the vacations. They may even have to take their kids out of private school,’ said Frank. ‘It’s a total reworking of their lifestyle.’

He added that it’s going to be no easy task.

‘It’s going to be very hard psychologically for these people,’ Frank said. ‘I talked to one guy who had to give up his private jet recently. And he said of all the trials in his life, giving that up was the hardest thing he’s ever done.’

The Chinese have the right idea: A bullet to the back of the head for the folks who managed this fiasco.

H/T Kevin Drum.