Category Archives: Mail

Mail 764 Friday, March 01, 2013

Sequester

Jerry,

A sequester reminder – the sequester’s 7.9% cut in Defense spending is on top of last year’s pre-sequester 8% cut in Defense. The first was absorbed in relatively good grace. This one won’t be, and we will regret it in the long term — if not the short term.

There are certainly ways to mitigate the effects, but I have no doubt that the current Administration’s, to put it kindly, defense mismanagement (what even Bob Woodward has called "madness") will assure that the impact to our defense preparations is even greater than the combined percentage of Defense cuts would suggest.

J

Yes but until we decide just what we are to defend and why, it might be better to stand down, finance X projects, and wait to see what kind of military we need. I do not care to have a splendid army which must then be used to intervene in places we should not be in. As in Balkans

Jerry Pournelle

Chaos Manor

I don’t dispute that as a potentially viable strategy – but the administration is downsizing x projects first.

Dr Pournelle

I thought about the award of Purple Hearts to Hassan’s victims. Without going into details, I can see that such awards would create problems for Hassan’s prosecution. What I do not understand is why the prosecution is taking so long. Hassan should have danced the Danny Deever years ago.

Live long and prosper

h lynn keith

Major Hassan was taken in the act of levying wear against the United States, which is the Constitutional definition of treason. There were two witnesses to the overt act. It is a prima facie case, and the only defense would be insanity. An insanity plea by a psychiatrist is going to be difficult and it is actually unlikely. The gallows can be erected outside the court room. Of he can be shot to death by musketry. The entire procedure need not take longer than a day.

Purple Hearts at Ft Hood

Jerry,

I offer a couple more questions about the Ft. Hood incident?

Sergeant Houst writes:

The actions of Major Hasan that led to the deaths and injuries of soldiers at Fort Hood fall within the category of criminal attack, not combat. As such, his actions are considered equivalent to "fragging". Fraggings are neither enemy nor friendly fire related even if the motivation for the ‘fragging’ was due to a real-time or previous enemy-related situation; and as such, not eligible for the Purple Heart.

I assume that if a soldier had shot up several comrades in arms at a military base during WWII that the he would be charged with murder under the Articles of War and his victims would not have been eligible for purple hearts. So what if he had shouted "Heil Hitler" prior to opening fire? Would he be shot as a spy or tried as a murderer?

Would the answer to this question determine whether his victims received Purple Hearts? I gave WWII as an example since it was a declared war, but I see the UCMJ was passed in 1950. My question isn’t intended to be about arcane difference in military justice before or after 1950, but about how we define enemy action during a war.

The situation is even more complicated now because we are engaged in a war with terror. We still don’t necessarily have a great handle on how to treat "operations other than war", as we have seen with recent concerns about who authorizes drone attacks. Can we ever defeat terror? I’m pretty sure that terror can’t sign a treaty of surrender on the deck of a battleship.

Mike Johns

Fragging is an act of mutiny. I will confess to not knowing much about the UCMJ. We had the Articles of War, and they were read to the troops every four weeks.

“ART. 66. MUTINY OR SEDITION.–Any person subject to military law who attempts to create or who begins, excites, causes, or joins in any mutiny or sedition in any company, party, post, camp, detachment, guard, or other command shall suffer death or such other punishment as a court-martial may direct.

“ART. 67. FAILURE TO SUPPRESS MUTINY OR SEDITION.–Ay officer or soldier who, being present at any mutiny or sedition, does not use his utmost endeavor to suppress the same, or knowing or having reason to believe that a mutiny or sedition is to take place, does not without delay give information thereof to his commanding officer shall suffer death or such other punishment as a court-martial may direct.”

I suppose the UCMJ is a bit more lenient. I prefer the old Articles of War.

As to how we know when terror is defeated, we probably do not, but the war ends when Congress declares that it is ended. It is not good for a Republic to be in a continuous state of war. The gates of the Temple of Janus were closed only twice in the days of the Republic, but three times under Augustus. The normal state for the United States is peacetime, and it should return to that.

Major Comet Impact On Mars Possible Next Year

Jerry,

Via Instapundit, this story on a recently discovered large comet that will be doing a close pass by Mars in October 2014. The comet’s diameter and course are still not precisely known – it could hit Mars, and if it does it’ll be a major impact, what would be an "extinction-level event" if it happened on Earth. Even if it does miss, it should be spectacular, at least as observed by the various Mars probes.

http://astronomyaggregator.com/solar-system/large-comet-to-buzz-mars-impact-possible/

Henry

Which should be interesting.

Subj: Valve: A Video-Game company run on anarcho-syndicalist principles

http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2013/02/varoufakis_on_v.html

>>Yanis Varoufakis of the University of Athens, the University of Texas, and the economist-in-residence at Valve Software talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the unusual structure of the workplace at Valve. Valve, a software company that creates online video games, has no hierarchy or bosses. Teams of software designers join spontaneously to create and ship video games without any top-down supervision. Varoufakis discusses the economics of this Hayekian workplace and how it actually functions alongside Steam–an open gaming platform created by Valve. The conversation concludes with a discussion of the economic crisis in Europe. <<

Rod Montgomery==monty@starfief.com

A variant on this management scheme is one in which all the officers are equal and use a matrix management system, and the troops are in much the same situation. There have been feudal periods in which something like this happened. The management madness of the last century wasn’t always so.

Apollo 16: Driving on the Moon

Jerry

From NASA, in their glory days: What would it be like to drive on the Moon? You don’t have to guess — humans have actually done it:

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap130129.html

This video is way cool.

Ed

They Know What You’re Shopping For –

Jerry

We have no privacy:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324784404578143144132736214.html?mod=djemalertTECH

This one is not behind the paywall.

Ed

Subject: Buckyballs going away.

Another sad case of regulation run rampant. Probably marbles are next.

http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2012/11/02/magnetic-buckyballs-toys-discontinued/

http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/02/tech/web/apparently-this-matters-buckyballs/index.html?hpt=hp_bn5

Tracy

John W Gardner Quote

Jerry,

I was so intrigued by the quote Mike Flynn referenced, I sourced it. The actual quote is a tad longer, but the short form Mr. Flynn sent in is an excellent condensed version.

The quote is from John W. Gardner’s "Excellence: Can We Be Equal and Excellent Too?" (W.W. Norton & Company, 1961) pages 101-102 (it is still in print)

"We must expect students to strive for excellence in terms of the kind of excellence that is within their reach. Here we must recognize that there may be excellence or shoddiness in every line of human endeavor. We must learn to honor excellence in every socially accepted human activity, however humble the activity, and to scorn shoddiness, however exalted the activity. An excellent plumber is infinitely more admirable than an incompetent philosopher. The society that scorns excellence in plumbing because plumbing is a humble activity and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy because it is an exalted activity will have neither good plumbing nor good philosophy. Neither its pipes nor its theories will hold water."

Humble of course is "low in stature." This says more about our culture than it does about the skilled trades such as plumbing. I have many friends who are excellent in the crafts. They make a decent living and seem to be happier than most. I think this is because they see and feel the results of their efforts immediately. The most skilled seem to fare better in rough times since the wealthy do appreciate skilled work and are willing and able to pay for such work.

My friends in the trades have told me quite directly and with good humor the things they will allow me to do in my home. They said anything else will waste my time and effort and will have to be redone. They prefer to do work right the first time, rather than resolve a mess made worse.

An apropos quote on obtaining excellence from Will Durant, page 61, The Story of Philosophy (also in print)

Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have those because we have acted rightly; ‘these virtues are formed in man by his doing the actions’ [1]; we are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit: ‘the good of man is a working of the soul in the way of excellence in a complete life; … for as it is not one swallow of one fine day that makes a spring, so it is not one day or a short time that makes a man blessed and happy.’ [2]"

[1] Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, ii, 4

[2] Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, i, 7

Regards, Charles Adams, Bellevue, NE

Of course no one reads Aristotle now. We are supposedly so far past that… You can see the results all around us.

More Bob Woodward on the origin of the sequestration plan

http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-02-22/opinions/37238840_1_jack-lew-treasury-secretary-rob-nabors

the automatic spending cuts were initiated by the White House and were the brainchild of Lew and White House congressional relations chief Rob Nabors

Regards,

John Harlow

Oscar and the First Lady

That posting did it for me.

I will continue to read your fiction, but your columns and/or social commentary have degraded to the point where I question whether you are really compos mentis.

I always though of you as a straight shooter, dealing from an evidence based deck (if I may mix my metaphors) but your comments on the FLOTUS are beneath my idea of you.

I won’t read your columns anymore…. thank you for the previous years.

Jason

I’m sorry you feel that way, but are you really saying that was not a political speech? And why was she surrounded by military people in formal uniform? You may well think this was a good thing to do, and I may well have lost my mind, but if so I am not the only person to have thought it was a bit strange. And certainly unprecedented. One assumes they were expecting Lincoln to win in which case the historical association might have been more appropriate, but once again, why surrounded by uniformed military?

Jerry Pournelle

Chaos Manor

Oscar and the First Lady

Thank you very much for your response.

Granted…in the sense that she has attained her position/fame though politics, then everything she does can be considered political.

But reading into it that there may have been an expectation for Lincoln to win and/or that the occasion is strange and/or is part of some unprecedented Machiavellian plot to further… whatever it is that she was furthering… oh and she forced an inappropriate military presence to further reinforce…whatever…

This is not evidence based…. at best, it is mean spirited gossip that is best served by outlets like TMZ.

Was the participation of the FLOTUS a completely innocent incursion into our collective Weltanschauung, probably not, did it have unprecedented and strange political purposes, some people seem to think so…. but then some people think that Elvis is not dead <g>

Cheers

I never thought it was evil, and clearly the troops were having a great time; but I do not think the office of president nor the military ought to be involved in a Hollywood event without good reason. Of course they may have thought Lincoln would win, in which case it would be appropriate for the President himself to make the presentation; but I am not sure I think of any reason for his wife to be an Oscar presenter, particularly when in theory they don’t know what film will win

Jerry Pournelle

Chaos Manor

Not evil, no…. never got that impression….

Here are two articles at random…. this one gave me the same impression as yours: http://althouse.blogspot.ca/2013/02/the-completely-inappropriate-use-of.html

While this one is quite a bit more thought provoking and in mine opinion more in line with what I’ve read from you over the years. http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2013/02/26/first_ladys_oscar_night_role_prelude_to_a_bigger_one_117173.html

Cheers Jerry and thank you very much for following up. I’ve always thought very well of you….

Which probably is enough on that matter.

Behold the 900-MPH Supersonic Ping-Pong Bazooka

Dear Jerry,

Physics fun…

"For years, Mark French has been using the regular subsonic version of the gun to teach kids about physics. "I’ve brought it to 4-H clubs and to schools. I’ve gotten ridiculous mileage out of this thing. With all that use, you can’t help but wonder whether you can improve it."

The typical setup uses a PVC plastic tube, with a ping-pong ball inside, that’s sealed on both ends with duct tape. A pump removes the air inside the tube, creating a vacuum. Then, when the seal at one end of the tube is broken, air rushes in, and because there’s no aerodynamic drag on the ping-pong ball, it can fire out the other end at 400 mph. "The [main] limitation here is how fast you can get air to go down the tube, because the ball is only going to go as fast as the air," French says.

On a hunch, French and his students modified the gun with a convergent–divergent nozzle, the type used in rocket engines and supersonic wind tunnels to accelerate air flow. The revamped gun shoots pressurized air through the hourglass-shaped nozzle. As the air travels through the nozzle’s choke point, compression accelerates the air. It blasts the ping-pong ball outward at 900 mph…"

http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/engineering/gonzo/behold-the-900-mph-supersonic-ping-pong-bazooka-15097897

There is a link to their paper and a some video. The ball remains surprisingly intact.

Cheers,

Rod Schaffter

Absurdity in security-clearance renewals

Jerry,

This may not be quite up to bunny inspector standards, but it is sufficiently dumb to catch my attention. The underlying article referenced was a Washington Post Opinion piece, and cited other mindless examples.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/absurdity-in-security-clearance-renewals/2013/02/25/ac6a7c3e-7e8f-11e2-a671-0307392de8de_story.html

==============================================================

Letter to the Editor

Absurdity in security-clearance renewals

Feb 26, 2013 01:19 AM EST

The Washington Post <http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/absurdity-in-security-clearance-renewals/2013/02/25/ac6a7c3e-7e8f-11e2-a671-0307392de8de_story.html#license-ac6a7c3e-7e8f-11e2-a671-0307392de8de> Published: February 25

Kudos to John Hamre [“This is no way to weed out spies <http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-wrong-way-to-conduct-security-clearances/2013/02/20/2d0d1e2c-7554-11e2-aa12-e6cf1d31106b_story.html> ,” Washington Forum, Feb. 22] for taking on some of the absurdities in how our government investigates candidates for security clearances.

During the most recent investigation into my own clearance renewal, the responsible agency refused to sign off. The reason? I had failed to file a foreign-contact report on an English-born woman I had known for many years and with whom I am still close. At that point in time, I had held a top clearance for more than 20 years and had served in several positions of significant trust. I had even disclosed the relationship on my application, but the government was correct: I had never filed that report.

I asked for a waiver on the grounds that she was naturalized in 1955 and had therefore been an American longer than me, even providing a copy of her naturalization certificate. It was all to no avail, however, so I dutifully filed a report disclosing that I was in regular contact with my mother. My clearance was renewed a few weeks later.

Andrew A. King, Arlington

===========================================

Al Perrella

Dear Dr. Pournelle,

This source claims that Senator Graham has put the casualties from drone strikes at 4700.

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2013/02/graham-drones

Methinks it’s time for some due process. As it now stands, the President has the power of life and death over any human not actually living in the United States. And he will make these decisions on the advice of the same intelligence experts who told us Iraq had WMDs and North Korea was decades away from launching missiles.

What due process is possible? I understand that this is war, but this isn’t like killing Admiral Yamamoto in 1943. Our enemies do not wear uniforms, and there will be no surrender ceremony on the deck of the USS Missouri. Terrorists and their ilk are going to be a thorn in our side for the rest of our foreseeable national existence. We’ve got to have a better answer than giving the executive total authority to kill enemy nationals.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

Dog Bites Man; Mann Bites Everyone —

". . . The major function of the school is the social orientation of the individual."

While alarming, this was not new, even in 1948. Samuel Blumenthal’s book "Is Public Education Necessary?" details the origins of publicly-funded, compulsory primary education in America, spearheaded by Horace Mann. It is not a pretty story. The quote above and all the others provided by Peter Polson are simply echoes of the purposes originally envisioned by Mann and his accomplices.

Richard White

Austin, Texas

Mail 764 Monday, February 25, 2013

Purple Hearts at Ft Hood

Dr. Pournelle,

I am not surprised by the "ruling" that those wounded at Fort Hood are not eligible for the Purple Heart. I don’t think that this is a special case, and I think those unfortunates would have been excluded as ineligible at almost any time in our history. Despite the perp’s purported jihaadist intentions, the injuries were not caused in an act by a declared enemy in a theater of war. In a superset composed of a two-valued system consisting of those wounded who are eligible, and all others, I suppose that the set of the latter includes those with workplace injuries. Someone is winding up their radio listeners.

I am upset about the state of prosecution of Major Hasan. This Court Martial should be completed. Since he is patently and admittedly guilty of several capital counts under the UCMJ, I do not understand why he is still among the living after four years. Military justice used to be administered more quickly than this.

Aid was also promised for the injuries sustained by the civilian police that took him down. I understand those individuals have been let down by the CinC.

-d

The US declared war on terrorism and killed about 100,000 Iraqi’s military and civilian in the subsequent actions.

The Fort Hood victims were on active duty having either just returned from deployment or about to be deployed.

If an American citizen of Chinese origin "volunteer" had shot up Fort Lewis in 1951 in the name of Mao, there being no war at the time — or for that matter there was no declared war in Korea. Does that mean that Korean vets do not rate Purple Hearts for wounds?

Of course I agree that Hassan ought to have been found guilty and hanged by now. He doesn’t deserve the honor of a firing squad.

Jerry Pournelle

Chaos Manor

My lack of familiarity with the standard is only partly at fault. I do agree that the casualties of the Fort Hood shooting should receive recognition, I did not think they were eligible under the normal rules for the award of the Purple Heart. In the sense that this incident should be treated specially, it should be a special case. My statement was not intended as a judgement on the quality or degree of their sacrifice or patriotism, but just based on what I remember.

To my poor memory, it seemed as if uniformed soldiers wounded or killed out-of-theater, Soviet-sponsored terrorist action were not eligible for decoration — during Vietnam or during the cold war. I never heard of any injury caused by a peace-protester assault that resulted in the award of this particular decoration. I just didn’t believe that this case was different than those.

What makes this particular crime even more heinous is that Hasan was not an Iraqi, Afghani, or declared "member" of Al Qaeda. Up to the first pull of the trigger, he was a comrade-at-arms of his victims.

I had not heard that the Mr. Obama took direct action to deny Purple Heart to anyone eligible for it. If this is the case, I am in complete agreement with, and just as upset as you.

I will remain unsurprised at any incident that abuses this country’s veterans. This is pure cynicism on my part, but based on what I know of history and only partially on my own REMF experience in service.

A personal gripe goes to the losing party last election. The massacre happened almost four years ago and Hasan remains unpunished, it seems the GOP used to be better at making known such poor, careless dereliction by an incumbent CinC. A large part of the responsibility for the re-election must laid at the feet of the opposition.

-d

Yes. My point is that we have a war on “terrorism”. Hassam was a terrorist. He operated here. Purple Hearts were awarded in the Civil War.

Of course the Administration does not want to say that Hassam was a terrorist, or that the massacre was an act of war. It’s a workplace injury.

I made a quick study. It seems Sec Army has the authority to determine Ft. Hood victims eligible for Purple Heart. I don’t know if this was done, or could be done prior to a courts martial verdict on Hasan.

I find this: http://m.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/oct/18/fort-hood-victims-see-similarities-to-benghazi/

"The Department of Defense is still refusing to reclassify the attack, citing the need to maintain the integrity of the legal case against Mr. Hasan. A spokesman for Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, however, did not rule out reevaluating that decision in the future."

I don’t know if the president decreed any other ruling (it would really surprise me to find him actively doing anything).

It seems that the civilians casualties (including the policewoman who shot Hasan) would be eligible for the Defense of Freedom Medal if the ruling was changed.

It seems that Congresspersons can initiate an appeal if an applicant is denied. I would love to see one make some political hay with this issue.

-d

Fort Hood Attack

Dr. Pournelle:

The actions of Major Hasan that led to the deaths and injuries of soldiers at Fort Hood fall within the category of criminal attack, not combat. As such, his actions are considered equivalent to "fragging". Fraggings are neither enemy nor friendly fire related even if the motivation for the ‘fragging’ was due to a real-time or previous enemy-related situation; and as such, not eligible for the Purple Heart.

There is however, nothing stopping the commanders of those soldiers from submitting them for medals of achievement, commendation, or meritorious service for their actions during or recovering from the attack.

The Meritorious Service Medal may be awarded for outstanding achievement or meritorious service to the United States. For Fort Hood, this might be pushing the envelope.

Army Commendation Medal (ARCOM) is awarded to any member of the Armed Forces who distinguishes himself or herself by heroism, meritorious achievement, or meritorious service. I’m fairly certain that would qualify for the Fort Hood victims.

The Army Achievement Medal is awarded while performing in any way with the Army in a non-combat field, distinguished himself/ herself apart from his/her comrades by meritorious service or achievement of a lesser degree than necessary for award of the Army Commendation Medal. Considering the nature of this incident, I might consider this an insult to the men and women killed or injured.

One point to mention is that at least in the Air Force, all of these medals provide various extra points for promotion. Downgrade to a lesser medal can, and has, caused many a military member to be passed over until the next cycle. At this time, that might amount to several thousand dollars for each of the Fort Hood victims or their heirs.

Michael D. Houst, MSgt, USAF (Ret.)

p.s. Fort Hood damn sure wasn’t a workplace accident!

I contend that the Fort Hood massacre was an act of war conducted on US territory, and those involved have every right to combat pay and benefits.

Sequester Love

Jerry,

I have come to love the sequester, and sincerely hope that it goes through. Having worked for or with the military since the age of 17, I find the idea that DoD can’t easily take a 7% cut laughable. Even better, post-sequester we will have raised Taxes on the 1% and disproportionately cut Defense (half the sequester against 19% of the budget). What’s left after taxing the rich and cutting defense?

Dan Steele

Icepilot

Port Ludlow, WA

It is not an uncommon view and given the size of the cuts on that makes sense. Somehow we have to stop spending so much more than we make.

ancient myths and recent events

Jerry,

The recent meteor event over Russia sure reminds me of the myth of Phaeton. The chariot of the sun, driven off its usual track by Phaeton, burned both the heavens and the earth, until Jupiter hurled a thunderbolt knocking Phaeton off his chariot. The sun did not shine for a year, mourning his death.

Sure sounds like a shallow angle large meteor entry followed by an impact-generated dust or water vapor overcast, either local or global in effect. A rather spectacular volcano might do the same in reverse if it tossed up a particularly large chunk, but I think the myth sounds a lot closer to a low graze-angle large meteor entry followed by an impact heavy enough to cause either long-term cloud coverage or significant dust in the upper atmosphere.

Sean

I noted that back when I was doing research on an Atlantis novel. The other candidate for Phaeton would be the Thera (Santorini) event, an enormous volcanic eruption that caused tidal waves all over the eastern Mediterranean and clogged the sea with volcanic ash and “floating stone” for a long time. I spent a week with Marinatos at his dig at Akrotira discussing the concept, which was more or less his from a 1938 article speculating that this was the origin of the Atlantis legend (Atlantis was Minoan Crete). I never wrote that novel.

An interview with ‘the father of global warming’

What I find interesting is that he’s in favor of remediation rather than the destruction of economies.

http://membercentral.aaas.org/blogs/scientia/interview-father-global-warming

I return to accuracies and what we know, which is that the Earth has been both warmer and colder than it is at present in both historical times and a very long time ago.

Marine generals showing rare dominance of top jobs

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/02/24/marine-generals/1934129/

Traditionally the Navy – with the Marines – belong to the President. If it’s a bigger job than that, you need the Department of War, which is the Army, and belongs to Congress. This got all complicated after the Department of War was abolished, and the Air Force was ripped out of the Army to become its own independent self, leaving support of the field army as a job no one in the Air Force wanted, but which it wouldn’t give to the Army. My last professional job offer was to go to St Louis in 1972 and be part of the team that structured the Army’s air (mostly helicopter of course) force.

The Marines wanted Afghanistan even though it’s far from the sea. It is, after all, a small war, and that’s what the Marines specialize in.

Back in the late 50’s I published an essay pointing out that about 80% of the foreseeable violent incident missions for the United States could be handled by a battalion of Marines with helicopter support – i.e. an oiler, a destroyer, and a medium sized helicopter carrier. I wasn’t the only one to reach that conclusion and we built some.

11 states with more people on welfare than employed

<http://admin.savage.wp.wnd.com/files/2013/02/130223welfaremap.jpg>

Last month, the Senate Budget Committee reports that in fiscal year 2011, between food stamps, housing support, child care, Medicaid and other benefits, the average U.S. household below the poverty line received $168.00 a day in government support. What’s the problem with that much support? Well, the median household income in America is just over $50,000, which averages out to $137.13 a day. To put it another way, being on welfare now pays the equivalent of $30.00 an hour for a 40-hour week, while the average job pays $25.00 an hour. Wrong, the cost includes the cost of administering these benefits (paying government employees).

And over time there will be more and more states in which this is true.

Universal Background Check

Jerry,

The urge to Do Something federally regarding gun control seems to be coalescing around "universal background check". IE, no gun transfers whatsoever without the recipient passing a background check in a national database of people barred from firearms possession.

This may well pass, being the sort of thing that’s politically hard to argue against. Who could fail to support "keeping guns out of the hands of criminals"? (Never mind that it won’t do that; 3/4ths of weapons currently used by criminals are either bought retail through already-illegal "straw purchasers" or outright stolen.)

I see a couple of problems, however. First, there’s the minor one of Constitutional authority. Where is the Federal government empowered to regulate private citizen-to-citizen intrastate transfers of anything? (This will no doubt be answered by stretching the Commerce clause even farther beyond recognition, of course.)

Then there’s the major problem: There’s no practical way to enforce such a law that doesn’t boil down to national gun registration.

It would most likely end up as a sporadically (selectively) enforced sham whose main practical effect would be to push millions of citizens into explicitly defying Federal law. We already are said to commit "three felonies a day" in unwitting violation of the huge mass of Federal law. (I probably hit my quota this weekend in a routine bit of home maintenance.) It cannot be a good thing to push a large fraction of the citizenry from being unconscious members of "Ham Sandwich Nation" to being conscious outlaws.

Or it could include record-keeping and reporting requirements that would be a conclusive step toward a national database of who owns what guns. Retail sales data is already recorded and preserved, albeit restricted (for now) to being used only in tracing specific guns used in crimes. "I sold it (or bought it) privately" is currently a sufficient answer to any gun no longer being where the Federal retail sales records show. Pass a universal background check law that’s practically enforceable, and it could soon instead be the admission of (yet another) Federal felony.

grumpily

Porkypine

Your papers, please.

Jerry Pournelle

At

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/senators-near-a-deal-on-background-checks-for-most-private-gun-sales/2013/02/23/d55e5f4a-7d0c-11e2-82e8-61a46c2cde3d_story.html

"Democrats say that keeping records of private sales is necessary to enforce any new law and because current federal law requires licensed firearm dealers to keep records. Records of private sales also would help law enforcement trace back the history of a gun used in a crime, according to Democratic aides. Republicans, however, believe that records of private sales could put an undue burden on gun owners or could be perceived by gun rights advocates as a precursor to a national gun registry."

"Could be perceived", eh? A good rule of thumb is, if the government has the data, sooner or later someone will be in charge who’ll use it.

So, Senate Dems want the essentials of a national gun registry, while Senate Reps want to compromise on merely making outlaws of a major slice of their voters.

Here’s hoping the House Reps have a little more backbone.

Jerry,

I’ve realized since sending my first note that the Codevilla piece explains something that’s puzzled the hell out of me since last summer.

Do you recall my writing you when it became clear that Romney was going to win the nomination, that oh well, at least his conduct in the primaries proved we had a candidate who knew how to gutter fight? Then, come the main campaign, he inexplicably played nice and lost.

Codevilla calls it. The Establishment Republicans are still traumatized by the New Deal. They don’t dare hope to beat the Democrats; they believe the best they can do is join them as junior partners in a ruling coalition and modestly reduce their mismanagement of the economy.

From that point of view, the Democrats are merely the competition. The two-thirds of the Republican Party that actually wants to beat the Democrats and restore the old Republic are the deadly enemy.

Yes, the country would have been better off if Romney had won – Obama now is pushing even harder down a very destructive path. But next time, we need to nominate someone who actually understands the need to beat the Democrats, not merely moderate them.

Porkypine

Well, yes. That was what Newt overcame: a Republican establishment that simply wanted to exist in tranquility. His Contract with America changed all that. But when Newt left Congress, there was a feeding frenzy resulting in disaster, and the Establishment limped up and explained it all. Republicans can’t govern because they can’t restrain themselves. That isn’t true, but it can be a danger: why should the departure of Newt Gingrich unleash the greedy ghouls? And then came 9-11 and we decided on war. Deficit spending became traditional…

Ruling Class vs The Country 

This Angelo Codevilla piece in Forbes looks at current political party fundamentals, with more hope than many – me included – have been feeling lately.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2013/02/20/as-country-club-republ icans- link-up-with-the-democratic-ruling-class-millions-of-voters-are-orphan ed/

Porkypine

Angelo is a good cold blooded analyst. He used to work for me at Pepperdine. Glad to see he is still doing well.

Jerry Pournelle

Chaos Manor

Nothing there that you haven’t mentioned many times, save his explanation of WHY the CCRepubs are that way.

I’m one of those annoying kids who asks "why" a lot, and won’t really buy off on anything till I understand the why of it. Motive matters a lot if you’re trying to predict behavior.

Codevilla’s explanation – traumatized by decades of losing to the New Dealers, thus deeply committed to "if you can’t beat ’em join ’em" – plus the McArdle "New Mandarins" piece – slots right in with what else I know. Always a satisfying feeling when the pieces fall into a coherent pattern.

Convincing the CCR’s we really can beat the Dems so they shouldn’t yet again pull a Stanley at Bosworth backstab can’t be neglected, but isn’t sufficient. The key is what Codevilla points out – a third or so of nominal Dems don’t agree with the current statist push. The potential realignment needs a better name than the "country" party though…

The mandarinization of America

The column :

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/02/21/america-s-new-mandarins.html

My takeaway is that it’s all very well to talk about providing food and medical care for the poor. How about providing them with the opportunity to be something other than poor? As it is, we’re building a society where only those with graduate degrees from Princeton can go on to success at large firms– we are increasingly ruled by people whose main qualifications are academic achievement, people who are good at taking tests.

"They really are very bright and hardworking. It’s just that they’re also prone to be conformist, risk averse, obedient, and good at echoing the opinions of authority, because that is what this sort of examination system selects for.

The even greater danger is that they become more and more removed from the people they are supposed to serve. Since I moved to Washington, I have had series of extraordinary conversations with Washington journalists and policy analysts, in which I remark upon some perfectly ordinary facet of working-class, or even business-class life, only to have this revelation met with amazement."

You think about it, that’s exactly what we have in President Obama: A product of the Mandarin system with no real experience outside of it.

It took five thousand years, total humiliation by foreign powers for China, and a bloody revolution to drop the system and rediscover capitalism. Here’s hoping we don’t have to go through anywhere near the same difficulties.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

It is not a new concept, of course. Wittfogel had much to say on the subject. The temptation of smart people to control the lives of others is great. Adams, who was certainly smarter than the average bear, concluded that “we in America believe that each man is the best judge of his own interest.” This is summed in the notion of liberty. Of course that means being free to do stupid things including falling for con schemes, leading to the temptation to make ever more complex laws and regulations, the result of which are often a cure worse than the disease.

‘Twas ever thus.

One of Us.

> But I don’t miss TV. I do worry about not being connected. I wasn’t for most of my life, and now the prospect of a few hours or even a day of not being wired is scary.

For someone approaching his 80th birthday in a few months (congrats on that!), you do a superb job at making the "generation gap" appear over-hyped!

Curiously, I expect my grandmother to start using Facebook some time this year; she didn’t care for it the last time she tried it, but her most recent exposure to my own account delighted her with the virtual torrent of up-to-date information about those family members that don’t visit as often as perhaps they should…

One of us. One of us…

Michael Mol

Well, thank you …

Brian Bilbrey, one of my long time advisors and the operator of the ISP that provided web access for Chaos Manor for more than a decade, recently got his degree, so I induced him to write something about it.

None of the details are very interesting. It’s not like I waited until I was 95 to finish the degree I started at 18 … that might be interesting.

I just took a couple of classes at a time while working full time. I maintained a 4.0 throughout, and graduated Summa Cum Laude in Computer Information Technology. All of the last 5 years of work were online through University of Maryland University College, and I worked my ass off. Some classes had proctored finals on campus, but there was strong drive to write more papers… I guess that’s "better", but I’m really good at computer-based finals – I knocked down two of them back to back one Saturday morning in about an hour and a half.

Some correspondents in the world have stated that online education is a watered-down version of the real (and real expensive) thing – face time in a classroom with professors. Well … teaching assistants being paid a pittance is who you really spend time with in classrooms. Personally, I think it’s down to the student. I was a terrible student when I started, thirty-odd years ago. Why wouldn’t a school want the money, regardless of student academic achievement. Yet I was invited to take my custom elsewhere. In the intervening decades, I took a few classes at other institutions, but didn’t get rolling properly until I started up with UMUC in 2008. I’m a much better student at this stage of my life.

Online I had a few less-than-stellar instructors, a fair number of pretty good ones, and a few absolutely superb teachers. One of the best of the latter is Charles Neimeyer, who taught History of War. He’s also the Director and Chief of Marine Corps History at Marine Corps University. I also had some good writing courses, and as long as the instructor had command of the English language, things went pretty well. Most of my schoolwork was technology-related though, in pursuit of the CIT degree. A lot of the world (especially the technology side of things) has changed dramatically since I started taking college courses in 1979. So I learned a goodly amount from every course, even the silly required courses. Learning is always good.

That said, I’m glad to have time to be down in the woodshop, building stuff in my spare time, again.

best,

.brian

The moral of the story is that it’s never too late.

National Security

Hi

The following tells about DHS "stealing" a new boat on importation from a very suspect country.

http://uncrunched.com/2013/02/21/the-department-of-homeland-security-stole-my-boat-today/

Roland Hill

The Iron Law at work. I have met bureaucrats like that. It makes me long for the institution of paladins.

Jerry: A ‘fluffy’ article on a weak nuclear force reactor. The science might explain the ‘false positive’ cold fusion results.

http://www.gizmag.com/nasa-lenr-nuclear-reactor/26309/

Chris C

Daughter of Time

Jerry,

Apparently you have readers around here – when I went to reserve a copy of The Daughter of Time at the city library website after your recommendation, there were two people already ahead of me, and several more shortly after. I finished it last night; a fine short read and a fascinating slice of history. (Yes, I’m going to return it today so the next in line can get to it.)

It occurs to me that it may be just as well the scheming and ruthless Tudors displaced the arguably popular and benevolent Richard III. The formidable British clandestine services that were key to winning the great wars of the twentieth century got their start under the Tudors.

Without those centuries of devious covert tradition (much of it passed on to the US at the start of WW II) this would be a very different world, likely not for the better.

thanks for the recommendation!

Henry

The British Security Services pretty well began with Walsingham…

Mail 763 Wednesday, February 20, 2013

This is nothing more than brazen bureaucratic extortion.

<http://washingtonexaminer.com/3-hour-airport-security-waits-under-sequester/article/2522078>

Roland Dobbins

They are not going to lay off the bunny inspectors.

Is the Universe Metastable?

Jerry,

An interesting report from the AAAS. The universe might go poof in a few billion years or so.

I can’t image what the Puppeteer Fleet would do if they found out!

Regards, Charles Adams, Bellevue, NE

<http://cosmiclog.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/02/18/17006552-will-our-universe-end-in-a-big-slurp-higgs-like-particle-suggests-it-might?lite>

Wil the Universe end in a ‘big slurp’? Higg-like particle suggests it might by Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News

"….[Joseph Lykken, a theoretical physicist at Fermilab] said the parameters for our universe, including the Higgs mass value as well as the mass of another subatomic particle known as the top quark, suggest that we’re just at the edge of stability, in a "metastable" state. Physicists have been contemplating such a possibility for more than 30 years. Back in 1982, physicists Michael Turner and Frank Wilczek wrote in Nature that "without warning, a bubble of true vacuum could nucleate somewhere in the universe and move outwards at the speed of light, and before we realized what swept by us our protons would decay away…."

Articles cited:

S. Alekhin, A. Djouadib, S. Mochd, The top quark and Higgs boson masses and the stability of the electroweak vacuum, Physics Letters B 716 (2012) 214-219 <http://pubdb.desy.de/fulltext/getfulltext.php?uid=23383-59716>

Michael S. Turner & Frank Wilczek, Is our Vacuum Metastable?, Letters to Nature, Nature, Vol 298, 8/12/82, <http://ctp.lns.mit.edu/Wilczek_Nature/(72)vacuum_metastable.pdf>

We’re doomed. But then we’ve always known that there will be an end to this world. On the other hand, I wouldn’t leap to accept this conclusion just yet.

The California Sixth Grade Reader

Hi, Jerry. I thought these historical quotes from National Education Association (NEA) functionaries might be of interest, or use.

http://www.americanthinker.com/2013/02/schools_jump_the_shark.html

<snip>

"In 1936, the National Education Association stated its position, from which they have never wavered; "We stand for socializing the individual."

The NEA in its "Policy For American Education" stated,

"The major problem of education in our times arises out of the fact that we live in a period of fundamental social change. In the new democracy [we were a Republic] education must share in the responsibility of giving purpose and direction to social change. The major function of the school is the social orientation of the individual. Education must operate according to a well-formulated social policy."

Paul Haubner, specialist for the NEA, tells us,

"The schools cannot allow parents to influence the kind of values-education their children receive in school; that is what is wrong with those who say there is a universal system of values. Our goals are incompatible with theirs. We must change their values."

"Education for international understanding involves the use of education as a force for conditioning the will of the people." – National Education Association, Education for International Understanding in American Schools, page 33 (1948)

"Schools will become clinics whose purpose is to provide individualized, psycho-social treatment for the student, and teachers must become psycho-social therapists."- National Education Association, "Education for the ’70s," Today’s Education, January 1969

"Far too many people in America, both in and out of education, look upon the elementary school as a place to learn reading, writing and arithmetic." – Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, National Education Association Yearbook, 1947

"The NEA’s ultimate goal is to tap the legal, political and economic powers of the U.S. Congress. We want leaders and staff with sufficient clout that they may roam the halls of Congress and collect votes to re-order the priorities of the United States of America." – Terry Herndon, NEA Executive Director, 1973

"We are the biggest potential political striking force [union] in this country, and we are determined to control the direction of [public] education." – NEA President Catherine Barrett (1972)

"In the struggle to establish an adequate world government, the teacher can do much to prepare the hearts & minds of children for global understanding and cooperation…. At the very heart of all the agencies which will assure the coming of world government must stand the school, the teacher, and the organized profession." – The Teacher & World Government by former editor of the NEA Journal, Joy Elmer Morgan, 1946

"NEA and its affiliates are effective advocates because we have power, and we have power because there are more than 3.2 million people who are willing to pay us hundreds of millions of dollars in dues each year." – Bob Chanin, NEA General Counsel

"I don’t want a nation of thinkers. I want a nation of workers." – John D. Rockefeller, created the General Education Board (GEB) in 1903 to dispense Rockefeller funds to the National Education Association.

Peter Polson

I suspect that most NEA members have never heard of any of this…

Explains a lot?

Dr. Pournelle,

I found your description of your visit with Marvin Minsky interesting. From the State-of-the-Union, I’m trying to figure this one out:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/innovations/post/why-mapping-the-human-brain-matters/2013/02/19/4027ad46-7aaa-11e2-9c27-fdd594ea6286_blog.html

"When completed, a detailed map of how the human brain works would be a staggering development in innovation — one that could lead to cures for brain-related illnesses as well as unimagined breakthroughs in artificial intelligence."

What laser-like examination is involved with at target described as "unimagined breakthroughs in artificial intelligence?"

Usually, I obtain or create a map to something that I couldn’t find otherwise. Maybe this is a true indicator of how many useful human brains can be found in the Fed?

-d

I am afraid I can’t help here…

SUBJ: Soldiers Coming Home

In all the discussion of soldiers coming home from Vietnam, I’m surprised no one has mentioned Bob Greene’s book "Homecoming: When the Soldiers Returned from Vietnam". Greene was a Chicago newsman and a writer in the tradition of Mike Royko, but had some kind of personal ‘fall from grace’ and slipped from sight. Still a helluva writer through.

—

Cecil Rose

BBC Storyville – Google & the World Brain

Jerry

I think you will like this fascinating program which is based around the Google book scanning project but exposes lots of other issues especially those of authors and copyright. Also of interest are the various international responses – I think you will particularly enjoy the response from the president of the French national Library 🙂

Program can be viewed here http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01qxmqc/Storyville_20122013_Google_and_the_World_Brain/

Best Regards

Andy gibbs

Words fail me. I thought this was The Onion, at first.

<http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/postal-launch-clothing-line-2014-223202293–politics.html>

———————————————————————–

Roland Dobbins

And yet ‘tis true, ‘tis true.

population dumbing down

I discussed the dumbing down of population with Dr. Leon Cooper (LASL retired) and wanted to share his comments: "The dumbing down trend has been evident to me for at least 50 years. What I see is youth accumulating more toys and thus becoming more interested in entertainment and ‘spectator’ activities, rather than creativity and ‘participator activities. The moment we, as parents (that’s me!), started providing cars for our high school children (not me!), they became more mobile. In essence, we enabled our children to get into trouble and to substitute actions based on emotion for logical thought processes.. Individual creativity flies out the window as self-gratification fills the void. This, combined with the Dr. Crabtree’s observations, is the road leading to destruction.

[The personal satisfaction and enjoyment in being creative is a thousand times more rewarding than the flash of excitement in personal entertainment. Creative endeavors last a lifetime. The thrill from self-entertainment, though a good thing, is gone in the blink of an eye. Every individual should strive to Live their Dreams.]"

James Crocker

Well, perhaps; but in fact some of the kids are smarter than we were. Schools can be improved. But if a foreign government had imposed this system of education on the United States we would consider it an act of war. As it is we are proud of it. Think on that.

North’s three rules of bureaucracy…

"To answer this, I begin with North’s three laws of bureaucracy.

1. Some bureaucrat will inevitably enforce an official rule to the point of imbecility.

2. To fix the mess which this causes, the bureaucracy will write at least two new rules.

3. Law #1 applies to each of the new rules."

http://www.garynorth.com/public/10681.cfm

Charles Brumbelow

I know Gary North and I knew his father in law. Have not seen Gary in a decade, and hadn’t seen this before. Thanks.

Fluoride in water

I wonder if many people know that in some cases natural water supplies have to be treated to reduce the levels of Fluoride? The correlation of reduced tooth decay in populations where natural Fluoride was present in water sources was how this whole thing got started. So in many areas they don’t need to add Fluoride to the water, there is enough already there.

—

Al Lipscomb

Well yes, of course, and as Francis Hamit points out most of those places are not known to be fountains of dullards. I have never seen any accurate testing of IQ in such areas. I do know think that the Constitution prevents forcibly medicating people for their own good. As John Adams said, we in America believe that each man is the best judge of his own interest. It appears we have reconsidered that notion.

Reading, phonics, and so forth

I recently learned that the local school district (in Texas) teaches phonics in 1st grade, but evaluation of its success is by giving the students made-up nonsense words to pronounce using the rules they’ve been taught. My first impression on hearing this was that clearly this was designed by someone who wanted phonics instruction to fail so they could go back to the see-say method that used to be prevalent.

But perhaps I am too hasty. Since you have some connection with successful phonics education, what is your opinion of this? Is this an effective way to teach reading? My own opinion is that associating words already in use with the written word would be the obvious target.

Best regards, etc.

Michael Walters

I would say they have hit upon precisely the correct test to determine if the kids can read. If you can read you can read polymorphusi, trinitrotuckercrud, penetratology, and other words I am sure you have never heard before. A second grader ought to be able to read those words. If your kid can’t read those words he can’t read and needs Mrs. Pournelle’s Reading Program http://www.jerrypournelle.com/Reading.html.

Forgotten President

Hi Jerry

I recall you often referred to Amity Shlaes’ "The Forgotten Man".

George Will has written an article in The Washinton Post that refers to her new Biography of Calvin Coolidge. Here is the link to that article.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/george-will-coolidges-taciturn-model-for-the-presidency/2013/02/13/ae797b4e-7541-11e2-95e4-6148e45d7adb_story.html

I know very little of this president, but what George has encapsulated has me intrigued. Given the current state of profligate spending and borrowing in the capital these days, one might find it time well spend dusting off the useful truths uttered by this forgotten man.

Take care,

Sam Mattina

I am a great fan of Miss Schlaes’s work. I have not seen this one yet but I will very likely read it. On my Kindle.

“No one else was recording people in Childress, Tex., in 1936, and here they are, a large group of them all talking in their natural voices.”

<http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/movies/the-kidnappers-foil-a-local-talent-national-treasure.html?smid=pl-share&_r=1&>

Roland Dobbins

“We doin’ it up and we doin’ it hard and we gonna take over. I’m here to step it up a notch.”

<http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/bronx/principal-sparks-outrage-internet-rap-video-appearances-article-1.1258463>

It seems to me that his grammar alone should’ve disqualified him for the post…

Roland Dobbins

Subject: FORTH

FORTH HEART IF HONK ELSE DON’T THEN

Joe Zeff

Indeed.

Mail 763 Sunday, February 17, 2013

Flouride and Stupidity

We discussed the flouride matter before and you said you would take it on if we had something very solid to go on with it.  As you know, much data is out there, but it’s very hard to present any of it and maintain credibility with the general public.  While reading an article about why people are getting stupider, I came across flouride as one of the reasons why.  I’ll get to the others after we deal with flouride:

<.

Researchers from Harvard have found that a substance rampant in the nation’s water supply, fluoride, is lowering IQ and dumbing down the population. The researchers, who had their findings published in the prominent journal Environmental Health Perspectives, a federal government medical journal stemming from the U.S National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, concluded that ”our results support the possibility of adverse effects of fluoride exposures on children’s neurodevelopment”.

“In this study we found a significant dose-response relation between fluoride level in serum and children’s IQ…This is the 24th study that has found this association”.

One attorney, Paul Beeber, NYSCOF President, weighs in on the research by saying:

“It’s senseless to keep subjecting our children to this ongoing fluoridation experiment to satisfy the political agenda of special-interest groups. Even if fluoridation reduced cavities, is tooth health more important than brain health? It’s time to put politics aside and stop artificial fluoridation everywhere”.

</

http://naturalsociety.com/leading-geneticist-human-intelligence-slowly-declining/

Harvard is about as about as solid as it gets.  It’s hard for nay-saying whinners to denounce an institution of people who are — by and large — smarter and more experienced than the nascent nay-saying community. 

But, this is just one reason why humans seem to be losing intelligence and control of emotions.  While I am convinced this article does not get all the reasons, it hits on some of the major lifestyle changes that cause it. 

Then we have problems with the food supply:

<.

One study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that pesticides, which are rampant among the food supply, are creating lasting changes in overall brain structure — changes that have been linked to lower intelligence levels and decreased cognitive function. Specifically, the researchers found that a pesticide known as chlorpyrifos (CPF) has been linked to ”significant abnormalities”. Further, the negative impact was found to occur even at low levels of exposure.

</

More food issues:

<.

Following 14,000 children, British researchers uncovered the connection between processed foods and reduced IQ. After recording the children’s’ diets and analyzing questionnaires submitting by the parents, the researchers found that if children were consuming a processed diet at age 3, IQ decline could begin over the next five years. The study found that by age 8, the children had suffered the IQ decline. On the contrary, children who ate a nutrient-rich diet including fruit and vegetables were found to increase their IQ over the 3 year period. The foods considered nutrient-rich by the researchers were most likely conventional fruits and vegetables.

Interestingly, one particular ingredient ubiquitous in processed foods and sugary beverages across the globe -high fructose corn syrup – has been tied to reduced IQ. The UCLA researchers coming to these findings found that HFCS may be damaging the brain functions of consumers worldwide, sabotaging learning and memory. In fact, the official release goes as far to say that high-fructose corn syrup can make you ‘stupid’.

</

And you can thank the left and their social programs as well:

The leftists and their celebrations of diversity may be another reason:

<.

According to Crabtree, our cognitive and emotional capabilities are fueled and determined by the combined effort of thousands of genes. If a mutation occurred in any of of these genes, which is quite likely, then intelligence or emotional stability can be negatively impacted.

“I would wager that if an average citizen from Athens of 1000 BC were to appear suddenly among us, he or she would be among the brightest and most intellectually alive of our colleagues and companions, with a good memory, a broad range of ideas, and a clear-sighted view of important issues. Furthermore, I would guess that he or she would be among the most emotionally stable of our friends and colleagues,” the geneticist began his article in the scientific journal Trends in Genetics.

Further, the geneticist explains that people with specific adverse genetic mutations are more likely than ever to survive and live amongst the ‘strong.’ Darwin’s theory of ‘survival of the fittest’ is less applicable in today’s society, therefore those with better genes will not necessarily dominate in society as they would have in the past.

</

—–

Most Respectfully,

Joshua Jordan, KSC

Percussa Resurgo

I have always opposed the forcible medication of people by contaminating their water supply. I do not know enough about the data to conclude that fluoridation affects future IQ, and particularly I don’t know about dosages. It has always seemed to me that if you want to persuade people to apply fluorides to teeth – you need not drink it, direct application to the teeth is sufficient as I understand it – you could distribute it as mouthwash in fire houses or other public places, or pay CVS and other drug stores to administer it free to all comers. Swish your teeth with fluoride and spit it out. If you don’t want to do that, don’t. For parents who want to be sure they kids get the fluoride, let them buy the drops and administer then to their own children. I see no reason why I should pay to put fluorides on my lawn on the off chance that putting it in the drinking water will get it on my – or your – kids’ teeth. The beneficial effects of fluoride come from topical application to the teeth, not from blood delivery after digestive absorption.

Most of the alleged detrimental effects are ascribed to drinking the stuff, and there is enough data to convince at least some people that they don’t want to consume it or allow their children to consumed. One supposes that Arrowhead and Crescent Springs and other delivers of bottled water have a vested interest in lobbying for fluorides since they want to sell bottled water without fluoride. This means that citizens who don’t want fluoride administrated to them must pay through taxes to have it delivered to them, then pay Arrowhead to deliver unflourided water. This may create jobs, but it does not seem a sane allocation of resources. And of course there is the question of rights: what right have you to treat me for my own? My bad teeth are not infectious to your children. Even if the fluoride treatment works, the benefits accrue to me, yet you must pay for them with no conceivable benefit to you. This is unfair and ought to be unconstitutional.

I leave out the claims that fluorides in the water do us active harm and make our children stupid. That question is important if we can establish it’s truth, but it is certainly not unproved – nor it is proved that the benefits claimed for fluoridation of the public water are greater than those that would be obtained by a less coercive means of fluoride distribution. The fluoridation advocates will assert “But we mean well, we mean nothing but good” which is likely true but irrelevant. They force the treatment on all whether they want it or not, and they can’t really prove that by doing that they are doing good for ther clients – or should we say victims? And while the proof of universal mental degradation from fluoride is not certain, no one has proved that some are no so affected. It seems clear to me. Distribute the stuff as contact medicine and get it out of the water.

I don’t think I need to comment on your theories of evolution at this time.

Hot Fudge Sundae which fell on Friday is growing .

Jerry:

Obviously; this should be a credible site.

http://www.planetary.org/blogs/guest-blogs/2013/20130215-what-we-know-about-the-russian-meteor.html

I would have to have a map depicting damage levels at various distances to the centroid of damage to estimate yield and "detonation altitude. Obviously; this thing came in at an oblique angle which allowed heat and aerodynamic stresses to build to the point where it fragmented, releasing it’s kinetic energy as an airburst.

The Russians could have lost a big chunk of a city.

James Crawford=

They most certainly could have. Or, give or take a few hours, so could we. It’s dangerous out there.

‘Shane, it turns out, had deep misgivings about the project he was working on and feared he was compromising US national security. His family wants to know whether that project sent him to his grave.’

<http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/2/afbddb44-7640-11e2-8eb6-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2KzVJrFJo

–

Roland Dobbins

I know no other data on this.

Peak Holy Oil!

Mr. Pournelle,

With regard to all the speculation on the "Dorner Papal Conspiracy" and the possibility of the next Pope being the last Pope, would it be true to say we have reached "Peak Pope"?

John Dowd

And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

This is the funniest story I’ve read about police in years:

<.

Police are under investigation for jokingly filling in a witness statement in the name of a force dog.

Officers became exasperated when prosecutors asked for an account of a crime from a ‘PC Peach’, not realising Peach was the name of a police dog.

So they completed the form as if it had been written by the alsatian, and signed it with a paw print.

The dog’s statement read: ‘I chase him. I bite him. Bad man. He tasty. Good boy. Good boy Peach.’

The form was pinned up at a West Midlands Police station last week for the amusement of colleagues, who are often at odds with the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) over the handling of cases. </ http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2279789/I-chase-I-bite–crime-report-dog–Police-investigate-completing-witness-statement-written-force-dog.html

—–

Most Respectfully,

Joshua Jordan, KSC

Percussa Resurgo

Ammunition for Education

Dr. P,

When Mr. White says, “It is generally known that those serving in the regular armed forces cannot be relied upon to bear arms against American citizens”, he is echoing a romantic notion unsupported by historical facts.

Kent State is merely the most recently notorious instance of U.S. soldiers firing on U.S. citizens to deadly effect. The Newark riot in the summer of ’67 was much bloodier than Kent State. Going back a little farther, MacArthur’s dispersal of the Bonus Army tells us that, not only will soldiers fire on civilians, but they will not even hesitate significantly when ordered into action against former comrades in arms. Going a little farther back, there is also that minor historical dust-up sometimes referred to as the War of Northern Aggression, which also disproves another romantic neoconservative notion (that democracies don’t wage war against other democracies).

Just my 2 cents worth, a bit more pessimistic than usual.

Regards,

Bill Clardy

On 2/15/2013 4:40 AM, Chaos Manor – Jerry Pournelle wrote:

There is a classic SF story about how a chap in an over organized society finds that the orders come from ‘suggestions’ from the only sane man left in the city. A janitor…

I believe that would be Jack Vance’s classic, Dodkin’s Job <http://www.troynovant.com/Franson/Vance/Dodkins-Job.html . One of my personal faves! 🙂

P.S. In attempting to find an e-text of the story, I ran across a filksong version <http://mudcat.org/@displaysong.cfm?SongID=1613 at the Mudcat Cafe <http://mudcat.org/ website. Highly amusing! 🙂

v/r, dh

That’s the story

Cal state only accepting foreign grad students

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-02-12/glut-of-foreign-students-hurts-u-s-innovation.html

Read this and for a second thought you wrote it…. Most surprising is the Cal State policy of restricting graduate school acceptance letters to foreign students.

From Bloomberg, Feb 11, 2013, 6:19:15 PM

"In the old days, the U.S. program for foreign-student visas helped developing nations and brought diversity to then white-bread American campuses. Today, the F-1 program, as it is known, has become a profit center for universities and a wage-suppression tool for the technology industry."

Thanks for your site,

Stephen Koop

Marvin was noting the influx of full paid foreign student to the detriment of domestic, but we had no conclusions.

Reading, phonics, and so forth

I recently learned that the local school district (in Texas) teaches phonics in 1st grade, but evaluation of its success is by giving the students made-up nonsense words to pronounce using the rules they’ve been taught. My first impression on hearing this was that clearly this was designed by someone who wanted phonics instruction to fail so they could go back to the see-say method that used to be prevalent.

But perhaps I am too hasty. Since you have some connection with successful phonics education, what is your opinion of this? Is this an effective way to teach reading? My own opinion is that associating words already in use with the written word would be the obvious target.

Best regards, etc.

Michael Walters

I would say that is precisely the proper method for determining success. It is culture free, and fairly independent of vocabulary. If you can read, you can read nonsense words. If you cannot read nonsense words you cannot read.

And if it’s done right about 95% of the students will be able to read morphantics by the time they get to second grade. Which means they will also be able to read Constantinople, Istanbul, and Timbuktu…

Jerry Pournelle

Chaos Manor

Excellent. I am glad to know my first impression was so far off the mark. Thanks for the information.

Stay well,

Michael Walters

SUBJ: The Guy With The Nuclear Reactor In His Garage

In Seattle. And he lets smart kids play with it.

http://kplu.org/post/why-are-kids-federal-way-playing-nuclear-reactor

Yes we had one at UCLA and I was a merit badge counselor showing the Scouts how a nuclear reacgtor worked, but some people were afraid I would explode and UCLA got shed of it. Ah well. Home of he Brave.

: Does breathing smoke prevent some cancers?

Jerry:

In your Mail for February 13 you said:

Of course there are plenty of other reasons not to habitually breathe in the smoke of burning leaves. I doubt we evolved to do it.

And yet the smell of burning leaves is one we love, and we are drawn to it. Unfortunately, burning leaves has been outlawed in most places and few moderns will have enjoyed the experience. But what if we evolved in response to the benefits of breathing in the smoke of burning leaves.

I continue to think the issue of smoking and lung cancer is more complicated than we know.

When my wife was diagnosed with lung cancer last year she said to the doctor, "But I’ve never smoked." The doctor explained that she had the kind of cancer that only nonsmokers get. Smokers don’t get her kind of cancer.

Naturally I immediately asked, "Does that mean that smoking protects you from some kinds of cancer?" He gave me a bit of a dirty look and said, "It doesn’t work that way."

But I kept wondering. How does he know it doesn’t work that way?

The doctor, who we dearly love, did admit that there hasn’t been much research on this kind of cancer. I speculated that perhaps that was because there was no one to sue over this kind of cancer. We have since learned that many friends and acquaintances have had this particular kind of cancer and had the same lobectomy surgery as my wife to get rid of it. No other treatment was necessary. You don’t even miss the removed lobe of one lung, and some don’t even miss an entire lung when it is removed.

I might also argue that primitive men (whether or not they evolved) lived in an atmosphere of thick smoke, whether in caves, tents, or cabins. Perhaps they were healthier because of it. After surviving infancy and childhood, the smoke might have done them a lot of good.

So many unknowns. So many opportunities for research that has no payoff other than satisfying simple monkey curiosity.

Best regards,

–Harry M.

Medicine is now more science than art, but a large degree of art remains. We know something about wha some things do to some people, and what helps them. We collect case histories and slowly generalize. We don’t have anough autism case histories – real ones—to justify many conclusions, Same for some kinds of cancer.

People used to smoke. They must have had reason to, They enjoyed it. Why? We really don’t know a lot about that. But I do know that non-smokers live longer, and it worked for me.

Waves of Hawaii

Jerry,

Clarke Little of Hawaii

Site : <http://www.clarklittlephotography.com/>

Gallery: <http://www.clarklittlephotography.com/gallery/gallery/3-0-MainGallery.html>

Regards, Charles Adams, Bellevue, NE

The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere

Jerry:

You mentioned that you once drove the route of Paul Revere’s ride with some MIT and Harvard students.

The ride is re-enacted every year on Patriots’ Day (a Massachusetts holiday in April) by a rider in period dress. Every year the rider dismounts in front of Gaffney’s Funeral Home in Medford, and after some local festivities re-mounts to continue the journey to Concord.

Most spectators don’t know the real significance of this stop, but insiders (my wife grew up in Medford) know the back story. It seems that Dawes and Revere stopped at the Isaac Hall house to "rouse the regulars" (Hall was the company commander of the Medford Minute Men). Hall was also a leading distiller of rum, and there are accounts of Revere refreshing himself with an ample portion of rum before continuing his journey. Yet other accounts (possibly local folklore) have Revere falling off his horse after being assisted back on.

The Isaac Hall house is still standing, and is now the Gaffney Funeral Home.

http://britishredcoat.blogspot.com/2009/03/isaac-hall-house.html

Best,

Doug Ely