Say hello to the new masters of the world

 AARRRGH, Crazy, critters, Forward!, Gah., Hmm..., news, politics, Worldwreckers, youtube, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Nov 152021
 

China certainly seems to be in ascendance, while the US is definitely in decline. The latter fact does not need to be true, but we, like the British Empire before us, are allowing it to happen. When the US fades, *someone* (or several someones) will certainly attempt to step in and fill the void. The void will be one of power, of course, economic and military. but it will also be one of culture… views on individual liberty, cultural norms, ethics and so on. Anyone who can fill the military/economic void will bring their culture with them, and there’s not a reason in the entire universe why their culture needs to be as enlightened as America’s has been.

So, if you’re happy to see the US back off, get ready for *this* on a global scale:

Health workers in China are killing pets while their owners are in quarantine

In one case, a dog owner named Ms Fu witnessed through her home security camera as people clothed in hazmat suits entered her home and beat her pet corgi to death with iron rods while she was away in a quarantine facility. She tested negative for the coronavirus.

Sure, the fifty million – or more – Chinese dead at the hands of the Chinese Communist Party is certainly a bigger deal than minor functionaries killing pets. But somehow modern campus leftists and ChiCom apologists seem perfectly happy to wave away the deaths of mere *humans;* after all, the only thing worse for the Earth than humans are white cishet capitalist humans, and a lot of lefties would be perfectly happy to see a lot of *that* *type* exterminated. But puppies and kittens? A little harder to gloss over murdering *them.*

And of course there’s the little problem that China is actively destroying the planet. Not only are they belching CO2 into the air at a phenomenal rate, they are dumping vast mountains of toxic garbage into the ocean… at the same time they’re stripping the oceans bare of all life. There are worse things that could happen than if Chinas fishing fleet were sent to the bottom.

Nixon opening China to the world will be seen in future centuries by the few remaining historians as one of the worst ideas in all human history. Sounded good at the time, but the unintended consequence could well be the conversion of Earth into a sparsely populated trash heap.

 Posted by at 8:12 pm

The dumbest editorial of the day

 dumbassery, Forward!, Gah., news, politics, weapons, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Nov 132021
 

America’s gun infatuation is a threat. The Supreme Court could make it worse.

Behold!

I was one of 30 former national security officials to sign on to an amicus brief arguing that unrestricted access to concealable firearms poses a great threat to public safety. If states like New York are unable to restrict who may carry a concealed weapon, we will be at greater risk of gun violence, threats from foreign and domestic terrorism and political extremism.

Because current laws against concealed carry are stopping terrorists? Really? Someone who wants to carry out a political assassination will be dissuaded because he can’t get a concealed carry license, or because a place where he wants to shoot somebody has a sign on the door saying “no guns?”

The author is probably not actually so stupid as to believe what she’s saying. But she probably believes that a lot of the American public *are* that dumb. If you are on the political left or on the side of gun control… just bear in mind that people like this think you are a ᚠᚢᚳkᛁᚾᚷ moron, willing and able to believe the most patently stupid arguments imaginable. People like this use not only fearmongering, but fearmongering based on falsehoods and an utter lack of logic. They should be spurned and mocked.

 Posted by at 10:38 pm

The end of Saturn

 AARRRGH, dumbassery, Forward!, Gah., history, politics, rockets, science, spacecraft, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Nov 132021
 

Some programs fade away; some die sudden deaths. The Saturn V, and the Apollo program in general, seemed to just sort of fade away; the public perception *seems* to be that as public interest in Apollo post Apollo 12 or so rapidly faded, interest in continuing Apollo faded, and thus the program was just allowed to die, finally killed off by Nixon.

Small problem with that narrative: the actual date of the death of the Saturn v can be precisely determined. in the NASA History office archive some years ago I found a memo by NASA Administrator James Webb, dated July 31, 1968, where the production of new Saturn V vehicles was cancelled. This limited the future of Apollo moon missions to only those Saturns already then under construction. Note that this is almost a *year* prior to Apollo 11 landing on the moon, and about four months prior to the election of Richard Nixon. Nixon could, perhaps, maybe, have restarted Saturn v production, but that’s not clear: when programs like this are cancelled, the staff vital for them *scatter.* Tribal knowledge evaporates. Equipment is sold for scrap, left to rust. Restarting production likely would have been fabulously expensive.

In mid 1968, the Apollo/Saturn program was obviously not facing post-success disappearing interest. The public was still thrilled. What NASA was facing was a slashed budget, with funds needed to further the progress of mankind being diverted to “Great Society” social programs. So instead of missions to the Moon and beyond, we got another fifty years of malaise, burdensome taxes and families being actively discouraged and dissolved. Thanks, LBJ. Thanks a lot.

 Posted by at 2:28 pm

Racist overpasses debunked

 Forward!, history, Hmm..., politics, youtube, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Nov 132021
 

As a response to the video in THIS POST, here is a debunking of the idea that overpasses were built over Long Island parkways specifically to keep black and Puerto Rican people from going to the beach. The theory was that the overpasses were intentionally built too low to allow buses to pass underneath them. But it turns out that buses and other commercial vehicles were already prohibited from parkways *by* *law*… and the buses that *could* go to this beach anyway all came from *white* population areas.

 Posted by at 1:39 pm

Janeway ain’t wrong

 AARRRGH, art, blather, Forward!, Gah., Meh., science fiction, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Nov 112021
 

Back before the yammering yahoos were forever going on about the need for “strong women characters,” pop culture was *full* of strong women characters. Star Trek: Voyager ended up kinda jam-packed with them… Janeway, Torres, Seven of Nine all ended up being well-written, well acted characters with distinct respectable personalities. Kes… meh, not so much. Modern live action Trek, sadly, has failed spectacularly in that regard, producing characters (both male and female) who run the short gamut from utterly forgettable to incredibly childish and annoying. Honestly: the bridge crew of the Discovery is *loaded* with women. How many of them do you even know the names of?

Janeway was a *proper* Starfleet captain: she commanded respect without having to berate people; she was emotionally affected by the things that happened around her and to her crew, but she was Captain enough to know when to keep it together. But then there’s “Michael Burnham.” Gah.

Burnham deserves no respect. Nor do the talentless hacks who write her.

 Posted by at 11:45 pm

Well, here we are

 AARRRGH, blather, Crazy, dumbassery, Forward!, Gah., news, politics, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Nov 112021
 

Sure, this is Britain, but the same nonsense would likely apply here as well:

Professor draws rage for telling students to work hard and avoid partying

A Cambridge University physical sciences professor sent out an email to his student saying:

“Please be careful how you handle yourselves here in these early weeks: remember that you are NOT at any other uni, where students do drink a lot and do have what they regard as a “good time” – and you are NOT on a course, as some Cambridge courses sadly are, where such a behaviour pattern in possible or acceptable.”

“Physical Sciences is a VERY hard subject, which will require ALL of your attention and your FULL brain capacity (and for a large fraction of you, even that will not be quite enough). You can ONLY do well (i.e. achieve your potential, which rightly or wrongly several people here assumed you have) I you are completely focused, and learn to enjoy the course. People who just TAKE the course, but enjoy their social life, can easily survive in many subjects — but not in this one.”

He is… NOT WRONG.

But people flipped out anyway.

I remember a few professors early in my aerospace engineering studies who made the same point, and they were not only not wrong, they were not wrong to do so. I had one Statics (a basic course required of *all* engineers, so the classroom was a huge auditorium) professor in particular who spent the first week badgering us, more or less bullying us to quit and find some field other than engineering. And he was partially successful: as memory serves, something like a third of the students bailed in that first week. And they were right to do so: if you can’t take some pressure, you shouldn’t be an engineer. If you go into art and get it wrong… who cares/ if you become an engineer and get it wrong. buildings collapse, planes explode, people die and nations fail. Science and engineering are *hard,* and spending your time partying and drinking will *not* help you. if the professor here convinces a student to study rather than party, he could well prevent an adequate student from becoming a failed one.

Those who are arguing that the professor is wrong are setting up students to fail. Even if the university dumbs down the requirements for graduation so that students who should have failed end up passing, once they get out into the private sector, they will find that they are incapable of remaining employed.

 Posted by at 9:40 pm

This opinion piece is everything wrong with America today

 AARRRGH, Crazy, dumbassery, Forward!, Gah., news, politics, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Nov 102021
 

A ramshackle rambling diatribe full of distortions, half truths and nuttery, courtesy NBC News:

A sobbing Kyle Rittenhouse already won — even before his trial is over

Any rational examination of the evidence showed that Rittenhouse was repeatedly attacked and defended himself appropriately, shooting only those who actively tried to physically harm him. This is the very definition of “self defense,” but the smug schmuck who wrote the piece ain’t having it. And then there’s this:

The truth is that too many white Americans probably see themselves in Rittenhouse — afraid of anyone, whether white or of color, who wants to live in a more equitable country — even if some don’t want to say so out loud.

Rittenhouse, and white people in general, aren’t afraid of people who “want to live in a more equitable country.” But murderous rioters and arsonists tearing up cities, destroying lives and livelihoods, burning buildings and books? Yeah. It’s not just white people who are justly leery of those types. But that’s not the narrative the author – who you’ll be shocked to find is a “professor of public policy at Davidson College” – wants to create. Instead, to this ilk the people who want to destroy civilization are the heroes; any who oppose them are by default the villains and should be utterly destroyed. That anyone would oppose burning cities is unthinkable. That anyone would choose to protect a business that is not his, is unthinkable.

The Chinese Communist Party is doubtless looking upon “thinkers” like this with satisfaction. One wonders if the FBI might find something interesting by examining certain financial records. There was a time when the FBI took seriously their job of defending the US against Communist subversion. If the US is to survive in a meaningful way, it would be helpful if the FBI once again took that job seriously.

 Posted by at 10:30 pm
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