The people who created the mess are getting away with it, while the vast majority are being hurt. People are not going to starve quietly while the bankers continue to live in their palaces.

The Arab Spring shows the result of long-term inequality. It can happen anywhere, and Europe may well be next.

Neat Geek Stuff

😉

I was going to add:

I had a good friend for a number of years who was an ex-pat American who worked a lot in Aerospace & Shipbuilding etc. I wonder if your Dad knew him? No easy way of knowing I guess. He is an amazing man, and a great *human* (one of the rare ones). He’s a Scientist, engineer, businessman, humanitarian, and general *jack of all trades*. Sadly, I haven’t spoken to him in years. *sigh*

He’s a member of the Climategate Country Club

His brief Bio tells it all really:

Are you a scientist working within climate science?

NO

I am unqualified to work within climate science because:

I have a BSEE from MIT in thermal power plant design

I have a MSE in applied mathematics.

My Phd was computer modeling of Maxwell’s equations.

I am a PE (Ohio)

Most of all I do not suffer fools gladly.

LOL He hasn’t changed a bit! 😀

Dr. Brenton R. Groves.

Google him… I think you’ll be impressed. 🙂 Be warned… his list of publications is quite long! 😉 His wife, Lois, is also quite impressive. 🙂

Now THAT is an excellent and succinct way of putting it! 😀 I may borrow that (with attribution, naturally) if I may. 🙂

Your father was a very interesting man. I would have liked to have met him. 🙂 I’m sure he and my grandfather would have gotten on very well! Probably would have agreed on the *important* things, and argued like hell about everything else, and loved it! 😀 I miss grandad, of course (as I am sure you miss your father). But I smile a lot also, especially when I think (something like) “Well, you were right again, you old sod!” Heh… 🙂 Wisdom of the aged, eh? 😉

Yes, I feel revolution is inevitable. It may well be Global, and may well be the last one we ever have. *shrug* Suit’s me…

This is how revolutions start, and the people in charge are oblivious to it. They assume that the ‘people’ will just do what they are told and not bother the great and powerful. There are limits, and we are, alas, approaching them.

Yes, wars are always good for ‘great achievements’, because it is the only time governments will pay for real research, and then only in the hope of discovering ‘more efficient’ ways of killing people. Humans really are a piece of work.

My Dad worked on building drones from all kinds of aircraft. It was all done down here on Eglin AFB.

I didn’t know that about the B-17’s. 😀 Thanks! Good to know I still don’t know everything! 😉 🙄 Heh…

Anyway, it’s easy to see why I think so very little of Homo Sapiens! Even with the so-called “great achievements”! Most of them were achieved through great pain and suffering (most often of the *little* people), and for all the wrong reasons (ego being the main one)!

The US used B-17s converted to drones to fly over the tests and then checked them for radiation when they landed. You can see some of those aircraft in the old movie “Twelve O’Clock High”, as all of the formation flying B-17s are in fact drones. The B-17s that crash in the movie are aircraft that were contaminated flying through the tests and slated for destruction. No one figured out that crashing an burning a radioactive aircraft was not a brilliant idea.

It took decades for the military to admit that the soldiers who participated in the tests were subjected to unsafe levels of radiation. Part of the problem was that no one knew for sure what a safe level was, so the soldiers were used as ‘lab rats’ and many died without knowing what had been done to them, and no government support for the illnesses they experienced as a result of the tests. Everything was classified.

A lot of ranchers downwind of the test sites lost stock and developed illnesses with the government not even mentioning what had been done to them. Great evil has been [and is still being] done in the name of ‘defense’.

It is amazing the things humans and their governments do, things that could easily wipe us off the face of the Earth.

The Brit’s tested nukes here (officially that is) from ’55 to ’63 @ the now infamous Maralinga. But the first test was actually in ’52 at Montebello Islands (off the coast of WA), and two more bombs were detonated in ’53 @ Emu Field (in the Great Victoria Desert). Aus were not (as it has been portraid) innocent victims of the Monarchy, but in fact willing participants. After all, the only ones likely to suffer were the indigenous Aborigines, and who could care less what happened to them? *shrug* In fact, after the officially reported 7 nuclear tests at Maralinga (and only 7 nuclear detonations did occur), a further 100+ tests were carried out to determine everything from how radiation spread, to radiation sickness, and how the bombs themselves would react to fire, explosions, earthquakes etc.
Tests included forcing soldiers to run, walk and crawl across contaminated test sites immediately following detonation tests. (Which at least proves that the British, American & Aus politicians and Military commands are not so different). The Brit’s did lie to us about several things, including about our scientists concerns that fallout from the first test bomb would spread far as they believed the yield was too high (about 13kT) and that proved to be the case. After detonation, radiation was detected as far as NSW, QLD & Vic, and all over SA & NT. After a series of smaller yield tests, the Brit’s decided to test a thermonuclear device in ’57 with a yield of almost 27kT. There were two further tests planned, but the Aus Gov had had enough and pulled the plug on them. Further, much smaller, tests were allowed. BTW, all the *minor* tests were carried out in absolute secrecy (it was a bit difficult to hide the major tests obviously). These *minor* tests included how plutonium weapons would react to fire and explosions aboard an aircraft carrying them. The results were over 40kg (22kg in one test alone) of enriched, highly toxic plutonium being spread over a very large area. There were in fact about 700 tests conducted all up, some of which are still highly secret. A Royal Commission reported in ’85 that many of the sites were still highly contaminated, despite assurances by the Brit & Aus Gov’s that they were safe. We spent over AU$105mill between ’96 & 2000 cleaning up the worst sites.

They all lie. 🙂

The hypocrisy of the situation is thick enough to float an Abrams.

South Korea finally admitted they ‘toyed’ with the idea, Japan’s new nationalists wouldn’t be adverse, and so on and so forth. If they had oil laying around they would be in trouble. Hell, most of Japan’s nuclear power system should be counted as nuclear weapons, except the Japanese will also be their target.

I just read a report on a DoD simulation of an attack on Iran – regional war lasting for about 8 years, but it would only delay an Iranian nuclear program for 3 years, meaning Iran could have nukes for the last 5 years of the war.

They forgot to mention the $10/gallon gas or the collapse of the world economy, so they must not think it’s important.

BTW, their reprocessing plant is a bit of a toxic waste dump right now, seems nuke spooks aren’t good at housekeeping. It’s a quiet scandal that keeps getting shoved under the covers by successive governments because they really don’t want to advertise that Canada once had the makings for nuclear weapons — according to the FAS, the Canucks even had the shells of bombs ready to fill with explosive goodness, and one of the UK nuclear tests was actually a Canadian test of their bomb design. (Hmm, I wonder if Australia got that same service from the UK… plausible deniability, eh?!).

So anyhow, I’m eagerly awaiting sanctions against Canada for their clandestine nuclear program. Oh wait… a clandestine nuclear program is only a crime if you’re brown. Alrighty, then!

– Badtux the Snarky Penguin