We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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This news in from my alma mater, CMU, on the NSF Million Books Project:
The NSF’s Information Technology Research Program has also awarded a $3 million, three-year grant to the Million Books Project to support digitization of core academic materials, technical reports, government documents and cultural treasures.
I made the prediction to friends in 1980 that by 2010 one would be able to sit on a beach in the South Pacific and access any reference work or data on Earth, whether it be 15th century bills of laiding from the Library of Lisbon or the contents of the Library of Congress.
I think we’re still on schedule.
It seems some of the conservative media are getting all hot and bothered over sex on the campus. If the allegation that tax payer funds were used were true, I would agree on that very limited issue. Universities should not be State funded. Period and full stop. In any case, the University of Arizona event in question apparently wasn’t campus funded:
The university insists none of their money went toward promoting the controversial festival. It was underwritten by a public-funded arts council and held both off- and on-campus.
Another even less objectionable event occured in Indiana:
Other universities have also lately had trouble maintaining the line between sex and education. At Indiana University, officials are probing whether any laws were broken when pornographic filmmakers from Shane’s World entertainment, based in Van Nuys, Calif., used a campus dorm to make an adult movie last month.
It’s hard to see what laws could be broken. I don’t think any force was used by the filmmakers. Hell, if you were an undergrad and a porn starlet hopped into YOUR bed, which of the following would you say?
- Help, Police! I’m being attacked by a sex goddess!
- Thank you God!
Why does sex seem to be such a hangup for so many of the conservative orientation?
Today’s Ballistic Missile interception test has been successful:
“The target was launched at 2:30 p.m. Hawaiian Standard Time (7:30 p.m. EST). The USS Lake Erie, equipped with Aegis BMD computer programs and equipment, developed a fire control solution without any external sensor inputs. Within two minutes after target launch the Aegis Weapon System fired the SM-3 guided missile. Approximately two minutes later, the missile’s kinetic warhead acquired, tracked and diverted into the target, demonstrating the Aegis BMD system’s capability to engage the ballistic missile target in the ascent phase. This was the third consecutive target intercept.”
I’d say we’re getting close to a North Korea sized ICBM solution.
NOTE: The available information does not specify the missile type intercepted, but I would guess it is more an IRBM than an ICBM in this test. I know very little about the Kaui Launch site so I can’t comment on what sort of pads/launchers they have. I’ll add more information when I receive it.
At my suggestion Perry recently added Sofia Sideshow to our blogroll. I’ve rarely commented directly on other blogs, but I’ll make an exception this time.
It’s fun. Go read it. And oh yeah, bro’ Brian, you should get together with him since you’re producing a film in his general region of the world.
Mr jcrank: If you ever need some intros into the commercial space world for an SF movie, feel free. I’m part of the Artemis Project.
Yes, I was briefly an Explorer Scout… but that’s not what I’m writing about.
Given the article posted by Natalie I think Samizdata needs to think ahead of the Statist curve. I too find this so far beyond my worst nightmares that I am near speechless – or whatever one calls the blogged word.
If anyone out there has their own server on a high bandwidth link and could work with Samizdata.net to set up a mirror and in the worst case scenario, free hosting, it would be much appreciated.
Here, for the Infidels, I repeat The Holy Word of The Goddess Liberty, (Praised be Her Name!) which I Worship above All Others and whose Word is not respected in the UK:
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
– US 1st Amendment
So take this Tranzi Scum!:
Victory to Israel! Hang Saddam! Shoot the Guantanamo terrorists! A HARM in every Al Qaeda’s SUV! Nuke the Chechens! The only good al Qaeda is a Dead al Qaeda.
Thank you for your kind patience.
Hot off the Debian-Security mail list:
“It has been confirmed that the Twente University server rooms have now completely burned down. This means, (security,non-us,nm,qa}.debian.org and ftp.snt.utwente.nl are now lost. Rest in peace…
To translate and summarize http://www.webwereld.nl/nieuws/13242.phtml: “The fire started a little after 8AM CET. There are no casualties. The near Dutch-German internet exchange will take over some of the SURFnet activities. The network will probably be up again tomorrow, with help from HP. A new server room in another building was already being prepared anyway for use next month…”
And yes, also in the Netherlands it’s highly unusual that such a fire happens.
Regards, Pieter-Paul”
There may be a suit against the Feds over the use of Federal funds for electioneering purposes at the State level.
Wouldn’t it be lovely (cough) to see those Statist turkeys behind bars? (pass that over to me again would you?….)
Secretary of Homeland Security to be Tom Ridge commented on domestic spying:
“Ridge said his recent visit to MI5, the British domestic intelligence agency, was “very revealing,” but that the powers the British agency wields would be unacceptable under the U.S. Constitution.”
I can’t really say I find this surprising. (Hi guys, did you get all that?)
Donald Rumsfeld listed Saddam’s available options in an interview with a reporter from El Mercurio, a Chilean newspaper:
“That’s a possibility. A number of leaders of countries have decided they were in a corner and they had no choice and, rather than have a conflict in their country, or rather than have their family and friends killed, that they will leave. So, that is a possibility.
Another possibility is that he will try to do what he has done repeatedly before: to lie, and to pretend-as he is already saying-that they do not have weapons of mass destruction and see how long he can fool the inspectors.
Another possibility would be simply to say, “Fair enough. We’ve got them, and you can come in and we will destroy them and life will go on.” And try to stay in office that way. Try to keep his regime intact that way. Which of those three courses of action he will end up taking I think is probably a function of how the world behaves as much as how he behaves.
If there is a determination and a steadiness of purpose, so that the countries of the world and the United Nations demonstrate to him that he really does not have a lot of choices; he does not have the choice of not disarming.”
Donald missed one, and it’s the one I’m starting to believe is the one which will actually happen.
Let’s think in medieval terms. Why would a King or Warlord arrange for his family and favorite courtiers to be sent out the backdoor of the castle? Why would he pay large sums of money to another Kingdom to ensure their safety?
Saddam knows he is going to lose. He is going to go down fighting.
He will use everything he has. Saddam expects to die and will go down shooting. Whatever you may think of him, Saddam is no soft bureaucrat. He killed his first man when he was in his teens or early twenties. He knows how to handle military weapons.
I suggest he is following a twofold strategy. First and foremost he is trying to buy time. He hopes he can pull off a fudge once again but doesn’t really believe it is going to work this time. He is using the time he buys to prepare for his final battle.
If he has made the Roman-like decision “to die well”, he has a number of options open to him. He might try hitting US forces or local allies first. Suicidal? Yes, but he might think it his best chance for inflicting casualties on us. Even if the kill ratio is badly against him he could think it a good idea to grab the initiative. We know high casualties don’t bother him much: just look to the Iran-Iraq war for proof.
There could be secret operations going on right now to deploy his nasties for the last “glorious” stand. He’ll take down half the population of Iraq if it will take more american soldiers with him. If he has bio and chem, they will be released not only in the desert. He will use them in urban battles, even in heavily populated areas. If he has nukes, he will have them pre-positioned with orders to set them off when defeat is imminent. His Fedaheen will certainly be prepared to die with and for him as they cannot expect to long survive his passing.
I assume the US military has already worked through this scenario and has plans to minimize it. They most likely have contingency plans for quickly regaining initiative if Saddam strikes first.
Make no mistake. We are dealing with someone fully capable of making a last glorious stand his statement for the history books. In his mind it’s the chance for the Persians to play the Spartans with him in the starring Leonidas role.
This game has no rules… and no limits.
If you ever wondered who handles bomb disposals when the bombs contain the bad stuff you will find this transcript of a demonstration by the Army’s TEU of interest.
A few days ago I wrote about my anger at Arabic translators being kicked out of the military. It seems I am not alone in my condemnation.
- Take a sheet of grey construction paper.
- Hold it over your head.
- Look up at it in a dark room.
That’s approximately what I can see from here. T’is a normal Irish night, so I’d also need slow wipers for my eyeballs.
I would just about see the glow from a dinosaur killer asteroid,.. if it passed directly overhead.
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Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
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