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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I ran across some interesting remarks by Donald Rumseld about the bureaucratic explosion in Washington of the last twenty to thirty years:
“Well, I suppose the two things that leap to mind — one is the interaction between the Congress and the department has changed dramatically since the 1970s. Back then the — as I recall, the authorization bill was about 50 or 60 pages. Today it’s 900 pages. The degree that the committees of the Congress — the staffs have blown up by many, many multiples on the congressional committees, with the result being that there are just an enormous number of requirements and inhibitions and restrictions and prohibitions that are imposed on the department. We’re up, I think, in the 900 level of reports that we send up there. I don’t even know who reads them, but we’re killing trees all over the globe. And it’s — they get put into the law and then people just keep doing it. If we just could knock off half of the reports and cut the rest of them in half and use a single color — (laughter) — like black and white — (laughter) — and then put them on the computer and give them the electrons and let them make the paper, we could save so much time and so much effort.
But the second thing is the interagency process. If you think about it, our overnment was organized in an earlier period. These departments and agencies the president has practically no ability to change without congressional approval. And the nature of our world in this 21st century is so different that all you can do is about from time to time add a new department. So over my lifetime, I’ve seen the Department of Housing and Urban Development added and the Department of Transportation added and the Department of HHS added and the Department of Veterans’ Affairs added, and now the Department of Homeland Security added. But nothing ever ends. We just keep layering on top.”
It’s been a hard few years for a lot of friends of mine. Up until I left Pittsburgh in 1989 I was usually out at nights with the local Deadhead crowd. My room mate of many years was in Sandoz, one of the top local bands of the time. They were at the core of the Pittsburgh Deadhead scene. As a local folk-rocker I’d always been on the fringes of it. Year in and year out, the audiences which supported local writers like myself were largely part of that scene.
It was saddening when I heard Gerry Garcia had passed away and the Dead would no longer tour. Their concerts were just undoubtedly the craziest, most fun, warmest and friendliest I can imagine ever to exist in this life. You simply had to experience the all day parking lot party followed by four hours of continuous music by the Dead. No warm up band: they played for the love of the music. No searches for hidden tape recorders: they reserved the center section for the TapeHeads. There was always a forest of microphones there. Every Dead concert that ever was can be had on a bootleg tape. The Dead even encourage fans to trade show tapes on the Internet. Just don’t trade their studio work… that’s all they ask.
It is with great pleasure I read they are touring again albeit with out Gerry because he’s, well, dead, not just Dead… You known what I mean.
I suggest you read the article. The changes since 1995 when they last toured should give you an indication of exactly how fast Liberty is being undermined in America. People go to Dead concerts to get high, dance naked, groove on the music, be nice to each other, party until dawn and in plain words have an incredibly good time. Times so good you savour them for the rest of your life.
A State that blocks innocent pleasure is hardly worth fighting for except the enemy we face is far, far worse and stands against absolutely everything about a Dead concert or a Rainbow Gathering.
If you want to know “Why We Fight”, join their tour and let yourself go. Saving this life style is something worth fighting for.
  
1990/91 Pittsburgh Dead Scene
Photos: D.Amon
I was just reading an article about the “space parasol” idea. That’s the concept of placing a sunshade at the Earth-Sun L1 point1 to intercept perhaps 2% of the solar flux before it reaches Earth. This would counter the projected temperature changes on Earth due to a green-house effect.
It struck me there is more to it than that. It is known the Solar Constant2 has risen slowly over the aeons of our star’s life and will continue to do so. At some point in our distant future we will have no choice but to either move our planet further outwards, abandon it for a new home or build sunshades. The evolution of the solar system gives us absolutely no choice in the matter. We will be forced to take complete control of the energy balance of Earth or else we and all other life will be on our way to extinction.
I’m confident our “greens” will by then have mutated into “browns” who will believe we should allow events to run their natural course from parched bare rock to parched bare rock.
Whether we take up the reigns of control now or our descendant species do so millions of years from now is not relevant to the purpose of this article however. Somewhere in the Universe there are civilizations which have faced the choice already. Some of them will have chosen to control the stellar flux on their home world.
We have two methods of detecting extrasolar planets currently. One is by the doppler effect caused by a stars’ dance about the changing center of gravity of its’ planetary system; the other is by watching the light curve for dips due to planets passing across their star’s disk from our perspective.
It is quite possible for us to see doppler effects without seeing eclipses. It happens if the plane of the alien solar system is tilted with respect to us such that planets never pass directly between us and their star. This is the most likely scenario.
But what if we were to see the opposite effect? What if we see a significant dip in the light curve at predictable intervals and yet do not see any doppler effect?
I’ll expand on this for those who have not said “Aha!” yet.
It should take a fairly significant sized body to make a dip we detect: almost certainly one with a disk size from which we would infer a substantial, Jupiter class, mass. Such an object would almost certainly cause alternating redward and blueward doppler shifts of the stars spectral lines as it orbits the star. If that is not the case, we have an anomaly. An object in orbit about its’ star which is large enough to block substantial light and yet is very low mass relative to its’ size should strike one as very odd.
It could be a parasol built by intelligent life.
1 = Lagrange points are where the gravity between two bodies creates a “balance” point such the pull from each tends to keep the object where it is. The Earth-Sun L1 point is on a line directly between and a couple million miles inwards. You can either read about it or calculate it yourself.
2 = The Solar Constant is the average total energy flux at Earth orbit, currently about 1.37 kw/m^2 flat on to the Sun. It is reasonably constant over a human lifetime but is not constant in the long term. The Sun was hotter in its’ earliest years until it stabilized somewhat cooler than it is now. It has slowly grown hotter and will continue to do so for billions of years to come. Life will be impacted long before our star leaves the Main Sequence in the far future. At that time it will expand to red gianthood and will become large enough to absorb or at best turn Earth into an orbiting cinder.
Stupidity at this level is nearly criminal. The US Army dismissed six Arabic language translators on grounds which had nothing to do with their ability to serve and protect the USA.
Yes, the US military does need some transformational changes. Some of its’ people need to be transformed into residents of the 21st Century – instead of the 19th. I want a military whose first concern is accomplishing their mission. One uses the resources at hand whether one likes them or not.
Nothing else matters worth a damn but winning this war before millions of us die.
The US DoD is studying whether to continue with its’ current broadband satellite systems or to move on to a global space laser com relay network. According to Undersecretary of the Air Force Peter Teets at a DoD News Briefing on Tuesday, Sept. 3, 2002, they hope to be ready for a decision by December 2004:
“Just exactly that way. We will progress in the development of the laser comm. technology between now and 2004. In 2004, we will decide whether or not we have confidence enough to deploy — whether we have confidence enough to not procure AEHFs 4 and 5 and, rather, rely upon a high bandwidth relay network of some kind using some form of laser comm.”
They seem primarily interested in space-space links, but I predict usefulness for space-ground links as well. Laser links have many admirable characteristics for this if you can get the pointing right. They do not have the extensive sidelobes or wide footprint of radio signals1; they are difficult to jam2; they can carry enormously more data3; and left entirely unsaid at this briefing… they are amenable to quantum cryptography4.
Oh I just love the future!
1 = This makes it very difficult to intercept. Even tightly beamed microwaves have enough off axis signal to be read miles away as the Russians did in New England in the 80’s. They purchased an old country house as a diplomatic site, stuck up a bunch of antennas and started picking off White House and other phone calls. At that time the exchange number was part of a clear text header, easily filtered for out of the massive volume of long distance voice traffic. It goes without saying US ELINT sats can pick up the faint leakage of microwave links from orbit.
2 = Someone will certainly comment about the effect of fog, clouds etc. It is not as much of a problem as you think, and most especially for point to point orbital communications. Even on ground links, much depends on the frequency in use. Water vapour does not absorb at all frequencies.
3 = Think of live two way hiresolution video links between pilots in theatre and control centres elsewhere in the world; perhaps even holographic 3D heads up data displays. The possibilities are staggering.
4 = Even without encryption, quantum tricks lets them make sure undetected “man in the middle” attacks are literally impossible.
According to a Wall Street Journal survey European economies are some of the freest in the world and getting more so. The rankings are worth a look.
Putin really laid into the EU and reporters about his handling of Chechnya. He’s certainly got a clear idea of what it is he is fighting.
I’d say Russian and American interests are being driven ever closer together at the same time both are diverging from the EU. This is definitely one of the developing features of the geopolitical landscape to watch closely.
It could well be the defining global political feature of the 21st Century.
Glenn Reynolds pointed out an article in today’s New York Times on the 4th day of student riots in Iran.
What? You haven’t heard? Presumably that’s because the news media thinks we’re more interested in whom is buggering whom in Buckingham than in events of real import? Yes. Of course. That must be it.
The Iranian government has given a sentence of death by hanging to an academic, Hashem Aghajari, for what Americans would call an exercise of his First Amendment rights. If profs in the USA think they are losing those rights simply because someone criticises them, they should consider Iran, where the State can make you lose your head instead of just your temper.
The student protests have spread to other cities and seem likely to continue unless the medieval mullahs stomp on them, an action which would just polarize any remaining fence sitters. The Iranian students are living proof there is a liberal, tolerant 21st Century face to Islam crying out for escape from the rule of fundamentalist fruitcakes.
News media everywhere should be pushing this story with as much alacrity as possible. No reasonable person wants to see blanket hatreds grow. This is precisely what al Qaeda wants. If they have any strategy, it is to bring about the war of civilizations in hopes they can win by expending more lives than we in the civilized world have a stomach for. They are not sufficiently versed in history to understand how terribly mistaken they are or exactly how apocalyptic such a war would be for all… but most especially for them.
We must let the average guy on the street know there are Muslims out there who are just like him or her; people who want to live their lives, worship in their faith, exercise basic liberties… and most importantly, allow others to do the same.
My feelings of hope for Iran are not new. Even in the days immediately following September 11th I told friends Iran is different. There is hope for it. It was never as crazy a place as the rest of the Medieval East; it has an educated populace which understands what a civil society is about. One way or the other they will find their way out of the swamp Khomeini led them into.
I do not think their own government is quite so evil as others in the region. I do not believe Iranians will sacrifice their own children to the past and there is no other path but that of massive and violent repression if they are to block reform.
If I knew an appropriate Muslim phrase (other than Inshallah, which is a bit weak for what I wish them) I would say it for those young Iranians who seek the blessings of Liberty.
I guess “good luck and godspeed” will have to serve.
At least that’s what Law.com says.
We always knew Glenn was destined fer a better title than Perfesser…
The Massachusetts people put in an enormous amount of work these last two years. They put their entire personal lives on hold to fight for Liberty. They came within a statistical whisker of forcing the biggest tax abolition in US history that we are aware of. They fought for our Party.
After the dust and confetti settle and the balloons are all popped… there are the bills. Lots of them. It’s not glamorous or exciting. But they must be paid before moving on.
Please consider helping them close out the old so they can move on to the new.
You can visit their tip jar or you can go to one of their web sites and read about it first.
Carla Howell
Michael Cloud
Small Government Initiative
Our teams fight with perhaps a hundredth of the resources of the Left and Right. Do your part to change the equation.
If we have to buy our Liberty back, then so be it.
The first time I spotted this in a Fox News article, I assumed it was just a simple error, something done in the rush to get the news up on the web. But after seeing it a second time:
“Some of the shootings occurred in Prince George’s County, Md., in the same town where Muhammad’s ex-wife, Mildred, lived with her sister. Mildred Muhammad had fled there from Washington because she feared her husband would hurt her, according to court documents.”
I have to wonder if it is policy.
I do not believe Mildred ever changed her religion or name. From what I remember of what I have read recently, she has not exactly been on speaking terms with her ex for longer than the time since he changed his name.
Why saddle the poor woman with this horrid association?
Steven den Beste points out something I missed entirely. With the change of Senate control, Senator Fritz “I whore for Hollywood” Hollings is no longer head of the Senate Commerce Committee. A very likely result is the DoubleSpeak titled “Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act” is most likely DOA. In case you don’t know, this is the act which would mandate control of your personal computer by the US government and anyone who can buy it.
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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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