Year: 2007

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot??

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Ummm…Are these guys on the payroll of Leno’s or Letterman’s gag writers, or what?

I saw the Get Smart movie the Nude Bomb, and the script writers for that miscarriage of spy spoofage were more credible than the DoD.

cbs5.com – Pentagon Confirms It Sought To Build A ‘Gay Bomb’

Hank Plante
Reporting

(CBS 5) BERKELEY A Berkeley watchdog organization that tracks military spending said it uncovered a strange U.S. military proposal to create a hormone bomb that could purportedly turn enemy soldiers into homosexuals and make them more interested in sex than fighting.

Pentagon officials on Friday confirmed to CBS 5 that military leaders had considered, and then subsquently rejected, building the so-called “Gay Bomb.”

Edward Hammond, of Berkeley’s Sunshine Project, had used the Freedom of Information Act to obtain a copy of the proposal from the Air Force’s Wright Laboratory in Dayton, Ohio.

As part of a military effort to develop non-lethal weapons, the proposal suggested, “One distasteful but completely non-lethal example would be strong aphrodisiacs, especially if the chemical also caused homosexual behavior.”

The documents show the Air Force lab asked for $7.5 million to develop such a chemical weapon.

“The Ohio Air Force lab proposed that a bomb be developed that contained a chemical that would cause enemy soliders to become gay, and to have their units break down because all their soldiers became irresistably attractive to one another,” Hammond said after reviwing the documents.

“The notion was that a chemical that would probably be pleasant in the human body in low quantities could be identified, and by virtue of either breathing or having their skin exposed to this chemical, the notion was that soliders would become gay,” explained Hammond.

The Pentagon told CBS 5 that the proposal was made by the Air Force in 1994.

……

Your tax dollars at work.

Wyoming Senator Replacement Law May Be Unconstitutional

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This is rather interesting, read the full article.

FindLaw’s Writ – Amar: The Wyoming Governor’s and the U.S. Senate’s Unnoticed Options, Under the Seventeenth Amendment, for Filling the Senate Vacancy Created By Senator Thomas’s Death

By VIKRAM DAVID AMAR
—-
Friday, Jun. 08, 2007

This week’s unfortunate death of Republican United States Senator Craig Thomas from Wyoming raises complex, if largely unnoticed, constitutional questions.

The consensus among the pundits is that Thomas’s departure from the closely divided Senate will have no short-term effect on the partisan balance there because although the Wyoming Governor is a Democrat, state law provides that when picking a temporary replacement to serve until an election can be held in 2008, the Governor must choose from among three candidates put up by the leadership of the state GOP – the party represented by the fallen incumbent.

This description of Wyoming law is accurate: The state elections code indeed directs that, in the event of a Senate vacancy among the Wyoming Senate contingent, the central party committee of the party represented by the prior incumbent is to submit three names of qualified persons to the Governor, who “shall” then choose one of the three to serve in the Senate until a popular election is held.

What is dubious, however, is whether this Wyoming statutory scheme is valid under the U.S. Constitution. Perhaps, in the spirit of bipartisanship or out of a desire to respect voter wishes, a Democratic Wyoming Governor should consider, and maybe even tap, a Republican temporary replacement for Thomas. But whether the Governor can legally be forced to pick one of the three persons served up by state GOP leaders is an entirely different matter.

The Key Provision: Section 2 of the Seventeenth Amendment

The key provision to consider is Section 2 of the Seventeenth Amendment, an alteration of the Constitution added in 1913 to guarantee direct popular election (as distinguished from state legislative selection) of U.S. Senators. Section 2 says:

“When vacancies happen in the representation of any State in the Senate, the executive authority of such State shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies: Provided, That the legislature of any State may empower the executive thereof to make temporary appointments until the people fill the vacancies by election as the legislature may direct.”

There is a very strong textual argument that the Seventeenth Amendment prevents the Wyoming legislature from dictating the Governor’s choices in making a temporary appointment: The Amendment’s language differentiates between a state “legislature” and a state “executive” authority, and allows a state legislature not to make or constrain any temporary appointments itself, but rather only to “empower the [state] executive to make [the] appointment.”

In other words, the Amendment, by its terms, creates potential appointment power only in Governors; it does not authorize legislatures to participate in such appointment decisions, beyond simply determining whether the Governors should be allowed to make temporary appointments or not.

….

Practice What You Preach, You Gravy Sucking Pig!!!

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Here we have a women who has made her career on shallow personality news and who is now in a position to do something about it.

Her response is to bring vapid personality chit-chat to Edward R. Murrow’s chair.

Katie Couric Seven for ’07: Simple Lessons for a Complicated Time

….

Pursuing something you love should be the first thing on your post-graduate to do list. But too often, that’s not what drives young people as they look at their life goals. According to a recent survey, many say their top two priorities are number 1, being rich, and number 2, being famous. Believe me, it’s not all it’s cracked up to be …

So quit and do the news industry a favor. Not only don’t you deserve to sit in Edward R. Murrow’s chair, you don’t deserve to sit in Geraldo’s chair.

You are a rich shallow person elevated well past your level of competence. Get out.

But thanks to self-made You Tube productions, and so-called reality shows like The Apprentice and Survivor, … fame, even the fleeting sanjaya-type, seems easier to attain, and more seductive, than ever.

The proliferation of celebrity magazines makes Lindsey Lohan’s latest stint in rehab seem more important than what’s happening in Darfur.

The kind of fluff that accosts us on the newsstand may seem like harmless fun, but it should also come with a warning label that says it can rot your mind and distort your values.

…

Cthulhu on a Croissant! What’s next? Rush Limbaugh lecturing people on the dangers of drug abuse????

Ummmm…Bad Example….

Tom Delay lecturing people on ethics….

Oops….

Robert Bork lecturing people on frivolous law suits???

OK…It may take a while for me to find a non-hypocrite winger.

Hypocrite!

CFM International’s Future Tech plans/

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An interesting article on the conflicts between fuel economy and noise, and the technologies involved.

CFMI Trying To Anticipate New Climate Challenges (Subscription Required)
Aviation Week & Space Technology
06/04/2007, page 52

Michael Mecham
Evendale, Ohio

. . . and some new ones, as CFMI tackles fuel costs and environmental concerns

Printed headline: Some Old Plans . . .

It came as no surprise to CFM International that prospective customers of next-generation single-aisle aircraft rank reduced fuel consumption as their highest priority. But they also are awakening to a broadening of the clean planet debate that is likely to lead to a series of new regulations, such as carbon trading, from governments eager to respond to the growing clamor to do something about global warming.

Recently, CFMI, the 50-50 partnership between General Electric and Snecma, surveyed lessors, banks, legacy and low-cost carriers (LCCs) about their priorities for the LEAP56 (Leading Edge Aviation Propulsion) initiative for 18,000-33,000-lb.-thrust-class engines the company launched in 2005 to power a successor to the Airbus A320 and Boeing 737 families.

……


CFMI likes what open rotors, whether in pusher (right) or puller configurations, can do to lower fuel burn. But noise and installation issues will make them a challenge. Credit: CFM CONCEPTS

But another bit of feedback is a sign of the times. “Focus on CO2,” the LCCs advised. European political leaders have been the most pronounced adherents of the global warming message, which is to decrease levels of carbon dioxide from man-made sources. But the idea that increased regulation is necessary is gaining acceptance elsewhere.

“In the last six months, we have been impressed by how much the debate has picked up in the U.S.,” says CFMI President and CEO Eric Bachelet.

…..

We can thank Al Gore for this.

Since CO2 emissions are directly related to fuel burn, reducing specific fuel consumption (SFC) is the most effective way to address the issue. The LEAP initiative is based on dropping SFC 10-15%, maintenance costs by about 15% and noise by 10-15 dB. to meet requirements expected in the next round of noise regulations, Stage 4, says Planaud. Additionally, oxides of nitrogen (NOx) emissions will need to exceed by 60% the Committee of Aviation Environmental Protection (CAEP) 6 standards that come into effect next year.

Rig tests of the compressor, combustor and high- and low-pressure turbines in the initiative will begin this year at Snecma’s facilities in Villaroche, France, and GE’s at Peebles, Ohio. The tests are aimed at an engine launch in 2011, which is enough lead time for Airbus and Boeing to introduce a successor to their A320 and 737 programs, respectively, by mid-decade.

….

Started in 2005, LEAP56 includes composite fan case and fan blades, titanium aluminide 3D airfoils in the low-pressure turbine, ceramic matrix composite high-pressure turbine nozzles and a second-generation twin-annular pre-mixing swirler (TAPS) combustor. Clapper calls the combined technologies a “step change” for CFMI.

Composite fan blades are one of the most intense technology development efforts. GE introduced them on the GE90 and has extended the concept with composite fan cases for the GEnx. Those composites are laid in plies pre-impregnated with resin, a laborious process that GE tried without much success to automate. Besides saving weight and cutting SFC, composite blades are slashing maintenance costs. Only three blades have had to be replaced on GE90s since the engine entered service in 1995. Composite blades are so durable that GE is aiming for their certification on the GEnx with no service life limits (AW&ST Apr. 16, p. 60).

Using 18 wide-chord composite blades, rather than the customary 22 or more on older designs, combined with a composite fan case will save 400 lb. on LEAP engines, says Planaud.

However, the company anticipates LEAP56 production rates comparable to CFM56 engines, which have been as high as 2,000 a year, about five times higher than the GE90/GEnx series. As a result, the CFMI partners have been looking for composite manufacturing techniques that can be automated. Most promising is a process called Resin Transfer Molding (RTM) in which bands of dry preform are woven rather than laid on top of each other to create the composite structure.

The strength of small composite blades is an issue. The big GE90 wide-chord fan blades–as much as 115 in. long–have proven adept at dissipating the shock of bird and other foreign object strikes. But the smaller LEAP56 blades have less surface area to absorb such shocks. Tests on a CFM56-5C using 70-in. RTM blades will be done this year.

While noise, NOx, carbon particulate and carbon dioxide emissions are a growing political issue, the size of their fuel bill remains the biggest sore point for airlines.

All the world’s airlines combined spent $43 billion on fuel in 2001–13% of their direct operating costs (DOC)–when Jet A cost $0.66 per gallon. At current rates of $2.03 per gallon, the bill for all airlines combined will hit $117 billion this year, or 26% of DOC, says Clapper.

To tackle this problem, CFMI assigned a team to use a combination of computer studies and the company’s experience in maintenance to consider alternative engine designs. Most were rejected.

Among them were the geared turbofan (GTF) that Pratt & Whitney is developing. Its large-diameter, slower fan is expected to benefit fuel burn, but also will increase weight and drag, the CFMI team concluded. And the GTF was seen as driving up maintenance costs. Similarly, a two-stage turbine will be more efficient, but its higher operating temperatures are a worry sign for maintenance.

So the company ended up with a single-stage turbine, but with a higher pressure ratio for improved combustor efficiency than current models. “It’s a simple, rugged design with fewer parts and higher reliability,” says Clapper.

Looking beyond LEAP56, Snecma has been pursing an alternative strategy that holds some promise: a counterrotating fan to boost bypass.

More radically, CFMI has dusted off the unducted fan concept first proposed in the late 1980s as a weight-savings approach to lowering fuel costs in response to the industry’s first oil shock. That idea faded in the early 1990s when fuel prices receded. But with fuel high again, and likely to stay that way because worldwide energy demands have increased so much, CFMI is taking a second look at unducted fans, which it’s renamed “open rotors.”

Last October, Rolls-Royce noted that it is exploring unducted fans, too. Pratt says mounting and noise issues are too great a hurdle and is sticking with its geared turbofan (AW&ST May 28, p. 65).

Without the weight and drag of an engine nacelle, CFMI calculates that a counter-rotating open rotor will save 10% in SFC beyond the improvements it foresees from LEAP56. Fans in both tractor (puller) and pusher configurations are under study. Using twin rows of blades improves their efficiency and allows slower speeds to reduce noise, Klapproth says.

An ultra-high bypass ratio, on the order of 35:1, is possible–four times the 9:1 ratio expected from LEAP56 and seven times the current CFM56 ratio of 5:1. Pressure ratios would be about 15:1, similar to LEAP56, but well ahead of the CFM56’s 11:1.

But the open rotors are noisy, about 10% noisier than the LEAP engine, meaning cabins will need additional insulation. At its best, the engine is unlikely to meet the 20-dB. effective perceived noise reduction that the company foresees by 2020, Clapper acknowledges.

The largest CFM56 produced now, the -5C for the A340-300, has a 72-in. fan diameter. An equivalent-sized engine with an open rotor will require a 12-14-ft.-dia. rotor, posing significant challenges for mounting and certification.

Regardless of how well open rotor technology works, it’s unlikely to appear until late in the next decade “at the earliest,” says Clapper.

The noise issue alone could doom it. While engine makers are confident they can continue to lower fuel burn, which directly reduces CO2 emissions, and reduce NOx/carbon particulate pollution, they are increasingly worried about their ability to do so while simultaneously reducing noise because the technologies to do the former work against the latter.

Noise tends to be a local issue, emissions more national and international. So there’s the possibility of an interesting debate taking place. It may be decided pragmatically. The pain of higher fuel bills may be so great that it will drive compromises that will still benefit the environmental camp, but work against those fighting to reduce engine noise.

My guess is that this will be changed with new forms of zoning that get residences away from airports. In a battle between global warming, and local noise, the localities lose.

Torah! Torah! Torah!

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This week’s parsha (Torah Reading) was Sheloch. It was the report of the spies back from Israel, where they say that it will be too hard to retake the land.

I was reading the English translation, along with the footnotes (Jewish Prayer books frequently have footnotes now, and Chumashim, the bound copies of the Torah and Haftorah readings for each week have had them for over 1000 years.

In any case, I came across the following passage (Numbers XV: 39)

And it shall be unto you for a fringe, that ye may see it and remember all the commandments of the Eternal, and do them: and that Ye search not after your own heart, and after your own eyes, after which ye use to go a whoring:

Note that this is the translation from my wife’s Chumash from about 35 years ago, what I read in synagogue was from a more modern translation.

In any case, there was Rashi’s Commentary below (Rashi was a Rabbi from over 1000 years ago who took the commentaries, which had been passed on verbally, and wrote them down.)

Here is the commentary on the portion which I have emphasized:

(The translation therefore is: AND YE SHALL NOT SEARCH AFTER YOUR OWN HEART). The heart and the eyes are the “spies” of the body – they act as agents for sinning: the eye sees, the heart covets, and the body commits the sin.

In the artscroll (not in front of me) it further makes it clear that one is to follow God with one’s intellect and faith, because the heart cannot be relied upon, because it leads one astray.

While I did not find this odd, I think that this is the exact opposite of what I understand of most Christian perspectives are on this.

This attitude is reflected in the idea that one should not study mysticism until one is firmly grounded in Torah, which is why the concept of a relatively untrained person “dabbling” in Kaballah (Like the singer Modonna) is viewed with alarm.

No one is concerned about any forces being unleashed (or at least very few are), but the potential for being led down the wrong path is great when one follows one’s heart.

F/A-18E/F To Get New Air Combat Sensor

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I think that this is a reaction to something that was perceived as lacking with current US fighter sensor suites.

F/A-18E/F To Get New Air Combat Sensor (Subscription Required)

Aviation Week & Space Technology
06/04/2007, page 30

Andy Nativi
St. Louis

Enhanced electronic warfare systems drive U.S. Navy to improve F/A-18E/F sensor suite

Printed headline: Bug Eyes

The U.S. Navy wants to upgrade its F/A-18E/Fs with an infrared search-and-track system out of concern that increasingly sophisticated electronic jamming systems could thwart the fighter’s radar system, leaving pilots “blinded” in air-to-air combat.

While the Russians have had these for decades, and they are part of the standard fit on both the Typhoon and Rafale, I believe that there have been only two combat aircraft so equipped in the US inventory, the F-106, and the F-14.

This is a recognition of the fact that our potential adversaries are aware of this.

Although the service has been upgrading the fighter’s radar, and the latest version (the APG-79 with active electronically scanned array) should have enhanced ability to nullify hostile jamming, Navy officials are worried about the proliferation of X-band electronic countermeasures systems, which could degrade radar performance. In particular, China’s expansive spending on electronic warfare equipment is being carefully monitored. The service fears this build-up could compromise their own freedom to operate in the Pacific.

Boeing would modify an external fuel tank to fit the F/A-18E/F with a centerline-mounted IRST. Lockheed Martin would provide the critical optics.Credit: BOEING CONCEPTS>

More than China, see below.

The addition of an infrared search-and-track system (IRST)–already standard on many Russian and western European fighters–would provide “spectral diversity” to the Navy. ……

As I’ve said, we are late to this game.


Boeing would modify an external fuel tank to fit the F/A-18E/F with a centerline-mounted IRST. Lockheed Martin would provide the critical optics.Credit: BOEING CONCEPTS

F/A-18 prime contractor Boeing has chosen Lockheed Martin to provide the sensor. A first prototype is set to be tested on a Super Hornet early next year through a company-funded risk reduction and capabilities demo effort. Enhanced versions of the AAS-42 electronics and optical units used on the F-14 (already available on South Korea’s F-15K) will be repackaged in a modified 480-gal. fuel tank. The equipment will also feature an off-the-shelf thermal control unit.

The fact that the South Koreans requested it for the F-15K implies that they are concerned about this very issue with North Korea.

My guess is that someone had done some analysis, and determined that if you put out a lot of power without a lot of sophistication, you can muddy the radar picture.

Boeing opted for a podded solution to save money. “Originally, we considered integrating the IRST into the aircraft fuselage, on the upper nose, or on the gunbay doors, but these solutions required significant structural, electrical and cooling system modifications and, in both cases, called for relocating existing antennas,” says Chris D. Wedewer, Boeing’s F/A-18E/F IRST program manager. “We also investigated the possibility of putting an IRST pod on the right fuselage station, opposite the fuselage-mounted Raytheon [Advanced Targeting Forward-Looking Infrared] targeting pod, but this option came with too many operational limitations in terms of field of view,” in particular when weapons are being carried, he adds.

Those limitations drove the decision to place the sensor on the centerline weapon station, traditionally the spot for the fuel tank. Since a fuel tank has already been cleared for that station, using such a device to house the IRST was seen as the next logical step. The IRST will also function as a fuel tank, with a part of a pod still able to accommodate 330 gal., Wedewer notes.

It is a fairly neat package for what I think is perceived as an immediate need.

….

Things I Never Thought I’d Say, Non-Bush Edition

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At my daughter’s IEP (Individual Education Program) meeting, my wife PLAYED THE GOOD COP, and our lawyer played the bad cop.

I never figured that she’d play the GOOD cop in a meeting with school administrators.

My wife is a dear sweet lady. She is also a Special Ed consultant with a practice, SEDRA where she supplies Educational Evaluations, Classroom Observations, Advocacy, IEP Process Workshops, In-School Tutoring for Individuals with Special Needs, and Service Referral.

She spent half of her childhood in the Bronx, and one of her clients affectionately referred to her as a “Pit bull”.

Both of our children are on IEPs, but did not need a lawyer for our eldest, a turning 10 years old in a week girl, Natalie, for the past 3 years. We found Mark Martin for her.

Natalie has a visual perception and motor planning disorder, that results in dyslexia and dysgraphia (her hand writing is worse than mine, which means that her handwriting is the worst ever).

Our lawyer for our son, 7 and a half year old Charlie, Wayne Steedman said that it would be best if we went with another lawyer for Natalie, because having to focus on more than one child at a time tends to diffuse the lawyer’s effort.

Well, lawyers are sharks or piranhas. Wayne is more of a shark. Mark is more of a piranha.

Both are far more pleasant than one would imagine when they are YOUR carnivorous fish.

The shark glides, silently and unnoticed, until it strikes, while the piranha is a flurry of teeth, reducing a cow to bones in under a minute (why is it that they always use a cow as the unit of measure of ferocious appetites?)

While Natalie’s school, Timber Grove Elementary is a good school, it has a profoundly negative attitude towards special ed kids.

I think that it’s primarily a function of the Principal, who has been nicknamed “The Scorpion”.

There are a disproportionate number of children, who are either at special schools run by the county, or in private placements paid for by the county who are in this school’s zone.

This seems to be particularly noteworthy with regards to the male special ed students.

Considering all the costs involved in private placements, I wonder if the principal has a picture of the superintendent getting freaky with a goat.

At Natalie’s meeting, the occupational therapist (kind of a misnomer, it’s about things like writing, tying shoes, and other fine motor operations) had a report suggesting that Natalie’s services be pulled. The first time any of our side saw it was at the meeting.

I was conferencing in via phone, but even I could tell that Mark Martin, esq., was not amused.

I think that the OT might end up with a diagnosis of post traumatic stress disorder after Mark was through with her.

It put the fear of god into the rest of IEP team, so while we do not have OT goals yet, we will be doing a follow-up meeting to take care of that, it looks like Natalie will get the services she needs.

Baltimore Metro House Prices Drop YoY.

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The price increase in this area is mostly from people fleeing from DC’s overpriced market.

Also, despite the “hordes” of people who are supposed to be coming here as a result of the military base re-alignment, prices still dropped.

Also, add 2-4% for incentives.

Area home prices fall for first time in 6 years

By Lorraine Mirabella

Sun Reporter

Originally published June 8, 2007, 4:03 PM EDT

The average home price in the Baltimore metro area fell 1.11 percent last month, the first decline in six years, according to statistics released today by Metropolitan Regional Information Systems Inc.

The average price of a house in Baltimore City and the five surrounding counties was $312,617 in May, down from $316,123 in May 2006, the statistics showed.

Prices fell in Anne Arundel, Carroll and Baltimore counties. Prices rose the most in Baltimore City, followed by Harford County, with Howard up less than 1 percent, MRIS said.

The falloff in average price came as sales volume plunged nearly 17 percent. In total, 3,030 homes were sold through the multiple listing service last month, compared to 3,648 last year, MRIS said.

The number of homes sold declined in every jurisdiction. Sales were off more than 20 percent in the two priciest counties — Anne Arundel and Howard. The smallest decline was in Harford County.

May’s price decline — which reflects contracts generally signed in March and April — comes at the start of the crucial spring selling season, when more people typically put their homes up for sale. The newer home listings, combined with the excess housing inventory that has been taking longer to sell, has likely hurt price growth, economists said.

The Yen-Carry Trades Has a Real Possibility of a Global Meltdown

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The idea is that you borrow Yen at less than 2%, and invest it elsewhere at 4+%, and the difference is pure profit.

The problem? If the dollar, or Euro, or Yuan, falls relative to the Yen, you can end up way in the hole.

This is another problematic feature of the current world trade and currency system. To much speculation, not enough trade and investment, creating volatility and costs.

The increasingly leveraged monetary system is an act of keeping hundreds of balls in the air at the same time, and one day, they will come down.

Dollar Rises in Asia on Yen-Carry Trades
Friday June 8, 4:02 am ET
Dollar Rises in Asian Trading as Investors Swap Yen for Higher Yield Overseas Assets

TOKYO (AP) — The dollar rose in Asia Friday as investors swapped the yen for higher yield overseas assets to take advantage of low Japanese interest rates.

The dollar was trading at 121.16 yen midafternoon, up from 121.11 yen late Thursday in New York. The euro fell to $1.3422 from $1.3432.

Traders said the dollar’s climb likely wouldn’t last, with a global stock fall expected to hurt sentiment for the dollar and the euro.”

CIA ran secret prisons for detainees in Europe, says inquiry

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Whoopie. We have gulags. I want my country back.

Impeach Dick Cheney Now. Impeach George Bush Tomorrow.

CIA ran secret prisons for detainees in Europe, says inquiry
Stephen Grey
Friday June 8, 2007
The Guardian

The CIA operated secret prisons in Europe where terrorism suspects could be interrogated and were allegedly tortured, an official inquiry will conclude today.

Despite denials by their governments, senior Polish and Romanian security officials have confirmed to the Council of Europe that their countries were used to hold some of America’s most important prisoners captured after 9/11 in secret.

None of the prisoners had access to the Red Cross and many were subject to what George Bush has called the CIA’s ‘enhanced’ interrogation, which critics have condemned as torture. Although suspicions about the secret CIA prisons have existed for more than a year, the council’s report, seen by the Guardian, appears to offer the first concrete evidence. It also details the prisons’ operations and the identities of some of the prisoners.”

….


Christofascist/Talibaptist Creation Museum Hires Man Who Did Sexually Explicit Vids

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Let me repeat: HA HA!!!!

Fundies, this is God’s way of saying that you are blithering idiots.

Actor’s Risque Past Halts ‘Adam’ Film By JULIE CARR SMYTH, Associated Press Writer

Thursday, June 7, 2007

(06-07) 17:50 PDT Columbus, Ohio (AP) —

The man who plays Adam in a video aired at a Bible-based creationist museum has led a different life outside the Garden of Eden, flaunting his sexual exploits online and modeling for a clothing line that promotes free love.

After learning about his activities Thursday, the Creation Museum in Kentucky pulled the 40-second video in which he appears.

“We are currently investigating the veracity of these serious claims of his participation in projects that don’t align with the biblical standards and moral code upon which the ministry was founded,” Answers for Genesis spokesman Mark Looy said in a written statement.

The actor, Eric Linden, owns a graphic Web site called Bedroom Acrobat, where he has been pictured, smiling alongside a drag queen, in a T-shirt brandishing the site’s sexually suggestive logo. The Web site, which has a network of members, allows users to post explicit stories and photos.

He also sells clothing for SFX International, whose initials appear on clothing to spell “SEX” from afar. It promotes “free love,””pleasure” and “thrillz.”

Linden, a graphic designer, model and actor who grew up in Columbus, said he is no longer affiliated with the Bedroom Acrobat site, and had handed the domain name off to somebody. Ownership records available through the NetworkSolutions database show Linden registered the site 18 months ago.

Bush Admin Seeks Changes to Patent System

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Ordinarly, I’d be encouraged, but I think that this HAS to be some sort of sweetheart deal to a supporter.

The following quote comes from the D-Squared Digest. I consider this to be the wisest thing yet written this century.

I believe that the following should apply any Bush admin initiative.

But it does inspire in me the desire for a competition; can anyone, particularly the rather more Bush-friendly recent arrivals to the board, give me one single example of something with the following three characteristics:

  1. It is a policy initiative of the current Bush administration
  2. It was significant enough in scale that I’d have heard of it (at a pinch, that I should have heard of it)
  3. It wasn’t in some important way completely Fucked Up during the execution.

So while this patent overhaul sounds like a bad thing, I think that I can wait for 18 months until adults are in charge.

Bush administration seeks overhaul of patent system | CNET News.com

By Steve Lohr

Story last modified Wed Jun 06 19:55:16 PDT 2007

The Bush administration wants to reform the nation’s patent system by requiring better information from inventors and allowing public scrutiny of applications, according to the director of the government’s patent office.

The goal, said Jon W. Dudas, director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office, is to improve the quality of patents, which should curb the rising wave of patent disputes and lawsuits. The legal wrangling is often over broad descriptions of ideas or activities, so-called business methods, or software that contains only incremental changes over prior work.

“There ought to be a shared responsibility for patent quality among the patent office, the applicants and the public,” Dudas said in an interview yesterday. “If everything is done right at the front end, we’ll have to worry a lot less about litigation later.”

Some steps to improve patent quality will require changes in the law, said Dudas, who will present his views to the Senate Judiciary Committee today. Both the Senate and the House have introduced patent-reform legislation this year, amid concerns that the current overburdened, litigation-choked system is hampering innovation rather than encouraging it.

One key change, Dudas said, would be a legal clarification of what is required of patent applicants. Under current law, an inventor is required to explain why a new product is sufficiently original to deserve the exclusive rights that patent protection conveys. But the applicants have a lot of discretion. The supporting information, Dudas said, ranges from “almost nothing” to what he called “malicious compliance,” which he described as boxes and boxes of background information intended mainly to obscure the nugget of an invention in the patent application.

Reform legislation, he said, should require the applicants to conduct a thorough search of related patents and technical journals, and then explain why the patent being sought represents a significant innovation beyond previous ideas in the field.

Dudas said the reform legislation should also make sure the search and information disclosures do not put an unfair burden on inventors who are not wealthy. Personal income, number of patents filed and other measures, he said, could be used to determine who would be exempt from certain requirements. “For the truly small inventor, we might do the search for them,” he said.

…..

Last Time, The Result Was the Mirage 5

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Seriously. The Mirage 5, a Mirage 5 variant with simplified avionics and higher system reliability was basically co-designed by IAI and Dassault.

The French canceled the Israeli order, so they created the Nesher, which was a copy, which led to the Kfir.

Dassault and IAI in talks on future project partnerships

Israeli company keen to leverage experience with Gulfstream and other business jets

Dassault is talking to Israel Aerospace Industries about co-operation on future business jet programmes, as the French airframer looks to extend its risk-sharing partnerships.

The Israeli business – which builds rival Gulfstream’s smaller aircraft, the G150 and G200 – is keen to leveerage its experience in designing and manufacturing fuselage sections to a wider market, and sees business aviation as a big opportunity. IAI has been building business jets since the late 1960s, and past products include the Jet Commander and Westwind. Before its 2001 partnership with Gulfstream, it sold the G200 as the Galaxy and built the G150’s predecessor, the G100, as the Astra.

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Instead of An Injunction, How about Just Sending them To Texas to Be Executed?

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It’s clear that this stuff needs to be eliminated.

The most valuable asset of the IRS is the fact that Americans as a rule pay their taxes, and the more the big players get away with stuff like this, the more ordinary tax payers will find the system unfair, and so will be tempted to cheat themselves.

IRS moves to close tax shelter used by IBM | CNET News.com

By David Cay Johnston Story last modified Wed Jun 06 22:06:46 PDT 2007

For the second time in 12 months, the government has moved to block a tax shelter that had been aimed at converting billions of dollars of corporate profits, on which taxes have yet to be paid, into profits that will never be taxed.

The move by the Internal Revenue Service came two days after IBM said that it used the technique to avoid paying $1.6 billion in income taxes.

As part of a $12.5 billion stock repurchase, IBM used a foreign subsidiary to buy back shares through foreign exchanges. The subsidiary then used the shares to pay its corporate parent in America for goods and services.

“It’s just a way to bring the profits into the United States without paying taxes by using the stock as currency,” said H. David Rosenbloom, an international tax lawyer at Caplin & Drysdale and director of the international tax program at New York University Law School.

On May 31, the Internal Revenue Service issued a notice declaring that the technique could not be used to eliminate taxes. The notice said it would disallow any transactions beginning on that day.

The technique “raises significant policy concerns,” the IRS said. The IRS shut down a simpler version of the same shelter in September.

Under a 1962 law, corporations can defer paying taxes on most profits earned abroad as long as the money remains outside the country. The taxes come due, however, if the money is returned to the United States.

The technique was believed to be in wide use by corporations that have substantial profits offshore and are also buying back large amounts of their own shares to return value to investors. IBM appears to be the only company that publicly disclosed its use of the tax shelter.

The tax shelter is known as “Killer B,” after the letter used to designate a provision in the tax code governing certain corporate reorganizations.

By avoiding the 35 percent federal tax on profit, a company can buy three shares for every two it would be able to acquire with profits that had been taxed.

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Damned Frivelous Lawsuits

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Once again, the right wing shows how it’s all about rules for thee, but not for me.

Suing over a bruise on your butt? Hypocrite.

Washington Wire – WSJ.com : Bork Files Slip-and-Fall Lawsuit

Our colleagues at WSJ.com’s Law Blog report on a lawsuit filed by Robert H. Bork against the Yale Club: One-time Supreme Court nominee Bork is suing New York’s Yale Club for $1 million, alleging he was injured when he fell at an event there last June. “When it was his turn to deliver remarks to the audience, Mr. Bork approached the dais,” the lawsuit said. “Because of the unreasonable height of the dais, without stairs or a handrail, Mr. Bork fell backwards as he attempted to mount the dais, striking his left leg on the side of the dais and striking his head on a heat register.” Bork, 80 years old, suffered a large hematoma in his lower left leg as a result of the fall, according to the lawsuit. Read more and comment at Law Blog.

This is a Paris Free Zone

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I am not referring to the city of lights, neither am I referring to the similarly named town in Texas.

Rather, I am referring to the hotel heiress.

Absent some sort of political activity, such as endorsements, running for office (PLEASE GOD NO!!), or her attempting to assassinate someone, she will not be mentioned here.

That is all.