And the kids made her breakfast, though their real gift was helping her cleaning for Passover.
In any case, they made her oatmeal with fresh strawberries, and my daughter Natalie also made her decaf coffee with chocolate, and strawberries.
Strawberries? Great googly moogly! My wife did gamely manage to get it down, and it’s sweet, but I need to instruct Natalie in the ways of coffee.
My daughter cleaned her room.
She really cleaned her room.
She got rid of about 3 bags of garbage worth of stuff that she had been storing, old drawings, notebooks, etc., and you can see the floor!
In fact, she opened up enough space that we could take her the stuffed animals that had been put in the attic in her last cleaning attempt back down stairs.
I never thought that the day would happen when we could see her floor again!
Have I mentioned that we can see her floor?
It’s an amusing site, and would probably be more amusing if it were in English, I’m sure that I am missing the finer points.
In any case, here is samurai Obama, and him battling Dick Cheney:
Wednesday Night Through Saturday Night are the first two nights of Pesach (Passover), and Shabbos, and my frum (Orthodox) mother in law is visiting, so not much computer time.
I do have some stuff set up to auto-post though, as Forhorn Leghorn says, “For just such an emergency.”
The new jobless claims number is out, and they are better, but they are still the suck, with initial claims falling 20,000 to 5.84 million.
Posted via mobile phone.
At least that is what this New York Times article appears to say.
Everyone gets a gold star….Lovely.
Posted via mobile phone.
That certainly is what this patent application filed by EADS , which shows a modified wing-fuselage fairing that is supposed to reduce drag from the installation of a larger engine, seems to indicate.
The problem would seem to be directly associated with the installation of the Pratt & Whitney Geared Turbofan (GTF) which has a significantly higher bypass ratio, and fan size, as compared to the engine currently used on the A-320 series.
The new fairing is the bottom of both pics.
Basically, it appears to be a sort of area ruling which accommodates the changes in air flow from a larger nacelle.
The lead competitors are the SAAB Gripen, Dessault Rafale, and the Boeing Super Hornet, with Super Bugs systems being their selling point, the Gripen’s short/rough field capabilities being their selling point, and the Rafale’s independence of US political restrictions being their selling point.
The down sides are, single engine for the Gripen, poor aerodynamics for the F/A-18E/F, and cost, lack of other export orders, and a relatively limited number of weapons qualified for carriage for the Rafale.
It appears that Brazil looks at this order as a way to expand its domestic aerospace capabilities through offsets and tech transfers, which probably would favor the French, who are desperate to get an export order.
This raises an interesting question: This is a large order, but just how many are one Brazilian?
Yeah, I know, lame joke.
For some reason, it appears that Senator Richard Shelby (R-AL) seems to be overrepresented in such metrics.
In this case, he has a hold on Ashton Carter to become the next Pentagon acquisition chief, because, wait for it, he has not received a guarantee from SecDef Robert Gates that the he would, “make the tanker decision on best-value grounds.”
He is concerned that Airbus, which would assemble the aircraft in his state, will somehow be cheated out of the contract.
Ummm…The Airbus A-330 won the contract because it had a larger, more capable aircraft that could be delivered sooner, and had a fly-away cost roughly equal to the Boeing 767.
This is not an issue. The issue is your colleague in the House and Senate, doing the same work for Boeing that you are doing for EADS, will attempt to sabotage the process and get the contract awarded to the Seattle aircraft manufacturer on political grounds.
You do not need a guarantee from Gates or Carter, you need it from your fellow legislators.
It looks like there are serious problems with the Navy’s new Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS), which is intended to replace steam catapults on the new carrier.
The GAO is highlighting potential delays and cost overruns, and the fact that testing is not intended to start until next year, even though the keel of the lead ship, the Gerald Ford, has already been laid.
It makes me wonder if SecDef Gates proposed slowdown on carrier production might be in some part by concerns over the maturity system, as retrofitting steam catapults would involve major changes to the ship, and possibly to its propulsion, which was not designed to supply steam to catapults.
Of course, as always, the US Navy is being less than forthcoming about potential problems, and continues to paint a happy picture, though there are stories suggesting that EMALS would be shelved, though it is unclear if replacing the system with steam would save money or keep the program on schedule, at least for the Ford.
It appears that the impetus to get this all started was the US Pershing II, whose actively radar guided MARV produced a CEP of something under 30m much less than the 75m beam of a Nimitz flight deck.
In any case, this is a good read, and if this technology has been in development since the early 1980s, I can see no reasons that the Chinese are not near the point of being able to deploy such a system.
Modern processors allow for sensor fusion from a number of data sources, and a CVBG puts out a lot of signature.
In any case, I tend to figure that warships these days fall into 2 categories: Submarines, and targets.
Not a whole bunch of conflict lately, and inflation is beginning to moderate, though much of that is because the economy is moving off the local currency.
It’s a good sign, as are reports that media restrictions will be relaxed.
It also looks like the MDC majority in Parliament is actually doing something, as they are looking to probe reports of police abuses.
We also have the Blanket gold mine reopening.
Unfortunately, at least on the symbolic level, 19 MDC ministers have accepted the offer of Mercedes Benz autos from Mugabe, which looks very bad.
We also have the IMF doing what it does best, making a financial disaster worse, and crushing the ordinary people beneath its treads.
What Mugabe won’t destroy, the IMF will.
South Africa has relaxed restrictions on Zimbabwean refugees, offering a 6 month visa.
No surprise. The real election was in the primary, it’s a solidly Democratic district.
One wonders what happens when Rahm leaves his position as White House Chief of Staff, though.
Gates just issued a statement urging legislators to look beyond their districts, but the important statement comes further down:
The thing that is important is to reinforce within the building, in terms of dealing with the Hill, that there is a chain of command,’ he said. ‘Once the decision is made, and particularly once the president signs off on the budget, then there needs to be discipline about people not conducting guerilla warfare against decisions the president has made.
(emphasis mine)
He is telling the generals that the decisions have been made, and behind the scenes lobbying will be punished.
This has been a consistent problem with the Pentagon for at least 15 years, and it has only become worse in the last 8 or so, and it needs to be shut down.
Military officers should answer questions honestly, but the lobbying for weapons systems is simply corrupt and a repudiation of civilian control.
Good for Bob Gates for putting the Generals on notice.
We have a report that consumer confidence is improving, according to the IBD/TIPP economic optimism index, which rose to 49.1 from 45.3, which is only slightly pessimistic, 50 being neutral.
I have no idea if the folks at at Investors Business Daily/TIPP actually run a good poll, but it does look like consumer confidence is up a bit, though the Federal Reserve’s view of the economy remains gloomy.
Certainly with wholesale inventories falling by 1.5% in February, the largest drop in 17 years, there are some bright spots here, because as inventories fall, orders have to be made to restock.
The same cannot be said for commercial real estate, with
mall vacancies at a 10-Year high, and office t rents falling significantly in San Francisco.(-24% year over year !)
Rents fell for apartments in Southern California and nation wide too, which tends to mitigate the impetus for people to buy homes, so I think that the continued increase in mortgage applications is still largely Refi activity.
The credit markets still suck which is why the Fed is looking at offering longer term loans at a higher interest rate for TALF, even as participation in the program is less than anticipated, indicating that investors are still leery of investing in things like mortgage backed securities.
In international finance, Fitch has followed S&P’s lead, and downgraded Ireland’s sovereign debt.
The Treasury has expanded TARP to cover insurance companies, including some of the very big names, such as Hartford, Prudential, and Met Life.
This Problem is getting smaller, not bigger.
Finally, both oil and the US dollar rose today, on a less then expected inventory for the former, and a flight to safety for the latter.
Another senseless shooting, this one at a religious retreat in California.
What the hell is going on here?
For running death and kidnap squads while President of Peru.
Unfortunately I don’t see the same thing happening in the US with Bush/Cheney.
In a response to the EFF’s lawsuit over illegal NSA wiretapping, the Obama has now responded with a claim for executive privilege that is more expansive than that of Bush and His Evil Minions&trade.
Basically, the Obama DOJ, and this is their ruling, this is the first filing in the case, is saying that, “the Patriot Act bars all causes of action for any illegal surveillance in the absence of “willful disclosure.'”
As Glenn Greenwald says in this analysius, “This is the Obama DOJ’s work and only its work, and it is equal to, and in some senses surpasses, the radical secrecy and immunity claims of the Bush administration.”
Lovely.
So it’s now the law of the land in Vermont. Great news!!!!!
Hopefully, Vermonters will deal with Governor Jim Douglas at reelection time.