Monthly Archives: December 2011

View 705 Monday, December 12, 2011

I worked on fiction over the weekend, and made considerable progress. I was going to go for a hike with Niven today, but it’s raining, and looks to be raining all day.

I suppose I ought to comment on the Republican debate of last Saturday. It was hardly a game changer. It is reported to have had the largest number of viewers of all the debates, and of course it was the first one after the elimination of Herman Cain as the not-Romney candidate, leaving Newt Gingrich as not only the leading non-Romney, but as a front runner well out ahead of the field.

This would normally have been the time to concentrate on Newt’s personal relationships, but there was a problem: Diane Sawyer hasn’t really a taste for that sort of thing. George Stephanopoulos was the Clinton War Room Bimbo Eruption manager, which gave him plenty of experience but perhaps of the wrong kind to prepare him for that kind of attack. The best he could do was to ask if character and personal relationship history was relevant to the office of President. The responses were about what one would expect. Everyone said yes, of course it’s important, and Newt was straightforward in admitting fault and seeking forgiveness. The other candidates gained character points.

One major attack on Gingrich was that he was a professional politician, while Romney, though experienced in government, was not. Newt rather deftly disarmed Romney on that issue by pointing out that had Romney won against Ted Kennedy in 1994, Romney would have been a professional politician too. That didn’t harm Romney but it does negate the issue.

Another was that Newt had proposed mining the Moon. To which Newt replied that we blinking well ought to be mining the Moon. His lines came pretty well right out of A Step Farther Out. He diidn’t say he’d rather spend the money mining the Moon than hiring bunny inspectors, but he could have. He’s still a space cadet. As any President with vision ought to be.

All told, no one was harmed, Newt came out looking better than when he went in. The polls show no confidence in Obama’s ability to manage the economy. And the election continues. So do the bunny inspectors, lousy schools, bailouts, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and the rest of it.

Does anyone remember a DOS game called Battles of Destiny? It came on a 5 ¾ floppy, and I don’t seem to have a copy any longer. [See below; have it, and thanks.]

I have fiction to work on. And it’s lunch time. There’s a lot of interesting mail I’ll get to after I write.

2330: I did a few hundred words and a good scene for Anvil.

Battles of Destiny

Hello Sir,

Battles of Destiny can be downloaded as freeware from the original makers web site:

http://www.holistic-design.com/?page_id=133&did=7

A pdf of the manual can be found here:

http://www.hotud.org/component/content/article/44-war/19797

E. Lee Bohannon

Which works just fine in DOSBOX. Thanks!

View 704 Saturday, December 10, 2011

It’s about lunch time, and I had a number of thoughts relevant to fiction while we were on our morning walk, so this will be brief. I’ll catch up here tonight and tomorrow, but I am going to go down to lunch and then to the monk’s cell today.

Tracy Walters sends this

Subject: Mysterious object seen near Mercury debunked

http://www.cnn.com/video/?hpt=hp_t2#/video/bestoftv/2011/12/09/tsr-mysterious-object-near-mercury-mpg.cnn

To which we can only say, alas. Not that I really expected it to be an alien spaceship orbiting Mercury, but that would have been pretty cool. I do remind you that solar flares are real and very big, and the 1859 event caused huge electro-magnetic pulses that started fires in many telegraph offices. Telegraph lines were the only long insulated wires around in those days. A similar event could have fairly drastic consequences in this world of long transmission lines.

We have historical evidence of such solar events every century or two. They can cause such bright aurora events that night turns into day, and this as far south as the Caribbean. Alexandria, Egypt has been recording them for millennia, and it’s a supportable conclusion that really big ones happen every one or two centuries. But that’s another story for another time.

If you want something else to think about,

Evidence suggests large tropical storms trigger earthquakes

http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2011/12/09/3387791.htm?topic=enviro

I would consider this plausible rather than definitive, but still…

Jim

If we believe that climate events can trigger earthquakes, the next question is do earthquakes trigger volcanic events? Volcanism can certainly cause climate change.

In 535 AD, Belisarius subdued the Goths, but the year was a year of world disaster. A large volcano, probably Krakatoa, erupted and spewed enough gunk into the atmosphere that the next decade was one of drastic cooling. There were also plagues. The period after is generally known as the Dark Ages. The Dark Ages officially began forty years before when the Goths deposed the last Western Emperor, but in fact Gothic rule in Italy wasn’t a lot different from what it had been under the last of the Roman Emperors.

It was also about then that the “Roman Warm” climatic period is considered to have ended and a period of global cooling began; but the beginning of the cooling isn’t so certain. What is certain is that something horrible happened in 535 which ushered in a long period of cooling, shorter growing seasons, plagues, tribal wanderings, and the real Dark Ages, if you define a Dark Age not as a time when you have forgotten how to do something, but have forgotten that anyone ever was able to do it. As with the US in education, where we have forgotten what we used to accomplish with the public schools, and now strive to achieve goals that would have been considered failure by most teachers over most of the period of the public schools. But I digress.

Fortunately the Dark Age Cooling ended, and the Earth began to warm again, producing the Viking Warm period with colonies in Greenland, grapes in Vinland (AKA Nova Scotia) and longer growing seasons across Europe and China. The Viking Warm was followed by the cooling that began in 1325 or so and led into the Little Ice Age which lasted until Earth began to warm again in 1800. There was a time when longer growing seasons, warmer winters, and farmlands in higher latitudes were considered a blessing. But that’s another story.

Anyway, I’m going to have lunch and then write fiction.

View 704 Friday, December 09, 2011

I have a dozen small chores to accomplish today and over the weekend. I need to complete my pass through Black Ship Island, a novella set in the world of Legacy of Heorot about early interstellar colonies set up by slower than light ships. This story is set between Legacy of Heorot and Beowulf’s Children and while it stands alone, it is a part of the development of that unusual society of Adults and Starborn. It introduces a new alien creature.

Then I need to complete a reminiscence on Poul Anderson to be part of a book to be published at BOSKONE this year, where I am one of the guests.

And I need to get on paper some of the scenes I have been developing for the Anvil book; Niven and I have scheduled a hike to discuss that next week. And there’s always Mamelukes, which sits teasingly at 140,000 words, about 10,000 words from completion. And everyone wants me to revive Chaos Manor Reviews which I have neglected for a quarter. Time was I kept up with that many projects and more, and it’s embarrassing to discover that I run out of energy before I can do what I used to consider a full day’s work.

And behind all those are the other projects like getting the public domain California 6^th Grade Reader posted as a Kindle Book for home schoolers and Charter Schools and for that matter just as good reading of what used to be a common part of our culture.

I really am dancing as fast as I can. At least I don’t have to go grubbing for quick money to pay the bills with free lance articles, thanks to those who subscribe to this place.

Roberta had an appointment so Sable and I took a long hike this morning. I’ve been getting a bit of static from some of my radios, and discovered that I no longer have any spray cans of tuner cleaner. I used to have several, including both “zero residue” and “lubricant”. There was a whole shelf of them at Fry’s. Alas, I wasn’t smart enough to buy a lifetime supply of them, and they seem to be scarce now, probably a gift from the friendly regulators at the EPA. I am not for polluting the atmosphere, but I doubt that tuner cleaners ever did much damage to anyone, except perhaps someone silly enough to sniff the stuff. But that’s another rant. Anyway, a quick trip on line showed these weren’t so easy to come by, but Radio Shack offers a lubricant tuner cleaner. There’s a Radio Shack about a mile away in Studio City, and I figured I needed the exercise. Sable and I took off at a brisk pace, taking the longer route down past where the Shell Station used to be when we first moved to Studio City. We met some neighbors, Sable met new and old admirers, and all was well. There were two clerks and only two customers in the Radio Shack. I found the lubricant tuner cleaner very quickly.

Then came the wait. Fifteen minutes. Both clerks were involved in doing something related to sales to the two customers. The elder, an Asian I would guess to have come from Bombay, was on the telephone. Endlessly on the telephone. It probably had something to do with a credit card. This went on and on and on. The other clerk, a younger American, was serving a little old lady who kept going off to find something else, then asking for one more thing like a new battery, and that went on and on. Eventually the little old lady got everything she wanted and that sale was completed after only fifteen minutes. My transaction was done in three minutes flat, although I note that Radio Shack’s system can’t tell whether a card is a credit or a debit card although Trader Joe’s can. I got my tuner cleaner and left. The elderly Indian clerk was still on the telephone. With the same customer. I can’t imagine how Radio Shack stays in business if they can make only about 3 sales each half hour. And mine was trivial.

The lubricant tuner cleaner did seem to work on my radio, eliminating the static when I turn the volume knob, but it leaves a residue I don’t like. I’ll have to see if I can find some zero residue cleaner, but I don’t think I’ll bother looking at Radio Shack. No wonder On Line is taking over retail sales.

And now it’s lunch time.

View 704 Thursday, December 08, 2011

The latest polls show Newt Gingrich leading in almost all the early Republican nomination events. Mitt Romney, who has campaigned for the Independent and Moderate vote while leaving the rest of the field to compete for the conservative Republicans, now has a decision to make.

Of course the establishment criticism of Newt is that he’s not a “real” conservative and never has been. Since many of those making that criticism have little idea of what conservative views are, that is not surprising.

Understand: I am not an apologist for Newt Gingrich, and I have said many times I would rather see him as Speaker than as President. I have also said many times than anyone in that field of Republican candidates would be a better President than Barrack Hussein Obama, who is busily showing that there are worse fates than to have Jimmy Carter as one’s chief executive.

In classic military science, officers are divided into Brilliant vs. Stupid, and Lazy vs. Active. Now understand, these are relative terms: we are assuming that this is not Lake Wobegon, and even the Stupid can be pretty smart compared to the general population; stupid is probably the wrong word although it is the one generally used in these discussions. You will see what I mean in a moment.

This produces four classes of officers. What do you do with them?

First, the commanders, from company to regiment to division to army to army group: which class do you want as commanders? The answer is that you want them Brilliant and Lazy. Then for their Chief of Staff you want the Brilliant and Active. The reasoning is simple enough. The Active tend never to leave well enough alone. They drive the troops mad with new schemes for improvement. Your units go to hell.

However, you need the Brilliant and Active in the picture, just not as commanders. Someone has to recognize problems and look for solutions and agitate for improvements. You want the man at the top to understand this, and select among the various recommendations those which are needed – and which are affordable. But you want the agitation for improvement, else things atrophy.

So far so good. Now what do you do with the Stupid and Lazy? Why, that’s the bulk of your officer corps. They follow orders, and if they come up with awful ideas they aren’t so active as to try to implement them. As to the Stupid and Active, you encourage them to get out and go away. You have no place for them.

I summarize here discussions which have quite literally gone on for a thousand years, and which have to fold in with the unassessable, such as leadership ability and charisma. Can this officer get the troops to follow him? Even when the mission is clearly badly planned and unlikely to succeed? And so forth. And the old adage, that if you don’t trust an officer with troops, you put him in Intelligence; reasons for not trusting judgment with troops vary and are not identical with the Brilliant/Stupid division, and binary categorizations like that aren’t always useful models anyway. There is always a continuum.

I bring this up because candidates who are brilliant but active can be a problem when the office sought is President of the United States.

I also remind you that I have had this discussion with Newt, not once but several times. I also remind you that Russell Kirk once said “What is Conservatism? Conservatism is enjoyment!” He was the classic brilliant but lazy intellectual; he also understood that the United States is in trouble, and it is time to “prune and fertilize” the nation. And Annette Kirk, his wife, was the author of the summary phrase of the National Commission on Education: “If a foreign government had imposed this system of education on the United States, we would rightfully consider it an act of war.” (A Nation at Risk, sometimes known as the Seaborg Commission from Nobel Laureate Glenn T. Seaborg.)

That is still the case. We have a national education system that is indistinguishable from an act of war on the people of the United States. We do not seem to have many candidates who are aware of that. The nation is still at risk.

And let me repeat, anyone on that stage is preferable, and by a lot, to what we have.

But the Presidency is not the only office, and this notion that it is has been one of the problems. Ideally we would have a Congress that understood that some problems are truly national, and require the attention of the federal government; but many more, probably most, are not the business of Washington, and the government ought to get out of the game. As to the role of the federal government in education, the proper role is for the Congress to set up, in the District of Columbia, the best system of education it can devise, and let that be a beacon to the world. And if it cannot do that, it ought to abandon the pretense that it knows how to run schools In Kansas City, Missouri, or Mineral Well, Mississippi, or anywhere else.

The Congress and President alike ought to find it absurd that the United States borrows money from China in order to pay Federal officers to inspect magician stage acts to be certain that the magicians have a federal license to use rabbits in their act. I suspect we can all make other lists of things the federal government pays for that are absurd on their face, and then another list of things that may or may not be worth doing, but which we simply cannot afford. We need to examine what is called “regulatory science” and understand that regulatory science is to science as duck hunters are to ducks. We need a Congress that understands that the purpose of the Constitution is to insure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity. It is not the purpose of the Federal government to deliver hot lunches to school children. That may be the business of the states, but it is the business of the federal government to protect the rights of some states to opt out of that, not force them to serve the free lunches.

But we all know that, and I ramble.

I have not discussed these matters with all the Republican candidates. I have discussed them, in depth, with one of them, and he remains my friend.

Freedom is not free. Free men are not equal. Equal men are not free. And the continued expansion of the federal government has the effect of favoring equality over freedom.

And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,
As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn,
The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return!

http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_copybook.htm

The story is coming out: when it was realized that the Iranians had managed to take control of the Rq-170 Sentinel drone, President Obama was offered several alternative actions to recapture or destroy it. He chose none of them, and now the drone with its electronics intact is on display in Persia, and doubtless will be sold to China. It’s an odd way to conduct a war. Of course the assumption that such equipment could be deployed without using advanced encryption for its controls was at best questionable. Some sources say that it was sheer arrogance: the US is so far in advance that we didn’t need that. This assumes that the People’s Liberation Army would not be cooperating with Iran, or else assumes that China is also well behind the US; both those assumptions are questionable at best.

There is more to this story than is coming out. Apparently we had contingency plans for what to do in this situation, but for some reason the preventive action, hardware encryption of the control signals, was not taken in the first place. We’ll keep watch.