Drones, dollars, and the open-source insurgency

Yesterday, I wrote on the massive new $636 billion "defense" spending bill passed by the House of Representatives. An article in today's Wall Street Journal should make us further question the efficacy of this type of high-technology spending. A MQ-1 Predator drone costs some $4.5 million dollars each. They have a wingspan of approximately 48 feet, weigh 2,250 lbs. when loaded, have a range of over 2,000 miles, and have a ceiling altitude of 25,000 ft. They can be loaded with two hellfire missiles, making them available for a combination of reconnaissance, combat or support roles. The MQ-9 Reaper drone, the larger and more-heavily armored cousin of the Predator, cost about $10.5 million each. The Air Force maintains a fleet of 195 Predators (total cost ~$877.5 million) and 28 Reapers (total cost ~ $294 million). The New York Times reported earlier this year that they are flying 34 daily surveillance patrols in Afghanistan and Iraq, up from 12 in 2006. They transmit some 16,000 hours of video each month. Insurgents can spend $25.95 to purchase Skygrabber, a program available on the internet which allows them to intercept the video transmitted by these drones.

Continue ReadingDrones, dollars, and the open-source insurgency

Border Incident

You may have heard about this by now. Biologist and science fiction writer Peter Watts was stopped on his way back into Canada by border guards. He'd been helping a friend in the United States move and he was returning. He was flagged to the side and the guards fell on his vehicle. He stepped out to ask what was going on, was told to get back in his vehicle, and when he asked again for the reason for the search, he was pepper sprayed, beaten, thrown in a lock-up overnight, and the next day sent into a winter storm on foot in shirtsleeves, all his personal property confiscated pending arraignment on charges of assaulting a federal officer. In his own words:

Along some other timeline, I did not get out of the car to ask what was going on. I did not repeat that question when refused an answer and told to get back into the vehicle. In that other timeline I was not punched in the face, pepper-sprayed, shit-kicked, handcuffed, thrown wet and half-naked into a holding cell for three fucking hours, thrown into an even colder jail cell overnight, arraigned, and charged with assaulting a federal officer, all without access to legal representation (although they did try to get me to waive my Miranda rights. Twice.). Nor was I finally dumped across the border in shirtsleeves: computer seized, flash drive confiscated, even my fucking paper notepad withheld until they could find someone among their number literate enough to distinguish between handwritten notes on story ideas and, I suppose, nefarious terrorist plots. I was not left without my jacket in the face of Ontario’s first winter storm, after all buses and intercity shuttles had shut down for the night.

In some other universe I am warm and content and not looking at spending two years in jail for the crime of having been punched in the face.

Here is a post on his behalf. A legal defense fund is being built by the writing community as you read this. The first thing, I admit, that occurred to me when I heard about it was a kind of reflexive "well, he must've said something," the kind of self apology for representatives of my government that springs automatically to mind. Because none of us want to believe that thugs and bullies work for us. I dismissed that idea. Watts is the least likely individual to provoke such a response. [more . . . ]

Continue ReadingBorder Incident

Climate and Conspiracy

Climate Change--Those Hacked Emails It's been a week or more since a gentleman hacker stole a bunch of private emails from the University of East Anglia in an attempt to liberate supposedly secret evidence that the entire climate change crowd is in on a conspiracy to defraud the public. I haven't yet heard if anyone is filing charges against the man, but evidently some folks, especially the Limbaugh-Beck screaming meme crowd, feel this is the new Pentagon Papers and the hacker in question is their Daniel Elsberg. It is an unfortunate fact that some things---like this issue---are so complex that most people cannot follow all the data to the conclusions. They haven't the time, the resources, or, frankly, the inclination. But then if anybody could parse evidence at this level, what would need scientists for? Why would anyone devote an entire life to researching one thing? If Joe the Plumber could actually understand the science behind the Large Hadron Collider, Paleontology, Evolution, and Climate Change, what do we need specialists for? I'm sure someone has an answer along the lines of "We don't! They just sponge off taxpayers and study stuff no one gives a damn about!" I'd like to think most people are not so easily gulled, but I've been disappointed before and probably will be again.

Continue ReadingClimate and Conspiracy

Obama, Afghanistan, and deja vu all over again

First, some background:

  • May 1, 2003 President George W. Bush, while standing in front of a "Mission Accomplished" banner, declares "Major combat operations in Iraq have ended."
  • October 27, 2007 Presidential candidate Barack H. Obama, speaking on the Iraq War, declares "I will promise you this: that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home, we will bring an end to this war, you can take that to the bank."
  • November 4, 2008 Candidate Obama is elected to the presidency.
  • January 20, 2009 Obama's inauguration.
  • January 21, 2009 First full-day of Obama's presidency passes with no sign that he intends to bring the troops home.
  • February 18, 2009 President Obama orders 17,000 additional soldiers to Afghanistan.
  • February 27, 2009 President Obama declares "Let me say this as plainly as I can: By August 31, 2010, our combat mission in Iraq will end." Ok, so it's not the "first thing he will do", but he will definitely do it. Someday. For sure, all the troops from Iraq will be out by 2011. It's hard to tell though, the 2012 elections will be right around the corner by that point...

Continue ReadingObama, Afghanistan, and deja vu all over again

Left, Right, Center, Lunacy Is Still Lunacy

Several years ago at a science fiction convention I saw a charlatan in the dealers room fleecing people with bogus "kirlian aura" photographs. The person in question had constructed an elaborate chair with complex armrests with hand-shaped inserts and cables. The victim sat in the chair, placed the hands on the plates, and a photograph was taken (a polaroid) that showed a bust portrait int he midst of swirling colors. I got a glimpse of the set up---there were mirrors on either side of the lens reflecting brightly-colored streamers that flanked the magic chair. Somehow, this created a lens flare of multi-hued cloudiness. I am a photographer by training. I know a little something about Kirlian "aura" photographs, enough to know that (a) you can't take them in full light and (b) Polaroid never made a film sensitive enough in the format this person was using to record the faint electrical tracings. You also couldn't run enough electricity safely through a whole human body to create even a thin outline much less the solar flare explosion these prints displayed. They looked nothing like a Kirlian photograph. But people were buying them, fifteen bucks a shot, and I expect the photographer in question made nice change that weekend. When an acquaintance of mine was showing hers off later I made a couple of remarks about the fraudulent aspects of it and all I got for my trouble was frostiness and dismissal as a hopeless skeptic. I confess I took that as my cue to say nothing further. I did not unmask the fraud, which would have been brave and ethical, but might well have gotten me pilloried as a spoil sport. This past year I sat on a panel about alternate religions and mythology at another convention. I was the only self-professed atheist on the panel. When I made my introductions and stated my position, a co-panelist asked me "So you're not a Christian? What are you then?" I was a bit dumbfounded. Did she not know what the word Atheist meant? I expounded. "I'm a humanist and rational materialist. I think all religions are essentially the same. Some are more benign than others but all of them are based on assumptions I can't accept. So I'm not only not a Christian, I am not a Jew, a Muslim, a Hindu, a Buddhist, or any variety of Pagan or New Age mystic. As far as I'm concerned, they're all bunk." I was not pilloried. We had a good discussion. I chopped up every religious assertion regardless its source and we all had a rousing good time fencing with each other and I was even congratulated later for having the guts to state my position clearly and forcefully. But afterward, the same co-panelist who asked my what I was if not a Christian came up to me and pressed me further. Do I believe in reincarnation? "No. There's no proof for it. It seems to me to be the same sort of wishful thinking all the rest of them embrace and I have no use for it." I think she was offended at that point. Thinking about it now, I'm beginning to realize why we have such difficulty in public forums discussing religion, especially religion in our political life.

Continue ReadingLeft, Right, Center, Lunacy Is Still Lunacy