What Kind of Bird is That?

Hey, we thought those drone birds were just indigenous to the Ay-rab lands! We thought they was just gonna be used for taking out turr'sts!

Boy, I've heard of chickens coming home to roost ... but chickens are a little different from flying imperial deathbots, aren't they? Yeah, but weren't our supervisors supposed to reserve those Flying Fists-O-Fury for the camel jockeys? Weren't we just supposed to amuse ourselves on YouTube, watching drone snuff-porn clips? Why, having fought the terrorists there, are they getting ready to fight us here? Check it out:

CONROE, Texas -- A Houston area law enforcement agency is prepared to launch an unmanned drone that could someday carry weapons, Local 2 Investigates reported Friday.

The Montgomery County Sheriff's Office in Conroe paid $300,000 in federal homeland security grant money and Friday it received the ShadowHawk unmanned helicopter made by Vanguard Defense Industries of Spring.

A laptop computer is used to control the 50-pound unmanned chopper, and a game-like console is used to aim and zoom a powerful camera and infrared heat-seeking device mounted on the front.

"To be in on the ground floor of this is pretty exciting for us here in Montgomery County," Sheriff Tommy Gage said.

So, this high-ranking clown in the Army of Domestic Occupation is "pretty excited." I don't know about you, but when these overupholstered militarized skinheads start getting excited, I start getting more worried than usual. Wonder what the Shur'f finds so exciting?

Michael Buscher, chief executive officer of manufacturer Vanguard Defense Industries, said this is the first local law enforcement agency to buy one of his units.

He said they are designed to carry weapons for local law enforcement.

"The aircraft has the capability to have a number of different systems on board. Mostly, for law enforcement, we focus on what we call less lethal systems," he said, including Tazers that can send a jolt to a criminal on the ground or a gun that fires bean bags known as a "stun baton."

"You have a stun baton where you can actually engage somebody at altitude with the aircraft. A stun baton would essentially disable a suspect," he said.

Gage said he has no immediate plans to outfit his drone with weapons, and he also ruled out using the chopper for catching speeders.

"We're not going to use it for that," he said.

Now, there's an impressive collection of weasel words. Mostly, for law enforcement, they focus on what they call less lethal systems. And Shur'f Tommy has no immediate plans to weaponize his deathbot. But think of the possibilities ... some anonymous porker having the ability to tase you, bro, from the air, with no peasant having the slightest ability to individually identify the LEO who's serving and protecting him. But at least the Shur'f firmly denies any intention of using his remote warrior to catch speeders. I feel better already!

But, well, uh ... I mean, could anything ... you know ... go wrong?

In September 2008, the Government Accountability Office issued a 73-page report that raised issues about police drones endangering airspace for small planes or even commercial airliners.

The report's author, Gerald Dillingham, told Local 2 Investigates that 65 percent of the crashes of military drones on the battlefield were caused by mechanical failures.

He said a police UAV could lose its link to the ground controllers if wind knocks the aircraft out of range or the radio frequencies are disrupted.

"If you lose that communication link as the result of that turbulence or for any other reason, then you have an aircraft that is not in control and can in fact crash into something on the ground or another aircraft," said Dillingham.

Pilots of small planes expressed those concerns in the original 2007 Local 2 Investigates reporting on police drones, and the FAA reported then that police departments across the country were lining up to apply for their own drones.

At Montgomery County, Franklin said an onboard GPS system is designed to keep the UAV on target and connected with the ground controllers. He said coordinates are plotted in advance and a command is given for the UAV to fly directly to that spot, adjusting to turbulence and other factors. He said he and the other controller can alter "waypoints" quickly on the laptop to move the chopper to areas that had not previously been mapped out. He said the aircraft moves at a speed of 30 knots, which he said makes it unsuitable for police pursuits.

Small aircraft pilots have expressed concerns that drones cannot practice the "see and avoid" rule that keeps aircraft from colliding in mid-air. Since the camera may be aimed somewhere else, pilots said police controllers may not be able to see and avoid other aircraft in the area during a sudden police emergency.

Gage said he would take every concern into account as his UAV is deployed.

The only routine law enforcement flights inside the United States over the past four years have been the Department of Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Their border flights over Texas and Arizona have included one crash, where the drone lost its link to the ground controller.

Oh, well, then ... nothing can go wrong! (Even though it sometimes does, but ... never mind.) Franklin says so, and the Shur'f is taking every concern into account! It's kind of like those no-knock, dynamic entry SWAT raids, where the chair-moisteners with any sort of warrant to serve dress up in all-black costumes and throw some flash-bangs and shoot any dog within sight and bust in and ... I mean, they never do that at the wrong address, do they? It's not like anybody ever gets hurt or killed, do they? Well, in any case, don't worry about it ... if anything does go wrong with the deathbot, the Shur'f will do a rigorous five-minute investigation of himself, and will conclude: unfortunate isolated incident, department procedures followed throughout, officers not at fault, nothing to see here, move along, move along.

Folks, you wanted a military empire, and you got one, and now you're its subjects. For my part, I reserve the right to complain bitterly, because I didn't want one, but I got the one you ordered, and I'm its subject, too. The chickens, and other -- more exotic -- flying creatures, are coming home to roost. Snarling kickers of swarthy butts overseas, and respectful public servants in a constitutionally-limited republic at home? You might want that arrangement, but it can't be had. So enjoy what can be had.

(Thanks, Agitator, for the link.)

"Defies Credulity"

Well, credulity might not have been exactly the word that the distinguished "Iran specialist" was looking for. I won't quibble, though; I get the idea. No one with an IQ north of room temperature could swallow this fable, even if it hadn't been mouthed by that Father of Lies, Preznit Corporate Barry Peace Laureate:

The United States will apply the "toughest sanctions" to further isolate Iran over the alleged plan to murder the Saudi ambassador to Washington, Barack Obama said on Thursday, despite growing scepticism over the amateurish nature of the plot and the apparently shambolic background of the main suspect.

Obama insisted that the US had evidence to back up the allegations, as he said he would not take any options off the table in dealing with Iran - diplomatic code for the possibility of military action. Tehran has vehemently denied any involvement in the plot.

US authorities said on Tuesday they had evidence of a plot by two men linked to Iran's revolutionary guard to kill Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the United States, Adel al-Jubeir, by setting off a bomb in a Washington restaurant.

Speaking at a joint press conference with South Korean President Lee Myung-bak, Obama said: "Now those facts are there for all to see. We would not be bringing forward a case unless we knew exactly how to support all the allegations that are contained in the indictment."

In addition to prosecutions, Obama said he would continue "to apply the sort of pressure that will have a direct impact on the Iranian government until it makes a better choice in how it interacts with the rest of the international community".

The State Department revealed on Thursday that the US had been in direct contact with Iran over the allegations. "We are not prepared at the moment to go any further on the question of who spoke to whom, and where, but just to confirm that we have had direct contact with Iran,'' said spokeswoman Victoria Nuland.

Go ahead; click through and read the whole thing. It would be hilarious, except for all the murder and material destruction that Da Prez is lusting after, egged on by the brutal mouthbreathers that constitute a majority of my countrymen. I keep playing letter games with the names; surely "Manssor Arbabsiar" must be an anagram for "maximize GE profits" or something similar, no? Well, how about "Gholam Shakuri," then? Or "Victoria Nuland?"

Then there's Barry, with his Progressive Parent talk: those naughty Eye-ranians are going to be in the Big Timeout until they learn to make better choices. And never mind questioning whether there's any backup for all this crapola: "We would not be bringing forward a case unless we knew exactly how to support all the allegations ..." and blah blah blah. No, fellow Americans, "our" government is just a murderous gang of multiply-proven liars. And we must like it -- else, they wouldn't still be in place. The wind has long since been sown, and it's fall -- time to reap the whirlwind. No one deserves it more than we do.

Wicked Sensitive

Check out the latest scandal:

Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain waded into a new controversy involving rival Rick Perry, saying it was “very insensitive” to have a racially offensive term painted in stone at the entrance to a hunting camp the Texas governor and his family had leased in West Texas.

The Washington Post reported Sunday that the word “Niggerhead” had been painted in block letters on a rock at the gated entrance to the ranch, but that the word was now painted over and the rock was lying flat.

Cain, appearing on “Fox News Sunday,” told moderator Chris Wallace that “that’s just very insensitive.”

There “isn’t a more vile, negative word than the ‘N word’ and for him to leave it there as long as he did, before I hear that they finally painted over it, it’s just plain insensitive to a lot of black people in this country,” he said.

Okay, sure, nigger's an ugly word, unless the speaker's a negro or an African-American or a person of color or black or whatever, and the context is cinematic, in which case it becomes both Authentic and really funny. I guess. Whatever. I suppose I must be developing some semi-Marxist leanings, because when I read that Rick Perry "and his family" lease a hunting camp in west Texas, that tells me what class the Guv is a member of, whether the camp's entrance is decorated by a rock with "niggerhead" painted on it, or "tax serf," or "taser target," or "Walmart peon," or whatever. People who lease hunting camps are members of the ruling class. I'm guessing the same is true of Herman Cain, the godfather of Godfather's Pizza (hmmmm, speaking of ethnic "insensitivity" ... Mr. Pot, may I introduce Mr. Kettle?). If Mr. Cain doesn't lease hunting property somewhere, it must be that he doesn't enjoy hunting, or boozing in a "hunting" milieu, or whatever. I bet I'm not welcome wherever it is he plays his golf, anyway.

The whole thing is grotesque beyond all possibility of parody. Here we are, in a country in which we're boasting about the assassination of Anwar al-Awlaki, who happens to be an American citizen of whom our wonderful somewhat-black president disapproves, which is enough to have him killed. I'm sure there's nothing new about that; I'm sure that, for most of American history, presidents have been able to have inconvenient people murdered. What's new is that all pretense of legal due process has been dropped; no one's bothering to pretend any more, and that complete lack of pretense really is pretty alarming. So, as I say, here we are, happy little consumer-subjects in the United States of Murder, Inc., and all the "realistic" candidates for Godfather (oh, man, now I'm insensitive, too!) are tossing feather pillows at each other over who's being more sensitive than whom.

Check out Candidate Cain's Official Website. O-bomb-a, early on, thought it necessary to lie to us about being a warhead, much as his predecessor, George the Stupid, did before achieving the office. But anyone who votes for or otherwise "supports" Cain won't even be able to claim to have been lied to: the Godfather's nothing if not up-front about "National Security" (the turr'rsts hate us 'cause we're so good, and want only to kill us all ... and, actually, he may have a point there -- if I pay much attention to contemporary American electoral politics, and what succeeds in that arena, I pretty much want to kill us all, too).

So, we can all be happy remote-control drone murderers together, but you don't want to say "nigger," because some things are just beyond the pale. They affront our exquisitely-refined sensibilities. Perhaps whoever the pathetic redneck was who just had to paint "niggerhead" on a rock out in west Texas should have polished up his act a little. He could've painted "sand-niggerhead," and that might have been perfectly okay. After all, they're THE ENEMY.

The Cost of (My) Education

I have an online friend -- actually, I have a gratifying and inexplicable number of online friends, but I'm thinking of one in particular today. She's a lady-type friend, in her early fifties. Let's call her "A," in the interest of her privacy. She lives far from where I do. A makes her living as a therapist; actually, I think both she and her husband do that.

A couple of weeks ago, after an extended period of time experiencing the sorts of trouble that women often experience, A underwent the "instant menopause" surgery. I am supposing that a routine part of such procedures is to send samples of the tissues removed to the lab for analysis. Last week, A told me that she'd been informed of the result: cancer. Not just any cancer, either, but something quite rare and very aggressive. What she was told is that everyone who gets this sort of cancer dies from it, because it's so rare, and so few patients have been treated for it, the medical community doesn't know what works to treat it. She subsequently had some further testing done that established that her cancer's in stage one -- quite early -- and that this means that it's expected to return, probably in six months to a year. She'll be treated using chemotherapy and radiation. She's probably still going to die from the disease, but now it seems that she'll have a little more time. This seemed to gratify her pretty substantially; more time was what she felt the need for.

I've been in frequent correspondence with A since she shared this news with me. Some of what she writes is funny, in a sad way, as when she says she's not seeing much point in dieting, or spending time on anti-wrinkle skin care, or getting long-term dental work done. Some is just heartbreaking. And some makes you think about what's important. One thing she told me that particularly stands out is that she and her husband have become aware of just how deeply they love each other ... what a great thing to learn! But why does the lesson have so dear a price? Can't we learn it without paying so heavily? Maybe we can't -- not completely, at least. But it does seem to me that each of us can spend some time thinking about the people we love, and what they (and love) mean to us. I know I have been. I certainly don't know of anything else I have to think about that's even remotely as important.

A tells me that printed on the back of her business cards is "Love matters." As true as that may be, I'd take it a little further: love is the only thing that, ultimately, matters ... because people matter so very much. Love is the basis of how people are supposed to relate to each other, if we perceive each other properly for what we are. C.S. Lewis summed it up in "The Weight of Glory:"

It may be possible for each to think too much of his own potential glory hereafter; it is hardly possible for him to think too often or too deeply about that of his neighbor. The load, or weight, or burden of my neighbor's glory should be laid on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you can talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or the other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another; all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations -- these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit -- immortal horrors or everlasting splendors. This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously -- no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption. And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner -- no mere tolerance, or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment. Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbor is the holiest object presented to your senses.

I am very prone to lose my perspective and my sense of relative scale. My occasional minor health problem, my dissatisfaction with the day job, seeing my native country descend into authoritarianism: these can quickly seem very important to me. They are not. Each person reading this is important. A is important. My wife is important. My children are important. Even I am important. Let us treat each other well. As A says, "love matters."

How Many Shopping Days Left?

Before the biggest holy-day in America -- bigger even than Black-Friday-After-Turkey-Day. I refer, of course, to the national orgy of spurious self-pity to which we're all invited: the Tenth Anniversary of the Holy Nine-Eleven.

Perhaps those who live in Manhattan have an excuse for this nonsense. Maybe those who collect paychecks for hanging out in the Pentagram, down in DC -- no, wait, they definitely don't have an excuse. But look at this. The denizens of Green Bay, Wisconsin are apparently all ripped up and traumatized and inconsolable about the Great Disaster. You know, the one where more civilians were killed by hostile action than at any previous time in human history. (At least, more than at any previous time since August 6, 1945 ... but hey, let's get back on the proper subject here, shall we?)

Even today, almost a week ahead of time, we're being prepped. This morning, I was taking my exercise at the local YMCA when the telescreen directly in front of the elliptical trainer I was using -- tuned to ESPN, no less -- began showing us all about the impact of der Tag on somebody-or-other. I'm not sure exactly what the details were, since I was blessedly free of the audio, but there was a neat little "America Remembers" logo. Oh, yes, America remembers. We remember some things. We remember what our corporatist-governmental supervisors find it useful for us to remember; the telescreen sees to that. We remember, but we do not think. We remember, but we learn nothing. We deserve all that we get: all that we have gotten, all that we are getting, and all that is on its way to us. Willful stupidity is a violation of natural law, and punishment is ongoing. My unhappy intuition is that a rapid intensification of our punishment is not far away.


Meanwhile, let's remember, America. Here's a picture of someone devastated by the Great Nine-Eleven. Of course, he's an Eye-rackie. So, even though he's small, I'm sure he had it comin' to him. No need to drag out the bagpipes to play "Amazing Grace" for this one.

The Mouths of Madness

It's an interesting sort of a Monday, here at the day job. To begin with, my day-job physical location is different today. To avoid a truly nauseating level of detail, suffice it to say that the alignment and testing of a large-aperture optic is going to require a fixture that can position a small concave spherical surface at a predetermined location, within a few microns, and also to move it by measured amounts and return it to the predetermined "home" position to within that same few microns' uncertainty. This fixture must be characterized, meaning that we know the translator coordinates that produce the "home" position, and also the (reasonably) exact directions of the three translational and two rotational axes of motion. This characterization requires the use of a CMM (Coordinate Measuring Machine). My employer is borrowing the use of such a CMM, and also its operator and the temperature-controlled inspection room in which it resides, from a local tool-and-engineering shop with which it does a lot of other business, and so that's where I'm sitting today, mostly because I'm the one who knows how to run the five positioning axes. I have a computer here (the one that runs the positioners), but no internet connection. I run the positioners; I assist in the interpretation of the data; and I have stretches of time in which there's really nothing for me to do, but not enough time to go back to the usual location and do my usual work. So, I have Notepad open, and my idea is to semi-live-blog my day, publishing the results on a delayed basis after my internet connectivity is restored.

The CMM guy likes to listen to the radio. He likes the talk radio, to be a little more specific. His choices in talk radio here in the Fort are rather limited. Those choices begin and end with the local Clear Channel outlet, call letters WOWO. And, since I'm sitting in the inspection room, listening to right-wing talk radio must be what I like to do, too. In any case, it's what I'm going to do.

We started out at this morning 6:30. The CMM guy works early hours, as everyone else here seems to do, also. (My normal day job starts at 7:30, which probably still seems pretty early to most people.) At 6:30, WOWO's local drive-time host, a [sarcasm]certified genius[/sarcasm] called "Charlie Butcher" (yeah, sure), was holding forth. He seemed to think that the big news this morning was the US having lost its "AAA" credit rating. About which, he's sure that: it's undeserved, since we are, after all, the You Ess Ay (number one!) and the strong center of Freedom and All That's Right in the world; it doesn't matter, since foreigners will be happy to lend us whatever we want, at whatever rates of interest it pleases us to pay; and it's very bad, because it makes us look bad; and it's all Obama's fault.

In due course, Charlie Butcher goes away, and on comes a national act: Glenn Beck. The Weepy Mormon is also preoccupied with what he's calling "the downgrade" -- which is all Obama's fault, of course. This probably makes it the official Topic of the Day, and relieves me from wondering what Mr. Limbaugh's chief concern will be, later on. Mr. Beck differs from the local guy in that he seems to think that some vague bad stuff might be on the way as a result of "the unthinkable" having happened; however, he has no particular advice for his listeners as to how they should prepare for this bad stuff because "we don't know what it will look like." He implies that the general advice he's been giving his listeners applies, of course -- stuff like get out of debt and have supplies of basic necessities stored away. Of course.

Later: I've had lunch, and the airwaves are Rush-infested. He's mad (true dat!) ... or perhaps I should say, he's simulating anger. For the first time since there have been credit ratings, the US has lost its credit rating. Through the Great Depression, through the First World War, through the Second World War, we had a wonderful credit rating, but now ... no more. Now, France ... the voice is nearly choked with rage ... has a better credit rating than we do! And they make ... perfume ... and cheese!

Gee, Rush ... at least they make something that someone would voluntarily buy. What do we make? War? About the only other country that wants war -- Israel -- doesn't pay for it. Not a good business model, I think.

In any event, all of this is the Peace Laureate's fault. Barackalypse Now! Obamageddon! Oooooh, are the Amur'kan people ever going to get even with him! He's Debt Man Walking! He's landslide-able!

Apparently, the Wicked Negro is supposed to be talking live (it's 1:19 pm, EDT), but he's not doing so yet. He's not fooling Rush a bit, though. Rush knows there's some less-than-honorable reason why the current Supremo isn't out there on time to face the nation, and face the music. Rush isn't telling us why, exactly, but the contemptuous tones of his voice leave no doubt that it's truly vile. Oh, well.

2:35 pm, EDT: I gather that Prexy has spoken. Based on what Mr. Limbaugh has to say, I can't tell what the content of the Peace Laureate's remarks may have been. I can tell that it's completely unsatisfactory to our pillhead host, but there's no surprise there, and no information, either. I daresay it would have been quite unsatisfactory to me, too, if I'd heard it -- but undoubtedly for different reasons. I don't suppose it matters much anyway, in the big picture. The American Empire is passing away; the only real question is, how graceful (or graceless) will the process be? I think the American concept is that no matter whether any merchant really wants to accept fishy IOUs from the gangster who has the biggest guns, they'll have to accept them anyway, out of simple fear. But the gangster usually overestimates his guns; he imagines that because they're astronomically expensive, they must be astronomically good, which doesn't necessarily follow. In any case, things should be interesting. Meanwhile, my Day of Talk Radio is over. My eardrums have been turned to leather, and I'm certainly looking forward to a more-normal day tomorrow.