How Did An iPhone Take This Picture?Unless the blades of this airplane propellor can defy gravity and float, the iPhone's camera totally distorted reality with this picture. How did this happen?
J.
Dowling | Duncan – Dowling Duncan redesign the US bank notes
No way.
Besides, isn't there some law stating that you've got to be dead before you can be on a stamp or bank note?
J.
The Secret Histories of Those @#$%ing Computer Symbols | Gadget Lab | Wired.com
I always wondered how the USB symbol came about...
J.
The Assault Weapons ban proved to be a non-starter - they couldn't show any decrease in crime and the law expired. If there HAD been a decrease in crimes committed with assault rifiles (like bayonettings or clubbings) there would have been an outcry to ban even MORE guns. But there wasn't - so other means need to be found.
EPA Considering Banning Lead Ammunition | Snowflakes in Hell"No, we're not against gun ownership! We just want to make the ammo prohibitively expensive! Lead's a poison, you know! Gotta do it for the children!"Are the gloves coming off? The Obama Administration has, until now, been reluctant to antagonize gun owners. Perhaps now that his popularity is reaching new lows, he’s looking to appeal to an important part of his green base by beating up on gun owners and shooters. Having utterly failed to eliminate the Second Amendment by hook, now it would seem he’s proceeding to do it by crook; by demonizing gun owners and the shooting sports as environmental devils. Let’s hope this is about as successful as the President’s other endeavors.
Yeah. Right....
J.
With a homebuilt sub.
World's Largest Amateur Space Rocket Set To Launch
Serious awesome going on there...
J.
Gateway Arch showing rust and decay
Went to see this a couple of years back with the little guy - VERY impressive, even on a gray November day. I'm not surprised it's showing problems with corrosion - though I would have thought they'd be paying attention to that since day one.
Metal, water, time... what could possibly go wrong?
J.
How to Replace Vital Documents When You've Been Less Than Diligent About Filing
Not that anyone ever has a problem with THAT, he said, whistling and looking around guiltily...
J.
The Point of No Return - Article - National Review OnlineIn pretty much every system there's excess items that don't directly affect the functioning of the system, but may impact how well that system performs its primary purpose.How did we get to the point where many people feel that the America they have known is being replaced by a very different kind of country, with not only different kinds of policies but also very different values and ways of governing?
Something of this magnitude does not happen all at once or in just one administration in Washington. What we are seeing is the culmination of many trends in many aspects of American life that go back for years.
For example - a 747. You don't really need all that stuff in the seatback pockets, do you? It's just a slight impact on the customer - and can save weight with its removal. And how about the interior furnishings? They're weight that can be discarded, all the plastics used to cover the walls, and provide overhead bins for luggage and stuff. And who really needs padded seats? Go for military-style webbing. Sure, it's not as comfortable, but think of the weight you'll save. Galley? Who needs that? It's just excess weight. Give each passenger a bottle of water and a bag of nuts on boarding. And why so many lavatories? One should be enough - the extra weight should be eliminated. Yes, it'll be hard to take care of 300 passengers with it - but they're still getting to their destinations, aren't they?
Sure. But you've taken something relatively luxurious and comfortable and turned it into an austere, unpleasant experience. (Not that flying commercial these days is any great thing in the first place...) About the only way you could make it worse would be to strip out the seats and make people sit on the floor, then turn the heating down to conserve fuel. (Yes, I know the airco systems run off engine bleed air and provide the pressurization needed to keep the passengers alive. Work with me here...)
But there comes a tipping point where people refuse to cooperate with what's being done to them. Would YOU routinely fly on an airline that treated its customers as above? Likely not - if you didn't have to.
Seems like for decades the left's done what it can to cast a pall over the notion that the US is a fine, exceptional place. Where their policies are implemented on a large scale, disaster seems to follow. (See Detroit, and California.) But it's never THEIR fault - that California has power problems, or Detroit's essentially collapsed as a functional city, or that the programs designed to 'help' the urban poor have created an almost permanent underclass of people for whom 'social justice' seems to demand that everyone out of that level be reduced to it.
It's almost like they see something great that they didn't build - and have to destroy it.
What strange times we live in. I think we'll survive it - but it's not going to be fun, and there's going to be people fighting every step of the way to keep improvements from happening.
But I think there's going to be more who are looking at the 'progressive' movement and seeing it for what it is - simply another power-hungry group that doesn't give a damn about the consequences of their desired programs, as long as they can lord it over the vast unwashed peasantry that doesn't have the power and influence they do.
J.
