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Missile Defense

Technology has always found its greatest consumer in a nation's war and defense efforts. Since the last attempts at a "Star Wars" defense system, has technology changed considerably enough to make the latest Missile Defense initiatives more successful? Can such an application of science be successful? Is a militarized space inevitable, necessary or impossible?

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rshow55 - 08:33am May 26, 2003 EST (# 12045 of 12076)
Can we do a better job of finding truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have done and worked for on this thread.

To shift the world up much from where it is - there have to be better constraints on the right to lie - or at least, on the right to evade checking.

Even at the NYT - and when there's a problem there - it is symptomatic of much wider problems.

If leaders of nation states worked for that - using their names - we could make a lot of progress from where we are.

A lot of the worst tragedies in the world are stupid - and could not possibly happen if levels of effective deception were significantly lessened.

That's an institutional problem. France has made a small beginning - but much more could easily be done - it seems to me.

rshow55 - 09:10am May 26, 2003 EST (# 12046 of 12076)
Can we do a better job of finding truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have done and worked for on this thread.

9460 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.hpRKbdepbTQ.2073473@.f28e622/11000

There is a competition between two models of world order - one in being - the other talked about - and in the process of being constructed - but not completed.

That new idea - with new institutions and much behind it now - but still with a budget less than 1% of the US Defense budget - is world order under the UN.

The old pattern, which has been as ugly as it has been, but has worked as well as it has - is hobbesian or machiavellian nationalism.

The Bush administration and the United States are dominant under that old pattern - and have limited committments to that old pattern. Substantial committments also to the new pattern of international law in the process of being formed.

9461 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.hpRKbdepbTQ.2073473@.f28e622/11001 In my opinion - the world is close to a transition to real stability - and a higher level of function in human terms.

I believe we'd be there if leaders of nation states had the wisdom, fortitude and courage to face the fact that there have to be limits on the right of people in power to decieve themselves and others. Limits that put some limits on personal political power and on sovereignty.

Maybe not severe limits. Maybe not limits applied with great consistency. But some limits. Enforced sometimes. When it matters enough.

- - - -

I posted that a while ago. Was I being naive? Have events shown me wrong? I don't think so.

Thought question: What would it cost to check to closure the main arguments Almarst has made - and facts that he has cited?

Maybe 1-2 million dollars. But money would be the least of the problems. Some people with real power would have to want it to happen. Foundation people, for example.

If the world changed so that such checking happened - most of the fixable problems in the world - in terms of real human needs, when you check, and count - could be fixed. Without any miracles. People involved could make money doing it.

almarst2002 - 11:10am May 26, 2003 EST (# 12047 of 12076)

THE US has floated plans to turn Guantanamo Bay into a death camp, with its own death row and execution chamber. - http://news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,6494000^401,00.html

Prisoners would be tried, convicted and executed without leaving its boundaries, without a jury and without right of appeal, The Mail on Sunday newspaper reported yesterday.

AND WHY NOT? AREN'T WE THE GREATEST DEMOCRACY ON EARTH? THE TEACHERS TO THE REST OF THE BARBARIANS AROUND?

TELL US ALL: "WHO IS THE PRETIEST OF THE WORLD?"

almarst2002 - 11:14am May 26, 2003 EST (# 12048 of 12076)

THE US-led administration in Iraq reopened a former interrogation centre of Saddam Hussein's secret police - http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,6472851%5E25777,00.html

LIFE BACK TO NORMAL, FULL SPEED.

jorian319 - 11:45am May 26, 2003 EST (# 12049 of 12076)

Rshochic,

Y'all have a lot of typing to do if you wanna outblather alarmist!

Ne'er seen the like - 24 posts in a row??!? SOMEONE thinks they're awful important.

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New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense