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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?

Read Debates, a new Web-only feature culled from Readers' Opinions, published every Thursday.

rshow55 - 09:50am Jul 14, 2002 EST (#3052 of 3063)

The things Eisenhower warned about in his FAREWELL ADDRESS of January 17, 1961 http://www.geocities.com/~newgeneration/ikefw.htm have happened. The stakes couldn't possibly be more serious, for the United States and the rest of the world. From my position, it seems likely that the Bush administration is considerably worse than it looks to the rest of the world. Things need to be checked. Checking has been, too long, "almost illegal." "Just not done." That's changing some -- and needs to change much more.

MD3029 rshow55 7/13/02 12:10pm ... MD3030 rshow55 7/13/02 12:15pm

If people keep checking - on issues of corruption - a tremendous amount of good could come of it. The stakes couldn't possibly be higher. If anyone wonders why I've worked so hard on this thread since September 2000 - - concerns about the Nazi connections of the Bush family, about militarism, and corruption - have been central. They concerned Bill Casey as well -- who wanted to fight the Cold War, win it, then somehow redeem the country - returning to decencies that had been lost. Instead, people allied to the Bush family have used the apparatus "justified" to fight the Cold War as a machine to enrich and raise the status of "insiders" at the expense of every decent American value - and with reckless disregard for the safety of the whole world.

lchic - 07:05pm Jul 14, 2002 EST (#3053 of 3063)

``I'm the right person for the job,'' said Pitt, appointed by Bush last year as the top market watchdog. ``This guilt by occupation is really a needless diversion.''

Pitt insisted that under his leadership, the SEC has been more effective and aggressive than ever in investigating and punishing companies, executives and accountants.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Business-Scandals.html

rshow55 - 07:19pm Jul 14, 2002 EST (#3054 of 3063)

If his feet stay to the fire -- maybe that can be true, and continue. We are looking for redemptive solutions -- because we have to be (not all the guilty can be punished - because the social system has to be maintained.) Pitt surely knows "where the bodies are buried." And can learn more - well enough, if he chose, to fix a number of things.

lchic - 07:20pm Jul 14, 2002 EST (#3055 of 3063)

Iraq
""Saddam must be deposed by force. But some in the US are asking why a blueprint for the conflict was leaked at the moment when sleaze scandals hit a new peak
^{http://www.observer.co.uk/worldview/story/0,11581,755061,00.html
The first leaks came 10 days ago when a five-inch thick dossier detailing plans for an invasion of Iraq involving 250,000 men was handed to the New York Times.}

rshow55 - 07:24pm Jul 14, 2002 EST (#3056 of 3063)

Postings I'm proud of, especially a proposal for a "nursery rhyme."

MD3036-3046 rshow55 7/13/02 1:07pm

MD2326_2327 rshow55 5/20/02 12:43pm . . . deals with a key personal problem, that also stands in the way of a clear accounting about "missile defense:

" Could things be arranged so that I could talk to ______, or some other professional, on technical matters, in a way so that I had reasonable confidence, and _________ had reasonable confidence, that, whatever other problems we might have, our conversation did not violate US national security laws?

"There could be a number of people or organizations in the blank, among them Theodore Postol, the physicist and Noam Chomsky, the linguist-mathematician, of MIT.

"I feel that this has to be possible.

- - - -

It isn't possible yet. I need something in writing,, or clearly operational otherwise, before it is. But perhaps progress is being made.

If that progress continues, it should be clear that accounting on technical issues, and not only money, has to be done. And can be.
MD1076-1077 rshow55 4/4/02 1:20pm

President Bush is right about this. The Cold War should be OVER. We need to move on. That means cleaning up some messes.

Cleaning up those messes is much more important than whatever may happen to Bush's own sorry carcass.

lchic - 07:27pm Jul 14, 2002 EST (#3057 of 3063)

Asteroid explosions run at 2-3 per month .... most nations are unable to distinguish between such an explosion and a FIRST STRIKE ... USA is only country to search for these explosions - but - takes TWO MONTHS to PUBLISH this information!

Technolgy is required to detect radio activity - Asteroids have it - nukes don't.

Current international tension gives more concern to scientists ... in 1989 USA president was awakened in the night (confusion over type of explosion).

^{(ABC au --Hamilton Island, BarrierReef, Qld is hosting a conference of Astronomers )}

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