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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 - 01:55pm Jan 9, 2003 EST (# 7530 of 7536)
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.

No 'Smoking Guns' Found in Iraq, U.N. Inspector Says http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-UN-Iraq.html

"Arms inspectors have not found any "smoking guns" in Iraq, Hans Blix said today before briefing the Security Council.

• Turkey's Reluctance on Bases Worries U.S. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/09/international/middleeast/09ALLI.html

• Complete Coverage: Standoff With Iraq http://www.nytimes.com/pages/world/worldspecial/

Things are unstable - things are touchy - it is very tense - the people who know the most, and care the most, are most worried, and those of them who aren't worried at all (or act like it) maybe should switch.

The conditions for a stable, beautiful transition look like they are well along. Like a very awkward wedding. Though there are differences. The groom suspects the bride of having a hatchet under her veil, or worse. With some reasons for feeling so. But that's only to be expected . . and people are practicing carefully - and maybe not slowly enough, but slowly.

At a certain level, rape and courtship look the same - the switching logic is similarly general - at key levels.

At a certain level, setups for treachery and courtship look the same - - the switching logic is similarly general - at key levels.

In some ways - but not some key others - the same at all levels - with a lot of symmetries. The potential for miscalculation is immense - things are tense - it is very unstable.

Key differences involve proportion and harmony and speed.

Nobody can afford to be too cute - too cocksure - too direct - or to make to many fast moves at once.

It may be possible for the US, and Iraq - to make a big transition - where they cease to be intolerable dangers and nuisances to each other - and become tolerable nuisances - and maybe even help each other in some ways.

Or there could be war. Now, with work done, proportions as they are, it would be a tragedy - though maybe unavoidable.

I think that it should be avoidable, and should be avoided. Though there may have to be accomodations - going both ways - and some of them will be coercive at some levels. Some damned coercive.

It looks beautiful in some big ways. Totally unstable - symettrically about the big things. Utterly unstable.

Worries the hell out of me . . . this could work out.

I'm taking my time - taking time to laugh - and getting some physical exercise. Moving slowly. Haven't been drinking coffee today at anything like my usual rate. Having to be careful about calibration.

Hopeful. Spent a lot of time laughing. Got a lot of things set up, checked, put throught their paces - and forgotten cleanly and neatly.

We do have a setup now where the incidence of war, and the agonies and dislocations of war, can be taken way down. I think both Bush and Hussien are to be commended, so far - though there are some infelicities.

rshow55 - 01:57pm Jan 9, 2003 EST (# 7531 of 7536)
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.

Saudi Arabia and the Palestinians are playing a very awkward role - and a very disruptive one. The biggest problems are at the Saudi level - and Saddam is to be commended, and pitied, for what he has to put up with.

Whether you happen to like the guy, or not, and I don't happen to like him very much.

rshow55 - 02:02pm Jan 9, 2003 EST (# 7532 of 7536)
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.

I'm trying to set up some explanations about switching logic that nobody can mistake - and it may be possible (though I doubt it can be perfectly.)

May flop. I'll be a while. I'm going to eat, and sweat some first. Things could work well.

- - -

I'm toying with approaches. It seems to me that I need to perpetrate a general purpose, course, expository atrocity. To make something servicably clear. But when I think about how clear I'd like to make it - and think of the people involved - - I hesitate.

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New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense