| Blog Description |
A US Army Signal Corps soldier blogs about the Army, radios, Defense Transformation, politics, terrorism, organized crime, and anything else that comes to mind.
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| Buttons 4 You |
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| Military News |
RSS news feeds and News widgets
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| Hey, Buddy. Got the Time? |
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| Terrorism News |
News widgets and RSS news feeds
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Blackanthem |
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| 101st Fighting Keyboards |
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| Referers |
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| Disclaimer |
| This is my blog. It is not authorized or approved by DoD, the US Army, the US Army Signal Corps, the Oklahoma Army National Guard or any subunits of any of the foregoing. All material is my own and does not represent any of the aforementioned groups. |
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| Electronic Weapons: Turning PlayStation Into A Supercomputer |
| 11.12.09 |
"Three years ago, the Tesla supercomputer add-on for PCs appeared on the market. This was basically an Nvidia graphics board tweaked to act like a supercomputer, rather than a device that put 3-D, photo-realistic game graphics on your computer screen. The latest version of this system will give you a teraflop of computing power for $10,000.
The Cell Processor on the PlayStation 3 (PS 3) is also a GPU, and that GPU alone was used to built several of the fastest supercomputers on the planet." |
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| Is ObamaCare Constitutional? |
| 10.12.09 |
Commerce and taxing power don't support mandate
In a recent legal memorandum, Heritage legal scholar Todd Gaziano, joined by Georgetown law professor Randy Barnett and Nathaniel Stewart, LLP, argues that the individual mandate is both unconstitutional and unprecedented.
Neither the power to regulate commerce nor the power to impose taxes grants Congress the power, they write, to "mandate that an individual enter into a contract with a private party or purchase a good or service and…no decision or present doctrine of the Supreme Court justifies such a claim of power."
Though many on the Left overlooked it, the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service even recognized the constitutional obstacles to the individual mandate:
Whether such [an individual mandate] requirement would be constitutional under the Commerce Clause is perhaps the most challenging question posed by such a proposal, as it is a novel issue whether Congress may use this clause to require an individual to purchase a good or a service.
The Supreme Court has long held that there are limits to Congress' power under the Commerce Clause. An individual mandate would require stretching these limits. Although this has been done in the past, "the current Supreme Court is unlikely to stretch the commerce power further than it already has," explain Gaziano, Barnett and Stewart.
Congress' power to "lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States...." also does not validate an individual mandate. The Constitution requires that a tax be apportioned on the basis of the census population, and not vary based upon factors such as the financial condition of the state's residents. "[But] this [constitutional] requirement will be impossible to meet based upon the variety of exceptions provided in the mandate," write Gaziano, Barnett and Stewart.
Interpreting the Constitution to support an individual mandate would open the door for future abuses, as Heritage's Conn Carroll explains:
If the individual mandate is Constitutional, then Congress could do anything. They could: require us to buy a new Chevy Impala each year to support the government-supported auto industry; require us to buy war bonds to pay for the Iraq and Afghan wars; require us to grow wheat (10 bushels each), or pay someone else to grow your share; require us to buy whatever they want.
"Politics may tell us what we want to do, but the Constitution tells us what we may do and we must keep those separate," Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) said yesterday at a Heritage event on the Constitution's role in the health care debate. An individual mandate that forces all Americans to purchase health coverage or incur a penalty would blur this separation horribly. And that's a serious problem. |
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| The real inconvenient truth |
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| Canadian OP/ED proposes China style one child rule for the whole planet. Health care reform lays the ground work to allow it in the US. "None will work unless a China one-child policy is imposed. Unfortunately, there are powerful opponents. Leaders of the world's big fundamentalist religions preach in favor of procreation and fiercely oppose birth control. And most political leaders in emerging economies perpetuate a disastrous Catch-22: Many children (i. e. sons) stave off hardship in the absence of a social safety net or economic development, which, in turn, prevents protections or development." |
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| Leadership: Leading With A Laptop |
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| "Starting in 2002, the marines took four years to design, build, test and roll out a new battalion headquarters system. It was only a generation ago that a battalion headquarters was a bunch of radios, typewriters, maps and troops, hauled around in a truck and set up in tents. That's all changed. There are still radios, but now the tent is full of laptop computers, a local area network, large flat screen displays, a satellite link, and much else that is new. The tent is also air conditioned. To keep the equipment from overheating, but it does make life easier for the troops. The battalion headquarters is now standardized, to make managing and quickly setting up all this new equipment possible." |
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| Counter-Terrorism: Women, Literacy And Angry Young Men |
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| "Thus in most Islamic countries, the women are having fewer children, and making more noise about economic and educational opportunities. This resonates with some of the better informed Islamic men. One reason the West, and other parts of the world, have enjoyed much better economic growth than the Moslem countries, is that they have added large number of educated women to their work force." |
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| Iran: Government Promises Students More Death Sentences |
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| "Currently, Iran has enriched its nuclear material to about five percent. For weapons, you need to increase the content of Uranium 235 in uranium ore to at least 54 percent (producing uranium that contains that percentage of the more volatile U-235 form of the nuclear material). This is far above the 5-10 percent minimum needed for nuclear power plants. Normally, Uranium ore is only about .7 percent U-235. Anything over 20 percent enriched can be used for a nuclear bomb. But the most effective and reliable nuclear weapons use 80 percent enriched nuclear material. Iran appears to believe that the UN will not be able to implement more severe sanctions (because China is an Iranian ally)." |
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| Infantry: The Phantom Menace |
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| "The basic 'Level 3' SAPI plates are 10x12 inches, weigh 4.6 pounds each and cost about $400. The older Level 4 plates, weighing about 6.4 pounds each, could stop some types of armor piercing bullets, and the new XSAPI weighs about six pounds and have somewhat greater stopping power. ESAPI is more expensive, at $600 a plate." |
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| protein wisdom: On blogging and its discontents. |
| 9.12.09 |
| "What McCain is — judging from what I’ve read, both past and present — is someone who has been candid in his writings about questions of racial politics, and as such, I believe he can be more accurately described as someone seeking a “real conversation on race” than nearly all those who gave lip service to such a noble idea, then worked tirelessly to make sure that said conversation never actually took place, with the punishment, for those who mistook the offer as legitimate, being predictable charges of racism, should any of those commenting question left-liberal orthodoxy." |
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| United States Central Command: Cobra's Anger |
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| "So far, the clearing operation has yielded more than nine weapons caches of various sizes, and the combined force has found homemade explosives, RPGs and mortars, an assortment of small arms including rifles, hand grenades and machine guns, along with associated ammunition, and several hundred components used in the production of improvised explosive devices. The ammunition and weapons were destroyed to prevent future use." |
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| Intelligence: Traffic Analysis |
| 8.12.09 |
| "The Taliban spend a lot of their time staying hidden. There are Afghan police, and civilians willing to provide information. The Taliban have to hide weapons and ammo, as well as caches of food. The hiding places are visited periodically, to add or remove material, or just to make sure someone else hasn't found the stuff and made off with it. Finding and looting these caches has long been a popular outdoor sport. The movements of these Taliban, going to add to a cache, or just check up, are often noted by U.S. troops. U.S. troops can find the caches with UAVs and scouts on the ground, who observe the traffic pattern in the hills, and put pieces of data together to locate where the stuff is hidden. It's this kind of detective work that is being used to find and destroy the small groups that make and place roadside bombs, or recruit, equip and use suicide bombers." |
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| Morale: Homeward Unbound |
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| "The math works like this. The army, marines and reserves can muster about sixty combat brigades. During 2004-7, there were 19 brigades deployed to combat zones (15 in Iraq, three in Afghanistan and one in South Korea.) That's when the army began working to get active duty troops two years dwell time for every year in a combat zone. For reserves, the goal was home for four years, overseas for one. It was believed that, with a little help from the marines, the army can just about make that. The increase in troops sent to Afghanistan will delay this dwell time plan for a few years. The Department of Defense has announced that there will be higher numbers of U.S. troops in Afghanistan for 2-4 years. At least that's the plan. And after the plan, the soldiers will have their dwell time." |
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| Counter-Terrorism: The Get-Out-Of-Jail Card |
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| "The foreign troops find they are capturing the same Taliban fighters over and over again, or finding, after a battle, the dead bodies of Taliban gunmen they had turned over to the NDS recently. The NDS claim that all this is not their fault, but you don't have to be in Afghanistan long before you realize that the corruption extends to everything, and that the Taliban use it whenever they can." |
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| Leadership: The U.S. Navy Builds An MMOG |
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| "'Move Two - Attacks at Sea: The scenario is multiple near simultaneous attacks on ships transiting the Red Sea to the Horn of Africa. Players would be self selecting and self organizing into collaborative teams of either Red (pirates) or Blue (US and Allied response). It is conceivable that players may have the option of signing up to be part of a third party as well, representing e.g. NGOs, other governments, etc, but this has not yet been determined. '" |
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| Artillery: MGS In The Mountains |
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| "The army sent the first of its Stryker Mobile Gun Systems to Iraq last year. The gun has an automatic loader. The gun is stabilized, and can be fired on the move. Once in Iraq, the gun performed well, providing accurate and effective firepower when needed. Last year, a Stryker brigade went to Afghanistan with nine MGSs, and will leave those behind when it is replaced by the 2nd Stryker Cavalry Regiment next year (which will then have 18 MGSs)." |
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| Afghanistan: Back To The Future |
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| "The newly announced U.S. strategy of chasing away the Taliban, thus allowing Afghan forces to move in and provide sufficient security to keep the Taliban from returning (from either mountain hideouts, or, more likely, bases in Pakistan), depends on several things that have never occurred before in Afghanistan." |
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| Information Warfare: What Goes Around |
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"Al Qaeda Audio and Video Recordings Released
2002 12 (8 of them vids)
2003 17 (6 vids)
2004 23 (5 vids)
2005 24 (14 vids)
After 2005, al Qaeda video production went through the roof, with some months seeing 5-10 new ones appearing." |
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| Infantry: Head Stuff |
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| "The PASGT came in five sizes, and weighed between 3.1 pounds (size Extra Small) to 4.2 pounds (size Extra Large). The new ACH weighs a third less than the PASGT, and uses a new type of Kevlar that provides more protection. The ACH will stop a 9mm bullet at close range, and rifle bullets at longer ranges. The ACH is smaller, and does not cover as much of the neck. This was important, because the newer protective vests (like the bullet-proof Interceptor) ride high on the back, thus becoming very uncomfortable when the soldier is prone and trying to fire his rifle. The ACH eliminates this problem. The ACH was first developed as a special project by the U.S. Army Special Forces, and was so successful that the rest of the army began buying them." |
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| Warplanes: Fuel Cell Flyer |
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| "The U.S. Navy has been experimenting with powering lightweight UAVs with fuel cells. One of these aircraft recently stayed aloft for 26 hours. The Ion Tiger UAV is a 37 pound aircraft that carries a 9.5 pound tank of compressed hydrogen to power the fuel cell battery that runs the engine. Also carried is a five pound sensor payload (day/night vidcam)." |
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| Leadership: Iran And The Bad Plan |
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"The Iranian exercise had air and air-defense units go through the motions of dealing with a hostile air strike against Iranian nuclear facilities.
The Iranian generals who organized the exercise were surprised at how uncoordinated and ill prepared their forces were for such an attack. Communications were spotty (due to equipment failures and poor training), and weapons (aircraft and missile systems) did not perform as expected. The Iranians, it appears, were victims of their own propaganda. For years, Iran has been announcing new weapons, that don't exist. Same thing with new initiatives in training and tactics." |
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| Weapons: The FBI Goes 20mm |
| 7.12.09 |
| "The 20mm rifle is intended mainly for destroying equipment at long ranges. Like motor vehicles, or even slow moving, and low flying, aircraft. Or small boats. The 20mm projectile weighs four ounces, and moves at 2,200 feet per second. The operational range of the 20mm round is 1,300 meters. In the hands of an expert shooter, the 20mm round can hit targets over 50 percent farther. The 20mm ammo available as armor-piercing incendiary or high explosive rounds." |
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| Weapons: The FBI Goes 20mm |
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| "The 20mm rifle is intended mainly for destroying equipment at long ranges. Like motor vehicles, or even slow moving, and low flying, aircraft. Or small boats. The 20mm projectile weighs four ounces, and moves at 2,200 feet per second. The operational range of the 20mm round is 1,300 meters. In the hands of an expert shooter, the 20mm round can hit targets over 50 percent farther. The 20mm ammo available as armor-piercing incendiary or high explosive rounds." |
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| Winning: The Bad Guys Are Ahead |
| 3.12.09 |
| "The problem is that all this new networking activity is not being carried out with enough attention paid to security. These new utilities networks are already under attack by the usual criminal hackers looking for PCs to covertly take over to use as zombies (to send spam or seek out other PCs to infect.) This demonstrates that these systems are also vulnerable to a military type attack, meant to shut down the power grid, or any other vulnerable utility." |
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| BofA Set to Repay Taxpayers - WSJ.com |
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| Shouldn't have offered it. Shouldn't have accepted it. : "While Bank of America is struggling to overcome recessionary pressures, which have caused loan losses to balloon, its $6.47 billion profit through the end of September was down just 12% from a year earlier. Because of its improved health, Bank of America officials had been pushing to repay the government. Federal officials refused to allow it until they were confident the bank was strong enough." |
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| Yahoo News: Afghanistan Photo |
| 2.12.09 |
| "A U.S. Army cadet reads a book entitled "Kill Bin Laden" as he waits with other cadets for U.S. President Barack Obama to deliver an address on U.S. policy and the war in Afghanistan at the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, New York December 1, 2009. Obama is expected to announce a plan to send 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan over six months in a bid to beat back the Taliban and bring a quicker end to a costly and unpopular eight-year war." |
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| Afghanistan - Yahoo! News Photos |
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| "A U.S. Army cadet reads a book entitled 'Kill Bin Laden' as he waits with other cadets for U.S. President Barack Obama to deliver an address on U.S. policy and the war in Afghanistan at the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, New York December 1, 2009. Obama is expected to announce a plan to send 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan over six months in a bid to beat back the Taliban and bring a quicker end to a costly and unpopular eight-year war" |
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| Afghanistan - Yahoo! News Photos |
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| "A U.S. Army cadet reads a book entitled 'Kill Bin Laden' as he waits with other cadets for U.S. President Barack Obama to deliver an address on U.S. policy and the war in Afghanistan at the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, New York December 1, 2009. Obama is expected to announce a plan to send 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan over six months in a bid to beat back the Taliban and bring a quicker end to a costly and unpopular eight-year war" |
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| Afghanistan - Yahoo! News Photos |
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| "A U.S. Army cadet reads a book entitled 'Kill Bin Laden' as he waits with other cadets for U.S. President Barack Obama to deliver an address on U.S. policy and the war in Afghanistan at the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, New York December 1, 2009. Obama is expected to announce a plan to send 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan over six months in a bid to beat back the Taliban and bring a quicker end to a costly and unpopular eight-year war" |
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| Bernanke Says Limiting Fed Independence Would ‘Impair’ Economy - Bloomberg.com |
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It's a turf fight, but if Bernanke thinks it's his turf to begin with, he needs to read the Constitution.
From Art I, Section 8 (in pertinent part): The Congress shall have Power...To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin,....
"“A number of the legislative proposals being circulated would significantly reduce the capacity of the Federal Reserve to perform its core functions,” the Fed chairman said in a commentary in today’s Washington Post. The measures “would seriously impair the prospects for economic and financial stability in the U.S.”
Bernanke has presided over the most expansive use of Fed powers since the Great Depression. While the 55-year-old Fed chairman has said he averted a financial meltdown, lawmakers have voiced concern about taxpayer-sponsored bailouts and proposed the most sweeping dismantling of Fed authority since the creation of the institution in 1913." |
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| War tax proponent Obey calls expected troop surge a 'fool's errand' - TheHill.com |
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From the Department of "It Takes One to Know One": "But Obey said supporting a corrupt Afghan government by adding troops amounted to a 'fool's errand.'"
Proof:
"If policymakers believe continuing the war effort in Afghanistan was an important public policy, Obey added, then they should be willing to pay for it by raising taxes on higher income levels. The war would likely cost as much over the next decade as the effort to reforming the healthcare system, Obey said."
Only if war funding is going to increase by a factor of 6.
More Proof:
"'In this war, we have not had any sense of shared sacrifice,' Obey said."
I've addressed this before. If REP Oeby is not sharing the sacrifice, that speaks about him and his character, not the nature or conduct of the war. |
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| Brown: Catch Bin Laden | The Sun |News |
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"But he said: 'We have got to ask ourselves why eight years after September 11 nobody has been able to spot or detain or get close to Osama Bin Laden.'"
Because he's dead? |
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