Monthly Archives: October 2004

Impending Draft?

This entry was posted in Conscription Constitution Domestic Terrorism Libertarianism on by

If recruiting doesn’t meet the needs then expect a push for a draft no matter what the candidates say today:

Compounding the difficulty of recruiting, Nunes said, is the fact that seven out of 10 people who walk through the front door of a recruiting office aren’t qualified for the military, for reasons ranging from criminal history to an inappropriate tattoo. The goal is to enlist at least one of the remaining three.
Colleges are the competition
Who knows which tattoos are inappropriate enough to keep you out? Seems this might be useful information to a lot folks in case a draft does come around.
Update: Mark Kleiman posts Yes, Virginia, there could be a draft.

Jet Powered Cell Phones

This entry was posted in Economics Energy Technology on by

And they might help keep you warm in the winter:

Though the turbine�s blades span an area smaller than a dime, they spin at more than a million revolutions per minute and are designed to produce enough electricity to power handheld electronics. In the foreseeable future, Epstein expects, his tiny turbines will serve as a battery replacement, first for soldiers and then for consumers. But he has an even more ambitious vision: that small clusters of the engines could serve as home generating plants, freeing consumers from the power grid, with its occasional black- and brownouts….
Epstein�s immediate goal, however, is to use these miniature engines as a cheap and efficient alternative to batteries for cell phones, digital cameras, PDAs, laptop computers, and other portable electronic devices. The motivation is simple: batteries are heavy and expensive and require frequent recharging. And they don�t produce much electricity, for all their size and weight.
On a per watt basis these things apparently will be smaller and more efficient then comparable fuel cells. But they do have a bit of an exhaust issue.
Read the rest.

Drama and Music Weekend

This entry was posted in Literature Music on by

Yesterday the Modulator family spent the day together. First watching a fine performance of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town and then a post play dinner.
I’ll spend this evening with Karl Denson’s Tiny Universe and Stockholm Syndrome. Conflicts preclude any of the rest of the family from joining.
Karl Denson is a recent favorite and I’ve been a Jerry Joseph fan for several years and am looking forward to seeing him in this new grouping.

Boycott or Buy? Part 2

This entry was posted in Capitalism Economics Election 2004 Libertarianism on by

In Boycott or Buy? Part 1 I encouraged each of you to make your own fair and balanced decision as how you might respond to the Sinclair Broadcasting issue. I still do.
Jim Henley reminds us, though, that it should not be an FCC issue at all:

It may arguably be bad business, in which case they’ll pay, but it’s not the FCC’s business. I enjoyed the hell out of the Sundance Channel’s live broadcast of the Vote for Change finale concert last night. That wasn’t station owners using their facilities for partisan political purposes?
I enjoyed listening to Vote for Change on a local radio station and Jim’s question jumped into mind just about two songs1 in…
I agree with Jim that it should not the FCC’s business. Primarily because the FCC should not even exist.
Sinclair owns the stations so they should be able to broadcast what they want. We can use our channel changers or the power switch to watch or not watch and we can choose to buy or not buy from their sponsors.
However, Sinclair Broadcasting along with their media and corporate ilk exist in the form they do only with the complicity of their regulatory monitors partners and our their executive, legislative, and judicial representatives. As long as this parasitic partnership rides on our backs it seems perfectly reasonable to pour sugar in its tanks and turn one limb against the other to the extent possible.
1I enjoyed almost all the music I heard on this broadcast and these late in the show pieces were amongst my favorites: Dave Matthews performing Don’t Drink the Water and Ant’s Marching and Springsteen’s Star Spangled Banner>Born in the USA.