which now means other countries encourage to do business with non-US companies?

Well it does look cool and I remember in 1980s when they were promoting it will be on the market in a few years (which they've been repeating for 30 years like for past 60 years we will have fusion power in 10 years, or in past 50 years we will be on Mars in 20 years). Probably never will get off the ground but hey looks cool, and I don't have a pilot's license so what difference does it make.

Other than that, Paul Moller wrote a paper about vertical lift and he derived an equation of engine power and blade area. I think, I read it in 1980s and forgot a lot of details. Generally Moller wrote the Avro "flying saucer" car was doomed from the start because the blade area was too small, according to his equation(s) which mathematically showed even with a lot more power than Avro Car can provide, it will never get out of ground effect. His equations showed helicopters are the best efficiency for vertical flight because blade area is very large. Moller went on to say the disadvantage of helicopters is poor horizontal flight performance and need for complex control system. Which is why Moller car uses several ducted engines. During that time he taught at UC Davis, had a business that produced small UAVs and I also think mufflers that provide good sound suppression, block sparks (to field equipment don't start grass fires), and not have excess blockage.

I remember in early 1990s when there was a mini air show of sorts at Yolo County airport and Paul Moller had on display a mockup of the 2-seat version. It had much of the prototype electronic systems, I looked and said, "Hey, those are 7400 type ICs instead of mil grade 5400 type ICs!" He replied no need to use expensive components for design testing. Lockheed will use them because they have only one customer, the government, so they can charge whatever expensive costs.

Getting back to flying car, there is the roadable airplane that does exist. And DeLoreans are promoted as "flying cars" as they do look distinctly different than other cars and have an interesting history. Ugh, according to the movie all those flying cars and conversion kits will be common place next year (yeah right).

Goes to show what's happened with this country. it seems much of Obama's policies are extension of Bush. Both parties put highest priority on surveillance of the people and in meantime more and more people struggling financially with feeling both political parties and higher ups are more interested in themselves rather than what's good for the country. Then there's foreign policy debacles in Middle East. Perfect timing for Putin to expand his empire and ISIS to go on their rampage because now it's difficult for this country's leaders to rally up the people to assemble an effective response.

What I find interesting is NFL cheerleaders are quite accomplished dancers of skills as demanding like for professional dancers on Broadway shows. Those I've met and read about have extensive dance training from ballet to modern, all needing to be in top physical shape. It's more than just looking good, you have to be ***good***. Auditions are demanding. Those who fail, cry. Those who get accepted, cry (all those years of training finally paid off). Once they are accepted, it doesn't get easier. Rehearsals and choreography is demanding, some candidates get washed out because they cannot project that "show presentation" (they either have "it" or they don't). Choreographers know what "it" is when they see it but cannot describe it.

Unlike NFL football players, cheerleaders don't make the big bucks. I read they have to be employed or a student in college. Raising a child is equivalent to being employed. They get some compensation per game. I guess those that pursue this occupation do it for the experience.

Just wondering. It seems there's all kinds of characters besides drag queens that use fake names. Plus so many entertainers use stage names, but their drivers license and passport don't have those names. I'd not be surprised there is a Randall Stevens promoting people to let him handle their investments even though he does not exist ("Shawshank Redemption").

A friend has a grandfathered account and sometimes we use his phone for streaming video hotspot, cost = $0. And doesn't seem to have throttle issues. They keep calling him about free upgrade plans. Otherwise using our phones we have to pay quite a bit (video adds up the GB very quickly) and only lasts for an hour when cell company "slams on the brakes."

Really. US politics are like football games, only two teams. Each team has strategies which they don't share with other team and the spectators. Prior to plays, team huddles to discuss plans for a play but spectators can only observe, kind of like what politicos do when they huddle in closed rooms. Teams know strategic plans and actions to be taken, spectators can only cheer or boo but have little influence on what team will win or lose.

ok, I'm going OT. These days you better pay that ticket, show up for court, or you will be issued a FTA (failure to appear) and you will be issued a bench warrent. Result is next time you are pulled over, it is mandatory arrest, as dispatch radios back to officer the 10-28/10-29 info.

But it wasn't like that back in the days. There were people that accumulate tickets which they never took care of i.e. as portrayed in "American Graffiti" of John Milner's "CS files." A relative of mine who died decades ago but I heard he was one of the worst drivers. When aunt and uncle going through his stuff after he passed away, they found piles of tickets. Or maybe he simply paid the fine and went on to the next. I believe back then you can just pay the fine but these days after number of moving violations in a certain period of time you lose license. Back then there was no CLETS and NCIC (there was but not all depts were "online" or it was really slow). I wonder how one can get away with so many tickets.

On subject of quotas, I ask my cousin, deputy sheriff, about quotas. He said there is none but if supervisor reviewing activity log and see deputy lacking in pullovers when was not dispatched on calls, then supervisor will wonder why deputy not active. Cousin said it's easy to find violators, somebody is always doing a traffic violation. Other times he has no time to pull people over because he is getting one call after another.

Heh, here's a story for the reading multitudes. As a child and mom going to night school, I had a baby sitter who was a strict Baptist. One day I said a "bad word" (I don't remember what it was) but my baby sitter made me wash my mouth with soap (yuck). Then on one occasion when she went to the store and brought along the children, me included. She got pulled over and she got really mad, was yelling at the cop, cussing like a sailor (I didn't get the words but I knew they were bad). Cop was calm about it all, insisted she sign the ticket. He gave her a copy which she screamed and cussed, crunched it up and threw it to the floor. When we got back home, she continued to yell and cuss, kicked the crunched up ticket to the ground. I wondered if she paid for it or not. Was an FTA issued?

Stealing US Army software or stealing IP and proprietary data related to Xbox Live? I kind of skimmed through the article, with the photo my first thought was stealing UH60 training material that goes into actual capabilities of the Blackhawk helicopter. Now it looks like gamer software but that may have longer sentences as The Business considers piracy most serious crime.

I don't follow football though some years ago I had opportunity to be in a press box high above 50 yd line. Very different than seeing it on TV, you can see how the play is set up and made. Where on TV the camera focuses on the ball so you miss peripheral details. What caught my attention is on hike, team with the ball had three guys acting like they had the ball (only one obviously did). It didn't fool opposing team but they still had to pay attention to those two other guys. And when they throw the ball, they throw it very high and very far.

Other than that, I have heard many people discontinuing their season ticket holdings as these are getting so expensive in the hundreds of dollars. What gets me is enormous amounts of money involved. The new Levi stadium in Santa Clara for example with billions involved, I only drove past it a few times. I hear on game day, traffic is superbad. And listening to VTA bus freq, drivers that shuttle viewers to and from the stadium many times are directed away from stadium by police. Transit Control said to drivers can't they tell the police they need to shuttle to the stadium, driver responded "the officer was really rude." I also heard Sunnyvale requested CHP to look into a vandal call because city didn't have officers to respond. Heck, stadium is Santa Clara but getting assistance from Sunnyvale for game day, and they still lacking resources?

I also saw on FCC database zillion new licenses for NFL freq.

I don't know bash either (been dabbling on learning to code), I see this headline thinking, "looks like I picked the wrong week to learn about bash."

For past 50 or so years, US says it will send a man to Mars in 20 years. For past 50 (uh wait, 30) or so years, USSR/Russia says it will send a man to Moon in 20 years. Like we will have fusion power in 10 years like they've been saying for past 50 years. And next year we will have Hover-Cars, including conversion kits for people with vintage '80s DeLorean. But then these days we do have Picture-Phones.

I always thought there was something else besides just code, like also learning terminal (and to learn whats this "bin/bash" stuff).

Thanks for being honest, I hate it when everyone says it is easy. hey, even landing a F18 on a carrier is easy. Just line up on the glide slope, drop the gear and hook, and land. (not). Oh gawd, hipsters... one project this person who put together a project and it was real whizbang, etc. But updates and other specifics was kind of mysterious. He'd "disappear" then come back with the solution but when I ask certain questions, I get a run-around. Then this project got all screwed up, this person no longer with it, and then we found out the coding was done by someone in Russia (we never knew who it was or a contact) but lots of code with all kinds of scripting. This was pre-Putin days, I cannot imagine if such a thing were to happen now. Aaggg.

but them ST communicators were so 20th century. No photos, no video, no music, no surfin' the web, etc. However, I'd love to have one with long range communications with stage quality audio.

Linux, that seems to be almost a must if want to be a coder. I have a mac. Now this bash shell and vim I guess I need to learn about these before coding. That's what I was talking about, other "stuff" to deal with in addition to learning code.