This (NYT: registration required) is one very good reason why I think there was no alternative but to enter Iraq and depose their dictatorial regime.

Economic sanctions don't work when nations and the UN corrupt them. Would the United States and the United Kingdom have spent the money and lives to depose Saddam Hussein if these sanctions were really working? I doubt it.

The UN, the French auditors, and a fair number of countries who did business directly with Iraq have a lot to answer for. This is one story I sincerely hope will not dry up and blow away before it hits the fan a few more times. Besides the New York Times, Rush Limbaugh picked it up, so did Fox news and even NPR. It needs a lot more publicity. There seems to be unanimous agreement among both Right and Left wing media that this is a very bad failure on the part of the UN.

The UN is not the benevolent organization most people seem to wish it were. I agree with Ms. Rosett, those books need to be opened and published before the UN is admitted back to Iraq in any capacity.

The only thing conceivably worse than a known evil dictatorship, are those who turn a blind eye and support it.

No matter what you think of the war in Iraq, you have to admire the bravery in this story:

A few days ago, while assisting with close air support over Baghdad, one of a pair of A-10 "Warthogs" took heavy fire and lost all hydraulics in the aircraft. As with power steering in your car, when you lose the hydraulic assist, it takes substantial strength and concentration to move or hold the controls. That's why there are TWO redundant sets of hydraulic controls in addition to the mechanical linkages. With both hydraulic systems gone, not only did the controls in the jet require substantial force to move, but they were sluggish as well.

But despite the physical demands, Captain Campbell maintained control of the aircraft for the entire one hour trip back to base. Upon arrival, mechanics swarmed around the aircraft in shock. The tail end of this aircraft looked like Swiss Cheese, with substantial chunks missing. Chief Master Sergeant, Robert Blackburn, Chief of maintenance for the squadron, pointed out that given the condition of the aircraft, returning to base was a "gutsy call" and given the complete lack of hydraulics there probably would have been a good case for ejecting.

But the best part is this: Captain Kim Campbell stands 5'2" tall and she weighs a mere 110 lbs. Her callsign "KC" stands for "Killer Chick."

Bravo!

Read more here and here.

According to Debka.com, US special forces have sabotaged the Kirkuk-Banias pipeline through Syria. This pipeline was one major source of cash for Saddam because Syria was selling it illegally.

Coincidentally, Syria announced that it would cut production by 240,000 barrels per day --about what that pipeline supplied.

There was a brief mention (no longer on the web site) that talks were underway with Jordan and Israel regarding an old Mosul to Haifa pipeline the British built 55 years ago, just before they left Palestine.

Israel and Jordan have been working on cooperative measures in the past. Jordan River water management is one of them. But something like this would take trade to an entirely new level. It would also piss off Syria and possibly even give the Turks a run for their money.

Jordan could sure use the cash for maintaining the pipeline and the port in Haifa is certainly modern enough and capable of handling tankers.

It's a great way to screw Assad's Syria; and giving the Turks some serious competition wouldn't hurt either. Stuff like this is poetic justice and it makes me grin ear to ear.

I'll admit to being a bit skeptical about going in to Iraq until the last week or so before Bush 43 issued his ultimatum. Before then, I didn't think action was needed sooner rather than later. I was also concerned about Arab world reaction.

The former issue I resolved by (re)educating myself on the situation in that part of the world. Whether we went in when we did, or a year or two later, I don't see how the outcome could have been any different. In the end, I'm convinced that military action was inevitable and the Coalition will win it.

This is not about the military action, however. I'm worried about whether we have the guts to win the peace.

I'm bothered by the Arab world where people are pledging themselves as martyrs in jihad against the United States and the United Kingdom. Is their fervor really about supporting a corrupt and dying dictatorship, or is something else going on?

This may be news to most Americans and British: the Arab world has no separation of religion and government. Their religious leaders and government support services are one and the same.

This is why so many political rallies tend to happen around the mosques of the faithful. Somehow, we're supposed to introduce the separation of Mosque and State, freedom of media, and a message of tolerance to people who have never had these things before. Right. This ain't gonna happen overnight. It will take at least one full generation before these ideas become acceptable to Arab Society.

We're going to have to deal with a bunch of powerful leaders who have hijacked the religion of Islam and bent it to their own purposes. Osama Bin Laden is hardly the only one of that ilk. He is (was?) merely one of the more spectacular cases.

I believe the reason this awful situation exists because the Koran is written in a form of Arabic which hardly resembles the spoken language of today. It contains poetry, idioms, and allusions which are obscure and easily open to interpretation in many ways. In comparison, the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament are much clearer and easier to understand.

Recall how the Catholic Church used to teach the bible from Latin. One look at the Arab world today will explain why Catholics abandoned that approach and why even the ossified Catholic Church was concerned about the possibility of abuse. Arab clerics have twisted the Koran in all sorts of ways to fit their politics, for good as well as purposes I can only describe as evil. Most don't know enough to question what they're being told. I hardly blame them. It's the faith they were raised with, and it takes a very thoughtful, well educated person to question those beliefs. People with strong backgrounds like that are scarce even in our part of the world.

To remedy this situation, we in the United States and the United Kingdom are going to have to do something terrible: We're going to have to get involved with ferreting out the religious issues from the political causes. Our countries will have to send monitors to the mosques, so we can prosecute those who incite riots and hatred.

Does this make me squeamish? Hell yes! Deprogramming Cult members is a dangerous process and we're looking at doing this on a societal level. But if we're really serious about establishing a peaceful, civilized society in that part of the world, that's what we're going to have to do.

The Arab people can't have it both ways. They can't expect to use their religion as a launching pad for all sorts of hate and discontent while expecting us to maintain a respectful distance because it's their religion. I would even go so far as to suggest that the Fundamentalist Wahabbi Islam is such a toxic religion that it deserves the label "Cult". Those who can't identify where their values and beliefs end, and where government and laws begin is setting themselves up for a cult of personality. And the Arab world is rife with examples of just that.

It's time to rid the world of the cults of those who wrap themselves in the garb of religious zealotry and hatred. Ferreting out these illegitimate religious leaders will require strong will, heroic effort and a stomach for making judgements about other people's beliefs.

To the Arab world, I'm sorry we are in this predicament, but I don't know how things could be different. I won't follow a cult, no matter how highly you may think of it. We have shed a great deal of blood learning why there is no alternative to separating religious and political leaders. Most Arab societies have not yet to figured it out. You have my condolences, sympathies, and regrets. This form of self discovery will be painful, difficult, and unavoidable. May it be as bloodless as possible.

I hope our leaders know what we've stepped in because there is no way we're going to come out of this smelling clean.

Saalam! (Peace!)

Is it just me, or are there others who see this pattern of anti-technocracy in politics these days? Politicians seem to be extremely eager to restrict access to private aircraft, training for "dangerous" technologies such as cryptography, electronics, chemical and biological information, and so forth.

Take the so-called Transportation Security Administration: Why are we spending so much money harassing private pilots with ever changing navigational restrictions and intercepts by F-16 and Blackhawk helicopters? The only people they seem to catch are those who are so off course they shouldn't be flying, or those who don't bother reading NOTAMS, or those who are flying lawfully but are misidentified by jittery radar operators.

OK, maybe it would be worth the effort for the sake of image, except that anyone with a rental truck or even an SUV can carry more payload closer to a government building and do far more damage. Are we guarding the roads? How about that farmer who drove his tractor right in to downtown DC claiming to be loaded with ANFO?

The safety net for airliner traffic is not working. The airlines are going broke trying to defend against illicit nail clipper users while the barn door of opportunity for terrorism remains wide open in all sorts of places ranging from bombs in a FedEx package to poor security in catering.

And let's keep those dangerous model rocket engines out of the hands of those cub scouts. Heaven forbid they should launch a small cardboard and balsa rocket from their local school yard.

Let's get real folks: Security doesn't come by limiting access to potentially dangerous stuff, technologies, or textbooks. It's found by alerting the public to who is on the loose, and what they might be looking for. The 20'th hijacker was found by an alert border guard. The shoe-bomber was thwarted by the passengers on the aircraft. And many Al Qaida operatives were revealed by records discovered in Afghanistan.

Security is a state of mind. It will be enforced by people looking out for each other --not by restricting access to textbooks, raw materials, or training. If our government officials are serious, they could seek the help of the technically literate public and stop $#!++ing on us!

Take that, Admiral Loy!

The availability of real time reports from the battlefield to the news broadcasters doesn't mean that the information we get out of Iraq is any better than it was for previous conflicts. If anything, it's worse.

This 'blog is something I call the "Fog of Journalism." It explains how three different reporters can see the same damned thing and report it three different ways.

Journalism is not what Journalists would like us to think it is. It's not impartial; it's more ignorant than most realize; and it is often distorted by hostility, empathy, or simplification.

First, if nothing else, there is a bias toward sensationalism. Reports get reframed in an attractive manner so that people will watch, read, and pay attention. Politically important but otherwise humdrum details often get lost in the noise. For example, it's far easier to report yet another study concluding there is global warming than it is to report that most environmental scientists have only a half baked opinion of what is going on.

Second, too many reporters are confusing independent views with total ignornance. Most stories are filtered through the incomplete knowledge or background of the reporter. Although journalists are usually advised to curb their own biases, this doesn't mean they should park their brains or ignore personal experience. Yet many do just that. They report obvious nonsense because they don't wish to appear "biased."

Further, they often empathize with the people they're interviewing, even when these people are quite ignorant or mistaken. Combine empathy or hostility with ignorance and before you know it reality becomes a casualty.

Third, expertise in the use of the medium doesn't guarantee accuracy. The fact that a reporter can glibly string words together in a manner that appears to make sense does not mean they understand what they're reporting. Conciseness is good for making headlines and explaining things, but it also can over-simplify an issue. The more complex the issue, the more likely it will be distorted.

And finally, with deadlines being forced to nearly zero (real time reporting), nobody pauses to think about what they're doing, writing, or saying.

So, think about those bleary eyed people on TV croaking through satellite telephones and ask yourself, how much do they really understand about what they're seeing? Do they know the battle plans of both sides? Do they know what kind of firefight they're in? Do they understand the geography, weather, local politics, or other such detail about the terrain?

No. They don't. I don't think we'll see a suitably accurate and considered picture of what really is happening in Iraq for at least a year. So take all those reports of chemical weapons plants, local population reactions, deadly firefights, and so forth, and file them for later. Some is hype, some is incomplete, some is empathy with one side or another, and some of it is just plain wrong.

Journalists mean well, but they're human. We are all blind people feeling different parts of the proverbial elephant. Only when we put it all together after the fact can we hope to understand what we were looking at.

I often cringe when I pass a suburban development these days. It's not that I don't like the architechture or the people who live there, it's the style of living itself.

I call it Junk-Food Living. Yes, it serves a purpose. Yes, it meets a need. But it's not good for those who live there. Kids in particular get shortchanged. Everywhere you go, you need a car. Yards are meant to be kept neat and orderly. Each house looks nearly indistinguishable from those nearby. There is almost no individuality.

Kids are kept inside or on playgrounds, all nicely supervised. Nobody has even so much as a TV antenna lurking on their roof. There are no tree houses, there is nothing unusual going on anywhere because that would violate neighborhood covenants.

That's not for me. My wife and I chose to live in a rural area where we wouldn't have to put up with some clipboard toting neighborhood nazi complain that our grass needs to be cut, that our garden needs to be weeded, or that it's not OK to change the oil and check a spark plug or two.

Now, mind you, we're not living in anything resembling an eyesore. There are no cars on blocks on our front lawn. But on the other hand, I have the freedom to put up a discrete wire antenna for my ham radio gear. I can and do work on my car or tractor whenever I need to. I can fly a kite over my hay field if I feel like it, I can even investigate potato ballistics if I so choose.

And my kids will have nothing less than I had: namely the freedom to explore all sorts of crazy or silly endeavors. I have trees they can use to build a tree house in. I have a barn where they can build or experiement with whatever suits their fancy.

The bottom line is this: modern suburban living sucks. My son, my daughter, and the baby we're expecting in just a few months will not have to contend with the kind of mental blinders we put on kids these days.

But sadly, we're in the minority. Most children growing up in cities and suburbs these days have no idea of the possibilities around them. Libraries often concentrate on the less technical stuff. Why? Because nobody's interested, so no books are on the shelf. It's a self fulfilling prophecy.

I plan to share. My kids, their friends, and the organizations such as 4H or scouts that they may be a part of will all have this available to them. I'm sick of the mediocrity in daily living standards.

Yes, my kids will be exposed to some dangerous stuff. Yes, they'll burn themselves with a soldering iron, bruise a thumb with a hammer, or get cuts and splinters falling out of a tree. But if I don't expose them to the unsafe reality of life, they'll never learn to work comfortably with these hazards and tools.

This may sound like I'm raising redneck kids, and maybe I am. Call us what you want. We'll be much better off for having had the experience of something other than life in the minivan bouncing from ballet to soccer practice.

Those of you who who graduated high school and went in to a technical field of some sort before the mid 1980s, you had a good experience that few kids get in school today. Do yourself and the world a favor: Share.

I've seen a rash of bad behavior among technically oriented people recently. We all love to poke fun at PHB gaffs, of course. But when someone actually asks a "dumb" question do you get snotty and tell them to RTFM or LIU, or do you try to find out what it is that they don't understand?

I know, having read many manuals and software, what a good, well organized set of documentation looks like. Yes, I built Heathkits when I was a kid. Yes, I knew what the documentation in those old DEC "Grey Walls" looked like. I also got a good look at the Orange wall(RSX-11M+) and the Blue bookshelf (RT-11). Those are some of the best examples of documentation I have had the good fortune of using.

I've also seen more than my share of not just bad, but outright wrong documentation. No, I won't mention any examples to protect myself from retribution from the guilty. In case you're wondering, the world is not a fair place, and my point wasn't to lambast those who produce bad documentation. It happens.

My thesis is that having figured out the documentation or the product itself and you understand it, be a mensch, and help out others who follow behind, if you can. Some folks ask some innocent but very complex questions. If I can't explain the answer to them, I can at least explain why I can't give a straight answer.

Here's what you'll get out of the deal: First, if the documentation wasn't read, you'll know that people aren't reading it and you can try to find out why. If the documentation was read and misinterpreted, take notes as to what got misinterpreted and try to clarify it. And if someone is thinking too hard and went off the deep end reverse engineering your product, make a note of that too. There is such a thing as dumbing down the documentation too far.

It helps to know your clients. It also generates good will. And if you don't have clients, remember, it still applies.

If you're in to ham radio, remember that the government didn't assign you that bandwidth so that you could be snotty to new-comers. If your hobby is racing, remember why so many still revere Dale Earnhart. If your hobby is amateur computing, just remember that what goes around comes around. Don't get caught with a bad piece of documentation if you aren't willing to help others with theirs.

Many people believe that the only good things in life come involve effort. However, very few people really want to do what has been done before. They want to put their efforts in to something fresh or unusual. So if you had a hard time with some technical concept, help someone out with it. Do this even if they're supposed to understand it in the first place.

Which leads me to the last part: Much of the snottiness is this attitude of "You're supposed to know that from your degree/certification." Well, there is a vast gulf between knowledge and understanding. One can know something very well, but not understand the implications. Teaching others is about making the connections --not about the facts themselves.

Help your neighbors make the connection. What's the point of recycling old challenges already won? Try to remember that it's not progress if everyone keeps having to fight the same old challenges.

Unlike many, I don't automatically cringe when politics enters a technical decision. I cringe when politics intrudes in to areas where it doesn't belong.

Let me explain: The decision for how much pollution we can tolerate in our rivers is a political one. The decision for how much money to spend on a project and what deadlines to set for it are strictly political decisions.

But when stupidity and a selective view of facts aimed at fear mongering receive a substantial political backing, or when a state educational standards establishment says that evolution is "just a theory" and decides to teach creationism as science, I get very angry.

It's funny how one can hold a somewhat relativistic view of others moral values, but treat facts as hard and fast. I can do this because I take the view that religion is strictly about morality and those views of morality are based on my beliefs and the beliefs of my neighbors. As far as I'm concerned in my religious beliefs, I couldn't care less if Mohammed, Jesus, Budda, Moses or any other notable religious figure has left behind a physical presence of any sort or not. My religion is not based on facts, just my own moral beliefs and my faith that my neighbor's beliefs are reasonably compatible.

I doubt that my thinking on this subject is unique. However, too many religions try claim they're based on fact. Spewing lies or half truths to a congregation to support faith is frankly sacriligious in almost everyone's religion. If you believe a morality to be the truth, who needs facts to support them?

I like to call that view my "honesty in religion" law. And since our moral values color our political decisions, this is extremely important.

Now we're looking at several new battery technologies which promise to make energy storage much more compact, efficient, and evironmentally safe. But can we get past generations of hucksters who were out to make a name for themselves? Is there enough intelligence and fairness in our society to make an honest political assesment on this subject?

Are religious leaders any more honest than political leaders? I used think I knew the answer to that. Now I'm not so sure. No wonder faith in an almighty deity is so popular...

Just so people know, I don't usually hide behind pseudonyms. My name is Jake Brodsky and yes, that's my ham callsign. I've been a ham since 1975.

I'm also an electrical enginner, an industrial software programmer and analyst, an instrument rated private pilot, a beer brewer, kite flier, farmer wannabe, and happily married father of two pre-school children.

By the way, a "happy marriage" is not the same as a marriage without a strife, stress, or battles for limited resources such as time, money, or understanding. My wife and I have issues like that all the time. Learning to bend, negotiate, and respect one another is a big deal. It sounds simple in abstract, but putting it to practice is not easy and we have plenty of friends and relatives who haven't figured this out.

My concerns in techno-politics specifically include RF spectrum management (or the lack thereof), Intellectual property rights (a simple term for a broad cross section of issues), and societal issues such as how we teach our kids and what we teach them.

My humor tends to be on the practical joke side. If I ever make it to a Slashdot meetup, beware. I'm a big fan of rubber chickens.

I work for a local water and sewer utility. You all probably are wondering what a geek like me does there. Well, it's not exactly public knowledge, but utilities all over are growing automation out of their ears as they finally discover the cost benefits to running this way. However it's still a hard sell.

Our managers were used to throwing people at a problem, not hardware. They're scared of complexity --and they're not entirely wrong, if past experiences are any judge. This is not one of the red-hot sexy industries. Very few intelligent, well qualified people want to work on hardware and software that takes shit from the public every single day of the year (I mean this literally!). I do it because I like being the one smart guy on staff, even though my peers often can't comprehend what I say. Yes, it's an ego trip. But in the scheme of ego trips I've seen, it's hardly the worst I know if.

So I program PLC and SCADA systems. I build industrial communications networks. I design RF toys, and I get paid for this. I started at an entry level position, and these days I'm finally making a reasonable salary. It's much like any government job. Seniority means more than performance. So I don't put any more performance than I have to on the job. That way I can still manage to pull off the occasional miracle or two where the situation really demands it.

That's my life in a very short description. It's not flashy, but I have a life away from the keyboard. And to me, that's what matters.