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Comment Global Cops (Score 1) 312

We need the global equivalent of a police force. We no longer live in a world divided by borders. We need an elected (not appointed) global government, with global laws, and with a world police force that can go after people whose crimes cross international boundaries.

OK.. now tell me one reason why this is a really bad idea. And then tell me how you would address that specific problem.

Submission + - The Ultimate Tech the US, Russia, China and India All Want: Hypersonic Weapons (nationalinterest.org)

An anonymous reader writes: They can hit any target in 30 minutes or less. They travel anywhere from Mach 5 to Mach 25. All the major powers want them and many look at them as a military game changer--if only they can make them work. Are hypersonic weapons the future of military doctrine?

Hypersonic weapons--or ballistic weapons that can hit a target flying many times faster than the speed of sound have been hyped since the 1970s. Currently almost all of the major powers are trying to build them. The US and China seem to be the furthest along and are working on various types of systems. China hopes such weapons could be a game changer and deter any US actions in Asia.

There is however one big problem (besides the insane amount of technology to make them work considering their speed): a possible arms race and the threat they could lead to a nuclear war:

"According to some analysts, the development of hypersonic weapons creates the conditions for a new arms race, and could risk nuclear escalation. Given that the course of hypersonic research has acknowledged both of these concerns, why have several countries started testing the weapons?"

Submission + - Airbus A350 XWB Enters Field Operations

jones_supa writes: The wait is finally over for aviation aficionados wanting to book a flight aboard the Airbus A350 XWB. Qatar Airways, the global launch customer of the plane, accepted delivery of their first A350 of 80 in order, during a ceremony at Airbus' headquarters in Toulouse, France, on Monday morning. This particular A350-900 will enter regular commercial service in January, operating daily flights between its Hamad International Airport hub in Doha, Qatar and Frankfurt, Germany. There are three different iterations of A350 XWB being built: the A350-800, the A350-900 and the A350-1000, which seat 270, 314 and 350 passengers, respectively, in three-class seating. The "XWB" in the name means "extra wide body." The A350 is the first Airbus with both fuselage and wing structures made primarily of carbon-fiber-reinforced polymer. Curious what it was like to be on the Tuesday delivery flight? Jeremy Dwyer-Lindgren was onboard that flight and chronicled the landmark trip in photographs.

Comment Re:bah (Score 2) 177

why didn't hash win out, or for that matter, heroin, or synthetic opiates active in the lower microgram range?

Economics. Cocaine was available in the U.S. for a long time and never had the market share that it had until the 1980s. It wasn't until the cost of marijuana became too high to transport and purchase that the switch to cocaine happened. Hash and heroin were equally expensive. Hash also requires marijuana to produce. At the same time Fat Albert was flying, the DEA was busy spraying marijuana fields, reducing crop yields and driving up the price of hash.

I am no expert, but my sense is that people gravitate towards the cheapest drug that will "do the trick" without getting in the way of a normal life. Alcohol, the official drug of the United States, doesn't do it for all of us. LSD is fairly inexpensive, but it requires a lot more free time than many of us have.

Comment Re:1984 (Score 5, Interesting) 177

Fat Albert was used for drug interdiction. It bears responsibility for helping turn the '80s into the "Cocaine Decade" in the U.S. because it became much more difficult to import the the heavy and bulky drug marijuana into the U.S. through Florida. Instead, those involved in boot-legging drugs into the country switched to a lighter, more compact drug -- cocaine. This quickly led to the development of crack cocaine and the rest is history. As a kid growing up in the Keys back then, the cultural change this brought with it was immensely obvious.

I remember when Fat Albert, tethered in Cudjoe Key, broke free from its mooring. Jets were scrambled and shot it down.

It is also recently responsible for a deadly general aviation accident, when a Cessna 182 hit its mooring line.

Fat Albert is also used for US propaganda directed at the Cuban population (TV Marti). It was supposed to be decommissioned last year. I don't know if it is still there. You could see it from pretty much anywhere in the lower Florida Keys.

Comment Re:Yes (Score 1) 238

Packet inspection is certainly possible. You proxy all traffic either explicitly or via one of the many MITM SSL deep packet inspection products. Surreptitious packet inspection is not possible. And that's a *very* good thing.

Comment Cinnamon on RHEL7 (Score 4, Interesting) 89

I've been a Red Hat/RHEL/CentOS/Fedora user for a *very* long time. I've been trying to use Gnome Shell since Gnome3 came out, so I have given it more than a fair shake. This past month I was testing RHEL7 for desktop upgrades at work and found that Gnome Shell is way too much of a distraction. So, at home I switched my desktop to Cinnamon. Holy Cow! I have a usable desktop again. I found Cinnamon in EPEL7 and installed that at work. It is so much more usable on RHEL7. This is what we will be rolling out as the default desktop firm-wide when we upgrade.

So -- a big *Thank You* to the Linux Mint team for making Cinnamon,

Comment Re:So how is the price... (Score 5, Interesting) 284

When measuring the cost of backups, the cost of the media is often a small footnote. The cost of off-site storage can end up costing way more depending on how frequently they pick up, how long you store the tapes, and how frequently you need to do emergency restores.. Note that you left off the "time" component of the AWS cost structure -- the cost is *per month*. Still, AWS has some serious advantages over tape -- like the cost of robotic tape drives and the housing and maintenance costs that go along with them (if you have that sort of need). Plus, if you are a big enough customer, those 1 cent/GB/mo costs go down quite a bit.

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