If I remember correctly, the Bell X-1 was also made in America. WP says the manufacturer was, of all things, Bell Aircraft.

This.

Investing rule #1: If you can't explain a company's main line of business, you don't understand what they do well enough to know if it's a good investment - so stay away.

Investing rule #2: If the company's independent auditor doesn't give a clean bill of health to the most recent fiscal year's financial statements (the standard phrase is "presents fairly, in all material respects"), then the company is in SERIOUS trouble so stay VERY FAR away.

What was the issue with Amtrak - Coast Starlight from LA Union Station to San Jose, then Caltrain straight into San Francisco?

Part of the issue in the USA is that major cities are farther apart than in Europe, and Americans seem to be less tolerant of travel time than Europeans.

The overland distance between New York City and Chicago is about 800 miles. High-speed rail typically averages 160 mph start-to-stop (sometimes better!), which works out to 5 hours terminal to terminal.

A sample flight time from New York - LaGuardia to Chicago - Midway is 2.5 hours gate to gate and a spot price of $110. Too many Americans, in my opinion, are going to compare the flight time and ticket price to a hypothetical HSR travel time and ticket price, and not take any other factors into account. (Getting to/from the terminal/station, baggage issues, security intrusiveness, and the sheer fact that trains are designed to carry people and planes are designed to carry people through the air.)

High-speed rail probably won't truly take off across America until us Americans think about all those other issues as part of travel.

Just out of curiosity, AC, did ANY Republican tell the TRUTH about climate change in ANY public appearance this year?

If you want your vote to matter in 2025 and later, please PLEASE vote for Democrats across the board in 2024.

Try these two tests:
1. Between the two major party candidates, which one abhors fascism? Almost certainly the Democrat.
2. What do you gain by voting for a third-party candidate over the Democratic candidate? Almost certainly nothing, and quite likely a good chance of the Republican candidate winning.

The leading Democratic candidate has shown repeatedly over the last several years that he has full control of his mental abilities. But anybody who is addicted to Fox News wouldn't know that.

Let me rephrase this section:

"Where's the value in US dollars (USD)? Or rather, how does USD contain tradeable value in a way that I can't get from carrots or silver? I can't eat USD. I can't sharpen USD alloy into something I can use to cut leather into belts. It sounds to me like USD and all fiat currency has value based on the "greater fool theory"."

This is a feature/bug of fiat currency: It has value because (a) the issuing authority accepts it as a measure of account, and (b) lots of people accept it as a medium of exchange. But it has no value unto itself. The "greater fool theory" applied to fiat currency treats the issuing authority as that greater fool; the moment "enough" people believe the issuing authority is no longer accepting the currency, that currency loses its public trust and its usefulness.

Crypto currency never took over from hard currencies such as USD because IMO it didn't have a "killer app" that hard currencies couldn't already do well, it just had niche advantages.

Or to come back to your original "work and resources" position: Crypto currency couldn't be exchanged for work and resources any easier than can USD, so why put in the effort to switch everything over to Bitcoin?

This case highlights the difference between "unenforced copyright" and "expired copyright."

I think society would benefit from a good faith discussion about copyright durations and about expanding fair use. For starters, I think copyrights owned by corporations should have a stage between "MegaCorp owns the copyright" and "finally in the public domain", possibly called "MegaCorp isn't likely to profit off the copyright any longer, so all noncommercial use is Fair Use". However this discussion will never happen as long as big corporations have a strong say in the matter.

I'm inclined to agree with you, Arglebargle -- Musk had a random idea and ignored sensible advice to see if it was reasonable before Tweeting (excreting?) it.

To be precise: Many years ago I was in Las Vegas. I asked a friend I was visiting why the city didn't have a subway. They said the water table is too high for underground transit to be practical.

Unless something geologic has changed since then, I rather suspect 68 miles of underground tunnels wide enough for vehicles will have too much groundwater seeping in, all the time, to be usable for transit.

At this point I wouldn't be too surprised if there were moral panics over (non-existent) hidden messages in Don Giovanni. And purportedly there were "concerns" over Le Nozze de Figaro.

Off the top of my head, I'm guessing Adam Smith's invisible hand has something to do with it.

I tried putting a lava lamp in a 450 degree F oven once. It came out hard as a rock.

I've heard American hardware and home-improvement stores also sell pipe insulation.

I let my Extra ticket lapse some time ago. Getting it back is on my to-do list.

How much QRM and where in the spectrum do those LED bulbs put out? And what can I do with my bulbs to cut that QRM? I don't want to spew RF noise if I can help it.