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USS Ronald Reagan Commissioning Tomorrow
wessman writes "Being an employee at Northrop Grumman's Newport News shipyard, I cannot help but be proud to see one of our products commissioned by the U.S. Navy, especially considering how long it takes to build a $5 billion Nimitz-class nuclear-powered aircraft carrier. And I'm sure the other 18,000 workers here feel the same way. The ship is being commissioned Saturday, July 12 at the Norfolk naval base. It is obviously the most technically advanced carrier in the fleet, taking the term "hardware" to new levels. Pick a local story. From the Hampton Roads Daily Press: Anchors Aweigh, Changes Abound Aboard Carrier, Some Wanted CVN-76 Named after Daredevil Flier, 20,000 Expected for Reagan's Rite, USS Constellation Retiring Too Soon?. From the Virginia Pilot: The Carrier Reagan - Ahead of Its Class, Carrier Construction is All in the Family, Former President's Son Michael Reagan Excited about Commissioning."
I wonder who is going to be skipper for the USS Gipper.
Does the ship forget where it is?
For me to read. At any rate, these are some awe-inspiring machines (Nimitz-class ships were #3 (IIRC) on TLC's Top 10 Military Machines of all time earlier this week). This makes 10, right?
Whew, at least it's not the U.S.S. Gerald Ford, or the U.S. Navy would be in big trouble. I mean, Gerald Ford tumbling while getting out of a helicopter is one thing, but I can only imagine what kind of manuever problems the U.S.S. Gerald Ford would have. It could potentially destroy half a sea port while attempting to dock.
"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars." - Oscar Wilde
So, what's the deal? Why are we honoring a man who destroyed America by naming the most expensive carrier ever built after him?
He was a president, and whatever his domestic failings, he does get the credit for ending the Cold War without WWIII.
Plus, I suspect that the darn things are just named after the president when they were first proposed.
Cue Anti-American debate...
/. there is an inevitable anti-American flamewar?
Here we go again. Why is it that ANY time anything tangentially related to a republican, american, "threat to humanity" or anything else from the USA appears on
It'll just lose all the data stored in its memory systems after every mission. Particularly secret CIA ones.
My journal has hot
Ronald Reagan's pro-spending, pro-big-government, anti-labor policies are undoubtedly going to lead my beloved country to her death. But with our large military, at least we will make a hell of a lot of noise when everything finally collapses.
Does that make it the U.S.S.R. Regan? :)
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
At $5 billion a pop, I can only imagine what a Beowulf cluster of these would be like..
Trolling is a art,
let me guess, Microsoft designed the onboard software, and it lives up to it's namesake :
the GPS forgets where it is, and the sensory equipment goes to sleep during long meetings.
PC moderators can suck my White pierced, tattooed dick. If you think pride == hate, s/dick/Aryan meat mallet/g.
Space for rent, inquire within
Now we get to see all the normal slashbots complain that we should be spending money on something else cause war is so 20th century and we now live in an age of peace and love.
Personally, I think its great that we continue to push the edge of technology in warfare. It allows us to keep wars down to as short a time as possible. And, the shorter the duration of wars, the less people killed by them. The better the tech, ideally the fewer civilian deaths also.
Norris/Palin 2012
Fact: We deserve leaders who can kick your ass and field dress your carcass.
'cause it's much more likely to strike fear into the hearts of America's enemies than the USS Jimmy Carter (motto: Malaise Forever).
Toronto-area transit rider? Rate your ride.
The list from "Changes Abound Aboard Carrier" includes:
* More space for women
* New island house
* Bulbous bow
* New arresting gear
One can't help but think it should have been named the USS Bill Clinton instead....
It may, however, very well send weapons to Iran.
Finding God in a Dog
Not me
Here is a hell of a lot of images of these things:
Pictures
the man who increased our national debt more blah...blah...blah..
Ugh. This stuff drives me crazy.
Crack a book. Congress does the budget. Maybe the phrase "Congressional Budget" rings a bell?
If your bitterest enemies are people who hack the heads off civilians, then I would say you're doing something right.
In the meantime, his name on the most advanced aircraft carrier on the planet will do nicely.
What defeat? Russian "communism" collapsed of its own accord. Reagan was just around when it happened (so was I; should I get some credit too?)
- A.P.
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
How come so many things are being named after this guy when he's not even dead yet? It used to be that you had to be dead to get public objects named after you. But for some odd reason, RWR is getting airports, federal buildings and warships named after him without the traditional respectful pause. This pause was there to prevent overly partisan hysteria from hijacking the public name space. And of course, Conservatives (who ought to know better) are the principal forces behind this flushing of tradition.
In Reagan's case, he is not really a factor, but his partisans (and detractors) are still pretty rabid. If he is really a great as his adherents say he is, why not wait a bit longer until a consensus emerges?
You will not drink with us, but you would taste our steel? - Walter Matthau, The Pirates
From the Pilot Online article Though they tout the Reagan as far more powerful than any threat it might face, Navy leaders insist that the massive cost of an even more powerful ship is easily justified.
They better make sure they commision at least two submarines to escort this thing. The only ship capable of really fighting a submarine is another submarine. The suface ship guys may say they can handle this role, but they can't. If this thing isn't escorted by at least two 688s it will never hear the modern diesel boat running on batteries that launches 4 torpodoes on it.
I hope that someday we will be able to put away our fears and prejudices and just laugh at people. - Jack Handey
You can call him jackass and in turn you may be called oversensistive.
Regardless the tragedy that alzheimers is, and it most definitely is... The joke is still funny.
lighten up.
Directed energy weapons! what does that mean? High powered lasers? Something else that's super-secret?
after reading that I half-expected a description of how the next carriers will transform into a gi-normous humanoid robot.
An interesting question is whether we can shrink the size of the supporting battlegroup around a carrier in these times of reduced naval competition.
Independant of pointless pissing contests about politics, Reagan was a notable president. I'd fully expect there to be a significant ship named after Clinton some time in the future.
-dB
"It if was easy to do, we'd find someone cheaper than you to do it."
It is simply wrong, indeed, dangerous, to name anything after a living personage, especially a politician. And double especially a President.
This is cult-of-personality gone extreme. It's a small step from this to granting titles to retired Presidents, to granting titles to current Presidents. Rather than an occasion for a solemn acknowledgement of a person's contributions -- as validated by the sweep of history -- we get partisanship, triumphialism, and politicking.
It might sound morbid but they should have waited until he was dead.
The Mongrel Dogs Who Teach
I served on the U.S.S. Carl Vinson (CVN-70). I also spent a little time on the Nimitz after I came off active duty and was in the reserves.
What always impressed me about carriers- beyond the obvious, was that all that high tech is backed up by very simple means of getting the job done.
I worked in the V-2 division, arresting gear. We had electric motors that set the weight on an arresting gear engine for each trap. But each of those motors had a crank and they could be set by hand if power was not available.
Sound powered phones are still another slick- no power needed tool that impress the heck out of me.
But what everyone should remember - the single thing that make carriers so effective- are the people that run it.
.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
Obviously nobody else read the article, or was too busy flaming the US for trying to impose a Pax Americana. The new series of ship (after this one) will have a separate reactor for powering electromagnetic catapults and directed energy weapons. Talk about the ultimate missle defense system:
Detect incoming missle with integrated helicopter radar
Point maser at incoming missle
Destroy incoming missle
Profit!
Piloting the planes off the deck via an electromagnetic catapule will give new meaning to the old Quake 2 'so-and-so rides so-and-so's rail'.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
...perhaps they will name a submarine after Monica Lewinski!
Eschew Obfuscation
Yeah, it would have been so much better for the world if the US had just turned a blind eye to the Soviet Union's goals of conquering Europe.
Considering the US has the most power, it's not surprising that we are involved in most of the war actions. The difference is that the US never starts anything, we just usually end up finishing them. And "start" does NOT necessarily mean dropping the first bomb.
As for me, I'm proud to live in a country that gives a damn and is willing to do something to back it up.
"Peace Through Strength" -- Ronald Reagan.
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
Nah, this one only uses NT to manage the reactor control rods. :)
--
I refuse to use
Individual systems on Navy vessels run many diferent operating systems. Many systems run NT or Win2k, others run Unixes, and most are firmware driven. So to ask what OS a freakin' aircraft carrier (read: floating city) runs, is just as vauge as asking what OS IBM uses.
-ET2
I wish there was some there was some way that I could be outside playing basketball, in the rain, and not get wet.
Hey, I'm a geek, and I love gadgets and technological gee-gaws, even the military ones. And I love reading history, and wars make for some of the best history. But is anyone else in the US bothered by how we seem absolutely enveloped by The Holiness and Greatness and Glory of Our Military? It's near worshipful (aka Idolatry). And I don't even watch Fox news.
Slashdot: Failed Car Analogies. Amateur Lawyering. Anecdote Battles.
I'm in favor of the USS Bill Clinton. Much more fearsome. When enemies see it, they know they're going to go down.... not to mention it will be deploying sea men into the enemy ship afterwards
I think Mr Reagan was a second rate President. He was surrounded by a bunch of shady characters.
But, Mr Reagan was an exceptionally decent human being, who cared deeply about the welfare of his nation, and for 8 years did the best he knew how to make this world a better place. That is more than can be said for many Presidents.
He is also a human being, and deserving of more respect than that.
HenryJamesFeltus.com
I'm waiting for the USS Bill Clinton, with fully retractable onboard ramming penis.
Yeah! He's up there with Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Roosevelt! I mean look at everything he did! Saved the economy while he was in office only to put the country into a huge debt after he left! What other leader could do a great thing like that???
Oh yeah, forgot the [/sarcasm]
Heh, a coworker once called me a socialist for saying that Reagan wasn't the greatest president that ever lived. So I guess if you don't like Reagan, you must be a socialist! I love the logic of Republicans.
I dunno who it is
but it prolly is fhqwhgads.
Well said.
But to be fair, we can't really expect Americans to put down their weapons and clean up their own backyards. It's far easier and more profitable to continue on the current path of economic supremacy via military supremacy. Not to mention the fact that both major parties are merely slightly different shades of black. The US 'democracy' is a sad joke of an auction. Both parties for example supported the 10-year + trade sanctions on the Iraqi people which prevented them from buying food and basic medial supplies. And I didn't see the opposition questioning Baby Bush's famed evidence of "Weapons of Mass Destruction (tm)' or any other part of the criminal endeavour. The puppets can't take all the blame, though. How about the media? Just heard that your real-life story of 'saving private ryan' had been 'modified' to suit the political aims of the CIA - ie instead of reporting that the girl was injured in a car accident, the story was spread that she was taken by Iraqi soldiers while fighting them off, and had to be rescued. But what good is news without a little stretching of the facts?
So yeah. Go USA! Lead us into yet another slaughter of innocents. And this time with shiny new aircraft carriers. That'll teach 'em to defend their rights, homeland and children!
WTF is this world coming to? No wonder people turn to drugs...
I recommend that you read Daniel Quinn's Ishmael and stop worrying about all the dying children in Africa, etc.
Did the thought ever cross your feeble little mind that perhaps some people love the country and its ideals but hate the leaders and their methods? Suddenly if you point out the problems you're un-patriotic, if you call for people to look at the problems in the system you're a commie, and if (God forbid!) you'd actually like to do something about the problems you see in the country you love, you should just shut up and leave.
Yeah, smart thinking. That Jefferson didn't like the British taxes? Then he should have left! The Northern states didn't like the South keeping slaves? They should all have left! Yeah, right on!
> A $5 billion aircraft carrier probably took nearly 5 years to build. During that 5 years, 18,000 jobs were created (from the /. article) and those 18,000 families had food on the table and contributed large portions of that $5 billion back into our economy, thus helping it greatly. Do you really think that even half of the $5 billion was on materials as opposed to labor? Labor is nearly _ALWAYS_ the most expensive cost in any production.
Woah, listen to the economics professor everyone. You have a point, but you could have got the same benefit to the economy by building a $5 billion gigantic rotating barbie doll. Just how big a barbie could you build with $5 billion. I don't know, but I bet I could figure it out with $1 million. Plus, this would provide lasting employment because you would need to make clothes for it. Include tourist money and we have a winner.
http://rareformnewmedia.com/
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It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
Love him or hate him, any compassionate person would not make fun of Ronald Reagan (or anyone for that matter) for suffering from Alzheimer's disease. Anyone with an ounce of civility would realize that its just crude. Its not funny whatsoever.
Its odd that so many liberals, so eager to tell everyone who compassionate they are, are so quick to make jokes about such topics.
[FromTheMorning]
BTW, mothballing old ships is standard Navy practice, just in case a big war causes them to need more ships. For example, in Gulf War I, many of the transportion ships used to move supplies to the Gulf were pulled out of mothballs.
The point of a carrier is not necessarily firepower. There's a reason they call it "100,000 tons of diplomacy." True, the Air Force can bomb anywhere in the world with their long-range bombers, but the fear of a plane that could fly over is a lot less than fear of a big ship parked off your coast. I can't believe there is even an argument over whether a new carrier is needed to replace the aging carriers. The USS Constellation is in really terrible shape, USS Kitty Hawk is almost as bad, USS John F Kennedy is worse, and even USS Enterprise, which was the first nuc carrier, is in really bad shape. I should know, I spend all day on one. What the Navy is trying to do with their new, automated systems is reduce the manning required. It costs well over half a billion dollars each year to maintain and operate a nuclear carrier. If they can automate systems, they will reduce the manning required to operate those systems, and their preventive maintenance through use of these systems (ICAN) will save A LOT of money. If it works. The server architecture is archaic, and runs Win2k. I can attest that other ships have had serious problems with the servers running these systems. And still do. They run Windows because the private companies providing a lot of these systems employ software that only runs on Windows. Its not a very good solution, but now that the Navy has started down a path, they are committed. Maybe the CVN-21 will have a chance...
Yeah, but at least I didn't post as an Anonymous Coward.
How the fuck does something like this get labeled 'Insightful'?
I try to make everyone's day a little more surreal.
That's the problem with nuclear submarines - they're too loud to hear purely electrical ones. I believe it put some impetous into the Seawolf project.
What's wrong with that? Nimrod was reputedly the founder of Babylon and/or the architect of the Tower of Babel.
A lot of RN ships have really dull names like HMS York or some other place name. I rather like things like "HMS Fantastic", "HMS Unstoppable" or even "HMS Comeandavaagoifyouthinkyourehardenuff".
That sort of thing.
That was classic intercourse!
USS Ronald Reagan Commissioning Tomorrow
Posted by michael on Friday July 11, @11:20AM
from the no-memory-of-those-events dept.
Jebus. I know that most of the Slashdot audience probably agrees politically with Michael, but it's pretty clear to me that this whole goddamn story is just an excuse for people to make snide jokes about Ronald Reagan. I don't care whether you like Reagan or not (I didn't particularly), but when did Slashdot get into the business of just posting Republican-baiting stories?
If I wanted political nastiness, I'd go to a political site. I DON'T. I want actual news for nerds and stuff that matters, not Michael Sims making jokes about Reagan's Alzheimer's. HA HA MICHAEL YUO = TEH FUNNEYMAN!!!!!
Go ahead, mod me down. But I hope somebody else stands up and asks the Slashdot editors to get Michael to cut this political flamebait crap. Republican, Democrat, I don't care, I just don't want to hear it anymore.
"95% of all Slashdot
You're full of shit ..
The vote is made by representatives of the people, who rely on the military to advise them on situations. Hence Bush and other military leaders telling us "weapons of mass destruction" etc. to have congress agree to go to war. As far as killing people goes, rules of engagement are pretty clear.
If the aircraft carrier wasn't designed for war and destruction then what was it made for. If the thing is never used it will be a "waste" of money, so of course it promotes war.
As far as your points go...
1.) And yours isn't?
2.) Since when is it required that you love america? Since when is america "peace loving" all I hear on the news is how we're killing people in Iraq. Anymore it's just body counts, they stopped even bothering with the pesky names.
3.) answered above.
I think this is very relevant, just you want to automatically disagree with anyone who thinks there's an alternative to blowing someone away.
Ignore the "p2p is theft" trolls, they're just uninformed
Anybody serve aboard her? That is a ship named after one of the Navy's formost geeks, way before being geeky was cool. (if it ever is)
Just a small ship in a big navy, but they are important to.
Children are dying and you are sitting on your ass posting on slashdot??! Honestly what the hell is wrong with you, where are your priorities?
Finkployd
The thing is is that the technology has moved on - the carriers are now the obsolete weapon. One small atomic bomb, whether it's delivered on a ship-to-ship missile or a torpedo will not only wipe out the carrier but take out its support group as well.
You are echoing a 1950's argument. With nukes [insert technology here] is obsolete. Yet Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Irag again were all conventional and carriers were invaluable. Also consider Cold War and other near-shooting incidents where carriers helped keep things calm, Cuban Missle Crisis for example. One of the various flaws in the argument you echo is that nukes are not like any other weapon. There is an extreme reluctance to use them. Use some conventional weapon on our carrier and we respond with conventional weapons on your military. Use nuclear weapon on our carrier and we respond with nukes on all your industrial and population centers, make an example of you. The preceeding Cold War policy has not been renounced as far as I know.
The US has to be prepared to fight a wide range of wars and carriers are invaluable in many scenarios. Many technologies, some quite ancient, are still valuable in this nuclear age. The spear for example. During the Iraq war I recall Marines clearing some marshy area with dense vegetation, bayonets fixed on their M16s.
Ah yes .... in the time you read this posting, a thousand children died from not having clean water. Think about where we are spending our money!
I read this in about 3 seconds. That would indicate that about a million kids die from bad water every hour, and 1.5 billion -all the children in the world - die from poor water every year. You just made that up, didn't you?
As much as I would also like to see better living conditions in the third world, it appears to me (and most economists who have studied the problem) that what they need the most is not piles of money coming from the US and Europe.
It is not at all the case that the developing countries that get the most money also develop the fastest. Rather, it seems like those who successfully allow for greater economic freedom and fight corruption do the best in improving living conditions.
To help people in the third world we would thus do best to encourage that sort of development in their governments. This can be done with a carrot and a stick. USS Reagan is a stick.
Tor
Unfortunately for the Iranians, the missiles will have used up all their propellant getting there...
I was in G3 and G4 on Enterprise, back in the late 80's. You'd be surprised what's moved by pulleys, steel cables, and compressed air on the same carrier with 4 to 8 nuclear reactors. Ships are a balance of high tech, and simple + reliable, like the sound powered phones. When jets got too heavy to take off of decks under their own power, the Navy started looking for ways to catapult them off. After examining various complicated mechanical measures, the Navy settled on a simple system where steam...that's right, hot water to steam, propels them off the deck.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
On the issue of Reagan convincing Congress to increase spending you are demonstrably mistaken.
From Fiscal Year 1981 through Fiscal Year 1981, only once did the Reagan administration propose more spending than Congress approved; for the other eight years, Congress spent more money than Reagan proposed. Here are the actual figures Reagan proposed, and the actual amount Congress authorized (in billions of dollars):
FY1981 Reagan: $655.2 Congress: $678.2
FY1982 Reagan: $695.3 Congress: $745.8
FY1983 Reagan: $773.3 Congress: $808.4
FY1984 Reagan: $862.5 Congress: $851.8
FY1985 Reagan: $940.3 Congress: $946.4
FY1986 Reagan: $873.7 Congress: $990.3
FY1987 Reagan: $994.0 Congress: $1003.9
FY1988 Reagan: $1024.3 Congress: $1064.1
FY1989 Reagan: $1094.2 Congress: $1144.2
Note that the Democratic party controlled the House all eight years of Reagan's presidency, and the Senate the last two. Had it not been for excessive spending by Congress (which also increased the amount of "locked in" spending for each successive budget), the budget deficit would have disappeared by the end of Reagan's term.
Source: Edwin S. Rubenstein, The Right Data, P. 235.
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
Umm, excuse me? "No memory of those events" refers to the Iran-Contra hearings, not to Reagan's Alzheimers. I guess many Republicans have scrubbed their brains of those events.
The whole goddamn story is actually a call for us to lust after spiffy new military hardware. Though the choice in naming is just one of an inordinate number of projects being named after our fortieth president. Some have called it "the Reaganization of America."
If you don't like Michael's stories, Slashdot has made it very easy to block stories on a per-editor basis. This was a great story, and the worst that can be said is that the "from the * department" comment was unnecessarily distracting. It wasn't even in poor taste.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
Funny you mention the USS Jimmy Carter, people always tell me it would shoot off hammers, nails and leaflets instead of tomahawks and torpedos.
BTW, the USS Jimmy Carter (SSN23) is the last of the Seawolf class submarine. I believe it is to be commissioned later this year.
Suddenly if you point out the problems you're un-patriotic
When you call the president a facist, you've pretty much trashed not just the country, not just its leaders, but everything the country is about.
The defining characteristic of this country is the orderly transfer of power. When someone starts calling people "fascists" - intimating that they are dictators -- they are trashing the fundamental principle of this country.
Regardless of how you dislike the embattled outcome of the last election it was *orderely*. There was no military coup, there was no mass unrest. It was orderly. A process was followed.
The main point here is that criticism going on mostly these days is not in good faith. It is made in bad faith to score political or other points. And that does reflect badly on the opposition. It shows that you are not a patriot, but an opportunist. If you have concerns, come out with them and take positive steps to work them out. That's not whats going on. What's going is that a lot of the political opposition in this country is purposely being drastically extreme, seeking to paint various people as fascists, or conspirators, etc. Dissenting in a country where dissent is legal and respected doesn't make you special. You are not patriotic for doing it. We need to get past that. Anyone with concerns should come forward with them. Whats happening now though is artifical concern. We have people using their dissent as a mask.
Let me just present this to you: where was the large anti-war movement in Kosovo. That's a big question. The UN was against it, Europe wasn't against it, and the left-wing of the American politics wasn't against it. The right-wing of American politics was against it. Now, fast forward to the Iraq conflict. Now this time around, things are exactly opposite. The left-wing is freaking out. The right-wing is all for it. Why? Politics. That's all.
Dissent yes, but lets not kid ourselves. 99% of the dissent we see is not principled, but rather, based on politics.
So, are we going to give it to Iran?
You are demonstrably mistaken. It was not Ronald Reagan but Congress that was "pro-spending," and "pro-big-government." From Fiscal Year 1981 through Fiscal Year 1981, only once did the Reagan administration propose more spending than Congress approved; for the other years, Congress spent more money than Reagan proposed. Here are the actual figures Reagan proposed, and the actual amount Congress authorized (in billions of dollars, 1981 included as a baseline):
FY1981 Reagan: $655.2 Congress: $678.2
FY1982 Reagan: $695.3 Congress: $745.8
FY1983 Reagan: $773.3 Congress: $808.4
FY1984 Reagan: $862.5 Congress: $851.8
FY1985 Reagan: $940.3 Congress: $946.4
FY1986 Reagan: $873.7 Congress: $990.3
FY1987 Reagan: $994.0 Congress: $1003.9
FY1988 Reagan: $1024.3 Congress: $1064.1
FY1989 Reagan: $1094.2 Congress: $1144.2
Note that the Democratic party controlled the House all eight years of Reagan's presidency, and the Senate the last two. Had it not been for excessive spending by Congress (which also increased the amount of "locked in" spending for each successive budget), the budget deficit would have disappeared by the end of Reagan's term.
Source: Edwin S. Rubenstein, The Right Data, P. 235.
(Posted this before, but evidently no one saw it...)
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
Who in the hell asked the US to "be the world's policeman?
Recently?
Liberia.
Within the last few years?
Mozambique (Operation Atlas Response).
Timor (USGET and UNTAET).
Venezuala (Operation Fundamental Response).
Turkey (Operation Avid Response).
Kosovar (Operation Allied Harbour).
Central America (Operation Strong Support).
Kenya & Tanzania (Operation Resolute Response).
That just takes us back 5 years to the middle of 1998. Do some research of your own.
I like you, Stuart. You're not like everyone else, here, at Slashdot.
"When you call the president a facist, you've pretty much trashed not just the country, not just its leaders, but everything the country is about."
"The main point here is that criticism going on mostly these days is not in good faith. It is made in bad faith to score political or other points. And that does reflect badly on the opposition. It shows that you are not a patriot, but an opportunist."
I'm astounded by this, and for once I really hope this is a troll.
So in the USA you have the freedom to say whatever you like - but if you don't follow the party line you get labelled "unpatriotic" (or maybe "communist", "one of them, not one of us", or even "a supporter of terrorism") ?
How did the USA come into existence ? Hmmmmm, let me think. Wasn't it something to do with people questioning those who governed them at the time ? Were the founding fathers "patriots" or "opportunists" ?
If I thought all Americans thought like you, my opinion of America would be greatly diminished. Fortunately, I know they don't (and it isn't).
And what is the point of an "opposition" if they are not allowed to oppose ? An unopposed government - is that the sort of government you really want ?
I guess you have no memory of REAGAN ACTUALLY SAYING THAT DURING IRAN-CONTRA.
Honestly, would it hurt to have a passing familiarity with the subject before bitching and moaning about "political flamebait"?
I recall that incident perfectly well, thank you. Reagan was clearly lying and making an ass of himself. Again, I'm not complaining because I love Reagan.
I'm "bitching and moaning," as you put it, because Michael either a.) just couldn't restrain himself from throwing a political jab into the story subhead or b.) thought a joke about Reagan's very well publicized descent into Alzheimer's-induced dementia would be oh so funny. Yayyyy michael.
Either way, my original point stands - I think the whole story was only posted as political flamebait, with Michael clearly stoking the fire. I don't care if you like Reagan or hate him, I just don't want any more of this junk on Slashdot.
Yes I know I can put Michael Sims' stories in my killfile, but he does post actual news stories as well, so I don't want to block those out. All I'm asking for is Taco, Hemos or somebody there to just tell Michael to cut the blatant flamebait shit out. If he wants to troll, do it in the comments section, not the story. The last time I checked, political flamebait was not Slashdot's mission.
"95% of all Slashdot
If you think that nuclear bombs make other weapons obsolete, then your plan for the liberation of Baghdad probably would have involved "liberating" everyone from their flesh.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Correction:
...and if (God forbid!) you'd actually like to do something about the problems you see in the country you love, you're a terrorist.
Regan himself was opposed to naming anything (momuments, ships...etc) after living people. He was once quoted as saying that he thought a president should be dead at least 25 years before people decide if he was good enough to have a monument or ship named after him.
OK, I've read all the sarcastic/scathing/vitriolic typical /. comments here. Some people seem very caught up in their own self-importance, others just in ignorance. I'm sure this post will fall to the bottom of the heap. That's not really my concern.
Having spent four years aboard another carrier (USS Theodore Roosevelt CVN-71) and being a member of the commissioning crew, I thought I'd interject some of my own self-importance/ignorance here.
The ocean is wide. Ours is an island nation even though it doesn't appear to be. This fact has kept us insulated from two world wars and many other conflicts. Having borders that are largely water requires us to have a naval presence to protect/defend those borders.
Bullies. Whether any of us like it or not and whether it is logical or not, people use force to get what they want in this world. Unfortunately, it seems to be in our base nature. Logic, compassion, and reason don't have any bearing on it. The only way to prevent being overrun by bullies is to be strong yourself. Having 4.5 acres of sovereign US territory that you can move anywher on the ocean allows you to keep those bullies at bay. Whether the politicians are capapble of using that force in a way we all agree with is a matter of much disagreement. Being able to place a force in the vicinity of an ally quickly is also a tangible show of support in a tense situation.
Technology changes. The basic design for the Forrestal-class aircraft carrier was laid down in the mid 50's. Experience since then has shown that conventionally-powered aircraft carriers are hard-pressed to perform operations that are relatively simple for their nuclear-powered counterparts. There's simply not enough steam produced by the boilers to drive the ship and operate the catapults. In addition, fuel-storage requirements of the carrier mean that there is less fuel aboard for aircraft operations and to support other ships in the battle group. This makes the CVN not only more capable but more self-sufficient.
If you don't use it, you lose it. The skills necessary to produce a 100,000 ton 1100ft long, 300 ft wide, nuclear-powered aircraft carrier don't really transfer well to civil shipbuilding. Continuous building projects not only provide new, improved ships, but keep the skills necessary to produce them alive.
Salt water is a bitch. Rust starts the moment you lay down the keel to the day the last chunk of scrap goes off to make more razor blades. Naval hardware gets put to hard use through its lifetime.
Pride. An aircraft carrier is something to see. It's hard to believe that something that big can move at all. Even after having lived on one for four years, I'm still in awe.
Ok.. enough said. Getting down off soapbox.
"Well Ranger Brad, I'm a scientist. I don't believe in anything." - Dr. Roger Fleming
His point is that all most of the Democrats are doing right now regarding President Bush and the war in Iraq is picking nits in a completely partisan attempt to make him look bad, not a patriotic attempt to do what is right for this country. Not all Democrats, actually, Hillary Clinton recently came forward in support of the war (and Bill had a couple of strongly worded speeches about Iraq's WMD program in the late 90's).
I agree that it is usually silly to label someone anti-American just because they have opposing views, unless those views are in direct opposition to the U.S. constitution that we are sworn to uphold (like income tax, gun control, etc. heheheh)
True, but I only have so much Karma to give for my country.
>Star Wars ---> Dreamed up in the 70's continues today. Even Clinton continued to fund it.
Funded quite and pushed more than quite a bit by the Reagan administration. Somewhere on the order of tens of billions of dollars for what is essentially a pork project that wasn't capable of shooting down another plane let alone a hypersonic missile.
"Clinton did it too!!" Err, that righty tagline is meaningless. Two wrongs don't make a right and criticizing Reagan has nothing to do with criticizing Clinton. That's a topic for another day.
>Grenada
Ah yes, the grudge match between the US and Cuba in which a Marxist uprising was used as an excuse to invade a country the size of my neighborhood. There were no winners here.
>War on Drugs - The war is 'lost' because we (people and government) lost focus not because it could not be won.
Oh please. Receational drug use has been a part of human history since before any established culture. Putting kids in jail for possesing or growing pot isn't focus, its stupid and counterproductive. More right-wing Jesus-isms.
>Central America ---> What part?
El Salvador - 75,000 murdered
Nicaragua - 50,000 murdered
BTW, Slashdot favorite Admiral Poindexter had a hand in a lot of the Latin American interventions. I won't mention Panama as that was Bush Sr not Reagan, but Poindexter was there too.
1. You comments display a fundamental misunderstanding of how federal government budgeting works. Once an appropriation for a Fiscal Year has been passed, budget rules stipulate that those spending levels, plus increases for inflation, plus population increase, beceoms the baseline for next year's budget. Thus each amount that Congress increases spending each year has a cumulative effect by raising the baseline each year. And keep in mind that liberals and the press screamed bloody murder anytime Reagan tried to actually cut spending (see Stockman's The Triumph of Politics for how hard Washington's poltical elites fight against budget cutting, and how budgeting rules rig the system in favor of higher spending); just imagine what they would have said if Reagan tried to "change the ground rules" of baseline budgeting. Taking out those cumulative increases, and it would indeed have erased the budget deficit. Could Reagan have vetoed those budgets? Yes, and he should have, but the political and media firestorm for doing so ("Ronald Reagan is killing our babies!" said Senator Kennedy today) would have dwarfed Monicagate. Just look at the fallout from the brief closure of some federal offices during the Gingrich-Clinton budget showdown.
2. The Carter figures are misleading because they are not inflation-adjusted dollars. After 1982, inflation was a very minor factor in increasing budgets and revenues, but during the hyperinflation of the Carter years they were a major factor. Subtract the rate of inflation from the Carter revenue increases and you're left with very little. (I would calculate the exact figure, but my Almanac doesn't go back that far, and I don't have a copy of Statistical Abstract of the United States handy.)
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
Quotes ... The Goliath of totalitarianism will be brought down by the David of the microchip." [1]
j html?articleID=10300367
In June 1989, Ronald Reagan said, "Information is the oxygen of the modern age. It seeps through the walls topped by barbed wire, it wafts across the electrified borders.
[1] http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle.
Woah, listen to the economics professor everyone. You have a point, but you could have got the same benefit to the economy by building a $5 billion gigantic rotating barbie doll.
True, but there are other positive effects of defense spending. First, and most obvious, is defense. To be fair though our military spending is far more than is necessary for defense, so what is it about? And does this particular purchase have no more net benefit to us than a gigantic rotating barbie doll. The critics would argue that our military spending is about world domination and empire and that no, it is not worth it. Sometimes that ciriticism is probably fair but it is very simplistic. Through our spectacular wealth and the historical accidents of WWII and the cold war we have ended up with global military domination - at each stage responding to real threats and not (initially) seeking any kind of empire. Along the way we have granted a very large portion of the world security guarantees and ended up with all those nations as our military dependents. At this point most of our allies spend very little on their own defense. In Europe they think they have made war obsolete by creating a stifling network of rules, aggreements, conventions and that all problems can be solved by a weekend summit in Bern. It rarely occurs to them that part of the reason this regime of paper rules works is because it is (inadvertantly) enforced by those much maligned American aircraft carriers. We are living in Pax Americana, we *are* the worlds policemen and have been since the end of WWII. There are dozens of conflicts today and dozens more that could develop tommorrow that would likely escalate into full blown wars if it were not for the ability of the US to project it's military power *via aircraft carriers* to intervene in those conflicts. Global trade and international noms are maintained to a large degree by those 12 aircraft carriers. If instead we had 12 gigantic rotating Barbies we would have the same immediate economic benefit but would in the not very long run we would suffer spectacular economic losses from the instablity caused by the power vaccuum. Our ability and our willingness to "project force" is a very large factor in the thinking China regarding Tiawan, N. Korea regarding S. Korea. It weighs even more heaviliy on various Middle Eastern dictatorships eying their neighbors rich oil fields and already committed to either fascist Pan-Arab nationalism or theocratic Islamism and with no compunctions against achieving either Arab or Muslim "unity" at the point of a gun.
Whenever people opposed to US military spending point out how very much more we spend than the rest of the world they seem to think that if the US stopped spending that much everything else would stay static. Sadly I think this quite niave. Right now S. Korea & Tiawan spend a great deal on defense but they *would* spend a great deal more if they knew we wouldn't or couldn't help them. Japan spends *very* little on defense considering she is next door to two military dictatorships, one with hegemonic ambitions and the other quite mad - what would be the result of the remilitarized Japan? How would those historically hostile, paranoid and ambitious dictatorships respond if Japan (noting that we are several carriers short and incapable of any significant aid) decides to double or triple military spending, institutes a draft or starts a crash nuclear program? How would all that movement effect other regional powers? The only reason S. Korea and Japan don't have nukes is because we do. The only reason they spend relatively little on defense, considering the threats they face, is because we do. The same is true (though perhaps less dramatically so) across the rest of the world.
1, Your figures are demonstrable incorrect. By deficit I assume you mean "the National Debt," otherwise your figures are an order of magnitude too large. The National Debt in 1981 was $997.9 billion; in 1989 it was $2857.4 billion, not $4000 billion. (Source: The World Almanac and Book of Facts: 1999, p. 110.)
2. Go upthread and read my comments on the cumulative effect of baseline budgeting procedures. Almost every increase made by Congress gets passed down (and actually slightly increased for inflation and population growth) in each year of budget outlays. The cumulative effect is much larger than merely adding up the differences year to year.
3. I never said the difference was enough to erase the National Debt (though holding the line from Reagan's initial FY82 budget with only increases for inflation certainly would have by now), only the federal Budget Deficit by the end of Reagan's term.
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
Carriers take forever to warp in. They should have gone with a couple of Scouts instead.
Daniel Crawford
This is Slashdot, we only do MICROSOFT baiting stories here!
paintball
A family friend used to work for the Navy designing computer systems for the various large ships. (One project he worked on was a system to replace paper maps with electronic versions. He had to develop a giant screen to display the maps that could serve as a table as well...they had to be Captain's coffee proof.) After a long and grueling project was developed, he got to go to the Mediterranean and Hawaii to install the systems onto the ships. What was nice was that he could take his vacation right after he was done installing the systems, and get his transportation to and from the exotic locales paid for by his job.
"I think that when you become a Republican, you don't get to score any more." -- Butt-head
Ack! I know this is gonna get swallowed up by the political spam, but a kinda cool piece of geek news slipped past when I was reading some of the news about the new carrier.. In particular, it's ONLY GOT 3 WIRES!! Ok, so who cares? Well, it used to be a tradition among veteran carrier pilots (don't know if it still is.. anyone here in the know?) to "catch the 3rd wire".. which is to say, prove (show off :) their competance/skills by aiming for the 3rd arresting wire on the deck. I guess they'll have to go for 2nd of 3 now or something. Anyway, it was just a neat piece of military culture I heard somewhere :)
G
Also known as the USS Know Nothing, is being sent to Liberia to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act.
Or the USS Chester Arthur, which, uh...
Never mind.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Here's what has been bugging me lately,
Why is it ok to lie about motives, money and politics (see Reagan & the Contras, or W. & Nuclear (prounouced NukeClear) weapons) but NOT ok to lie about sex? (see Clinton and Monica).
I hate Clinton but I could honestly care less who he had sex with. I put him in the same category as Bush Jr. except maybe he was a little smarter.
Just a thought.
- If you wanna see what happens when the dumbest amonst us aspires to lead look no further than the Grand US of A
I think people are forgetting that US Navy carriers are more than just the carrier operating alone.
Today, a USN carrier task force will not only have the carrier, but also a number of destroyers armed with the Aegis defense system surrounding the ship to provide air defense and also launch longer range attacks using Harpoon and Tomahawk missiles. Also, about 2-3 attack submarines also operate with the task force, searching out for enemy submarines and also launching offensive operations using Tomahawks against distant targets and Harpoons against enemy surface surface ships.
When the USSR still existed, they spent a huge sum of rubles building special submarines armed with large cruise missiles and also flying specially-armed Tu-95 Bear bombers carrying large cruise missiles specifically to counter the USN carrier task forces. That also explains why the Soviets built and launched large nuclear-powered satellites whose sole purpose was to try to track the movements of our carriers. Today, with the USSR no longer extant, these Soviet-era anti-carrier forces no longer exist; today's military threats are no match for the USN carrier task force. The navy of Communist China don't have anywhere near the numbers, weapon systems, or tactics needed to take on our carriers.
Besides, carriers are actually a bargain when it comes to projecting power. It is very costly to set up and operate fixed military bases in foreign countries; a carrier can carry an extremely formidable strike force anywhere in the world easily. I think the Soviet Union's biggest blunder militarily was the fact they never really addressed the need to project power using an aircraft carrier until it was way too late; if they had aircraft carriers that could launch conventional aircraft operating by the early 1970's they could have been much more successful in projecting power, especially in Africa.
Bill Clinton doesn't deserve an ounce of credit for the boom that happened on his watch.
Well, yes of course. That's because he's a democrat.
We all know that if he had been a Republican presiding over such a boom, there would be a national airport and numerous federal buildings named after him by now.
So everyone should be forced into enjoying American style freedom (poverty), wheather they want it or not?
So the choices are with us or against us.
And who said extermism was bad thing...
Bah.
Large, round, goes down.
Watching Cowboy Bebop in my jammies, eating a bowl of Shreddies.
Yeah, but would terrorists fear a gigantic rotating barbie doll?
You know, come to think of it, they might...
--- Ban humanity.