I can't count the number of friends that I have that have no idea how to change a flat, check oil levels, check tire pressure or even add windshield washer fluid, or even change a burned out tail-light bulb." Their response is always, "I'll call AAA, the tires don't look flat, that's what the oil changes are for..."
When I asked my parents to sign an application for a learner's permit they told me they would be happy to do so after I demonstrated that I could check tire pressure, add air and change a tire; check and add oil, radiator fluid and wiper fluid. Later my Dad made me learn to drive a manual transmission. My regular car while learning was an automatic and I tested in this car but my Dad had me drive a manual a little bit too. He didn't recommend getting manual, he just thought I should know how to drive one just in case.
My parents liked AAA but they didn't believe in being dependent upon it. That AAA should be more of a convenience and not a necessity.
Whatever your complaints about your job, at least debugging your code doesn't involve stepping through assembly on a pencil and paper virtual machine.
Back then it was actually easier to read through large amounts of code, flipping between different sections, etc when it was on paper.
The listing wasn't used for paper and pencil emulation, we had quite nice integrated editors and debuggers to see what was going on (ex. the LISA 6502 assembler). The listings were for reading and understanding. These lists were used somewhat like tablets today. You can take the listing anywhere, flop down on the couch and start reading,...
The problems with the Linux Kernel itself are fundamental and unfixable: too big, at a million lines, and not designed from the beginning for minimum trust of all the many components... all manner of malware has been written, some of which also appears to accomplish useful work, or corrupts things that do useful work, and it is time for a system that intrinsically distrusts any programs or drivers it is running to do the right things, and ensures that the system owner can retain control.
So Tanenbaum was correct. Monolithic kernels are the past, microkernels are the future.:-)
With the exception of the waiters in Paris, you mean.
I live in Paris... the waiters are fine. The tourists are a pain in the ass.
I was a tourist in Paris. "Hello" / "bonjour", "please" / "sil vous plait" and "thank you" / "merci" was about all the french I needed. Waiters, clerks, cashiers, etc. were all friendly. Being courteous enough to start by saying hello in the local language and let them be the first to speak english seems to work exceptionally well across Europe, Paris included.
Someone is sure an expert on electric car fires, gas car competitors?
Those competitors are also offering all electric vehicles:
General Motors: Spark
Ford: Focus
Fiat (Chrysler): 500e
Toyota: RAV 4
Honda: Fit
Nissan: Leaf
What about Shell Standard Oil Aramco BP
They'll supply the natural gas used to generate the electricity.
No, you are specifically claiming (1) that this "uncertainty" about Iraq's possession of nuclear weapons was a justification for the United States to launch an unprovoked invasion of Iraq and (2) that that was the reason that the Bush/Cheney did in fact order the invasion of Iraq.
No, I am saying that uncertainty is the reason that the US invaded. Justification is a different topic.
#2 was very clearly false even at the time and as the author indicates wasn't believed in any way shape or form by the Bush Administration itself.
The journalist contradicts you claim. "They were operating in an atmosphere of fear and anger and **uncertainty**. They were seeing these threat reports every day -- including episodes we didn’t even know about, like the botulism scare. When they come into office, they had thought, at the time, that Iraq was a top threat. Then once 9/11 happens it sort of removes all constraints that they might have had prior to that in their interest and inclination to use force."
And you are gliding right by the false intelligence that Cheney and Bolton worked very hard to introduce into the system.
You are confusing the reason they invaded with how they sold the war to the public. The administration was willing to go in to make sure, the public would need more than that to support the invasion. Note the journalist that you cite also mentions all the threat reports the administration was seeing and that he specifically mentions threats not know by the public at the time. There was both real intelligence and exaggerated intelligence. Note that real intelligence is not necessarily correct intelligence, its all educated guesswork. For example the Bin Laden raid, IIRC there was only a 60% chance that he was the actual resident.
It doesn't matter a whit what Saddam Hussein told an FBI interrogator or anyone else since the actual facts on the ground in Iraq (whether true or deceptive)/were never a factor in the decision to invade.
Again, your cited journalist contradicts you and includes uncertainty as one of the factors contributing to the invasion.
The simple truth is that if Saddam had not engaged in his tactic of manufacturing the perception that he may still have WMD, that if he had allowed the UN inspectors unfettered access so that they could make a factual determination regarding disarmament then there would have been no invasion. Look at Libya, another country the US had attacked and who had a leader the US wanted to remove. After the Iraqi invasion Gaddafi brought in the UN to supervise the dismantling of his WMD program and relations with the US improved.
Just because the uniforms look European and the propaganda seems European doesn't mean that the film isn't directly comparing the US's nonsensical attitude towards violence and military-worshipping...
The US is not military worshipping. Most US citizen believe in a strong national defense, although there is a lot of disagreement as to what such a defense should consist of. The notion that warfare somehow improves the nation is a quite alien concept in the US. That was a distinctly European notion in the WW2 timeframe you mention below.
What nonsensical attitude towards violence are you referring to? The movie was 1997. The recent military violence committed by the US included:
1994-5. Participating in NATO strikes designed to end ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and Serbia.
1993. While participating in UN operations in famine ridden Somalia, attempting to capture a warlord attacking humanitarian relief works.
1991. Leading an international coalition operating under United Nations authority to kick Iraq out of Kuwait.
... to that of Europe during the second world war, a period in time Europe has left far behind it.
The genocide and ethnic cleansing in the Balkans proves otherwise.
What you describe is a caricature of the US, not the reality of the US.
IIRC the risk was not merely the possibility of war. Peacetime military duty and construction/labor duty were both inherently dangerous. There were training casualties. There were work related casualties. Certainly nothing approaching the casualties of combat but I think it was explicitly stated that both could have been made safer but that would have been counterproductive, that service had to have a tangible risk of death even in peacetime so that the voting franchise had been truly earned.
Perhaps it was more about joining 'their group' (i.e. buying into the game). It is all about control. If I want people to work in my interests, I need to get them on my side. I get them on my side by convincing them that it is better for them to be on my side. When writing the above I was reminded of the 'black lists' of the McCarthy times. If you were not on 'their side' (i.e. communist-haters), you were on the other side and had a lot of problems. So, regardless of what your own opinion was (and contrary to the concepts of an open and free society) you had to tote the line.
The theory expressed in the book was that only people who have materially demonstrated a willingness to put the good of their society ahead of their own personal comfort and safety should be allowed to vote, to exercise power. There was no expectations as to how a citizen would voted, no groups to join or not join, no side to be on, no line to tote.
European military? you mean in the sense that it portrayed current american military when it was written, american military which was modeled after european militaries of the past and which would go on to do - and still does - "country hopping" military campaigns...
The officer's uniforms had a very familiar European style. The rank of Marshal is a European rank not a US rank. So the look and language of the teacher is portrayed, yet you claim the student is the subject. That is an odd opinion.
The FBI agent who interrogated Saddam was not a Cheney spokesperson or apologist. Saddam worked to create the impression that he may still have WMD. Its a fact. A fact not known until Saddam's capture yet still a fact.
Your quote backs my argument. That in the absence of evidence proving or disproving Saddam's possession of WMD the administration was going to assume he possessed it to be safe, especially so in a post 9/11 environment.
Let me be clear. The point I am arguing is *not* that Saddam had WMD. My point is that those who claimed he did not were *guessing* as much as those who claimed that he did. That the UN was hindered to the point that they could not make a determination. That the truth of the matter was not really known until the US invaded.
I find this to be somewhat laughable. Robert Heinlein was entirely serious about the message that the story delivers. That only those who serve in the military and commit violence in the name of their country should truly be considered "citizens" of the country.
That is absolutely mistaken. Committing violence was **not** required. What was required was to put the needs of your society ahead of your personal safety. Service was not required to be military in nature. It was absolutely clear that non-military construction and labor service also fully qualified a person for citizenship. It was also clear that such construction and labor service was also hazardous and that casualties occurred. That one risked their life in order to serve, both military and non-military service.
The satire was not subtle at all - how did so many people miss it?
My experience is that Europeans recognized the satire immediately, while Americans thought it was a serious movie glamourising American militarism.
Funny, in America we immediately thought it satire and that the militarism portrayed was European in nature. The uniforms had European looks, the ranks seemed European (the US has no Marshals), etc. The newsreel like scenes very 1940s in their style.
It really took Americans 16 years to work this out? To me, the satire was brazenly obvious the moment I watched it for the first time all those years ago.
Regular Americans got the satire and the jokes at the time. Its only the "elite" that have had a recent revelation, a revisionist reinterpretation of what was meant merely as fun and laughs as social commentary for politics and events that did not exist at the time.
Not a good movie, but somewhere between campy and popcorn flicks, and doing neither well.
It was a 90s action movie, nothing more. It was a good movie in that context. Only a disappointment if one considered the book and what the movie could have been.
Was it art? Well perhaps to the crowd that accepts an everyday item in a jar of piss as art. Well, at least after you tell that crowd the movie is an anti-American commentary.
Was it a commentary on "American imperialism"? No, that's quite a bit of revisionism. The main characters were not from the USA, the government was global in nature and the look of the government and the military was absolutely European.
I was surprised how well the movie tried to follow the plot of the book.
In what way did the movie follow the plot of the book? Verhoeven even admitted that he didn't even finish the novel. He supposedly read a couple of chapters then got bored and stopped. Outside of a handful of similar events they are almost nothing alike.
Someone is sure an expert on electric car fires, gas car competitors?
Those competitors are also offering all electric vehicles:
General Motors: Spark
Ford: Focus
Fiat (Chrysler): 500e
Toyota: RAV 4
Honda: Fit
Nissan: Leaf
They've got a 1/4" plate of steel shielding the battery...
I'm not 100% sure but isn't such a skid plate protecting a gas tank normally only found in off-road vehicles? Seems like the Tesla offers more protection than a normal gasoline car.
I'm claiming that the story that "no one knew or could tell whether or not SH had nuclear weapons" is a back formation developed after the fact to try to justify launching an unprovoked invasion of a sovereign nation...
Same AC here. You are simply wrong. If there is any revisionist creation it is that someone outside of Saddam's inner circle **knew** he had no WMD. You are confusing various governments who argued there is no evidence that Saddam has WMD, that is something quite different than arguing he did not possess WMD. **Both** sides of the debate were guessing. The UN inspectors were sent in to make such a determination and their work was hampered. It was not until the war that such a determination was ever made. Prior to the war there was merely an argument that positive proof of WMD was needed. The US had a different opinion, that if Saddam was going to make us guess then we were going to guess that he had it and act accordingly.
The simple irrefutable fact remains that Saddam admits he worked to create the **perception** that he still had WMD.
... that said story not only doesn't fit with the facts of the situation in 2002/2003 but doesn't even fit the words that were being spoken by senior Bush/Cheney Administration officials in public at the time, that it doesn't account for Cheney's program of juicing intelligence information that fit his precepts and suppressing all other reports,...
It fits in perfectly well. The US government was willing to go just in case Saddam still had WMD. However the US government also realized that the public would need more than that in order to support the war.
... and that said program of back-justification kicked into high gear on November 6th 2008 for some odd reason.
Actually that is the timeframe where the details of Saddam's interrogations was made public through a Freedom of Information request.
It was the brutal and unforgiving environment that they grew up in that made them so, it was quite the Darwinian process.
That is nonsense.
The main reason the Atreides where "deported" to Arrakis was: they had a "secret" special force that could withstand and even beat the Sardaukar.
It was the Duke's rising popularity among the other nobles that the Emperor considered the real threat. He wasn't happy about the Duke's very good and loyal troops but I don't think they were quite to the Sardaukar level in general, a handful of exception perhaps. Keep in mind that the Duke's forces were quickly wiped out by the Sardaukar in close quarter battle. It was only the Fremen that were surpassed the Sardaukar in close quarter battle.
On Arrakis however when the Harkkonen killed the Duke and sent Paul into the desert, the surviving Atreides Elite warriors and that includes Pauls mother thaught their fighting techniques to the Fremen.
I agree that the Bene Gesserit trained surpassed the Fremen. However the Fremen were initially, before any new Bene Gesserit training, superior to the Sardaukar. The Bene Gesserit training was something of value that could be traded to the Fremen for sanctuary. It was something that earned Paul respect in a warrior culture and laid the foundation of his acceptance as a leader. It made the Fremen even more effective, but at no time were the Fremen less capable than the Sardaukar in close quarter battle.
What Paul brought to the Fremen was not so much individual fighting tactics, rather it was bringing them together under a unified command and having them operate in a far more coordinated and strategic fashion. Which of course relied heavily on his other Bene Gesserit training.
That the Fremen had a hard live, and where used to fighting made that more easy ofc. However the Fremen without the Atreides would have been wiped out by the Sardaukar.
Only through technology (i.e. bombardment from aircraft) and disunity (destroyed in a piecemeal fashion as various tribes did not support each other). Again, in close quarter combat the Fremen were unrivaled and Paul's greatest contributions were in unification and strategic and tactical planning.
BTW. I wasn't clear earlier. Some of the things I have mentioned may have come from later books, not the original Dune. For example a more detailed look at the Sardaukar home world and how they were like the Fremen in some ways.
I've read Dune about 3 times over the decades. I'm feeling its about time to read it again.:-)
maybe they're pushing these scientists off on the private sector for a (well planned) reason.
To be honest getting the private sector involved in space seems to be working fairly well. Involved in the sense of a private company providing a service like launch and delivery of supplies to a space station, not in the "old" sense of a government subcontractor working on a government project.
... the ridiculous voice-activated weapons that dramatically underplayed the importance of desert tactics, making Paul's force the technologically superior one...
Yes the sonic weapons were perhaps the greatest disappointment in the movie. However it wasn't desert tactics per se that made the Fremen an incredibly superior fighting force. It was the brutal and unforgiving environment that they grew up in that made them so, it was quite the Darwinian process. We see something similar in the Emporer's Sardaukar environment. Its being the product of such environments that creates the discipline and the physical and mental toughness that leads to being greatly superior warriors. At least that is the premise of the books.
Key members of the U.S. House of Representatives are seeking to require the National Science Foundation (NSF) to justify every grant it awards as being in the 'national interest.'
It is in our national interest to be on the leading edge of science and technology, therefore basic research is in the national interest.
Slashdot Mirror
I can't count the number of friends that I have that have no idea how to change a flat, check oil levels, check tire pressure or even add windshield washer fluid, or even change a burned out tail-light bulb." Their response is always, "I'll call AAA, the tires don't look flat, that's what the oil changes are for..."
When I asked my parents to sign an application for a learner's permit they told me they would be happy to do so after I demonstrated that I could check tire pressure, add air and change a tire; check and add oil, radiator fluid and wiper fluid. Later my Dad made me learn to drive a manual transmission. My regular car while learning was an automatic and I tested in this car but my Dad had me drive a manual a little bit too. He didn't recommend getting manual, he just thought I should know how to drive one just in case.
My parents liked AAA but they didn't believe in being dependent upon it. That AAA should be more of a convenience and not a necessity.
Whatever your complaints about your job, at least debugging your code doesn't involve stepping through assembly on a pencil and paper virtual machine.
Back then it was actually easier to read through large amounts of code, flipping between different sections, etc when it was on paper.
...
The listing wasn't used for paper and pencil emulation, we had quite nice integrated editors and debuggers to see what was going on (ex. the LISA 6502 assembler). The listings were for reading and understanding. These lists were used somewhat like tablets today. You can take the listing anywhere, flop down on the couch and start reading,
The problems with the Linux Kernel itself are fundamental and unfixable: too big, at a million lines, and not designed from the beginning for minimum trust of all the many components ... all manner of malware has been written, some of which also appears to accomplish useful work, or corrupts things that do useful work, and it is time for a system that intrinsically distrusts any programs or drivers it is running to do the right things, and ensures that the system owner can retain control.
So Tanenbaum was correct. Monolithic kernels are the past, microkernels are the future. :-)
The Linux kernel has served us reasonably well, but perhaps it's time for a new generation to create a new generation of kernel.
Maybe something with a microkernel architecture rather than a monolithic kernel? :-)
The Linux kernel has served us reasonably well, but perhaps it's time for a new generation to create a new generation of kernel.
"It works great! Throw it out and start again!" Your idea is bad, and you should feel bad.
His idea is pretty much like the idea that Linus had many years ago.
With the exception of the waiters in Paris, you mean.
I live in Paris... the waiters are fine. The tourists are a pain in the ass.
I was a tourist in Paris. "Hello" / "bonjour", "please" / "sil vous plait" and "thank you" / "merci" was about all the french I needed. Waiters, clerks, cashiers, etc. were all friendly. Being courteous enough to start by saying hello in the local language and let them be the first to speak english seems to work exceptionally well across Europe, Paris included.
So now feds are the experts on high-tech cars?
Someone is sure an expert on electric car fires, gas car competitors?
Those competitors are also offering all electric vehicles: General Motors: Spark Ford: Focus Fiat (Chrysler): 500e Toyota: RAV 4 Honda: Fit Nissan: Leaf
What about Shell Standard Oil Aramco BP
They'll supply the natural gas used to generate the electricity.
No, you are specifically claiming (1) that this "uncertainty" about Iraq's possession of nuclear weapons was a justification for the United States to launch an unprovoked invasion of Iraq and (2) that that was the reason that the Bush/Cheney did in fact order the invasion of Iraq.
No, I am saying that uncertainty is the reason that the US invaded. Justification is a different topic.
#2 was very clearly false even at the time and as the author indicates wasn't believed in any way shape or form by the Bush Administration itself.
The journalist contradicts you claim. "They were operating in an atmosphere of fear and anger and **uncertainty**. They were seeing these threat reports every day -- including episodes we didn’t even know about, like the botulism scare. When they come into office, they had thought, at the time, that Iraq was a top threat. Then once 9/11 happens it sort of removes all constraints that they might have had prior to that in their interest and inclination to use force."
And you are gliding right by the false intelligence that Cheney and Bolton worked very hard to introduce into the system.
You are confusing the reason they invaded with how they sold the war to the public. The administration was willing to go in to make sure, the public would need more than that to support the invasion. Note the journalist that you cite also mentions all the threat reports the administration was seeing and that he specifically mentions threats not know by the public at the time. There was both real intelligence and exaggerated intelligence. Note that real intelligence is not necessarily correct intelligence, its all educated guesswork. For example the Bin Laden raid, IIRC there was only a 60% chance that he was the actual resident.
It doesn't matter a whit what Saddam Hussein told an FBI interrogator or anyone else since the actual facts on the ground in Iraq (whether true or deceptive) /were never a factor in the decision to invade.
Again, your cited journalist contradicts you and includes uncertainty as one of the factors contributing to the invasion.
The simple truth is that if Saddam had not engaged in his tactic of manufacturing the perception that he may still have WMD, that if he had allowed the UN inspectors unfettered access so that they could make a factual determination regarding disarmament then there would have been no invasion. Look at Libya, another country the US had attacked and who had a leader the US wanted to remove. After the Iraqi invasion Gaddafi brought in the UN to supervise the dismantling of his WMD program and relations with the US improved.
Just because the uniforms look European and the propaganda seems European doesn't mean that the film isn't directly comparing the US's nonsensical attitude towards violence and military-worshipping ...
The US is not military worshipping. Most US citizen believe in a strong national defense, although there is a lot of disagreement as to what such a defense should consist of. The notion that warfare somehow improves the nation is a quite alien concept in the US. That was a distinctly European notion in the WW2 timeframe you mention below.
What nonsensical attitude towards violence are you referring to? The movie was 1997. The recent military violence committed by the US included:
1994-5. Participating in NATO strikes designed to end ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and Serbia.
1993. While participating in UN operations in famine ridden Somalia, attempting to capture a warlord attacking humanitarian relief works.
1991. Leading an international coalition operating under United Nations authority to kick Iraq out of Kuwait.
The genocide and ethnic cleansing in the Balkans proves otherwise.
What you describe is a caricature of the US, not the reality of the US.
IIRC the risk was not merely the possibility of war. Peacetime military duty and construction/labor duty were both inherently dangerous. There were training casualties. There were work related casualties. Certainly nothing approaching the casualties of combat but I think it was explicitly stated that both could have been made safer but that would have been counterproductive, that service had to have a tangible risk of death even in peacetime so that the voting franchise had been truly earned.
Perhaps it was more about joining 'their group' (i.e. buying into the game). It is all about control. If I want people to work in my interests, I need to get them on my side. I get them on my side by convincing them that it is better for them to be on my side. When writing the above I was reminded of the 'black lists' of the McCarthy times. If you were not on 'their side' (i.e. communist-haters), you were on the other side and had a lot of problems. So, regardless of what your own opinion was (and contrary to the concepts of an open and free society) you had to tote the line.
The theory expressed in the book was that only people who have materially demonstrated a willingness to put the good of their society ahead of their own personal comfort and safety should be allowed to vote, to exercise power. There was no expectations as to how a citizen would voted, no groups to join or not join, no side to be on, no line to tote.
European military? you mean in the sense that it portrayed current american military when it was written, american military which was modeled after european militaries of the past and which would go on to do - and still does - "country hopping" military campaigns...
The officer's uniforms had a very familiar European style. The rank of Marshal is a European rank not a US rank. So the look and language of the teacher is portrayed, yet you claim the student is the subject. That is an odd opinion.
The FBI agent who interrogated Saddam was not a Cheney spokesperson or apologist. Saddam worked to create the impression that he may still have WMD. Its a fact. A fact not known until Saddam's capture yet still a fact.
Your quote backs my argument. That in the absence of evidence proving or disproving Saddam's possession of WMD the administration was going to assume he possessed it to be safe, especially so in a post 9/11 environment.
Let me be clear. The point I am arguing is *not* that Saddam had WMD. My point is that those who claimed he did not were *guessing* as much as those who claimed that he did. That the UN was hindered to the point that they could not make a determination. That the truth of the matter was not really known until the US invaded.
I find this to be somewhat laughable. Robert Heinlein was entirely serious about the message that the story delivers. That only those who serve in the military and commit violence in the name of their country should truly be considered "citizens" of the country.
That is absolutely mistaken. Committing violence was **not** required. What was required was to put the needs of your society ahead of your personal safety. Service was not required to be military in nature. It was absolutely clear that non-military construction and labor service also fully qualified a person for citizenship. It was also clear that such construction and labor service was also hazardous and that casualties occurred. That one risked their life in order to serve, both military and non-military service.
The satire was not subtle at all - how did so many people miss it?
My experience is that Europeans recognized the satire immediately, while Americans thought it was a serious movie glamourising American militarism.
Funny, in America we immediately thought it satire and that the militarism portrayed was European in nature. The uniforms had European looks, the ranks seemed European (the US has no Marshals), etc. The newsreel like scenes very 1940s in their style.
It really took Americans 16 years to work this out? To me, the satire was brazenly obvious the moment I watched it for the first time all those years ago.
Regular Americans got the satire and the jokes at the time. Its only the "elite" that have had a recent revelation, a revisionist reinterpretation of what was meant merely as fun and laughs as social commentary for politics and events that did not exist at the time.
Not a good movie, but somewhere between campy and popcorn flicks, and doing neither well.
It was a 90s action movie, nothing more. It was a good movie in that context. Only a disappointment if one considered the book and what the movie could have been.
Was it art? Well perhaps to the crowd that accepts an everyday item in a jar of piss as art. Well, at least after you tell that crowd the movie is an anti-American commentary.
Was it a commentary on "American imperialism"? No, that's quite a bit of revisionism. The main characters were not from the USA, the government was global in nature and the look of the government and the military was absolutely European.
I was surprised how well the movie tried to follow the plot of the book.
In what way did the movie follow the plot of the book? Verhoeven even admitted that he didn't even finish the novel. He supposedly read a couple of chapters then got bored and stopped. Outside of a handful of similar events they are almost nothing alike.
Might want to add that it is a very short book.
So now feds are the experts on high-tech cars?
Someone is sure an expert on electric car fires, gas car competitors?
Those competitors are also offering all electric vehicles:
General Motors: Spark
Ford: Focus
Fiat (Chrysler): 500e
Toyota: RAV 4
Honda: Fit
Nissan: Leaf
They've got a 1/4" plate of steel shielding the battery ...
I'm not 100% sure but isn't such a skid plate protecting a gas tank normally only found in off-road vehicles? Seems like the Tesla offers more protection than a normal gasoline car.
I'm claiming that the story that "no one knew or could tell whether or not SH had nuclear weapons" is a back formation developed after the fact to try to justify launching an unprovoked invasion of a sovereign nation ...
Same AC here. You are simply wrong. If there is any revisionist creation it is that someone outside of Saddam's inner circle **knew** he had no WMD. You are confusing various governments who argued there is no evidence that Saddam has WMD, that is something quite different than arguing he did not possess WMD. **Both** sides of the debate were guessing. The UN inspectors were sent in to make such a determination and their work was hampered. It was not until the war that such a determination was ever made. Prior to the war there was merely an argument that positive proof of WMD was needed. The US had a different opinion, that if Saddam was going to make us guess then we were going to guess that he had it and act accordingly.
The simple irrefutable fact remains that Saddam admits he worked to create the **perception** that he still had WMD.
... that said story not only doesn't fit with the facts of the situation in 2002/2003 but doesn't even fit the words that were being spoken by senior Bush/Cheney Administration officials in public at the time, that it doesn't account for Cheney's program of juicing intelligence information that fit his precepts and suppressing all other reports, ...
It fits in perfectly well. The US government was willing to go just in case Saddam still had WMD. However the US government also realized that the public would need more than that in order to support the war.
... and that said program of back-justification kicked into high gear on November 6th 2008 for some odd reason.
Actually that is the timeframe where the details of Saddam's interrogations was made public through a Freedom of Information request.
It was the brutal and unforgiving environment that they grew up in that made them so, it was quite the Darwinian process.
That is nonsense. The main reason the Atreides where "deported" to Arrakis was: they had a "secret" special force that could withstand and even beat the Sardaukar.
It was the Duke's rising popularity among the other nobles that the Emperor considered the real threat. He wasn't happy about the Duke's very good and loyal troops but I don't think they were quite to the Sardaukar level in general, a handful of exception perhaps. Keep in mind that the Duke's forces were quickly wiped out by the Sardaukar in close quarter battle. It was only the Fremen that were surpassed the Sardaukar in close quarter battle.
On Arrakis however when the Harkkonen killed the Duke and sent Paul into the desert, the surviving Atreides Elite warriors and that includes Pauls mother thaught their fighting techniques to the Fremen.
I agree that the Bene Gesserit trained surpassed the Fremen. However the Fremen were initially, before any new Bene Gesserit training, superior to the Sardaukar. The Bene Gesserit training was something of value that could be traded to the Fremen for sanctuary. It was something that earned Paul respect in a warrior culture and laid the foundation of his acceptance as a leader. It made the Fremen even more effective, but at no time were the Fremen less capable than the Sardaukar in close quarter battle.
What Paul brought to the Fremen was not so much individual fighting tactics, rather it was bringing them together under a unified command and having them operate in a far more coordinated and strategic fashion. Which of course relied heavily on his other Bene Gesserit training.
That the Fremen had a hard live, and where used to fighting made that more easy ofc. However the Fremen without the Atreides would have been wiped out by the Sardaukar.
Only through technology (i.e. bombardment from aircraft) and disunity (destroyed in a piecemeal fashion as various tribes did not support each other). Again, in close quarter combat the Fremen were unrivaled and Paul's greatest contributions were in unification and strategic and tactical planning.
:-)
BTW. I wasn't clear earlier. Some of the things I have mentioned may have come from later books, not the original Dune. For example a more detailed look at the Sardaukar home world and how they were like the Fremen in some ways.
I've read Dune about 3 times over the decades. I'm feeling its about time to read it again.
maybe they're pushing these scientists off on the private sector for a (well planned) reason.
To be honest getting the private sector involved in space seems to be working fairly well. Involved in the sense of a private company providing a service like launch and delivery of supplies to a space station, not in the "old" sense of a government subcontractor working on a government project.
... the ridiculous voice-activated weapons that dramatically underplayed the importance of desert tactics, making Paul's force the technologically superior one ...
Yes the sonic weapons were perhaps the greatest disappointment in the movie. However it wasn't desert tactics per se that made the Fremen an incredibly superior fighting force. It was the brutal and unforgiving environment that they grew up in that made them so, it was quite the Darwinian process. We see something similar in the Emporer's Sardaukar environment. Its being the product of such environments that creates the discipline and the physical and mental toughness that leads to being greatly superior warriors. At least that is the premise of the books.
Key members of the U.S. House of Representatives are seeking to require the National Science Foundation (NSF) to justify every grant it awards as being in the 'national interest.'
It is in our national interest to be on the leading edge of science and technology, therefore basic research is in the national interest.