Can you still get winXP and office 2k? Maybe he had to buy a new computer and didn't want a legacy OS on it. Computers don't last forever you know.
You can still get brand new Windows 95 discs on Ebay. XP and 2K are no problem to acquire. And I'm of the school that says unless there's a real reason why you should upgrade, you shouldn't be forced to. Lots of people use older operating systems because it suits their needs. I'd say for 90 percent of businesses, Windows 2000 would quite ably suit their needs. The only reason many businesses upgrade is because "Microsoft tells us it's time to upgrade".
I don't know, what can you do with Win7 and Office 2010 that you couldn't do with WinXP and Office 2000? What new improvements in productivity do you gain from them? How did they lower your other costs (e.g. hardware)?
Well, new versions of Office simply exist to force you into their new file formats. Office 97, simply put, does everything anyone could want, and does it well. The only real selling point for the latest iteration is the collaboration technology in it, and even then, that's only good for you if you're using it in a business or groups. There's really no practical justification for a home user to upgrade Office.
Windows 7 though, that's a bit different. It appears that MS has really given us a reason to move on from XP, with better graphics support and better security, without the bugs of nags of Vista. Windows 7 is really what Vista should have been. And it would be more compelling if all versions of 7 were 64 bit native, as CPU's have been 64 bit for quite some time now. The 64 bit part would be the real selling point here, as it would allow all versions to move past that 4 GB memory limit, hardware permitting. For a lot of people, the only reason they really had to move to XP from 98SE was the file system limits on FAT32. While 98 was more stable than 95, the reason I upgraded was the 2 GB FAT limit that was smashed with FAT32. Microsoft too often forgets that we need practical reasons to upgrade, not just shiny eye-candy. And real practical reasons, not artificially forced situations like their new Office file formats. The only reason they did that was to force businesses away from 97 and 2K.
Back when I was finishing up college in the 90's, laptops were becoming very affordable for average folk to use, and we started getting students that brought them to class to take notes. With the exception of one gal that did it for the whole quarter, all of the others stopped bringing their laptops and reverted to paper and pen notes. It was loud, they couldn't keep up on the keyboard, and they had to sit near an electrical outlet, as their batteries inevitably would get low before the end of a two hour class. Taking notes in Notepad or Word just became too much of a hassle, for them AND for the rest of the class. I always found it much easier just to bring a paper pad and a microcassette recorder to class. I'd play the lecture back while working the next day.
Professors should post their slides on the web, and students should spend their time listening, thinking, and asking questions instead of writing. Anything less and students become mere stenographers, only retaining long enough to commit to paper.
In my case, my understanding and retention of the material was always aided in taking notes during the lectures. And what if he's covering stuff not in the book? Without notes, you'd better have a photographic memory.
More to the point, even if it was a "game changer", it still wouldn't eliminate pen and paper. Just as the word processor didn't. Just as the typewriter didn't.
After centuries, the ax and the shovel and the knife are still used everyday. They didn't disappear just because the chainsaw and the bulldozer and the laser were invented. Not all tasks require elaborate technological solutions. If you want to just dig a small hole, a shovel is the best way to go about it. Same with taking a few pages of notes. In any work, the task calls for the appropriate tool, not necessarily the most modern one.
The sun? Oh my god, what a brilliant idea! Nobody has ever thought of that one before! Quick, young lad, make haste! Inform the world that people ought to consider the sun -- the single most widely studied object outside of Earth, monitored by thousands of ground-based instruments, satellites in various Earth orbits, and even custom satellites in our Lagrangian points. That data might be useful! Perhaps a couple dozen people people should write several dozen papers studying what sort of direct and indirect effects the sun might have on our climate! And then perhaps they should be summarized in the IPCC report!.... oh wait....
Yes, we've studied the Sun intently. Is that supposed to mean that we have a complete understanding of its effect on the climate? Really? Do you honestly think we have all the answers now? That we're even close to having all the answers?
That's my whole problem with the "science is settled" meme. Science is never settled. It's constantly progressing, proving old assumptions wrong much of the time. Not only is the science not settled here, its becoming more and more apparent that we don't have near the understanding of the climate that we thought we did. After all, even most of the die-hard warming advocates admit that they can't explain the current cooling trend in their models.
Enemy Territory is over 7 years old now, and still has a strong following. On forums I constantly see comments about people coming back to ET because "newer games just aren't as fun". New maps are still being created, and older favorites are still being modded. ID seems to be on the ball with this idea. Look at what they did putting Quake 3 online. If a game has a following, don't kill it.
After EA's decision to terminate servers for a whole bunch of games... some of them fairly recent... and now Live pulling this stunt... I'm really wary about getting my son that Xbox 360 he's been wanting.
I've got an old Mac at work I use for various tasks, but I use Windows at home. And it's loaded up with all of the standard defenses... firewalls, anti virus, malwarebytes, spybot s&d, you name it. And yet Windows boxes are still getting owned. And its not even necessarily "bad" websites that are spreading this stuff... porn, torrent sites, etc. There are a lot of websites out there that have no idea that they've been owned, and that they're spreading this filth to Windows machines. The latest trojans with "Internet Security 2010" infect Windows boxes so badly that it often takes longer to completely clean them than it does to just throw up your hands and decide to nuke and pave.
I know Macs will eventually be a bigger target when they get more of the market, but after one of my family machines became infected... again, despite having all of the necessary security software... I decided it was time to spring for a Mac Mini at home. Better that the wife and kids learn a different OS than Daddy pulling all of his hair out because of yet another damn trojan... despite best efforts to the contrary.
"but they are tricky to build, extremely expensive, and (even if difficult to intercept) trackable back to their source."
Except that they're not all that expensive to build in the grand scheme of things, especially if you go for an IRBM or MRBM. Look at the lists of missiles under development right now. Many of them are being built in the third world. The cheap cost vs. a conventional air force has always been one of the primary attractions of missiles.
"These guys are brilliant hypesters with good government management skills."
Some of the guys at Tesla also run SpaceX, the company that will soon begin providing commercial launch services for NASA.
Now, I'm all for commercialization of space... I think it's long overdue. But imagine if NASA cancels Ares and then these guys go "So yeah, we contracted some missions for you, but we've decided that our Falcon design isn't viable. Sorry about that".
It's a good thing Boeing and Lockheed have Delta and Atlas rockets.
Woz was the tinkerer, who brought the spirit of the tinkerer to Apple. Steve Jobs is the anti-tinkerer; he just wants you to shut up and buy cool looking gadgets from him on a regular schedule.
Does anyone else see the irony in two Republican congressmen complaining about the privatization of space flight?
No, because they're in districts with heavy NASA jobs, and fear losing them. This is simply a case of local interest, regardless of party. Ted Kennedy, the so-called "liberal lion", was never known as a friend of defense companies, and yet when the Navy canceled the Zumwalt-class stealth destroyer, he fought tooth and nail to save that expensive boondoggle. Because the ships would be built in Massachusetts, and at the end of the day, regardless of your party, local economics trumps party ideology.
Well, there's also the potential for more people on the ground to be killed from bad launches/re-entries.
That's pretty much why launches are generally done on a coast (with a flight path over the ocean), a desert, or a tundra. Until someone like Boeing or SpaceX sets up shop in Chicago or NYC, I don't see any further danger here.
"Someone must have informed him that the space program is important for the United States, because this proposal was removed before the election. "
Probably Elon Musk, a major contributor of cash and support to the Obama campaign. In what I'm sure is just a coincidence, Mr. Musk also has a company called SpaceX that, surprise!, is set to begin supplying NASA with commercial launch services.
Not that I disagree with the commercialization of some of NASA's duties. I think that it is in fact long overdue. But It's also curious that while President Obama is moving towards a kind of nationalization-lite with other major industries... autos, banking, etc... he seems to have gotten the free-market gospel when it comes to NASA.
During the election, about 95% of African-Americans voted for Barack Hussein Obama due solely to the color of his skin.
And 95% of McCain voters voted for McCain due solely to the color of his neck.
Had the GOP nominee been Mike Huckabee, an Arkansas pol, then the joke might have hit home. But part of McCain's problem was that he was decidedly un-redneck. Much of the southern and mid-western base sat the last one out because he didn't connect with them.
It doesn't surprise me, but I've lived in states that have suffered the receiving end of that Californian outflow. No matter where they move to, they seem to be extremely intent on turning it into exactly where they came from. The last thing we need is more of these people moving out and spreading the insanity around.
Yeah, I've noticed that as well. They leave because things were horrible, and then they proceed to try and bring about the exact same kinds of policies in their new states that are destroying their old one.
Joking aside, the T-50 certainly isn't all-aspect stealthy in the manner of the F-22. The exhaust and nozzles are conventionally shaped. Perhaps the Russians are trying to go for the best mix of stealthiness and affordable price tag.
It's just a test to see who reads the article before sharing their enlightened opinion.
Honestly, would it really have surprised anyone if it was true? California seems bent on a destroying itself with stupidity, to the extent that many of the smart and talented people are getting out of Dodge, so to speak. The reason why surrounding states have been more competitive politically this past decade (after mostly being solid GOP) is the sheer number of Californians getting the hell out of their state. Everything from California... costs, product liability laws, fuel standards, etc, is stricter and more expensive than most of the country. Buy a mouse or keyboard, and many of them will have a tag on it warning you not to do something stupid, like eat the cord. The small print explains that this little reminder was brought to you via a product safety lawsuit in California.
California, with it's bust-ass budget and spiraling social program costs is a preview of what might happen to the rest of the country. They're still $21 billion in the hole, and yet now they want to enact a statewide universal health care program, with costs upwards of $200 Billion over the next decade?
Again, when you hear something ridiculous about California... true or not... does it really surprise you?
"Case in point, the F-22. Great aircraft, but can't do Air-to-Ground at all."
FYI, that's not true any longer. The Raptor's weapons bay can hold more ordinance than the F-35, including Mk 84's, JDAM's, and SDB's. What was holding the Raptor back in air to ground was lack of software in the first production aircraft. The F-22's fire control system is software upgradeable, and the air to ground software has since been added. The F-22 would be a better strike bird than the F-35, as it has all-aspect stealth, where the F-35 is really only stealthy from a front, head-on profile in most radar systems. I've been a critic of the F-22 as well, but at least it can do what it was designed to do and brings a lot of capability to the table.
because those production lines DONT EXIST ANYMORE.
it would not only cost as much to build new F16 or whatever, you would get an inferior product. therefore its logical to go with the F22/35.
Um, the F-16 never left production. Block 60's are rolling off the line in Texas right now. To a lot of the world, the best replacement for an F-16 is a new F-16.
The Harrier line is down, but I've seen estimates that it could be started up again with AESA radars for around $48 million a pop, considerably cheaper than the F-35 (and less capable as well... the Harrier was the only bird that the F-35 would have been a clear improvement over, cost excepted).
No, they're not. Birds are not dinosaurs any more than squid, octopus and nautilus are ammonites. Closely related they may be, but birds are birds.
I can see where they'd think modern birds are descendants of velociraptors, or even the T-Rex to some extent. But what about dinosaurs like Brontosaurus or Triceratops? Do we really think those guys were bird ancestors? They look more like elephants than ostriches. We lump a lot of animals together under the generic "dinosaur" tag. But how much does a stegosaurus have in common with an allosaurus... and by extent, a chicken or an eagle?
Where do I start? There's so much. It's over budget, far behind schedule (only 10 percent of scheduled flight testing completed in 2009, with the prototypes spending most of their time parked on the taxiway or in a hangar). The fire control suite and EOTS are nothing but vaporware, promises, and plastic display models at this point. It's overweight. When anaysts said that it was less maneuverable than an F-16, Lockheed said "That's OK, dogfighting is obsolete anyway". Hmm, where have we heard that before? There are noise problems with the engine (on average twice as loud as an F-15 at takeoff), enough of a problem to current designated noise corridors that a least two cities are actually suing USAF not to bring F-35's to their area. Google "F-35 noise", and prepare for a lot of reading. The F-35 is quickly becoming the new F-111, a plane designed by committee for everyone and pleasing no one.
The cost is what'll probably kill this program, or limit its' sales. There are grumbles in the Navy department that they want to kill it in favor of new (and cheaper) Super Hornets. Lockheed says base F-35 models will be around $70 million apiece (compared to $50 a pop for Super Hornets). But realistic" estimates say the tag is more likely between $111 and $132 million, flyaway. At the top range, it would make them more expensive than the far more capable F-22. Oh, and the Navy just completed a study that found the F-35 would cost 70% more per hour to operate than Super Hornets, and that the F-35B's vertical thrust mode would damage current flight decks.
USAF should simply buy new build F-16's. The Navy should buy new Super Hornets. And if the Marines can't have new-build Harriers, then get the Marines out of the fixed-wing business altogether (a possibility that Bill Sweetman over at Aviation Week has also raised).
That's the first time I've heard someone list Zumwalt among those programs. Not necessarily disagreeing, just news to me.
When a Destroyer costs upwards of $7 billion apiece, can't handle the latest generation of Standard AAM's, and you end up buying only 3 of them for research purposes... that's a boondoggle.
"So unless Congress steps in (which isn't unlikely), Obama will be the President that ended America as a space-faring nation."
Note that the article states that while Constellation would be canceled, a new heavy lift rocket for low-Earth orbit missions would be researched. And face it, there are lots of commerical rockets that do much of that job right now.... Boeing's Delta Heavy and Lockheed's Atlas Heavy come to mind. What we should do is extend the Shuttle for a few years, and perhaps do an updated Saturn rocket (which despite urban legends to the contrary, we still have blueprints for at Rocketdyne).
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Can you still get winXP and office 2k? Maybe he had to buy a new computer and didn't want a legacy OS on it. Computers don't last forever you know.
You can still get brand new Windows 95 discs on Ebay. XP and 2K are no problem to acquire. And I'm of the school that says unless there's a real reason why you should upgrade, you shouldn't be forced to. Lots of people use older operating systems because it suits their needs. I'd say for 90 percent of businesses, Windows 2000 would quite ably suit their needs. The only reason many businesses upgrade is because "Microsoft tells us it's time to upgrade".
I don't know, what can you do with Win7 and Office 2010 that you couldn't do with WinXP and Office 2000? What new improvements in productivity do you gain from them? How did they lower your other costs (e.g. hardware)?
Well, new versions of Office simply exist to force you into their new file formats. Office 97, simply put, does everything anyone could want, and does it well. The only real selling point for the latest iteration is the collaboration technology in it, and even then, that's only good for you if you're using it in a business or groups. There's really no practical justification for a home user to upgrade Office.
Windows 7 though, that's a bit different. It appears that MS has really given us a reason to move on from XP, with better graphics support and better security, without the bugs of nags of Vista. Windows 7 is really what Vista should have been. And it would be more compelling if all versions of 7 were 64 bit native, as CPU's have been 64 bit for quite some time now. The 64 bit part would be the real selling point here, as it would allow all versions to move past that 4 GB memory limit, hardware permitting. For a lot of people, the only reason they really had to move to XP from 98SE was the file system limits on FAT32. While 98 was more stable than 95, the reason I upgraded was the 2 GB FAT limit that was smashed with FAT32. Microsoft too often forgets that we need practical reasons to upgrade, not just shiny eye-candy. And real practical reasons, not artificially forced situations like their new Office file formats. The only reason they did that was to force businesses away from 97 and 2K.
Back when I was finishing up college in the 90's, laptops were becoming very affordable for average folk to use, and we started getting students that brought them to class to take notes. With the exception of one gal that did it for the whole quarter, all of the others stopped bringing their laptops and reverted to paper and pen notes. It was loud, they couldn't keep up on the keyboard, and they had to sit near an electrical outlet, as their batteries inevitably would get low before the end of a two hour class. Taking notes in Notepad or Word just became too much of a hassle, for them AND for the rest of the class. I always found it much easier just to bring a paper pad and a microcassette recorder to class. I'd play the lecture back while working the next day.
Professors should post their slides on the web, and students should spend their time listening, thinking, and asking questions instead of writing. Anything less and students become mere stenographers, only retaining long enough to commit to paper.
In my case, my understanding and retention of the material was always aided in taking notes during the lectures. And what if he's covering stuff not in the book? Without notes, you'd better have a photographic memory.
More to the point, even if it was a "game changer", it still wouldn't eliminate pen and paper. Just as the word processor didn't. Just as the typewriter didn't.
After centuries, the ax and the shovel and the knife are still used everyday. They didn't disappear just because the chainsaw and the bulldozer and the laser were invented. Not all tasks require elaborate technological solutions. If you want to just dig a small hole, a shovel is the best way to go about it. Same with taking a few pages of notes. In any work, the task calls for the appropriate tool, not necessarily the most modern one.
The sun? Oh my god, what a brilliant idea! Nobody has ever thought of that one before! Quick, young lad, make haste! Inform the world that people ought to consider the sun -- the single most widely studied object outside of Earth, monitored by thousands of ground-based instruments, satellites in various Earth orbits, and even custom satellites in our Lagrangian points. That data might be useful! Perhaps a couple dozen people people should write several dozen papers studying what sort of direct and indirect effects the sun might have on our climate! And then perhaps they should be summarized in the IPCC report! .... oh wait....
Yes, we've studied the Sun intently. Is that supposed to mean that we have a complete understanding of its effect on the climate? Really? Do you honestly think we have all the answers now? That we're even close to having all the answers?
That's my whole problem with the "science is settled" meme. Science is never settled. It's constantly progressing, proving old assumptions wrong much of the time. Not only is the science not settled here, its becoming more and more apparent that we don't have near the understanding of the climate that we thought we did. After all, even most of the die-hard warming advocates admit that they can't explain the current cooling trend in their models.
Enemy Territory is over 7 years old now, and still has a strong following. On forums I constantly see comments about people coming back to ET because "newer games just aren't as fun". New maps are still being created, and older favorites are still being modded. ID seems to be on the ball with this idea. Look at what they did putting Quake 3 online. If a game has a following, don't kill it.
After EA's decision to terminate servers for a whole bunch of games... some of them fairly recent... and now Live pulling this stunt... I'm really wary about getting my son that Xbox 360 he's been wanting.
I've got an old Mac at work I use for various tasks, but I use Windows at home. And it's loaded up with all of the standard defenses... firewalls, anti virus, malwarebytes, spybot s&d, you name it. And yet Windows boxes are still getting owned. And its not even necessarily "bad" websites that are spreading this stuff... porn, torrent sites, etc. There are a lot of websites out there that have no idea that they've been owned, and that they're spreading this filth to Windows machines. The latest trojans with "Internet Security 2010" infect Windows boxes so badly that it often takes longer to completely clean them than it does to just throw up your hands and decide to nuke and pave.
I know Macs will eventually be a bigger target when they get more of the market, but after one of my family machines became infected... again, despite having all of the necessary security software... I decided it was time to spring for a Mac Mini at home. Better that the wife and kids learn a different OS than Daddy pulling all of his hair out because of yet another damn trojan... despite best efforts to the contrary.
"but they are tricky to build, extremely expensive, and (even if difficult to intercept) trackable back to their source."
Except that they're not all that expensive to build in the grand scheme of things, especially if you go for an IRBM or MRBM. Look at the lists of missiles under development right now. Many of them are being built in the third world. The cheap cost vs. a conventional air force has always been one of the primary attractions of missiles.
"These guys are brilliant hypesters with good government management skills."
Some of the guys at Tesla also run SpaceX, the company that will soon begin providing commercial launch services for NASA.
Now, I'm all for commercialization of space... I think it's long overdue. But imagine if NASA cancels Ares and then these guys go "So yeah, we contracted some missions for you, but we've decided that our Falcon design isn't viable. Sorry about that".
It's a good thing Boeing and Lockheed have Delta and Atlas rockets.
Woz was the tinkerer, who brought the spirit of the tinkerer to Apple. Steve Jobs is the anti-tinkerer; he just wants you to shut up and buy cool looking gadgets from him on a regular schedule.
Does anyone else see the irony in two Republican congressmen complaining about the privatization of space flight?
No, because they're in districts with heavy NASA jobs, and fear losing them. This is simply a case of local interest, regardless of party. Ted Kennedy, the so-called "liberal lion", was never known as a friend of defense companies, and yet when the Navy canceled the Zumwalt-class stealth destroyer, he fought tooth and nail to save that expensive boondoggle. Because the ships would be built in Massachusetts, and at the end of the day, regardless of your party, local economics trumps party ideology.
Well, there's also the potential for more people on the ground to be killed from bad launches/re-entries.
That's pretty much why launches are generally done on a coast (with a flight path over the ocean), a desert, or a tundra. Until someone like Boeing or SpaceX sets up shop in Chicago or NYC, I don't see any further danger here.
"Someone must have informed him that the space program is important for the United States, because this proposal was removed before the election. "
Probably Elon Musk, a major contributor of cash and support to the Obama campaign. In what I'm sure is just a coincidence, Mr. Musk also has a company called SpaceX that, surprise!, is set to begin supplying NASA with commercial launch services.
Not that I disagree with the commercialization of some of NASA's duties. I think that it is in fact long overdue. But It's also curious that while President Obama is moving towards a kind of nationalization-lite with other major industries... autos, banking, etc... he seems to have gotten the free-market gospel when it comes to NASA.
Think about. You can accuse O'Reilly, Hannity, Matthews, etc of many things, but you can't accuse them of being idiots.
Chris Matthews said that he "forgot Obama was black". Yeah, I can accuse of him being an idiot.
During the election, about 95% of African-Americans voted for Barack Hussein Obama due solely to the color of his skin.
And 95% of McCain voters voted for McCain due solely to the color of his neck.
Had the GOP nominee been Mike Huckabee, an Arkansas pol, then the joke might have hit home. But part of McCain's problem was that he was decidedly un-redneck. Much of the southern and mid-western base sat the last one out because he didn't connect with them.
It doesn't surprise me, but I've lived in states that have suffered the receiving end of that Californian outflow. No matter where they move to, they seem to be extremely intent on turning it into exactly where they came from. The last thing we need is more of these people moving out and spreading the insanity around.
Yeah, I've noticed that as well. They leave because things were horrible, and then they proceed to try and bring about the exact same kinds of policies in their new states that are destroying their old one.
Joking aside, the T-50 certainly isn't all-aspect stealthy in the manner of the F-22. The exhaust and nozzles are conventionally shaped. Perhaps the Russians are trying to go for the best mix of stealthiness and affordable price tag.
It's just a test to see who reads the article before sharing their enlightened opinion.
Honestly, would it really have surprised anyone if it was true? California seems bent on a destroying itself with stupidity, to the extent that many of the smart and talented people are getting out of Dodge, so to speak. The reason why surrounding states have been more competitive politically this past decade (after mostly being solid GOP) is the sheer number of Californians getting the hell out of their state. Everything from California... costs, product liability laws, fuel standards, etc, is stricter and more expensive than most of the country. Buy a mouse or keyboard, and many of them will have a tag on it warning you not to do something stupid, like eat the cord. The small print explains that this little reminder was brought to you via a product safety lawsuit in California.
California, with it's bust-ass budget and spiraling social program costs is a preview of what might happen to the rest of the country. They're still $21 billion in the hole, and yet now they want to enact a statewide universal health care program, with costs upwards of $200 Billion over the next decade?
Again, when you hear something ridiculous about California... true or not... does it really surprise you?
"Case in point, the F-22. Great aircraft, but can't do Air-to-Ground at all."
FYI, that's not true any longer. The Raptor's weapons bay can hold more ordinance than the F-35, including Mk 84's, JDAM's, and SDB's. What was holding the Raptor back in air to ground was lack of software in the first production aircraft. The F-22's fire control system is software upgradeable, and the air to ground software has since been added. The F-22 would be a better strike bird than the F-35, as it has all-aspect stealth, where the F-35 is really only stealthy from a front, head-on profile in most radar systems. I've been a critic of the F-22 as well, but at least it can do what it was designed to do and brings a lot of capability to the table.
because those production lines DONT EXIST ANYMORE.
it would not only cost as much to build new F16 or whatever, you would get an inferior product. therefore its logical to go with the F22/35.
Um, the F-16 never left production. Block 60's are rolling off the line in Texas right now. To a lot of the world, the best replacement for an F-16 is a new F-16.
The Harrier line is down, but I've seen estimates that it could be started up again with AESA radars for around $48 million a pop, considerably cheaper than the F-35 (and less capable as well... the Harrier was the only bird that the F-35 would have been a clear improvement over, cost excepted).
If this holds up, Birds Are Dinosaurs. Period.
No, they're not. Birds are not dinosaurs any more than squid, octopus and nautilus are ammonites. Closely related they may be, but birds are birds.
I can see where they'd think modern birds are descendants of velociraptors, or even the T-Rex to some extent. But what about dinosaurs like Brontosaurus or Triceratops? Do we really think those guys were bird ancestors? They look more like elephants than ostriches. We lump a lot of animals together under the generic "dinosaur" tag. But how much does a stegosaurus have in common with an allosaurus... and by extent, a chicken or an eagle?
"Since when is the F-35 a defense boondoggle?"
Where do I start? There's so much. It's over budget, far behind schedule (only 10 percent of scheduled flight testing completed in 2009, with the prototypes spending most of their time parked on the taxiway or in a hangar). The fire control suite and EOTS are nothing but vaporware, promises, and plastic display models at this point. It's overweight. When anaysts said that it was less maneuverable than an F-16, Lockheed said "That's OK, dogfighting is obsolete anyway". Hmm, where have we heard that before? There are noise problems with the engine (on average twice as loud as an F-15 at takeoff), enough of a problem to current designated noise corridors that a least two cities are actually suing USAF not to bring F-35's to their area. Google "F-35 noise", and prepare for a lot of reading. The F-35 is quickly becoming the new F-111, a plane designed by committee for everyone and pleasing no one.
The cost is what'll probably kill this program, or limit its' sales. There are grumbles in the Navy department that they want to kill it in favor of new (and cheaper) Super Hornets. Lockheed says base F-35 models will be around $70 million apiece (compared to $50 a pop for Super Hornets). But realistic" estimates say the tag is more likely between $111 and $132 million, flyaway. At the top range, it would make them more expensive than the far more capable F-22. Oh, and the Navy just completed a study that found the F-35 would cost 70% more per hour to operate than Super Hornets, and that the F-35B's vertical thrust mode would damage current flight decks.
USAF should simply buy new build F-16's. The Navy should buy new Super Hornets. And if the Marines can't have new-build Harriers, then get the Marines out of the fixed-wing business altogether (a possibility that Bill Sweetman over at Aviation Week has also raised).
"
That's the first time I've heard someone list Zumwalt among those programs. Not necessarily disagreeing, just news to me.
When a Destroyer costs upwards of $7 billion apiece, can't handle the latest generation of Standard AAM's, and you end up buying only 3 of them for research purposes... that's a boondoggle.
"So unless Congress steps in (which isn't unlikely), Obama will be the President that ended America as a space-faring nation."
Note that the article states that while Constellation would be canceled, a new heavy lift rocket for low-Earth orbit missions would be researched. And face it, there are lots of commerical rockets that do much of that job right now.... Boeing's Delta Heavy and Lockheed's Atlas Heavy come to mind. What we should do is extend the Shuttle for a few years, and perhaps do an updated Saturn rocket (which despite urban legends to the contrary, we still have blueprints for at Rocketdyne).