You are absolutely corect that it costs less for Google to buy into AOL than to see its AOL revenue disappear. What no one seems to be saying yet is that Google can use its part ownership to increase its AOL revenues. Can you imagine the kind of financial windfall to Google if they managed to push Adsense into AOL email or even AIM? That's a LOT of potential clicks from a large and captive audience.
So, the XBox 360 has 3 hyper-threaded, in-order-execution cores to run games which are primarily single-threaded and would benefit greatly from out-of-order execution. It's almost as if the hardware designers asked themselves, "how can we screw the game developers?"
For all the Sony fanboys out there, the PS3 hardware is just as bad, maybe worse.
Flash is far more expensive per unit of memory than disk drives. Engadget.com is estimating that Apple might get as much as a 50% price reduction from Samsung. However, even at such a sharply reduced cost, a 20GB flash iPod would likely cost ~$500 or more. The current market surely won't support such an expensive 20GB MP3 player.
If they really cared about standards compliance, they would have fixed at least some of the head-banging CSS bugs for Beta 1. It's pretty clear from the blog link posted by the OP that these fixes are an afterthought. The fact that the developers needed to go to various websites to see what the worst IE CSS bugs are indicates 2 things: 1) the IE development team doesn't actually develop any web pages to test the software that they write (if they did, they would know EXACTLY how infurating some of these IE-only bugs are), and 2) they've never read the CSS standard spec. Everyone remembers Ballmer running around, waving his arms, and yelling "Developers! Developers! Developers!" Well, I guess we web-developers don't count, even those of us who develop exclusively for IE.
Before anyone chimes in that I'm some anti-Microsoft zealot, I'd like to point out that I'm a web-developer in a shop that is exclusively MS. I code in ASP.NET and write HTML/CSS/JavaScript targeted at intranet users on IE ONLY. My complaint is not that MS doesn't follow standards, but that their CSS implementation is infuriatingly buggy. When you can't even keep your IE only developers happy, you've got a serious problem. And it's not the sort of problem that you can fix as an afterthought.
I'm 27 and attended public school in New Jersey. We certainly learned how to diagram sentences. It was boring and I hated it at the time, but it was an invaluable exercise.
And, in the end, when the bad guys stand triumphant, will you be satisfied when you look in the mirror and say to yourself, "Well, at least I went about it 'the right way'"? Some of us would rather stab the bad guys in the back and win in our quest to make the world a better place. Striving to make the world better and losing doesn't actually make the world better.
Microsoft's attempt to jump on the Peer2Peer bandwagon is a very good thing. P2P has had the stigma of being merely a playground for hackers, pirates, and open source zealots for too long. Like it or not, Microsoft's involvement in this area will give P2P instant legitimacy among many who have been slow to embrace the technology. Consequently, the MPAA, RIAA, and other entertainment industry cronies won't be able to push through draconian legislation against P2P.
I was merely quibbling over the use of the term 'objective' as used in the article. Quite frankly, I'm surprised that it managed to get me a +5 Insightful mod.
Your comments are dead-on. I too enjoy PJ's site and hope that she keeps up the good work.
You don't have to be misleading or a liar to lack objectivity. There seems to be an assumption that I believe that Groklaw has failed in their attempts to cover the SCO case. As I stated earlier, PJ's coverage of the case is the most detailed, informative, and thorough on the net, IMHO. In order for her coverage to be objective, however, she would need to stick to just the facts of the case and her legal interpretations thereof. Groklaw's coverage is filled with plenty of nasty language directed at SCO, conjectures on the motives of it's executives, and flat-out anti-SCO sentiment. I, and most of the IT community, agree with the Groklaw articles, but to call them "objective" is disingenuous.
While mainstream media coverage of SCO has varied widely -- sometimes accurate, sometimes resembling coverage of the OJ Simpson trial --
Groklaw has emerged as a steady voice of reason and objectivity adeptly defusing all attempts at "FUD" PR around the case.
While Groklaw's coverage of the SCO case has been the most thorough and detailed, it has hardly been objective. There has been virulent anti-SCO sentiment on that site from the very beginning of the case. That may be a reasonable attitude, but it is hardly objective.
Since 270 EV are needed to win the election, I guess this means that we can look forward to a joint Bush/Kerry Whitehouse. The next 4 years are going to be craaaazzzy.
It's posts like this that make me wish Slashdot had (-1, Wrong) mods.
Of course Windows is modular by design. You can't have hundreds of programmers work on a piece of software unless it is devided into discrete functional units. You misunderstand the meanings of the terms "monolithic" and "modular" as they were used in the report. If the various interlocking components of Windows (like IE) can only be swapped by Microsoft and not by the users of the OS, then Windows is monolithic to the user. When you have to patch IE and OE holes because they are tightly integrated into the OS and can't be uninstalled, you are dealing with a monolithic software suite. Running Windows also means that you have to use its GUI, HAL, Windowing System, etc. I'm not knocking Windows for having these components nor am I complaining about the design decisions that led to this arrangement. I'm just saying that Windows is as monolithic as monolithic can be with respect to its users and that there are MANY bits and pieces tightly integrated into the OS beyond the kernel.
You said:
Linux, by contrast, is designed with a mix of monolithic and modular, with some monolithic components which just don't budge (the Kernel, X)...
This is incorrect. X will most certainly budge. You do not need to use X to run Linux. You don't even need X to have a GUI or windowing. The kernel is a "monolithic" in the sense that it gets compiled into one big chunk of code. However, it is modular in the sense that you can include or remove pieces of the kernel based on the needs of the system. A Linux kernel running a real-time application on an ARM processor is going to be quite different from the Linux kernel running SUSE on my desktop at home.
BTW, you called the report "useless astro-turfing." Clearly you don't even know the meaning of the term "astro-turfing."
Reading my initial post, it very much came off as a flame, even though I did not intend it that way. Thank you for not responding in kind.:)
I am aware that there is some controversy over the concept of a priori, but not in this case. I'm not only implying that it is "no longer a priori to say the CO2 fraction has continuously risen above previous data points," I'm saying that it never was a priori knowledge and never will be. Making a valid logical inference from the data that cannot be disputed by any sane person does not make the inferred proposition a priori. I think you are confusing the epistemological property of aprioricity with logical validity (assuming the premises are true). The a priori / a posteriori distinction only applies to how you came about the knoweldge. If there was observation used in the course of forming the proposition, then that proposition is a posteriori.
I've read Naming and Necessity and I'm unsure about why you think it applies in this case. "The CO2 fraction has continuously risen above previous data points" is a contingent, a posteriori proposition. I'm not sure why you might think otherwise.
Please do not use terms like "a priori" when you clearly have no idea what they mean. A priori knowledge is gained independently of experience. As you are basing your claims on scientific observations, they are a posteriori. By definition, all scientific knowledge is a posteriori. Here, educate yourself.
I apologize for the offtopic post, but I can't let this sort of mistake slide. Mod me down if you will.
I'm from Jackson. I worked at Great Adventure when I was younger. (I'm not proud of either of these facts.) Almost no one refers to it as "Six Flags." It has always been "Great Adventure" to most anyone who lives within a 30 mile radius of the park.
There is nothing to deal with and, you are right, we are not special.
You can't charge for the Zietgeist statistics if they are given away for free. My guess is that someone figured out that money could be made with detailed usage stats. Just one of the many changes we'll now be seeing at publicly traded Google.
I'm not saying that Google is going to become another corporate evildoer. It's just a fact of life that Google is going to need more diverse revenue streams.
There are several differences between the video players you described and this reference board with the 3.5" screen. First of all, all of the items you mention have bigger screens. Second, the airplane and car DVD players have a power supply to draw from and can therefore afford to produce a brighter picture than a battery powered player. Third, the positioning of the screens on planes and in cars (usually attached to the roof) generally prevents the screen from being exposed to too much glare. Fourth, I have used portable DVD players and they suck. I think their overall lack of sales and most people's preference for viewing DVDs on laptop computers supports my point. Fifth, you are a troll.
Does it come with a magnifying lens so I can see what's happening when I play my TV shows and videos? Maybe it's just me, but I find that any video screen smaller than about 10" is completely unwatchable. To make matters worse, mobile video is even more difficult to see on the go because of the variations in ambient light intensity and the jostling motion of walking/commuting/etc.
These mini-video players look like a poor solution to a non-problem.
Sounds like you ought to check out Discover magazine. They have lots of good stuff for those who are science literate, but don't want to get in over their heads.
This will be a great weapon if our enemies keep deploying fleets.
Our enemies aren't deploying fleets, yet I still think this is a great weapon.
What if the conflicts of the next century are all going to be low-intensity, and if there are no fixed targets for us to hit? Do we really need to spend all the money on the DDX system if that's the case?
Well, given current events, it's very difficult for me to believe that they are ALL going to be low intensity. Sure, we are going to have a lot more situations like the one in Somalia. That's why the Armed Forces are going through a restructuring phase right now. I'm sure you know that. As for "no fixed targets," I would say that you are looking at it the wrong way. Can you pin down the enemy location and be reasonably sure that he will stay there for the next 4 minutes? If so, you can take him out if he's within 200 miles of the coast line. The idea is to be as responsive, accurate, and cost effective as possible if you are dealing with small cells of combatants that are on the move. The railgun definitely fits that profile. If the situation is not suitable, then the railgun isn't used. It's still far more cost effective and has a much faster response time than aircraft and missiles.
Heck, what are we going to do if our enemies just go to a system deliberately designed to frustrate our fleets? Say, using terrorists to lay mines in areas that they know our fleet is deploying in (does the DDX have that covered? I've been a ltitle skeptical of the claims the Navy has made on this store, mainly because the USN has an historical ignorance of the effectiveness of mine warfare), attacking ships in port (as you note, this was the Cole's real vulnerability..although I can recall when Iranian Boghammers used to be able to sneak close enough to carriers that, if they had been intending suicide attacks, they could have pulled it off on mroe than one occassion), sending suicide missile crews to launch clusters of missiles to overwhelm fleet defenses, etc.
Well, when I googled the DD(X), it's mine detection capability was one of the things the Navy was bragging about. Who knows if it's true or not. As for suicide misslie attacks, that is definitely a possibility. However, you need to consider that you need state-sponsorship to acquire anti-ship missiles. That makes the scenario less likely because any state would know that they would get blown into kingdom come the moment we found out who provided the missiles. I think it's a far more likely scenario that we see a large number of small craft attacking with rocket and RPG fire. Our ships are not built to deal with small, fast craft like that and they could do quite a bit of damage before being taken out. Your criticism of the Navy in this regard is certainly valid, I think.
With regard to VTOL carriers and a replacement for the E2-C, it's certainly feasible if they can fix a lot of the problems of the V-22...
Oh, God. Please let the V-22 project die already. What a disaster. VTOL carriers are fine and all. In fact, I think the Joint Strike Fighter has a VSTOL variant. I just don't see a tremendous benefit to them. Perhaps you can educate me.
With regard to 12 carriers: that's showing some strain, and we've had a good chunk of time in the current conflict where we didn't have any carriers at all in the Med....
Your point is well taken. However, ALL branches of the armed forces are under considerable strain right now. Sen. Clinton (man, it's still hard to say that) said that she doesn't see any way to NOT increase the size of the armed forces b/c they are stretched way too thin.
The DDX is going to look mighty useless if it can't, say, come into that 250-mile range without having been plastered by missile fire first.
The answer to your question is in the article. The new destroyers will use what is called the "Integrated Power System." In effect, the ship is a big power generator producing ~75 megawatts from four advanced turbines. That power is then used to turn the screws via electric motors, run the ship, and fire the railgun. 15MW doesn't sound like a problem for IPS.
At top speed, a Nimitz class carrier goes 35 mph, and cruises at far less. "Cheap" hydrofoil craft go 40-50mph, and good ones can easily break 100.
I have no clue where you are getting your 100mph figure from, but I've only ever seen max speeds of 70 knots, or about 80 mph and that was for small craft. That's nice and all, but a Nimitz carrier group at top speed will cover about 850 miles/day. Since we have carrier groups in every major ocean/ sea and they are positioned rather close to the potential hot spots in their theater of operation, speed of deployment is not an issue. They will arrive on station in a few days in the worst case scenario.
It's speed of deployment. It took us over a month before we were ready to attack Afghanistan; according to Woodward's interview with Bush, he was furious over this fact (and with good cause!). Now, that wasn't a coastal situation, but the same issue applies: We really need to get away from this cold-war mentality heavy-armor massive-craft fighting style.
I can guarantee you that the month we needed was to ready ground troops, prepare transport of all that gear, and plan the operation. I can also guarantee you that planes from a carrier group could have struck Afghanistan almost immediately. They certainly didn't require a month of travel time.
Sitting underwater isn't going to protect you from the unexpected. I'm sure many people laughed off the concept of something like the Cole happening before it did. Are we to keep preparing for the last attack again? What if the next "surprise" is, say, surfacable mines buried on the ocean bottom? What if the next attack is a rogue state's first low yield nuclear warhead? What if the next attack comes from a ship that looks like an oil tanker until it fires from 10 miles away?
No, sitting underwater is going to lower you in the water, decrease your profile, prevent pitching and rolling that lead to stronger radar signatures, and increase survivability if you do happen to get hit. Tell me, what is going to protect you from the unexpected, reduced size and greater speed? Hardly. All the what ifs are nice, but your proposed changes to the Navy don't in any way change how much damage is inflicted. If someone hits a group of ships with a nuclear weapon, that group of ships is pretty well fucked, hydrofoil or no. You can rest assured that someone in the Navy is busy thinking up every possible bad scenario involving one of their ships and trying to pick up funding to do studies on them.;)
Both hydrofoils and lifting bodies do great in the open ocean (perhaps you're confusing them with SES - Surface Effect Ships? They do poorly in the open ocean). In fact, Australia has a hydrofoil troop transport that was sort of the envy of the US navy when they deployed it to Iraq - very fast, low radar cross section, etc.
I am aware of our interest in the Australian vessel. The Marine Corps is looking into puchasing them. Here is a good link on the topic. I'm not saying that these craft don't have their uses, I'm saying that rapid deployment isn't an issue for a carrier group. Those already have a great balance of rapid deployment and massive firepower.
VTOL carriers allow for tiny carriers - no need for a big runway.You have small, fast ships that can get within range of their targets in weeks instead of months
I know about VTOL carriers. It's a nice concept, but until you can replace vitally important aircraft like the E-2C with VTOL versions, it's a moot point. (Yes, radar and command/control are that important.) The whole point is moot anyway because a carrier could sail most of the way around the world in a month. Most of the space in a carrier isn't used for runway anyway. The takeoffs need about a quarter (if that) of the carrier's length and landings
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You are absolutely corect that it costs less for Google to buy into AOL than to see its AOL revenue disappear. What no one seems to be saying yet is that Google can use its part ownership to increase its AOL revenues. Can you imagine the kind of financial windfall to Google if they managed to push Adsense into AOL email or even AIM? That's a LOT of potential clicks from a large and captive audience.
So, the XBox 360 has 3 hyper-threaded, in-order-execution cores to run games which are primarily single-threaded and would benefit greatly from out-of-order execution. It's almost as if the hardware designers asked themselves, "how can we screw the game developers?"
For all the Sony fanboys out there, the PS3 hardware is just as bad, maybe worse.
Flash is far more expensive per unit of memory than disk drives. Engadget.com is estimating that Apple might get as much as a 50% price reduction from Samsung. However, even at such a sharply reduced cost, a 20GB flash iPod would likely cost ~$500 or more. The current market surely won't support such an expensive 20GB MP3 player.
If they really cared about standards compliance, they would have fixed at least some of the head-banging CSS bugs for Beta 1. It's pretty clear from the blog link posted by the OP that these fixes are an afterthought. The fact that the developers needed to go to various websites to see what the worst IE CSS bugs are indicates 2 things: 1) the IE development team doesn't actually develop any web pages to test the software that they write (if they did, they would know EXACTLY how infurating some of these IE-only bugs are), and 2) they've never read the CSS standard spec. Everyone remembers Ballmer running around, waving his arms, and yelling "Developers! Developers! Developers!" Well, I guess we web-developers don't count, even those of us who develop exclusively for IE.
Before anyone chimes in that I'm some anti-Microsoft zealot, I'd like to point out that I'm a web-developer in a shop that is exclusively MS. I code in ASP.NET and write HTML/CSS/JavaScript targeted at intranet users on IE ONLY. My complaint is not that MS doesn't follow standards, but that their CSS implementation is infuriatingly buggy. When you can't even keep your IE only developers happy, you've got a serious problem. And it's not the sort of problem that you can fix as an afterthought.
I'm 27 and attended public school in New Jersey. We certainly learned how to diagram sentences. It was boring and I hated it at the time, but it was an invaluable exercise.
And, in the end, when the bad guys stand triumphant, will you be satisfied when you look in the mirror and say to yourself, "Well, at least I went about it 'the right way'"? Some of us would rather stab the bad guys in the back and win in our quest to make the world a better place. Striving to make the world better and losing doesn't actually make the world better.
Microsoft's attempt to jump on the Peer2Peer bandwagon is a very good thing. P2P has had the stigma of being merely a playground for hackers, pirates, and open source zealots for too long. Like it or not, Microsoft's involvement in this area will give P2P instant legitimacy among many who have been slow to embrace the technology. Consequently, the MPAA, RIAA, and other entertainment industry cronies won't be able to push through draconian legislation against P2P.
Just ask Robert Novak. He outed a CIA operative and is he being forced to betray the confidentiality of his sources? No.
I was merely quibbling over the use of the term 'objective' as used in the article. Quite frankly, I'm surprised that it managed to get me a +5 Insightful mod. Your comments are dead-on. I too enjoy PJ's site and hope that she keeps up the good work.
You don't have to be misleading or a liar to lack objectivity. There seems to be an assumption that I believe that Groklaw has failed in their attempts to cover the SCO case. As I stated earlier, PJ's coverage of the case is the most detailed, informative, and thorough on the net, IMHO. In order for her coverage to be objective, however, she would need to stick to just the facts of the case and her legal interpretations thereof. Groklaw's coverage is filled with plenty of nasty language directed at SCO, conjectures on the motives of it's executives, and flat-out anti-SCO sentiment. I, and most of the IT community, agree with the Groklaw articles, but to call them "objective" is disingenuous.
Since 270 EV are needed to win the election, I guess this means that we can look forward to a joint Bush/Kerry Whitehouse. The next 4 years are going to be craaaazzzy.
It's posts like this that make me wish Slashdot had (-1, Wrong) mods.
Of course Windows is modular by design. You can't have hundreds of programmers work on a piece of software unless it is devided into discrete functional units. You misunderstand the meanings of the terms "monolithic" and "modular" as they were used in the report. If the various interlocking components of Windows (like IE) can only be swapped by Microsoft and not by the users of the OS, then Windows is monolithic to the user. When you have to patch IE and OE holes because they are tightly integrated into the OS and can't be uninstalled, you are dealing with a monolithic software suite. Running Windows also means that you have to use its GUI, HAL, Windowing System, etc. I'm not knocking Windows for having these components nor am I complaining about the design decisions that led to this arrangement. I'm just saying that Windows is as monolithic as monolithic can be with respect to its users and that there are MANY bits and pieces tightly integrated into the OS beyond the kernel.
You said:
This is incorrect. X will most certainly budge. You do not need to use X to run Linux. You don't even need X to have a GUI or windowing. The kernel is a "monolithic" in the sense that it gets compiled into one big chunk of code. However, it is modular in the sense that you can include or remove pieces of the kernel based on the needs of the system. A Linux kernel running a real-time application on an ARM processor is going to be quite different from the Linux kernel running SUSE on my desktop at home.BTW, you called the report "useless astro-turfing." Clearly you don't even know the meaning of the term "astro-turfing."
Reading my initial post, it very much came off as a flame, even though I did not intend it that way. Thank you for not responding in kind. :)
I am aware that there is some controversy over the concept of a priori, but not in this case. I'm not only implying that it is "no longer a priori to say the CO2 fraction has continuously risen above previous data points," I'm saying that it never was a priori knowledge and never will be. Making a valid logical inference from the data that cannot be disputed by any sane person does not make the inferred proposition a priori. I think you are confusing the epistemological property of aprioricity with logical validity (assuming the premises are true). The a priori / a posteriori distinction only applies to how you came about the knoweldge. If there was observation used in the course of forming the proposition, then that proposition is a posteriori.
I've read Naming and Necessity and I'm unsure about why you think it applies in this case. "The CO2 fraction has continuously risen above previous data points" is a contingent, a posteriori proposition. I'm not sure why you might think otherwise.
Cheers.Please do not use terms like "a priori" when you clearly have no idea what they mean. A priori knowledge is gained independently of experience. As you are basing your claims on scientific observations, they are a posteriori. By definition, all scientific knowledge is a posteriori. Here, educate yourself.
I apologize for the offtopic post, but I can't let this sort of mistake slide. Mod me down if you will.
I'm from Jackson. I worked at Great Adventure when I was younger. (I'm not proud of either of these facts.) Almost no one refers to it as "Six Flags." It has always been "Great Adventure" to most anyone who lives within a 30 mile radius of the park.
There is nothing to deal with and, you are right, we are not special.
You can't charge for the Zietgeist statistics if they are given away for free. My guess is that someone figured out that money could be made with detailed usage stats. Just one of the many changes we'll now be seeing at publicly traded Google.
I'm not saying that Google is going to become another corporate evildoer. It's just a fact of life that Google is going to need more diverse revenue streams.
There are several differences between the video players you described and this reference board with the 3.5" screen. First of all, all of the items you mention have bigger screens. Second, the airplane and car DVD players have a power supply to draw from and can therefore afford to produce a brighter picture than a battery powered player. Third, the positioning of the screens on planes and in cars (usually attached to the roof) generally prevents the screen from being exposed to too much glare. Fourth, I have used portable DVD players and they suck. I think their overall lack of sales and most people's preference for viewing DVDs on laptop computers supports my point. Fifth, you are a troll.
Have a nice day.
Does it come with a magnifying lens so I can see what's happening when I play my TV shows and videos? Maybe it's just me, but I find that any video screen smaller than about 10" is completely unwatchable. To make matters worse, mobile video is even more difficult to see on the go because of the variations in ambient light intensity and the jostling motion of walking/commuting/etc.
These mini-video players look like a poor solution to a non-problem.
Sounds like you ought to check out Discover magazine. They have lots of good stuff for those who are science literate, but don't want to get in over their heads.
This ain't just someone's Ph.D project.
Our enemies aren't deploying fleets, yet I still think this is a great weapon.
Well, given current events, it's very difficult for me to believe that they are ALL going to be low intensity. Sure, we are going to have a lot more situations like the one in Somalia. That's why the Armed Forces are going through a restructuring phase right now. I'm sure you know that. As for "no fixed targets," I would say that you are looking at it the wrong way. Can you pin down the enemy location and be reasonably sure that he will stay there for the next 4 minutes? If so, you can take him out if he's within 200 miles of the coast line. The idea is to be as responsive, accurate, and cost effective as possible if you are dealing with small cells of combatants that are on the move. The railgun definitely fits that profile. If the situation is not suitable, then the railgun isn't used. It's still far more cost effective and has a much faster response time than aircraft and missiles.
Well, when I googled the DD(X), it's mine detection capability was one of the things the Navy was bragging about. Who knows if it's true or not. As for suicide misslie attacks, that is definitely a possibility. However, you need to consider that you need state-sponsorship to acquire anti-ship missiles. That makes the scenario less likely because any state would know that they would get blown into kingdom come the moment we found out who provided the missiles. I think it's a far more likely scenario that we see a large number of small craft attacking with rocket and RPG fire. Our ships are not built to deal with small, fast craft like that and they could do quite a bit of damage before being taken out. Your criticism of the Navy in this regard is certainly valid, I think.
Oh, God. Please let the V-22 project die already. What a disaster. VTOL carriers are fine and all. In fact, I think the Joint Strike Fighter has a VSTOL variant. I just don't see a tremendous benefit to them. Perhaps you can educate me.
Your point is well taken. However, ALL branches of the armed forces are under considerable strain right now. Sen. Clinton (man, it's still hard to say that) said that she doesn't see any way to NOT increase the size of the armed forces b/c they are stretched way too thin.
Hardly. The railgun is
The answer to your question is in the article. The new destroyers will use what is called the "Integrated Power System." In effect, the ship is a big power generator producing ~75 megawatts from four advanced turbines. That power is then used to turn the screws via electric motors, run the ship, and fire the railgun. 15MW doesn't sound like a problem for IPS.
Very well put. If I had mod points, you get some.
I have no clue where you are getting your 100mph figure from, but I've only ever seen max speeds of 70 knots, or about 80 mph and that was for small craft. That's nice and all, but a Nimitz carrier group at top speed will cover about 850 miles/day. Since we have carrier groups in every major ocean/ sea and they are positioned rather close to the potential hot spots in their theater of operation, speed of deployment is not an issue. They will arrive on station in a few days in the worst case scenario.
I can guarantee you that the month we needed was to ready ground troops, prepare transport of all that gear, and plan the operation. I can also guarantee you that planes from a carrier group could have struck Afghanistan almost immediately. They certainly didn't require a month of travel time.
No, sitting underwater is going to lower you in the water, decrease your profile, prevent pitching and rolling that lead to stronger radar signatures, and increase survivability if you do happen to get hit. Tell me, what is going to protect you from the unexpected, reduced size and greater speed? Hardly. All the what ifs are nice, but your proposed changes to the Navy don't in any way change how much damage is inflicted. If someone hits a group of ships with a nuclear weapon, that group of ships is pretty well fucked, hydrofoil or no. You can rest assured that someone in the Navy is busy thinking up every possible bad scenario involving one of their ships and trying to pick up funding to do studies on them. ;)
I am aware of our interest in the Australian vessel. The Marine Corps is looking into puchasing them. Here is a good link on the topic. I'm not saying that these craft don't have their uses, I'm saying that rapid deployment isn't an issue for a carrier group. Those already have a great balance of rapid deployment and massive firepower.
I know about VTOL carriers. It's a nice concept, but until you can replace vitally important aircraft like the E-2C with VTOL versions, it's a moot point. (Yes, radar and command/control are that important.) The whole point is moot anyway because a carrier could sail most of the way around the world in a month. Most of the space in a carrier isn't used for runway anyway. The takeoffs need about a quarter (if that) of the carrier's length and landings