Military fatalities by month.
Month US UK Other* Total Avg
Jan 05 107 10 10 127 4.1
Feb 05 58 0 2 60 2.14
Mar 05 36 1 3 40 1.29
Apr 05 15 0 0 15 1.07
Friday, April 15, 2005
This explains why most academics are liberals
I have all the respect in the world for educated people. I hope to be one some day. But unfortunately, all too often, sounding educated has become a substitute for actually saying something meaningful. These guys proved it in a prank.
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (Reuters) - A bunch of computer-generated gibberish masquerading as an academic paper has been accepted at a scientific conference in a victory for pranksters at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Jeremy Stribling said on Thursday that he and two fellow MIT graduate students questioned the standards of some academic conferences, so they wrote a computer program to generate research papers complete with nonsensical text, charts and diagrams.
The trio submitted two of the randomly assembled papers to the World Multiconference on Systemics, Cybernetics and Informatics (WMSCI), scheduled to be held July 10-13 in Orlando, Florida.
To their surprise, one of the papers -- "Rooter: A Methodology for the Typical Unification of Access Points and Redundancy" -- was accepted for presentation.
The prank recalled a 1996 hoax in which New York University physicist Alan Sokal succeeded in getting an entire paper with a mix of truths, falsehoods, non sequiturs and otherwise meaningless mumbo-jumbo published in the journal Social Text.
Stribling said he and his colleagues only learned about the Social Text affair after submitting their paper.
"Rooter" features such mind-bending gems as: "the model for our heuristic consists of four independent components: simulated annealing, active networks, flexible modalities, and the study of reinforcement learning" and "We implemented our scatter/gather I/O server in Simula-67, augmented with opportunistically pipelined extensions."
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=573&ncid=757&e=2&u=/nm/20050415/od_nm/odd_gibberish_dc
Update: You can read their paper, and even make one of your own at their web site. Probably the most famous geeks at MIT right now.
http://www.pdos.lcs.mit.edu/scigen/
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (Reuters) - A bunch of computer-generated gibberish masquerading as an academic paper has been accepted at a scientific conference in a victory for pranksters at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Jeremy Stribling said on Thursday that he and two fellow MIT graduate students questioned the standards of some academic conferences, so they wrote a computer program to generate research papers complete with nonsensical text, charts and diagrams.
The trio submitted two of the randomly assembled papers to the World Multiconference on Systemics, Cybernetics and Informatics (WMSCI), scheduled to be held July 10-13 in Orlando, Florida.
To their surprise, one of the papers -- "Rooter: A Methodology for the Typical Unification of Access Points and Redundancy" -- was accepted for presentation.
The prank recalled a 1996 hoax in which New York University physicist Alan Sokal succeeded in getting an entire paper with a mix of truths, falsehoods, non sequiturs and otherwise meaningless mumbo-jumbo published in the journal Social Text.
Stribling said he and his colleagues only learned about the Social Text affair after submitting their paper.
"Rooter" features such mind-bending gems as: "the model for our heuristic consists of four independent components: simulated annealing, active networks, flexible modalities, and the study of reinforcement learning" and "We implemented our scatter/gather I/O server in Simula-67, augmented with opportunistically pipelined extensions."
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=573&ncid=757&e=2&u=/nm/20050415/od_nm/odd_gibberish_dc
Update: You can read their paper, and even make one of your own at their web site. Probably the most famous geeks at MIT right now.
http://www.pdos.lcs.mit.edu/scigen/
Thursday, April 14, 2005
Still waiting on my travel voucher...
WASHINGTON — Some National Guard and Reservists mobilized for the War on Terror have waited months, even years, to get reimbursed for their travel and meal expenses, they say, costing thousands of dollars in out-of-pocket costs and forcing many to be delinquent in paying other bills on time.
Now some lawmakers and soldiers are calling this outstanding debt the latest in a long line of inequities and hardships for the nation’s Guard and Reserve soldiers, many of whom have reported problems with housing allowances, health coverage and payments for purchasing battlefield gear.
"The problems that I experienced — and most of the guys I was deployed with — were extensive. It was ridiculous," said Sgt. Jason Hartley, a National Guardsman from New York City who returned from Iraq two months ago. He just received a check for his housing allowance — 12 months after the expense was incurred.
"Most of the problems I encountered were with the travel system," said National Guardsman Patrick Jennings, a military historian who was deployed to both Afghanistan and Iraq and is home now in Newmarket, N.H. "I got a check a few months ago that was two years old."
A new Government Accountability Office report released in March on the "Inefficient, Error-Prone Process Results in Travel Reimbursement Problems for Mobilized Soldiers" found that the Department of Defense pay system was overwhelmed early on due to the massive call-up of the Army National Guard since the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,153409,00.html
Now some lawmakers and soldiers are calling this outstanding debt the latest in a long line of inequities and hardships for the nation’s Guard and Reserve soldiers, many of whom have reported problems with housing allowances, health coverage and payments for purchasing battlefield gear.
"The problems that I experienced — and most of the guys I was deployed with — were extensive. It was ridiculous," said Sgt. Jason Hartley, a National Guardsman from New York City who returned from Iraq two months ago. He just received a check for his housing allowance — 12 months after the expense was incurred.
"Most of the problems I encountered were with the travel system," said National Guardsman Patrick Jennings, a military historian who was deployed to both Afghanistan and Iraq and is home now in Newmarket, N.H. "I got a check a few months ago that was two years old."
A new Government Accountability Office report released in March on the "Inefficient, Error-Prone Process Results in Travel Reimbursement Problems for Mobilized Soldiers" found that the Department of Defense pay system was overwhelmed early on due to the massive call-up of the Army National Guard since the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,153409,00.html
Wednesday, April 13, 2005
Moonbats continue to reign in Seattle
Having worked in recruiting, I have plenty of sympathy for the job they have to do in the first place. Now they have to do their job being persecuted by people trying to make political statements. If you don't want to join the military, don't! If you don't want your kid to join the military, don't let them! But that doesn't give you the right to prevent others from having access to information on the opportunity.
Citing various concerns about the war in Iraq, recruiting tactics and the military's policy on homosexuality, a local parent-teacher-student group is urging Seattle high schools to ban military recruiters from campus.
In taking its stand, the Garfield High School PTSA expressed fears that military recruiters were aggressively targeting high school students and were sometimes misrepresenting sign-up agreements in order to meet recruiting goals.
"Public schools are not a place for military recruiters," the resolution adopted last week reads.
The move is largely symbolic -- in Seattle, the decision of whether to allow recruiters on campus is left up to principals -- but it's important to take a stand, PTSA co-chairwoman Amy Hagopian said.
The vote reflects parents' fears that their children will be "sucked into this war, through recruitment or a draft or something," she said.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/219727_emilitary12.html
Citing various concerns about the war in Iraq, recruiting tactics and the military's policy on homosexuality, a local parent-teacher-student group is urging Seattle high schools to ban military recruiters from campus.
In taking its stand, the Garfield High School PTSA expressed fears that military recruiters were aggressively targeting high school students and were sometimes misrepresenting sign-up agreements in order to meet recruiting goals.
"Public schools are not a place for military recruiters," the resolution adopted last week reads.
The move is largely symbolic -- in Seattle, the decision of whether to allow recruiters on campus is left up to principals -- but it's important to take a stand, PTSA co-chairwoman Amy Hagopian said.
The vote reflects parents' fears that their children will be "sucked into this war, through recruitment or a draft or something," she said.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/219727_emilitary12.html
Who will he be working for?
Most Republicans skipped the hearing, leaving Democrats largely
unchallenged as they assailed Bolton's knack for making enemies and disparaging
the very organization he would serve.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A45024-2005Apr11.html
Tuesday, April 12, 2005
Another great editorial on intel
Just read and learn. It lays out how to approach intel requirements better than a hundred commissions ever could.
If size were a measure of insight, the WMD Commission's just-released 618-page report would be an even more valuable guide to understanding the cascading series of failures that have plagued our country's intelligence service than the 9/11 Commission's 567-page best-selling opus. But there is no correlation whatever between size and insight and — alas — the most striking feature of both reports is their focus on what is obvious and their silence about what lies beneath.
For example, the WMD Commission concludes that "We need an Intelligence Community that is truly integrated, far more imaginative and willing to run risks, open to a new generation of Americans, and receptive to new technologies." Well, yes — but this recommendation is equally valid for large corporations, universities, and the 2008 U.S. Olympic women's synchronized-swimming team.
The 9/11 Commission concluded — after nearly two years of contentious hearings and deep thinking — that the horrific attacks on New York and Washington weren't prevented by our country's $40 billion-a-year intelligence service because it had suffered a "systemic failure." No kidding — but most Americans had figured this out even before the south tower of the World Trade Center came crashing down.
While both reports provide a detailed narrative of what precisely went wrong, neither report explains why things went so wrong.
http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/meyer200504120757.asp
If size were a measure of insight, the WMD Commission's just-released 618-page report would be an even more valuable guide to understanding the cascading series of failures that have plagued our country's intelligence service than the 9/11 Commission's 567-page best-selling opus. But there is no correlation whatever between size and insight and — alas — the most striking feature of both reports is their focus on what is obvious and their silence about what lies beneath.
For example, the WMD Commission concludes that "We need an Intelligence Community that is truly integrated, far more imaginative and willing to run risks, open to a new generation of Americans, and receptive to new technologies." Well, yes — but this recommendation is equally valid for large corporations, universities, and the 2008 U.S. Olympic women's synchronized-swimming team.
The 9/11 Commission concluded — after nearly two years of contentious hearings and deep thinking — that the horrific attacks on New York and Washington weren't prevented by our country's $40 billion-a-year intelligence service because it had suffered a "systemic failure." No kidding — but most Americans had figured this out even before the south tower of the World Trade Center came crashing down.
While both reports provide a detailed narrative of what precisely went wrong, neither report explains why things went so wrong.
http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/meyer200504120757.asp
Monday, April 11, 2005
Where is Jack Bauer when you need him?
Onething I have always found so interesting about the CIA, is that it is so hard to get in. They take the cream of the crop, a bunch of very intelligent people and then drown them in bureaucracy. Quite sad. I found this an interesting read.
And who can blame them for wondering? The CIA, as I wrote a couple of years
back, now functions in the same relation to President Bush as Pakistan's ISI
does to General Musharraf. In both cases, before the chief executive makes a
routine request of his intelligence agency, he has to figure out whether they're
going to use it as an opportunity to set him up, and if so how. For Musharraf,
the problem is the significant faction in the ISI that would like to kill him.
Fortunately for Bush, if anyone at the CIA launched a plot to kill him, they'd
probably take out G. W. Bish, who runs a feed store in Idaho.
Friday, April 08, 2005
Major disaster strikes Canada
My thoughts and prayers are with our Canadian friends as they struggle through these difficult times.
A beer truck flipped over on a roadway overpass in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Monday, prompting local officials to comment on the tragedy.
"It is sad," Capt. Scott Logan of the Halifax Regional Fire Service (search) told The Daily News of Halifax. "Chances are they won't recover any of the beer."
The truck, hauling 46,368 bottles of Alexander Keith's India Pale Ale (search), skidded to a stop against the overpass's guardrail, luckily avoiding a 50-foot plunge down to another road.
The female driver was pulled out of the cab uninjured — "more frazzled than hurt," according to Logan — letting rescuers focus on the calamitous aspects of the disaster.
"I had a tear in my eye, actually, when I was watching it," said police Constable Mark Hobeck. "It was full of beer. We were hoping a Hostess truck full of pretzels would come by, but no such luck."
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,152793,00.html
A beer truck flipped over on a roadway overpass in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Monday, prompting local officials to comment on the tragedy.
"It is sad," Capt. Scott Logan of the Halifax Regional Fire Service (search) told The Daily News of Halifax. "Chances are they won't recover any of the beer."
The truck, hauling 46,368 bottles of Alexander Keith's India Pale Ale (search), skidded to a stop against the overpass's guardrail, luckily avoiding a 50-foot plunge down to another road.
The female driver was pulled out of the cab uninjured — "more frazzled than hurt," according to Logan — letting rescuers focus on the calamitous aspects of the disaster.
"I had a tear in my eye, actually, when I was watching it," said police Constable Mark Hobeck. "It was full of beer. We were hoping a Hostess truck full of pretzels would come by, but no such luck."
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,152793,00.html
What is wrong with the army language program
I will post this without comment, in order to avoid a court martial.
I've just read one of the funniest and saddest government documents I've run across in years. Published by the Pentagon (the source of most such things) under the title "Defense Language Transformation Roadmap," it details the official plan for improving foreign-language skills among U.S. military personnel. The plan is meant to fill an urgent need. It was ordered by the deputy secretary of defense, administered by the undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness, and coordinated with the service secretaries, combat commanders, and Joint Chiefs of Staff. And to read it is to see, with your own increasingly widening eyes, the Pentagon's (or is it the federal government's?) sheer inability to get anything done on time.
The document—only 19 pages, so take a look—traces, all too clearly, the project's shameful chronology. It got under way in November 2002—over a year after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks—when the undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness was directed to have the military departments review their requirements for language professionals (interpreters, translators, area specialists, and so forth). This review was a bust—or, in the document's more delicate language, it "resulted in narrowly scoped requirements based on current manning authorizations instead of … projected needs."
So, in August 2003—in other words, after another nine months—the undersecretary tried again, directing a formal review of the Defense Language Institute Foreign-Language Center. The resulting study "articulated the needs for qualitative improvement in language skills." What a surprise!
In September 2003—two years after the 9/11 attacks that made officials realize they didn't know enough about the rest of the world—the deputy undersecretary of defense for plans commissioned a study "assessing language needs."
For the first seven months of 2004, the deputy undersecretary assembled a "Defense Language Transformation Team," consisting of representatives from the services, the National Security Agency, and the Special Operations Command. ("Transformation" is widely known to be Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's chief obsession, so officials know that stamping the word on a document or program is the best way to grab attention.)
On May 10, 2004, the deputy secretary of defense ordered the military services, the JCS, the combat commands, the NSA, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and the Defense Threat Reduction Agency to appoint "Senior Language Authorities," who will "assess language needs, track language assets, identify emerging policy requirements," and form a "Defense Foreign Language Steering Committee."
From June through August, 2004, the steering committee oversaw the development—and on Aug. 31, approved—the "Roadmap," and submitted it to the undersecretary of defense.
So, by the end of last summer, it had taken 21 months simply to draw up a 19-page plan.
It gets worse.
http://www.slate.com/id/2116330/
I've just read one of the funniest and saddest government documents I've run across in years. Published by the Pentagon (the source of most such things) under the title "Defense Language Transformation Roadmap," it details the official plan for improving foreign-language skills among U.S. military personnel. The plan is meant to fill an urgent need. It was ordered by the deputy secretary of defense, administered by the undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness, and coordinated with the service secretaries, combat commanders, and Joint Chiefs of Staff. And to read it is to see, with your own increasingly widening eyes, the Pentagon's (or is it the federal government's?) sheer inability to get anything done on time.
The document—only 19 pages, so take a look—traces, all too clearly, the project's shameful chronology. It got under way in November 2002—over a year after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks—when the undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness was directed to have the military departments review their requirements for language professionals (interpreters, translators, area specialists, and so forth). This review was a bust—or, in the document's more delicate language, it "resulted in narrowly scoped requirements based on current manning authorizations instead of … projected needs."
So, in August 2003—in other words, after another nine months—the undersecretary tried again, directing a formal review of the Defense Language Institute Foreign-Language Center. The resulting study "articulated the needs for qualitative improvement in language skills." What a surprise!
In September 2003—two years after the 9/11 attacks that made officials realize they didn't know enough about the rest of the world—the deputy undersecretary of defense for plans commissioned a study "assessing language needs."
For the first seven months of 2004, the deputy undersecretary assembled a "Defense Language Transformation Team," consisting of representatives from the services, the National Security Agency, and the Special Operations Command. ("Transformation" is widely known to be Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's chief obsession, so officials know that stamping the word on a document or program is the best way to grab attention.)
On May 10, 2004, the deputy secretary of defense ordered the military services, the JCS, the combat commands, the NSA, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and the Defense Threat Reduction Agency to appoint "Senior Language Authorities," who will "assess language needs, track language assets, identify emerging policy requirements," and form a "Defense Foreign Language Steering Committee."
From June through August, 2004, the steering committee oversaw the development—and on Aug. 31, approved—the "Roadmap," and submitted it to the undersecretary of defense.
So, by the end of last summer, it had taken 21 months simply to draw up a 19-page plan.
It gets worse.
http://www.slate.com/id/2116330/
Wednesday, April 06, 2005
Since when was fraud covered under the 1st Ammendment?
Professor's visit sparks furor at Eastern Washington University
By John K. Wiley The Associated Press
CHENEY, Spokane County — A Colorado professor whose formal visit was canceled because of safety concerns criticized administrators yesterday on the Eastern Washington University (EWU) campus, where he spoke after a compromise was reached.
Ward Churchill, whose remarks comparing some Sept. 11 victims to a Nazi war criminal touched off a firestorm and prompted calls for his firing, was a guest of EWU's Native American Student Association.
Scores of uniformed police officers stood by as Churchill told about 500 students gathered at the university's outdoor mall that his appearance was a victory for their free-speech rights.
Churchill earlier had gone to a federal court to try to force the university to rescind its cancellation of a planned speech. Instead, Churchill was allowed to lecture ethnic-studies classes and speak at the Native American Awareness Week rally.
"It was stated clearly, and in English, that the administration's posture here, in attempting to cancel [the formal speech] ... carried clear implications of unconstitutional prior restraint of speech," Churchill said.
"The job assignment of any academic institution ... is to see to it that the academic mission of the institution is fulfilled, not to prevent it, not to shape it to the purposes of their funders," he said, calling security concerns "bogus."
Churchill's remarks were received with polite applause, though a few boos could be heard.
EWU President Stephen Jordan in February canceled a scheduled speech by Churchill, a Colorado ethnic-studies professor, because of security concerns over Churchill's writings comparing some World Trade Center victims to Adolf Eichmann, an architect of the Nazis' "final solution" for European Jews during World War II.
http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis.cgi/web/vortex/display?slug=churchill06m&date=20050406&query=ward+churchill
By John K. Wiley The Associated Press
CHENEY, Spokane County — A Colorado professor whose formal visit was canceled because of safety concerns criticized administrators yesterday on the Eastern Washington University (EWU) campus, where he spoke after a compromise was reached.
Ward Churchill, whose remarks comparing some Sept. 11 victims to a Nazi war criminal touched off a firestorm and prompted calls for his firing, was a guest of EWU's Native American Student Association.
Scores of uniformed police officers stood by as Churchill told about 500 students gathered at the university's outdoor mall that his appearance was a victory for their free-speech rights.
Churchill earlier had gone to a federal court to try to force the university to rescind its cancellation of a planned speech. Instead, Churchill was allowed to lecture ethnic-studies classes and speak at the Native American Awareness Week rally.
"It was stated clearly, and in English, that the administration's posture here, in attempting to cancel [the formal speech] ... carried clear implications of unconstitutional prior restraint of speech," Churchill said.
"The job assignment of any academic institution ... is to see to it that the academic mission of the institution is fulfilled, not to prevent it, not to shape it to the purposes of their funders," he said, calling security concerns "bogus."
Churchill's remarks were received with polite applause, though a few boos could be heard.
EWU President Stephen Jordan in February canceled a scheduled speech by Churchill, a Colorado ethnic-studies professor, because of security concerns over Churchill's writings comparing some World Trade Center victims to Adolf Eichmann, an architect of the Nazis' "final solution" for European Jews during World War II.
http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis.cgi/web/vortex/display?slug=churchill06m&date=20050406&query=ward+churchill
A Tribute to a Hero
I discovered this while surfing the web this morning. I didn't know Gene really well, but I served with him for a couple of months. I thought this was a sweet tribute. Hard to believe it has almost been three years. You will be missed SSG Vance.
http://http://www.genevancejr.com/
http://http://www.genevancejr.com/
Now that is what I call a stop loss!
Brilliant headline from the front page of the Seattle Times this morning.
A Pasco guardsman is fighting the Pentagon's right to add 26 years to his enlistment.
www.seattletimes.com
Lifetime enlistments, just like under the Czar. I am assuming it is supposed to be 26 months but you never know. Bush and Rummy could be up to something.
Update: Actually now that I think about it, what they are referring to is when you stoploss someone it become indefinite, although it has to follow certain rules, usually 90 days past your deployment. So they code this in the system at some far off date like 2030. This happened to a bunch of people I served with in Bosnia. But no, they do not make you serve 26 more years.
A Pasco guardsman is fighting the Pentagon's right to add 26 years to his enlistment.
www.seattletimes.com
Lifetime enlistments, just like under the Czar. I am assuming it is supposed to be 26 months but you never know. Bush and Rummy could be up to something.
Update: Actually now that I think about it, what they are referring to is when you stoploss someone it become indefinite, although it has to follow certain rules, usually 90 days past your deployment. So they code this in the system at some far off date like 2030. This happened to a bunch of people I served with in Bosnia. But no, they do not make you serve 26 more years.
Tuesday, April 05, 2005
More Math Challenged Liberals
Stupid comment of the day: Bob Beckel a Democratic strategist was on Hannity and Colmes tonight commenting on the recent 60 Minutes Jane Fonda interview. He used the opportunity to attack Michael Reagan for not serving in Vietnam, tasteless, but oh well. Then when that was done he did the same to Sean Hannity, another conversative who supported the war, but was unwilling to serve! Just one problem, Sean Hannity was born on December 30th, 1961, which means he would have been all of 12 years old when the US involvement in the war ended.
I admit it, I only joined the National Guard to avoid the draft.
I admit it, I only joined the National Guard to avoid the draft.
Monday, April 04, 2005
Chief's Rules of Conspiracy Theories
I have been reading conspiracy theories on the Internet, chiefly (no pun intended) regarding the 9/11 attacks and all the theories that Bush either caused or allowed it to happen for certain benefits such as arresting young Muslim men and invading Afghanistan and Iraq. How exactly that benefits Bush is a long story. Anways, being a rather skeptical person, I am just amazed by some of the wild distortions of logic that some people will come up with to defend their theories, so I have come up with the following rules that conspiracy theories must follow. Not exactly Newton's 3 laws of motion, but hey, I am just starting.
1. It is only necessary to observe the evidence that you wish to.
For example, the moonbats who believe that a cruise missile hit the Pentagon. As "proof" of this they cite a man who said he saw a plane hit the pentagon "like a cruise missile", ignoring the concept of a simile, and the fact that he, along with thousands of other people saw a "plane" hit the pentagon.
2. A lack of evidence is only proof of the depth of the cover-up.
Pretty self explanatory, I would have the evidence if only they hadn't covered it up so well!
3. Anyone who doesn't agree with a conspiracy theory is either part of the cover-up (see rule 2) or just a close minded drone of the government.
4. The law of inverse proportionality of authority. The validity of any source is inversely proportional to its authoritativeness .
Any government commission, serious academic (not those who teach humanities at Berkeley), law enforcement official, or politician, ie. the people who are in the position to actually know, are immediately suspect because they were probably involved in the conspiracy in the first place. Someone completely removed from the situation, like some guy posting on his website while watching reruns of Star Trek in his parents' basement is more likely to be untainted.
5. Occams corollary: The complexity and difficulty of a conspiracy theory is only proof of the depth and deviousness of the conspiracy.
1. It is only necessary to observe the evidence that you wish to.
For example, the moonbats who believe that a cruise missile hit the Pentagon. As "proof" of this they cite a man who said he saw a plane hit the pentagon "like a cruise missile", ignoring the concept of a simile, and the fact that he, along with thousands of other people saw a "plane" hit the pentagon.
2. A lack of evidence is only proof of the depth of the cover-up.
Pretty self explanatory, I would have the evidence if only they hadn't covered it up so well!
3. Anyone who doesn't agree with a conspiracy theory is either part of the cover-up (see rule 2) or just a close minded drone of the government.
4. The law of inverse proportionality of authority. The validity of any source is inversely proportional to its authoritativeness .
Any government commission, serious academic (not those who teach humanities at Berkeley), law enforcement official, or politician, ie. the people who are in the position to actually know, are immediately suspect because they were probably involved in the conspiracy in the first place. Someone completely removed from the situation, like some guy posting on his website while watching reruns of Star Trek in his parents' basement is more likely to be untainted.
5. Occams corollary: The complexity and difficulty of a conspiracy theory is only proof of the depth and deviousness of the conspiracy.
More Kudos for UW
UW School of Medicine ranks as nation's top primary-care medical school
For the 12th consecutive year, the U.S. News & World Report annual graduate and professional school rankings, released today, list the University of Washington (UW) School of Medicine as No. 1 among medical schools that excel in primary-care training. The UW School of Medicine also continues to be ranked as the best in the United States for teaching medical students about family practice and rural medicine.
The UW medical school received high national rankings in teaching other medical disciplines. It tied for No. 4 in teaching medical students about AIDS, ranked No. 6 in teaching about women's health, No. 7 in geriatrics training, No. 7 in internal medicine training, tied for No. 8 in teaching future physicians to recognize and treat drug and alcohol abuse; and tied for No. 9 in pediatrics training.
For the 12th consecutive year, the U.S. News & World Report annual graduate and professional school rankings, released today, list the University of Washington (UW) School of Medicine as No. 1 among medical schools that excel in primary-care training. The UW School of Medicine also continues to be ranked as the best in the United States for teaching medical students about family practice and rural medicine.
The UW medical school received high national rankings in teaching other medical disciplines. It tied for No. 4 in teaching medical students about AIDS, ranked No. 6 in teaching about women's health, No. 7 in geriatrics training, No. 7 in internal medicine training, tied for No. 8 in teaching future physicians to recognize and treat drug and alcohol abuse; and tied for No. 9 in pediatrics training.
Friday, April 01, 2005
A little shameless self promotion
In the 2 years since I first was admitted to UW, the program has gone from 39 to 18. Coincidence? I say not. OK, I have never actually attended, but let's not get into that right now...
UW's MBA Program Advances to Nation's Top 20 Elite
The University of Washington’s MBA program has been ranked 18th among the nation's best business schools by U.S. News & World Report, advancing nine spots from last year's ranking by the weekly news magazine. The annual rankings appear in the 2006 edition of the book America's Best Graduate Schools. "The progress is the result of outstanding effort and collaboration among our students, staff and faculty, coupled with tremendous support from the business community in the Pacific Northwest," said Dave Burgstahler, acting dean.The rankings are based upon reputation among recruiters and academic peers, student quality indices, and measures of placement success for the program. The magazine surveyed more than 391 accredited master's programs in business.Dan Poston, executive director for MBA programs, said the progress made in the rankings is due in part to the new MBA curriculum instituted last year at the suggestion of employers who hire UW graduates."Regional recruiters are pleased with our responsiveness and with UW MBA graduates who demonstrate better communication skills, critical thinking, ethical values, and leadership," he said. "By building deep ties to businesses in the Pacific Northwest and by striving to serve the needs of those businesses, our reputation with recruiters has climbed, our salaries and placement percentages rose and our graduates are happy."The school's Executive MBA program was ranked 22 in the nation. And among specialty programs, Accounting was ranked 22, International 21, and Entrepreneurship 29.
U.S. News & World Report ranked the UW Business School's graduate program 49 in 2002 and 35 in 2003.A complete list of the rankings will be available Monday in the 2006 edition of the newsstand book America's Best Graduate Schools. Some of the specialty categories will also appear in the April 11 edition of U.S. News & World Report.
UW's MBA Program Advances to Nation's Top 20 Elite
The University of Washington’s MBA program has been ranked 18th among the nation's best business schools by U.S. News & World Report, advancing nine spots from last year's ranking by the weekly news magazine. The annual rankings appear in the 2006 edition of the book America's Best Graduate Schools. "The progress is the result of outstanding effort and collaboration among our students, staff and faculty, coupled with tremendous support from the business community in the Pacific Northwest," said Dave Burgstahler, acting dean.The rankings are based upon reputation among recruiters and academic peers, student quality indices, and measures of placement success for the program. The magazine surveyed more than 391 accredited master's programs in business.Dan Poston, executive director for MBA programs, said the progress made in the rankings is due in part to the new MBA curriculum instituted last year at the suggestion of employers who hire UW graduates."Regional recruiters are pleased with our responsiveness and with UW MBA graduates who demonstrate better communication skills, critical thinking, ethical values, and leadership," he said. "By building deep ties to businesses in the Pacific Northwest and by striving to serve the needs of those businesses, our reputation with recruiters has climbed, our salaries and placement percentages rose and our graduates are happy."The school's Executive MBA program was ranked 22 in the nation. And among specialty programs, Accounting was ranked 22, International 21, and Entrepreneurship 29.
U.S. News & World Report ranked the UW Business School's graduate program 49 in 2002 and 35 in 2003.A complete list of the rankings will be available Monday in the 2006 edition of the newsstand book America's Best Graduate Schools. Some of the specialty categories will also appear in the April 11 edition of U.S. News & World Report.
Thursday, March 31, 2005
I'll have a Berger with a side of felony
WASHINGTON — Former national security adviser Sandy Berger will plead guilty to taking classified material from the National Archives, a misdemeanor, the Justice Department said today.
Berger is expected to appear in federal court in Washington tomorrow, said Justice spokesman Bryan Sierra.
The former Clinton administration official previously acknowledged he removed from the National Archives copies of documents about the government's anti-terror efforts and notes that he took on those documents. He said he was reviewing the materials to help determine which Clinton administration documents to provide to the independent commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
He called the episode "an honest mistake," and denied criminal wrongdoing.
Berger and his lawyer, Lanny Breuer, have said Berger knowingly removed the handwritten notes by placing them in his jacket and pants and inadvertently took copies of actual classified documents in a leather portfolio. He returned most of the documents, but some still are missing.
The charge of unauthorized removal and retention of classified material is a misdemeanor that carries a maximum sentence of a year in prison and up to a $100,000 fine.
The materials related to a 2000 report on how government reacted to the terror threat prior to the millennium celebrations.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002226586_webberger31.html
Something fishy is still up with this. Your humble Chief has been in situations where he has had to handle sensitive items and I have never had to stuff classified documents in my socks! This isn't a field operation where sometimes people get sloppy and cut corners in order to get things done, it was a former senior official at a government archive. It was not a mistake, he knew what he was doing. Most likely he is plea bargaining to avoid having to explain in public why he stole those documents, and for whom.
Berger is expected to appear in federal court in Washington tomorrow, said Justice spokesman Bryan Sierra.
The former Clinton administration official previously acknowledged he removed from the National Archives copies of documents about the government's anti-terror efforts and notes that he took on those documents. He said he was reviewing the materials to help determine which Clinton administration documents to provide to the independent commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
He called the episode "an honest mistake," and denied criminal wrongdoing.
Berger and his lawyer, Lanny Breuer, have said Berger knowingly removed the handwritten notes by placing them in his jacket and pants and inadvertently took copies of actual classified documents in a leather portfolio. He returned most of the documents, but some still are missing.
The charge of unauthorized removal and retention of classified material is a misdemeanor that carries a maximum sentence of a year in prison and up to a $100,000 fine.
The materials related to a 2000 report on how government reacted to the terror threat prior to the millennium celebrations.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002226586_webberger31.html
Something fishy is still up with this. Your humble Chief has been in situations where he has had to handle sensitive items and I have never had to stuff classified documents in my socks! This isn't a field operation where sometimes people get sloppy and cut corners in order to get things done, it was a former senior official at a government archive. It was not a mistake, he knew what he was doing. Most likely he is plea bargaining to avoid having to explain in public why he stole those documents, and for whom.
And here I didn't even know Hillary ran guns for the Khmer Rouge
From the New York Times:
Clinton Supporters Gear Up Against 'Swift Boat' Tactics
WASHINGTON, March 31 - With 19 months to go before the elections and no opponent in sight, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaign is nonetheless warning her political supporters that she is the prime target of "the right-wing attack machine."
In a fund-raising e-mail message sent out on Thursday, Mrs. Clinton's campaign also said her critics were preparing an advertising campaign against her similar to the one orchestrated by Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a group that attacked Senator John Kerry's Vietnam service during the presidential election.
"The right wing is already getting ready, naming Hillary as their 'No. 1 target' and boasting about their 'Swift Boat' style ads," said the e-mail message, which was sent by Ann F. Lewis, the director of communications for Mrs. Clinton's campaign committee, Friends of Hillary. "Help us show the right wing that we will be ready and able to fight back."
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/01/nyregion/metrocampaigns/01hillary.html
Now is it just me, or does it seem a little ridiculous to act like the SBVFT organization was some type of elite hit squad, some type of political tactic unheard of in the history of politics? John Kerry based his campaign on his Vietnam service, with his tacky saluting and "I served in Vietnam" speeches every 5 minutes, and then suddenly when it became a liability he started whining about it. Bush was attacked constantly on his Air National Guard service, but guess what, it wasn't the basis of his campaign. Nobody cared except for the people who were never voting for him in the first place. So if Hillary wants to beat "swiftboat like tactics" then why doesn't she run on something meaningful? Oh, and explaining how she made all that money on those cattle futures might help too.
Clinton Supporters Gear Up Against 'Swift Boat' Tactics
WASHINGTON, March 31 - With 19 months to go before the elections and no opponent in sight, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaign is nonetheless warning her political supporters that she is the prime target of "the right-wing attack machine."
In a fund-raising e-mail message sent out on Thursday, Mrs. Clinton's campaign also said her critics were preparing an advertising campaign against her similar to the one orchestrated by Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a group that attacked Senator John Kerry's Vietnam service during the presidential election.
"The right wing is already getting ready, naming Hillary as their 'No. 1 target' and boasting about their 'Swift Boat' style ads," said the e-mail message, which was sent by Ann F. Lewis, the director of communications for Mrs. Clinton's campaign committee, Friends of Hillary. "Help us show the right wing that we will be ready and able to fight back."
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/01/nyregion/metrocampaigns/01hillary.html
Now is it just me, or does it seem a little ridiculous to act like the SBVFT organization was some type of elite hit squad, some type of political tactic unheard of in the history of politics? John Kerry based his campaign on his Vietnam service, with his tacky saluting and "I served in Vietnam" speeches every 5 minutes, and then suddenly when it became a liability he started whining about it. Bush was attacked constantly on his Air National Guard service, but guess what, it wasn't the basis of his campaign. Nobody cared except for the people who were never voting for him in the first place. So if Hillary wants to beat "swiftboat like tactics" then why doesn't she run on something meaningful? Oh, and explaining how she made all that money on those cattle futures might help too.
Putting the Smackdown on Liberal Lying Profs
Hey, WWU professors should not attempt to argue economics with future UW MBA candidates on the prowl. Floyd McKay, a frequent guest columnist for the Seattle Times published a rather ridiculous and fact impaired editorial yesterday to which I quickly sent off an e-mail (he never should have listed his Yahoo account). His reply was the typical expected, I am right, and even if I am not, it doesn't make a difference because my intentions are correct. Last year I previously e-mailed him on a error he made on the Bush Air National Guard issue with a similar response. Both him and the Times refused to issue a correction, but this time the Times has said they will run my letter to the editor in tomorrow's edition. Yeah, I am almost famous.
For the time being the folks at soundpolitics.com were nice enough to publish my letter. http://www.soundpolitics.com/archives/004091.html It is a great local blog, I highly recommend it. So this is my little accomplishment for accountability in the media. Power to the people!
For the time being the folks at soundpolitics.com were nice enough to publish my letter. http://www.soundpolitics.com/archives/004091.html It is a great local blog, I highly recommend it. So this is my little accomplishment for accountability in the media. Power to the people!
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