New Mars Forums

The Soviet Union sustained the most casualties in WW2, and Stalin's armies killed far more Nazis than the US/UK/CAN did on the Western Front or in Italy.

Cindy, just so we are clear.

Ending such patriarchal systems is a "good thing" - - NO question here.

That said, Abram tanks, B-2 bombers & young Marines patrolling with M-16s may not be the best tool to accomplish that goal. Remember the sitcom "All in the Family" ?? 

Anyway, suppose 150,000 foreign troops entered NYC and told all the Archie Bunkers to start treating women equally. How well would that work out?

Our goal in Iraq can be noble but our current means and budget are far too meager for the task for creating sexual equality in a Muslim society.

Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.

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A few weeks ago I googled  "French nucelar arsenal" - - I decided to be worried about froggie revenge for Le Big Mac - - over 400 H-bombs with MIRV SLBMs. De Gaulle had no intentions of being subservient to Uncle Sam.

Abortion

Cloning

GWB is not the secular choice.

Respect between the political parties would be a great place to start.

51-49 shouldn't mean that the 51 get to lock the 49 out of the room.

Part of my porblem with an all-American "Us vs Them" mentality is that a large percentage of GWB's supporters would consider me, as a Roman Catholic, to be one of the 'thems" to be assimiliated or destroyed.

Part of the reason "we" in the West have trouble confronting the radical Islamicists is that our society hasn't clearly decided "who we really are" - - lacking a shared core consensus on the "identity" of America we are weak in the face of radical Islamicists.

Remember, Jesse Jackson and Jerry Falwell are both American Baptist preachers. Unless they can find common ground as "Americans" without the need for one to defeat the other the US ability to confront global threats is weakened.

And here is a question I would very much like to ask GWB:

Do you and Prince Bandar pray to the same God?

http://www.cnn.com/2002/images/08/28/to … .jpg]Photo

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Why do we see growing divergence between America and Europe?

If we follow Samuel Huntington's theories (Clash of Civilizations) these two branches of western cultures are developing increasing different conceptions of God and the role God plays in daily life.

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http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.j … 996272]U.K. to allow cloning human embyros for stem cell research. Okay its not Europe, but tis close.

Years ago, in an on-line discussion, I made the mistake of referring to a Brit as "European" - - the bloke told me to 'naff off and if he could have reached his hands through cyber-space, he'd a throttled me.

http://www.thismodernworld.com/weblog/m … 87]College picture - - any rugby players here?

Later on, I read that this is an actual talking point. See, Kerry cannot tax the rich because their lawyers and accountants will successfully dodge the taxes.

Therefore, if we elect Kerry he will end up taxing the middle class because the rich will become invisible (through skillful tax dodges) and therefore IRS will hammer the next in line, the middle class.

Kerry's tax increase will necessarily slide down the rate brackets, no matter what he says so voting for Kerry will raise your taxes, no matter what.

Its not an intellectual argument, yet the focus groups seem to think it has traction.

???

http://www.scescape.net/~woods/elements … html]Xenon

1 part per 20 million in Earth's atmosphere & 0.08 ppm in Mars atmosphere (why can't they use the same measurement?!)

???

0.8 parts per 10 million or 1.6 parts per 20 million or 160% of Earth's ratio, right?

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Mars settlers will need to process atmosphere for survival.
Making supercritical carbon dioxide, for example.

Xenon will be a by-product of that processing and if a xenon powered ion vessel is in Mars orbit, to fill up the xenon tanks seems to make sense.

I hope this link works:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/8/6/ … 12911/4298

It appears the whole "Swift boat smear" may well backfire on the GOP. Regardless of the truth, I'd now say this was a bad idea (from a pragmatic perspective) for the Right to fund this media blitz.

It makes Bush look desperate.

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http://www.boston.com/news/nation/artic … kerry/]One retraction - - others are coming in.

Maybe. Thats why I am worried.

With the recent additional over-runs "on return to flight costs" and the potential for ESA & RSA whining in the future after RTF succeeds, the idea that we will finish ISS now and some future leader will bear the brunt of telling the ESA & RSA "NO" doesn't seem like a sure thing.

On ISS/STS all GWB is saying is that the next Preisdent will be tough. Promise.

Given the pork that STS generates and given that the orbiter is being re-built from the ground up as we speak and given that it will soon be deemed safe to back away from some of the CAIB recommendations, maybe in 2010 we are told that re-certification is NOT the big deal with thought it was.

And off in Crawford GWB says "Aint my headache."

I do not know which would be worse for US interests:

- - an ISS that is useless after the orbiter is retired, which will annoy our allies who committed to help build a station and then we pulled the plug;

or

- - an ISS that the RSA & ESA & Japan & Canada use in a manner they deem valuable after we withdraw from participation.

I am not talking engineering, I am talking politics.