Honoring Britain's Veterans of the Falklands War - 25 years ago

Scroll down in the text of this article to see some good photographs of the British military on parade and some pictures of Margaret Thatcher & Tony Blair greeting veterans along with princes Charles & Andrew.

TigerHawk: "The spring of 1982 was a barren time for the West. The capitalist economy was in a shambles, the Soviet Union was resurgent, America had not yet recovered from the indignities of the Ford and Carter years, and Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher had not yet established themselves as the great leaders we now know they were. The Falklands War was therefore quite possibly the most essentially rejuvenating foreign policy moment between Israel's recovery of its hostages in Uganda in 1976 and the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. Finally the West had stood up to a tin-pot dictator and given him his comeupance."

Several years ago I was in Buenos Aires while the Argentines were putting the finishing touches on their memorial to the same war. They also honor their veterans, and obviously view this conflict differently. We didn't get to know the locals well enough to discuss politics, but I got the impression that most people thought it was unimportant old news.

IBM patents external memory technology

I don't want to rain on their parade, but this seems to be a pretty unlikely product. As the cost of RAM approaches the cost of the plastic & sand (silicon) required to manufacture it, sharing such cheap components seems unlikely.

TG Daily - IBM patents external DRAM box:
"IBM is pitching the invention as a technology that could provide a cheaper and more flexible way to temporarily upgrade the available memory in computing systems ranging from PDAs to servers. According to the description of the patent, the technology includes three separate parts - a connector, a container to hold RAM as well as a cable that couples the connector to the container.

IBM says that the connector can be inserted into a DRAM slot just like a common memory module, allowing the memory installed in the external box to be addressed by the motherboard as another bank or DRAM. When there is no external RAM module plugged in, no memory is recognized by the motherboard's memory addressing unit, the patent claims."

IBM's people create more patents annually than any other company in this industry (perhaps any industry), and they have more patents inside your PC than any other company. Perhaps someone sees an opportunity here that I'm missing. Certainly if people start replacing hard drives with RAM, then they would use much more of it . . .

Tips I could have used before graduation night ...

I ended up with pretty blurry photos of a graduation ceremony (low light & long lenses aren't very compatible) - some of these tips would have helped, but my faithful mono-pod (a tripod with only 1 leg) would have been even better.
instructables : How to take AWESOME night photos WITHOUT a tripod:

"This instructable will teach you how to use the normal digital camera you already own to take night photos that are not blurry, and without a tripod. "

D Day - June 6th, 1944

American Thinker Blog: D Day plus 63 years:
Thanks to American Thinker for these links to D-Day history:

"Here are links to information about the D-Day contributions of the Army, Army Air Force, Navy and Coast Guard.

http://www.worldwar2history.info/

http://www.d-daymuseum.org/education/factsheets_history.html

http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq109-1.htm

http://www.aero-web.org/history/wwii/d-day/toc.htm

http://www.uscg.mil/history/h_normandy.html

http://www.uscg.mil/history/Normandy_Index.html
"

"for evil to triumph it is only necessary for good men to do nothing"

American Thinker: Boycotting Decency:
I try to keep up on events in my homeland England and also in Europe - this article makes it clear that these are places I could no longer live ...

"the British college teachers union just voted to boycott Israel's universities and colleges.

Why would England, home of the 'Mother of Parliaments,' support the destruction of a small and besieged country that has managed to maintain the only true democracy in the most treacherous neighborhood in the world? Why would professors and teachers, who are presumably dedicated to free speech and thought, be opposed to the free exchange of information with such a democracy?

Ten years ago Europe was appalled over ethnic cleansing in the Balkans. Today the British vote to open the door to ethnic cleansing in Israel. "

It has always surprised me that college professors are blind to the fact that their lifestyle is supported by the freedoms they so often attack. Apparently, they've learned nothing from the history they dispense and equate life under Pol Pot as equivalent to, or better than, life under Churchill or Reagan.

"The boycott move shows the powerful return of the anti-democratic Left in Britain, very similar to the Stalinist Left that did so much damage to Britain and the West in the 20th century. It also shows the new power in British academic institutions of Islamic fascists. A major fact is that the same UCU board that voted to deligitimize Israel also voted to block police inquiries about Islamist recruiting on university campuses. The message is clear. The academic Left will protect Islamofascists on campus."

Simple self survival ought to discourage the growth of fascism & terrorism in our midst, but apparently the allure of Political Correctness is more powerful than the realities of their own lives.

"Viciously slandering Israel and of course the United States has become socially acceptable in Europe today, and Britain is no exception. Both of those hatreds are very selective: no such superhuman standards of moral conduct are applied to Saudi Arabia, the Sudan, or Zimbabwe, or France for that matter. Politically Correct intimidation governs British society, which is as frightening in its own way as Cromwell's witch-hunts four centuries ago. The spirit of the witch-hunt is alive today, and Britain's academics, and for that matter Britain's Jews, seem to be frozen in fear. Given the dark history of Europe this is another throwback to a mad past."

Perhaps Dark Ages & Inquisitions are part of the natural cycle of life in Europe - I will attempt to live where I'm a member of the audience, not a a participant.

The future of our civilization may be in doubt

American Thinker: The Mickey Martyr Club:

"Hamas, the Islamofascist party that now controls half the Palestinian population, is giving the world an important object lesson on civilization; or rather, on the crucial difference between civilization and barbarism. In a West that has dulled the edge of its moral sense after years of "all cultures are equal" propaganda, it is high time for us to learn again what seemed so simple and obvious to previous generations: That civilization is better than bloody, vengeful barbarism, both in war and peace.
. . .
the world has been introduced to the Mickey Martyr Club (Music please, Maestro!). Here come the kids marching in. Palestinian toddlers are being taught the glories of suicide-killing the Jews of Israel, using a Mickey Mouse rip-off on Hamas TV. Walt Disney's cartoon mouse is now Mickey Martyr, on his way to paradise-after-death in a thousand bloody shreds.
. . .
war raises the most agonizing moral questions, starting with the decision to kill, because other options have simply run out. Clear thinking about morality is the essence of civilized warfare, and civilized warfare is the only justifiable kind.

Given these considerations, what are we to make of the Mickey Martyr Club on Hamas TV? Has any cause ever discredited itself so completely?

What makes Hamas TV indoctrination of the very young even worse is that Hamas could have a peace agreement with Israel tomorrow. Don't believe that Hamas doesn't know that. They know perfectly well that the great majority of Israelis aspire to peace, and they despise them for it. Hamas represents a profoundly reactionary, fanatical, religious martyrdom creed, straight from the clan vendettas of the desert, twelve centuries ago.

Those tiny kids on Hamas TV could have a good life. They could grow and thrive, if only they were taught to accept their neighbors. All it takes is a decision by the adults, their mothers and fathers.

For Westerners who fastidiously turn their eyes away from Islamic primitivism, the time to take a stand is coming. Soon, no one will have the luxury of sitting this one out"

This rather long article has a good discussion of "just war" on it's way to this disturbing conclusion. It is worth reading in it's entirety at the link above.

Don't make the mistake of believing that Hamas is the only barbarian group and Israel the only victim. They're funded very well by people in other middle eastern countries, including some countries that pose as our allies. Techniques that work in this corner of the Middle East will be used again in Europe and eventually here in the US unless we have the will to stop them in the only way possible - with force.

Diabetes drug Avandia is latest FDA Scandal

Latest drug scare shows need for FDA overhaul - Yahoo! News:

"On Monday, The New England Journal of Medicine rushed out an analysis by prominent cardiologist Steven Nissen of data about patients taking Avandia. It suggests they have a 43% higher chance of suffering a heart attack.

The exact numbers aren't known and may be quite small. Glaxo says that the analysis is flawed and that its own studies show the opposite. Either way, users of the drug have a problem. If Avandia boosts the risk of cardiac disease, that is particularly frightening to diabetics, two-thirds of whom die of heart problems. On the other hand, if Glaxo is right, patients would increase their risk by quitting the drug. The FDA isn't helping them make that choice.

Only as the report came out did the FDA acknowledge potential problems and advise people on Avandia to consult with their doctors. It stopped short of warning against taking the drug. It said it was reanalyzing data that Glaxo had provided 'recently.' Recently would be last August, a full nine months ago.
. . .
The Vioxx scandal should have forced big, quick changes at FDA. It hasn't. Last year, the
Government Accountability Office, Congress' watchdog arm, issued a scathing report describing an agency hobbled by turf battles, insufficient resources, poor management and passivity in tracking adverse reactions once drugs are approved.

The FDA is convening an advisory board of experts in September to look at all the evidence it has about Avandia. But it shouldn't have taken alarm bells from an independent analyst to prompt one - and the September date suggests a disturbing lack of urgency."

This is what happens in bureaucracies - they start out with the best intentions and end up squabbling about internal politics. We taxpayers are not getting the protection we're paying for, and we're not getting the medicine we're paying for either. Perhaps big government solutions are actually part of the problem ...

One key question to always ask your doctor - "does this prescription increase or reduce mortality rates?" In other words, find out if it is proven to make you live longer, or just masks symptoms your doctor doesn't like seeing in your lab tests.

Also, you can always do your own comparisons for interactions with other drugs, vitamins, & supplements you take, One web-site for comparisons is Medscape from WebMD, but there are many others to be found with a simple Google search.