Just to have a post:
The NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts
http://www.niac.usra.edu/
(For projects that won't bear fruit in the immediate future.)
http://www.adtdl.army.mil/atdls.htm
General Dennis J. Reimer Training and Doctrine Digital Library
(Just in case you need to know how to run that battalion of attack helicopters you have lying around.)
As I'm in the middle of a discussion about the Federal budget, I thought I'd look up some figures. You can find information on Federal budgets through 2002 at the Whitehouse:
2002 budget in PDF format -- note the pretty tables!
2001 budget in html format -- more tables
I also found more recent budget estimates in slightly less people-friendly formats at the OMB:
The 2004 fiscal year budget estimate, in tables
Fun facts from this year's budget, with comparisons to 2002:
Defense discretionary: 425 billion (19.2%, in 2002 it was 16% of the total budget)
Nondefense discretionary: 434 billion (19.6%, in 2002 it was 19% of the total budget)
Social security: 471 billion (21.2%, in 2002 it was 23% of the total budget)
Medicare: 244 billion (11%, in 2002 it was 12% of the total budget)
Medicaid: 168 billion (7.6%, in 2002 it was 7% of the total budget)
Other mandatory: 313 billion
Total spending: 2,212 billion
Total income: 1,756 billion
Deficit: -455 billion (ouch; in 2002, there was still a surplus...)
Fun defense facts, from Straight Dope (I just googled them, but I think they're reasonably consistent in their resource gathering):
The top five big spenders on the military as a percent of gross national product:
1. Eritrea (27.4%)
2. Angola
3. North Korea (I guessed this one would be on there...they have a huge number of soldiers for their size)
4. Oman
5. Saudi Arabia
Ah...I was just reminded to add a bit about where the money comes from (using 2001, but it's pretty consistent across years):
Individual income tax: 48%
Corporate income tax: 10%
Other: 4%
Excise taxes (for example, fees on alcohol and tobacco): 4%
Social insurance receipts: 34% (and you might as well bundle this in with income tax -- it's another form, really)
I'm personally fond of income taxes; I'm happy to pay into the services I rely on. Mind, I'd like them to be managed better than is happening right now, especially since our current chief executive is simultaneously cutting taxes on people who don't need the help and spending more money. Not really conservative, that.
The BBC has a decent little flash primer on urban warfare. You can see it here.
I had my second round interviews with McKinsey & Co. today. Now I wait to see if I made it to round three.
I'm sure this has come up before:
For
Here's a rundown of the people representing me in the legislature at each level of government:
Mountain View city government
http://www.ci.mtnview.ca.us/citygov/council/roster.htm
State senator Elaine Alquist
Assembly member Sally Lieber
http://democrats.assembly.ca.gov/members/a22/
United States senator Diane Feinstein
United States senator Barbara Boxer
United States representative Anna Eshoo
Honeyfields is represented by United States representative Zoe Lofgren
A Flickr group devoted to error messages:
Should you ever have a hankering for old-style Communist propaganda, you can read the "Korean News" from the Korean Central News Agency of DPRK.
A lot of it is staid, '50s-style Communist gibberish:
Three-revolution team members active in different domains of the national economy in the DPRK have successfully settled not a few scientific and technological issues arising in the nation's development of science and technology and the building of a great prosperous powerful nation.
It's interesting, of late, to see how it balances broad Korean 'ethnic nationalism' with the need to vilify the South. Consider these two stories:
S. Korea's Policy of Opening Education Market Accused
Pyongyang, May 5 (KCNA) -- At least 3,500 members of the All-People Educational Solidarity in south Korea, which groups 83 educational and public organizations including the "National Teachers Union", held a rally in Youido of Seoul on April 30, at which they accused the government of its unjust education policy, the south Korean MBC reported. The participants in the rally said that they could not repress resentment at the present government which has pursued the policy of opening the education market because it will bring education to collapse. They demanded the government drop it at once.
Message: The South Koreans are screwing things up.
Motion on Tok Islet Passes through S. Korean NA
Pyongyang, May 5 (KCNA) -- The "Unification, Diplomacy and Trade Committee of the National Assembly" of south Korea adopted a motion on defending the dominium over Tok Islet on May 3, the south Korean KBS reported. The motion said south Korea strongly condemns Japan's claim to Tok Islet and distortion of history in textbooks as it made a premeditated and deliberate attempt at grabbing part of Korea's territory in a bid to recall the departed soul of imperialists, far from making an honest reflection and apology for its past history.
Message: The South Koreans are Koreans, and they're going to make sure what's rightly ours (as Koreans) is ours.
It's natural that things would assort in this way, but it's fascinating to see them try to fit both kinds of rhetoric into the same voice.
For South Korean news in English: Chosun Ilbo. I don't think it's the best news source one could find in South Korea, but it does at least have a lot of English-language coverage, and my Korean is far from good enough to make it through a Korean news site in any sane amount of time.
Should you ever find yourself arguing with the wiggier sort of libertarian (free market everything!) the Non-Libertarian FAQ provides a useful deconstruction of many of the more unsound libertarian concepts.
Also just an interesting read, generally.
Last week, ota mentioned to us that one can block pre-approved credit card offers. Here's more info on the Federal Trade Commission web site.
I'll be calling to do this presently.
From NPR:
Obtain free real estate estimates at www.zillow.com.
A Sukhoi (a Russian fighter) making some insane maneuvers. So many of these look like they should result in unrecoverable flat spins or tumbles.
The top hit on a Google search for "anniversaries" is this list of wedding anniversary gifts from the Chicago Public Library. It includes both "traditional" and "modern" options.
Highlights:
The traditional first anniversary is "paper," the modern is "clocks." Both are kind of tepid.
The "modern" list features diamonds at the tenth, thirtieth, sixtieth and higher anniversaries. The "traditional" list only has diamond at the sixtieth anniversary, which, given lifespans in older eras, seems like a dodge designed to get you out of ever having to give a diamond anniversary gift.
Peculiar "modern" anniversaries include the forty-second ("improved real estate"), the forty-fourth ("groceries"), the forty-sixth ("original poetry tribute") and the forty-eighth ("optical goods -- e.g. telescope, microscope").
Most impressive is that the "modern" listing goes all the way up to the hundredth anniversary, for which the gift is "10-carat diamond." Let's hope you invested properly at the start of that century-long marriage so you can afford the million-dollar price tag.
Overall, I think someone at the Chicago Public Library is yanking our chains.
Otters holding hands:
Oh hai. In teh beginnin Ceiling Cat waz invisible, An he maded the skiez An da Urf, but he no eated it.
- Genesis 1:1, from the lolcat Bible
Found by clicking through a link from meta's most recent random 10 post to apophenia's blog, where it was the most recent post.
From the ads at the top of my Gmail just now:
Which is great, because I was really having trouble finding spare parts for my old Panzerkampfwagen VI Ausf. B.
Before I delete the link from my bookmarks:
Wil Wheaton reading at Phoenix Cactus Comicon 2008
Wil reads a story from one of his books, as well as reading his review of the TNG episode Justice from tvsquad.com.
I'd already read the Justice review, but enjoyed the live version quite a bit, too. This reading is currently sitting on my iPod.
Just ran across this today, on UK-based Rapture TV:
That's Jean-Claude Van Damme dancing in a video for the Bob Sinclar song "Kiss My Eyes."
Jean-Claude is a trained dancer, by the way.
This came up in conversation with all the nice folks who helped us move yesterday. Yngwie Malmsten teaches you how to play guitar, the easy way:
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