Libya! Duh!

To everyone who assumed that the enemy of Gaddafi was automatically the group we should support. Read on

Libya's liberation: interim ruler unveils more radical than expected plans for Islamic law

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Mr Abdul-Jalil went further, specifically lifting immediately, by decree, one law from Col. Gaddafi's era that he said was in conflict with Sharia - that banning polygamy.

My stars! The muslim nation who ousted their dictator is going to reform into an even more muslim nation? Whodathinkit!?

Plus no alcohol or loan interest. Stick that in your “enlightened” world view and smoke it.

At best we are looking at an emerging longer term struggle between the younger more western leaning populace vs the traditional Islamists. I’ve said it before - You cannot give people democracy who do not understand it. It has to be a revelation from within. Just because there is revolution, doesn’t mean there is revelation.

When does Hendrix go on?

Seeing the unbelievable mess that is now the Occupy Wall Street movement, I am reminded of Woodstock.

At least with Woodstock there was good music. Plus, the music also provided something else of practical value – when the music stopped, you knew it was time to go home.

Pigeon-Guided Rocket

Human ingenuity never fails to astound me. During World War II, the US needed to figure out how to guide a missile effectively but the available machinery wasn’t small enough to do the job. The solution? According to B.F. Skinner it was to place 3 pigeons in the nose cone to guide the missile in flight and they gave him $25k to try it out.

He built a nose cone for a missile fitted with three small electronic screens and three tiny pigeon cockpits. Onto the screens was projected an image of the ground in front of the rocket.

“He would train street pigeons to recognize the pattern of the target, and to peck when they saw this target,” says Kidwell. “And then when all three of them pecked, it was thought you could actually aim the missile in that direction.” As the pigeons pecked, cables harnessed to each one’s head would mechanically steer the missile until it finally reached its mark.

The most astounding thing about the project is that it actually worked! But even after a successful demonstration, officials declines to go Skinner’s way.

(for more avian carrier fun check out RFC 1149 – “Standard for the Transmission of IP datagrams on Avian Carriers” or “How to run the internet on carrier pigeons”)