Autonomous Swarm

No mention of how these swarm bots will be armed.  Seems a purpose built craft would offfer some advantages

Winter Soldier Anyone?

Why bother making a story about a test when the defense application is obvious?  Why say it is a three year study implying they will be aloft that long?  If they were aloft three years they would be outdates by the time they came down.



The location is also the most populated area in the US.



Radar ‘Blimps’ to Monitor Washington-area Skies | Defense Tech



Of course any serious discussion of this developmet will be drowned out by conspiracy theorists claiming the x band radar will turn of all into mindless zombies.

More Americans Renounce Citizenship, With 2014 on Pace for a Record - Total Return - WSJ

This is the domain of the Treasury Department? Hmmm. To paraphrase Princess Leah "The more you tighten your grip the more [taxpayers] will slip through your fingers."

More Americans Renounce Citizenship, With 2014 on Pace for a Record - Total Return - WSJ

Spending my son's money on guns

Well no, I am giving him wise council.

So he's has $300 in the bank and his thoughts are easily turned to guns.  He wants something that won't cost him everything.

22 Single Action pistols are great to look at and fun to cock. They are also very slow to reload which makes them not fun for plinking.  Plinking being about all they are good for, with the possible exception of dispatching trapped critters.  The low end ones apparently have a lemon now and then.

Taurus 94 looks like a great plinker. It holds as many as a semi-auto (9) and can have quick reloads with speed loaders which are as inexpensive if not more so than additional magazines ($10 at the moment).  Cost is an issue with this one.  Maybe we can get his sister to split the $360 price tag with him.

Viral morality and group think

"The Internet has simply camouflaged how bizarre such behavior is by making it go viral."--Dr. Keith Ablow

The economics of violence:a matter of scale

One of the concepts in The Sovereigns Individual is the economics of violence of making so it is not financially advantageous to have a massive army in this, the age of information.  It has occurred to me recently that while this trend make nations states more irrelevant, this does not mean they will not adapt, in fact, be leader in adapting to these trends.  I have comforted my self with the thought that the government would never "come for us."  It wouldn't economically make sense to load a tank onto a trailer. Haul it up here, unload it and have it destroy our roads rumbling along at 8 gallons/mile ( yes gpm not mpg) to come to my house to force me to comply.  This is also a strong argument for the right to keep and bear arms.  Gun control advocates are correct that a rifle is little good against a tank, but it is the local bureaucrat thugs for whom we need to raise the cost of violence.

The military is seeing it too.  Notice the following evolution of laser guided missles:
Hellfire: $150,000 missle, 100lbs, 20 lb warhead
Griffin:$75,000, 43lbs, 13lb warhead
LMM: 29lbs, 6.6lb warhead

No longer are russian tanks on the menu, but one house or car and not the ones around it.  Game changer.

I am indeed despicable

I watched Despicable Me while "overseeing" my 7 children and 1 nephew and wondering why we think the innocence of children can reform the evil in us.  Having children will quickly bring out your short temper, sharp tongue, and other vices. Children's innocence is beautiful but shallow and short lived.