Fred In Houston

He's Back

Excaliber

The Excalibur 155mm Precision Guided Extended Range Artillery Projectile, also known as the M982 ER DPICM (Extended Range Dual Purpose Improved Conventional Munitions) Projectile, is the Army's fire and forget, smart munition. It provides capability to attack all three key target sets, soft and armored vehicles, and reinforced bunkers, out to ranges exceeding current 155mm family of artillery munitions. Because of its accuracy and increased effectiveness, Excalibur reduces the logistical burden for deployed ground forces. It also provides lower collateral damage through its concentrated fragmentation pattern, increased precision and near-vertical descent.

The top target for al Qaeda in Iraq south of Baghdad was killed July 14 in Arab Jabour by precision-guided munitions, the Excalibur.

Shortly after 12 p.m., 1st Battalion, 30th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division, received a call that Abu Jurah and 14 anti-Iraqi forces were meeting at a house in Arab Jabour.

Abu Jurah was an AQI cell leader and was responsible for improvised explosive devices, vehicle-borne IED and indirect fire attacks on Coalition Forces in Arab Jabour.

At approximately 1:12 p.m., the house was positively identified allowing 1st Battalion, 9th Field Artillery Regiment to fire two Excalibur rounds destroying the meeting house.

An unmanned aerial vehicle observed persons leaving the house, loading injured individuals into a sedan and fleeing the scene.

An AH-64 Apache helicopter engaged the sedan destroying it.

Three people were observed running from the meeting house to a nearby house.

A U.S. Air Force F16 Fighting Falcon dropped two 500-pound GPS-guided bombs on the second house.

al Qaeda In Iraq Same As al Qaeda

President Bush’s Homeland Security Advisor Fran Townsend Made It Clear At A Press Conference Today That Al-Qaeda In Iraq Is Same Entity As Al-Qaeda In Pakistan.

It Doesn't End In Iraq

The Democrats kids are actively debating the surrender of the US in Iraq, but the enemy is plotting their next move. When will the kids learn. Real enemies must be defeated, not appeased. Thomas Sowell has a piece up at Townhall.com which explores the issue. It starts out ...

"And then what?" That is the question which should be asked of those who are demanding that we pull out of Iraq now.

If you seriously believe a pullout in Iraq is the answer, then you are compelled to answer that question. While you are at it, answer the question why is a pullout the answer? To what? hmmm, yeah that's the answer, but to what. No one knows.

Well I can tell you what is next, it will be the next front in the war with al Qaeda. That front is likely to be in the west, the U.S. or Europe most likely. Why do you think the terrorists, Iran and other al Qaeda allies are pouring resources, suicide bombers and everything they have into the conflict in Iraq? Think, think about that. Why are the terrorists doing that? Surly you don't believe they just want us to go away, news flash, we were away on Sept 11, 2001, weren't we?

The war does not end with Iraq, whether we pull out or not, it does not end there. And that is the question that all of the pullout now crowd must answer ... And then what?

Ubuntu Live!

July 22-24, 2007 Portland Oregon, the world's first Ubuntu Conference.

Carbon Neutral

Now leave my car alone.

What Do Iraqis Say

Note how the caption does not agree with the verbiage, for the people in the air ports who walk by without the time to listen to the whole story.

Incredible Shrinking Federal Debt

Yes, the federal deficit is shrinking. But the Democrat-led Congress, if it has its way, will bring it back with a vengeance by spending more than needed and by repealing Bush's tax cuts.

Source:

Sun Near And Far

July 2007 ... When is the Sun most distant from Earth? It happened again just this past weekend. A common misconception is that the Sun is most distant during the winter, when it's the coldest. In truth, however, the seasonal temperatures are more greatly influenced by the number of daylight hours and how high the Sun rises. For example, during northern winter, the tilt of the Earth causes the Sun to be above the horizon for a shorter time and remain lower in the sky than in northern summer. The picture compares the relative size of the Sun during Earth's closest approach in January (northern winter) on the left, and in July (northern summer) on the right. The angular size of the Sun is noticeably smaller during July, when it is farther away. If the Earth's orbit was perfectly circular, the Sun would always appear to be the same size. These two solar images were taken from Spain during 2006, but the same effect can be seen in any year from any Earth-bound location.

U.S. Heat Map

Globull Warming

The Coming Wave

The folks over at OLPC got the ball rolling with their slated $100 laptop, now slipped up to near $200, but the concept is taking off. The new idea is to not cram all the features of a desktop into a laptop, but to make a communication gadget that works with the connected world. A lightweight notebook that targets the email, Internet, video, photo, tunes storage crowd. Functionality not MIPs and megapixels, low cost functionality at that.

So here comes ASUS and Intel with the latest ASUS sub $200 miniature notebook.



Palm is weighing in with the Foleo



The major difference here is the ASUS can use either Linux or WinXP while the Palm has it's own OS. I would think Linux would be my choice, but ...

Then there is the Via NanoBook Ultra Mobile Design illustrate the tremendous interest by the mainstream mass market.








The children the One Laptop Per Child has spawned.

American

It's sometimes worthwhile to explore what the original founders of America thought about various subjects. Immigration has been the hot topic the last few months, so what did George Washington, the country's first President say about immigration. In Washington's farewell address he said

For this you have every inducement of sympathy and interest. Citizens by birth or choice, of a common country, that country has a right to concentrate your affections. The name of AMERICAN, which belongs to you, in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of Patriotism, more than any appellation derived from local discriminations. With slight shades of difference, you have the same Religion, Manners, Habits, and political Principles. You have in a common cause fought and triumphed together. The independence and liberty you possess are the work of joint councils, and joint efforts; of common dangers, sufferings and successes.

So Washington was a nationalists? What's wrong with that? A distinct American culture, as opposed to a multicultural hodge podge was deems to be better. Yes I think it is. It's not that people of other creeds are not welcome, it''s just that they must pick up the assimilation and become Americans. Yes, the burqa has to go, and also the Shiria law. You do not come to America to change America, bring your customs and expect those to be respected, you come to America to convert, to become American. If this bargain is not what you want, your choice is to stay where you are, there is no right to immigration, as much as the open borders crowd would like it to be.

... there is no need of encouragement: while the policy or advantage of [immigration] taking place in a body (I mean the settling of them in a body) may be much questioned; for, by so doing, they retain the Language, habits and principles (good or bad) which they bring with them. Whereas by an intermixture with our people, they, or their descendants, get assimilated to our customs, measures and laws: in a word, soon become one people.
- George Washington, in a letter to John Adams, November 15, 1794

It's obvious that by assimilating, becoming American, our country, our culture, our norms and our beliefs are to be preserved -- Not the norms of immigrants, those are to be discarded. That is the grand bargain for immigrants wishing to come to America, become Americans, one people.

The Pledge, Mostly Forgotten These Days

Globull Warming

Here is the latest image showing the CO2 emissions, well not directly but indirectly, caused by humans doing their agricultural burning. Since this is the week, may as well start it on the right foot, exposing the hoax. If it weren't a hoax, would these Live Earth people be singing the praises of this practice, or would they be trying to stop it. This does appear to be generating much more greenhouse gas that cars, I doubt even LA is this polluted -- An yes we have had our share of brush fires, and I know how bad the choking smoke is first hand.

July 1, 2007 - Fires in Central Africa

The agricultural burning season continued in central Africa in late June 2007. During the burning season, people use fire to clear brush and cropland, to drive livestock and game, and to renew pasture grasses. This image of fires in the heart of Africa was captured by the MODIS on NASA’s Aqua satellite on June 24, 2007. Places where MODIS detected actively burning fires—hundreds of them—are marked with red dots. Though it is not necessarily immediately hazardous, such large-scale burning can have a strong impact on weather, climate, human health, and natural resources.

The countries show are, from top left in roughly clockwise order: Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania, Zambia, and Angola.

Live Earth is Saturday maybe we can get one or more example a day of abuse of the environment that just seems to go on by when it comes to reporting. It's the evil cars and power plants, didn't you know? Why no, I didn't.

Countries on fire doesn't even twitch the globull warming loons meter, I wonder why that is?

Some Bumper Sticker