Schadenfreude: Pleasure derived from the misfortunes of others.
Example: When I [Lloyd Grove of the NY Daily News] suggested to Franken that I didn’t believe him [regarding that he had “no comment” about O’Reilly’s recent legal woes] and that he must be having his own little schadenfreude festival he conceded: “Well, if this is true, there’ll be enough schadenfreude to fuel … uh, no comment, no comment!”
ADMIRONISHMENT: “No one does weird quite as well as Japanese game designers and animators, who come up with concepts so bizarre that one feels a mix of admiration and astonishment, best expressed as admironishment.” – Charles Herold, author of the Game Theory article “Touches of Weird, Done Best in Japan”
SPOOFPROOF: “Nothing is spoofproof,” said Timothy L. Murray, the chief operating officer of Cross Match Technologies, which has supplied scanners used at 115 airports and 15 seaports. “So there’s a market niche that cares an awful lot about whether the thing on the reader is alive.” – Ian Austin, author of the What’s Next article “Is It Really You? A Scanner Delves Beneath Fingerprints”
I’ve grabbed from Space.com this interview with Burt Rutan, aerospace maverick and winner of the X Prize. He’s been in the papers a lot in recent years (feel free to read the article from Wired back in July, 2003 which is especially good). This new article, basically an interview with Burt, is incrediblity enlightening and if you have any interest in being a civilian astronaut in your lifetime, read it! Also, it’s amazing how much he looks like a grizzled Wolverine – if Logan ever had a father, Burt would be my first choice to play him in the fourth or fifth X-Men movie (see below).
Thursday, October 14, 2004
MOJAVE, California — Nobody can claim that Burt Rutan, the innovative aerospace designer, doesn’t have his head in the clouds – and his eyes focused on the stars.
Fresh from success of nudging the piloted SpaceShipOne’s nose to record-setting heights and capturing the $10 million Ansari X Prize, Rutan and his team at Scaled Composites have clearly set their sights on far loftier goals.
One gets the feeling that in restricted niches of the Mojave Spaceport here, work is already underway on bigger and better spaceships. Asked directly about that prospect, Rutan is quick with a “no comment” that comes wrapped in a guarded smile.
“You think this is cool?” Rutan asked, pointing to the freshly flown SpaceShipOne. “Wait ’til you see SpaceShipTwo … it is erotic,” he added, alluding to the smooth lines of a craft that would seem tangible and touchable – not a minds-eye image of vaporware.
In an exclusive interview with SPACE.com the day after his design won the X Prize, Rutan discussed his passion for making the space frontier accessible to the public.
Simplicity of design
Standing in Scaled Composite’s hangar alongside his creation, Rutan examined the spacecraft. It looks fresh and ready for flight; no worse the wear from its high-speed, back-to-back suborbital jaunts.
“Any damage is actually kind of hard to find,” Rutan said. A slight charring in a couple of spots on the vessel is all that’s visible. “You’re hard pressed to find anything else.”
Thermal protection is not an issue for suborbital space tourism, Rutan said. “We got to 3.3 Mach number, but we only go there momentarily. We don’t sit there for about an hour like the SR-71 does,” recounting the abilities of the super-fast military reconnaissance aircraft.
Looking into the hybrid rocket motor area of SpaceShipOne, Rutan underscores the simplicity of the power plant’s design.
“The fewer things you have that can leak or can fail in a rocket motor the fewer problems you have,” is a Rutan rule of thumb.
Similarly, there’s the plumbing of the craft, pneumatic cylinders and valves to control the large movable tail section rather than using electrical systems. Like your garden hose under pressure, a turn of the valve and water is definitely going to come out, Rutan said. “It’s just that reliable.”
Tomorrowland upbringing
On any number of topics — be it NASA (news – web sites), large aerospace contractors, or inept television reporters — Rutan has an opinion, mischievously taking out a handmade ear from his shirt pocket and casually slipping it on.
Wording on the false ear speaks volumes: “Bull**** Deflector”.
Time traveling back to when he was 12 years of age, Rutan recalls a seminal moment that triggered his yearning about space travel.
In 1955, Walt Disney took television viewers into Tomorrowland – a series of Disneyland presentations that included rocket genius Wernher von Braun detailing space travel in matter-of-fact prose. Those TV shows also talked about floating in weightlessness, lunar exploration, as well as the potential for life on Mars.
“It influenced my life like you wouldn’t believe,” Rutan recalled. Those television airings came before Sputnik in 1957, the selection of America’s first astronaut corps, and the flight of the Soviet Union’s Yuri Gagarin – the first human into Earth orbit.
“And we’re sitting there amazed throughout the 1960s. We were amazed because our country was going from Walt Disney and von Braun talking about it – all the way to a plan to land a man on the Moon – Wow!”
The right to dream
But as a kid back then, Rutan continued, the right to dream of going to the Moon or into space was reserved for only “professional astronauts” – an enormously dangerous and expensive undertaking.
Over the decades, Rutan said, despite the promise of the Space Shuttle to lower costs of getting to space, a kid’s hope of personal access to space in their lifetime remained in limbo.
“Look at the progress in 25 years of trying to replace the mistake of the shuttle. It’s more expensive, not less, a horrible mistake,” Rutan said. “They knew it right away. And they’ve spent billions – arguably nearly $100 billion over all these years trying to sort out how to correct that mistake – trying to solve the problem of access to space. The problem is – it’s the government trying to do it.”
Forecast of things to come
The flights of SpaceShipOne, Rutan said, permit a forecast of things to come.
“I predict in five or six years, the average kid is no longer just hoping and dreaming that he’ll go to space. He knows he will. He’ll at least take one of these suborbital flights that are flying every other day or every day here at Mojave,” Rutan stated. While initially expensive, flights into space will drop in price over time, he added.
“And I predict that within 10 years from now, maybe 12 years, kids will know that they will go to orbit in their lifetime. They will know they will – not just dream and hope,” Rutan explained.
IBM mentality
Turning his attention to the larger aerospace firms like Boeing and Lockheed Martin that offer pricey lines of boosters, Rutan offers free advice.
“They are thinking SpaceShipOne is a toy,” Rutan said. That assumption is akin to the mentality of IBM in 1975. At that time, they believed people aren’t going to have cheap computers. Computers are main frames and they have to be complex and very specialized. That was the view of IBM, he pointed out.
“IBM didn’t know in 1975 that they were going to build $700 dollar computers for people and that they were going to build them by the tens of thousands. But then came Apple,” Rutan said, “and they had to.”
That being the case, Rutan made another prediction: “Lockheed and Boeing will be making very low-cost access to space hardware within 20 years. They just don’t know it yet – because they’re going to have to.”
Thousands of probes
Rutan said that an upshot of public space travel is the creation of far less expensive boosters in order to satisfy growing numbers of customers.
That development — coupled with advances in computers and sensors – will enable thousands of probes to be launched that flood the solar system 25 years from now, Rutan said.
“You’ll be able to do a lot more exploration if you send thousands. And it’ll be cheap because the boosters were developed because people can’t afford to spend too much to get into orbit,” Rutan concluded.
“I could be wrong – but these are the things that keep me up nights.”
As my wife so acutely pointed out today, the NY Times Real Estate section has been mirroring our life for the past few months. Actually, its consistently about a week or two behind actual events. Here’s how:
First, a little background. Jessie and I are currently looking at apartments to buy. When we first started looking, we thought that we would buy an apartment in Harlem because its up-and-coming and the prices are so much cheaper than the rest of Manhattan. A week or two after we began looking in earnest, the Times printed an article on August 29th entitled “In East Harlem, Developers Find The Next Frontier.” We laughed and also were a tad dismayed; what if everyone adopted the same strategy as we had based on this article and whatever deals remained would be quickly snapped up?
After looking in Harlem for only a little bit, we found what we thought was the ideal apartment – a 3 bed room 1000 sq ft apartment on 119th and Madison. It was bigger and more expensive than we wanted and needed but as an investment, we thought that it was a “can’t miss” proposition. We bid on it the next day and although our bid was accepted, the seller later that week made up (or at least we strongly suspect made up) some story about a higher bid coming in after ours was accepted and said that we could still have the apartment but that we needed to match the higher asking price. We declined and walked away from the deal because it was just too much. The very next weekend, on September 26th, the Times published an article entitled “3-Bedrooms Soar as New York Nests” which featured the apartment we walked away from as the only 3 bedroom apartment that is available in Manhattan for less than $500,000. Jessie and I laughed and said, “I guess that apartment is going to be even more popular now.” In fact, it wasn’t sold and its now off the market. We both think that the seller was fucking about and just wanted to see how much he/she could get for it. If the price was high enough, he/she would sell. I guess the price isn’t high enough yet.
We continued to look for an apartment, working on our own and with the aid of our broker. We have a very ambivalent feeling towards him because while we like him, we don’t love him and often feel that we are finding more and better apartments to look at than he is finding for us. True to form about a week or two after we started to feel this way, the Times wrote an article on October 3rd entitled Your Broker as Your Friend, or Maybe Not.
After looking at a number of different apartments over a few weekends, we found one that we liked alot and placed a bid on it. Ours was one of five bids but after a day’s worth of negotiations, it was the winning bid. The apartment is an awesome loft space one block from Washington Square Park in the heart of NYU’s campus. Its basically a big white box which needs some work so we would put in a new bathroom, new kitchen, new closets and even build a nice second level because it has 13 foot ceilings and we can – we saw another apartment in the same building that did this already and we were really looking forward to this design project. However, when talking about the building to our friend Keri she said, “Aren’t you going to be living above a restaurant?” We didn’t know – the entrance was on a side street and we hadn’t been back since the open house. So, Jessie did some recon on her way to work and sure enough, the ground floor has a mexican cantina, a coffee shop and a caterer. The apartment we “won” was on the second floor. So, once again we walked away from an apartment, although this time rather reluctantly. Sure enough, this past weekend the NY Times followed our lead with an article on October 10th entitled Rushing to Buy Can Bring Regrets on Moving Day”. This is now just plain weird.
Now we are thinking about simply renting for another year or two instead of buying because the market is so inflated. If the Times writes about this as an emerging trend, I’m going to crap myself and seek a restraining order.
“Folk songs are evasive.” They offer “the truth about life, and life is more or less a lie, but then again that’s exactly the way we ant it to be.” Their lesson? “If you told the truth, that was all well and good and if you told the un-truth, well, that’s still well and good. Folk songs taught me that.”
“The sociologist were saying that TV had deadly intentions and was destroying the minds and imaginations of the young – that their attention spans were being dragged down. Maybe that’s true but the three minute song also did the same thing.”
The Civil War was when “America was put on the cross, died and was resurrected…would be the all-encompassing template behind everything that I would write.”
A very important legal motion was made last week. A NY Times reporter was ordered sent to prison in contempt of court because she would not give up a source. This case, and the story behind it, has been in the news for quite some time. The short of it is that Bob Novak outed a CIA agent and the government is trying to find who was at fault. This makes sense – people might have died because of this lapse in judgement and it is 100% against the law to divulge this type of national security secret. However, the manner in which the government goes about finding who was at fault in interesting as well. Here is the Op-Ed response to this legal judgement, from the publisher of the NY Times himself:
The Promise of the First Amendment
By ARTHUR OCHS SULZBERGER JR., chairman and publisher, and RUSSELL T. LEWIS, chief executive, The New York Times
Last Thursday, a federal district judge ordered a New York Times reporter, Judy Miller, sent to prison. Her crime was doing her job as the founders of this nation intended. Here’s what happened and why it should concern you.
On July 6, 2003, Joseph C. Wilson IV – formerly a career foreign service officer, a charge d’affaires in Baghdad and an ambassador – wrote an article published on this page under the headline, “What I Didn’t Find in Africa.” The article served to undercut the Bush administration’s claims surrounding Saddam Hussein’s nuclear capacity.
Eight days later, Robert Novak, a syndicated columnist, wrote an article in which he identified Ambassador Wilson’s wife, Valerie Plame, as an “operative on weapons of mass destruction” for the C.I.A. “Two senior administration officials told me,” Mr. Novak wrote, that it was Ms. Plame who “suggested sending Wilson” to investigate claims that Iraq had tried to purchase uranium ore from Niger. After Mr. Novak’s report, several other journalists wrote stories in which they said they received similar information about Ms. Plame from confidential government sources, in what many have concluded was an effort to punish Mr. Wilson for speaking out against the administration by exposing his wife as a C.I.A. operative. The record is clear, however, that Judy Miller is not one of those journalists who reported this information.
Because the government officials who revealed Valerie Plame’s status as a C.I.A. operative to the press might have committed a crime in doing so, the Justice Department opened a federal criminal investigation to find whoever was responsible.
During the course of this investigation, the details of which have been kept secret, several journalists have been subpoenaed to provide information about the source of the leak and threatened with jail if they failed to comply.
On Aug. 12, Ms. Miller received a subpoena in which she was required to provide information about conversations she might have had with a government official in which the identity and C.I.A. connection of Mr. Wilson’s wife might have been mentioned. She received this subpoena even though she had never published anything concerning Mr. Wilson or his wife. This is not the only recent case in which the government has subpoenaed information concerning Ms. Miller’s sources. On July 12, the same prosecutor sought to have Ms. Miller and another Times correspondent, Philip Shenon, identify another source. Curiously, this separate investigation concerns articles on Islamic charities and their possible financial support for terrorism that were published nearly three years ago. As part of this effort to uncover the reporters’ confidential sources, the prosecutor has gone to the phone company to obtain records of their phone calls.
So, unless an appeals court reverses last week’s contempt conviction, Judy Miller will soon be sent to prison. And, if the government succeeds in obtaining the phone records of Ms. Miller and Mr. Shenon, many of their sources – even those having nothing to do with these two government investigations – will become known.
Why does all of this matter? The possibility of being forced to leave one’s family and sent to jail simply for doing your job is an appalling prospect for any journalist – indeed, any citizen. But as concerned as we are with our colleague’s loss of liberty, there are even bigger issues at stake for us all.
The press simply cannot perform its intended role if its sources of information – particularly information about the government – are cut off. Yes, the press is far from perfect. We are human and make mistakes. But, the authors of our Constitution and its First Amendment understood all of that and for good reason prescribed that journalists should function as a “fourth estate.” As Justice Potter Stewart put it, the primary purpose of the constitutional guarantee of a free press was “to create a fourth institution outside the government as an additional check on the three official branches.”
The founders of our democracy understood that our government was also a human institution that was capable of mistakes and misdeeds. That is why they constructed a First Amendment that would give the press the ability to investigate problems in the official branches of our government and make them known to the public. In this way, the press was sensibly put in a position to help hold government accountable to its citizens.
An essential tool that the press must have if it is to perform its job is the ability to gather and receive information in confidence from those who would face reprisals for bringing important information about our government into the light of day for all of us to examine. Without an enforceable promise of confidentiality, sources would quickly dry up and the press would be left largely with only official government pronouncements to report.
A quarter of a century ago, a New York Times reporter, Myron Farber, was ordered to jail, also for doing his job and refusing to give up confidential information. He served 40 days in a New Jersey prison cell. In response to this injustice, the New Jersey Legislature strengthened its “shield law,” which recognizes and serves to protect a journalist’s need to protect sources and information. Although the federal government has no shield law, the vast majority of states, as well as the District of Columbia, have by now put in place legal protections for reporters. While many of these laws are regarded as providing an “absolute privilege” for journalists, others set out a strict test that the government must meet before it can have a reporter thrown into jail. Perhaps it is a function of the age we live in or perhaps it is something more insidious, but the incidence of reporters being threatened with jail by the federal government is on the rise.
To reverse this trend, to give meaning to the guarantees of the First Amendment and to thereby strengthen our democracy, it is now time for Congress to follow the lead of the states and enact a federal shield law for journalists. Without one, reporters like Judy Miller may be imprisoned. More important, the public will be in the dark about the actions of its elected and appointed government officials. That is not what our nation’s founders had in mind.
To honor the life of Jacob Cohen, aka Rodney Dangerfield, I have compiled for your faithful reader some of his best one liners:
I come from a stupid family. During the civil war my great uncle fought for the west!
My father was stupid. He worked in a bank and they caught him stealing pens.
When I was born..the doctor came out to the waiting room and said to my father.. “I’m very sorry. We did everything we could..but he pulled through.”
My mother had morning sickness after I was born.
My mother never breast fed me. She told me that she only liked me as a friend.
My father carries around the picture of the kid who came with his wallet.
I could tell that my parents hated me. My bath toys were a toaster and a radio.
I worked in pet store and people kept asking how big I’d get.
One year they wanted to make me poster boy..for birth control.
I remember the time I was kidnapped and they sent back a piece of my finger to my father. He said he wanted more proof!
My uncle’s dying wish was to have me sitting on his lap. He was in the electric chair.
I stuck my head out the window and got arrested for mooning!
Once when I was lost.. I saw a policeman and asked him to help me find my parents. I said to him..”Do you think we’ll ever find them.” He said..”I don’t know kid.. there are so many places they can hide.”
I remember I was so depressed I was going to jump out a window on the tenth floor.. so they sent a priest up to talk to me. He said..”On your mark…”
On Halloween..the parents send their kids out looking like me. Last year.. one kid tried to rip my face off! Now it’s different.. when I answer the door the kids hand me candy.
When my old man wanted sex.. my mother would show him a picture of me.
I had a lot of pimples too. One day I fell asleep in a library. I woke up and a blind man was reading my face.
My wife made me join a bridge club. I jump off next tuesday.
One time I went to a hotel. I asked the bellhop to handle my bag. He felt up my wife!
For two hours..some guy followed me around with a pooper scooper.
I met the surgeon general. He offered me a cigarette!
A travel agent offered me a 21 day special. He told me I would fly from New York to London. Then from Tokyo back to New York.I asked him..”How am I supposed to get from London to Tokyo?” He told me..”That is why we give you 21 days.” Another travel agent told me I could spend 7 nights in Hawaii. No days.. just nights.
My problem is that I appeal to everyone that can do me absolutely no good. They say..”Love thy neighbor as thy self.” What am I supposed to do? Jerk him off too?
At christmas time I sat on santa’s lap. His fly was open. Boy..what a present he gave me!
My sex life is terrible. My wife put a mirror over the dogs bed. Actually she did put the mirror over our bed. She says she likes to watch herself laugh.
I’m a bad lover. Once I caught a peeping tom booing me.
My wife only has sex with me for a purpose. Last night she used me to time an egg.
I asked my wife if she would put out the garbage. She said..”Why should I.. you never put out for me.”
I asked her if she enjoys a cigarette after sex.She said..”No.. one drag is enough.”
A girl phoned me and said..”Come on over there’s nobody home.” I went over. Nobody was home!
A hooker once told me she had a headache.
I went to a massage parlor. It was self service.
If it weren’t for pick-pocketers i’d have no sex life at all.
I was making love to this girl and she started crying. I said..”Are you going to hate yourself in the morning?” She said.. “No.. I hate myself now.”
She was no bargain either. She showed up with pigtails under her arms.
She was fat and ugly. She was so fat that…
– She got on the scale and a card came out saying.. “One at a time.”
– Her bath tub has stretch marks.
– Her belly button makes an echo.
– She has a dress with a sign on the back saying.. “Caution wide load.”
– When guys have sex with her they ask for directions.
– One day I ran into her with my car. She asked me why I didn’t ride around her. I told her that I didn’t think I had enough gas.
– Her bikini is made out of two bed sheets.
– When guys eat her out they ask for provisions for the trip.
She was so ugly that…
– She was known as a two bagger. That’s when a girl is so ugly that you put a bag over your head in case the bag over her head breaks.
– I bent down to pet her cat only to find that it was the hair on her legs.
– I took her to a dog show and she won first prize.
– They use her in prisons to cure sex offenders.
– I took her to the top of the Empire State building and planes started to attack her
– The last time I saw a mouth like hers it had a hook on the end of it.
I was tired one night and I went to the bar to have a few drinks. The bartender asked me.. “What’ll you have?” I said..”surprise me.” He showed me a naked picture of my wife.
During sex my wife always wants to talk to me. Just the other night she called me from a hotel.
My marriage is on the rocks again. Yeah..my wife just broke up with her boyfriend. One day..as I came home early from work..I saw a guy jogging naked. I said to the guy..”Hey buddy..why are you doing that for?” He said..”Because you came home early.”
I went to look for a used car. I found my wife’s dress in the back seat!
Once in a restaurant I made a toast to her..”The best woman a man ever had.” The waiter joined me.
It’s been a rough day. I got up this morning..put on a shirt and a button fell off. I picked up my briefcase and the handle came off. I’m afraid to go to the bathroom!
I had a problem. I tried group sex. Now I have a new problem…I don’t know who to thank!
My friends and I played a new version of Russian roulette. We passed around six girls and one of them had VD.
I went to see my doctor.. you know him.. Doctor Vidi-boom-ba? Yeah..I told him once.. “Doctor.. every morning when I get up and look in the mirror..I feel like throwing up; what’s wrong with me?” He said..”I don’t know but your eyesight is perfect.”
I remember when I swallowed a bottle of sleeping pills. He told me to have a few drinks and get some rest.
I told him I think my wife has VD. He gave himself a shot of penicillin.
I told my dentist my teeth are going yellow. He told me to wear a brown necktie.
He found a new way to cover up his bad breath…he holds up his arms.
Why every time he smokes..he blows onion rings.
My psychiatrist told me I’m going crazy. I told him.. “If you don’t mind I’d like a second opinion. “He said..”Alright..you’re ugly too.”
I was so ugly..my mother used to feed me with a sling shot!
When I was born the doctor took one look at my face…turned me over and said.. “Look…twins!”
And we were poor too. Why if I wasn’t born a boy..I’d have nothing to play with!
The Bush Administration has passed legislation called the Leave No Child Behind Act which creates federal standards on education policy and results. While good in name, it is in fact leaving more children behind than before it was passed because it has been incredibly and woefully underfunded. Standards are in place that most states of no hope of living up to. Money that was promised has not and almost will not appear. Here is a run-down of what the NY tri-state area didn’t get and what the 3 “crucial” swing states didn’t get:
NY TRI-STATE AREA:
New York did not get $966 million in public school funding last year promised by Congress and the President, including $664 million for extra academic support for low-income students, $73 million for critical after-school programs, and $24 million to raise teacher quality.
New Jersey did not get $209 million in public school funding last year promised by Congress and the President, including $122 million for extra academic support for low-income students, $15 million for critical after-school programs, and $7 million to raise teacher quality.
Connecticut did not get $80 million in public school funding last year promised by Congress and the President, including $47 million for extra academic support for low-income students, $6 million for critical after-school programs, and $3 million to raise teacher quality.
SWING STATES:
Florida did not get $500 million in public school funding last year promised by Congress and the President, including $313 million for extra academic support for low-income students, $35 million for critical after-school programs, and $17 million to raise teacher quality.
Ohio did not get $310 million in public school funding last year promised by Congress and the President, including $196 million for extra academic support for low-income students, $23 million for critical after-school programs, and $12 million to raise teacher quality.
Pennsylvania did not get $337 million in public school funding last year promised by Congress and the President, including $217 million for extra academic support for low-income students, $25 million for critical after-school programs, and $12 million to raise teacher quality.
Thanks go to the Committee on Education and the Workforce for providing the stats.
SpaceShipOne soared into space today, the second time in less than a week, and won the X Prize which worth if you were wondering a cool 10 million dollars. Here is how Google honored the winners, who will usher in a new age of space tourism:
The ultimate goal of the Burt Ratan crew is to bring the cost of a space flight for passengers down to the price of a low-cost car. I would gladly sell my Yugo to experience weightlessness. Richard Branson is already on the SpaceShipOne bandwagon – he’s licensed the technology to create Virgin Galactic, a company that will sell flights on a more consumer friendly version of Scaled Composite’s prize winning spacecraft. Branson says he’s naming the first plane the V.S.S. Enterprise. Talk about an homage. I hear they are only accepting applications from pilots named either Sulu or Checkov…