Brin-l Summary 3-30-02
From the Editor
It has been an interesting and at times contentious week in the world of Brin-l.
I wish I had more time to summarize some of these, but it was enough work with
the one liners. The Middle East threads, of which there are several, dominated
most of the week and becoming less constructive towards the end of the week. I
apologize for giving some of these threads short shrift, but it would have been
too time consuming for me to try and summarize them all in more detail.
Rising from the contentiousness in the Middle East discussion, the thread
Civility Request got a good deal of cursor phosphorus over the last few days.
It began as a request by Julia that the use of a certain prominent obscenity be
moderated and evolved into a discussion on the nature of such words and weather
or not they should be used on list. The best thing that came of that
discussion, IMO, was Marvin's Slappy Fish Dance thread in which he suggested: "I
think we should have a debate about the funniest Monty Python sketch ever."
I received no nominations for Post of the Week so I chose Brett Coster's
Original Axis Stuff post, reprinted at the end of the summary. Brett posted
several interesting and informative notes on WWII well worth reading as his
knowledge on the war is impressive. Good stuff, Brett.
A final note. A welcome to three people that either normally lurk or are new
list members: Klaus, Kimm and Dan.
And now back to my other project. Right Marvin?
3/24
Brin-l Summary 3-23-02
Kind words from Kevin. 8^)
This Week in the Middle East
Klaus, shedding his lurker status, weighs in on this latest thread on
the Arab-Israeli conflict.
Wow! Usenet Historical Archives.
Rob S. has found another treasure on the web. See:
http://www.google.com/googlegroups/archive_announce_20.html
nuclear warfare & the Bush administration
Continuing thread about the Bush administration's "Shadow Government"
and the discussion of nuclear battlefield weapons.
I'm back on-line
Julia's back from AggieCon.
NL Central
Continuing thread on Guatam's baseball predictions.'
SCOUTED: UNIX under the desktop
William Goodall offers "A penguin's-eye look at Apple's OS X. see:
http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=5610
NL West
The last (and least?) division in Guatam's baseball picks.
Near Miss: Asteroid takes Earth by surprise
Ronn posts an article relevant to this continuing discussion. See:
http://skyandtelescope.com/news/current/article_545_1.asp>:
3/25
How to See Comet Ikeya-Zhang
URL for an article about "The brightest comet since 1997's Hale-Bopp"
posted by Ronn. See:
http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/ep/pressrel/ikeya-zhang_rel.html
brain, gravity, weightlessness
"The Fool" posts the URL to an article about the human brain's internal
map of gravity. See:
http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s511262.htm
Scientology on the Rampage
Chad has issues with Scientology's bullying of Google. See:
http://microcontentnews.com/articles/googleupdate.htm
www.xenu.net
evolution
Zim weighs in on this continuing thread: "The minor differences in genes
distribution that characterize racial differences will be gone in a few
generations. Imagine that. John Lennon was right"
Fish
Fool posts a short article, "Fish Fillets Grown Larger In Tank", by Ian
Sample, about an attempt to grow meat.
Dutchness
Zim tells Dan he's a Nimrod, not a neurologist. 8^)
Missions to Mars
Alberto wonders why there wouldn't be sex in space as stated on a TV
show he has just seen.
EnderConI
Ronn directs us to a site where we can register for EnderCon. See:
http://www.endercon.com
Tentative Movie Poster For Star Trek: Nemesis
Posted by Ronn. See:
http://www.mediatrek.com/temp/st10poster_trekweb_mediatrek.jpg
3/26
Flame Warriors
Gary Nunn says: "Some of the Flame Warriors described here are painfully
close to the Brin-L list. :-) (notice smiley emoticon indicating good
natured humor)" See:
http://www.winternet.com/~mikelr/flame1.html
Kiln People race
In this spin-off of the evolution thread, Chad asks if we think Brin was
alluding to racial assimilation in Kiln People.
Axis of Evil
JDG posts a pair of articles about the North Korean Government. See:
http://opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=90000453
http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=105001733
Palestinians Kill Anti-Zionests
John posts this URL:
http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=105001724
SCOUTED: British SBS commando to get 'American VC'
William finds this interesting because "the UK government tends not
to award gongs
to special forces who survive their heroism because
of security concerns. See:
http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2002/03/26/nsbs26.xml
Why We Fear Ourselves More than Asteroids
The article, posted by Ronn says "The Dread Factor is not high enough.
See:
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/solarsystem/asteroid_fears_020326-1.html
Workshop on Scientific Requirements for Mitigation of Hazardous Comets and
Asteroids
Another article about asteroids posted by Ronn. See:
http://www.noao.edu/meetings/mitigation/
Andrea Yates
An article about Andrea Yates' "spiritual advisor". Posted by Ronn.
Child Soldiers
Spin-off of This week in the Middle East.
3/27
James White
Ilana has recommended author James White, Julia explains how they were
written and adds "Beginning Operations_ is an omnibus that starts with
_Hospital Station_, and includes _Star Surgeon_ and _Major Operation_ as
well. So if anyone is interested in the series, that's probably the
easiest thing to get your hands on.
FDNY
URL posted by Gautam. "The New York City Fire Department football team
starts its National Public Safety League season next week missing seven
starters, 12 alums and two coaches. But the firemen are playing. Hell,
yes, they're playing." See:
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/
Look for "The Life of Reilly" at the bottom of the page and find the
archived column from 3/20/02.
A Dark Day in American History
JDG (and many others) don't like the new campaign finance reform bill.
See:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A24747-2002Mar27.html?referer=email
More on the state of science education today...
Ronn notes: "Relatives of U.S. military personnel in Afghanistan and
other callers phoned quake experts early this week, anxious to know
whether the military bombing campaign triggered Monday's earthquake in
Afghanistan . . . See:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/03/27/MN149594.DTL
District Attorney's Office Looking into Russell Yates' Role in Drownings
Posted by Ronn, see:
<http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,48770,00.html>
Deaths Today
Rob notes the passing of actors Milton Berle and Dudley Moore. Jeroen
adds movie director Billy Wilder.
Cars or Vacuums Drive Themselves?
Steve Sloan asks: So, which would be more likely to drive itself first?
Cars, or vacuum cleaners? Would it be cars, because an expensive
computer would be easier to hide in the price? Or would it be vacuums,
because they don't need to be as safe?
How this Conflict Will be Resolved
Terrorist Goals
Targeting Girls
Resolved: War is immoral.
Spin-offs of This week in the Middle East.
A French Translation of A4P
Trent posting some stuff about his Alliance for Progress Encyclopedia.
See: http://www.u.arizona.edu/~tshipley/Encyclopedia/
Editors Note: Not sure where this thread originated.
3/28
A Baseball Challenge
Kimm Antell (first time poster?) posts baseball picks.
doctors
Fool posts a funny joke.
Julia's internet may go down today
So contact Jeroen or Eileen instead.
Civility Request
Discussion about profanity on the list.
north korea
Posted by Fool: "The Bush administration has obtained information
indicating that North Korea possesses at least three nuclear bombs as
well as an undetermined amount of fissile material. See:
http://www.worldtribune.com/worldtribune/breaking_3.html
Terrorist Goals
Middle East discussion spin-off.
Accents
Dan (first time poster?) asks "Are there languages in which an American
accent is sexy?"
No Statute of Limitations on Murder
Ex-Secretary of State Kissenger is under fire for his involvement in the
Allende
assassination. See:
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/28/international/americas/28KISS.html?todaysheadlines
Robo Ump
A replacement for blue? See:
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/28/technology/circuits/28HOWW.html
Original Axis Stuff
One of several interesting, informative posts from Brett Coster about
WWII. This one deals mostly with the U-Boat war.
3/39
Wish List: 9 Innovations in Search of Inventors
See:
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/28/technology/circuits/28STAT.html?todaysheadlines
No Title
Doug posts a blank message with no title. It gets several replies.
List Problems
Kevin's wondering if there are list delivery problems.
Interesting spam experiment
Gary has inadvertently accumulated some interesting spam data.
Domain Name Games
Gary explains why he thinks "domain names are the hot commodity of the
21st century."
Yahoogroups & spam
Gary has discovered that Yahoo Groups has reset _everyones_ marketing
preferences without telling anyone.
WW2 History
Alberto adds a few notes to our accumulating World War II history
lesson.
Bareball Challenge
Has Kimm invented a new sport. (kidding)
Baneball Challenge
Damn, where _is_ that s key.
Popper in the New Yorker
From Marvin: "Check out the April _New Yorker_ for a wonderful article
about Karl Popper and about science and art and philosophy in general."
Depleted Uranium
Fool posts this URL about the health hazards of depleted uranium:
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99992024
Thompson DSL back up
Julia's on line again.
Legitimate Targets?
Brett posts some interesting facts about the combat status of
parachuting pilots among other things.
I'm back...
Jon is from 'vacation' with a different e-mail address. Would that
vacation have been a honeymoon???
3/30
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Hulk Smash
Rob has found out that Ang Lee, the director of Crouching Tiger, Hidden
Dragon has commenced filming of the new Incredible Hulk movie.
Suppose Sharon believes Jeroen
Middle East spin-off.
The N-word
Middle East spin-off.
Why I'm Hard-Nosed About the Middle East
Middle East spin-off.
Britain's Queen Mother Dies at 101
Fool posts the Washington Post article's URL:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A39931-2002Mar30.html
Gun control or abortion
Alberto suggests we relieve the tension in both the Civility Request
thread and the various Middle East threads by starting other, less
contentious ones.
Slappy Fish Dance
Marvin's idea is to debate about the funniest Monty Python sketch. All
I have to say to him is: I burst my pimples at you and call your
debating request a silly thing, you tiny-brained wiper of other
people's bottoms! (From my nomination, The Castle Aaaagh, The Holy
Grail) Check out: http://bau2.uibk.ac.at/sg/python/monty.html
Post of the Week
Original Axis Stuff
Brett Coster
The St Lawrence, of course, being Canadian territory was fair game for the
U-boats as Canada was officially at war with Germany from about 6 September
1939. As was the Caribbean, or at least those areas around the British
protectorates such as Guyana, Jamaica and Bermuda. And any non-US ship
outside the 3 (or 12?) mile limit was in international waters and also
"fair" game. Of course, the Germans had committed, in 1936, to warn ship
crews before attacking and sinking their ship.
Within hours of the British declaration of war on 3 September 1939 a U-boat
had sunk a passenger liner, the Athenia, killing 28 Americans. The Kapitan
thought it was a troopship, which presupposed enormous efficiency on the
British side. Anyway, the British reinstituted convoys almost immediately
but could only escort them part way across the Atlantic - there were far too
few escorts available, and even fewer with the range to cross without
refuelling. It was not until 1943 that all convoys could be protected the
entire journey across the Atlantic, by both ship escorts and aircraft.
Roosevelt was hamstrung until after the 1940 election in how much aid he
could provide to the British. The Republicans were solidly isolationist and
were already muttering impeachment about how much Roosevelt had already
aided Britain and France. Hitler was still a golden boy for much of the US
Right. It was after that election that Lend Lease was introduced and the US
Navy took on more of the role of convoy support, which released British and
Canadian resources to provide greater coverage over a smaller area.
During 1941, well before Pearl Harbour, the US Navy was effectively at war
against Germany's U-boats. In July US troops replaced British troops in
Iceland (Iceland was a Danish territory, and Britain had occupied Iceland at
request of the Danish government in exile to prevent it falling to Germany),
and the US Navy thereafter provided some convoy escorts up to about Iceland
across the Atlantic. I think US PBY aircraft flew anti-submarine patrols
from Reykjavik, too.
Roosevelt authorised the US Navy to hit back after 2 destroyers were
attacked by U-boats in September and October 1941 (one of them sunk). The
case was building, partly due to coat-dragging by the US Navy, and would
eventually have triggered an official US response. There was always the
option for US "volunteer" units to enter on Britain's side, and hundreds of
Americans had already joined Canadian defence units. America was starting to
become very aggressively neutral. Then Japan attacked and Hitler foolishly
declared war on the US which gave the greenlight to full US entry against
both Axis powers. (I don't know if Mussolini declared war on the US or if
Italy just got caught up as a German ally. It's noteworthy that the US never
declared war on Finland, which in December 1941 was a German ally.)
Churchill was desperate to get America involved (which is why there are so
many rumours about British codebreakers and Pearl Harbour) and Roosevelt had
identified Hitler as America's greatest threat and was preparing the case
for a war against Germany. The two had been corresponding for years. Had
Pearl Harbor not happened, I think the US would have increased its
involvement but more slowly. As it was, the US was turning out Hudson
bombers in 1939 for the British (and Australia) along with Catalinas (PBYs)
and Dakotas (C-47s), in 1940 and '41 were added P-40s, Buffaloes (F2A),
Wildcats (F3A), and Vengeances among others, often redirected from US
Army/US Navy orders. In 1942 Mustangs were added, along with improved
versions of the P-40 etc. Merlin engines were being built and exported by
Packard, radar was already being developed and produced in the US from
British research and the A-bomb research had also been passed across to the
US (not that that counted anything for the Brits after 1945). All of this
was done in 1940.
British-bound vessels were in convoy from the start of the war, Halifax in
Canada being the major convoy collection point. The U-boats could legally
sink any British flagged vessel in international waters, along with any ship
flying the flag of any allies or conquered nations, such as Australia,
Canada, NZ, Norway, Holland or Poland, etc. And if a US ship was bound for
Britain, especially if it was in a convoy, then it too was bad luck, as far
as the Kriegsmarine was concerned.
American coastal cities weren't blacked out until well after Pearl Harbour,
and the US Navy thought convoying was an unnecessary, defensive, option. It
took months after Pearl Harbour for the US Navy to institute convoy systems
along the US coast which resulted in thousands of lives lost. I mean, why
should the US learn anything from the British? I think U-boats even sank a
ship in New York in early '42.
So, I believe that Roosevelt would have eventually joined the war against
Germany without Pearl Harbor. However, once Japan attacked he would have had
an enormous problem directing any effort against Germany had Hitler not
himself declared war on the US. As it was, there was a huge struggle in
Washington, up until 1943, between the Germany-firsters and those wanting to
beat Japan first. Roosevelt was a Germany firster, the US Navy was almost
entirely Japan-first.
Without Hitler's declaration, the US may have been restricted to providing
materiel to Britain, possibly also to Russia (much less likely), while
actually fighting Japan. So US military entry against Germany may not have
happened until minimum 1944 and probably quite later given that an invasion
of Japan would probably have been required. (It was use against Germany that
drove the A-bomb programme, not Japan.) And without US materiel,
particularly trucks, electronics and aircraft, the Russians would not have
been nearly as effective in 1943/44 against the Germans. I don't doubt the
eventual outcome, but WW2 could well have continued into the 1950s.
Brett
--
Doug
email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
