Jane Galt has a very lucid and entertaining exposition on airline economics (which is or, if we’re lucky in the future, will be relevant to spaceline economics as well.)

The New York Times magazine returns to form, with a story about the “cycle of violence.”

To the author, Elizabeth Rubin, here’s a clue to ease your confusion, and to explain why the “cycle” is asymmetric, and not morally equivalent:

The Palestinian murderers target innocents. The Israelis target the murderers.

The New York Times magazine returns to form, with a story about the “cycle of violence.”

To the author, Elizabeth Rubin, here’s a clue to ease your confusion, and to explain why the “cycle” is asymmetric, and not morally equivalent:

The Palestinian murderers target innocents. The Israelis target the murderers.

The New York Times magazine returns to form, with a story about the “cycle of violence.”

To the author, Elizabeth Rubin, here’s a clue to ease your confusion, and to explain why the “cycle” is asymmetric, and not morally equivalent:

The Palestinian murderers target innocents. The Israelis target the murderers.

Jack Kelly has a piece Jewish World Review, asking why the obvious connections of McVeigh and Nichols to the Middle East continue to be ignored.

Here’s another one for the stupid criminal tricks file–he didn’t get eaten by a crocodile, but here’s a guy who lost an arm in escaping from handcuffs. He can only do that trick one more time, then they’ll have to cuff one of his legs. If it continues, it could end up like Monty Python’s Black Knight.

“All right, this time it goes around your neck, you stupid git.”

XCOR had a test flight incident that might have been a problem if the vehicle had been unmanned. One of the engines didn’t shut down due to an electrical failure. Rutan let the engine burn long enough to give him the energy he needed to land, then shut it down with a manual valve and landed safely.

This is how you test vehicles–not with billions of dollars in software and simulations.

The government continues to take our money and hand it to the dairy industry to overproduce, so we can pay more for milk, and they can take more of our tax money to store the surplus.

“They keep making it and we keep buying it,” said Steve Gill, an Agriculture Department official.

No kidding? Give that man a raise for mental acuity.

This kind of outrageousness has been going on for so long that I’m just numb to it, but it’s useful to remind ourselves of the stupidy and venality of government policies occasionally, particularly as elections approach. Unfortunately, both parties are guilty.

The Supreme Court has ruled that candidates campaigning for judgeships can describe themselves and their opponents.

Cheerfully, this bodes ill for McCain-Feingold.

Jon Dougherty has the scoop on Magaw and his opposition to armed pilots. It would threaten his plans at empire building.

Putting this pompous, power-hungry gun-grabbing bureaucrat in charge of airline security is one of the most infuriating things that Bush has done. By itself, it’s enough to cost him my vote next time. Not that I’d ever vote for a Democrat either, of course.