pigeon religion

January 31, 2009 in 4GW, Afghanistan, NATO

Sometimes, at the moment, politics feels like an entirely unconscious business; just a matter of the right reflexes. Like B.F. Skinner’s religious pigeons (see also here). Tap the right kneejerk and get a pellet. Hence this exchange in a US military press conference: Q Yes. Do you have any evidence that there are more or [...]

our futuristic “mailing list” technology will render your crude oppression meaningless

January 31, 2009 in action, LibDems, ORGANISE

After MySociety’s triumph on the MPs’ expenses issue, this looks interesting: the Lib Dems are putting out a call for geeks. This was followed up by a survey being sent out; I’ve filled it in, so I may end up spending the next election twiddling bolts on Chris Rennard’s particle accelerator. Apparently, there’s to be [...]

brrrains!

January 31, 2009 in Blair, computer, ideology, managerialism, NHS, open source, Tories

Suddenly, an awful wet crunching and groaning and sick heavy breathing. It’s…huge…festooned in the rags of a once-respectable suit, waving a bladeserver torn from a rack like a child’s toy…dripping with stale blood. No! The NHS IT Zombie has escaped, and it’s fortified itself by eating BT’s brains. Now it’s coming for us. DAATA! it [...]

the latent content of this airport, however…

January 27, 2009 in Cameron, conservatives, corruption, history, ideology, logistics, London, maps, politics, wind power

This really is getting strange. The Tories look worryingly convinced of the wisdom of a plan to build a gigantic airport in the North Sea, split between two separate islands, because you never need to change the runway a plane is going to depart from…right? At the same time, the Government is considering a gigantic [...]

all too often it’s just a comic, not much more

January 25, 2009 in press

I don’t think Chris Dillow is right. Chris argues that the whole sordid fiasco about the Disasters Emergency Committee broadcast suggests the BBC should stop doing radio and TV news and put the money into long form reportage and documentaries instead; this, he reckons, would get people to read newspapers, would create a lot of [...]

you fasten the triggers..

January 25, 2009 in 4GW, action, Afghanistan, Viktor

This may or may not be significant, but soon after the An-12 exodus from Sharjah, a dodgy An-24RV was seriously damaged in Boosaso, northern Somalia. Interestingly, this aircraft (serial 47309406) had been used by Aero-Service in the DRC and also by UTAGE in West Africa, the firm involved in the Christmas Day 2003 727 crash. [...]

US flattened by self administered denial of service attack

January 20, 2009 in Internet, networks, torture, US

Two things. Marty Lederman of popular legal blog Balkinisation has just become the first blogger in good standing to join the Obama Administration. He’s going to be Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Council. That’s repellent schreibtischtäter John Yoo’s old job. I repeat, old Organ Failure Yoo has been replaced by Liberal [...]

an insular class subject to country with powerful fogs

January 18, 2009 in class, conservatives, democracy, demographics, ideology

I’m trying to tally the uses of the phrase “middle class” in Britain. So far, I’ve come up with: Synonym for “bourgeois” – which is problematic, because almost as soon as Marxism was invented, the idea that the bourgeoisie *owned* industry rather than managing it became obsolete. The middle class owns houses, it doesn’t own [...]

a very short post

January 18, 2009 in Home Office, immigration

Phil Woolas is beneath contempt. I was going to say more, but it would be waste verbiage.

give IT yahoos United States (dollars)

January 18, 2009 in 4GW, action, bad science, computer, conservatives, cultures of war, hacker, Internet, Israel

So, there’s this rumour-surrounded gadget that GIYUS wants people to install on their computers as part of the War on Terror. Obviously, I wondered exactly how it worked; did it analyse the Web sites you visit semantically, so as to target its talking points precisely? Did it use some sort of social recommendation mechanism? Also, [...]