Kravlor.com - The Personal Site of Mike Bongard

A Simple Fact-Check Comparison

Wed, 08 Oct 2008 12:10:27 -0500

After watching the debate last night, I, like many others I'm sure, was a bit disappointed in McCain's demeanor and overall performance. It galled me that he had the nerve to repeat known, disproved lies from his campaign trail on national TV. I like what CNN has been doing with their 'fact check' work (partnering with FactCheck.org; what I don't like is that they don't summarize the fact check verdicts in the summary, forcing a click-through.

It seems like a pattern is emerging:

Summary of Fact-Check Verdicts for Campaigns
Issue	Campaign	Verdict
McCain health care plan; Business thinks bad idea	Obama	True
McCain: Misjudgment on Iraq ("greeted as liberators")	Obama	True
Obama: Never taken on party leadership	McCain	False
McCain: Not leader on Freddie-Fannie subprime lending warnings	Obama	True
Obama receiving record Fannie & Freddie campaign contributions	McCain	Misleading
McCain's involvement in Keating Scandal	Obama	True
Obama: 94 Tax-raising votes	McCain	Misleading; Misleading
Obama's comments re: Afghanistan	McCain	False
McCain health care plan; $5k credit insufficient for $12k cost	Obama	True

Wouldn't you think that the above presentation makes things a bit more clear?

Missed Advertising Opportunities!

Sat, 04 Oct 2008 15:17:11 -0500

I was waiting to give my 26th unit of blood yesterday, when I saw something I don't see every day: a blimp.

Watching that dirigible fly around the sky while I was giving blood helped keep my mind pleasantly occupied. Afterward, I was walking back to work and got a better look at the aircraft -- it was for Outback Steakhouse.

Now, I didn't go and get a steak dinner. But I thought about it. And that's more than I can say for every other form of advertising I've been bombarded with lately.

Sometimes, I'm amazed by the collective efforts of the Internet

Fri, 26 Sep 2008 14:35:00 -0500

In my last post, I wanted to add a little snippet from Seinfeld -- "The Ukraine is not weak!" So, of course, I googled it.

And stumbled onto a site rife with amazingly stupid stuff, which proceeded to eat my spare time this afternoon.

Stupid, but really, really amazing. Check it out.

Pirates! With Tanks!

Fri, 26 Sep 2008 14:27:26 -0500

Pirates Seize Ship Carrying Tanks, Ammo

It's not often you see news stories involving the following actors:

Pirates
The Ukraine
Tanks

Seriously. Now it's going to be even more dangerous to sail off the coast of Somalia -- because the pirates are going to be armed with tanks!

Ever wonder what a plasma looks like at 33,000 frames/second?

Tue, 23 Sep 2008 22:18:47 -0500

I just found out in this last week, after being able to borrow a Phantom v. 7.3 camera from PPPL!

Shiny New Movie (2.5 M DivX-encoded AVI)

Pretty darn spiffy, huh? :) Now I just need to write some image processing software...

This Can't Be a Good Thing (for my thumbs)

Tue, 23 Sep 2008 21:11:18 -0500

Capcom released Mega Man 9.

A stroll down memory lane -- via pure 8-bit Mega Man goodness. Jumpy blocks, cleverly placed pits -- and who can forget those pesky instant-death spikes?

WHO WILL SAVE DR. LIGHT FROM BEING FRAMED BY THE INFAMOUS DR. WILY? WHO??

This can't be good for my Ph.D. research. :)

Waking up on the Funny Side of Bed

Mon, 22 Sep 2008 07:27:04 -0500

Since my wife started her new job as a Assistant State Public Defender, we've been working on getting used to a much earlier schedule.

This has forced us to do several things, in the spirit of making the 5:30-5:45 AM wakeup period as automatic as possible, including:

Streamlining the bathroom
Adding new bathroom shelving
Reorganizing drawers in the bedroom
Pre-making coffee and tea (a lifesaver!)

Still, since we've been at it only for a week, we haven't quite gotten in the groove; I end up getting in her way taking showers, etc.

So, it was a little bit surprising to me when this morning my wife started laughing while the alarm clock was not-so-pleasantly waking us from peaceful slumber. It turns out she had a very elegant, parallel solution to the morning "bathroom problem."

Use the second bathroom.

It's really a shame that it took two people with advanced degrees in law and nuclear engineering a week to figure that one out. :)

The Realm of Thornwood is Safe Once Again...

Sat, 23 Aug 2008 21:37:50 -0500

... now that I have managed to vanquish Dark Sol in the upper lairs of the Labyrinth!

To the 99.5% of people who don't get that at first, my apologies. However, those who DO recognize the sheer awesomeness of the original Shining in the Darkness can appreciate the accomplishment.

It's too bad that the game came out seventeen years ago. It makes me feel old knowing that I was horrifically addicted to it back then, just as I was now. This time, though, I had more detailed maps -- if only because I made them myself. (It's too bad today's games don't make you do that. I thought it was always a fun challenge.)

I Wish I Could Say it Better...

Fri, 15 Aug 2008 20:18:25 -0500

Today's XKCD cross-post:

Seriously, though -- these machines should be taken away and dismantled. I may be a fervent fan of new technology, computers, and the like, but when it comes to the foundation of our democracy, I'm very happy with good old-fashioned paper. I'll happily wait *gasp* a day to find out the election results, as long as they're verifiable!

An interesting choice...

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 07:28:21 -0500

Turns out San Francisco is going to have a ballot initiative to rename a sewage plant after G.W. Bush.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/07/17/presidential.putdown.ap/index.html

Here's hoping it succeeds! ;) (I especially like the predictable phrase "Local Republicans say the plan stinks and they will oppose it.")

A Dark Day for America

Thu, 10 Jul 2008 00:04:23 -0500

Well, I guess we're all going to never know the true extent of the illegal warrantless wiretapping program that has been spying on innocent American citizens with complicit assistance from the telecom companies.

And my current favorite for the Presidency voted for it. Along with 68 other un-American idiots.

Dammit.

I don't care if they're Democrat, Republican, or Whatever -- any politician voting in favor of this unconstitutional bill deserves to be thrown out of office -- immediately -- for directly violating their sworn oath to protect and uphold the Constitution of the United States of America. For me, this means getting Herb Kohl out of office, a longtime Dem whose time is now up in my eyes.

You can contribute your political dollars to this PAC which is dedicated to exactly that purpose. I have. Also you can support the ACLU and EFF. I also have -- and will continue to do so as they challenge this law from the moment President Bush will gleefully sign it into law.

2008 Fireworks Show!

Sat, 28 Jun 2008 23:39:12 -0500

Kristen and I got a chance to see the 2008 Rhythm and Booms annual fireworks display here in Madison. Last year, we decided to go to it rather late, and ended up in a field just outside Governor Nelson state park. (Lots of mosquitoes, a poor view of the fireworks, and ticks, to boot!)

This year was better.

View Larger Map

We found an awesome viewing location in a parking lot just outside Warner park. The lot afforded a wide view of the sky, and (based on my calculations) about 0.5-1 km from the explosions of the shells. A spectacular view, and the booms would give you the whole-body shake that makes fireworks oh-so fun! I strongly suspect that we'll be back there next year.

My Letter to Obama

Sat, 28 Jun 2008 16:40:46 -0500

I am a scientist who is actively working on solving our Nation's (and world's) energy crisis, and hold an advanced degree in nuclear engineering and engineering physics. I respectfully urge Senator Obama to revise his policies towards nuclear energy.

As the Senator is well aware, nuclear power is a proven technology which has zero carbon emissions and is capable of providing base-load electrical power. Despite its wastes, nuclear power is currently the best of our available options when it comes to electric generation while satisfying carbon emission requirements to combat global warming.

I am a nuclear engineer -- and I fully support deploying a broad base of green electrical power generation technologies such as wind, solar, geothermal, and hydro-power in order to help clean up our grid. However, eliminating nuclear power from serious, immediate consideration in the energy discussion effectively removes one of our most powerful weapons against combating global warming from the table.

Therefore, I again strongly urge Senator Obama, as a scientist, nuclear engineer, and an enthusiastic supporter of your campaign to reconsider his stance on nuclear power.

We'll need a lot more of it in the days to come if we mean to seriously combat global warming -- a worldwide crisis which needs to be attacked from every possible angle, sooner rather than later. I do not relish the prospect that my children, and their children's children, will be paying the price for our inaction today.

Arsenals of Folly

Sat, 28 Jun 2008 12:25:53 -0500

I think this post represents my first book review on my website, but hey -- you have to start somewhere!

I recently finished reading Richard Rhodes' Arsenals of Folly:The Making of the Nuclear Arms Race (2007, Knopf). (Amazon link) I have read with great interest his more mammoth tomes The Making of the Atomic Bomb and Dark Sun; the latest book in the series was much slimmer (at a more modest 300-ish pages) and had a different focus.

While the prior two books focused on WWII and the scientists who were crucial to the discovery of nuclear fission and fusion; its eventual application to atomic weaponry; Soviet espionage; and political ramifications of post-WWII following the dawn of the nuclear age, Arsenals focuses primarily on the interplay between Ronald Regan and Mikhail Gorbachev near the end of the Cold War.

A theme that continues to shine through the historical accounts is the paranoia, on both sides of the conflict, which led to the arms race. It's amazing to me how close we've come -- on many more occasions than you'd like to believe -- to full-scale nuclear war. Being a nuclear physicist myself, the prospect is terrifying. (The image below is of the crater generated by a preliminary-phase hydrogen bomb in 1954; modern weapons (and all H-bombs in general) can be scaled to much higher destructive yields.)

Although I lived through the end of the Cold War as a child, Arsenals helped me to put it in perspective. Until I read it, I don't think I truly appreciated the danger that we were all living under (myself included) of nuclear annihilation. And while the arms reduction goals achieved and documented in the book significantly reduce the threat, we still have so many nuclear weapons that it hardly seems justified.

Something else that I found particularly interesting: how people ended up rationalizing the truly awesome destructive capabilities of nuclear weapons. Presidential advisers and military brass of the 70's and 80's were arguing about "winnable" nuclear wars where we would only lose 150,000,000 American lives in the exchange. These people wanted to see such an exchange! I prefer the view of Fermi and Rabi, key contributors to the nuclear science and ultimately the weapons: "By [the H-bomb's] very nature it cannot be confined to a military objective but becomes a weapon which in practical effect is almost one of genocide...it is necessarily an evil thing considered in any light."

So, the interested reader will have lots to learn from Arsenals of Folly. While it is a sobering read, I highly recommend it to all -- and especially Rhodes' prior works on the history of atomic weaponry. They serve as powerful reminders of why we need to continue to strive towards elimination of nuclear weaponry (and more importantly, securing of nuclear materials) in order to ensure the continued survival of all humanity.

Another one bites the dust!

Tue, 20 May 2008 11:49:18 -0500

Looks like another republican congressman is resigning in shame -- this time around, it's a rather mudane sex scandal, albeit under circumstances I find a bit odd: fathering a child with your mistress after she bails you out of jail and a DUI charge after the Super Bowl!

Oops...

I feel for this guy's family, especially his poor wife and existing children. It really sucks when your husband/father turns out to be a total jerk. On the other hand, things keep looking better for the Dems in November!