http://www.economist.com/node/16789834.
Neccessity is the mother of invention.
Author: georgefattell
Visit to the Griffith Observatory
I visited the historic Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles for the first time last Saturday. I was quite impressed with the 75 year old building. It is filled with interesting exhibits and offers spectacular views of Los Angeles.
More pictures at the Griffith Observatory
Included in my gallery of pictures is a picture of the James Dean monument on the Observatory grounds. Scenes of the iconic 1955 film Rebel Without a Cause were filmed there and that film helped launch the young Dean to stardom.
When Rights Make Wrongs
Ralph Peters addresses the subject of the Ground Zero mosque.
Key quote:
The glaring failure of our media has been their unwillingness to question the Cordoba Initiative with the same rigor they apply to the mosque’s opponents: Who will fund the mosque complex? Why should so grandiose a project be built so far from the center of mass of New York’s Muslim communities? Why scorn out of hand Governor Patterson’s remarkably generous offer of free state land elsewhere in New York City?
Obama: Fighting the Yuppie Factor – Article – National Review Online
Obama: Fighting the Yuppie Factor – Article – National Review Online.
Victor Davis Hanson is spot on in this article about Obama.
VDH is a great writer imo. One of my favorites at National Review.
God vs No God argument
On Dawkins Atheism: A Response
Key quote:
Dawkins ignores the possibility that God is a very different sort of being than brains and computers. His argument for God’s complexity either assumes that God is material or, at least, that God is complex in the same general way that material things are (having many parts related in complicated ways to one another). The traditional religious view, however, is that God is neither material nor composed of immaterial parts (whatever that might mean). Rather, he is said to be simple, a unity of attributes that we may have to think of as separate but that in God are united in a single reality of pure perfection.
Robert Gates’ wise defense cuts–Ralph Peters – NYPOST.com
The Ruling Class vs. the Public
Superyacht A visits San Diego
These are pictures that I took of the spectacular and futuristic Superyacht A in San Diego Bay yesterday (08-11-2010). I found out that it is owned by 39 year old Russian billionaire Andrey Meinchenko and that it cost $300,000,000.00. The German built ship has a crew of 42, can cruise at 23 knots and has a range of 6,000 miles. It also has a helipad forward of the superstructure and is equipped with small speed boats that can be deployed from the aft section of the vessel. It looks like it belongs in a James Bond movie. Very cool.
UFC 117 Post Fight thoughts
I went 3 and 0 on my predictions and I’m pleased with that, although I wasn’t going out on a limb with any of my picks (SIlva, Fitch, Dos Santos). Still, wins are wins, and I’ll take them.
Fitch and Dos Santos won tough fights, but did so decisively. Anderson Silva, on the other hand, barely survived his battle against Chael Sonnen. As I noted in my 117 prediction post I was rooting for Sonnen and thought he was capable of pulling the upset. Sonnen dominated the fight for 4 1/2 rounds, until Silva found a away of putting Sonnen in a triangle choke and submitted him before the final round ended. Submissions have always been Sonnen’s Achilles Heal and, unfortunately for him, Silva was able to take advantage of what might be Sonnen’s only real weakness. Hopefully, we will see a rematch between these two. Ironically, Sonnen’s reputation in the MMA world has been elevated in defeat because he showed the world that the seemingly invincible Anderson Silva can be beaten.
The victory by Junior Dos Santos puts him in line to fight the winner of the Brock Lesnar vs Cain Velasquez fight. Good luck with that Junior.
FSJ on iPhone vs Android
Dan Lyons (aka Fake Steve Jobs) provides some interesting thoughts on the smartphone battle taking between Apple and Google in his most recent post on the FSJ Blog here….We Do Not Care About Android
Money quote:
It cracks me up when people say we’re doing the same thing in mobile that we did in personal computers and how this is some colossal mistake and somehow, apparently, everybody at Apple is just so stupid or blind that we can’t see that we’re doing this all over again even though everyone else in the world can see it and how can this be happening and oh my goodness isn’t it awful?
But what would you suggest we do? License iOS to HTC and Samsung and Motorola and everyone else, and then hire a zillion support engineers to mop up every mess they make with all their Frankenstein monster hardware designs?
Friends, listen up. We know what we’re doing. We’re doing it on purpose. We don’t need to be the biggest. Is Porsche the biggest? Or Mercedes? Or BMW? No, and they don’t want to be. Neither do we.
In three years, maybe less, Android will be way bigger than us. And we’ll have the better business.
gmf journal 