[geoffbaker]

And out of pure curiosity, exactly how will spenidng millions trying to ferret out anything about Obama's birth certificiate (reminds me of the endless search for ANY dirt on Clinton, over many years and 50 million dollars, which netted nothing while the terrorists were plotting...)...

exactly how will that solve our grave and real present problems?

Perhaps we should stick with issues such as how best to regulate banking, how to get the auto industry back up and profitable, and how to end this bloody war...

Just a thought...

[clamp]

Hillary will be in Phuket Thailand next week, along with other big wigs with lots to say but nothing to do. The government are clamping down and will have Draconian rules to stop any demonstrations like last time.

     People will die on this one.

[Ice]

And out of pure curiosity, exactly how will spenidng millions trying to ferret out anything about Obama's birth certificiate (reminds me of the endless search for ANY dirt on Clinton, over many years and 50 million dollars, which netted nothing while the terrorists were plotting...)...

exactly how will that solve our grave and real present problems?

Perhaps we should stick with issues such as how best to regulate banking, how to get the auto industry back up and profitable, and how to end this bloody war...

Just a thought...

  Not all truth is dirt and not all dirt is true.  I believe the majority of Americans are not so naive as to not be able to discern the difference. The news media is a different breed of animal though.

Fact:
 The documents that answer once and for all  the citizenship question either way remain secret. 
  Why ?
Fact:
 Millions of Americans want to know the answer.


 Banking ; That's a can of worms.
Many have suggested dismantling the Federal Reserve as a start
Others have suggested that we not force the lenders to loan to unqualified buyers.
 
 The auto industry:  We could try applying the same restrictions here on imported vehicles that the producing countries place on ours. I.E. If country "A" places a 200% tariff on US vehicles, we could place a 200% tariff on vehicles imported from country" A" that could be a start.  Just a thought.

[geoffbaker]

The citizenship issue stinks to me of Clintonian-era Republican "governing through allegation"... when ANYTHING will do so long as it has a chance of damaging your opponents, so USE it!

That's hardly nonpartisan, and I'll tell you something else... many MORE millions neither care nor want to see a repetition of that kind of behaviour from the other party. Obama was voted in by people who want to see this mess get fixed... and who don't want to see us waste our time (AGAIN) on minor issues morphed into endless allegations and investigations and muckraking - all with no substance and all justified by "well, if you'd just answer all our questions..." (a never ending process with an infinite amount of questions) ... that's governing through allegation.

Meanwhile, of course, we have real problems that need to be addressed; and if the minority party chooses again to drag this nation into endless, pointless muckraking as they did in '98, while our real problems get worse and our enemies get stronger... well, they will lose ALL credibility... AGAIN.

And who will come forward to head this insanity, again? Good old Newt... the most disgraceful politician in America. A man who demanded we dig out all the dirt on Clinton's sex affairs while having one of his own while his wife was dying; a man who came to power bringing ethics charges against the House Speaker and who stepped down over EXACTLY the same charges... a man who stopped government because he wasn't invited to ride up front in AF1. Selfish, egotistical, arrogant, entirely dishonest and slimy. He's thinking of running for President in 2012... does he think the American people have no memory?

Oh well here we go again!

I certainly have no interest in this story; I think it is neither important nor credible. Now if you bring me a story in which Obama is secretly planning to take us to war on trumped up WMD charges... well I'll be happy to look into it.

Re autos: I'm all for tariffs.

You call for openness and accountability in government. I'm afraid that it isn't going to happen... if there is one lesson the Dems are slowly and painfully learning, it is that open government in this partisan era means simply letting your enemies slowly pick you to death. There are those who don't see terrorists as the enemy; no, the current President is the enemy, and any means used to destroy him must be good... because these kinds of people are summer patriots; entirely patriotic and supportive when their party is in power; and angry secessionists and haters when their party is out.

So I'm afraid the era of open government is over; the standard response will always be, from now on, to declare executive privelege. The Reps have finally taught the Dems that lesson...

But I can assure you, the new administration is far more open than the last one; so that's a good thing.

[LJRead]

This thread has certainly gotten off track.  And now it is getting redundant as well.  What interest me is the way in which society is changing through things like obsolescence of products like cameras, changes in buying practices and employment through the internet, and things like transparency which is bound to change as the word gets out through the internet.  It is the 'What if?'  of life now that interests me.  In addition, it is what can be done to bring more rationality and simplicity to our daily lives in the midst of the chaos that is foisted upon us.

I do like the way that Royal Enfield seems to be keeping its collective chin up through all this - a really bright spot in this gloomy world, isn't it?  Refreshing really.

[Cabo Cruz]

"I do like the way that Royal Enfield seems to be keeping its collective chin up through all this - a really bright spot in this gloomy world, isn't it?  Refreshing really."  LJRead

Br. Larry, I like it; I like it a lot...

[rideOn]

I've always disagreed with the B.S. belief to avoid discussions on politics and religion. Two topics that can positively affect. I think I've voted straight party maybe once in 30 years of voting. I try to be objective, but we all get caught up in values or whatever. The day that Reagan was first innaugerated, the Iran hostages were freed. His admin. later gave Sadam lots of dough to help in keeping tabs on Iran. Sadam didn't. I 'm wondering if the latest Irag war was a US attempt to boot him and set up these bases to lkeep tabs on Iran and get what we paid for years ago. Iran sure is becoming a hotspot with nukes. I don't believe the US will leave Iraq completely. From the American Indian wars to the European and pacific wars, the US military has never left completely.

The UN's world view is similar the the US in regards to rights and freedoms for everyone. My little town has quite a bit of gang activity. The police have insiders and posts around about to closely monitor gang activity. Gang initiation ranges from raping girls in the Wal=Mart parking lot, to break-ins to shootings. Most often, these activities are broken up. Sometimes cops get hurt. If the police didn't get involved, it would be difficult to predict how far the gang activity would escalate. Sometimes, the darkness has to be kept in check.

Maybe Iraq was intelligence failure or maybe they just told us crap to gets troops in there. We are often the government's mushrooms: kept in the dark and fed crap!

Bush Administration: 9/11 - 3,000+ US civilians dead and blamed on intelligence failures.

[LJRead]

Freedom seems to be going out the window these day - freedom to choose, and along with that, freedom to learn and know the truth.  Democracy of any form will only work with a knowing voter base.  There has definitely been a conspiracy to keep us from knowing the truth of what is going on, and to gradually undermine our freedom of choice.  How can we choose if we are spoon fed pap?  These green shoots in the economy, the stupid scare over 'swine' flu.  Misinformation produced by various companies wanting to sell unsafe products such as pharmaceuticals,  Lies put out by banks and Wall street so that they could cash in.  Manipulation of the marketplace so both short selling and long selling money men can profit by conspiracy.  Regulations put in so that certain segments of the population can profit.  It is getting out of hand!

[RAKe]

I hate to rain on the political diatribes, but the original purpose of this thread--the evolution of technology, including transportation, is definitely an interesting conversation.  The evolution of gasoline-powered vehicles into both diesel- and electric-powered vehicles is all well and good, but an important advance in the future of transportation has yet to be mentioned (even missed by ace.cafe!).

There is a pending revolution in the concept of propulsion underway that will render the reigning oil barons obsolete (ASAP!!).  The laser-guided weapons technology of Gulf War I and since has further developed into laser propulsion.  At the White Sands Missile Base in New Mexico, one particular genius has long since developed an atmospheric and aerospace flight concept that allows a vehicle to travel using neither a powerplant nor propellant.  How about laser-guided and laser-powered travel from a fixed base of supply?

NASA has been working on it for well over a decade, and I have heard that some important news is forthcoming regarding “lightcraft” (lasercraft) technology, and I can only hope it will advance as rapidly as computers did upon their ntroduction.  Lightcraft, as currently designed, will adopt a flying saucer configuration (H.G. Wells was a 19th/20th-century Nostradamus, wasn’t he?) that will consist of a fixed saucer within a spinning saucer (to maintain balance) that will travel in any direction perfectly-centered along a “square-shaped” laser beam.

The most important factor in the whole concept is that this pending mode of travel will utilize proven technology, which will expedite its continued development.  But the notable problem thus far is that the current research models travel on a 10,000-watt laser beam, and to power a craft large enough for human travel, 100-kilowatts will be required—ten times the power!  But advances are being made frequently, so it is only a matter of time.  Hopefully, our existing technology will not become obsolete too soon.  I still have an internal-combustion hovercraft to finish!!

[geoffbaker]

I don't see laser powered propulsion as a possibility except in deep space. Heating of the atmosphere, atmospheric interference... millions of blinded people... all of these argue against using lasers to propel anything

I think two much more realistic scenarios are

1) magnetic levitation/propulsion systems. These are already tried and true and run many trains around the world; but the extreme example exists in the military's "rail gun" application, where a magnetic device is used to run a projectile up to speeds of tens of thousands of miles and hour. This could realistically be used to create a large scale maglev orbital system which could throw very large objects into space without the need for rockets or internal propulsion systems of any kind.

2) the space elevator. Originally envisioned by Arthur C Clarke, the idea was a structure several hundred miles in height capable of lifting objects into orbit. The problem was that the materials needed to build such a platform needed to be hundreds of times stronger than anything we'd ever imagined....

until, that is...

they discovered in the 90's something called carbon nanotubes (also known as fullerite and buckyballs in different incarnations) which have over two hundred times the atomic strength of steel. By atomic strength I am referring to the POSSIBLE strength of absolutely pure steel on an atomic level; which is many, many times stronger than any steel we know how to make today. Carbon nanotube technology could be used to build buildings on such a scale, and is probably the most exciting development in nanotechnology to date!

[RAKe]

I would argue that lightcraft (lasercraft) technology will, in our lifetimes, become widely accepted, if not commonplace, and nanotechnology is indeed a significant component of those advances.  The levitation/propulsion system(s) mentioned have a niche for urban and mass travel, but require a substantial infrastructure, limiting their utilization for individual transportation. 

The space elevator was an interesting concept for vehicles seeking to “escape” the atmosphere and travel in space.  In fact, it was President Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) that initially utilized laser technology in conjunction with an on-board hydrogen propellant in order to launch a craft into a “low-earth” orbit (I suppose just outside the stratosphere).  The vehicle proposed by SDI was essentially beam-powered propulsion centered on a parabolic reflector fitted to the bottom of the craft, which was designed to propel the craft through the atmosphere into the aforementioned orbit.  The primary problem with SDI as developed was the question of beam quality with distance.  I do not know the extent of SDI’s feasibility, but it sure did terrify the Soviet Union, and aided in bringing the Cold War to an end.

The modern research of Leik Myrabo of the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute is much more advanced, and a number of propulsion systems are being researched for future atmospheric travel.  How about an on-board laser propulsion system as part of a larger nuclear power production system?  Such a propulsion system could be developed and downsized for individual transportation.  If the waste disposal dangers of such a system can be effectively addressed, nuclear travel could one day become much as gasoline is today.

A system using magnetohydrodynamics will convert laser energy to electricity, and will build upon the rapidly evolving electric vehicle technology while allowing for individual vehicle travel.  A system being researched by Seoul National University is developing laser propulsion using atmospheric air as a propellant.  Sounds promising, but the research is in its infancy.
 
All of these systems are combining with other advancing technologies (such as the individual vehicle levitation provided by hovercraft) to charge into the future of transportation.  As fiercely individual as we motorcyclists are, I expect that our primary desire (freedom in the wind) will in some manner be incorporated into these advances.

[geoffbaker]

I really believe sometime soon we will all drive pollution-free vehicles for our regular commutes and travel...

We'll just keep our loud, smelly RE's just for the fun of it...

[LJRead]

Interesting comments by Rake and Goeff about laser and magnetic propulsion ideas, but the problem I see is in the shear size of anything needing to be done.  During the Great Depression, it was Hoover Dam and a huge undertaking that was, and one that couldn't have been achieved without government.  Ideas on mass and individual transport are the same way if anything radical is to be achieved and that means several things.  Number one would be a system so well worked out that it could be instituted without a lot of changes going forward, and even allowing for some change in the initial design.

I tend to prefer working alone, which means I know I'm limited in what I can achieve (though I sometimes surprise myself with just how much one person can achieve), but at the same time I admire those with management skills and those who like to work in teams. 

Initially it will be experimental pilot schemes on a small scale, but finally it will take commitment on a rather large scale.  Already states are lining up behind very fast trains for travel, and for this the technology is well advanced and in use in Japan and other places, but the more advanced ideas are going to take time and work to develop.

[rideOn]

We'll just keep our loud, smelly RE's just for the fun of it...

Reminds me of the old Rush song Red Barchetta. A guy's grandfather kept alive an old car after the 'motor law' and sneaks a ride. A sci-fi narrative be not be so 'fiction' after all.

[geoffbaker]

Interesting comments by Rake and Goeff about laser and magnetic propulsion ideas, but the problem I see is in the shear size of anything needing to be done.  During the Great Depression, it was Hoover Dam and a huge undertaking that was, and one that couldn't have been achieved without government.  Ideas on mass and individual transport are the same way if anything radical is to be achieved and that means several things.  Number one would be a system so well worked out that it could be instituted without a lot of changes going forward, and even allowing for some change in the initial design.

I tend to prefer working alone, which means I know I'm limited in what I can achieve (though I sometimes surprise myself with just how much one person can achieve), but at the same time I admire those with management skills and those who like to work in teams. 

Initially it will be experimental pilot schemes on a small scale, but finally it will take commitment on a rather large scale.  Already states are lining up behind very fast trains for travel, and for this the technology is well advanced and in use in Japan and other places, but the more advanced ideas are going to take time and work to develop.

I read an article last week in Scientific American which suggested that by using biofuels we could reduce our dependence on foreign oil by 50%, without using any additional cropland or competing for food production (using biodiesel, and biofuels made from any cellulosic biomass - including yard waste, construction waste, agricultural waste..) and that it could be done for less than $1 trillion - or well under half what we've spent on Iraq...

Seems to me that's doable ...