Well, really, the whole unguided missile thingy isn’t all that complicated, just a matter of “leading” the target, in much the same manner as a hunter leads a flying duck with a shotgun, save that the “duck” in this instance is traveling several hundreds of miles per hour, at range of thousands of yards. Piece of cake.
Simply unmount the missile from its housing (in order to acheive aiming mobility), and carry it on the shoulders of several Iraqi volunteers. One such volunteer aims down the length of the missile, probably using a stabilizing fin as a handy aiming point. Having calculated the speed of the target, its approximate range, the aimer leads the target at the appropriate point. When he is satisfied that he has optimized the leading allowance, he then fires the missile, flash-broiling himself and the missile bearer-aimers in the process. This will vastly enhance the possibility of an actual intercept, lowering the odds against an actual hit from the galactic down to a mere few million to one. Assuming that the pilot doesn’t do anything unsportsmanlike and uncooperative, like turn left, or right, speed up, slow down, or change altitude.
Care should be taken that disinformative propaganda is not posted by infidel little black ducks, such as Arabic signs declaring “Wabbit Season!”
AQA, I agree the downing of the gunships is irrelevant to the discussion of the targeting of aircraft in the non-UN sanctioned no-fly zone.
So the question is, why did you bring it up?
Besides, I’ll note yet again, that as much as those aircraft being fired upon constitutes an act of war, so does the violation of a nation’s sovereign air space.
As for SA’s continued delusions, I can only thank him for illustrating in detailed fashion – to the tune of sixty posts in this thread alone – the prototypical Bush sycophant I had in mind when composing this OP.
Bad enough that this delusional thought process comes from pedestrian supporter on a message board, downright scary when you realize that the President’s isolated himself with like-minded ideologues.
Even easier then that, get about 10 Iraqis, and place a queen size sheet on the ground. Place the missile in the middle of the sheet, and when the plane is just about to fly overhead, the Iraqis yank the sheet, snap it tight, and BOING! up into the sky it goes. Look out American imperialist pilots!
You do know that the white house immediately labeled the CIA’s report as speculative don’t you?
It seems the administration has finally learned the art of downplaying potentially grave and gathering threats to the homeland. I look forward to a future without constant bombardment by stories of nuclear-tipped anthrax-drone submarines patrolling our eastern seabord.
Funny, I was thinking that very thought this morning reading the paper. The article was saying how we almost totally dismantled AQ. I rolled my eyes and thought, yeah but they just changed their name.
Rojo, companero, I read your post about Powell and Bush with mixed feelings: shock, horror and dismay mixed with the usual fear and loathing. So where is the “liberal media” in all of this? If there were truly a liberal bias in the media, wouldn’t I expect to see headlines “Bush Don’t Know Diddly-Squat!”. One notes, however, that you link to that solidly lefty-socialist rag, Financial Times. You really can’t expect our Tighty Righty brethren to accept such a source so closely identified with left-wing agitation, now can you?
The post about AlQ brings to mind a blurb from months past, from the Bushiviks, to the effect that 75% of the top leadership of AlQ had been captured or neutralized. One cannot help but be struck by the numerical precision of that estimate. It implies a knowledge I didn’t know we possessed. If we know that the figure is “75%”, that states a level of knowledge much different than simply saying “a whole bunch of 'em!”. Certainly, it means we know, at least approximately, how many AlQ there are. I mean, if you don’t know if there are 100 or 10,000, a figure like 75% becomes impossible, no? So, we knew how many there were to begin with, subtract how many we have liquidated, and badda-boom, badda-bing, 75%.
From whence? Did someone give us the mailing list? Do we have a membership roster, with addresses and cell phone numbers, and we just cross them off as the occassion permits?
Or is this…how to put this politely, so as not to offer offense…somewhat speculative. Very speculative. A great honking pile of bullshit. Neutron density crapola. Something along those lines.
When I got to my late teens, I thought about voting. What would voting accomplish, I wondered. Was there a pure and ethical politician I could cast my vote for? I looked over the likely candidates for the next election and saw there was not. Was there at least a man running who would be true to his word and not just say things that he thought voters would want to hear and then once elected fuck over the public by doing whatever the hell he felt like? I looked over the likely candidates for the next election and saw there was not.
Would my vote even count in the grand scheme of things, given that I live in a state that awards all the electoral college votes to the winner? I looked over the figures for the political stance of my state and saw that it would not.
So, did that mean my one small vote had no power at all, I wondered. And then it hit me. There was something I could do with my vote. I could use the power of my one vote to piss people off. How could I, a single person, piss the most people off? I looked at the republicans, and saw that they considered democrats to be misguided, and had a “they don’t know any better, so what do you expect?” attitude about the opposition. Then I looked at the democrats and saw that they were not only utterly convinced that their largely untenable plans were morally right, but that people who opposed them were in league with the very devil himself.
Thus I knew where the power of my solitary vote lay - and chose to become a republican.
Damn it, delucidador! Would ya kindly stop making me laugh while I’m trying to slap some sense into some of your more erm…reality-challenged compatriots? I mean, hell, it just cuts right into that lather I work so hard to get into to.
Seriously though – and you’ll have to excuse me, 'cause I know just how much you dislike praise – that’s one hell of a spirit you’ve got going there. Don’t you dare ever lose it.
