Yawns Explained

It Cools Your Brain.

Brain Reading

WOW:

The advent of techniques like PET scans and functional MRI has enabled researchers to observe the brain in action with a precision that is unprecedented. One of the interesting aspects of these studies is that we can now actually perform a limited version of what might be called mind reading: identifying what's going on in the brain without having the owner of said brain describe it. In the latest development in the field of neuroimaging, researchers have watched the brain of someone watching an image, and were actually able to perform reasonable reconstructions of the image.

Your Government at Work

Every few weeks for nearly four years, the Secret Service screened the IDs of employees for a Maryland cleaning company before they entered the house of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, the nation's top immigration official.

The company's owner says the workers sailed through the checks -- although some of them turned out to be illegal immigrants.

As reported by the Post, government in action in its most base form. Inept.

Multiple Kill Vehicle Test Successful

This is wicked looking. Congrats to Lockheed Space Systems Company:

In the event of an enemy missile launch, a carrier vehicle would be fired into space to unleash hordes of the weapons, which would then lock on to their targets and destroy them.

A video released by the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) shows the MKV-L being tested the device at the National Hover Test Facility at Edwards Air Force Base, in California.

It shows the gadget hovering and shifting from left to right under the power of tiny rockets as it mimics how it would track a missile.

Video at the link.

Malaria Vaccine Promises Success

Good news:

Results from two phase II trials in Africa show that a new malaria vaccine is effective at preventing both infection and the mosquito-borne disease itself in infants and children.

"Malaria is killing almost 1 million people, mostly African children, every year," Dr. Christian Loucq, director of the PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative, said during a morning teleconference Monday. "Clearly, the world needs a safe and effective malaria vaccine."

Why Wal-Mart is Better than FEMA

In a natural disaster? Go to Wal-Mart. An indepth study on Wal-Mart's response to hurricanes versus that of state and federal agencies.

“In general, the environment of market competition is superior to that of the political process in providing both the knowledge necessary to respond to people’s needs and the profit incentive to act on that knowledge in ways that create value. Within the political process, agencies face different incentives, as they do not operate by profit and loss. Instead, government agencies are more often concerned with pleasing other political actors and finding ways to expand their budgets and power. This often makes them less sensitive to the direct needs of the people who rely on them to get specific tasks accomplished...

“In addition, the absence of a competitive market for their product means that, in general, government agencies face knowledge problems in determining what their output should be and how best to produce it. However, government agencies with a more decentralized structure that puts them in more direct contact with the people they serve may be able to overcome these knowledge problems. Larger, more centralized government agencies will lack the incentives of firms in competitive markets as well as the knowledge provided by true market prices, but more decentralized ones may do better along the latter dimension.

Missile Defense Test Success

Congratulations to Boeing, Raytheon, and Northrupp on this well deserved accomplishment.

The Boeing Company, working with industry teammates and the U.S. Missile Defense Agency, today completed the successful intercept of a target warhead in the most challenging test to date of the United States' only long-range ballistic missile defense system.

"This test demonstrated that the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system can defeat a long-range ballistic missile target," said Scott Fancher, vice president and general manager of Boeing Missile Defense Systems. "This intercept is further proof that GMD can provide our nation with an effective defense against the threat of long-range ballistic missiles."

One step closer to system success and a much needed victory for continued funding under the Obama administration.

Meanwhile, PM has an in-depth article on the entire system:

To learn more about missile defense, PM visited an Alaskan Army base where soldiers keep defensive missiles locked and loaded in case a rogue nation makes its move. But will the system work?

What A Single Nuclear Warhead Could Do

What A Single Nuclear Warhead Could Do

Wall Street Journal By: Brian T. Kennedy
November 24, 2008

As severe as the global financial crisis now is, it does not pose an existential threat to the U.S. Through fits and starts we will sort out the best way to revive the country's economic engine. Mistakes can be tolerated, however painful. The same may not be true with matters of national security.

Although President George W. Bush has accomplished more in the way of missile defense than his predecessors -- including Ronald Reagan -- he will leave office with only a rudimentary system designed to stop a handful of North Korean missiles launched at our West Coast. Barack Obama will become commander in chief of a country essentially undefended against Russian, Chinese, Iranian or ship-launched terrorist missiles. This is not acceptable.

The attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, have proven how vulnerable we are. On that day, Islamic terrorists flew planes into our buildings. It is not unreasonable to believe that if they obtain nuclear weapons, they might use them to destroy us. And yet too many policy makers have rejected three basic facts about our position in the world today:

First, as the defender of the Free World, the U.S. will be the target of destruction or, more likely, strategic marginalization by Russia, China and the radical Islamic world.

Second, this marginalization and threat of destruction is possible because the U.S. is not so powerful that it can dictate military and political affairs to the world whenever it wants. The U.S. has the nuclear capability to vanquish any foe, but is not likely to use it except as a last resort.

Third, America will remain in a condition of strategic vulnerability as long as it fails to build defenses against the most powerful political and military weapons arrayed against us: ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads. Such missiles can be used to destroy our country, blackmail or paralyze us.

Any consideration of how best to provide for the common defense must begin by acknowledging these facts.

Consider Iran. For the past decade, Iran -- with the assistance of Russia, China and North Korea -- has been developing missile technology. Iranian Defense Minister Ali Shamkhani announced in 2004 their ability to mass produce the Shahab-3 missile capable of carrying a lethal payload to Israel or -- if launched from a ship -- to an American city.

The current controversy over Iran's nuclear production is really about whether it is capable of producing nuclear warheads. This possibility is made more urgent by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's statement in 2005: "Is it possible for us to witness a world without America and Zionism? But you had best know that this slogan and this goal are attainable, and surely can be achieved."

Mr. Ahmadinejad takes seriously, even if the average Iranian does not, radical Islam's goal of converting, subjugating or destroying the infidel peoples -- first and foremost the citizens of the U.S. and Israel. Even after 9/11, we appear not to take that threat seriously. We should.

Think about this scenario: An ordinary-looking freighter ship heading toward New York or Los Angeles launches a missile from its hull or from a canister lowered into the sea. It hits a densely populated area. A million people are incinerated. The ship is then sunk. No one claims responsibility. There is no firm evidence as to who sponsored the attack, and thus no one against whom to launch a counterstrike.
But as terrible as that scenario sounds, there is one that is worse. Let us say the freighter ship launches a nuclear-armed Shahab-3 missile off the coast of the U.S. and the missile explodes 300 miles over Chicago. The nuclear detonation in space creates an electromagnetic pulse (EMP).

Gamma rays from the explosion, through the Compton Effect, generate three classes of disruptive electromagnetic pulses, which permanently destroy consumer electronics, the electronics in some automobiles and, most importantly, the hundreds of large transformers that distribute power throughout the U.S. All of our lights, refrigerators, water-pumping stations, TVs and radios stop running. We have no communication and no ability to provide food and water to 300 million Americans.

This is what is referred to as an EMP attack, and such an attack would effectively throw America back technologically into the early 19th century. It would require the Iranians to be able to produce a warhead as sophisticated as we expect the Russians or the Chinese to possess. But that is certainly attainable. Common sense would suggest that, absent food and water, the number of people who could die of deprivation and as a result of social breakdown might run well into the millions.

Let us be clear. A successful EMP attack on the U.S. would have a dramatic effect on the country, to say the least. Even one that only affected part of the country would cripple the economy for years. Dropping nuclear weapons on or retaliating against whoever caused the attack would not help. And an EMP attack is not far-fetched.
Twice in the last eight years, in the Caspian Sea, the Iranians have tested their ability to launch ballistic missiles in a way to set off an EMP. The congressionally mandated EMP Commission, with some of America's finest scientists, has released its findings and issued two separate reports, the most recent in April, describing the devastating effects of such an attack on the U.S.

The only solution to this problem is a robust, multilayered missile-defense system. The most effective layer in this system is in space, using space-based interceptors that destroy an enemy warhead in its ascent phase when it is easily identifiable, slower, and has not yet deployed decoys. We know it can work from tests conducted in the early 1990s. We have the technology. What we lack is the political will to make it a reality.

An EMP attack is not one from which America could recover as we did after Pearl Harbor. Such an attack might mean the end of the United States and most likely the Free World. It is of the highest priority to have a president and policy makers not merely acknowledge the problem, but also make comprehensive missile defense a reality as soon as possible.

Mr. Kennedy is president of the Claremont Institute and a member of the Independent Working Group on Missile Defense.