On 11/30/2023 9:18 PM, Gerry wrote:
> On Thu, 30 Nov 2023 12:54:07 -0500, "Jim Wilkins"
> <muratlanne@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> "Richard Smith" wrote in message news:ly1qc9szs9.fsf@void.com...
>>
>> In the brief time I did it, making equipment for the divers was
>> likewise - assume very limited to zero visibility, currents - and
>> gloves on. Makign sure anythign I made would work in "real" conditions.
>>
>> ---------------------------------
>> Thanks for reminding me that working under the car on the exhaust yesterday
>> was far from the worst job, though the freezing temperature and nose to
>> wrench clearance were similar. And not having the dealer do it was worth
>> $160 an hour.
> OTOH my dealer service department promotes the use of Nitrogen for
> tire inflation, so, when the tire symbol lights up I go there and let
> them top up my tires for free!

I use the special 78% nitrogen blend. My local auto dealers don't seem
to stock that. Fortunately I have a lifetime supply on hand.

--
Bob La Londe
CNC Molds N Stuff

--
This email has been checked for viruses by AVG antivirus software.
www.avg.com

"Bob La Londe" wrote in message news:ukd35k$1uj54$1@dont-email.me...

I use the special 78% nitrogen blend. My local auto dealers don't seem
to stock that. Fortunately I have a lifetime supply on hand.
Bob La Londe

------------------------

I do too, the blend with 0.94% Argon. By my calculations the pressure
reduction/volume expansion from tank to tire reduces the relative humidity
below 50%, and the water trap in the line has never showed one drop. I might
add an inline drier cartridge to the inflater. Before the Thanksgiving trip
28PSI from summer had decreased to 25PSI at freezing.

https://www.air-compressor-guide.com/articles/water-in-compressed-air-calculations

On Fri, 1 Dec 2023 07:54:20 -0500, "Jim Wilkins"
<muratlanne@gmail.com> wrote:

>"Gerry" wrote in message news:mbnimidt6519ib2qvri0jb0sn3rkprfo1i@4ax.com...
>
>OTOH my dealer service department promotes the use of Nitrogen for
>tire inflation, so, when the tire symbol lights up I go there and let
>them top up my tires for free!
>-----------------------
>... and look for something they can charge you to fix, or suggest buying a
>new one. Last week I asked to sit in a Ford Bronco and they offered to let
>me take it home overnight. A year ago when I tried the Maverick (liked it)
>their lot was nearly bare, enough to practice tight parking maneuvers in it.
>What I really want is a new 2000 CRV, which I'm slowly getting piece by
>piece.
Actually, someone had swiped the fancy all metal "N" valve caps from
the curb side wheels (for their bike?) so I ended up with four nem
caps for free. -high value item you know!

Thanks Jim for link to 254-page report.
Being very cold and needing to warm up a friend who had chilled, I
made a fire in the stove and whiled away time writing my
interpretation of "events".
http://weldsmith.co.uk/tech/minerals/condurrow/231120_skipload/231128_cm_skip_pdf254pg.html
"Mine skip and guides - 254 page PDF"
Have I got "The Cold War" context right? (1977)
Rich S

"Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lyv89fzkcm.fsf@void.com...

Thanks Jim for link to 254-page report.
Being very cold and needing to warm up a friend who had chilled, I
made a fire in the stove and whiled away time writing my
interpretation of "events".
http://weldsmith.co.uk/tech/minerals/condurrow/231120_skipload/231128_cm_skip_pdf254pg.html
"Mine skip and guides - 254 page PDF"
Have I got "The Cold War" context right? (1977)
Rich S
--------------------------------
I heat my house with a fire in a stove too. It came with electric heat that
looked so promising when they thought nuclear power would be cheap. That's
why I have a 200A 240V electric service, 48KW available for welders and
machine tools. Our electric rates are nearly the nation's highest and my
consumption averages 2-3 KWH per day.

I realized after skimming through much of that .PDF that it probably didn't
apply to Condurrow, but I had it on screen and sent the link before moving
away. I had been looking for more historical, less automated mining
equipment descriptions. I've found that solutions from one field can be
helpful in another, knowing a different previous application of [something]
got me out of an intellectual property theft lawsuit.

Dunno about the Cold War context. After the Army I didn't get back into
government work until the 1990's when it was over and not missed. After WW2
we studied the enemys' war efforts in considerable detail and found that
shortages of Nickel, Chromium and Tungsten had greatly hindered the Germans,
though they had a frighteningly large surplus of Uranium from Radium mine
waste. Somehow it disappeared after the war.

An example of the detail:
https://www.uboatarchive.net/Design/DesignStudiesTypeXXI.htm

"Portsmouth" is the naval shipyard in Portsmouth NH USA. Type XXI is a
Diesel-electric version of the unsuccessful peroxide-powered experimental U
boats, which had improved submerged hydrodynamics relative to previous
models that were optimized for surface travel and more internal volume to
accommodate the bulky peroxide tanks. After studying German advances and
deficiencies we realized we could go further if the boat didn't need to run
on the surface on Diesel power, so this is the prototype for nuclear hulls:

https://www.ussalbacore.org/

The day I visited the former commander of the shipyard was aboard waiting
for a film crew and I peppered him with more technical questions than he
could or should answer.

All in all, I'm still glad I joined the Army, learned computer electronics
and was paid to fly and drive around Europe.

"Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> writes:

> "Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lyv89fzkcm.fsf@void.com...
>
> Thanks Jim for link to 254-page report.
> Being very cold and needing to warm up a friend who had chilled, I
> made a fire in the stove and whiled away time writing my
> interpretation of "events".
> http://weldsmith.co.uk/tech/minerals/condurrow/231120_skipload/231128_cm_skip_pdf254pg.html
> "Mine skip and guides - 254 page PDF"
> Have I got "The Cold War" context right? (1977)
> Rich S
> --------------------------------
> ...
>
> I realized after skimming through much of that .PDF that it probably
> didn't apply to Condurrow, but I had it on screen and sent the link
> before moving away. I had been looking for more historical, less
> automated mining equipment descriptions. I've found that solutions
> from one field can be helpful in another, knowing a different previous
> application of [something] got me out of an intellectual property
> theft lawsuit.
>
> Dunno about the Cold War context. After the Army I didn't get back
> into government work until the 1990's when it was over and not
> missed. After WW2 we studied the enemys' war efforts in considerable
> detail and found that shortages of Nickel, Chromium and Tungsten had
> greatly hindered the Germans, though they had a frighteningly large
> surplus of Uranium from Radium mine waste. Somehow it disappeared
> after the war.
>
> An example of the detail:
> https://www.uboatarchive.net/Design/DesignStudiesTypeXXI.htm
>
> "Portsmouth" is the naval shipyard in Portsmouth NH USA. Type XXI is a
> Diesel-electric version of the unsuccessful peroxide-powered
> experimental U boats, which had improved submerged hydrodynamics
> relative to previous models that were optimized for surface travel and
> more internal volume to accommodate the bulky peroxide tanks. After
> studying German advances and deficiencies we realized we could go
> further if the boat didn't need to run on the surface on Diesel power,
> so this is the prototype for nuclear hulls:
>
> https://www.ussalbacore.org/
>
> The day I visited the former commander of the shipyard was aboard
> waiting for a film crew and I peppered him with more technical
> questions than he could or should answer.
>
> All in all, I'm still glad I joined the Army, learned computer
> electronics and was paid to fly and drive around Europe.

I understand that with U-boats "the hunter had become the hunted".

I suspect it went like...
a U-boat could sink one merchant ship with the loss of all its cargo;
with the certainty of that U-boat then being destroyed - and the loss
of a U-boat and all its crew cost the attacker more than the target
lost.
The one about on a first voyage a U-boat and its crew had a 30% chance
of not returning. Those losses made the service non-viable. They
mean it could have no body of experience and no mentoring?

MOST people I have met who have been in the armed services speak
positively of it. It used to be the case, and hopefully still is,
that coming from a disadvantaged background you learned a Trade very
well and got a good life after leaving the Services.
Glad you did well out of it, with electronics.

The mine PDF.
Yes you are right - contemporary technology. I didn't think of your
deliberate choice there.

Thing is - I learned a lot - and that was always the point. I
contribute - but gain.

Best wishes

"Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lyplzn557x.fsf@void.com...

I understand that with U-boats "the hunter had become the hunted".

I suspect it went like...
a U-boat could sink one merchant ship with the loss of all its cargo;
with the certainty of that U-boat then being destroyed - and the loss
of a U-boat and all its crew cost the attacker more than the target
lost.
The one about on a first voyage a U-boat and its crew had a 30% chance
of not returning. Those losses made the service non-viable. They
mean it could have no body of experience and no mentoring?

MOST people I have met who have been in the armed services speak
positively of it. It used to be the case, and hopefully still is,
that coming from a disadvantaged background you learned a Trade very
well and got a good life after leaving the Services.
Glad you did well out of it, with electronics.

---------------------------

Allied technical advances including long range patrol bombers, antisub
carrier groups, sonobuoys, homing torpedos, and your Huff-Duff instant
radio-location came together almost simultaneously to locate and sink U
boats just as they appeared to be winning.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_24_mine

The U boats stayed out until the end but kept quiet and didn't attract
almost certain retribution, waiting for the promised magical wunderweapons
that would give them the advantage again, as in German legend and opera.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarnhelm

Unfortunately for them the Allies had excellent magicians too, such as
Stanley Hooker, Barnes Wallis and R.V. Jones.

In the spring of 1945 when those new boats went out they were detected and
sunk almost immediately, 1-2 a day. I have a memoir by a surviving U-Boot
captain who was fortunate enough to be moved to Infantry as the desperate
end approached.
https://uboat.net/fates/losses/chart.htm

April and May 1943 are the turnaround when losses more than doubled, they
they decreased because the boats became less active. April and May 1945 are
when the new ones came out. May losses were in the first third of the month.

The fleet of snorkel-equipped boats lying in wait for the Normandy invasion
fleet accomplished almost nothing against the Allied defensive screen.
Surface torpedo boats did more damage.

"Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lyplzn557x.fsf@void.com...
I understand that with U-boats "the hunter had become the hunted".

I suspect it went like...
a U-boat could sink one merchant ship with the loss of all its cargo;
with the certainty of that U-boat then being destroyed - and the loss
of a U-boat and all its crew cost the attacker more than the target
lost.
------------------------------
Worse. U boats were required to report convoy sightings by radio to bring in
other boats, the "Wolf Pack". The transmissions were encoded and compressed
into bursts that were too short for German radio direction finders to
locate. Naturally those were the world's best.

However you Brits weren't using German equipment, your direction finders had
been developed to map lightning strikes and could indicate the direction of
a U boat transmission in its first milliSecond, without rotating the
antenna. It didn't matter that the message was encoded if it contained what
the hunters already knew, the local weather or Allied ship positions. The
destroyers would head in its direction and watch for a blip on their
undetectable centimetric radar. If available a plane would be sent to
"accidentally" see and be seen by the target and conceal the real means of
detection, in case the target evaded destruction. In high traffic areas
planes would broadcast lower frequency radar known to be detectable to
pretend it was all they had and to discourage the U boats from running on
the surface to recharge their batteries.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-frequency_direction_finding
Your ears locate sounds a similar way.

Amazing info. I gather you did well out of your time in the military.

"Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lyzfyqqycw.fsf@void.com...

Amazing info. I gather you did well out of your time in the military.
-----------------------------
I heard a lot of stories of non-combat service from when my father was a
company commander in the Air Corps. He and my uncle served in New Guinea
where the commanding general was an engineer and inventor himself and
encouraged any home-grown innovation that helped fight the enemy. MacArthur
backed him as long as the results served the fight, strict rule followers
were sent home for "combat fatigue". The natives had no money so loose
control didn't lead to the corruption that occurred elsewhere. Otherwise
they treated government property as toys to play with and especially
customize as only engineers and mechanics can.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Gunn

The Chief of Staff was Merian Cooper, a bold and independent
pilot/adventurer who had created "King Kong" and served with the Flying
Tigers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merian_C._Cooper

I was expecting hardship and discipline, instead the food was good and the
Captain in Basic Training had bet that his company could score the highest
on the final test three times in a row. We were the third, so they marched
and ran us to their limits (I'd been a distance runner), but treated us with
respect and gave us weekends off. We could see what other training companies
experienced, were grateful and delivered the results that made him a Major.

Then in Electronics school my course was classified and no material could
leave the building, thus no homework. I was free to explore nearby New York
City on weekends. Nearing graduation we were promoted to the first level of
NCO and made squad and platoon leaders, which made the school's boastful Air
Force contingent furious, since they had to wait years for promotion.

The German I studied in college may have directed me to serve in Germany
where I travelled around and needed it. Discipline there was reputedly
strict, however ambitious civil rights lawyers were exploiting accusations
against "ethnic" personnel as racial incidents which hurt the careers of any
officers involved. As a result discipline nearly vanished for everyone, drug
use was accepted and barracks inspections ceased so they wouldn't have to
ignore the punchbowls of hashish etc. Interestingly everything kept running
smoothly, the small percentage who make things happen continued to and the
rest smoked their dope and stayed quietly out of our way.

Shortly after arriving I was promoted to a tech grade of sergeant which
allowed me to act independently wherever I went and get things done. My job
was fixing code machines that never broke, though other equipment did and
the phone lines the Army leased to link computers were their worst, barely
usable whenever it rained.

I was on call and couldn't be given a task I couldn't drop when a plane
arrived to take me on a repair mission. After a reorganization we lost air
support and drove, in military vehicles until they broke down and then in
Army civilian vehicles or our own cars if we could pass the driving (sign
reading) test. Beware of Glatteisgefahr and be sure to Einfahrt Freihalten.
Due to Vietnam's cost there was no money in Europe for spare parts, and no
local source for anything not Metric. Private mail orders kept Jeeps
running, usually with higher performance parts that made them dangerous at
German road speeds. BMWs handle well for good reason. Since few left the
base to go drinking the military pay gave us cash to burn on cameras, audio
equipment and car parts, although in the US married servicemen qualified for
welfare. Gasoline was very cheap because we didn't pay the 3/4 of the posted
price that was tax.

Thus I became the post photographer and helped out in the motor pool and
with the USO whose director wanted to run a small theatre group. I was the
prime choice for meet-the-Germans trips to local attractions like the neat,
flower bordered and Teutonically organized sewage facility they were so
proud of. Methane from a sludge digester ran a huge Diesel that powered the
facility. OTOH being the token enlisted man at an officers' banquet in
Heidelberg Castle was fun, I danced with the Colonel's wife on the huge wine
barrel (the younger wives were ignoring her) and saw how bored and unhappy
the officers' wives were. I recruited wives into the USO theatre group to
keep them busy and out of trouble. I was selected to attend a grad student's
Drug Education program which was mainly about his research into how various
popular intoxicants inhibit blood circulation in frogs' transparent feet. He
was very surprised to find a trained scientist in his class when he expected
all useless losers who could be spared. Conveniently it was held next to an
old airstrip we used for emergency landings. Once we tied up Stuttgart's
international airport while we made a very slow emergency landing in an old
radial-engined Canadian bush plane.

I had learned enough of German (and French) language and culture to get
along. Most Americans hadn't, felt left out and stayed on base. Two
"ethnics" reenlisted to get back to Saigon, their reason being that in the
US and Germany they were distinctly second class but in Vietnam they became
rich Americans for the first time.

At the time the saddest day of my life was landing back in New Jersey.

"Jim Wilkins" wrote in message news:ukkpmc$3f59i$1@dont-email.me...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Gunn
"When the A-20s proved highly successful in low-level strikes against
Japanese shipping and ground targets, Gen Kenney gave Gunn the go-ahead to
convert a squadron of B-25s into similar strafers."

--------------------------------
An A-20 is a light bomber, a B-25 a medium, comparable to a Wellington.

Accounts vary on this. We had given the Dutch (displaced from
Indonesia/Netherlands East Indies) the squadron of B-25s but they had no
pilots for them. One version is when Gunn and friends learned they were
sitting unused in Australia they made a midnight raid with forged papers to
claim them and bring them back, off US records and free to be modified.
Notice the official acceptance of the acquisition. I think we paid off the
Dutch to keep quiet.

Their firepower was enough to suppress (kill off) Japanese ships'
antiaircraft defenses and allow other bombers to skip bombs with tenth
second delay fuses along the water and into the sides of the ships, like the
Dambuster raid. One bomber had flown so low over the explosion that it
returned with part of the ship's logbook stuck in a radial engine.

Carrier fighters and bombers used similar methods to cripple the heavy AA
defense of the two largest Japanese super-battleships and sink them with
torpedos.

"Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> writes:

> "Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lyzfyqqycw.fsf@void.com...
>
> Amazing info. I gather you did well out of your time in the military.
> -----------------------------
> I heard a lot of stories of non-combat service from when my father was
> a company commander in the Air Corps. He and my uncle served in New
> Guinea where the commanding general was an engineer and inventor
> himself and encouraged any home-grown innovation that helped fight the
> enemy. MacArthur backed him as long as the results served the fight,
> strict rule followers were sent home for "combat fatigue". The natives
> had no money so loose control didn't lead to the corruption that
> occurred elsewhere. Otherwise they treated government property as toys
> to play with and especially customize as only engineers and mechanics
> can.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Gunn
>
> The Chief of Staff was Merian Cooper, a bold and independent
> pilot/adventurer who had created "King Kong" and served with the
> Flying Tigers.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merian_C._Cooper
>
> I was expecting hardship and discipline, instead the food was good and
> the Captain in Basic Training had bet that his company could score the
> highest on the final test three times in a row. We were the third, so
> they marched and ran us to their limits (I'd been a distance runner),
> but treated us with respect and gave us weekends off. We could see
> what other training companies experienced, were grateful and delivered
> the results that made him a Major.
>
> Then in Electronics school my course was classified and no material
> could leave the building, thus no homework. I was free to explore
> nearby New York City on weekends. Nearing graduation we were promoted
> to the first level of NCO and made squad and platoon leaders, which
> made the school's boastful Air Force contingent furious, since they
> had to wait years for promotion.
>
> The German I studied in college may have directed me to serve in
> Germany where I travelled around and needed it. Discipline there was
> reputedly strict, however ambitious civil rights lawyers were
> exploiting accusations against "ethnic" personnel as racial incidents
> which hurt the careers of any officers involved. As a result
> discipline nearly vanished for everyone, drug use was accepted and
> barracks inspections ceased so they wouldn't have to ignore the
> punchbowls of hashish etc. Interestingly everything kept running
> smoothly, the small percentage who make things happen continued to and
> the rest smoked their dope and stayed quietly out of our way.
>
> Shortly after arriving I was promoted to a tech grade of sergeant
> which allowed me to act independently wherever I went and get things
> done. My job was fixing code machines that never broke, though other
> equipment did and the phone lines the Army leased to link computers
> were their worst, barely usable whenever it rained.
>
> I was on call and couldn't be given a task I couldn't drop when a
> plane arrived to take me on a repair mission. After a reorganization
> we lost air support and drove, in military vehicles until they broke
> down and then in Army civilian vehicles or our own cars if we could
> pass the driving (sign reading) test. Beware of Glatteisgefahr and be
> sure to Einfahrt Freihalten. Due to Vietnam's cost there was no money
> in Europe for spare parts, and no local source for anything not
> Metric. Private mail orders kept Jeeps running, usually with higher
> performance parts that made them dangerous at German road speeds. BMWs
> handle well for good reason. Since few left the base to go drinking
> the military pay gave us cash to burn on cameras, audio equipment and
> car parts, although in the US married servicemen qualified for
> welfare. Gasoline was very cheap because we didn't pay the 3/4 of the
> posted price that was tax.
>
> Thus I became the post photographer and helped out in the motor pool
> and with the USO whose director wanted to run a small theatre group. I
> was the prime choice for meet-the-Germans trips to local attractions
> like the neat, flower bordered and Teutonically organized sewage
> facility they were so proud of. Methane from a sludge digester ran a
> huge Diesel that powered the facility. OTOH being the token enlisted
> man at an officers' banquet in Heidelberg Castle was fun, I danced
> with the Colonel's wife on the huge wine barrel (the younger wives
> were ignoring her) and saw how bored and unhappy the officers' wives
> were. I recruited wives into the USO theatre group to keep them busy
> and out of trouble. I was selected to attend a grad student's Drug
> Education program which was mainly about his research into how various
> popular intoxicants inhibit blood circulation in frogs' transparent
> feet. He was very surprised to find a trained scientist in his class
> when he expected all useless losers who could be spared. Conveniently
> it was held next to an old airstrip we used for emergency
> landings. Once we tied up Stuttgart's international airport while we
> made a very slow emergency landing in an old radial-engined Canadian
> bush plane.
>
> I had learned enough of German (and French) language and culture to
> get along. Most Americans hadn't, felt left out and stayed on
> base. Two "ethnics" reenlisted to get back to Saigon, their reason
> being that in the US and Germany they were distinctly second class but
> in Vietnam they became rich Americans for the first time.
>
> At the time the saddest day of my life was landing back in New Jersey.

(because?)
America was in turmoil then???
The Northern and "rust-belt" cities were in economic and social collapse?
The "hippy culture" was kind of alright for those involved but the
country felt directionless and without a shared vision?

I was in the USA in 2001 to 2002.
What I saw as a complete inversion from confident, outgoing and
self-believing to paranoid and inward-looking was horrendous.
There was no need for the American people to be drawn into that trap,
yet the "leadership" took everyone in that direction, as it seemed to
me.
America seemed to have rebuilt itself from what documentaries show of
the early 1970's.
Maybe I am a naive idealist seeing a great country doing well and
for good reason
when I arrived in early 2001.

Very tentative almost-random thoughts there...

Best wishes,
Rich Smith

"Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lyh6kx95p7.fsf@void.com...

"Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> writes:
>
> At the time the saddest day of my life was landing back in New Jersey.

(because?)
America was in turmoil then???
The Northern and "rust-belt" cities were in economic and social collapse?
The "hippy culture" was kind of alright for those involved but the
country felt directionless and without a shared vision?

I was in the USA in 2001 to 2002.
What I saw as a complete inversion from confident, outgoing and
self-believing to paranoid and inward-looking was horrendous.
There was no need for the American people to be drawn into that trap,
yet the "leadership" took everyone in that direction, as it seemed to
me.
America seemed to have rebuilt itself from what documentaries show of
the early 1970's.
Maybe I am a naive idealist seeing a great country doing well and
for good reason
when I arrived in early 2001.

Very tentative almost-random thoughts there...

Best wishes,
Rich Smith

------------------------------
The short answer is because it was New Jersey which we called the Armpit of
America for its geography below Long Island, the sluminess of its cities and
the foul chemical odors of the port of Elizabeth in the corner by NYC. The
non-urban parts could be quite pleasant.

I'll have to consider and research a longer answer. In general I think we
divide ourselves into self-reliant and productive people who reside in their
own homes and dissatisfied, less well-adapted ones who tend toward urban
apartments and liberal-arts jobs, creating words and pictures instead of
useful objects. I've had experience on both sides. Geographically and
politically that separates us into conservative and liberal regions plus
many that are mixed, as liberals flee what they have created yet can't/won't
adapt.

I remember the 70's as a time when we felt we'd lost our way, culminating in
the Carter years. Afterwards things just became divided and confused. The
idea of Make America Great Again has become an icon that arouses sociopathic
hate from the left and I don't understand why. They appear too eager to
blame everyone but themselves for their low achievement level, with terms
like "underprivileged", denying the benefits of study and hard work. Society
may have become too complex and difficult to navigate for some, but the
history and literature of ancient Athens shows a similar rise, discord and
downfall in a far simpler time.

https://www.ihc.ucsb.edu/the-idiot-and-the-community/

Popular democracy still exists. Here in NH the entire town population can
debate, amend and vote on a warrant that specifies the next years budgets
and changes to town and school operations. In practice there might be a
hundred or so who are sufficiently interested to attend and perhaps 20 of us
willing to stand up and speak. The final vote is a separate day-long
election that allows more participation.

We've had recent immigrants from more urban Massachusetts tell us we should
just let our elected officials make all the decisions without interference.
That symbolizes the gulf between independent self reliance and passive
codependence.

Out of curiosity I attended an evening lecture in MA by far-left professor
Noam Chomsky, I don't ignore views I disagree with. Before it began the
people in front of me were discussing their pride in not needing to
understand technology, specifically how to set time on a VCR, and gleefully
ridiculing those geeks/nerds who do. I stayed quiet; my briefcase held a
prototype of a miniature atomic clock I was developing for the Air Force.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/nov/30/americas-undying-empire-why-the-decline-of-us-power-has-been-greatly-exaggerated

"Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> writes:

> "Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lyh6kx95p7.fsf@void.com...
>
> "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> writes:

> The short answer is because it was New Jersey which we called the
> Armpit of America for its geography below Long Island, the sluminess
> of its cities and the foul chemical odors of the port of Elizabeth in
> the corner by NYC. The non-urban parts could be quite pleasant.

Ahh... Right...

> https://www.ihc.ucsb.edu/the-idiot-and-the-community/

Interesting observation...

> ...
> interference. That symbolizes the gulf between independent self
> reliance and passive codependence.
>
> ...

It is externally observed about Britain
"The large number of unskilled 'managers'"
That someone outside seeing a second-by-second reality here.
Inured by years and decades of it, a friend still chortled when I
portrayed an annoyance she related as being "a nothing" because it was
"a laryngial reflex action".
As in - there you are making the Company function, hooked into the
vertical revenue-earning structure of the business

(there are "high-flyers" who strike the deals but rely on a raft of
support making everything easy and pre-organised for them so they can
walk in and concentrate solely on the arrangement which brings money
into the Company and there are those who are not controlling the top
end but are diligently "taking on-board" the needs of the topmost
making everything happen as if it just does in return for a modest
pouring of money to them)

with these horizontal stratems of "managers" whose job should be
keeping the stationery cupboard stocked, booking-in the
central-heating service company, etc. - who have transmuted into
"managers" who pick into the revenue-generating activity.

But the big picture is - the economy is supporting some double-figure
percent of people who seem to do nothing but these reflex actions
without comprehension. Do these things and you are "managerial
material" in Britain and you will be recognised, recruited and given
jobs where you force people doing any actual doing to justify every
little day-to-day thing - "taken on board" by those who self-validate
as being a crucial.

Variants of the "How many managers does it take to change a
lightbulb?" joke has got to extreme levels of sarcasm in response to
the situation.

As I see it...

I am skeptical a successful enduring economy can come from this.

Those who have benefitted from talented success do identify similar.
That the path they followed is not open now, and it would not be
possible to replace a significant person in a Company because "the
managers" would control it - with significant backing og the Law -
"equal opportunities legislation and practice" - hence being able to
insert one of their own.

Etc.

Rich S

"Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> writes:

> https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/nov/30/americas-undying-empire-why-the-decline-of-us-power-has-been-greatly-exaggerated

It starts off well, discussing the big picture, and that is fine - at
least the "landscape" being considered is recognisable.
Then with more recent events things start to wobble. The arguments
are propped-up with untruths, half-truths and fantasies - we suspect.
It is easier to comment on things further back where there is the
benefit of hindsight.
"The Guardian" has "fallen by the wayside" along with all other formal
media outlets. Jarring retransmissions of narrow "monomessage"
propaganda around truths so certain that that explains the absence of
nuance - noticeably irreconcilable with what we can see and sense of
events unfolding.

Geez I am feeling I am walking on unstable ground and quicksands
trying to go this far.

Time to go make another tea. Best wishes

"Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lymsup8322.fsf@void.com...

"Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> writes:

> https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/nov/30/americas-undying-empire-why-the-decline-of-us-power-has-been-greatly-exaggerated

It starts off well, discussing the big picture, and that is fine - at
least the "landscape" being considered is recognisable.
Then with more recent events things start to wobble. The arguments
are propped-up with untruths, half-truths and fantasies - we suspect.
It is easier to comment on things further back where there is the
benefit of hindsight.

----------------------
I picked the article for its British viewpoint. Sometime your side sees us
more objectively than we want to.

You gave a fair appraisal, it's common to see a set of observations
amplified beyond what they justify, that's what Chomsky did in his lecture.
I admit to composing and then deleting a lot myself. I try to separate the
facts from the opinions though a clever writer can obscure the difference.

Being retired and something of a hermit I'm no longer well enough connected
to comment seriously on the direction of our society. The most recent group
I listened to was flea market vendors, mostly older folk who have backed out
of the rat race to live a more independent gypsy lifestyle. Some are quite
well educated and they tend to be highly opinionated in diverse ways. A
portion are craftsmen peddling their wares and perhaps living off-grid,
which I've been exploring from the alternate energy perspective since the
1970's.

At night classes and school open house functions I've tried to get students
talking about their plans and view of society. In general they were upbeat
and optimistic, perhaps because the open-house participants were a
self-selected group of the most ambitious and outgoing.

The local TV channel has been running short pieces about the homeless. It's
meant to raise sympathy but to me they come across as antisocial,
intentionally unemployed whiners. I can think of several people who were/are
on the verge of unemployment for their hostile, negative and
self-destructive attitudes. They aren't "underprivileged", their problems
are their own demons, but politicians won't lure their votes by saying that.

"Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lyr0k183sl.fsf@void.com...

It is externally observed about Britain
"The large number of unskilled 'managers'"
That someone outside seeing a second-by-second reality here.
Inured by years and decades of it, a friend still chortled when I
portrayed an annoyance she related as being "a nothing" because it was
"a laryngial reflex action".
As in - there you are making the Company function, hooked into the
vertical revenue-earning structure of the business

(there are "high-flyers" who strike the deals but rely on a raft of
support making everything easy and pre-organised for them so they can
walk in and concentrate solely on the arrangement which brings money
into the Company and there are those who are not controlling the top
end but are diligently "taking on-board" the needs of the topmost
making everything happen as if it just does in return for a modest
pouring of money to them)

with these horizontal stratems of "managers" whose job should be
keeping the stationery cupboard stocked, booking-in the
central-heating service company, etc. - who have transmuted into
"managers" who pick into the revenue-generating activity.

But the big picture is - the economy is supporting some double-figure
percent of people who seem to do nothing but these reflex actions
without comprehension. Do these things and you are "managerial
material" in Britain and you will be recognised, recruited and given
jobs where you force people doing any actual doing to justify every
little day-to-day thing - "taken on board" by those who self-validate
as being a crucial.

Variants of the "How many managers does it take to change a
lightbulb?" joke has got to extreme levels of sarcasm in response to
the situation.

As I see it...

I am skeptical a successful enduring economy can come from this.

Those who have benefitted from talented success do identify similar.
That the path they followed is not open now, and it would not be
possible to replace a significant person in a Company because "the
managers" would control it - with significant backing og the Law -
"equal opportunities legislation and practice" - hence being able to
insert one of their own.

Etc.

Rich S

-----------------------------------
I attribute the rise of human drones to taxing the production of machines to
artificially employ unproductive people. For government there is a direct
advantage to the economy, for politicians a larger voting base, in private
enterprise it's less clear. Perhaps if a manager's value and salary is tied
to the number of people they manage the incentive is to add more up to a
barely justifiable limit. They also serve as targets for blame, like the
Specialist (Corporal) who took the fall for the Abu Ghraib scandal.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Graner

There was a running joke in the Army that the Specialist who typed orders in
the Pentagon actually ran everything because the officers never checked what
he wrote.

Another is about what a Lieutenant should do when ordered to put up a
flagpole. The correct answer is to say "Sergeant, erect a flagpole here" and
then stay out of his way. I read the officer's instructions on setting up a
Bailey bridge which support that. There's nothing on how to actually perform
the work. In my case the orders were "It's broke, go fix it".

My Army position of being highly skilled but commanding no one didn't fit
well into their structure and the rank and pay grade later reverted to
Sergeant. It's difficult to weigh the value of engineers and scientists who
work alone against that of a manager of many who gives direction and
resolves conflicts but personally produces nothing. Ben Rich's memoir of
directing the Lockheed Skunk Works mentions that dilemma.

In R&D an effective strategy is to partition the work into one-man units if
possible, Mitre and Segway did that. That way they can cooperate between
their fields without stepping on each other's toes within their own. I've
read that British wartime research was handled that way, by very small
groups. I expanded my role to packaging and programming only if no one else
was available for them.

"Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lyr0k183sl.fsf@void.com...

Variants of the "How many managers does it take to change a
lightbulb?" joke has got to extreme levels of sarcasm in response to
the situation.

-------------------------
They can't, that's a Union job.

I've lived the parallel question of how many actors it takes to
accomplish -anything- useful. Their salvation was the tech crew which
possibly could recreate civilization from scratch.

"Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> writes:

> "Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lymsup8322.fsf@void.com...
>
> "Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> writes:
>
>> https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/nov/30/americas-undying-empire-why-the-decline-of-us-power-has-been-greatly-exaggerated
>
>
> I picked the article for its British viewpoint. ...
> ...

My impression is:
you will not find any "British opinion" in any "mainstream media".

How you would find out our opinion - not going to be easy...

We have to get on day-by-day with a complex impression guiding our
trajectory, without time and energy to as much as start to describe
what it is we see.

Yet there is to a significant extent shared impressions it seems.

"Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> writes:

> ...
> I attribute the rise of human drones ... ..., for politicians a larger
> voting base, ...

The main driver?
A big base of voters totally reliant on the Government for its
existence, perceiving themselves as "upwardly mobile".

Absurdities here:

* during the "Covid19" crisis there was no need for these people to go
to work - so they invented "the furlough scheme" - the Government paid
for them to stay at home - at the time I did not see that it was going
to be the "no real role" Conservative-party voters where the majority
beneficiary of this largesse - as everyone "still" in the working
group, including me, were 100% unbrokenly needed at work.

* a "low-skilled manager" relying on a domestic help who in their own
country is a Doctor, a vetinarian, etc.

The Government had to make jobs for its voters, and being a
"right-wing" Government driving the change they invented "the culture
of the manager" - which created this demographic raft in our society.

How it impacts me - if I go for a job these will be the people on the
interview panel.
"How many angels fit on the head of a pin?" would be a remarkably
recognisable question because at least you can quantify the pin. Many
questions - neither the situation nor what they ask you to address are
recognisable in the parallel universe of wherever their heads are at.
Background explanation - "equal opportunites legislation" means the
whole recruitment process has to be handled by "managers" - and, well,
cue every fantasy and have no relation to the point.

"Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lylea78wuy.fsf@void.com...

Absurdities here:

* during the "Covid19" crisis there was no need for these people to go
to work - so they invented "the furlough scheme" - the Government paid
for them to stay at home - at the time I did not see that it was going
to be the "no real role" Conservative-party voters where the majority
beneficiary of this largesse - as everyone "still" in the working
group, including me, were 100% unbrokenly needed at work.

* a "low-skilled manager" relying on a domestic help who in their own
country is a Doctor, a vetinarian, etc.

The Government had to make jobs for its voters, and being a
"right-wing" Government driving the change they invented "the culture
of the manager" - which created this demographic raft in our society.

-------------------------------
In the US both parties participate, the Right absorbs the excess labor
capacity above consumption with defense and space work and the Left with
expanding the management of social and regulatory programs. Both decry the
half they don't control as unnecessary waste. The distinction is somewhat
blurred by competition to boost Federal spending in each legislators' home
district.

"Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lyr0jz8y89.fsf@void.com...

"Jim Wilkins" <muratlanne@gmail.com> writes:

> I picked the article for its British viewpoint. ...

My impression is:
you will not find any "British opinion" in any "mainstream media".

--------------------------------------

Not specifically British, I don't read other languages well enough for
sophisticated concepts and don't trust automated translations to catch
subtle context-dependent shades of connotation, sometimes the translation is
just ludicrous. The subtitled foreign TV shows here are police dramas with
limited vocabulary.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SOKO_Potsdam
A common phrase from the detectives is "keine Ahnung", "I haven't a clue".

For instance I wouldn't understand the true meaning of Realpolitik without
knowing the history of Otto von Bismarck. He provoked France into declaring
a war they would lose by shading the wording of a telegram such that they
could take its translation as an insult. We may have mistranslated an
ambiguous Japanese term concerning their possible surrender as an absolute
denial, and thus nuked them. I took it as similar to the difference between
"think little of" and "think nothing of" something, which are opposites.

An example I found in an English-language Russian magazine was a Russian's
comment of "Horses, Men!" over the Hot Line between Washington and Moscow
that puzzled US translators until someone realized it was a reference to the
disorder of battle from Lermontov's famous poem "Borodino".

Oriental translations can make no sense or mean other than intended. I saw
one expressing existential despair; "Parts that are exhausted of their lives
are to be replaced."

National leaders usually speak their native language at international events
and let professional translators word them correctly in other languages,
even if they speak it. JFK was ridiculed for a statement that came out like
"I am a Danish!" (breakfast pastry). "Berliner" is the adjective for a
resident, "ein Berliner" is a jelly doughnut. Both versions are used here,
but would you say "I am a British"?

The perils of mistranslation - you benefit from experience and travel...

"Richard Smith" wrote in message news:lyy1e780t2.fsf@void.com...

The perils of mistranslation - you benefit from experience and travel...

----------------------

The applicable phrase is good judgment comes from experience, and experience
comes from bad judgment. I hope I didn't accidentally insult anyone too
badly. A few German beers increased the quantity of my foreign speech but
did nothing for its quality. That applies in English too.