Brickmuppet Blog 2.0

March 22, 2009

That is Not a List....

..nor is the ship rolling.

That is the damage to the sail of USS Hartford from here recent collision with USS New Orleans. There is a good discussion of this that includes informed opinion over at Bubbleheads place.

Scuttlebutt over there is that the submarine rolled over 80 degrees.
That is one tough boat.

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More Ideas for Naval Numbers on a Budget

As has been mentioned here before, the combination of increasing unit costs, aging hulls in need of replacement an increase in the numbers of units needed and the unforced budget debacle facing the treasury has created a procurement conundrum for the US Navy and Coast Guard.

We need ships, lots of ships in a decade or less but given the economy we are likely to have have very little money

Given the high tempo 'medical diplomacy' operations pioneered by the Bush administration as well as the need to respond to disasters such as typhoons, volcanoes, plagues and tsunamis at least some of the vessels we build ought to have some sort of cargo capacity and a larger than average medical facility.

A converted or redesigned merchant design would seem to be the logical choice but if these are to replace the FFGs then it is important to ensure that such a vessel be capable of providing something in the event of a hot war other than terrible ways for bluejackets to die.

This is not unheard of. The Flower class sloops of world war one were built to commercial standards, had a modest cargo capacity and were intended to serve as minesweepers, troopers, escorts, picket vessels, gunboats and light replenishment ships. They were not frontline ships but they were not helpless either and provided sterling service as convoy escorts and on gunboat duties between the wars.

The challenges of modern warfare mean that an electronics fit is needed of course so such a ship will bear no relation in cost to whatever merchant ship it is designed from, but it might cost something akin to a modern corvette.

Lets take a standard American containership design, the Philidelphia Class, and assume the aft deck is used for helicopter operation and the aft holds are used as a flex deck for small craft and Littoral combat ship modules. The holds forward of the bridge have ample room for containers that can contain everything from food to hospital or war supplies. I'd use the midships below decks space (where pitching would be minimized )for a big hospital and a secondary helipad (if only to directly service the hospital). This would not have the capability of the Mercy or Comfort but it could conceivably approach that of the LHAs and could do a LOT of good on mercy missions.
It might be less threatening as well. Note that while such a vessel would not be a hospital ship, and would therefore be targetable by law, most people we are likely to lock horns with are unpersuaded by appeals to human decency anyway. Forward of the hospital area, even 2-400 containers would be an impressive ammount of relief supplies in peacetime and still leave room for 16-32 VLS cells for ESSM. The large helideck would give a decent helicopter borne ASW and possibly even minesweeping capability in wartime especially if during a major war something like SCADS or the old ARAPAHO concept were put into place along the lines of this....

We might be able to build a dozen or more of these in commercial yards over the next few years. This would have the added benefit of propping up and stimulating our shipyard capacity during dark economic times in a way that dog parks in California are unlikely to do. Such a program might appeal to the current leadership in ways a more conventional naval procurement would not.

These would probably not able to be procured in the same numbers that 600 ton corvettes might but they could ad a considerable complementary capability to the low end of the hi/lo mix.

At any rate it may bear considering. Any thoughts?

UPDATE: In the comments James Rummel takes the time to comment at length about the idea and makes some lucid points but also indicates that I may have been unclear about as few things.
These are not replacemtnts for our cruisers and destroyers, but a low end complement. If they replace anything they might best replace part of the production run of the LCS vessels....
IF they can be procured more economically and IF they would be a net improvement in capability . These are indeed big "IFs".
There are certainly all sorts of issues with this concept both political and practical. However, I am of the opinion that, if built, these would be warships with peacetime duties similar to a 19th century gunboat but with much greater utility to assist the main force.

Mr Rummel makes another comment that deserves mention.

You suggest that this is only a temporary change until economic conditions improve. But anyone interested in military procurement will tell you in a heartbeat that it would be almost impossible to get Congress to pony up for actual, very expensive warships after a decade of building cheaper cargo ships. Once the change is made, there is no going back.

This is a very real concern.

It is probably one reason the navy doesn't build some smaller carriers to increase survivability through numbers. This was tried in the 70s ant the congress made it plain that it would ONLY buy the smaller carriers and not increase numbers...thereby gutting the navy but giving the impression that congress was providing modern ships.

It does not always work out that way though.

In the 1880's the UKs shipbuilding program was terribly screwed up, with problems that included cost overruns, excessively long build times, ships massively over budget as well as overdue, quality control issues, problems integrating new technologies and simple corruption (sound familiar?). The response was to, for a time, order only second line vessels such as gunboats and auxiliaries as well as a few experimental technology test beds such as experimental high speed craft (the torpedo boats).

These were often ordered outside the usual defense procurement clique.
In the meantime the procurement system was overhauled, investment was made in physical plant improvements at the shipyards and the procurement system was reformed, Concurrently, a determination of what sort of vessels were needed was made. Then rational, attainable requirements for the various types of vessels were drawn up that matched the then current technologies, the national strategy of the time as well as the gamut of potential scenarios.

After several years of building gunboats and finishing the dubious vessels that were already ordered, the Royal Navy began building ships under the Naval Defence Act. William Whites design team produced the finest ships that had been built up to that time and for nearly two decades, every subsequent class was an improvement on their design predecessor in some way.

^{HMS Royal Sovereign}

From that point until WW1 the British Royal Navy built a balanced fleet and produced some of the best, most economical; and cost effective ships of their day.

So while the pitfall Mr Rummel points out is very real, it can in fact be avoided if care is taken and the legislature acts in good faith...another very big "IF".

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 12:00 AM | Comments (10) | Add Comment
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1 As a guest here, I'm having a hard time coming up with a way to avoid offending you while still voicing my opinion that this is a really terrible idea.

Busy now. Give me a day or so to think on it.

James

Posted by: James R. Rummel at Sun Mar 22 02:03:09 2009 (85JOu)

2 Thanks for dropping by.
It's just brainstorming and opinions were solicited so offense is unlikely.

^{( WTF? Dissenting opinions in my echo chamber!1!? zomg!1!!}⁾

By all means have at it.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Sun Mar 22 08:37:46 2009 (xqpbD)

3 I really enjoy your blog Brickmuppet, there are very few places where you can read about ships while looking at cute anime girls!
The specifics of your proposal have been intensely debated for years with the Falkland campaign cited by both sides: The necessity of logistic support vs survivability and recoverability. The loss of Atlantic Conveyer in the face of all the brits efforts and all the handicaps argentina had to overcome shows that defences alone are not the answer. On the other hand S&R principles and merchant ship construction are not totally incompatible (ref. the ww2 exploit of the tanker Ohio in the relief of Malta). If we accept that our ship is going into harms way we can modify the design for fire main capacity and access, critical system seperation and redundancy, compartmentilization, etc. These changes coupled with a large well trained crew would give our ship a fighting chance.
As for equipping, have you considered drop in modules for the container wells? many possibilities there.

Posted by: Larry Schumacher at Sun Mar 22 23:13:26 2009 (jBw+d)

4 Well, the whole ship procurement program has become totally broken due in large part to political corruption, primarily on the part of Congress critters. The rest is due to contractors and Naval "gold plating." Until that procurement process gets repaired, somehow, we are screwed. For and example look what happened to the super and stealthy rail gunned destroyer project. Pretty much looks like it is going to be two ships as tech demos since on cost as much as a fleet of Arleigh B's. It's bad enough, that I'd suggest purchasing warships from Korean yards or course that won't happen because things have to be built in the US. Maybe we could get the Koreans to build a yard in an "Open Shop" state.

Posted by: toadold at Mon Mar 23 00:45:30 2009 (zcbXo)

5 I want to make sure that I understand your proposal.

If I'm reading you correctly, you are suggesting that the Navy pretty much assign building dedicated warships a lower priority. Instead, they should throw their clout behind acquiring the type of vessels you discuss above.

Again, if I understand correctly, you are saying that this is simply acknowledging basic reality. Ships are becoming so old that they must be retired anyway, redesigned civilian cargo carriers would fill a great many more roles than dedicated warships, and the most common type of mission the Navy is tasked with today is humanitarian.

Besides, at least this way there would be some active ships around, instead of a steadily shrinking number of aging warships.

Is that correct?

James

Posted by: James R. Rummel at Mon Mar 23 04:24:00 2009 (YuARq)

Is that correct?

Basically yes.

This is a sub optimum solution to be sure, but the situation, both financial and political is pretty messed up. We are broke and our obligations are not going to obligingly taper off while we get our house in order.

We have a fair number of underage first rate destroyers and a dozen or more of the Ticos can probably soldier on at least a decade. I would hope that very low rate destroyer production would continue to make up for aging and attrition.
These vessels have lots of missile tubes and with Aegis the ability to use them quite effectively.
We have no shortage of tubes, but we need more hulls.

What we need is a successor to the FFG7s ( frigates) and something to augment the 2 overworked hospital ships. Assault ships can do the latter but they are expensive to operate, a little threatening, and the gator navy is being used already.

Note that I don't advocate flying jump jets off of these despite the diagram above. It was the only ARAPAHO graphic I could find. Several helicopters, a few being flying cranes to offload humanitarian containers, would be adequate. I wouldn't want the electronic suite to be much more than a modern version of what the Perrys have.

Tilt away guys.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Mon Mar 23 08:30:45 2009 (NOj8q)

7 Brickmuppet your hospital tasking is one of areas in which I see LCS1 as being useful. Her nimble shallow draft hull enables her to get into small ports. State would rent a warehouse on the quay while LCS would bring in equip. and materiels in her hold. Additional personel would be flown in by V22. These units would set up clinics in the warehouse as well as classrooms for health and hygine ed. I have done this on a small scale in mexico and have seen great results; a few inexpensive basic items and an afternoon of instruction can make a huge difference in sombodys life. While all this is going on in addition to basic support the ship could host an NOAA survey crew to update the chart info for the area; such info is always valuable.

Posted by: Larry Schumacher at Mon Mar 23 10:14:49 2009 (jBw+d)

8 <i>"...the situation, both financial and political is pretty messed up. We are broke and our obligations are not going to obligingly taper off while we get our house in order."</i>

The problem, as I see it, is that you have completely ignored the only real reason why the Navy exists in the first place. What is worse is that you are ignoring the reason people seek out a career there.

You see, the Navy exists to make war against America's enemies. That's it. Nothing else.

Every single ship under Navy command was planned, purchased, budgeted, and operates to conduct combat operations, or to support the ships that do. Even prototypes are purchased to test new technology that might go in to a warship, not so we can develop designs to bring medical aid to 3rd World nations.

It is true that some humanitarian missions have gotten some press lately, but the idea is to support combat operations through PR work. Hearts and minds. Get a hospital or aid station set up in equatorial Africa so the locals are less likely to join al Queda. After all, if the Navy's purpose was to bring medical services to those who needed it, you would see them setting up clinics in Canada, where socialized medicine has caused huge waiting periods for even basic care. But you don't.

Your scheme calls for the Navy to throw all of their resources, budget and political, into building nothing more than support ships. What is worse is that these ships won't be supporting warships conducting combat operations, since you propose simply retiring an entire class of ships.

So how do you think our professional fighting sailors would view the change?

It would be seen as complete submission and defeat. The Navy to which they devoted their lives, making some extreme sacrifices so far as raising a family and enjoying watching their children grow up, would be changed into some sort of shipping concern.

You suggest that this is only a temporary change until economic conditions improve. But anyone interested in military procurement will tell you in a heartbeat that it would be almost impossible to get Congress to pony up for actual, very expensive warships after a decade of building cheaper cargo ships. Once the change is made, there is no going back.

Another thing you failed to take in to account is what the Marines would have to say. One of the big debates that rage amingst military circles is how the Navy has ignored ship designs with guns, in favor of missiles and anti-submarine capability. The idea is that the Navy is not interested in supporting amphibious landings, even though that is one of the more likely operations we will be forced to use if there is ever another serious shooting war.

But, lack of big guns or not, at least most warships have a gun of some kind. They can still support landings, just not in the style to which the Marines were accustomed in WWII.

That isn't true with the ships you propose. They have an extremely limited self defense capability, but really can't do anything to add to the firepower being brought down on trouble spots. And yes, I am counting the VLS pod you mentioned in your post. A few dozen cruise missiles simply can't take the place of thousands of artillery shells that a single warship can fire off, not to mention the VLS pods that the warship would also have available.

I think that, should your scheme be adopted, we would see a migration of talented, dedicated people who would find other work after their term of enlistment expired. Smart, dedicated warriors who we need to keep our 1st class warfighting capability intact would fade away, and we wouldn't see too many of their ilk stepping up to enlist and replace them. What warrior would be interested in making the sacrifices of spending all that time away from homw and family, hust to serve on board a cargo vessel that is helpless to any submarine that happens along?

This is a terrible idea! Lucky thing that just about everyone with a military background would laugh it into the ground just as soon as they heard of it.

James

Posted by: James R. Rummel at Mon Mar 23 17:41:54 2009 (YuARq)

9 Mr. Rummel, I think you are seeing things that are not there...

The problem, as I see it, is that you have completely ignored the only real reason why the Navy exists in the first place. What is worse is that you are ignoring the reason people seek out a career there.

You see, the Navy exists to make war against America's enemies. That's it. Nothing else.

I agree completely that the purpose of the USN is to make war against Americas enemies. Nothing I have said here would indicate that I don't appreciate that.

However, you also wrote:

It is true that some humanitarian missions have gotten some press lately, but the idea is to support combat operations through PR work. Hearts and minds. Get a hospital or aid station set up in equatorial Africa so the locals are less likely to join al Queda

...and it seems you think that might be a worthy goal. Weaken the current enemy by reducing his ability to recruit.

You wrote:

Your scheme calls for the Navy to throw all of their resources, budget and political, into building nothing more than support ships. What is worse is that these ships won't be supporting warships conducting combat operations, since you propose simply retiring an entire class of ships

I do not propse the navy put ALL of its rescources into this. This is intended to provide additional low end hulls at a minimum of sacrifice in frontline production.

I don't propose retiring an entire class of ship.

I do point out that the FFG7s are at the end of their useful lives.

Note that the projected replacement, the LCS is very lightly armed and quite expensive. It is also built to basically commercial standards. This vessel might be a better fit for many missions.

As I pointed out in the follow up comment the navy has many destroyers and cruisers to fight with. It has aircraft carriers and submarines. However, for duties like we are asking the navy to do now (hunting pirates, show the flag and the humanitarian missions) the navy needs larger numbers than we have. We can't afford to build all the needed hulls as destroyers. Additionally, it is a waste of materiel to use an AEGIS cruiser to hunt pirates and give out water packets. Those vessels need to focus on drilling for a hot war.....killing enemies and breaking their ships.

One proposal is to build lots of vessels like the navies Cyclone class patrol boats....but those would be basically useless in any sort of hot war.

As to the utter uselessness of these vessels lets look at what I actually said

....and still leave room for 16-32 VLS cells for ESSM. The large helideck would give a decent helicopter borne ASW and possibly even minesweeping capability in wartime especially if during a major war something like SCADS or the old ARAPAHO concept were put into place along the lines of this...

32 VLS cells equals 128 Evolved Seasparow missiles. This is not a defenseless ship, though being built to civilian standards it might not be terribly survivable if it were hit.

The ASW and minesweeping helicopters would be very useful in supporting the fleet.

A fleet that would then be better able to make war against Americas enemies.

With 3 times as many AAA missiles and 4 times as many helicopters, one of these vessels would be a fine replacement for the Perry class frigates in convoy escort. One of the greatest threats the navy faces right now is cheap quiet diesel boats. This is a possible way to deal with that problem.

Just to clarify: by "deal with" I mean sink.

The hull I proposed using is an off the shelf comercial design...but it is 23000 tons. There is no reason that it could not be fitted with the same gun as a 9000 ton destroyer, and carry enough ammunition to exhaust the barrel life of said gun (7000 rounds for the 5" 62) before reloading. However, not every ship needs to be able to conduct fire support ops.

You suggest that by buying ships that have some support capability that the Navy would not get recruits. Well the Navy has oilers, repair ships, water barges, hospital ships, combat stores ships, survey vessels and torpedo recovery ships now. Those sailors are not going to fail to reenlist because they got a billet not on a destroyer.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Tue Mar 24 01:16:19 2009 (xqpbD)

10 http://www.thinkdefence.co.uk/2012/03/a-ship-for-all-seasons-or-the-return-of-the-auxiliary-cruiser/

Posted by: GJ at Sun Mar 25 15:44:53 2012 (KJn9O)

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March 21, 2009

Random 4-Koma is Random

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For Those Who May Be Concerned....

...my earlier post, linking to a post on the Bear was not in any way, shape, form or fashion linking to anything regarding this bear.

Thus you may click without worry.

Er....in that post..but not in this one...'cause if you click on the hyperlink in in this one you'll find the wrong bear...and that would be bad....

...if you're good.

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So...Would this be the Eucalyptus Curtain Then?

The Australian government has begun censoring the internet.

As Pixy explains, it gets even stupider from there.

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March 20, 2009

Above the Fold

OK. I have very little time right now but this needs to be said.

Give the POTUS a break.

The other night the President made a self deprecating comment about his bowling score. In the process he offended some people. It was not a politically correct comment and was inartful for a political leader to utter.

Big
Effing
Whoop

For one thing the fact that the President tried a self deprecating remark is a major improvement over the mini Parthenon of his nomination speech.

This kerfuffle should be given a rest.

Many of us on the right are making the bleedingly obvious point that if Bush , McCain or Palin had said this it would be run into the ground by the press incessantly. Well yes...and it would be wrong...and you know what?We would say so.

This flubbed bit of self deprecation is a non issue.

He has made some cringeworthy faux pas over the last few days and like many of my friends my face is often embedded in my palm over them. But he is our president and this is an exceedingly trivial issue.
There are quite a few issues pertaining to policy that we can, and must oppose him on...I have and I will.

However it is not good to be playing the "gotcha" game and crowing about hurt feelings over a joke. This is stupid and bad for the country.

Political correctness is a bane of our nation and its corrosive effects on free speech need to be fought tooth and nail...including here.

Yes it is delightfully Karmic crow over this and give the Dems a well deserved dose of their own poison, but it is unfair to the office and bad for the country to hound our President over trivialities. It also cheapens our outrage over the many very real, nontrivial issues we have.

I am no fan of the current resident of the White House, but Barak Obama is the President of the United States...he has taken the weight of the world onto his shoulders on our behalf. He damned well deserves not to be hounded over PC trivialities for the good of the nation.

God knows there are enough substantive issues to oppose him on .

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March 18, 2009

How Very Fortunate We Are

For the benefit of those with lives or weak constitutions, the hyper-partisan hyperlinks are below the fold....For the benefit of everyone, there's this...

^{Artist Unknown}

more...

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The Bear

Eagle One has taken the time to put a long and well researched post up concerning one of the finest and most storied ships to ever split waves and break ice. The mighty cutter Bear.

Go now...Go read the whole thing.

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Norks Make Massive Technological Breakthrough

Fear the might of the DPRK...

It has taken almost 10 years of work, but North Korea has acquired the technology to launch a project very dear to its leader's heart - the nation's first "authentic" Italian pizzeria.

It's nice to see them get a success under their belt.... seeing as how the Atomic Bomb and feeding their people projects were utter busts.

Somewhere in heaven Sejong the Great is weeping.

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Anime News: Some Regrettably Accurate..Some Regrettably Not

THAT Anime Blog has a roundup of most of the upcoming season. It makes an interesting comparison with this prediction I recently received via E-Mail.

As your brains may grudgingly recall, this time last year I predicted some of the anime trends we'd be seeing soon. For those of you whom
time has been a balm to soothe the mind, let me rub raw some
old wounds: remember Hobos, Hairdressers, Veterinarians, and Mushrooms.

I confidently measure my predictive powers against the track records of
such luminous benchmarks as Nostradamus, any economist (other than Adam
Smith), and the Christian Bible. As we venture forward further, the
producers of Japanese manga and anime have begun to make their intentions
known. I predict 2010 shall be the year of:

1) Demolition Derbys (a.k.a Banger Racing in Europe)
2) Reptiles/Dinosaurs (listed separately because there are too many people
on this list who know the difference).
3) Gardening
4) Belgians

As usual, at first the new elements will be introduced into fairly safe
territory:

Thumb Green : A heartfelt series about an orphan, Tanazaki, who is adopted
into a family of estate gardeners. Mom works in topiaries and Dad prefers
tea roses, but the adopted son follows in bonsai-enthusiast grandfather's
steps. When the last Japanese heir to the estate dies and the manor falls
to the young Belgian heiress, can Tanazaki learn to forgive her shameful
secret and teach her to live in harmony with the back lawn? And will
Tanazaki's new sister, who may feel more than sisterly-affection for
Tanazaki, ever perfect her compost pile? Look for the hidden symbolism of
the koi pond as it reflects the state of romance between the heiress, the
orphan, and the possibly-insane sister.

Crash 1911 : A truly anachronistic and jingoistic offering, Crash 1911 is
set in 1914(!) in a Miyazakiburgstein (one of those generic
Western-Central European with steampunk touches) setting. "Crash 1911"
refers to the undefeated reign of driver Josef Tildeff's and his 1911
season winning twelve-competitor collision. Now in 1914, most of the
participants of that epic season have returned with even more-outlandish
cars and unlikely proteges, including a deaf Mongolian, a Cajun
zydeco-playing grandmother, and Tildeff's own protege who is (you guessed
it) a Japanese orphan. How will each of the competitor's life experiences
aid them in the upcoming derby? And why is it every non-Asian character
except the son of the Belgian calvary officer painted in such a negative
light? Still, all the mechanical designs will look like "the Secret of
Blue Water" meet "Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bag" to the point that the only fan
disappointment will be that none of the cars actually fly.

Sensai Crocogator-san's Class Trip : Middle-school Crocogator takes his
students on a different class trip each week, visiting factories, places
of historical interest, zoos, etc. Students from different walks of life
(dirt poor, privileged rich, brains, jocks, and just-average-losers) all
learn important lessons each week while they face the challenges of
growing up Japanese. Each week at least one student will be eaten by this
pedagoguish member of Osteolaemus holtzus (common name: the Too-Clever
Crocodile), but never fear - they tend to reappear in the middle of the
episode with no apparent ill-effect. The series will impart a love of
history. Season highlights will include the hilarious Alligator-wrestling
episode and the tour of the Diet building.

Later, as fallow ground goes further a-weed, we will see:

Caimen Maid Crisis! : This rather pedestrian tale will be a complete
ripoff of last season's 'Matic-Panic Stylist Yuki, except the
cybernetic-valet will be replaced with an alien Crocodilian Princess and
the original threatening alien invasion will be replaced by Atlantean
golems. There will be no plot-twists that couldn't be predicted by
hyper-active ten year-olds. Sales of the figurines of the Caimen Maid will
convince the producers to put out 19 OVAs, each of which feature her in a
different provocative outfit that can be lucratively merchandised.

Pumpkin Road-rage: It's the future, and a growing segment of the
transportation market features mutated, semi-intelligent vegetables. The
smartest of these appears to be Pumpkin Buggy, an orange sports-car with a
seed-spitting cannon. When rogue cars from the Belgian-based Zucchini
Biotechnical begin causing traffic havoc, Pumpkin Buggy and his owner are
drafted into the Tokyo Police Department to fight these street-racing,
squash-smashing renegades. It's "Jayce and the Wheeled Warriors" meets
"Speed Buggy" with a hint of "Riding Bean" and "ADP Police."

(Name Witheld For His Protection)

Lest you judge my corespondent too harshly I would point out that he really did guess...unlike the above linked bloggers who I strongly suspect...peeked.
Note too that unless there is some hapless cypher-nebish added to Queens Blade he was surprisingly prescient in not predicting any Harem shows.

Which is one of the few bright spots of the upcoming season (For me anyway)

Regards the actual upcoming season, my corespondents predictions certainly showed more innovation than the real thing. Queens Blade looks to likely to take 'fan service' well into the realm of diminishing returns...(the trailer is age blocked by You Tube...and rightly so ). However, while the reverse harem show Hanasakaru Sheishounen appeals to me even less, it is neat to see that there actually is one.

As to things that I'm actually looking forward to, the upcoming season is sparse pickings...with shows that seem to be ranging from the dystopic to the insipid. There are some things that seem to have some promise however.
Providing I have any opportunity to watch anything, the long awaited sequel to Full Metal Achemist is certainly high on my "to watch" list, and I take comfort in the fact that it is the only one I'm reasonably confident will be brought over.

The brief synopsis given of of K-ON looks interesting...

The story about four high school girls that try to sustain their schoolâ€™s popular music club despite being unable to read music or play instruments.

Heh...This could be cute.

The return of Hayate the Combat Butler is unlikely to suck, while the original was not high art it was enjoyably demented...For those unaware it tells the story of a competent and practical but...unlucky young lad who lands a job as a butler/bodyguard for an insanely rich and sheltered debutante and her bizzare household.

Of particular interest to me (being that I'm an utter geek) is, of course, that show the THAT crowd tossed onto the end of their post...as if it was an afterthought or something. (Infidels!) It appears that the next several weeks will see a straight up remake of...
Mazinger Z!

Oh be still my beating childhood!

Wow...Sad case of arrested development that I am, I fear I am going to have to watch this. I mean what could be cooler?

Oh yeah....that.

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March 17, 2009

Cheer Up !

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March 12, 2009

Owch! Owch! Owch!

It burnnnnsss!!!!!!!!!!

Via Ace

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March 11, 2009

Aerospace Projects Review

A few months ago I rather furtively purchased an item from Aerospace Projects Review. The item was on the stillborn project Meteor, a 1950's proposal for an orbital space station I mentioned in passing here.

I immediately bit the bullet and subscribed.

It is worth every frigging penny.

Lowther is an aerospace engineer and has meticulously researched and obtained information on all manner of historical projects, both those that were built and those that weren't.

Mr. Lowther is also an accomplished draftsman and he provides superb artwork both by himself and people like Damon Moran to complement the existing schematics and his in depth analysis...

^{PLUTO art by Damon Moran}

There is a lot of crap on the internet concerning projects that were never built...much of it utter bilge. Lowther's site is NOT one of those.

I cannot recommend this site highly enough. The prices are nominal and the information on various aerospace projects is amongst the most detailed available.

Anyway....plug.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 10:26 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Mirror Eyes

For the first time ever, a vertebrate has been discovered that uses mirrors in addition to lenses to focus light in its eyes.

^{image via BBC}

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 09:40 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Banality of Terror

more...

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 07:36 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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March 10, 2009

Capitolism

Yes Brickmuppeteers, a new word is born.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 09:37 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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March 08, 2009

OK This Crap Needs to End NOW

As anyone who has perused this blog at any length is aware, as a citizen I am NOT an advocate, fan or booster for the current President.

However....

He IS the President and he is damned well due the respect, even in disagreement, that Americans who are not hyperpartisan douchebag putzes accord a holder of that august office. (Just as Bush was.)

I was going to do a normal below the fold politics post on the cacophony of fail currently emanating from the oval office when I discovered that this piece of excrement had arrived in my inbox.

The video is short (2:28 ) and purports to show the different level of regard the USMC has for the previous and current Commander in chief.

Two points:
One....It is quite probable that these were cherry picked speeches. No indication is given of what sort of ceremony the two speeches were for, they may have had different solemnity levels and the different commands may have had different standing orders for their troops.

Two...The United States Armed Forces, while in uniform, do NOT, must NOT play politics. That leads down a trail which ends in blood. Happily, we have a pretty damned professional officer corps whose oath is to uphold the constitution, not any party, so I don't actually see this happening short of an actual suspension of the constitution.

While it is perfectly OK (and IHMO right now necessary) to criticize our President. This video manages at a stroke to disrespect the office, disrespect a man who has taken the weight of the world on his shoulders on our behalf AND dishonor the Marines of Camp Lejune by painting them as disloyal.

This line of attack is libelous, seditious crap and Brickmuppet Blog unequivocally and without reservation condemns it.
_{UPDATE: I sent this to several Milbloggers a few others.Sent it to some of the Volokh conspirators because I wonder if the video would constitute a violation of the Hatch Act.

UPDATE 2: I'm behind the curve on this one, Greyhawk comments

UPDATE 3: I am off base, this doesn't even come close to a Hatch Act violation. To clarify,}_{I wasn't concerned that the Marines in the vid were violating the Hatch act in any way, but I failed to make that clear. I thought that the vid might have been produced by a servicemember, but even if it was it is merely in poor taste, not any violation of the Hatch Act. Thanks to all those who responded and set me straight.
My opinion of the merits of the video still stands.}

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 09:01 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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March 07, 2009

Warrior Queen Boudica and the Lost Art

Colleen Doran laments the disappearance into the publishers aether of the last of the "Big Books" the Big Book of Wild Women which would have featured a story illustrated by Ms. Doran about the warrior queen of the Celts. In fact she laments its disappearance so much that she went ahead and published her story as part of a long, informative post concerning the historical Boudica.

Anyway, read the whole thing.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 11:31 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Refined Cultural References For the Erudite Geek

Wonderduck has started a conversation about what sort of geekery geeks should grok.

I'm not one to really ask about this as video games are a big part of the geek culture that long since passed me by and...well...I don't play many video games. I can count the ones I have played over the last 5 years on 1 hand.

Avatar however, has picked up the baton and run with it.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 11:14 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Interesting Find

Amongst the 37 songs I've thus far hunted down and put in the Blogradio rotation is one I blundered into quite unexpectedly: The radio edit of Hoshi no DejaVu, the OP song from Southern Cross.

I've been told that the song, (rather unlike the show) was fairly popular in Japan, topping the charts in 1984 at one point. It's an oddball find and it sort of blends with the other stuff too...

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 08:05 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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