![[F]](12125_files/site.gif) New York Times on the Web Forums
 Science
Technology has always found its greatest consumer in a
nation's war and defense efforts. Since the last attempts at a
"Star Wars" defense system, has technology changed
considerably enough to make the latest Missile Defense
initiatives more successful? Can such an application of
science be successful? Is a militarized space inevitable,
necessary or impossible?
Read Debates, a new
Web-only feature culled from Readers' Opinions, published
every Thursday.
  (12124 previous messages)
mazza9
- 11:45am May 28, 2003 EST (#
12125 of 12148)
"Quae cum ita sunt" Caesar's Gallic
Commentaries
Breaking News: RShow55 is Jayson Blair!!! Details at
Eleven!
mazza9
- 11:46am May 28, 2003 EST (#
12126 of 12148)
"Quae cum ita sunt" Caesar's Gallic
Commentaries
News Alert: Lchic is Maureen Dowd!!! Details at Eleven!
mazza9
- 11:47am May 28, 2003 EST (#
12127 of 12148)
"Quae cum ita sunt" Caesar's Gallic
Commentaries
Enquiring Minds Want to Know. All the news that's fit to
spit!
bbbuck
- 12:04pm May 28, 2003 EST (#
12128 of 12148)
Can anyone get me a date with Rudi Bakhtiar?
rshow55
- 01:23pm May 28, 2003 EST (#
12129 of 12148)
Can we do a better job of finding
truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have
done and worked for on this thread.
I try to avoid similarities to Jayson Blair - and
tell the truth and keep my promises as best I can.
I've also tried to act in ways that were respectful of The
New York Times - an organization I admire very much - an
organization that I believe is a credit to America.
I've worked hard to do things that "the average reader of
the New York Times" would approve of, if that hypothetical
reader looked at the circumstances under which I was acting.
Clearly, I can make mistakes. I know that very well. So can
anyone. There are also limitations on how fast I can work
through decisions - and how fast I can work. There are
limitations on my courage, as well.
In early November, 2001, I sent an open postcard to Mr.
Arthur O. Sulzberger, Jr. Publisher of The New York Times with
this text.
*****
"Dear Mr. Sulzberger:
" I need an exception to NYT policy, and
feel I have to ask you, or someone you designate, for the
permission. Our nuclear weapons systems and ongoing and
prospective negotiations about them involve instabilities. I
would like to communicate with Sam Nunn and Ted Turner's
NUCLEAR THREAT INITIATIVE in ways that can work.
" I am asking that (reporter's name), or
someone (s)he designates assist me in Washington over three
days time -- meeting with some NTI people to discuss a
presentation on stability - then spending a day helping to
prepare a presentation the NTI people, as they are, can
understand and use. Some explosive instabilities need to be
avoided by the people who must make and maintain the
relevant agreements. The system crafted needs to be workable
for what it has to do, have feedback, damping, and dither in
the right spots with the right magnitudes. The things that
need to be checkable should be.
" I will try to pay my debts appropriately,
and think perhaps I can. I feel that the TIMES staff spend
more than 10% of its time on defense and offense. It should
be more like 3.5%. I feel that the reduction can be done,
step by step, with each step win-win.
Robert Showalter
That text was communicated, a little later, to a Senate
staffer who I had contacted before, in a communication set out
(with some key names Xd out from the original) at http://www.mrshowalter.net/LtToSenateStffrWSulzbergerNoteXd.html
I've been working under what have seemed to me awkward
circumstances - and perhaps I have not dealt with them as well
as I might have. But I've tried to act honorably, and some of
what I've done can be checked.
I personally think I've been acting honorably, and
reasonably competently.
I also think lchic has been acting superbly well by
any reasonably balanced standards.
rshow55
- 01:26pm May 28, 2003 EST (#
12130 of 12148)
Can we do a better job of finding
truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have
done and worked for on this thread.
I wish I'd written the postcard better in one respect. I
wish I'd added the word bolded here
I feel that the TIMES staff spend more than
10% of its time on internal defense and offense. It
should be more like 3.5%. I feel that the reduction can be
done, step by step, with each step win-win.
My intention was to try to "earn my keep" by explaining
some simple things that might have been useful about exception
handling - checking mechanisms - and especially about the
importance of setting them up so that they did not, with time
- produce the opposite of the intended effects.
(18 following messages)
   
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Science
Missile Defense
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