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Missile Defense

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.

rshow55 - 11:48am Sep 8, 2003 EST (# 13566 of 13576)
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.

Hi, gisterme - one thing you would see if you went back and looked at your posts - is that you've worked hard.

Another thing you might see, or remember - is that you've sometimes asked me for answers - and I haven't given them to you.

That's true of Almarst , too.

There are some things one can say to criticise President Bush's speech last night

TEXT President Bush's Address to the Nation http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/08/international/08PTEX.html

and I agree with a lot said in The President's Speech http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/08/opinion/08MON1.html

but, everything considered, I think it was a pretty good speech - a step in the right direction. Not that I'm sure I'd disagree with some things I'd guess would occur to Almarst , reading the speech.

My college president sister's father in law, now passed away, gave a wonderful toast at her wedding:

" Here's to it . . . . from it . . . . and to it again.

" If you don't do it . . . when you get to it to do it . . . .

" You never get to it, to do it again.

You can't reverse time. But sometimes you can get to a situation like something that happened in the past - and do it better.

Sometimes much better.

I've been spending a lot of thought - wondering about things I thought about doing, and didn't - and whether I should have - and about what might be done now.

A big question for me is this.

"Why didn't I level with people about my background, from Eisenhower on - much earlier?

Working that through has interested me - and I've got plenty of regrets. Times I wish I could have answered your questions, and Almarst's questions more clearly. All the same - it seems to me that a lot of progress has been made - sometimes more than I expected. And I don't think I've always done badly.

I think that lchic has been superb - not only in her postings - but in her many hours of talking to me - guiding me -keeping me straight.

In 13565 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.wxECbZdJEuv.8043124@.f28e622/15257 I talk of "miracles." Could I handle those "miracles" if they happened? Or "miracles" like them?

I think so. I also think that if such "miracles" happened - it would help Putin, Annan, Bush, and other leaders do things they are expected to do. Not because I'm important. But because problems I was assigned to do - and have worked on - are important.

I think I could help Bush spend that 87 billion better - in terms of what he wants to do .

It seems to me that I'm doing what Eisenhower and Casey asked me to do - and that on a lot of things - it is working. It seems to me that most of the useful intellectual work I've done in my life has been done since I started working with lchic - and it seems to me that this thread just might be worth it - even for you.

wrcooper - 02:04pm Sep 8, 2003 EST (# 13567 of 13576)

gisterme

Has Showalter ever changed your mind about anything? Or the mind of anybody you know in high or low places?

Have you ever taken any action based on anything Showalter or Ichic have ever published in this forum?

jorian319 - 02:26pm Sep 8, 2003 EST (# 13568 of 13576)

Have you ever taken any action based on anything Showalter or Ichic have ever published in this forum?

I cannot speak for gisterme, but my answer is yes. As long, that is, as posting a reply counts as taking an action.

wrcooper - 02:40pm Sep 8, 2003 EST (# 13569 of 13576)

jorian319

Geez, okay. I was thinking more along the lines of, say, convening an emergency session of the cabinet, calling a general or admiral on the carpet, summarily summoning the Joint Chiefs to a policy review brainstorming conclave, calling off a bombing raid, revising a military spending bill, writing or rewriting a speech. You know, big stuff. If gisterme's the prez, and Showalter thinks he's been doing yeoman work, effectively and instrumentally impacting national and international affairs, then surely that is true only if President Gisterme has actually done anything as the result of reading Showalter's posts, right? Even if gisterme were the prez, maybe he's posting without anybody around him knowing; maybe he's doing it all anonymously and secretively; it's just a hobby, something he does when he isn't running the country and plotting wars abroad. If his administration's actions don't reflect Showalter's opinions as to what the Bush administration should do, then I fail to see how Showlater can think that he's getting through to the top. The top may be corresponding with him, but it's ignoring his advice. So that's why I want to know if President Gisterme has actually taken any of his advice.

President Gisterme, you have the floor, sir.

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