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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?

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rshow55 - 07:29am Oct 28, 2002 EST (# 5330 of 5341)
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.

Gisterme points out that I don't and can't know who (s)he is - and can only make inferences based on responses. I know gisterme is very sensitive when I make comments about Stanford deans - but I can't be sure who (s)he is without checking - checking that I can't do - though some others could.

But since gisterme has done so much work on this board, and spoken with such authority - it does seem fair to review my reasoning about who (s)he is, and is associated with. Sometimes, when gisterme's patterns of "reasoning" are very close to enronation - it seems worth remembering that.

I do in fact think that gisterme (if gisterme is an individual, not a team) is Condoleezza Rice - but the key point is a somewhat broader one - and one that gisterme has been aware of for a long time. Here are examples of that discussion:

rshowalter - 11:26pm Sep 3, 2001 EST (#8409 includes:

I've suggested in MD6808-10 rshowalter 7/9/01 4:43pm . . . that gisterme , who has posted so extensively on this thread, could not have done so, without the knowledge and backing of the very highest levels of the Bush administration, including Rice , Rumsfeld , Armitage , Wolfowitz , Hadley , and their bosses.

rshowalter - 04:43pm Jul 9, 2001 EST (#6808 includes

" (The corpus of gisterme here bears reading -- it could not possibly be occurring without the knowledge, approval, and backing, of the highest levels of the Bush administration) gisterme takes me to task, especially, for the my judgement of the possible - as gisterme has a right to do. gisterme writes:

" Why couldn't my opinions possibly be occurring without the knowledge, approval, and backing, of the highest levels of the Bush administration, Robert? Why couldn't gisterme write whatever he wants here in the land of the free?"

That's a fair question - - and one on which gisterme is protesting with feeling (perhaps, protesting too loudly) because the alternative that I suggested, explicitly in MD6790 rshowalter 7/9/01 10:35am , is that, in my opinion,

National Security Advisor Condaleezza Rice,

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld,

Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage,

Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfkowitz,

Deputy National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley,

and the people they report to have to know of this thread, and gisterme's writing on it.

That's my opinion. I think it is a reasonable opinion, amounting by now to an overwhelming probability -- and I think that many other people, looking at the circumstances, might form the same opinion.

rshowalter - 04:44pm Jul 9, 2001 EST (#6809

For one thing, as of now, if you search "gisterme" you find 58 search pages for this thread -- and they are of high quality, and authoritative, often, in both form and content. For another, gisterme has often taken the position of an officer of state - with a treatening degree of power not far from reach. Here's an example.

rshow55 - 07:30am Oct 28, 2002 EST (# 5331 of 5341)
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 asked a question -- and the issue involved was whether I was committing treason -- a serious issue. MD6024 rshowalter 6/25/01 4:52pm It is a good question -- and short -- I asked: "What have I said that is not in the national interest?" I still think that's a good question -- and I believe I've been serving the national interest to high standards.

gisterme replied to the question directly in these posting, and said some related things in other postings:

MD6028 gisterme 6/25/01 6:58pm ... MD6033 gisterme 6/25/01 7:45pm MD6060 gisterme 6/26/01 3:13pm ....

If gisterme does not have high government connections -- and is not speaking with authority --- gisterme has often written to convey a sense that those connections exist.

rshowalter - 04:47pm Jul 9, 2001 EST (#6810

Do I think that this thread has gotten some attention, at high political levels, in but the US and other countries? Personally, I do think so, and it that's not a certainty, it does seem to me to fit a good deal.

There have been postings like this, rather often, and they've not been contested. They've even been supported. MD6549 rshowalter 7/4/01 11:38am quotes MD5990 rshowalter 6/25/01 11:57am

"This isn't an entertaining thread - it is an effort, with a good deal of cooperation and encouragement from almarst and gisterme , to set out patterns where staffs can communicate, and get to closure, on problems that would be intractable otherwise. . . . But it isn't easy reading for individuals. The problems involved, at unavoidable levels, require a degree of memory, and tolerance for complexity, that require staffs.

"With the internet, and crosslinking, and hard work, there are technical arrangements, partly coming into focus here, that accomodate communication, including the expression of disagreements between staffs. "

I believe that gisterme has indeed been representing a staff, and I still think it very likely -- almost certain, that Rice, Rumsfeld, Armitage, Wolfkowitz, Hadley, and their associates and bosses know about this thread. In the future, if it matters enough, there may be ways to find out whether or not that's true.

I do believe that many, if not most, experienced people, reading gisterme's postings in context, would conclude that he represents the Bush administration -- with "deniability" at one level, but - by now, not very much.

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