Letters to the Editor
Rocky
Published Letters: 89 Editor's Choice: 14
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Once in 86 = twice in 40?
[Read the article: How many Katrinas in a lifetime?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I know that a once in 86 average means there can be more than 1 every 86 years. Still, I find it's no small irony that the last Katrina-size hurricane to try and wend its way up the Mississippi was Hurricane Camille in 1969. That's barely 35 years apart and reminds me of the 100 year floods we see around here every 5 or 10 years.
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So why isn't the SEC running these guys down????
[Read the article: I tried to get rich on stock spam]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]If the scheme involves buying and selling thinly traded stocks during a narrow window, it seems obviously easy to find out who is doing the pumping and dumping. Who bought the shares before the scam started and who sold within the window of profitability. Somewhere in there is the culprit. A specific entity showing up in multiple scams would standout like a sore thumb. So why are they being tolerated?
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How long does it take to write a book?
[Read the article: Software is hard]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Answer that question and you'll know how long it takes to write software. It's a creative process that does not lend itself well to management and marketing timelines. How do you know when a book is done? Probably the same way a software developer knows the software is done: the time has come to move onto other things. Until that time has come, the work products can be infinitely refined.
If you've written 10 books of a particular genre of a certain size and quality, your experience will let you estimate how long an 11th simliar book will take. You'll likely be very accurate but writing that 11th book is probably more than a little tedious.
Software engineers prefer to write code for new things. Invariably, this means the subject of their effort is something they know little to nothing about. Before finishing the project, they will necessarily become experts in the most esoteric details of their goal. How can they know at the beginning the many details they're going to unexpectedly encounter somewhere between start and end?
There is a huge and unfamiliar amount of ground that has to be covered between the beginning and end of a project. With a few decades of experience in software development, I've observed that:
1) It takes a software developer 2 to 3 times their own estimate to develop any new software.
2) It takes a software developer 1/2 to 1/3 their own estimate to fix software written by someone else that's already deployed.
3) At the end of any project, a software developer looks back at what they've learned, compares it to what they thought they knew and what they didn't know they didn't know when they started, and shudders.
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Differing perspectives
[Read the article: Ask the pilot]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]For Patrick's consideration (as well as that of other pilots), there are two kinds of flight-delayed travelers in the world.
There's your joe/jane average citizen with their joe/jane average lives. Those lives aren't geared to deal with delays; these people have things to do and a tight schedule to get them done pretty much each and every day. Getting stuck in a 1/2 hour traffic jam screws up their entire day or week.
Then there are those who's lives have a regular "hurry up and wait" component. This group regularly faces unavoidable and uncontrollable delays in what they're supposed to be getting done. I'd include military personnel, airline crews and astronauts in this group.
Delays the latter group can brush off with the kind of annoyance reserved for pesky mosquitos are delays that set the former group howling at the moon, God and congress.
There is some value in having a knowledgable and articulate pilot explain the whatnots and wherefors that make the this or that air-travel-thing not a big deal. At the very least, it temporarily diverts attention long enough that the howling dies down. More than that, I would not expect.
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Jeez
[Read the article: Porn free]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Can I sue for intellectual whiplash? The guy embraces Coulter and then complains there's no depth to the discourse. What a wanker.
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Maybe they're getting traction in Washington
[Read the article: Inside America's powerful Israel lobby]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]but Isreal is losing the battle for hearts and minds in the rest of the United States. That doesn't bode well for them long term.
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Excellent
[Read the article: So many accountability moments, so little time]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"They've got me totally paranoid."
Excellent!
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Elections have consequences
[Read the article: To Damascus with Nancy Pelosi]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]A consequence of the last election is apoplexy on the right. That seems only fair. I've been apoplectic for more than 6 years now. It's definitely about time that I get to enjoy a little apoplexy on the other side of the now much wider divide. Let the entertain continue. Ms. Pelosi, you go girl.
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His health
[Read the article: The GOP's secret weapon?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]His health hasn't interfered with his work as vice-president as far as we know. Not that anyone would suggest Dick might not be forthcoming about any health issues he's had in the last 6 years. You do have to wonder, though, if his holing up in undisclosed locations has always been him hiding from Al Qaeda or was he off being fitted with his latest cyborg upgrade.
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Shooter - read your history...
[Read the article: The right-wing brain in action]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]and, maybe, you'd make more sense. Syria didn't invade Lebanon. Syria was invited into Lebanon by the international community. The United States was in the middle of leading that initiative.
Life and politics is a little more complicated than the RWA echo chamber wants you to grasp. So far, they're succeeding in your case.
Best of luck.
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Their God?
[Read the article: The right-wing brain in action]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]They think their God is greater than ours, what do you think?
They believe their God is the God of Israel and the God of Christianity.
They also believe Jesus was a great prophet, born of a virgin, who did NOT rise from the dead (the same can be said of the beliefs of many branches of Christianity (though, obviously, not of the dominant Rome-based branch of Christianity and it's offshoots (among which offshoots you'd have to ironically include the Rapture Christians who believe the Rome-based church may be the whore of Babylon))).
I think you'd do well to stop thinking and start reading; you've got a lot of catching up to do.
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You CAN NOT count the number of shots
[Read the article: Compassionate conservatism]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]and make any decision about when it's "safer" to rush someone. Why? Because the federal assault weapons law limiting magazine capacity to 10 rounds was allowed to expire in 2004. The standard Glock 19 capacity now is 15 rounds. You can buy high-capacity magazines to increase that 15 round limit legally.