Meanwhile, last night in outer space:
Jupiter, 3/31/03. Taken with a Nikon 950 set at f/4 for 1/15 of a second at 2.5X digital zoom, attached to a 25 mm MA eyepiece, looking into a 7 inch, f/15 Maksutov telescope.
Oh look, it's April Fool's Day. Sorry, I don't have a prank planned.
Ahhhhh!!!!! Behind you,
it's Strom Thurmond!
(Made you look.)
War news (pervasive isn't it):
Rather than talk about the Iraq distraction, I've some questions about the other war, remember, against the people who actually attacked us... no, not the Dixie Chicks and Peter Arnatt.
A one liner on NPR news said the project to vaccinate necessary workers against a smallpox is still underway. I don't get it. A vaccination is a very specific protection to a specific virus. It protects against only smallpox and nothing else. So why is such a large outlay being spent on such a narrow protection? Do they know something we don't, but should?
Later in the news was a story about money from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) not getting to the frontline security providers for whom it was intended. Billions of dollars are in the hands of the federal government instead of providing the security we have already paid for, including two billion earmarked for port inspections by the Coast Guard.
Tom Ridge's DHS has set up a paperwork jungle that requires up to and possibly more than a year of red tape before any money can be spent on our security - other than imunizing cops and doctors against a single bug. I suspect our safety money is running President Bush's foreign adventures.
