James R. Rummel

I am a self defense instructor who lives in Columbus, Ohio.

Science Fiction is Here

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StrategyPage.com is reporting that Israel has developed a recon rifle grenade. (Post from November 4, 2004.)

It would appear that Israel Military Industries, Ltd. has developed a rifle grenade with a webcam and radio transmitter. Fire the grenade in a high arc and it’ll transmit still pictures of what’s below to a laptop on the way back down. Neato idea.

There’s been a proliferation of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles in the military, some of them so small that they can be carried and operated by one man in the field. This means that they can provide real-time intelligence to the guys at the point of the spear, fast enough that it can actually be used in the sharp and intense environment of a firefight.

This list of UAV’s worldwide shows that Israel has put a great deal of effort into developing this new technology. (In hindsight I suppose it was inevitable that they’d eventually try to find new applications.)

But these little model airplanes are expensive, and they are complicated enough so that they sometimes don’t work. The Recon Rifle Grenade (RRG, for want of anything better) would eventually be more expensive, since any UAV is reusable but one of these nifty little devices aren’t. But the initial cost is less, and if one grenade doesn’t work due to a failed component then you just load up another and try again. With UAV’s you don’t have that option.

Anyone else remember reading military sci-fi where stuff like this was wow-neato gear? Now if they’d only develop a flying car I’d be happy.

Call it Like You See It

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It’s no secret that the exit polls the networks were setting such stock in were deeply, deeply flawed. Megan says it better than I can.

A number of people have emailed to point out that the samples in individual precincts are small. That’s true, but the overall sample is large, and it went awry on every level: in each state and in the national vote. Sure, it was a close race, but as far as I can tell, the errors all ran one way: towards Kerry. Rumour has it that the reason the networks were so slow to call the Carolinas is that the exit polls showed them going for Kerry, a nonsense result in light of the result, and even in light of previous polling.

I’ve been tilting against biased media for a few years now, but I’d like to point out that this is hardly anything new. We had the exact same problem last election, and even the mid-term elections of 2002. Just in case you think this is a case of American news media falling down on their face, I would like to point out that they have the same problem with exit polls conducted in foreign countries.

So the news organizations should just save some time and money and not bother. But I doubt they’ll listen to me.

This item from the Washington Post mentions that the blogs were experiencing heavy traffic mainly because they were able to post leaked exit poll data in real time.

This troubles me, because it appears that Big Media has figured out how to turn the blogs to their own ends. Simply use them as a faster news outlet. That way they can spin the story they want and still have plausible deniability. (“It wasn’t us. We’re a respected news organization. It was those pajama guys who blabbed crappy data without bothering to verify.”)

This is self correcting, for the most part, since blogs allow instant feedback from readers. But if the source of the data is protected in some way, and we’re operating from a leak, then our credibility can be knocked into the toilet. Just like the blogs managed to do to Big Media’s rep.

So everyone should make sure that they mention when data is not 100% credible. Or else it might (gasp!) bring your readership down.

Cry Me a River

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I’m a political blogger that happens to live in Ohio, a battleground state during this week’s election. So when I heard that European observers were going to be over here, keeping an eye on things, I wanted to interview them.

I tracked down the name Soeren Soendergaard, one of the top guys that was going to be here in Ohio. I sent him an Email, politely and with all respect, requesting that he and members of his team allow me to briefly interview them for my blog. I made sure to mention that anything I wrote was going to be positive, respectful, supportive. And it was a perfect example for him to make his case to the people of Ohio. (What the hell, maybe I could sell something to, I dunno, NRO or something.)

I received a very curt reply, saying that I would be contacted when the team was settled and had time for the press. Don’t call us, we’ll call you.

So I heard squat. Repeated queries got bumpkiss. There goes my dream of getting paid for blogging. (And let me tell you, I could really use some of that sweet media cash.)

Then I see this news item. My ol’ buddy Soeren is royally pissed because he was refused entry to some polling places here in my home town.

He said he had been personally refused admission at three out of four polling stations in Columbus, Ohio. “It’s the limit of arrogance,” complained the left-wing deputy, representing the 55-nation OSCE, a pan-European body of which the US is a member and whose duties include monitoring elections to ensure fair play.

Heh. I love that. Soeren is refused entry to US voting areas and “It’s the limit of arrogance.”

You know, I’m having trouble working up any sympathy for these guys.

PS I see that Soeren is a Socialist. He must have read all those posts I wrote here where I mock Canadian health care.

A View From the Other Side

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I first started reading the blogs because they were fast. Bloggers would usually post about an upcoming newsworthy subject, discuss every single ramification while fact checking to death, and then go on to something else. Then, two days or so after the blogs had moved on, I’d see the headlines on the front page of my local newspaper.

It’s this desire to find out what’s going on that drives many people to the blogs. Once they get here they soon find that the story they’re reading in the mainstream press isn’t really what’s going on. It’s spun, distorted, altered to conform to the preconceptions and prejudices of the author and his editors.

A dear friend of mine sent me a link to this article in the UK Independent, a British newspaper. The author is Rageh Omaar, whose day job is working for the BBC. He talks about how people in the United States are turning in ever greater numbers to blogs and the Internet to get their news. He gets it right when he says that people have lost faith in the traditional news organizations and are trying to find less biased sources.

What’s I found interesting is that he actually thought that American Big Media was too conservative! He closes his article by quoting Rick Mercier, a columnist for The Free Lance-Star in Virginia. Mr. Mercier is extremely critical of the Bush administration, and sees the invasion of Iraq as a failure of the press to do their job.

Well, you can find always find an op-ed somewhere that will support your confirm your own prejudices. What Mr. Omaar needs to do is take a look at the studies that prove that the American media is hopelessly slanted to the Left, and we’ve had proof of that since at least 1980.

Of course, we are talking about a guy who works for the BBC. The only thing I can say is that he’d better take the time for a little introspection and recognize his own bias while he has a chance. After all, a group of bloggers are nipping at the BBC’s heels even as we speak.