Musings of a Technonerd

One of my interests is WW2 history. I've been reading a book by the name of "Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle Of Midway." It's a great read. In short, what these authors do is tell the story from a perspective that hasn't been told yet, the Japanese perspective.

What this book does is clear up myths, misconceptions and plain out and out lies that have been perpetuated over the years. For instance, a commonly held belief is that the Aleutians Operation was designed by Admiral Yamamoto as merely a feint to lure the American fleet out of Pearl Harbor. In fact, research has proven the Alaskan actions were part of Japan's overall plan to attack, and permanently hold the islands as a safeguard against the Americans using them as a base to attack the northern part of the Japanese homeland. There's more.

If your a student of WW2 history, you need this book in your library. It a large book, at 640 pages, filled with maps, diagrams, vast amounts of information on the Japanese fleet, and many photos never seen before in Western press. At $35, it's a bargain in my opinion.

If you're interested in that sort of thing, you'll also want to visit the Author's website, Combined Fleet. It's guaranteed to keep you busy for hours by itself.

There's news in today's local daily blab about Republican Congressman Gil Gutknecht trying to edit the Wikipedia entry about himself. That's not something unique. Many politicos from both sides of the aisle have been caught doing this. What I find amusing is that he was trying to eliminate earlier references he made at the beginning of his career that he'd self impose a limit of six two year terms. He's running for a seventh term this year.

Back when the Republicans gained control of the house, they issued the much ballyhooed "Republican Contract With America." It contained ten items they proposed legislation on. If you look at item ten, you'll see "THE CITIZEN LEGISLATURE ACT: A first-ever vote on term limits to replace career politicians with citizen legislators." The proposal was to limit Senators to two term, and house members to three terms. Now, of course, since the Republicans have been in control of both houses of congress for some time, the mere mention of term limits to a Republican will get you that "deer-in-the-headlights" look, and a swift change of subject.

The office of Gutknecht responded: “A spokesman for Gutknecht did not dispute that his office tried to change his Wikipedia entry. But he called into question the reliability of the service, which was created in 2001 and claims to be the largest reference website on the Internet.”

Or: "Yeah, we got caught trying to drive your car, but you shouldn't have left the keys in the ignition."



"The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not 'Eureka!' (I found it!) but 'That's funny ..."
Isaac Asimov