Extra Credits
Published on 28 Apr 2018Mansa Musa is remembered as the richest person in the entire history of the world, but he also worked hard to establish the empire of Mali as a political and even religious superpower. However, his excessive wealth started creating bigger problems…
April 30, 2018
The Empire of Mali – Mansa Musa – Extra History – #3
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About half the Vikings fanbase are off their meds after the 2018 NFL draft
Everyone, and I do mean everyone, on the various Viking fan forums, chats, blogs and even \r\MinnesotaVikings seems to have been completely blindsided by the way this year’s NFL draft fell out for their favourite team. When the team didn’t select UTEP’s Will Hernandez with their first round pick, there was a stunned silence (well, relatively speaking), and then the nay-sayers quickly got up to speed with variations on “this means Trae Waynes/Mackenzie Alexander are hot garbage” and many of the rest were just in denial. The next day, with the fans baying for a quick trade-up to snag (take your pick of the remaining top-ranked offensive guards), the selection of a tackle from the same program that produced legendary bust T.J. Clemmings had the pitchforks and burning brands being passed out and a quick noose-tying seminar running at the back of the room.
Day three of the draft did little to re-assure the angry draftniks, but the Daily Norseman‘s Ted Glover is going to try to soothe the savage breast with a little tap dance and top hat routine also known as his Stock Market Report:
In recent seasons, Minnesota Vikings GM Rick Spielman has received kudos around here (for the most part) on draft weekend. His aggressive trades up in the early rounds, and savvy (if sometimes maddening) maneuvering in later rounds have netted players that the consensus of folks tend to really like.
This year, though, the reception to this year’s draft class has been more…um…muted. The general theme is ‘the Vikings didn’t take an interior offensive lineman right away. Ergo, everything sucks and just let the meteor hit and give me the sweet release of death.’
Mind you, this was a team that went 13-3 and made it to the NFC Championship game…but I digress. When the takes are hot, the takes are hot.
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Russian Civil War and Russian Wars I BETWEEN 2 WARS I 1919 Part 2 of 4
TimeGhost History
Published on 29 Apr 2018On what was only recently the Eastern Front of World War One there is no end to war. Russia is at war with itself while it tries to reconquer the former territories of the Russian Empire. These new countries are also at war with themselves and each other, while they fight the Bolshevik Russian armies invading their young borders. Ukraine, Poland, Belarus, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Finland, Romania, wherever you look in Eastern Europe there is war, more war… endless war.
Join the TimeGhost Army at https://timeghost.tv
or on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/TimeGhostHistoryHosted by: Indy Neidell
Written by Spartacus Olsson and Indy Neidell
Directed by: Spartacus Olsson
Produced by: Astrid Deinhard
Executive Producers: Bodo Rittenauer, Astrid Deinhard, Indy Neidell, Spartacus OlssonA TimeGhost chronological documentary produced by OnLion Entertainment GmbH
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When “more recycling” is not the answer
Tim Worstall responds to the Australian environment minister on recycling:
Those with a modicum of economic training will be hard put to understand this story out of Australia. Recycling plastics has just got more expensive. So, therefore, the Federal environment minister, Josh Frydenburg, is insisting that everyone must recycle plastics more.
What? Even, whut?
No, no, demand curves slope downwards, when things become more expensive we do less of them, not more. It’s only in religion that we are urged to do even more of the more difficult things. Maybe that is it, we waste more money on plastics therefore we’re worshipping Gaia harder or something. Otherwise this is simply mad:
Plastic packaging on fresh food, groceries and a range of other items will be banned within seven years to cope with Chinese restrictions on Australian recyclables.
State and federal environment ministers held crisis talks in Melbourne yesterday and agreed to prioritise the development of a larger domestic recycling market, with Queensland councils alone expected to face a combined bill of more than $50 million in the face of the new Chinese restrictions.
China has decided, rightly or wrongly – I think wrongly but there it is – that they’ll not take plastic waste from outside the country. That means that everywhere else needs to work out what to do with the stuff they collected and used to send to China. OK, obviously, some sort of response is necessary. But more recycling isn’t it:
We need a national accounting system in which the cradle to the grave costs of waste are borne by the generators of it. We would do well to emulate Germany’s system. Producers and distributors are obliged to take back used packaging. This has resulted in a large reduction of packaging, and the development of a waste management industry which employs about 200,000 people. Municipal solid waste landfill has been reduced to virtually zero.
There’s the make work fallacy at play. Having 200,000 people handling waste is a cost, not a benefit, for that’s the labour of 199,997 more people being used than simply tipping it all into a furnace or a hole in the ground would require. And therefore we’re poorer by the loss of what those 199,997 people would produce if it weren’t for their worshipping Gaia for us.
[…]
As above the only reason I can think of to increase recycling as the costs of it also increase is because people are in the grip of a religious mania. Which isn’t, as much of history shows us, a great way to run a country really, religious mania.
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The Ferdinand: What Not To Do When Building a Tank
Potential History
Published on 11 Mar 2018A brief history of the VK 45.01 (P), or the Porsche Tiger, and the disaster it later became.
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QotD: Gandhi versus Gandhi
I had the singular honor of attending an early private screening of Gandhi with an audience of invited guests from the National Council of Churches. At the end of the three-hour movie there was hardly, as they say, a dry eye in the house. When the lights came up I fell into conversation with a young woman who observed, reverently, that Gandhi’s last words were “Oh, God,” causing me to remark regretfully that the real Gandhi had not spoken in English, but had cried, Hai Rama! (“Oh, Rama”). Well, Rama was just Indian for God, she replied, at which I felt compelled to explain that, alas, Rama, collectively with his three half-brothers, represented the seventh reincarnation of Vishnu. The young woman, who seemed to have been under the impression that Hinduism was Christianity under another name, sensed somehow that she had fallen on an uncongenial spirit, and the conversation ended.
At a dinner party shortly afterward, a friend of mine, who had visited India many times and even gone to the trouble of learning Hindi, objected strenuously that the picture of Gandhi that emerges in the movie is grossly inaccurate, omitting, as one of many examples, that when Gandhi’s wife lay dying of pneumonia and British doctors insisted that a shot of penicillin would save her, Gandhi refused to have this alien medicine injected in her body and simply let her die. (It must be noted that when Gandhi contracted malaria shortly afterward he accepted for himself the alien medicine quinine, and that when he had appendicitis he allowed British doctors to perform on him the alien outrage of an appendectomy.) All of this produced a wistful mooing from an editor of a major newspaper and a recalcitrant, “But still …” I would prefer to explicate things more substantial than a wistful mooing, but there is little doubt it meant the editor in question felt that even if the real Mohandas K. Gandhi had been different from the Gandhi of the movie it would have been nice if he had been like the movie-Gandhi, and that presenting him in this admittedly false manner was beautiful, stirring, and perhaps socially beneficial.
Richard Grenier, “The Gandhi Nobody Knows”, Commentary, 1983-03-01.
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April 29, 2018
Tank Crew Training – More German Tank Prototypes I OUT OF THE TRENCHES
The Great War
Published on 28 Apr 2018Chair of Wisdom Time!
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Minnesota Vikings 2018 draft – third day
With the first two days of the 2018 NFL draft in the books, we roll on to day three where Rick Spielman is usually a busy trader. After trading their third-round pick to Tampa Bay late on Friday, the Vikings began the final day of the draft with the following picks in hand:
- R4N02 (102nd overall) – Acquired from Tampa Bay
- R5N30 (167th overall)
- R6N06 (180th overall) – Acquired from Tampa Bay
- R6N30 (204th overall)
- R6N39 (213th overall) – Compensatory pick
- R6N44 (218th overall) – Compensatory pick
- R7N33 (225th overall) – Acquired from Denver
With the second pick of the fourth round, the Vikings selected Jalyn Holmes, defensive end from THE … [dramatic pause] … Ohio State University:
Holmes was a team captain in his true senior season of 2017 and made nine starts, garnering an Honorable Mention All-Big Ten selection by coaches and media.
The 6-foot-5 defensive end totaled 51 games during his Buckeyes career.
Holmes helped Lake Taylor High School win its first Virginia 4A state championship in 2012 by racking up 79 tackles, 40 tackles for loss and 11 sacks.
The pick was announced in St. Paul by the U.S. Olympic Curling Team.
Holmes doesn’t rush well enough to be a 4-3 end and needs more strength to fit into 3-4 fronts. However, if he improves his hand usage and adds lower body strength, he has the potential to become an effective 3-4 end with the ability to push the pocket as an interior rusher in sub packages. Holmes lacks the explosiveness to be a starter who will fill up the stat sheet, but he has intriguing size/strength potential that could make him a better pro than college player.
That last paragraph is quoted from an NFL.com pre-draft evaluation.
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Pipe Dreams: What Happened To Hovertrains?
Mustard
Published on 8 Apr 2018In 1974, a French train sets a speed record, exceeding 250 miles per hour. But this train is unlike any other before it. Instead of rolling on wheels, it hovers on a cushion of air. In the 1970’s hovertrains were seriously being considered the solution to slow, antiquated railways, which increasingly had to compete with new superhighways and even intercity air travel.
Without the rolling resistance of train wheels, hovertrains promised greater efficiency and much higher speeds. By feeding high pressure air through lifting pads, hovertrains float on a cushion of air much like a hovercraft.
One of the most widely known hovertrain prototypes was called the Aerotrain. Lead engineer Jean Bertin and his team in France, designed several versions, including one that could carry 80 passengers. The i80HV was powered by a turbofan sourced from an airliner, producing over twelve thousand pounds of thrust. At the front, a 400 horse power gas-turbine supplied high-pressure air to hover the twenty loaded train a quarter of an inch off its guideway. The British and Americans also experimented with hovertrain technology, incorporating the linear induction motor for improved efficiency. British research led to the development of the RTV-31 Tracked Hovercraft, and the American’s developed several prototypes, culminating in the development of the Urban Tracked Air Cushion Vehicle (UTACV).
But like their counterpart the Maglev, Hovertrains failed to revolutionize rail. Hovertrains, Maglevs, or any other innovative alternative to rail has to compete with nearly a million miles of rail line already in existence. With stations and infrastructure built-out in nearly every city in the world. The limitations of conventional railways were overcome not a single innovative leap forward, but by incremental improvements. Existing rail networks were modernized with sections of track that could handle higher speeds. New signaling technologies were developed along with more advanced wheelsets.
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QotD: Impostor Syndrome
… the list of people who sometimes worry about being uncovered as an impostor is as impressive as it is long. Having to live with a nagging fear of being “found out” as not being as smart or talented or deserving or experienced or (fill-in-the-blank) as people think is a common phenomenon. So common, in fact, that the term “Impostor Syndrome” was coined to describe it back in the 1980’s. Indeed, researchers believe that up to 70% of people have suffered from it at some point. Myself included.
Apart from serial narcissists, super low achievers and outright crazies, no one is immune to the self-doubt that feeds Impostor Syndrome. But what matters most is not whether we occasionally (or regularly) fear failing, looking foolish or not being ‘whatever enough’; it’s whether we give those fears the power to keep us from taking the actions needed to achieve our goals and highest aspirations. Unfortunately, too often people do just that.
Impostor Syndrome is the domain of the high achiever. Those who set the bar low are rarely its victim. So if you are relating to what I’m sharing, then pat yourself on the back because it’s a sure sign that you aren’t ready to settled into the ranks of mediocrity. Rather, you’re likely to be a person who aims high and is committed to giving your very best to whatever endeavour you set your sights upon. A noble aim to be sure.
But giving your best is not the same as being the best. Likewise, there’s a distinct difference between trying to better yourself and being better than every one else. Overcoming the Imposter Syndrome requires self-acceptance: you don’t have to attain perfection or mastery to be worthy of the success you’ve achieved and any accolades you earn along the way. It’s not about lowering the bar, it’s about resetting it to a realistic level that doesn’t leave you forever striving and feeling inadequate. You don’t have to be Einstein to be a valuable asset to your organization and to those around you. Nor do you have to attain perfection to share something with the world that enriches people’s lives in some way.
Margie Warrell, “Afraid Of Being ‘Found Out?’ How To Overcome Impostor Syndrome”, Forbes, 2014-04-03.
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April 28, 2018
Lab-Grown Meat Is Coming to Your Supermarket. Ranchers Are Fighting Back.
ReasonTV
Published on 26 Apr 2018The U.S. Cattlemen’s Association petitioned the USDA to declare that “meat” and “beef” exclude products not “slaughtered in the traditional manner.”
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Minnesota Vikings 2018 draft – second day
After the shock of the first round — the Vikings actually using their original pick instead of trading down — the team entered the second day of the 2018 NFL draft with the following picks for day 2 of the draft:
- R2N30 (62nd overall)
- R3N30 (94th overall)
The team’s identified needs include offensive line, defensive line, running back, tight end, and safety, in roughly that order of priority. After off-season losses, a starting guard or tackle is the highest priority, then defensive line rotational depth, a pass-catching running back to provide a change-of-pace on third down, and depth at the tight end and safety positions.
Hard though it may be to believe, “Trader” Rick actually went ahead again and selected a player at the 62nd overall pick with no hint of a trade. The selection was Brian O’Neill, Tackle, Pittsburgh:
From the Vikings website:
Player Bio
O’Neill’s athleticism helped him win honors as Delaware High School Defensive Player of the Year (five sacks, 13 pass deflections, also 33 receptions, 614 yards, and eight touchdowns as a tight end) in football and the state’s basketball Player of the Year award. His talent came as no surprise since his father was a running back at Dartmouth and his mother a swimmer at Northeastern University. O’Neill was a tight end during his redshirt season in 2014 and the following spring but moved over to offensive tackle before the 2015 season. He played in all 13 games, starting the final 12 (one at left tackle, the rest at right tackle). O’Neill continued his improvement on the line, starting all 13 games at right tackle and earning second-team All-ACC from league coaches. Injuries on the line caused him to move to left tackle for his junior season, where he started all 12 games and garnered first-team all-conference honors. Pitt coaches used O’Neill’ athleticism as an offensive weapon as a rusher (two scores, one on a lateral and the other on an end-around) and passer (0-for-2). He won the satirical “Piesman Trophy” in 2016 for one of his touchdowns.
Overview
O’Neill has good length and is a terrific athlete, but his inconsistencies at the Senior Bowl practices will be hard for teams to get out of their minds. What might be even more troubling is the way he seemed to panic and lose technique in certain matchups. O’Neill is a classic zone scheme blocker, but teams may take a look at him as a move guard with tackle potential rather than locking in with him as a blind-side tackle. O’Neill needs to get thicker and stronger or swing tackle could be his ceiling.
And finally, the pressure must have gotten to “Trader” Rick, having gone two whole rounds with no trades, ended up swapping the Vikings’ third round pick to Tampa Bay, collecting the Bucs’ fourth round (102nd overall) and sixth round (180th overall) picks in exchange. This means the team has the following picks (pending further trade activity) for the final day of the draft:
- R4N02 (102nd overall) – Acquired from Tampa Bay
- R5N30 (167th overall)
- R6N06 (180th overall) – Acquired from Tampa Bay
- R6N30 (204th overall)
- R6N39 (213th overall) – Compensatory pick
- R6N44 (218th overall) – Compensatory pick
- R7N33 (225th overall) – Acquired from Denver in the Trevor Siemian trade earlier this year.
How A Man Shall Be Armed: 14th Century
Royal Armouries
Published on 20 Feb 2017Discover how the introduction of plate armour changed the way knights of the 14th Century armed themselves for battle.
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QotD: Nixon’s final days in the White House
The sudden, hellish reality of a nuclear war with either Russia or China or both was probably the only thing that could have salvaged Nixon’s presidency after the Supreme Court ruled that he had to yield up the incriminating tapes that he knew would finish him off. Would the action-starved generals at the Strategic Air Command Headquarters have ignored an emergency order from their commander-in-chief? And how long would it have taken Pat Buchanan or General Haig to realize that “The Boss” had finally flipped? Nixon spent so much time alone that nobody else in the White House would have given his absence a second thought until he failed to show up for dinner, and by that time he could have made enough phone calls to start wars all over the world.
A four-star general commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps with three wars and 35 years of fanatical devotion to duty, honor and country in his system would hack off his own feet and eat them rather than refuse to obey a direct order from the president of the United States – even if he thought the president was crazy.
The key to all military thinking is a concept that nobody who ever wore a uniform with even one stripe on it will ever forget: “You don’t salute the man, you salute the uniform.” Once you’ve learned that, you’re a soldier – and soldiers don’t disobey orders from people they have to salute. If Nixon’s tortured mind had bent far enough to let him think he could save himself by ordering a full-bore Marine/Airborne invasion of Cuba, he would not have given the Boom-Boom order to some closet-pacifist general who might be inclined to delay the invasion long enough to call Henry Kissinger for official reassurance that the president was not insane.
No West Pointer with four stars on his hat would take that kind of risk anyway. By the time word got back to the White House, or to Kissinger, that Nixon had given the order to invade Cuba, the whole Caribbean would be a sea of fire; Fidel Castro would be in a submarine on his way to Russia, and the sky above the Atlantic would be streaked from one horizon to the other with the vapor trails of a hundred panic-launched missiles.
***
Right. But it was mainly a matter of luck that Nixon’s mental disintegration was so obvious and so crippling that by the time he came face to face with his final option, he was no longer able to even recognize it. When the going got tough, the politician who worshiped toughness above all else turned into a whimpering, gin-soaked vegetable……. But it is still worth wondering how long it would have taken Haig and Kissinger to convince all those SAC generals out in Omaha to disregard a Doomsday phone call from the president of the United States because a handful of civilians in the White House said he was crazy.
Hunter S. Thompson, “Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’76: Third-rate romance, low-rent rendezvous — hanging with Ted Kennedy, Jimmy Carter, and a bottle of Wild Turkey”, Rolling Stone, 1976-06-03.
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April 27, 2018
Minnesota Vikings 2018 draft – first day
The Minnesota Vikings started the first day of the draft holding the 30th overall pick, along with seven later draft picks. Vikings General Manager Rick Spielman has been a very active trader in previous drafts, so the odds of the team actually picking a player at the number 30 spot seemed slim. Spielman has said on several occasions that he prefers to have up to 10 draft picks, rather than the default seven each team is allotted. And yet, when the number 30 pick was due to be turned in, it was the Vikings making the pick after all, selecting cornerback Mike Hughes from the University of Central Florida.
First, I must admit that I didn’t know anything about Hughes until after he’d been selected by the Vikings, but I did suggest yesterday that I thought cornerback was the Vikings’ #2 need in this draft. If the team thinks they can get a quality guard or tackle in the second round (quality being defined as starter or close-to-starter level), then going for cornerback help makes a lot of sense.
Here’s the Vikings announcement on Hughes:
Bio
An all-state pick from Bern, North Carolina, Hughes signed on with home-state UNC for the 2015 season. He played in 11 games as a reserve that year, making 12 tackles and breaking up three passes. Hughes was suspended in October, however, for violating team rules after being part of an incident at a fraternity house. His time with the Tar Heels was over, so he attended Garden City Community College in 2016, earning national junior college All-American honors with 47 tackles, two interceptions, six pass breakups, and three return touchdowns. UCF Head Coach Scott Frost convinced Hughes to join UCF for the 2017 season, and his play was a big reason for the team’s undefeated record. He started 12 of 13 contests, garnering first-team All-American Athletic Conference honors as a defensive back (44 tackles, four interceptions — one returned for a touchdown, team-high 11 pass breakups) and second-team accolades as a returner (20 attempts, 635 yards, two touchdowns on kick returns; 13 attempts, 233 yards, one touchdown on punt returns).
Overview
Hughes simply hasn’t had the game experience he needs to put together the consistency in coverage that teams might like to see. He’s a projection-based prospect who has shown twitch, ball production and toughness in a small sample size. Despite being a little short, he is likely to stay outside in coverage. While teams wait for him to gain coverage experience, they can certainly lean on his tremendous talents as a return man. Hughes has potential, but there is still work to be done in coverage.
Update: At the Daily Norseman, Ted Glover considers the first day of the draft, both the sensible and the head-scratching.
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