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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: combjelly who wrote (139522)	10/2/2001 10:20:53 PM
From: i-node	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1580506

The sad, sorry fact is all it takes is one perfectly placed nuke in an exo-atmospheric burst to bring the country to a complete halt What a liberal crock. With math that even you can handle, you can see that there is more than the three warheads needed that will likely get through. This is precisely the kind of non-thinking I'm talking about. As a software engineer for the last three or so decades, I've seen exponential growth in every area of technology I work with. When Reagan was elected a 300MB disk drive unit stood three feet tall and cost $40,000. Since this is the AMD thread, I'm sure I don't need to point out the exponential growth in processing capability. Newer technologies on the horizon will certainly provide for order-of-magnitude increases in our capabilities in the areas of computer power, communications speeds, and optics. Even an extremely slow individual like yourself can surely see that the defeat of ANY number of incoming warheads is a matter of time. Yeah, North Korea or Libya could do the same, but that seems to be a rather brain dead way to commit national suicide. Yes, well, I think we are clear that, for some at least, national suicide is no longer out the question. It is foolhardy to ignore the promise of SDI. It's ultimate deployment may well be 50 years off, but the benefits are substantial. While we certainly will face other threats during this period, it is essential that our leadership continue development on the several fronts. The people who have suggested that SDI is an "unattainable goal" are either liberals with an undisclosed contradictory agenda or simply lack the intellect to see the obvious.

To: combjelly who wrote (139522)	10/2/2001 11:45:44 PM
From: TimF	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1580506

we might, on a really good day, take out 90% of those warheads. Maybe less, maybe a little more... ...The problem is that the same number of people on the globe are going to survive whether we build SDI or not" So we might shoot down 90% of the warheads but the number of people who are going to survive will not be any different?!? Yeah, North Korea or Libya could do the same, but that seems to be a rather brain dead way to commit national suicide. Or China could possibly deter the US from interfering against an invasion of Taiwan by even the threat (directly spoken or very subtle and idirect) of a nuclear attack. I agree a nuclear missile attack on the US is unlikely but its so devastating that we should do what we can to protect against it. A Soviet invasion of western Europe was also unlikely at least why we had nukes, but that didn't stop us from spending enormous amounts of money to deter an invasion or defend against one. Also a month ago I would have thought that the world trade center getting destroyed by hijacked aircraft was unlikely. Tim

To: combjelly who wrote (139522)	10/3/2001 2:10:11 PM
From: tejek	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1580506

Sure, you can imagine a bin Laden launching a single, or even half a dozen, nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles, but as recent events have proven, there are cheaper ways to achieve those ends. Yeah, North Korea or Libya could do the same, but that seems to be a rather brain dead way to commit national suicide. let's face it, SDI is nothing but a multi-billion dollar night light for the next several decades. If that is what you want, why should everybody else pay for it? The irony of starwars is that it would not have been effective on 9/11 even if it had been in place. In fact the head guy at NORAD said that our F-16 defense was ineffective because like starwars, NORAD planned for an external attack. Of course, that doesn't stop the militacrats from screaming for starwars again. I guess having starwars in place it allow them to sleep better at night. As an alternative, I think we should give them prozac or xanax....they're a lot cheaper. <g> ted