One of these days, an article like this could be illegal

This stuff could really trouble a lot of people if they were to read it.  But if you did, you may have a heads up on what is coming down the pike.  It is either this, or a dictatorship, or maybe both.

THE SURGING PRICE OF GOLD AND SILVER AND THE COMING COLLAPSE OF THE FEDERAL RESERVE

When the US could no longer convert its US dollar to gold in 1971 as required under the Bretton-Woods agreement, paper currencies everywhere became only government promises to pay. For the first time in history, all money became fiat.

Well, that does it for today. Helluva way to end the day. And Krugman isn't worried about debt? Bwah hah hah hah!

Mary Roach

I can hear Artie Johnson say, Very Interesting!

Nancy and The King

I've been looking for a video today and must have seen a couple dozen. Here's one with Nancy Sinatra and Elvis Presley. Elvis does most of the singing here. What caught my attention was that long smooch at the end. No wonder Elvis had some problems at home!

Making Deals

Is so much trash, if my friend, you get no cash.  A quote from Ringer's book that I've mentioned today.  Ok, what does that have to do with anything?  Well, the budget talks are said to be inching closer to a deal.  If this is true, the Republicans are going to get a deal, but they won't get any cash.  It won't mean a thing.  I'll tell what will happen.  They'll get a deal to promise to cut the budget in exchange for a deal to extend the ceiling to cover spending until the elections.   Then when they go to try to "collect" by having the cuts reflected in the budget, they will get stiffed.  Just watch.

Winning Through Intimidation

I wrote about Ringer before.  What got me thinking about his ideas again was the bit of recognition I expressed earlier today.  People really want to believe a thing to be true.  But wishing it to be true doesn't make it so.  Ringer had a section on that in his book, and a good summary of his book is right here.  The relevant section is "THEORY OF REALITY".  This is a much condensed summary of the section in the book.  As I understand it, Ringer asserts that failure results because of the inability or unwillingness to face reality.  People will substitute a wish and that wish will cloud their ability to see the truth which stands between them and their goals.  We might wish the world to be altruistic and kind, but the reality is that the world is best described by the joke- "it's a dog eat dog world and I'm wearing milk bone underwear".

Books for Dummies

Maybe you've seen those books at bookstores.  Anything from A to Z is explained in a way that even a caveman can get it.  Well, I got that idea for a google search on quantum tunneling and guess what?  I got a hit.  And here it is.  Oops.  It says Quantum Mechanics for Dummies, but the google search said quantum tunneling, so how did I get here.  By way of a backlink from here.  But this is still quantum mechanics!  Okay, it is listed under quantum tunneling, but the post says it's quantum mechanics.  So, let's just go with it as it is, ok?

So, I read through the first one and I don't get it.  Let me try reading it again.  After reading it a second time, I understand it a little better.  One warning about quantum mechanics that I've heard before, it is rather strange.

I'm getting a headache.  I think I'll stop here.

Update:
I read the second one now and something struck me about human observation is believed to be what causes the change.  This is psychological, and it goes to show how psychology can influence the way we perceive things.  This leads me to the observation that people believe what they want to believe.  It may take something really penetrating to get past that mental roadblock that people put up when a reality makes it presence known, for people do not perceive a thing for what it is, but impose their own wishes upon it.

Update:
I'm hitting a wall on this fusion topic.  There are people who have dedicated a good portion of their lives studying this stuff.  I don't think I can add anything to the discussion.  Rather than to keep on with this, I will stop here.  I can't become a physicist at my age.  Time to wrap this discussion up.  I wish all who are working on this all the luck in the world.  They may need it, and so do we.

Morn. Sum. 5/7

I think I must not be getting any live human beings here.  There may be a few people, but most of this must be bots.  Amazon gave must some strange numbers, like there was nobody here.  The thought occurred to me that maybe nobody really was here.  Something that may give you pause.

I've advertised this page and talked about it with people.  So, I don't think it is a case of nobody knowing about it.  I think there is truly a lack of interest here.  If that's true, and I think it probably is, then I can deal with that.  But having bots come here and give me the impression that I really have an audience isn't nice.  But I can deal with that too.

This blog has never been about fantasy.  I'm not dealing in fantasy and I won't believe in fantasy.  Just people dishing it out doesn't make me believe it.  Maybe the game is to see how long someone can play me until I catch on, huh?  But this blog has always been about finding truth.  Maybe the truth is not what people are interested in.  But it interests me.  I regret it that I can't interest people in it.  It may make a difference if people had a little more respect for the truth.

Jeff Bezos of Amazon fame invests in fusion

I've looked it over and I am a bit skeptical, though.

Update:

Well, I've made enough posts for today.  This will be a wrap.  I didn't have a daily plan.  I guess that was the plan to have no plan.  Overall, I'm pleased with my posts.  Traffic looks good on Blogger, but not on Sitemeter.  So it hasn't changed any.

See ya tomorrow.  Thanks for coming by.

Reid should tell this to Krugman

But wait! This was in 2006. Now Reid is "embarrassed" by what he said just a few years ago. Everything is different now. We have a new President, who isn't George Bush. That makes all the difference.

Phil Collins- Don't Care No More

Here is a song about someone who wants to break free from an oppressive individual(s). At least that is what I get out of it.

Wanna see some quantum tunneling?

I managed to find this through Wikipedia when researching what quantum tunneling is all about. Don't get it yet, but this video may demonstrate a few things about it that may be useful. I recall quantum tunneling was used in the fusion discussions that I came across. In what context, I don't recall just now, but it might have been with respect to muons and their catalytic ability to enable fusion.

Beam Powered Space Propulsion Work from NASA, DARPA and some other companies

Beam Powered Space Propulsion Work from NASA, DARPA and some other companies

I wrote about this several months ago. 

This concept grew out of a long term idea that was written about by Jerry Pournelle back in the seventies. It's not a new concept, but the technology is.

Thomas Sowell

Damn straight.

Wow

Time for an old fashioned fisking

Blogs haven't been around that long, maybe a decade.  The old time blogs used to have their own language, but you don't see much of that anymore.  One such term, called Fisking, was used in describing a 100% deconstruction of a poorly constructed argument.  One such argument seems to have been put forth by our dear friend, Paul Krugman.  Let's see how I do in fisking his argument.  He starts off well enough, as follows:

From G.D.P. to private-sector payrolls, from business surveys to new claims for unemployment insurance, key economic indicators suggest that the recovery may be sputtering.

And it wasn’t much of a recovery to start with. Employment has risen from its low point, but it has grown no faster than the adult population. And the plight of the unemployed continues to worsen: more than six million Americans have been out of work for six months or longer, and more than four million have been jobless for more than a year. 

A fair description of our current situation, but here is where he veers off the road:

It would be nice if someone in Washington actually cared.

It’s not as if our political class is feeling complacent. On the contrary, D.C. economic discourse is saturated with fear: fear of a debt crisis, of runaway inflation, of a disastrous plunge in the dollar. Scare stories are very much on politicians’ minds.

Yet none of these scare stories reflect anything that is actually happening, or is likely to happen. And while the threats are imaginary, fear of these imaginary threats has real consequences: an absence of any action to deal with the real crisis, the suffering now being experienced by millions of jobless Americans and their families.

A lack of caring can take more than one form.  Krugman doesn't care about debt, but he should.  After all, it was a debt problem that got this recession on the road.  I can recall it vividly in 2007.  When I first heard of the freeze in the credit markets, I knew recession was inevitable.  All the caring in the world wasn't going to stop it.  The only way to ease it was to assure the markets that the debts could be made good.   The government did that, but at a fearful price.  It took the burden upon itself of righting the ship, but in the process, has now begun taking on water itself.  But Krugman isn't worried about this.  But there have been rumblings across the globe about this runaway spending.  What happens if the rest of the world decides that we can't pay our debts?

What does Washington currently fear? Topping the list is fear that budget deficits will cause a fiscal crisis any day now. In fact, a number of people — like Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson, the co-chairmen of President Obama’s debt commission — have settled on a specific time frame: terrible things will happen within two years unless we make drastic spending cuts.

I have no idea where that two-year deadline comes from. After all, what we do in the next couple of years hardly matters at all for U.S. solvency, which mainly depends on what we’ll do in the long run about Medicare and taxes. And, for what it’s worth, actual investors — people putting real money on the line — are notably unworried about any near-term fiscal crisis: the Treasury Department continues to have no trouble selling debt and remains able to borrow very cheaply, indicating high confidence on the part of investors that debts will be repaid in full.
 

Who's buying the debt?  Has Krugman ever heard of quantitative easing?  That's how the government is financing itself these days.  The only reason the government can borrow cheap is that it is borrowing from itself.  Indeed, the monetization of debt is a sure sign of grave distress.  Even during the Great Depression, the government wasn't doing this.  It is a new phenomenon, at least in the United States.  Once upon a time, the Southern States seceded from the Union.  But they had financial problems.  What did they do?  Why they printed money, of course.  This is what happens when governments start to fail.  But Krugman isn't worried about this?

Do the scare-mongers even believe their own stories? Maybe not. As Jonathan Chait of The New Republic notes, the politicians most given to apocalyptic rhetoric about the deficit are also utterly opposed to any tax increase; they argue that debt is destroying America, but they’d rather let that happen than accept even a dime of higher taxes. Yet the inconsistency and probable insincerity of their fear-mongering hasn’t stopped it from having a huge effect on policy debate.

No, obviously not.  Anybody worried about this is a fear monger.  Raising taxes may help a little.  I suspect that it won't though.  The problem is a hostile attitude toward growth.  Amongst the left, there is this great dislike of any notion that people should actually get rich.  That we must have a "sustainable" economy.  Hence the blockade upon pro growth policies.  Higher taxes and higher regulations.  Let's not grow, let's regulate and "spread the wealth".  No mention of creating new wealth.  Does Krugman really believe that raising taxes and creating vast new debt is going to create wealth?  That is not his argument.

The deficit isn’t the only unfounded fear. I’ve written before about misguided inflation fear, but, for now, let me focus on a new issue that has suddenly begun to loom large in opinion pieces and remarks on talk shows: fear of a disastrous plunge in the dollar. (Who sends out the memos telling people what to worry about, and why don’t I get them?)

What you would never know from all the agitated dollar discussion is that the recent dollar slide is actually tiny compared with big drops in the past, notably under the administration of George W. Bush and during Ronald Reagan’s second term. And you’d also never know that those earlier dollar slides, far from hurting the economy, were beneficial, because they helped U.S. manufacturing compete on world markets.
 

So, his argument is for a cheaper dollar.  This hardly reassures those who worry about the plunge in the dollar that has already occurred.  Continuing this policy, which has not really worked over the past decade, should not be what the doctor ordered.  But that appears to be what this doctor is ordering.

He claims that this fear is unfounded, but that is precisely how we got into this mess in the first place.  When you can't pay debts, you lose your credit privileges.   Isn't Krugman worried about this?  No.  He is worried about unemployment.  But who isn't?  It just so happens that repeating the same policies that got us in this mess won't help unemployment.  Instead, we should have a growth policy.  The only growth Krugman wants is growth in debts and taxes.

Which brings me back to the destructive effect of focusing on invisible monsters. For the clear and present danger to the American economy isn’t what some people imagine might happen one of these days, it’s what is actually happening now.

Unemployment isn’t just blighting the lives of millions, it’s undermining America’s future. The longer this goes on, the more workers will find it impossible ever to return to employment, the more young people will find their prospects destroyed because they can’t find a decent starting job. It may not create excited chatter on cable TV, but the unemployment crisis is real, and it’s eating away at our society.
 

Of course unemployment is real.  The disagreement is over how to address this issue.  Debt is real too.  Unless you don't intend to pay your debts.  Which leads to a debt problem when you can't get credit.

Yet any action to help the unemployed is vetoed by the fear-mongers. Should we spend modest sums on job creation? No way, say the deficit hawks, who threaten us with the purely hypothetical wrath of financial markets, and, in fact, demand that we slash spending now now now — which might well send us back into recession. Should the Federal Reserve do more to promote expansion? No, say the inflation and dollar hawks, who have been wrong again and again but insist that this time their dire warnings about runaway prices and a plunging dollar really will be vindicated. 

It is an old argument.  What causes growth?  Does the government create jobs or does the private sector? Does increasing debt without limit create jobs, or does investment that creates growth.  Is the private sector more competent in creating growth, or is the government?  We've seen two years of this, but results are less than impressive, except in the rate of growth of debt.

He finishes by scolding the political class for not caring enough.  Therefore, they should spend more and not worry.

So we’re paying a heavy price for Washington’s obsession with phantom menaces. By looking for trouble in all the wrong places, our political class is preventing us from dealing with the real crisis: the millions of American men and women who can’t find work.

Is rising debt a phantom menace?  I suppose people can disagree.  I think that it is a real menace that must be addressed now.  In order to maintain credit privileges, one has to demonstrate the integrity and the ability to repay the loan.  At some point, if the debtor has shown no discipline in controlling his own appetites and begins to show the inability or unwillingness to repay his debts, he will lose that privilege.  It is this that Washington should fear.  What is needed is a strong growth policy.   A policy that will encourage growth, not debt.  One that ensure that our debts will be paid and that is what will enable us to borrow what we need to do the spending that is necessary.

Jay Cost on Food Stamp Recovery

It would appear that this may be so, but I think he underestimates the power of propaganda.  And the Democrats have a big advantage in that department.

Fusion and Fusion propulsion

This was written up nearly a year ago at NextBigFuture.  The link provided doesn't work anymore.  It combines MHD Airbreathing with IEC Fusion (polywell).  Here's a link to the discussion of fusion propulsion.

Well, back one moment to this idea of muon catalyzed fusion. It doesn't appear to be a likely candidate for rocket propulsion though. It seems that you need a mechanism for making the muons and that doesn't seem likely in space.

I had a speculation yesterday about muons being used is Rossi -Focardi experiments. Based upon factors like this, it doesn't appear likely.

About that selloff

I got this bit of news via Instapundit.  This could explain a selloff, but not a bubble being burst.  I think that would have to come from the Fed.  If the Fed keeps dumping monetary stimulus ( funny money), the prices will rise again anyway.  The CME deals with derivatives, not physical deliveries.  At least as far as I know.

Also, he's predicting recession from this.  Well, that's getting a bit ahead of ourselves again.  Credit on the whole needs to freeze up like it did in 2007.   I have no other reports of that.

Also, Chris Laird has a public article out.  I have to differ a bit with him on some of his calls.  I don't think that silver or gold is in a bubble at all.  It is only reflecting the Fed's excessively accomodative policy.  Fed policy is inflationary and hasn't changed.  Until it does, or if it does, precious metals have the fundamentals on its side.  "Don't fight the fed".

Morn. Summ 5/6

Not much to say about these numbers. They look okay, but they really aren't improving.

Wrap 5/5

I thought it was a pretty good day of posting.  Just before I wrote this, I went to Sitemeter and checked out their stats there.  There is a big discrepancy in the numbers from there and blogger.  You can see that in my morning summary each morning.  But lately, the discrepancy is getting bigger.  The numbers so far on Blogger don't look bad, but the one on Sitemeter looks not so good.

I wonder if I am letting myself get lulled into a false sense of progress here.

Well, something to think about.  As for those who are coming, thanks again.  Be back at it tomorrow.

50th Anniversary of Alan Shepard's flight, first American in space.

This is on the Nasa page, in case you're interested.

Is Gold in a bubble?

What's a bubble? Seriously. What is a bubble? A bubble has to be defined as a monetary value that is not realistic. But what is that? What would be a realistic value for gold?

You'd have to compare it with other commodities. And other assets. Not with dollars, because dollars can vary in buying power. In that case, gold is not out of whack with commodities, which have also been rising. Gold is doing better than real estate, but real estate has been in a bubble of its own.

I think you can sell gold if the Fed does what it did in the early eighties. Get serious about stopping inflation. But the Fed claims that there is no inflation. So that doesn't appear to be in the cards. Not yet.

I am going to see this as a temporary blip in the rise of gold and commodities. I think the end will be plain. This isn't. Not yet. Something has to happen first that leaves no room for doubt. Like what, for instance? It would have to be quite significant. I've spent the whole day writing about cold fusion. If that turns out to be valid, it could knock the price of oil way down. That would strengthen the dollar and loosen the grip of inflation on the economy.

But that hasn't happened yet. And it may not happen at all. Don't count your chickens before they hatch.

Update (shortly later)
Another thing to keep in mind is the debt ceiling. This hasn't been raised yet. The Speaker had a few things to say about that. Here's his latest presser.

Michael Moore says bin Laden was executed

Yeah, it appears so.  This gets my attention because of the smarminess of this "we aren't that kind of people" stuff that gets said.  I don't mind going after a bad guy, but don't get afraid of getting your hands dirty.  And if your hands do get dirty, don't say that they aren't.  "Don't pee on my leg and say it's raining."

Wooty test and some other videos

A little change of pace here. We got Tbone Pearson working on his Spellfury series. He's been doing some videos on his giant puppets and here's one of them.



The NewGuy is working on some stuff. Here's a video of his latest:




These guys said they won a Webby award, but not for this

3:00 Update

Looking for the definition of neutroid again and found this.  Not exactly a definition.

Another post from Rossi.  Pretty much sums things up.  In answer to this.

Ok. I've seen enough. From what I've seen, they are depending on some kind of random process they don't understand, but somehow it works. If they could explain it, they would. But they can't. I can understand their behavior. You don't have to understand a phenomenon in order to take advantage of it. There is nothing to do but wait until a demonstration is completed. This demonstration will take place in October.

At this writing, it is 20 minutes before 3pm. Today was a bad day in the commodities markets. The only thing I see here is the debt limit. If it looks like it won't be increased, that removes some of the inflation bias. I might add that there's a saying "sell in May and go away." That could be in play too.

Here's some discussion about commodities today.

2:00 Update

Back to the Nuclear Journal and comments.  Here's one that was interesting in that it summed up what they are trying to achieve.

Dear Ing. Rossi,

I have been reading a lot of documentation relevant to your recent involvement with Focardi, as well as the previous studies conducted on Ni-H by Focardi and Piantelli, which managed to produce a working cell with an output of 40 W (thermal). I have also thoroughly listened to all the recent interviews from you and Focardi. As far as I understand, the breakthrough acceleration you gave in the development of a usable device based on their original experiments can be summed up (at least) by the following:

1) use of nickel powder instead of nickel rods, to increase available surface

2) use of “enriched” nickel (62 Ni and 64 Ni) instead of “natural mix” nickel, to maximise reaction rate with H and fusion into stable 63 and 65 Cu

3) use of high pressure H2 gas instead of low pressure (below 1 bar as in original experiments) to maximise interaction Ni-H

4) use of undisclosed catalyst compounds to maximise rate and stability of the Ni-H reaction process

Are the above points 1 to 4 correct?

Thank you
Ing. Carlo Ombello

By way of this comment, I managed to get another post that explains the process.   This seems to be the most clear discussion of the process yet.  But it gets us back to hydrinos.  What are these?  I discussed that, but what are they really?  Can they be protons matched up with muons?  But if so, where do the muons come from?  From space, but how are they put into practical use?  If not muons, then how?

I'm going through a lot of comments here.  It takes a long time to get through them all.

Here's something interesting.  Rossi says he got his inspiration from the guys who were discredited with respect to their cold fusion device many years ago.

1:00 Update

I left off with the mention of muons.  Muons can induce fusion, it has been said.  Where do muons come from?

On Earth, most naturally occurring muons are created by cosmic rays, which consist mostly of protons, many arriving from deep space at very high energy[5]
About 10,000 muons reach every square meter of the earth's surface a minute; these charged particles form as by-products of cosmic rays colliding with molecules in the upper atmosphere. Travelling at relativistic speeds, muons can penetrate tens of meters into rocks and other matter before attenuating as a result of absorption or deflection by other atoms.
— Mark Wolverton (September 2007). "Muons for Peace: New Way to Spot Hidden Nukes Gets Ready to Debut". Scientific American 297 (3): 26–28.

 If you could find a way to make muons, it would be a big help.  But this is not easy.

Moving on, let's look at the so called weak force.   It interests me in this discussion because of the possible changing of a neutron into a proton.  Here's a key point:

The weak interaction is unique in a number of respects:
It is the only interaction capable of changing the flavor of quarks (i.e. of changing one type of quark into another).
It is the only interaction which violates P or parity-symmetry. It is also the only one which violates CP symmetry.
It is propagated by carrier particles that have significant masses (particles called gauge bosons), an unusual feature which is explained in the Standard Model by the Higgs mechanism.

In order to get from a neutron to a proton, one of the quarks has to change "flavors".  The neutron, having 2 down quarks, must have one of them become an up quark.  When that happens, there are now 2 up quarks and a down quark.  That makes it a proton.

An up quark is the lightest and a down quark is the next lightest of all quarks.  In order for a down quark to become an up quark, it needs to lose some mass.  Somehow, "gluons" get into this mix.  What's a gluon?

Gluons (from English glue) are elementary particles which act as the exchange particles (or gauge bosons) for the color force between quarks, analogous to the exchange of photons in the electromagnetic force between two charged particles. 

Somehow, this all needs to be pulled together.  One more thing about neutrinos:


Neutrinos can induce fission:

Very much like neutrons do in nuclear reactors, neutrinos can induce fission reactions within heavy nuclei. 

I don't know if Nickel can be said to be heavy nucleii, but it has this highest binding energy at atomic weight 62, mentioned in an earlier post.  The beta decay of a neutron produces a proton, and electron and a neutrino.  Can the neutrino cause something to happen here?  What about muons?  How can they figure into this, or at all?

I think it is time to return to the nuclear journal article.

11:00 Update

Looking over the comments on Journal of Nuclear Physics  , I found a mention of hydrinos, or mini atoms, or neutroids- these appear to be new terms not discussed earlier.  So, I looked them up.  Nothing on neutroids, but I did find this on hydrinos.  I've heard of Black Light Power before.  I didn't take them seriously, though.

According to Mills, a specific chemical process he calls "The BlackLight Process" allows a bound electron to fall to energy states below what quantum theory predicts to be possible. In the hydrogen atom, these states are postulated to have an effective radius of 1/p of the ground state radius, with p being limited by the speed of light to a positive integer less than or equal to 137.[4]:31, 207 He terms these below-ground hydrogen atoms 'hydrinos'.

 Well, that doesn't seem to look good.

Speculation alert: What about β− decay?  According to the Wikipedia, this occurs in neutron rich nucleii.  This would be the case if you add 5 neutrons to a Ni58 giving an unstable scenario with Nickel not having a stable isotope at atomic weight of 63.  Would adding 1 more neutron to a stable Ni62 trigger beta decay? In this case, the neutron would turn into a proton, releasing an electron and a neutrino.  The extra proton transmutes the Ni62 (plus a rogue neutron) into Cu63.  This seems plausible because the neutron on its own is unstable.  This may not explain the energy release, though.

I remember muons.  Maybe they will be helpful in this discussion.  But now, I have to update.

Update:

Please note that I will take a break until 1pm, local time.  From this post, that means 2 hours from now.  I need to go get some stuff for lunch and then have lunch.  Later!

10:00 Update

The previous discussion left off with us getting from Ni58 to Cu63 by way of beta decay.  Beta decay of the type that allows neutrons to turn into protons, giving off electrons and neutrinos.  But that doesn't explain where the additional mass comes from.  You have to add mass to get from atomic weight 58 to atomic weight 63.  That means at least 5 particles with the mass of a proton and /or neutron.  You need at least one proton, and 4 neutrons.  Just adding one proton will give us copper.  Let's say you bombard nickel with neutrons until you get ni 64, then just one beta decay would yield cu64.  But that means it has to lose a neutron to get back to cu 63.

That leaves a problem with beta decay.  So, I looked up beta decay in this fashion with respect to Nickel and Copper.  There's some discussion about that.

More speculation: Looks like you can get to Ni62 and then add a proton giving Cu63.  That means adding 4 neutrons to Nickel then adding a proton.  That will yield the correct weight.

All this discussion gets rather deep.  As you will know, I am not trained in this.  But I am commenting upon entries in the Wikipedia.  Presumably, these entries are correct and I am understanding them correctly.

Going back to the NextBigFuture post on this yields additional information.  The mechanism is explained here.
The mechanism thus explained leads to comments which include comments from Rossi.  There are over 100 comments.  Plenty to read over.  I'll leave that to the next post.

9:00 update: Nuclear transexualism

That caught my attention! The idea that protons can turn into neutrons and vice versa, well, it kinda grabs your attention. Mine anyway. Boys will be girls and girls will be boys. Well now! I'm a bit old school, I'd like boys to be boys and girls to be girls. But protons and neutrons can change identities. Oh, well. What's the world coming to?

But I digress. Let's continue with this page on Wikipedia, the subject of beta decay, described somewhat above. Hmm. If you read this stuff, you are most likely to come away from it quite confused.

An down quark can become a up quark. My previous discussion didn't go into what up and down meant. I feel a joke coming on, but forget it. But we do get an emission of a boson out of the deal. Ok. Well, there are W bosons and Z bosons. But wait! There are X and Y bosons too. Don't want to leave anybody out. Actually, these are hypothetical bosons. These hypothetical bosons are important in the Grand Unification Theory.

Now here's the interesting part. The significance of changing a proton to a neutron and vice versa means that we transmute one chemical element into another.

If this happens, it can be a big deal, don't you think? It doesn't change the number of nucleons, but it does change its charge. Here's an interesting discussion of beta decay stable nuclides.  Here's a portion of that chart

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta-decay_stable_isobars

All joking aside, this is no laughing matter. Really.

I'd like to go back a review a post made on a blog not long ago.  Compare notes, if you will.

Rather than go into Al Fin's post, I will observe that it may be theoretically possible to get from Ni58 to Cu63 through beta decay.  But there's no discussion anywhere that I can see that says that this is possible.  I only infer from the chart above that it is possible.  There is no discussion about energy release that I see.  The transmutation yields protons from neutrons while giving off electrons and electron neutrinos. Electron neutrinos are often simplified to just plain old neutrinos.

Daily Plan

Today's agenda will be fusion.  This is a popular topic, and by popular demand, I will write about it.  Now, there's not a lot I can say about it, because I don't much.  What I can write about is what I read about.  And there's plenty out there to read.  I'll put up stuff as I come across it.  Hopefully, it will be interesting.  I'll just keep adding to this post, so keep tuned to this post.  It may look like I'm not doing anything, but I am.  So pay attention.  The time is nearly 7am local time, which is central time US.  I'll check in on the hour.

8:00 Update:
I began with Wikipedia on nuclear fusion. I know this isn't an ultimate authority on anything, but it is handy. While reading, I notice that elements that are heavier than iron can be fused, but they are endothermic, meaning they require energy, as opposed to being exothermic, meaning they release energy. This was new to me and I mentioned that before.

I came across the word nucleon, which I've seen elsewhere. That bugged me a bit, so I wanted to understand more about it. A nucleon is at least 1 proton and 1 neutron together as a unit. Nucleons can interact between each other, as well.  Therefore, in an element such as carbon, which is atomic number 6

http://www.webelements.com/

could conceivably have more than one nucleon. For that matter, helium could too. Hydrogen can have at most one, since it can have only 1 proton and still remain hydrogen. But, so far, I don't know how these things are put together. It may not work that way.

The discussion gets into quantum physics, which is another area I know little about. But I have come across the terms "bosons" and "fermions". But some other terms came in that I wasn't familiar with. Such as hadron. I've heard of the Large Hadron Collider or some such in Europe. A "hadron" is a particle made of quarks. I have heard of quarks too, but don't know too much else about them. A "baryon" is a particle made of 3 quarks. A proton and a neutron are baryons. The name baryon comes from Greek, meaning heavy.

But what is a quark? Quarks are elementary particles, meaning we don't know of anything smaller than a quark. Quarks are never found in isolation. They combined to form hadrons, defined above. There is plenty more about quarks, but not here.

What is a fermion? I'll rely upon memory. Einstein once postulated that there could be something called a boson condensate, which would mean that bosons can condense like water condenses. Bosons attract, fermions repel. That's my understanding.

Baryons are strongly interacting fermions. Bosons do not obey the Pauli Exclusion Principle but fermions do. The significance of that, well, I'm not sure, but it may be why bosons can form condensates and fermions cannot.

It may be interesting to note that electrons are not baryons.  Neither are neutrinos.  Neutrinos travel near the speed of light and have little or no mass.  Neutrinos are similar to electrons, but have no electrical charge.  There is a corresponding anti particle called an anitneutrino, which are formed when protons turn into neutrons and vice versa.  Now, that's interesting that a proton can turn into a neutron and vice versa.  Anyway, there are three different kinds of neutrino.

Neutrinos can induce fission?  It's theoretical.  If true, it would do what neutrons do in splitting heavy nuclei.

Neutrinos are quite important, evidently.  Lots of study has been done on them and more is being done all the time.

This is getting lengthy.  I will make new posts on this subject, so that means this is the last on this post.  Look for new posts as I continue writing about this.

Morning summary 5/5

Typical day.  No need for a lot of words.

The old alchemist's dream

With today's technology, that dream can be fulfilled- sort of.  I came across this discussion in the Wikipedia by way of reading up on cold fusion.  As a matter of fact, gold has been produced this way, but not economically. If you read through this article though, one wonders if an industry can be created by doing this very thing.

Starting with cheap tungsten, it can be treated until it is radioactive.   The decay of the radioactive tungsten will produce rhenium.  By treating the produced rhenium the same way, it will result in osmium.  The market value of osmium is much, much more than the tungsten you started with.

With your profits, you can buy plenty of gold.  It isn't quite the same as turning lead into gold, but it has a similar outcome.

Update:

It has been an interesting day.  Here are my posts for today.  I've covered all the bases except for the markets.  The above isn't a market based post though.  In the markets, gold dropped and so did the dow.  Don't know what, if anything, that means.  Just Mr. Market doing his thing.  Anyway, here's my posts and with that I say until tomorrow.  Thanks for dropping by.

Fusion

My post about Bussard's fusion device is still the most popular post that I've written. Far be it for me to ignore that when I want to get my audience interested enough to come back here. So write about it I will.

I wrote that I didn't understand the Polywell device. The thing that I didn't understand was how could such a small device contain something hot enough to fuse hydrogen? It requires enormous amounts of heat. How was this possible?

I've probably written this before, but I can't locate the post. At the risk of repeating myself, I came to understand it by watch Tom Ligon's presentation on YouTube. The fact is, Polywell doesn't require heat to do the fusion. It is done, as best as I can describe it, by electricity. In particular, the electrical potential which can be measured in electron volts. It turns out that electron volts can be expressed in terms of degrees Kelvin. Bingo!

Now I got it. Energy can be expressed in more ways than one. Kinetic energy is nothing more than motion of matter. It might be hard to see it that way, but, admittedly from someone not trained in physics, it appears to be the case. For example, in a television set, there is enough electron volts there to melt the whole thing, so why doesn't that happen? I think it has something to do with the electromagnetic spectrum. In order to have heat, the electrical energy has to be converted into infrared radiation. That is felt as heat. As long as no infrared radiation is produced, your TV won't melt. But it will produce visible light, which allows you to watch images on a screen. Visible light is on the electromagnetic spectrum, but not on the same wavelength as infrared. And kinetic energy is also energy, but is expressed as motion of matter. Electromagnetic energy is expressed as wavelengths of particles.

Cold fusion has been debunked, supposedly, but if there is no heat, it must be cold, right? I mean, it doesn't have to be in billions of degrees. It can be in thousands or ten thousands of electron volts. Fusion can take place under those conditions and has taken place under those conditions. Therefore, it doesn't take a huge tokomak structure to produce fusion. It can be done with a smaller device, like a polywell, or focus fusion device. Or other approaches.

Conventional wisdom has been written about here too. It so happens that conventional wisdom is often wrong. That because certain fallacies are allowed to take hold and that is what dominates thinking from then on. So when cold fusion gets debunked, the only alternative must be hot fusion done by tokomaks, right? Well, wrong. But that is what people come to think and it is unfortunate.

White House Press Briefing

Let's see how this goes. Will try to keep up with a press briefing with the White House Press Secretary, Jay Carney. It is supposed to begin at 2 Eastern, but hasn't begun yet, and it's after that time. Still waiting.

Here we are, got a feed going, waiting for him to show up.

Here he is, I think.

President made decision not to release photos of bin Laden. Interview with Steve Kroft of 60 Minutes. President asked about how did you know it was him? Prelim was 95 per cent sure. Why not release pics? Did all testing, no doubt he's dead. Graphic photos not to be used as propaganda. Not a trophy. Don't need to spike the football. All his advisors agree. Is it really true? We were monitoring world reaction. No doubt among Al Qaeda that he is dead.

Questions: Photos didn't exist when bin Laden was killed. Arguments on either side. Graphic photos of him shot in head. Not in our interest to allow images to become icons to allow propaganda for them to used as incitement against Americans.

Evolution of decision making process? Got opinions of others that went into decision.

Panetta said there may be photos. Downside of releasing weighed heavily. Not 100 percent obvious decision. Consulted with National Security Team.

Firefight, who was firing at US commandos? Operational details need to be secret, he says. Details unavailable from him.

Not going further than information given yesterday, he says. (Ducking the question)
He says we need to be mindful of that we need to protect way of getting bad guys.

Burial question. Respect to him shown greater than respect shown to his victims. Fact made clear are not aimed at Islam. Cooperation from Muslims important. Seen as good thing. Who we are, he says.

What said to 911 victims who want closure. Reiterates won't go beyond what he has said earlier.

Any other evidence of his death that may be considered in being released? Some other details may be released- how reached conclusion can be made available.

Pakistani government question. Briefing- don't know about it, he says.

More questions about shooting. ( something about this they are not willing to let people know about )

Approval rating poll bounce. But economy is still polling badly.

Any opportunity for questioning bin Laden? Refused to answer.

Extolling the bravery of killing one man who was said to be unarmed. No casualties of Americans, he said.

Was willing to answer a bit about asking bin Laden's wife. Inconsistent.

911 families, would they be allowed to view photos? He said he doesn't know.

Economy question. Budget discussion.

Pressing for details, won't provide them. Exploitation of 911 families? Meetings will be private.

Why invite Bush? This is moment of unity for Americans, he said.

Was Panetta misinformed? Final decision had not be made, he said.

Wreath laying ceremony at Ground Zero.

Questions about legal justification for killing. He says authority to kill if wouldn't surrender. Team could take him prisoner, if necessary. Surrender would have been accepted, if feasible.

Pakistan question- how was he able to hide in plain site? Investigations ongoing.

Stop giving information, why? Divulging information that would limit capacity doing something similar in future. (Seems to be getting defensive There seems to be an evasion.)

Enhanced interrogation techniques question. Not really answered as far as I can tell. Multiple ways of obtaining information, he says.

Deliver justice or take into custody?

I'm stopping here. The questions continue.

Update:

Holder says killing justified.   Ok, but why not say so directly?  Why the talk about surrender?  It appears that they don't want it to appear as an assassination, when in fact, it was.  It appears that they are playing paddy cake with the Islamists for some reason.  Why treat his body with so much respect?  Who is he worried about?  US public opinion or someone else's and, if it is someone else's, why?


Update:

A possible explanation here.   There are those in Europe who say killing bin Laden that way was against International law.  How does that square with what the Democrats were saying about Bush?  It doesn't.

Update:

Good point made here in a comment:

Seems to me this is a strategic error whose consequences will be felt in the years to come. By assisinating rather than capturing, we are losing the opportunity to pump terrorists for information. Without that information, how will we be able to capture the new terrorists who take the place of the ones we kill? 

Nancy Sinatra

These YouTube videos are pretty old, almost forty years. They were big hits back then, cause I remember them. Evidently, she still can draw the crowds, the YouTube views are in the millions. I figured I'd put up one here as a sample in case anyone had forgotten or had never heard her singing. She's good.

Obama covers Lady Gaga- new video out

As I mentioned in the YouTube description, this was supposed to sound like Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance" but the software wouldn't cooperate. Use your imagination!

Super Hornet

Artificial gravity classroom, Space Show

http://spaceshowclassroom.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/designconceptsforamannedartificialgravityresearchfacilityforiac2010sept14.pdf

It's hard to read this.  For a better view, go to the link indicated and read the pdf.  This show was on last night and I missed it.  I don't see a mp3 file to download yet.  Just this pdf.  Here's another source of info, which is also a pdf from the Space Show's blog.

http://spaceshowclassroom.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/artificial-gravity-iac2010-presentation-revised-2011april30.pdf

From NASA Watch page

I'm going to watch the Shuttle take off from this page, whenever they get around to it.

Update:

I added a video on the Government page.  You can see it by clicking on the sidebar on the left near the top of the page.  The page is shared with the NASA page mentioned above.  There's a link to several other videos courtesy of the White House, if you are interested in that kind of thing.

Update:

Interesting link on CSPAN.  It says it's in progress, as I am writing this at 7:30 am cdt.  It is about Energy.  No, it was April 26th.

Update:
The energy discussion that I watched was rather mundane stuff.  Nothing new and sexy like fusion.  Not that it wasn't there, but it got boring enough that I lost patience with it.  For example, most of the talk was about lowering carbon emissions and biofuels and such.  Those are all evolutionary developments.  If fusion is developed, it would be disruptive.  Hence, a rather mundane discussion, and I cut it short.  Onward to other topics.

Morning Summary 5/4/11

Looks like I got a comment on my truck.  It's from a dealership in Florida.  Other than that, nothing to report.

The evening wrap, Tues. 5/3

Spent most of the day reading Pournelle's book. In one respect things seem pretty bad, but there are little signs of light that keep the optimism alive. Sometimes, it seems hopeless. But the thought of just one bit of good news can change everything. The death of bin Laden isn't that. In the larger scheme of things, he didn't matter much. Nor does the fate of the current batch of politicians. The thing that would really make me feel like jumping up and shouting would be if a way to net fusion power was positively confirmed. If energy can be mastered, so can spaceflight. And therein lies the hope for the future. Pournelle thinks that way. So do I.

Press briefing on CSPAN

White House Daily Briefing  covers some further details about the bin Laden killing.

Got this link via Instapundit, it isn't complementary of the raid.  It may introduce complications.

Rossi and Focardi Energy Catalyzer

Rossi and Focardi Energy Catalyzer

One thing I have learned in the last several months while blogging is that fusion isn't as big a deal as I once thought. Getting useful energy out of it still is, obviously, but fusion itself isn't that big of a deal. Another thing is that once you get past a certain atomic weight, fusion is endothermic. That means, it requires energy, which was a bit of a shock to learn that. The more I learn, the less I know.

Pournelle's book

This book was originally written in the mid seventies, getting close to four decades ago. He had a lot of hopes for the Shuttle, but that didn't succeed in making space more accessible. By that yardstick, the program was a miserable failure.

As I wrote before, the first part of the book was the most interesting. He had a couple parts that could have been omitted, as far as I am concerned. The fourth part gets interesting again as he discusses space flight itself. The math involved, the rocket equations, propulsion systems and so forth.

In general, it looks like he was too optimistic. He did give a warning early in the book. We do this now, or we may never do it, he says. I think that this is an extremely likely proposition if people do not wake up, and soon. The thing that may doom a prospective space-faring civilization is now upon us. A catastrophic economic collapse, a war, or perhaps even both.

There are those who are very happy about bin Laden's death. But at what cost? Things that desperately need to get done are not getting done. And I am not referring to global warming. Belief in that is part of the sickness. But to argue with those who believe is a waste of time. But argue they are, and it is a disaster.

The tragic thing is that most of these things can be done now and with the technology we have available, but nobody seems interested enough to do anything about it. Those who are interested have some very flighty ideas, like going to the stars or even to Mars. The one hope, Elon Musk, and his company, Spacex, is guilty of this too.

But I suppose his efforts are better than nothing. Just going to Mars won't be good enough. Witness the lunar landings in the sixties and early seventies. We don't have anything on the Moon yet, do we?

Things are so bad that NASA can't even get their unmanned programs in good order anymore. The Webb telescope is taking up all the oxygen of the unmanned program and the manned program is coming to an end.

Maybe something will emerge. There are hopeful possibilities. But time is running short and the need is getting desperate.

Update:

Almost finished.  The last part is about energy.  That fits in with the Kardeshevian aspirations of this blog. Master energy and space to take civilization to a higher level.  If only.

Update:

I see here that Pournelle is friendly with Newt Gingrich.   Very interesting.

Morning Summary, 5/3/11

The stats, as usual. As usual, not much to report elsewhere.  Well, it looks like my truck is getting a few views.  A little bump in my pageviews on blogger, but a dip on sitemeter.  A wash.

I think I'll consolidate the daily plan into this one post. Since Pournelle's book is turning into a long read, I may need a day or two more to finish.

Preliminary discussion about the book is that not only is it long, but it needs to be shorter. The best part of the book was the beginning.  It discusses how to make everybody rich, which is a lot like what I write about here. But nobody seems to be interested in that.  Peace and prosperity is too boring, I suppose. What we need are wars and depressions to keep things interesting.

I think I'll watch the Icarus video I put up yesterday while the Space Show was on.  Frankly, I don't know if it is worth watching.  I put it up there because it reminds me to get to it eventually.

Project Icarus

What's on the Space Show today.  I think this will be my last post today.  See ya'll tomorrow.



Update:

I've watched about 45 minutes of this. My impression is that it is too ambitious. We can't even get off the ground and these people want to get to the stars? Come on.

Euphoria doesn't last

My news sites are filled up with Osama bin Laden stories.  This suggests that the news is getting strong play now, but this will fade over time.  Once that happens, the underlying situation will reemerge.  Prior to this event, the metals markets were going parabolic.  Now, that seems to have flattened out.  Silver took a big hit, so I understand.  Silver has been in a bigger move than gold.  Now, supposedly with the death of bin Laden, everything is hunky dory.  It may seem that way for awhile, but nothing much has changed.  I expect this will last for a few days, but will resume once the story fades out.

Jerry Pournelle

I'm reading the latest (Kindle) edition of "A Step Farther Out".  That's what I'll be doing today.  Just in case anybody's wondering.

Update:

Something rather interesting that I came across while reading Pournelle's book.  As I wrote in this post with respect to the velocity of a pb11 fusion reaction, and its possible use in a fusion rocket- he wrote that the exhaust velocity is better than 10k kilometers per second. This is about 1/4 of what I calculated, so I must have been on the right track.  He also says the Isp of such a rocket could be something over a million.

Now the thing that caught my eye was not only that, but that it doesn't have to be net energy to be useful as a rocket engine.  It just needs an energy source and it needs to be reasonably efficient at fusion.  Not net energy, mind you, but something that could produce useful thrust.  That usefulness of thrust would in large part be dependent upon how efficient the reaction can be made in terms of exhaust velocity and quantity of matter fused.

Update:

This is a long book, so it will take awhile to finish it.  Currently about half way through it.  I'm going to give it a rest.

A few thoughts about bin Laden's passing

For the country, I think it is basically a good thing. For once, we seem to have demonstrated some competence. This was sorely lacking. I expect some euphoria over this, but reality will set back in shortly.

Another thing struck me was all the celebration by those who support Obama. It was these same people who like to brag about their heightened sensitivity. Their exquisite refinement. They would never do anything so gauche as violate human rights. Well, their President has just violated the hell out of somebody's rights and they are really thrilled about it. They acted in a similar fashion as Osama's cohorts would have with Obama's body, if the situation had been reversed. More than likely, if these people had their way, they would drag Osama's body down the street while proclaiming their exquisite refinement and concern for democracy and human rights. Great victory, huh?

All in all, I think we should be grateful that, after nearly a decade, and over a trillion dollars spent, they managed to find one man hiding in a cave. Whoopee!!
Big government proves its worth.

Good morning, ya'll. 5/2/11

Well, here we are on the Good Ship Lollypop, for one more day. One of these days, we'll all wake up with a tummy ache, but it will all be fun while it lasts.  Maybe Mommy and Daddy will be around to make things better, while they tuck us in for beddy bye.

Newsletter - Edition 263 - 01 May 2011 By Christopher Laird

Chris didn't have a newletter last week, but here it is for this week.  It is a subscription service and the link to his site is in the products page. 

   Market technical comments vs the chaos
   But chaos reigns supreme right now…
   Dow rally could continue past Summer – Maybe big transition in effect
   USD nearing an important test
   The prices now compared to the peaks in 1980

That's all for today.  What a day, what a week.  The topic today?  It was supposed to be events, but I only covered one, which was the Space Show.  I looked around for others and added a new page where NASA events can be watched.

The day ended with some comments about markets.  What I didn't mention, except in a comment, was that i watched a presentation on the coming currency crisis.  It's pretty persuasive,and by the way, I watched it after I made the Government in La La land post.  I can say that with credibility because that is what I've been posting here for months.  ( not exactly in those terms, though)

Government in La La Land

Here's something to chew on.  A quote lifted directly off Instapundit.  If this doesn't make the hair on the back of your neck to stand on end, nothing can.

HITTING THE REAL DEBT CEILING:

Even as the Treasury issues more and more debt, there are fewer and fewer people willing to buy it. I forgot to mention the really startling number. Pimco (which has now dumped US Treasuries) estimated last month that, under QE2, 70 per cent of the US Government’s debt is being bought by the Federal Reserve.

In other words, under the 2011 budget, every hour of every day, the federal government spends $188 million it doesn’t have, $130 million of which is “borrowed” from itself.

Ouch.

 [ emphasis added]

Nobody is buying US debt, so the Fed is monetizing it.  There's no "there" there.  It may as well be printing press money.  This is economic policy?  No. It is madness.

Carnival of Space 195

Carnival of Space 195

In particular, check out this Focus Fusion post at the bottom of the page.

Also, check out this one.  It is about using the Falcon Heavy for a lunar mission.  Woo hoo!

Liveblogging 5/1/11

The Space Show   This is an open line show, the first of this type that I've live blogged.  May cut this one short if nobody calls in.  No emails today.  Appeal for support.

Topics today: Unusual guest list this past few weeks.  Different from past.  Likes, dislikes?  Also about Shuttle Endeavor, and the scrubbing of the launch.  Voyager probes about to go into interstellar space.  With a serious discussion with Icarus team.  Heavy lift deal talked about in Congress.  Critical thinking flowchart.  Google search how to have a rational discussion, Brandon Scott Borrell on Thought catalog.  Critical thinkers.com?

European space missions go it alone.   Also space workforce issues.  Damage done by layoff highly skilled workers and dismantled industry.  Upcoming shows.  Something on artificial gravity.  Marshall Savage's concept in his book: Undersea colony development in order to move forward on space colonies.

Caller: Dean Davis a guest on show.  He has been laid off as type of person mentioned above.  New jobs, but not high level.  Concern about mentorships.  Highlights of his career. 34 years every manned, civil, scientific unmanned space asset.  Launch vehicles.  Big picture guy.  Knowledge of space platforms work together.  They believe they can resolve issues by podcasts and so forth.  Loses personal touch that you need to make things happen.  Trimming back because of cuts, ship without rudder.  Thousands of engineers that can't find jobs.  Spacex can cherry pick who they want, but choose lower rated people.  People are being left out who may not be as well qualified.  Linchpin that has kept things together.  We are losing something.

US is falling behind in a major way.  We are "eating our seed corn".  We are allowing our one advantage to get pissed away.

Will have military implications.  Engineer half life is short.  Has multiple degrees.  Is cutting edge, not "buggy whip".  These are arguments in favor of maintaining the space industry.

Comment: False economy is something that I have observed in person in my own job.  You can get something cheaper, but it ends up destroying the basis of a business eventually.  What we have here is false economy.  But on the other hand, there is a false investment, where money gets spent which is totally worthless on the premise that it is an investment.  Putting it another way, it is just another way of being stupid.  This country is stuck on stupid.  I can go off on a long rant here, but I'll let it go.

email quarkstar13@aol.com

 2nd caller, Charles Pooley? from Las Vegas

Meet ups.  Hundreds of them.  (never heard of them) Zero sum game.  One eats another.  Irreversible decline, because the Cold War is over.  Do it the traditional American way.  No more socialized space.  Spacex is sucking off the NASA teat.  Big mistake.  The old way is over.  Go a new way.  It is a struggle, but in the end it will better.  Face the fact we are in a new era.

Markets will develop if you put it up there first.  Kinda like Field of Dreams.  Does not need to have a product now.  Have to invent it.  He said NASA is irrelevant.
Barnes and Noble every Saturday, near UNLV campus.  meetup.com/microlaunches.com

John from Atlanta

Objects to characterizing the space program is Soviet style?  Too expensive, he says.  No leadership, he says.  No need to do space, says some.

Dr Space mentions what was said by others: Misallocation of resources by going into space.  Myth of space workforce.

John doesn't think private people can get us there.

Back and forth between John and Dr. Space.  Some discussion of economic conditions.  Real world being described.  Congress is detached from real world, Dr. Space says.  Can't see more for NASA budgets. What is solution for confusion?

John: try to preserve essential capability.

Now a discussion of the heavy lift rocket that only goes up on 4 missions, then a new one after that.  ( Never heard of it)

Dr. Space talks about government regulations.  Too burdensome these days.

Commercial space ideas.  If competition, a market may develop.  Doesn't think we are going back to government based space program.  In a holding pattern and it is confusing.  Policy is dysfunctional.

John argues for government support.  Dr. Space agrees, but wants a vigorous private space program.

Dr. Space:  Idea of how to use it as a political issue.  May elevate discussion, but he doesn't think it a big issue.

I'm quitting here even though he may have more callers.

Five year gold

I feel like Artie Johnson doing that old Laugh in skit.  You know, the one with the German spy in the bushes, who rises up and says "Very eenterestink!"  I can't find it on YouTube, but I did find this one that was done as a Sesame Street video about the letter "q".



But I digress. I was looking at this webpage and found this and had that same feeling--- Very interesting!

This is an inverse head and shoulders pattern.  Notice that I've drawn three horizontal lines on the pic.  Going from left to right, the first line is about equal distance between 750 and 1000.  The second line is just below 750, and the third line is about even up with the first line.  I drew a fourth line at the 1000 mark which shows a break out to new highs.  The first and the third lines represent the "shoulders" and the head is in the middle, just like in anatomy.  In this case, think of the man as being upside down.

I've seen this chart in the bearish scenario, with the rightside up head and shoulders.  That stock went into decline and never recovered.  The head and shoulders pattern is very significant.  The inverse could well be as well.  In this case, since it is inverse to the bearish head and shoulders, this inverse case is very bullish.  It looks like the breakout was back in late 2009.  It is about an year and a half old.

For your information, I saw a real head and shoulders on the Dow back in 2008.  It is close to being invalidated by this latest rally.  However, if this rally fails, for any reason, it could be the breakout DOWNWARD.  Be very, very careful about buying stocks.  But gold is not in danger.  It's chart is not in a critical point at this time.

Liveblogging

Liveblogging events: that's the proposed strategy.  I need to set up a bunch of calendars of events that are of interest to this blog, meaning me, and hopefully a few readers.  Some examples, space launches, economic events, elections and debates, shows of interest like the space show, and so forth.

Morning ya'll. May 1st already

Funny thing about these pageviews, Blogger and Sitemeter are going opposite directions. Sitemeter looks better, Blogger looks worse. But neither look good, to be honest.

It's a new month, and some new strategies need to be employed. Trouble is, I don't know if that is going to be possible. I haven't look into it enough yet.

Ok, so here's the stats. Read em and weep.