Category Archives: Uncategorized

November 14, 2012 · 12:13 am

The Travelers’ Club Sequel is Released! For a Limited Time Book One on Kindle for just 99 Cents!

The Travelers’ Club Sequel is Released!  For a Limited Time Book One on Kindle for just 99 Cents!

The sequel to the highly rated, The Travelers’ Club and The Ghost Ship is now on Kindle, available in book format on this site under the Store page, and can also be purchased in local bookstores.  The first book starts with a ghost ship drifting in the Mediterranean Sea.  Our intrepid members of Her Majesty’s Travelers’ Club go to find out why in early 1880.  In the new second book, The Travelers’ Club – Fire and Ash, our explorers are sent from London, across the pond to the United States in late 1880, an expedition that takes them across the nation to a fiery conclusion near Phoenix, Arizona.  While they can be read in any order, the first book has been dropped in price on Kindle to just 99 cents!  That is right, the entire full length adventure for less than a dollar.  This has been done so readers can catch up on this adventure from the very start.  You won’t want to miss the excitement!


 

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November 8, 2012 · 8:23 pm

I Will Be Signing Books at Steampunk Second Friday In Mesa!

Thanks to Bob Leeper at Evermore Nevermore and the other folks who put together the Mesa Second Fridays!  This Friday, November 9th, from 6pm to 10pm I will be signing copies of my three books, The Travelers’ Club and the Ghost Ship, Twisted History – and the freshly released The Travelers’ Club – Fire and Ash, which is book two of the Steampunk series.  Come by and say hello.  In bookstores The Travelers’ Club novels are $14.95 each, and Twisted History $7.95.  You can buy them for $10 and $5 tomorrow night, respectively, signed and personalized with your name.  There will also be other Steampunk vendors, food, fun, and one of my favorite Steampunk bands, local favorite Jellied Brainz.

 

 

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November 8, 2012 · 2:19 pm

Ready for the Presidential Election on December 17th?

Ready for the Presidential Election on December 17th?

That is correct!  You just thought we had put the election in the past when you cast your ballots on November 6th, but those were more suggestions than votes depending on which state you live in and its election laws.  The actual votes are cast by the Electoral College.  Some are bound to vote for the candidate picked by their state, some not, some have to for a certain number of rounds.  These people will actually decide the President of the United States on December 17th, 2012.

So why an Electoral College?  What happened to one man one vote?  Why not go by the popular vote?  The Founding Fathers had two reasons to create the Electoral College.  One was a distrust of the masses.  What if they elected an idiot, a felon, someone unqualified?  Then the Electoral College could “fix it” by voting for someone else.  Second, were states rights.  We have a Senate and a House in Congress.  Each State gets two Senators regardless of population.  Then, the country’s population is divided by 435 each ten years during the census, and the House is based on population.  This keeps smaller states more important.  The Electoral College is based on your number of Senators and House members.  100 in the Senate, 435 in the House, for 535.  Why then are there extras?  Those are territories, not states.  Confused yet?

So why not change it to popular vote?  Well, if you live in a less populated state like Montana, the Dakotas, Nevada, etc., you would never want that.  No candidate would ever campaign or run an ad in your state again.  All the money would be spent in the big media markets like New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Chicago, etc.  The urban vote would be the only one sought, because the rural vote would not matter.  It takes 2/3 of the states to ratify a change to the Constitution.  There is no way a small state would want that, so it is unlikely to ever change.  Let us look at a map by county of the recent election:

If you look at that map, you see RED, or Republican.  Almost the entire country is Republican by land mass and space.  So how did the Democrats win?

Here is a look by state:

You can see that those little blue areas are urban populations, so they have a lot more people than the huge area of red voters.  The states with more large cities, mainly the two coasts, vote blue.  The south and midwest vote red, and the Great Lakes area tends to be the swing area, along with Florida.  This urban versus rural polarization is a recent phenomenon of the last twenty years.  When I was growing up, Reagan was Governor of California, and the south always voted Democrat.  There has been a huge shift to city versus rural.  Another reason the rural voters are unlikely to ratify a change to eliminate the Electoral College and further dilute their voting impact.

 

This explains the Electoral College Process from the US Department of Archives:

Summary of Key Dates for the 2012 Presidential Election

June through October 2012

The Office of the Federal Register, on behalf of the Archivist of the United States, prepares Electoral College instructional materials for the Archivist to send to the governors of the 50 States and the mayor of the District of Columbia.

The materials include:

Under the 23rd Amendment of the Constitution, the District of Columbia is allocated 3 electors and treated like a state for purposes of the Electoral College. For this reason, in the following discussion, the word “state” also refers to the District of Columbia and the word “governor” also refers to the Mayor of the District of Columbia.

November 6, 2012—Election Day

Registered voters cast their votes for President and Vice President. By doing so, they also help choose the electors who will represent their state in the Electoral College.

Mid-November through December 17, 2012

After the presidential election, the governor of your state prepares seven Certificates of Ascertainment. “As soon as practicable,” after the election results in your state are certified, the governor sends one of the Certificates of Ascertainment to the Archivist.

Certificates of Ascertainment should be sent to the Archivist no later than the meeting of the electors on December 17, 2012. However, federal law sets no penalty for missing the deadline.

The remaining six Certificates of Ascertainment are held for use at the meeting of the Electors on December 17, 2012.

December 11, 2012

States must make final decisions in any controversies over the appointment of their electors at least six days before the meeting of the Electors on December 17, 2012. This is so their electoral votes will be presumed valid when presented to Congress. The deadline for resolving any controversies is December 11, 2012.

Decisions by states’ courts are conclusive, if decided under laws enacted before Election Day, November 6, 2012.

December 17, 2012

The Electors meet in their state and vote for President and Vice President on separate ballots. The electors record their votes on six “Certificates of Vote,” which are paired with the six remaining Certificates of Ascertainment.

The electors sign, seal, and certify six sets of electoral votes. A set of electoral votes consists of one Certificate of Ascertainment and one Certificate of Vote. These are distributed immediately as follows:

  • one set to the President of the Senate (the Vice President) for the official count of the electoral votes on January 6, 2013;
  • two packages to the Secretary of State in the state where the electors met—one is an archival set that becomes part of the public record of the Secretary of State’s office and the other is a reserve set that is subject to the call of the President of the Senate to replace missing or incomplete electoral votes;
  • two packages to the Archivist—one is an archival set that becomes part of the permanent collection at the National Archives and Records Administration and the other is a reserve set that is subject to the call of the President of the Senate to replace missing or incomplete electoral votes; and
  • one set to the presiding judge in the district where the Electors met—this is also a reserve set that is subject to the call of the President of the Senate to replace missing or incomplete electoral votes.

December 26, 2012

The deadline for receipt of the electoral votes by the President of the Senate and the Archivist is December 26, 2012. States face no legal penalty for failure to comply.

If votes are lost or delayed, the Archivist may take extraordinary measures to retrieve duplicate originals.

On or Before January 3, 2013

The Archivist and/or representatives from the Office of the Federal Register meet with the Secretary of the Senate and the Clerk of the House in late December or early January. This is, in part, a ceremonial occasion. Informal meetings may take place earlier.

January 6, 2013

The Congress meets in joint session to count the electoral votes on January 6, 2013. Congress may pass a law to change this date.

The Vice President, as President of the Senate, presides over the count and announces the results of the Electoral College vote. The President of the Senate then declares which persons, if any, have been elected President and Vice President of the United States.

If a State submits conflicting sets of electoral votes to Congress, the two Houses acting concurrently may accept or reject the votes. If they do not concur, the votes of the electors certified by the Governor of the State on the Certificate of Ascertainment would be counted in Congress.

If no Presidential candidate wins 270 or more electoral votes, a majority, the 12th Amendment to the Constitution provides for the House of Representatives to decide the Presidential election. If necessary the House would elect the President by majority vote, choosing from the three candidates who received the greatest number of electoral votes. The vote would be taken by state, with each state having one vote.

If no Vice Presidential candidate wins 270 or more electoral votes, a majority, the 12th Amendment provides for the Senate to elect the Vice President. If necessary, the Senate would elect the Vice President by majority vote, choosing from the two candidates who received the greatest number of electoral votes. The vote would be taken by state, with each Senator having one vote.

If any objections to the Electoral College vote are made, they must be submitted in writing and be signed by at least one member of the House and one Senator. If objections are presented, the House and Senate withdraw to their respective chambers to consider their merits under procedures set out in federal law.

January 20, 2013 at Noon—Inauguration Day

The President-elect takes the Oath of Office and becomes the President of the United States.

General Authority

The Archivist of the United States, as the head of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), is responsible for carrying out ministerial duties on behalf of the States and the Congress under 3 U.S.C. sections 6, 11, 12, and 13.

NARA is primarily responsible for coordinating the various stages of the electoral process by helping the States prepare and submit certificates that establish the appointment of electors and validate the electoral votes of each State.

The Archivist delegates operational duties to the Director of the Federal Register. The Federal Register Legal Staff ensures that electoral documents are transmitted to Congress, made available to the public, and preserved as part of our nation’s history.

The Office of the Federal Register Legal Staff reviews the electoral certificates for the required signatures, seals and other matters of form, as specified in federal law.

Only the Congress and the courts have the authority to rule on substantive legal issues.

Office of the Federal Register, National Archives and Records Administration

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November 3, 2012 · 7:38 pm

What is Steampunk?

I write across several genres of both fiction and non-fiction, but many of my novels and stories are Steampunk.  The biggest question we Steampunk enthusiasts get is, “What IS Steampunk?”  At the Wild Western Festival I manned the booth for the Arizona Steampunk Society, where we handed out brochures and event descriptions and I answered that question around 300 times.  I conducted an entire seminar/panel at the LepreCon Convention in Tempe on the topic, powerpoint presentation is here:

Why is Steampunk Picking up Steam

The most basic answer is that you already know what Steampunk is and probably like it, you just don’t know the term.  Steampunk is science fiction adventure set between 1830 to 1900.  It is the Victorian Era in England when Brittania grew and the British Empire never had the sun set upon it.  During this period of colonialization, most of South America, Africa and Asia were annexed by the “major powers” of Europe.  In America, it was the pre-Civil War era, through the Civil War, the Indian Wars, and the Wild West.  It encompassed most of our traditional movies and literature about westerns and the Civil War.

Examples of Steampunk begin with writers who wrote during that time – HG Wells, Jules Verne, Arthur Conan Doyle, and even some Kipling.  20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Around the World in 80 Days, Journey to the Center of the Earth, The Land that Time Forgot, The Mysterious Island, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Dorian Grey, Sherlock Holmes and other stories are ALL steampunk.  Science fiction and adventure, set during that time.

More modern examples include The Wild Wild West TV series and movies, the movie versions of stories listed above, Cowboys and Aliens, the recent Sherlock Holmes movies, Abraham Lincoln Vampire Slayer and so on.  That is the literary and movie answer.

However, there is a world-wide movement, complete with millions of fans and thousands of conventions in which people dress up and play out parts in Steampunk.  This includes Steampunk music, indie films, events (my wife is at a Steampunk Masquerade Party tonight, I am at home, just able to walk after surgeries, can’t dance) and even a life-style.  Those familiar with goth, punk, manga, hipsters and cosplay will understand more what these movements are like.  The people of Steampunk have a blast and are among the nicest people around.

So what then is the allure of Steampunk?  It is simply fun, naivete and adventure.  In the nineteenth century, Steam powered engines such as railroads, factories and other sciences made dramatic changes in the world.  Electricity, steel, oil, transportation all changed society from an agrarian world with no lights but candles and ships which relied on the wind, to a modern world.  This allowed war to change from what it had been for nearly a thousand years to a suddenly dangerous and brutal occurrence.  It allowed us to see at night, to move around, to transport over distances, to build skyscrapers, to travel the world reliably.  At the time, large parts of the globe were unexplored.  Africa was considered “the Dark Continent” because there were no maps except the coast.  The source of the Nile was discovered by Stanley and Livingston.  It would not be before 1922 that King Tut’s tomb was found.  The world was mysterious, and for the first time we could explore it.

Nine Kings Gather in Windsor Castle in 1910

This was an era of industrial magic, robber barons, monarchies, creation of huge cities with slums, conquering of weaker nations, exploration and excitement and fear of the future.  The United States and France were the only democracies, and neither were working out too well.  America had a major Civil War with over 700,000 casualties.  France had starvation, then the Terror, then Napoleon, then stupid wars like the Franco-Prussian War.  It was a simple existence gone wild through industrialization and science.  New fighting old.

That is Steampunk.  From 1900 or so to 1940s is referred to as ‘Dieselpunk’.  These include such favorites as Indiana Jones and Sky Raiders of the Universe, Tin Tin and Captain America.  Future sci-fi was originally called ‘Cyber-punk’ when computers were new in the 70s and 80s.  We have computers all over now, but when they first came out, they created a hopeful and scary future for us, just as steam power and science did for the Victorian Era.

Here are some Steampunk pictures to show you some variations in the genre and the community:

 

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October 31, 2012 · 5:41 pm

Two Disturbing Short Stories for Halloween

Together, these stories are less than three pages long.  Both of these short stories have been published together on more than one occasion.  I wrote these early on and they are related.  They are a bit dark and more on the R side than PG-13.  I don’t want to give away how they are related, so I will just post them here for your enjoyment.  They are not horror, or traditional Halloween fare, but hopefully, they are a bit creepy.

 

 

Humanity Won

by Michael Bradley

Elizabeth dreaded his return.  He would be home soon.  He called her Liz; he was too lazy to even say her full name.  First, he would be drunk.  He always spent what money he had on gambling, tobacco and alcohol.  His breath always smelt of cheap liquor and ashes.

Elizabeth pressed her hand against the shoddy door.  The blue flashing light of the sensor at the door sill reminded her she could not leave.  The azure tint revealed the black tattoo markings on her wrist, put there by the slave traders.  Her world was 700 square feet of gloom that became Hell when he was home.

She wondered how he ever found the self-control to save the money to buy her.   The slave trade was expensive, especially for a beautiful young blonde.  Perhaps he had some luck at the casino one day and used his winnings to buy her before he squandered it like always.  However he accomplished it, now she had to wait for him, for whatever perversion he dreamed up in his drunken mind.

Elizabeth had spent the day as usual, cleaning up after him, doing the dishes, the laundry, the bed linens.  He lived like a pig, wallowing in his own filth.  Despite the small size of the apartment he managed to make a mess of it every day.  Perhaps out of spite.  She would have left or thrown herself out the window, but the band around her neck kept her from it.  It was forever bound to her and if she moved more than a hundred feet from the apartment, it would explode and kill her.  They were forty floors up in the slum high rise, so she would not even hit the ground.  Still, more and more she thought about the peace that oblivion would bring her.

He stumbled in, fumbling with his keys.  He dropped off his shoes in the hallway and threw his dirty socks onto the floor.  The place reeked of his stench.  She wondered why he bothered to pay for a place with a shower.  He saw her and lurched over.  Disgusted, she flinched back, but he pointed to his wrist.  The device looked like a watch, but one touch would send terrible pain through her neck band.  She came over submissively.  He whispered disgusting things into her ear.  She wondered if he researched his depravity on internet fetish sites or if it came to him naturally.  He pulled her to the bedroom and the freshly made bed and tossed her onto it.  “Get naked Liz!”  He commanded in a slurred voice.

After, she lay there, humiliated.  His snoring was deep and raspy.  The satisfaction on his face enraged her.  It was the tipping point, the final impetus.  She went to the kitchen and grabbed the largest knife.  It was a bit rusted and the handle chipped.  Crap, just like everything else he owned, just like her.  She was damaged goods, abused by her owner.  She went to the bedroom and saw the master lying in his own puke.  He had vomited in his sleep and was choking.  He had done so before and managed to roll over and survive.  Elizabeth could not leave it to chance; she finished it with several strokes of the knife through his chest.  Blood shot out and soaked her.

She stood there, free at last.  Unknown emotions filled her and she was overwhelmed.  If she stayed in the apartment, they would come for her.  She would be punished, or worse, sold to another master.  Her catharsis had put her on a path she could no longer control.

She went to the window, broke the glass out with her bare knuckles.  She did not wince as the glass shards stuck in her hand.  She climbed onto the sill and dove.  Free at last.  Elizabeth exploded about ten stories down.  The windows beside her fall shattered inward.  The remains of her body littered the tenement street.

Police arrived, glad not to have to enter the crime ridden building.  The body parts were in the street.  One of the officers scanned the barcode on the arm lying on the sidewalk.  “Looks like another Elizabeth model malfunctioned and thought it was human.  Somebody must have bought this domestic robot off the black market.  All of these were recalled.”

His partner sighed.  “People are always looking for a deal.”

 

Humanity Too

by Michael Bradley

Wally squinted at the dingy clock, waiting for his shift to end.  He was drunk as usual.  The boss didn’t seem to care how much he drank as long as he was able to bartend and water down the customer’s drinks.  It was a strip joint, kept dark to conceal the low quality, older dancers.  In truth, it was a brothel, with hand jobs in the VIP room for two hundred bucks.  The customers did not care if the beer tasted like piss and the mixed drinks were mostly melted ice.  Wally knew he deserved to be here, he was a loser.

Once he had worked at a big firm, doing accounting, but he always screwed up the numbers.  He invited his boss over for dinner to try to win back some points; just another mistake.  His boss was impressed, but with his wife.  A month later he was fired and his wife was screwing the boss.  The divorce went quickly and badly, she took everything.  He was not an attractive man and not bright.  He tried to compensate for his depression with pills but they cost too much.

Finally, he found this job.  He received little pay, but free cheap booze.  He chain smoked now and would take his check to the casino to try to get lucky.  If he lost his money, so what?  He never made enough to live on anyway.  Mostly, he lost.  The rent on his tiny tenement apartment was three months over due and he had no food in the house.  Life was closing in on him, and he had given up caring.

The only thing left to him was Liz.  One time he had actually won some cash at the tables and made the only good decision in his life.  He was approached by some guys who frequented his work who saw him staring at the women.  They told him they could take care of him with a black market robot.  Impulsive as ever, and not having had sex for years, he agreed.  They sold him an Elizabeth model.  They looked like beautiful young 25 year old blondes, but Wally knew from the news that they were defective.  The men told him not to worry.  Just keep the collar on her.  If she acts strange, tap the button on this wrist band that will reset the bug.

Each evening he would stumble home and find her waiting for him, his one island of peace and happiness.  Today, he fumbled his keys in his drink numbed fingers and opened the door.  She was there, pretty as always.  He managed to kick off his shoes and take off his socks, his feet sore from standing all day.  He came over to her, but she made a strange face and jerked.  He pointed at his wristband, and she became normal again.  After using the button the first dozen or so times, he found that she reset without having to actually press it.  He did not understand why.

He whispered in her ear things he had seen at work and wanted to try.  Unlike his wife and other women, she was always there willing to please him.  Liz was so sweet to him.  After he had sex, he rolled over content for the moment.  He hoped the alcohol or malnutrition would kill him before the bill collectors caught up with him.  He couldn’t imagine the Hell of prison and the forced sobriety.  He smiled at Liz and passed out, snoring drunkenly.

He awoke choking.  He had vomited in his sleep, not for the first time.  He always wished to die in his sleep, painlessly, but he managed to fight for his miserable life by reflex and roll on his side.

Liz came into the room and stood over him.  She held one of his old broken knives.  His wife had only left him things that were of no use to her.  Liz stood poised to stab him.  He was so pleased with her.  She loved him so much and knew his misery; she would help him end it all.  He tried to speak to encourage her, but his throat was gagging on the remnants of his bile.  She struck, deeply and mercifully.  He felt his life leaving him and seemed to float above his body.

He saw Liz from above, standing still for a few moments.  Then she headed to the window and broke it.  No!  Don’t!  You will die if you jump!  She could not hear him of course, and she jumped.  The poor girl, she could not go on without me.  His spirit dissipated, free at last.

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October 18, 2012 · 9:36 pm

Wild Western Festival – Book Signing

I will be at the Wild Western Festival, at Sahuaro Ranch Historical Park, this Friday, Saturday and Sunday from 10 am until 5 pm signing copies of The Travelers’ Club and The Ghost Ship and Twisted History.  Copies will be available for $10 and $5 respectively, which is about a 40% discount off the retail price.  Look for me at the Arizona Steampunk Society booth.  And yes, I WILL be in costume, so you can’t miss this opportunity to gawk at me in my Stetson.  Those who know me know what color it is too – Black.

Here is the link with all the information:

http://www.wildwesternfestival.com/

 

 

 

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October 18, 2012 · 10:25 am

A Great Man Passes – Bill Konopnicki

I met Bill Konopnicki many years ago in one of those lobbyist back rooms.  He needed someone to run his campaign, and the major lobbyist who invited me in was conflicted out because they had another candidate in the race for the two seats.  They wanted me to help Bill be the second place person.  I always hated running campaigns.  There was no money in it, I would break even at best and Bill lived in Safford.  Running campaigns over multiple counties was tough not only in travel, but they have different voters lists, zip codes and media markets.  In my life I have run over 150 campaigns and won over 90% of them.  So, I was honored to be called in, but hesitant.

Who was this person across from me?  I did research and found they owned some restaurants and radio stations.  They were well-liked, a local boy made good, a faithful LDS member, a family man, and sincere.  My concern is that he had the “fire in his belly” to run for office, not that he was just a pawn, selected by others.  We had a great meeting and I was truly impressed with him, which is a rare for me as I am usually quite cynical of people.  He had that rare quality, where you knew you could trust him five minutes into a conversation.  He was the type of person I would love to have had as a father or grandfather, patient, wise, kind and humble.

His name was a tough one.  Konopnicki?  As best as I know it was pronounced KO-po-nik-ee.  At least when I said it that way he smiled and never corrected me.  I ran a campaign based on his honesty, integrity, business sense and local background.  There was a compelling picture we used of him stooping to check the progress of cotton in a field.  These were real pictures, not staged, and people could tell.  We won the primary easily.  So easily, that our fellow candidate’s team asked us to back off, that we might defeat their candidate in the general.

I met with Bill and he asked what he should do.  I said, “Do you want to win and represent your district, or not?”  He thought about it for a few minutes.  “I want to win.” he said simply and firmly.  So we did.  I have helped elect so many people I was disappointed in later, but I have never regretted helping Bill Konopnicki.  I know we all have our failings and vices, but I honestly never found any of them in Bill.  He went with the other person for future campaigns when the conflict was resolved, but he never forgot our early work together.  He was like that.  A person who never forgot friends.

Not only will I miss Bill Konopnicki, but the world will miss him.  When you lose someone of his caliber, we are all lessened.  My prayers are with his family, loved ones and friends that their time of grief may be short and their memories of the man long.

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October 18, 2012 · 9:54 am

Government Declassifies Flying Saucers

 

The truth isn’t out there … it’s been stored in a warehouse for 56 years.

The National Declassification Center in College Park, Md., opened one of more than 100 cardboard boxes from the Air Force recently and came across a 114-page document from 1956 sure to interest the tin-foil-hat crowd: a document describing a secret program by the Air Force to build a flying saucer.

“These records have been classified probably since their creation during the ’50s,” Neil Carmichael, director of the declassification review division at NDC, told Popular Mechanics, which first posted news of the complete document. “It’s like somebody went into somebody’s office, emptied out a filing cabinet, stuck it in a box, sealed it, and sent it off to the federal records center. It was deemed permanently valuable at some point in its life and that’s why we have it today.”

Last week, the group posted a few images and a brief blog entry on the program, which was estimated to cost just $3.2 million, the report said. But an NDC representative told FoxNews.com that the group is “in the process of digitizing” the entire document and has not yet released it onto its website.

Carmichael told FoxNews.com this document is just a drop in the agency’s bucket.

‘It never ceases to amaze me what we find in the records.’

– Neil Carmichael, director of the declassification review division at NDC

“We have about 400 million pages to get through the executive order President Obama signed in 2009,” he said. “I tell my techs, ‘If you find anything interesting, let us know.’”

And every once in a while, they find something good.

“Some of these reports are kind of interesting,” he told FoxNews.com. Talk about an understatement!

The newly released documents, not yet posted on the website of the National Declassification Center, offer details on a Cold War-era plan to build a round, vertical takeoff and landing aircraft that can only be described as a flying saucer.

The disk-shaped craft — which comes complete with an ejector seat and was powered by a “ram jet” — was designed to reach a top speed of Mach 4 and reach a ceiling of more than 100,000 feet, according to the lengthy document, which is titled “Project 1794, Final Development Summary Report” and dated 1956.

It reveals that the Air Force had contracted the construction of the craft to a Canadian company, Avro Aircraft Limited in Ontario.

“Six Armstrong Siddeley Viper turbo-jet s — 1,900 lb. thrust, 22.0” overall diameter, 525 lb weight each — are mounted radially in the wing, exhausting inwards; and used as gas generators to drive a pair of contra-rotating centrifigual impellers by means of a radial inflow turbine,” the document says.

Much of the 114-page document is devoted to detailed descriptions and schematics of the propulsion system, as tested in a scale model seen in a series of photographs. But the report appears to conclude that the flying saucer was better in concept than actual execution.

“The efficiency of the airframe at supersonic speed appears good and that of the engine reasonable, so that a long supersonic cruise range is also forecast,” it said. But in testing, the craft — essentially a glorified hovercraft — simply didn’t work as hoped.

“Apparently, as it gained in altitude, it would start to wobble uncontrollably,” Carmichael explained.

The report notes a followupplan to develop weapons suitable for the saucer, to allow it to be used as for reconnaissance, as an interceptor, or as a tactical bomber. Still, the concept of the U.S. Air Force attempting to build a flying saucer at the height of the Cold War is captivating, leading some to posit a connection between the rumors of a crashed saucer at Roswell, N.M., and the public fascination with Area 51.

After all, the Air Force dubbed it Project 1794 — rearrange those numbers and you’ll get 1947, the year of the Roswell incident.

“I’ve been doing this for 20 years and it never ceases to amaze me what we find in the records,” Carmichael told FoxNews.com.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/10/18/govt-declassifies-report-secret-flying-saucer/#ixzz29fcBsE9s

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October 16, 2012 · 9:08 pm

Who Is Better to Lead the Free World – WITHOUT talking about the two current candidates!

Forget Obama, Romney and other candidates.  Forget conservative and liberal.  Forget Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Green Party, Independent, etc.

Here are the questions:  Does a person’s cultural and financial history matter to you for President?  If so, what is the perfect mix?

1)  Does it make you more inclined to vote for someone if they are the same race, the same gender, from the same state or city?  Why?  I have voted for a whole spectrum, none of that entered my mind, but I have heard others say it matters.  I voted for Alan Keyes, a black Republican for President eight years before Obama ran.  I am glad we overcame the hurdle of electing a black man to office less than 50 years after people died in the Civil Rights movement for their equality.  But should I care he is black and be happy?  Shouldn’t we be color blind and not remark on his race?

I grew up dirt poor, white trash.  We grew our own food, sewed our own clothing, even gathered wood and nails from old collapsed barns to make our own lean to house to live in.  My father was permanently disabled when I was around three, so we got free USDA crap cheese and milk, social security checks and lived like crap.  My father and mother abused me and my brother and sisters terribly.  My brother abused me as well.  I went to school with bloody pants from being whipped.  My father died when I was 15, my mother took off to another state shortly after that.  I raised myself through high school.  I went on to the US Air Force, then achieved degrees in electronic engineering, computer science and economics and finance.  I worked like a banshee and made six figures.  Now I have “retired” to be a novelist.

Am I better as a leader because I was poor and abused?  Am I worse as a leader because I was a CFO and CEO and a 1%er?  Does it matter I served in the military?  Does it matter I served in public and private sectors, that I made payroll and developed jobs?

What if I was born with a silver spoon?  From birth I hobnobbed with power, like the Kennedy clan, or the Rockefellers.  Does that make me out of touch?  Or would that make me a better leader because I know how to use power, who has it, how to play the game to achieve goals.  I would be comfortable in the halls of power and be experienced at the landmines?

If I was poor and struggled and achieved…  Does that mean I am better?  What if I get to Washington and have no idea what to do?  I only know my small group from my home town to call upon.  I don’t understand how to get things done in the big time and get frustrated?

These issues are shown to us in beautiful films at conventions, images on our screen, pundits and propagandists, charts, jokes, pretty much everywhere.  But do they really mean something?

2)  Having read the above…  Who is your perfect candidate?  No names.  Describe their life.  I would appreciate if you feel comfortable answering here, but even if you just think about it yourself, hopefully this has been thought provoking.

 

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October 14, 2012 · 6:32 am

Putting Together a Horror Anthology – Submissions Requested

Twisted Nightmares!

Horror Anthology

Submissions Needed, 5,000 words or less, only horror themes can be poetry, short stories, flash fiction, whatever.  WORD format preferred, only electronic submissions accepted.

Volunteer Editors Needed; Volunteer Selection Panelists Needed

Publishing by Michael Bradley, Eiverness Consulting Group, Ltd.

Submissions required by January 31, 2013.  Expected publication prior to May 2013 and published in Kindle format.

Please send inquiries and submissions to:

eiverness@cox.net

For the subject put:  Anthology Submission

This publication is designed to be an additional opportunity to highlight the talents of local writers.  Those chosen for publication will receive two free copies of the printed version and will be able to buy printed copies at cost for their own use or sale.  All other profits and expenses, including electronic sales will be retained by the publisher.

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