This reminds me of a fun story my dad would tell from his naval days.

There was a bunch of guys getting flow out to some base in BFE. Long, boring flight, nothing to do but...well I guess messing with the flight crew sounds like fun! So, all of them start slowing creeping to the back of the plane. Planes have this thing called trim which you adjust to level out the ride so you don't always have to give input into the controls. So after about 15 mins of them slowing moving to the back of the plane, the trim is set at a pretty aggressive downward inclination...then everyone dashes forward at once.

This sends the plane into a nose dive. The flight crew realize what is going on quickly and recovers the craft...but then he gets a little fun on the controls and starts bouncing them off the floor and ceiling for a bit. Good ol navy fun apparently. I would of been cowering in the back.

To be honest when I saw the words "naval action" I had a totally different idea in mind. *cough*

This video confirms what I already suspected.

Back in high school me and a bunch of other students who got high enough PSAT scores got invited to go down to the Naval Academy in Annapolis to experience a weekend orientation of the academy. I bunked with a guy from Texas who was a black belt in karate. At the time I was really into Tae Kwon Do and we got to talking about martial arts in general. One of the other guys in our room asked us how to deal with an attacker with a knife and the karate guy without pause answers, "Run."

Everyone laughed until he lifted up his shirt and showed us this ugly red scar that goes from one side of his belly to the other. Apparently, some guy had talked trash to him out on the street one day and instead of walking away he faced off against the guy. The knife came out so fast he said he never saw it coming. He got hella lucky in that the slash wasn't deep enough to hit his internal organs and that the other dude just took off running after getting the one hit in, but he was still bleeding everywhere. Some other people nearby called an ambulance and got the kid to the hospital.

Years later, my brother and I got into mixed-martial arts and used to practice defending against knife attacks. We'd wear cheap white clothing and used red markers to simulate the knife. What we learned really quickly is that even if you successfully disarmed the simulated attacker, when you looked down you had probably been cut in at least 3 different places during the attempt.

So I agree with everything in this video. Someone comes at you with a knife, you're not necessarily fucked but you need to accept that in all likelihood you're going to get cut... and that even if you succeed in incapacitating the attacker there's still a good chance you'll bleed out from the cuts you took in the process before medical attention arrives.

I understand that there are time concerns with a televised series, but I felt like there was a lot in this battle/episode that I missed in comparison to the book.

I've read that George R. R. Martin is a fan of the Chinese historical novel "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" (I'm a fan also), and to me it seems pretty clear that the Battle of the Blackwater was fairly strongly inspired by the Battle of Red Cliff (Chi Bi) from that book.

Both have a long lead-up to a known naval battle, led by very intelligent strategists (Tyrion in GoT, Zhuge Liang in RoTK) coming up with a strategy that involves clustering/connecting the boats with a chain/chains and then hitting them with fire. The nuances present in the telling of both of these battles in their respective books are great, and although I personally think that the GoT version was partially inspired by RoTK, Martin did a good job of putting his own spin on it and making it his own.

The TV version was still entertaining for me, but I kept on thinking about what was missing that makes the characters (particularly Tyrion) shine even more. It also seemed that everything happens so fast that it would likely be fairly confusing to viewers who haven't read the book also.

Anyone coming from a TV perspective only have a take on that? Or is anyone familiar with RoTK and see the shadows of it come through in Game of Thrones like I do?

Probably some naval exercise.

Got in another debate with a hardcore conservative today. Different one this time. I learned some pretty awesome things.

1. If you spend more money on your military, it will always be stronger. No matter what! If you slightly reduce spending on your military while removing troops from conflicts such as Iraq, thereby freeing troops up for other things, your military will still be weaker.

2. Military might is virtually solely determined by number of people in it. China has a better military than the US. In fact, China could successfully land invade the US right now!!! When presented with the fact that China has not even attempted a land invasion of Taiwan because a portion of the US navy is sitting between the two, this was ignored. When I pointed out the US spends multiple times more than China does on military, and therefore he contradicted himself, this was promptly ignored because China apparently also has a better economy than the US, too.

3. When I disputed the proposition that China could successfully land invade the US by pointing out that amphibious assaults require air power, and China doesn't have sufficient aircraft carriers, I was told that air power is not required for a successful massive land invasion. For example, the only thing air power was used for during D-Day was patrols and to parachute some troops in behind enemy lines. They were not required to protect naval vessels carrying troops, nor did they participate in any significant bombings of Normandy. Also, the US successfully invaded Normandy without aircraft carriers, so the fact that China only has one aircraft carrier is irrelevant. I asked how China would get its air force over to the West Coast of the US without aircraft carriers, but that was ignored because an air force wasn't necessary.

4. When I pointed out multiple sources of info showing that air superiority was needed during D-Day, and was specifically sought out prior to even contemplating invasion, and the fact that I have a degree in History, taught it, and my concentration in college was WWI to the present, he responded that he knew more because he was in the navy for 8 years.

In the end, I was accused of thinking I knew more about everything than anyone else, and ridiculed for thinking I knew things because I went to college.

Sadly, this is a true story, and I'm related to this person.

I know there are idiots in every political group, but the amount of ignorance and idiocy coming out of the right these days is staggering, and so many of them are obnoxiously loud and proud about these kinds of views.

Hmmm Yes. It's all crazy. Why are people so afraid of people in hoodies?

Cmon people. It's engrained in our collective consciousness.

If you dress like a naval officer, people assume you're in the navy.

If you dress like a priest, people assume you're a priest.

If you dress like a cop, people assume you're a cop.

If you dress like a bank robber, well..

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:

5th amendment
"No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."


Fixed for you

5th amendment

"No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."

After 7 minutes my mouth was dry--I realized I'd been sitting watching this with my mouth hanging open.

Google translation from the Spanish Youtube description:

Engine V-12 naval air injection hand-built craftsmanship. Perhaps it is the engine in the world smallest of this modality. It has 12 cm3 of displacement, the cylinder bore is 11.3 mm and career piston is 10 with only 0.1 mm. Works Kg/cm2. This is constructed with stainless steel, aluminum and bronze. This motor is dedicated to Patel and her 4 oldest grandchildren Sarah, Carmen, Jose and Paul.

>> ^therealblankman:

Ummm... what is the Norwegian military doing blowing shit up in the Pacific Ocean? Do they have some colonies there or something?


since when is the absence of a good reason in the way of governments blowing shit up?

A US Navy report from the Naval Facilities Engineering Command published in January says that the jet efflux will “melt the top surface of asphalt pavements and is likely to spall the surface of standard concrete pavements” and that there are “no identified sealants that can survive a significant number of vertical landings”. It recommends that vertical landings are only made on specially designed continuous concrete pads (with no joints) of at least 100ft square.

A similar report published by the US Navy in November 2009 said that aircraft carrier decks will require significant strengthening to withstand the risk of buckling under the high temperatures generated by the F-35B.

http://www.airforcesmonthly.com/view_news.asp?ID=1749

Seems similar to one I got a few years ago:

This morning I was awoken by my alarm clock powered by electricity generated by the public power monopoly regulated by the US Department of Energy. I then took a shower in the clean water provided by the municipal water utility. After that, I turned on the TV to one of the FCC regulated channels to see what the national weather service of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration determined the weather was going to be like using satellites designed, built, and launched by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. I watched this while eating my breakfast of US Department of Agriculture inspected food and taking the drugs which have been determined as safe by the Food and Drug Administration.

At the appropriate time as regulated by the US congress and kept accurate by the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the US Naval Observatory, I get into my National Highway Traffic Safety Administration approved automobile and set out to work on the roads build by the local, state, and federal departments of transportation, possibly stopping to purchase additional fuel of a quality level determined by the Environmental Protection Agency, using legal tender issed by the Federal Reserve Bank. On the way out the door I deposit any mail I have to be sent out via the US Postal Service and drop the kids off at the public school.

After spending another day not being maimed or killed at work thanks to the workplace regulations imposed by the Department of Labor and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, enjoying another two meals which again do not kill me because of the USDA, I drive my NHTSA car back home on the DOT roads, to ny house which has not burned down in my absence because of the state and local building codes and fire marshal's inspection, and which has not been plundered of all it's valuables thanks to the local police department.

I then log on to the internet which was developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Administration and post on freerepublic.com and fox news forums about how SOCIALISM in medicine is BAD because the government can't do anything right.

Its not a lack of police to fight drug cartels which is the cause of the violence. That analysis is hollow. You are leaving out the devastating consequences of NAFTA and imperialism on these countries.

Poverty and unemployment have only worsened as a result of subsidies going towards big agrobussiness instead of local farmers. This is what leads to crime. Its a reaction by the working class getting even more fucked. When you can't get any $ by growing corn and instead have the chance to make $ selling drugs, yeah, you do it.

It isn't a coincidence that the majority of immigrants come from countries that have had dictators and death squads with the support of the US. Guatamala, El Salvador, Mexico. Destroyed economies create migrants which are CHEAP LABOR. Add to this the criminalization of immigrants with AZ's SB1070 and GA's copycat HB87. The AZ bill was pretty much written by Corrections Corporation of America, a private prison corporation which gets $200 per bed a night.

Its all part of the imperative of profit, the inherent violence of capitalism, duh
----
Additional reading:

http://blog.sojo.net/2010/10/28/prison-and-profits-the-politics-of-az%E2%80%99s-sb1070-bill-revealed/

http://www.democracynow.org/2011/5/25/harvest_of_empire_new_book_exposes
"And then there's this from independent journalist Zafar Bangash:

"The CIA, as Cockburn and (Jeffrey) St Clair reveal, had been in this business right from the beginning. In fact, even before it came into existence, its predecessors, the OSS and the Office of Naval Intelligence, were involved with criminals. One such criminal was Lucky Luciano, the most notorious gangster and drug trafficker in America in the forties."

The CIA's involvement in drug trafficking closely dovetails America's adventures overseas - from Indo-China in the sixties to Afghanistan in the eighties....As Alfred McCoy states in his book: Politics of Heroin: CIA complicity in the Global Drug Trade, beginning with CIA raids from Burma into China in the early fifties, the agency found that 'ruthless drug lords made effective anti-communists." ("CIA peddles drugs while US Media act as cheerleaders", Zafar Bangash, Muslimedia, January 16-31, 1999)

And, this from author William Blum:

"ClA-supported Mujahedeen rebels ... engaged heavily in drug trafficking while fighting against the Soviet-supported government," writes historian William Blum. "The Agency's principal client was Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, one of the leading druglords and a leading heroin refiner. CIA-supplied trucks and mules, which had carried arms into Afghanistan, were used to transport opium to laboratories along the Afghan/Pakistan border. The output provided up to one half of the heroin used annually in the United States and three-quarters of that used in Western Europe....""


http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=18877