This video lacks a lot of salient details.

Yes, the F35 is aiming at the A10 because contractors want jobs (something to do).

However, the strength of the A10 is also its weakness. Low and slow also means that it takes you a long time to get to your troops. Fast jets arrive much sooner (significantly so). A combination of both would be ideal. F35 to get there ASAP, and A10 arriving later to take over.

It's not really worth debating the merit of new fighters. You don't wait for a war to start developing weapons.

Yes, our recent enemies are durkas with small arms, and you don't need an F35 to fight them - but you also don't even need to fight them to begin with - they aren't an existential threat. Terrorist attacks are emotionally charged (well, until they happen so often that you get used to hearing about them, and they stop affecting people), but they are nothing compared to say, a carpet bombing campaign.

The relevance of things like the F35 is to have weapons ready and able to face a large national power, should a nation v nation conflict arise with a significant other nation. In the event that such a conflict ever does, you don't want to be caught with your pants down.

Defense spending costs scale with oversight requirements.

Keep in mind that money pays people. Even materials are simply salaries of the material suppliers. The more people you put on a program, the more that program will cost.

Yes, big contractors make big profits - but the major chunk of their charges is still salaries.

Let me explain what is going on.

Remember the $100 hammers?
In fact, the hammer still cost a few bucks. What cost 100+ bucks was the total charges associated with acquiring a hammer.
Everything someone does in association with acquiring the hammer, gets charged to a charge code that's specific for that task.

Someone has to create a material request - $time.
Someone has to check contracts for whether or not it will be covered - $time.
Someone has to place the order - $time.
Someone has to receiver the package, inspect it, and put it into a received bin - $time.
Someone has to go through the received items and assign them property tags - $time.
Someone has to take the item to the department that needed it, and get someone to sign for it - $time.
Someone has to update the monthly contract report - $time.
Someone has to generate an entry in the process artifacts report, detailing the actions taken in order to acquire the hammer - $time.
Someone on the government side has to review the process artifacts report, and validate that proper process was followed (and if not, punish the company for skipping steps) - $time.

Add up all the minutes here and there that each person charged in association with getting a hammer, and it's $95 on top of a $5 hammer. Which is why little things cost so much.

You could say "Hey, why do all that? Just buy the hammer".
Well, if a company did that, it would be in trouble with govt. oversight folks because they violated the process.
If an employee bought a hammer of his own volition, he would be in trouble with his company for violating the process.
The steps are required, and if you don't follow them, and there is ever any problem/issue, your lack of process will be discovered on investigation, and you could face massive liability - even if it's not even relevant - because it points to careless company culture.

Complex systems like jet fighters necessarily have bugs to work out. When you start using the system, that's when you discover all the bits and pieces that nobody anticipated - and you fix them. That's fine. That's always been the case.



As an airplane example, imagine if there's an issue with a regulator that ultimately causes a system failure - but that issue is just some constant value in a piece of software that determines a duty cycle.

Say for example, that all it takes is changing 1 digit, and recompiling. Ez, right? NOPE!

An engineer can't simply provide a fix.

If something went wrong, even unrelated, but simply in the same general system, he could be personally liable for anything that happens.

On top of that, if there is no contract for work on that system, then an engineer providing a free fix is robbing the company of work, and he could get fired.

A company can't instruct an engineer to provide a fix for the same reasons that the engineer himself can't just do it.

So, the process kicks in.

Someone has to generate a trouble report - $time.
Someone has to identify a possible solution - $time.
Someone has to check contracts to see if work on that fix would be covered under current tasking - $time.
Say it's not covered (it's a previously closed [i.e. delivered] item), so you need a new charge code.
Someone has to write a proposal to fix the defect - $time.
Someone has to go deal with the government to get them to accept the proposal - $time.
(say it's accepted)
Someone has to write new contracts with the government for the new work - $time.
To know what to put into the contract, "requrements engineers" have to talk with the "software engineers" to get a list of action items, and incorporate them into the contract - $time.
(say the contract is accepted)
Finance in conjuration with Requirements engineers has to generate a list of charge codes for each action item - $time.
CM engineers have to update the CM system - $time.
Some manager has to coordinate this mess, and let folks know when to do what - $time.
Software engineer goes to work, changes 1 number, recompiles - $time.
Software engineer checks in new load into CM - $time.
CM engineer updates CM history report - $time.
Software engineer delivers new load to testing manger - $time.
Test manager gets crew of 30 test engineers to run the new load through testing in a SIL (systems integration lab) - $time.
Test engineers write report on results - $time.
If results are fine, Test manager has 30 test engineers run a test on real hardware - $time.
Test engineers write new report - $time.
(assuming all went well)
CM engineer gets resting results and pushes the task to deliverable - $time.
Management has a report written up to hand to the governemnt, covering all work done, and each action taken - documenting that proper process was followed - $time.
Folks writing document know nothing technical, so they get engineers to write sections covering actual work done, and mostly collate what other people send to them - $time.
Engineers write most the report - $time.
Company has new load delivered to government (sending a disk), along with the report/papers/documentation - $time.
Government reviews the report, but because the govt. employees are not technical and don't understand any of the technical data, they simply take the company's word for the results, and simply grade the company on how closely they followed process (the only thing they do understand) - $time.
Company sends engineer to government location to load the new software and help government side testing - $time.
Government runs independent acceptance tests on delivered load - $time.
(Say all goes well)
Government talks with company contracts people, and contract is brought to a close - $time.
CM / Requirements engineers close out the action item - $time.

And this is how a 1 line code change takes 6 months and 5 million dollars.

And this gets repeated for _everything_.

Then imagine if it is a hardware issue, and the only real fix is a change of hardware. For an airplane, just getting permission to plug anything that needs electricity into the airplanes power supply takes months of paper work and lab testing artifacts for approval. Try getting your testing done in that kind of environment.



Basically, the F35 could actually be fixed quickly and cheaply - but the system that is in place right now does not allow for it. And if you tried to circumvent that system, you would be in trouble. The system is required. It's how oversight works - to make sure everything is by the book, documented, reviewed, and approved - so no money gets wasted on any funny business.

Best part, if the government thinks that the program is costing too much, they put more oversight on it to watch for more waste.
Because apparently, when you pay more people to stare at something, the waste just runs away in fear.
Someone at the contractors has to write the reports that these oversight people are supposed to be reviewing - so when you go to a contractor and see a cube farm with 90 paper pushers and 10 'actual' engineers (not a joke), you start to wonder how anything gets done.

Once upon a time, during the cold war, we had an existential threat.
People took things seriously. There was no F'ing around with paperwork - people had to deliver hardware. The typical time elapsed from "idea" to "aircraft first flight" used to be 2 years. USSR went away, cold war ended, new hardware deliveries fell to a trickle - but the spending remained, and the money billed to an inflated process.

-scheherazade

I would guess that each outlet/light string is plugged into/through a remote control switch that operates wirelessly, and each house uses their own electricity, but I could be wrong.

How can this be real, They'd have to all be plugged into one outlet.... I don't think they make fuses that strong!

Very true, nowadays I don't see why anyone would want to smoke it.

I have a cheap old EZ Vape plug in wall version next to bed for occasional weekend use. I want a Volcano but too expensive course I'm more a light user.

I grow my own, I keep 1 mason jar filled or half, growing 2 every few months in closet using cfl

small fyi: don't get virtual recorder. they must have known he was gonna plug them, the pop-up ads happen seemingly every other keystroke. I literally got 5 pop-ups in less than a minute.

Regarding sound quality, the masses have spoken and their response is "meh, good enough".

Convenience is now prized over quality.

I find it hilarious when people spend thousands on a sound system and then plug a mp3 player into it...

Hello lucky760,

I am blacklisted ! / ? / !? / ?!

...at least at/on my primary puter or my DSL connection or its IP.

If you were not aware I'm sure you are now, I am not computer savvy.

Best guess...deading vids I had a particular porn site come up several different times yesterday. I expeditiously exited and continued. Upon returning home last night I sought to continue. My screen locked up, I received the spinning beachball of death, could not force quit or restart so resorted to "pulling the plug." I backed up and retired.

This morning I resumed and was quickly treated to an 80's video, blacklisted.

Is malware a good guess?

(in a little voice meekly) help

Schuko all the way, best plug on the planet (at the moment). Ground always attaches first, the socket forms a protective casing and pins can not be touched long before contact happens, is protected from elements better, latched inlets (both pins need to push on them to allow the plug thru), can be plugged in two orientations.. Seems counterintuitive that it would be the safest to have neutral and live be allowed to switch places but it prevents highly dangerous practice of connecting earth and neutral inside the appliance, 50% of the time that would short and trip the fuses. Appliance manufacturers HAS to follow basic safety quidelines. Also means onnecting a plug is easy, just breen-yellow to ground, rest is up to you which way you want them. In fact, most of use can't remembers which color is neutral and which is live as they are BOTH treated as live.

Also they don't have fuses in the plug. Again, seems counterintuitive but the fuse is meant to protect individual parts of the circuit. The fuse in the appliances them selves protect the appliance, not it's cord. The fuses on the wall sockets have to be built to protect all cabling, both in and out of the wall.

Small details but it forces buildings to be built with higher standards, less shortcuts can be made.

One feature on Schuko is that when pulled from the cable, the plug leaves the socket first. In UK plugs, you can have a situation where someone trips on a wire and the wire will leave the plug, plug stays in the wall (or wall socket is damaged too) Making the weak point the plug-socket connection, the wire will stay firmly screwed inside the plug, socket and plug will be undamaged. There are L shape plugs too with Shcuko so this is not always the case but most often, those are incased and molded: your appliance will take the hit instead and fly off the desk. Also stops dangerous cable pulling with long cables with extensions for ex in construction sites. You have to actually go and move it yourself. Safer, more work but safer (yes, there are few cases where we knot the wires to stop it happening but when done by a professional, we know how to knot them so that the force is not pulling or bending the plugs at all, otherwise they can disconnect by them selves, often modus operandi when rigging lights)

Also, the pins are round, making bent pins something that just wont happen unless you drive a truck over them. Damaged, bent pins will be destroyed in the process, preventing someone to just bend them back in shape: the tube will not be round again.. It's a genius design.

Only thing that it is horrible at is transformers, small PSUs that takes up sometimes three sockets as Shcuko is more compact, the extensions are smaller then too.. So sometimes two wall sockets can take one PSU and we end up with lots of extensions chained with half of the sockets filled (i got 600 led lights in my living room, takes 4 extensions to get them all running, half of the sockets are used....)

If each plug has a fuse and there is no fuse box, wouldn't stabbing an outlet kill you? Since there is no fuse to trip? I could image a kid stabbing the ground to open the live then stabbing the live with something else.

I have mixed feelings about the UK plug. 1) they are HUGE. therefore power strips are also quite large, and the wall outlets only have place for one device. 2) I've seen plenty of UK plugs where the conductor goes all the way to the housing, not halfway like he shows as a feature. I've seen Euro-plugs with both types as well. 3) putting fuses on the plug instead of part of the house means that too many <13A devices could be plugged in, and (if used simultaneously) cause a fire in your walls and burn your house down (I assume UK requires circuit breakers and branch circuits nowadays). 4) the same safety device that requires ground to be plugged in first makes it really-hard to plug into cheaply made outlets or power strips (the plastic cover doesn't slide easily).
That said, another safety feature that he didn't mention in the video was that most wall outlets have their own switch on the outlet itself. Turn-off ; plug-in ; turn-on. This prevents arcing, which is easier with the higher 240V.

Euro outlets' holes are too small to fit most screwdrivers, knives, fingers into, and they have both grounded and ungrounded (smaller) variety.

My favorite are the IEC-60309 plugs/outlets, but are only for bigger amperages - 20,30,50,60, etc.

Same design was used in Ireland. I remember stealing plugs off other appliances when you were short a plug.

"They just finished you mom's new butt plug!"

wait until the end, when it goes moshing...

@robbersdog49 in these kind of videos, they hook up the spin motor directly to the plug.

...Swirley's mirror...ear's still plugged....