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Post by Bob k6tr on Apr 17, 2009 0:17:20 GMT
I think SOHO has operated for a very very long time Yes it has. Next year will make 15 years. It was designed to last 5. and is running out of fuel. It is consuming it's hydrazine but no where close to running out. NASA/ESA designed in a large fuel tank because there was a great deal of uncertainty about how much manuevering would be required to get it in orbit around Lagrange 1. At it's present rate of fuel consumption SOHO can stay on station for another 20 years. I donĀ“t think that it has the fuel to make that maneuver. You got that right ! The earth is 93 million miles from the sun. The moon is 240 thousand miles from earth. SOHO at LaGrange 1 is 950 thousand miles from earth. Even with all of the extra fuel onboard NASA is not able to do much with SOHO. SOHO is about the size of a School Bus. For comparison the STEREO Satellites are about the size of a Golf Cart. It took some slick orbital mechanics to get those two satellites in the orbits they now occupy. Quite interesting with SDO. SDO needs an Atlas V to make it into a GEO. That Atlas V that SDO is going to use was originally slated for Mars Science Laboratory. Now that mission got delayed and SDO got that slot. Sweet for us! /Sven SDO was tested and ready for launch ahead of LRO/LCROSS which will be launched next month. NASA's Launch Scheduling has an element of politics to it. With Solar Activity low right now SDO may have been pushed back if MSL was ready to go in September but it would have to successfully complete all of it's preflight tests. Even if MSL did grab that booster SDO would have been launched in the First Quarter of 2010.
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Post by Bob k6tr on Mar 9, 2009 3:53:32 GMT
If the SDO is to be placed in a geosynchronous orbit, although the data transfer rate may be greatly increased, doesn't that mean it will have much less solar observation time than SOHO? Are they just planning to relinquish the Lagrange 1 spot? The advantage of SOHO and ACE was the 24-hour coverage of solar activity, albeit at intervals in time to deal with downlink data transmission possibilities. Having much more data is a positive, but a geosynchronous orbit would place the SDO into an eclipse position for a good portion of each day, on a daily basis. SDJ That problem isn't as bad as one would think. It's been awhile since I read the planning documents but as I recall the eclipse period at it's height would once a day for a maximum of 70 minutes at local midnight. And that will only occur during 2 45 day periods, one in the Spring and one in the Fall. Regarding SOHO, once SDO is up and calibrated all of SOHO's instruments will be shut down with the exception of LASCO. I haven't heard how long that will continue but one of the arguments presented to justify SDO is the ground based assets that will be freed up with the retirement of SOHO so I imagine it won't be long. As to LaGrange 1 ESA has dibs on it for a Pathfinder Mission to find out if there are oscillating waves propagating through the universe.
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Post by Bob k6tr on Mar 6, 2009 20:56:32 GMT
I have decided to broaden the discussion in the thread. This topic will include SOHO - Solar Heliospheric Observatory Hinode - JAXA Solar Observatory STEREO - Solar Terresterestial Observatory SDO - Solar Dynamics Observatory GOES - Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite Solar Probe Plus Solar Sentinnels ======================================================== ======================================================== Three months ago NASA announced that it had formally assigned a launch window for the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO). That window is set for October 8th to November 8th 2009 with October 8th as the targeted launch date. Updates and Progress Reports were posted regularly at the Goddard Space Flight Center website while the observatory was under construction in Maryland. sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/The observatory was shipped to the Kennedy Space Center after completion of it's final construction test last December. At that time the Goddard website went quiet. NASA now has launched a Mission Webpage for SDO which is being updated regularly at : www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/sdo/main/index.htmlOnce launched and commissioned SDO will replace most of the functions on SOHO. Shortly thereafter most of the instruments on SOHO will be powered down bringing to an end the mission of the most productive scientific research satellite ever launched by NASA. The biggest improvement on SDO will be it's data download rate which can be described a tremendous, more than 1 Terabyte per day. SDO will be placed in a Geosynchronus Orbit above its download station in White Sands New Mexico. SDO will send down a continous stream of Live Video of the Sun where we only received snapshot before from SOHO and STEREO. It will include instruments that will furnish higher detail of the sun especially its Helioseismic/Magnetic Imager. This satellite should prove to be quite an asset for those involved in Astrophysics and Solar Research.
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Post by Bob k6tr on Jan 15, 2009 7:08:54 GMT
From the reports I have read it sounds like Windows 7 started from Vista with major redesign work done. It sounds like most of the instability problems of Vista have been cleaned up.
If applications run faster on 7 that is gravy. The big question is will the 64 Bit Version show the same stability as it's 32 Bit little Brother. If they can tame that Dragon I think the market will accept it.
The biggest problem Windows 7 is up against is the success of XP. It's a very solid platform which is stable and gives users little to complain about. It has developed a "works fine lasts a long time" ethos as such users don't want to abandon it. You really have to abuse XP to get a Blue Screen Out of it.
Microsoft is stating that they are now scheduled to end Full Support for XP in 2011. Look for that date to be advanced as much as a year if the Windows 7 transition comes off smoothly. Microsoft also states that after full support for XP ends they will continue XP Support against security threats until 2014. That date will probably stick.
Earlier this week AMD Released their Quad Core Microprocessors that are nearly the performance equal of Intel's Quads but at a much lower price. After word got out that market tests of the newly released chips verified the performance and quality claims of AMD Intel announced it would slash prices on their chips.
That's news from the computer front.
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Post by Bob k6tr on Jan 14, 2009 21:28:13 GMT
Has anyone downloaded the Beta Version and taken it out for a test spin ?
It was first announced that Free Beta Copies would be limited to 2.5 Million Copies when the distribution program was initiated over the Jan 10/11 Weekend. Yesterday Microsoft announced because of overwhelming demand the distribution limit would be lifted but kept in place the closing date of January 24 for the program. But before you think you're getting a Freebee all Beta Versions will self destruct on August 1 2009 after which you will have to purchase an Official Release Copy.
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Post by Bob k6tr on Jan 8, 2009 10:28:02 GMT
I would be one to contest the definition of "successfully" in this context. The reason I happened back to this thread was that I saw an article regarding deaths from medical mistakes in the UK that is relevant IMO. Yes, and how does that influence the dead last ranking of US Healthcare by the World Health Organization ? That is an objective ranking based upon hard data about Life Expectancy, Maternal Mortality and Infant Mortality. Citizens in the United Kingdom are not afforded the right of torts citizens of the US are granted. So doctors are not constrained the way they are here. That results in higher incidents of malpractice in the UK. The point you should be supporting with that argument is for tort reform in the UK not Health Care Deform in the US. I live in Michigan where it is commonly reported that Canadians (certainly those of means) come to get health care they can't wait for at home. I wouldn't be surprised that other border states are similar. Canadians are very quick to complain about their healthcare system until the subject of returning to a US Fee for Service System is proposed. Then the same individuals clam up quick ! Umm. Yes. There have been too many news accounts of $1000 toilet seats. And most of the toilet seats are in the US War Budget yet have you heard or read any effort to clean up that abuse ? After all the War Budget makes up HALF of the Federal Budget. You have talked about the overhead costs in private payer systems. I have no doubt whatsoever that you are correct. My mailbox is full of the stuff. The question is why you believe government run systems will be any better in the nearly total absence of evidence the government can run anything anything better. It's not a question of BELIEF. It is a matter of proven fact ! The second paragraph of my first post spells this out in detail. Did you bother to read it ? In case you didn't here are the bullet points again. The progression of problems with the social security system since it's inception certainly doesn't inspire a great deal of confidence (to say nothing of post office efficiency). Prior to the advent of Social Security many of the US Elderly subsisted on pet food because they didn't have the means to obtain a proper diet. BTW every newly elected President since James Carter has announced that we are going to "reform" Social Security. What they wind up doing is raiding it after which they PROCLAIM the program is fixed for good only to repeat the same sorry routine when the next occupant of the White House is sworn in. Yet the 3 Social Security trust funds sit solvent. Why do you believe costs will go down because we can file a form 999 for a doctor appointment with some proposed federal health agency like we do a 1040 with the IRS. (/sarcasm) Because the only way the Health Care Crisis will ever get fixed in this country is to put EVERYONE in the same risk pool. And the only way to do that is through the tax system. And there is no sarcasm in that statement. Medical costs themselves are out of control for many reasons. Health insurance itself is one of them. The government becoming the insurer isn't going to change that. Health Care Insurance is the principle reason for out of control costs. Increases in Premiums, copayments and deductibles for individuals as well as employer fees have been zooming out of sight to the tune of 3 to 10 times inflation. Employers have been hit with increases of up to 80% in their costs. This increases are so corrosive that it is affecting the competitiveness of US Industry. I don't claim to know the answer. I do believe that shifting insurance fees and paperwork in the private sector to tax rates and bureaucratic paperwork in the govenment sector will almost certainly not solve the problem. I can tell you that your "belief system" has lead you into a false and erroneous state of consciousness. I KNOW what the facts are and have presented them here. Yet you refuse to address them. The least you could do is to look up PNHP (Physians for a National Health Program) or the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) and get a solid picture of what is going on. Believe in the stars but argue from facts.
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Post by Bob k6tr on Dec 30, 2008 1:06:25 GMT
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Post by Bob k6tr on Dec 28, 2008 19:22:01 GMT
I must say that the above comments confirm my suspicions about how poorly a single payer system will work. The above statements of failure made in the above post were made in the context of the Healthcare System currently in place in this country. That system is a Fee-for-Service Insurance based system. The fact of the matter is a Single-Payer Healthcare System has been implemented successfully in at least 2 dozen countries. It is has a proven track record of providing superior service at far lower cost. There is no reason why it can't be implemented in this country. But yet the American Public is subjected to this incessant drumbeat condemning government as incompetent. How is it then that those other countries can successfully implement Single-Payer ? Are American Government Officials uniquely unqualified ? What has been proven a failure is the Fee-for-Service Insurance based Non-Healthcare System operating in this country Those that will be in charge of writing and implementing it are so far removed from medicine that they don't have a clue about how things really work at the patient doctor level. One of the lead organizations working to implement Single-Payer healthcare in this country is Physcians for a National Health Program. (PNHP) PNHP counts among it's membership 15,000 practicing physcians. Included in it's leadership are two renowned physicians. David Himmelstein MD Professor of Medicine at Harvard University and Marcia Angell MD former Editor for the New England Journal of Medicine. Let no mistake be made the Single-Payer Movement is made up of some of the most knowledgable People in Healthcare. www.pnhp.org/Another fact contrary to your assertion doctor is the book written about Single Payer entitled "Healthcare Meltdown". It is written by Two MDs from very conservative backrounds who came around to the idea the only way this country is going to permamently fix it's Health Care Crisis is to implement a Single-Payer System. Robert LeBow MD was the original author of the book initially published in 2002 by Hood Books. LeBow was involved in a Cycling Accident and lost his life a few years ago. C. Rocky White MD who came to single payer a few years ago picked up the book, updated it and added 2 Chapters of his own. The book is 300 pages long and list for 15 USD. It's ISBN is: 13:978-0-911-469-30-1 My plan is to retire soon. Mike Interesting you should mention that doctor. In a previous post I mentioned the University of Illinois Medical Center Study which found 59% of physician favoring a Single-Payer Health Care System while 32% oppse it. Being curious I poked around to find out the nature of the opposition. The 32% of physicians that oppose Single-Payer fall into two categories. The first is Older Physicians who have become set in their ways and resistant to change. The second group are the Physician who Specialize in highly lucrative disciplines which include Cosmetic Surgeons, Radiologists and Anesthesiologist.
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Post by Bob k6tr on Dec 27, 2008 5:33:10 GMT
Great post! I'm an anesthesiologist and have been in practice for 20 years. The first 17 in inner city Columbia, SC and most recently, Columbus, Ohio. I work nights, weekends and holidays taking care of those that they say have "no health care". Don't be fooled! Anyone that walks into a hospital ER gets timely health care 24/7 whether they can pay for it or not. That may be so but the grim reality is 18,000 people in the US die needless every year for lack of health care. Even more shocking people are sufferring or dying because their insurance claims are unjustly denied. The problem is they have no health care insurance and can't pay. Therefore the rest of us pay in higher premiums etc. Actually the insurance companies reemburse the health care providers based upom the procedures they perform and the providers are in not much of a position to dictate the reembursement rates so the providers don't have a mechanism to pass off their losses. When a person without Healthcare Insurance walks into a Doctors Office, or Clinic or Hospital it is those entities that wind up taking it in the shorts. The government has been decreasing payment to hospitals and physicians for years by cutting fees through Medicaid and Medicare. Now the government wants to cut some more and then extend Medicare and Medicaid to everyone and call it a single payer system. It will end up costing more to cover everyone. Medicare as it currently operates pays out for service from a trust fund. Medicaid gets funds from general revenue. Neither of these sources are currently well endowed. Under a Single Payer System the system is funded from both employer payroll and worker income taxes. With the 2 Trillion Dollars that is currently paid in insurance premiums Medicare could be built into a First Class System that would provide Healthcare for all and handsome compensation to providers. For those that are not aware for those that lead a healthy life Health Care Expenditures are comparatively low from ones mid teens through their 40s. As people enter there 50s and 60s Healthcare expenditures go up. So Medicare winds up picking up the tab when people most need it and the Insurance Companies get to collect premiums for several decades with a very low percentage of payouts. In escence what Medicare has become is a vehicle to take the "Money Losers" off the hands of the insurance industry who in turn get to skim the cream. A study done for the Congressional Budget Office estimated that if a Single Payer System were implemented in this country it would result in an immediate savings of 350 Billion Dollars per year. Anyone who has done even a cursory examination of the problem knows the US spends $7100 per person per year and ranks 18th out 18 industrialized nations. That $7100 dollars is twice the average of the 17 countries that finished ahead of it. Money is not the problem ! My wife is an RN with 20 years experience, college educated etc. and makes less than an autoworker straight out of high school already. The work force won't be there once we get this government mandated system all set up. Did you watch the video I posted ? The first part, posted at the top, opens with a narrative from a woman. That woman's name is Roseanne DeMoro. She is the Executive Director of the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee. It is one of the largest Nurses Unions in the country and it has been one of the lead organization advancing Single Payer since 1992. Did you also know that a majority of Physcians favor a Single Payer Healthcare System ? In a study conducted by the University of Illinois Medical Center last winter 2000 Physcians were surveyed. The survey showed that 59% of doctors favored a Single Payer Health Care System while 32% opposed it. That's almost 2 to 1 and up significantly since the last study done in 2002 which found 49% of Physcians favored Single Payer. This was reported in the New England Journal of Medicine as well as Business Week. So more than the nurses back Single Payer. Who in their right mind will want to go into health care with poor conditions, poor hours and for little pay. The system needs to be simplified. We jump through enough hoops already just to get an insurance company to pay. That's why we need Single Payer. The current For-Profit Insurance System in the US operates at 31% Administrative Overhead. Medicare Operates at 4% Administrative Overhead. The Canadian Single Payer System operates at 3% Administrative Overhead. The Socialized Medicine System used by the United Kingdom operates at 1% Administrative Overhead. These figures show how fundamentally out of line the US Healthcare System is. Did you know that a doctor must by law pay for an interpreter for any non-english speaking patient that comes to his office? Lets make it fair. One would hope that doctors and the medical system do everything they can to pair up doctors in communities which they serve so they have adequate communications with their patients. And what I find more curious is why a Doctor would consider a mandate to provide that level of communication such a burden ? Let's ask all businesses to provide goods and services for free for those that can't pay. I don't mean to sound cynical. I do feel good about myself for all that I have done for the sick and dying. I wish I could have spent more time with my wife and kids while they were growing up though. Now I feel better. Mike Ahh here it comes out. "Let's treat healthcare as just another commodity". We don't do that with Fire Depatments which are built up and funded through taxes. The same can be said for Police Departments. But health care is treated like a commodity like buying a pair of shoes. A case could be made for that type of system if the US were an impoverished third world country and could not afford it. But this is the US which has the largest economy in the world and can afford it. There are at least 2 dozen other countries that provide a Single Payer System to their citizens while the US continues to balk. Even the Island Nation of Taiwan with an economy a tiny fraction of the US has recently switched over to a Single Payer System. For all of the hard work the American People do for this country why is it they are treated as serfs. Aren't American people as good as Canadians, or Brits, or French, or Begians, or Japanese or....... ?
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Post by Bob k6tr on Dec 22, 2008 3:55:44 GMT
Hi Maui Excellent thread. I've beem working with Single Payer Health Care Groups here in California since 1994. First let me tell you that Obama and Daschle are not our friends when it comes to implementing Single Payer Healthcare . While they talk positively about Single Payer they dismiss it as unfeasible. Don't buy that line ! They plan to implement their plan called Individual Mandate. This is nothing more than a plan to rescue the insurance industry. It does possess some attractive qualities like the reduction of paperwork but those arguments do not hold water and don't get at the root of the problem which is the Insurance Industry. Right now the Administrative Overhead in our current Fee-for-Service System is 30 - 32 percent. Medicare has an Administrative Overhead of 4 percent and the Canadian Single Payer System operates at 3 percent. And Administrative Overhead includes more than paperwork expenses. It includes the costs for the horrendous overstaffing of Insurance Companies with claims adjusters and the obscene sums of money paid senior staff. (CEOs receiving 10s of millions of dollars annually) As you probably already know the US ranks 18th out of 18 Industriallized Nations in Healthcare based upon a WHO (World Health Organization) Study yet spends TWICE the money of the average of the 17 countries that beat it. So why does Barack Obama want to use the coersive power of the State to compell people to buy insurance they can't afford ? The problem IS NOT MONEY. There is plenty of money to right the system without further burdening the public. The root of the Healthcare Crisis in this country is the Insurance Companies. Any plan that does not give them the boot does nothing more than kick the can down the road. And don't let anyone tell you different. The struggle for Single Payer healthcare has been a long one and the entrench interests are at the top of their game when it comes to perpetrating fraudulent analysis. They're are very effective at creating empty buzz words to effectively divert attention from the root of the problem. Take Universal Access or Universal Coverage. Sounds pretty nice on the surface huh. Well the way politicians define Universal Coverage is to mean that eveyone should be compelled to buy insurance. If you go to a meeting or host one asked the speakers and the guest where they stand on HR-676. HR-676 is the legislation authored by John Conyers which would implement Single Payer Healthcare in this country and watch the response you get. A number of Progressive Legislators who supported some form of Single Payer for decades have reversed their position in the last year to line up behind the insurance industry. If you really want Single Payer Healthcare there are two avenues to pursue. First get behind HR-676 on the Federal Level and second hook up with groups in your area to implememnt it on a state level. The latter is in it's infancy in most states. I haven't heard or read of any groups in Washington yet. BTW HR-676 has 92 cosponsors in congress so there is a solid base to build on. In terms of groups you can consult check out Health Care Now www.healthcare-now.org/ . Also checkout Physcians for a National Health Program www.pnhp.org/ . Want the nurses perspective on the matter go to the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committe website www.calnurses.org/Want to see what the newspapers are saying ? news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&q=Single+Payer+Health+Care&btnG=Search+NewsThose are just a few for starters. And returning the deceit a treachery theme there are also massive efforts to derail the Single Payer Movement. A group has been set up by forces aligned with Obama to channel those people who want change into Obama's Individual Mandate Program. The group's name is Healthcare for America Now (HCAN). healthcareforamericanow.org/ It draws on the expertise of some former members of the Single Payer who have since jumped ship. More importantly it draws on the finances of a number well heeled individuals, as well as some unions and lobbying groups who want to suck-up to the Democrat Party's Agenda of pandering to the insurance industry. Right now their war chest stands at 25 million dollars. If you want more detail check out: www.counterpunch.org/redmond10172008.html If you want to hear a debate between Richard Kirsch of HCAN and David Himmelstein of PNHP click this link. www.archive.org/download/DailyDigest-071008/2008_07_10_healthcare.mp3If you want more info on HR-676 checkout this 4 Part Series While what I say might seem depressing there has never been a better opportunity to get Single Payer. Yes our elected officials are buckling under to the Insurance Industry right now but there is strong ground swell for Single Payer Healthcare at the Grassroots Level. Single Payer Healthcare Groups are sprouting up like weeds. Unfortunately there isn't the financial backing behind them to mount a massive public relations campaign. The HCAN Operatives are in exactly the opposite situation. They have a pile of money but little if any popular base of support. We can get Single Payer Healthcare. It won't be easy but we can get it.
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