Override or not?

Washington intrigue.

As Democrats move to block Trump's emergency declaration over the wall, Republicans are faced with a dilemma.

If the Mueller report comes out with damning evidence that Republicans cannot deny, it is not a zero chance that Pelosi becomes acting President until January 2021. After all, Pence is so tied up in Trump's campaign and administration, there may just be enough to push for his impeachment too.

And if so... then setting a precedence for executive overreach is not going to work out for the Republicans. In that one year while she is in power, she may use that precedence against the Republicans, and the Republicans will have no one else to blame.

So Republicans are faced with a choice:
1. Pray that Mueller has nothing. Stick with Trump's emergency declaration, and do not override his veto when it happens. Given the number of indictments to date on this case, hindsight may make them look like ostriches sticking their heads in the sand. But who knows? It is a political gamble, and some may be willing to take it.
2. Override Trump's veto when it happens. Break from Trump before the bad news from Mueller breaks, so that Trump doesn't end up dragging the entire GOP with him when he goes down. This may even be used to strike a deal with the Democrats (behind closed doors) to keep Pence. But of course, this will bring the Twitter wrath of Trump, so it is a political gamble that the GOP will be able to survive without Trump.

So it all boils down to Mueller. If Mueller remains tight-lipped, the GOP will need to take a gamble. But if Mueller lets slip some info to the GOP on where his report is going, the GOP will then be able to make a better assessment of the situation in choosing between Option 1 or 2 (probably 2, given all the indications to date).

And there is an Option 3: Trump declares war somewhere in the world (Iran, or most likely, Venezuela), and basically forces everyone to keep him in power so as not to risk the US losing a war through presidential impeachment. Dirty trick that ends up with people getting killed, but nothing is beyond or below Trump.

I guess this will be a week of backroom deals...
🤔

Dune, as a movie--my thoughts

I am a fan of Dune by Frank Herbert. No secret to that. And a fan of The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R.Tolkien too. And it got me thinking, "Why can someone pull of a The Lord of the Rings movie, but no one has really succeeded yet at a Dune one?"

There has been The Lord of the Rings movies in the past, not just the one directed by Peter Jackson. But I think we can all agree that the ones by Peter Jackson were somewhat successful at visualizing the story. And there were Dune movies in the past too. But none of those were of similar success. Why?

Here are my thoughts.

For a start, movie length. Each movie in Peter Jackson's depiction was more than 3 hours long; more like 4 hours. That is really pushing the limit for movies; it is not an easy task to keep someone in a seat for 4 hours. But one movie per book, and Peter Jackson managed to do it. I think it is because Tolkien's writing style is very descriptive, which means a significant portion of the books were things that can become part of visual effects and costumes and scenery. Unlike words, movies don't need as much "time" to portray these. Another feature of Tolkien's writing is the effort he puts into world-building. There is quite a significant portion of the books spent on providing backgrounds to everything and everyone in the world. These can selectively be left out of the movie to cut down time without heavily impacting the overall plot.

But Frank Herbert's Dune is different in style and length. For a start, the series spans 6 books (or 8, if you could the two by his son, Brian, who sought to bring closure to the world developed by his father). If each book is going to become at least a 3-hour movie, we are looking at something like 20 hours or more. A daunting task even for someone thinking about making this into a TV series.

Then, there is the actual style. Frank Herbert's style of writing is less descriptive. He gave a lot of effort into building his characters, and developing plots within plots within plots. Which makes it hard for a director to choose what to cut; every part of the book is there to build up a plot within a plot within a plot, which the viewer may fail to comprehend fully if anything is left out. A lot of screen time is going to be devoted toward portraying all those dialogues and subplots. This means each book can easily run beyond 4 hours. Multiply that by 6 (or 8) books, and I think we know why no director is ready to take up the challenge of portraying the Dune series. Unless it is a TV series. But the problem is: some plots run deep and slow; something that happened in episode 3 may only be fully realized in episode 20. It is hard to convince a network to produce a series where a person must watch EVERY episode in order to get an idea of what is happening.

So there you have it, my superficial thoughts on the difficulties of portraying the Dune series on film. While the number of books is one issue, the more significant one, I believe, is the way the books are written. Still, as a Dune fan, I do hope someone will eventually take on the daunting task. After all, with video on-demand, it is easier nowadays for a person to not miss an episode.

3D printing parts for military aircraft

First metallic 3D printed part installed on F-22

Wow.
Wow!

I had always been trying to push for the idea of adopting 3D printing technology to lower the cost of having to lug around spare parts onboard ships. Spare parts take up space which can be used for other purposes. But the issue with widespread implementation is: certification. Very few companies are willing to certify 3D printed parts as "meeting the required specifications to be used as a replacement" for their parts. After all, this puts them out of the parts business. They won't be able to sell spares anymore. It then falls on the onus of the ship owner to determine if those 3d printed parts are good enough, and given the risks involved, most owners are going to simply say, nada, not worth my time to try and test and certify.

But what we have now is the U.S. military setting an example. If 3D printed parts are good enough to be used as spares on a multi-million state-of-the-art fighter jet, there is no reason why they cannot be good enough for other forms of transportation. Of course, there is still the need for testing to make sure those parts meet the required specifications. But this move does help to lower the mindset hurdle.

Hopefully, more and more people will see the merits of using 3D printing to produce spare parts. The savings in storage space is obvious. But beyond that, it also helps to reduce the number of types of spares that one needs to keep on hand, and the turn-around time; the logistics implication is huge. There is a possibility here, an opportunity waiting to be explored. Let us move beyond the confines of traditional mindsets to see things at a different level.

Palpatine and Trump, declaring emergencies

I really think Trump is a Star Wars fan.

Palpatine created a crisis by forming the separatists, then used this crisis made by him to gain emergency powers. Which eventually led to him usurping power for himself, and declaring himself emperor.

Trump created the rhetoric of a crisis at the border, and has now used this "crisis" created by him to declare an emergency to give him emergency powers. If we follow the movie script, this is going to end with him declaring himself emperor... 😅