Science and research are absolutely key to our economy, both now and in the future. That’s why I and others have been pressing the Coalition Government to protect the £4.6 billion revenue budget for science and research programs. And we’ve managed more; since January, the Department for Business Innovation and Skills has announced £495 million of

There is still time to make your voice heard on the Crowdsourcing Smart Defense Cuts post. So far, many thoughtful and interesting comments have been posted, with no shortage of discussion on specific platforms and programs. LCS and F-35 seem to be the hot topics. What about non-platform specific cuts? Are there some naval or military missions or capabilities that should be divested by DOD or can ...

Admiral Greenert appears to be making some organizational changes within OPNAV. From Christopher Castelli at InsideDefense (subscription only). Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Jonathan Greenert plans to shake up the organization of his staff, reincarnating the role of a single baron overseeing warfighting programs, sources tell Inside the Pentagon. The new plan would create a three-star leadership ...

One of Ms Blood's academic forefathers is also a prominent opponent of US missile shield programs. She was disturbed to find, at her meetings with representatives of the US military-industrial complex (mostly DoD guys) in Honolulu recently, that he was...

My latest column at WPR is about the difference between security assistance and "governance" assistance: In March, the Stimson Center released a report (.pdf) by Gordon Adams and Rebecca Williams reviewing U.S. security assistance programs. Titled "A New Way Forward," the report argued that the United States should restructure its security assistance programs away from "security," as defined in Co...

Meanwhile, over at the global superpower, the public is slowly waking up to the fact that this government, too, is going bust, thanks to out-of-control entitlement programs, expensive bailouts, and the suicidal policy of everlasting peace through everlasting war. For the past six months, all of the United States government’s issuance of new debt has been bought by its compliant central b...

“Critics of Social Security and Medicare frequently invoke the words and ideals of author and philosopher Ayn Rand, one of the fiercest critics of federal insurance programs. But a little-known fact is that Ayn Rand herself collected Social Security. She may also have received Medicare benefits. An interview recently surfaced that was conducted in 1998

"The moon shot has long been a favorite trope of politicians plugging for new government programs, right up there with the Marshall Plan. It was a wondrous achievement, but it presented a relatively discrete engineering problem. If only reforming education, a complex task involving the crooked timber of humanity here on earth, were as straightforward." Rich Lowry, giving his less than joyous take ...

RADM Frank C. Pandolfe, Director, Surface Warfare, N86, OPNAV and I have something in common, we are both very excited about the Littoral Combat Ship and associated programs. His presentation at the Surface Navy Association conference is up on SWONET (and should be on YouTube but whatever). Go here, ignore the certificate warning, and click watch under RADM Pandolfe's picture. I really apprec...

White collar work in the West is threatened by lightspeed worldwide communication with countries where wage rates are dramatically lower; and by increasingly powerful computers and programs. When all but manual and menial work simply and permanently isn't there anymore for very large numbers of people, the moral connexion between work and income is weakened. The issue then will be distributio...