Tuesday, July 29, 2014

Operation Protective Edge vs Operation Linebacker II

Operation Linebacker II resulted in 1,624 civilians killed in North Vietnam. This was the "Christmas bombing" campaign of the Vietnam War.

Right now just over a thousand are claimed (by the Palestinian Health Ministry) killed by Operation Protective Edge. Other sources cite higher numbers. So somewhere around 800 civilians, putting Operation Protective Edge just about at the halfway point of Operation Linebacker II's on the 21st day of operations.
Operation Linebacker II was only 11 days. 


Operation Linebacker II was an enormous air campaign. So big, in fact, that there was some argument against taking was was upwards of half the US Air Force's manned bomber fleet against North Vietnam.
Linebacker did a spectacular job of destroying a lot of stuff, including a hospital. And, you know, at least 1600 people.
It did not, however, alter the outcome of the war. Well, except arguably to make the South lose because the US passed the Case-Church Amendment which might not have happened if it weren't for Operation Linebacker II.

Tuesday, July 15, 2014

Socialist Hellscape

So yesterday I went through the socialist hellscape that is Obamacare. That is, I had my first doctors appointment with my new HMO under the expanded Medicaid portion of the Affordable Care Act.
The appointment was set up a week earlier. It took three hours door-to-door.
My Obamacare doctor's offices are nicer than the offices at my private insurer's. They're newer. Inside the Princeton University Medical Center it is the Bristol Meyers Clinic. I probably have a younger doctor than I would have got under my old private plan.
At first my blood oxygen tested strangely low at 92%. But a re-measurement showed it at 98%. I have no idea why.
I had to wait for the doctor. This seems to me to be largely in line with what I have to do when I've gone to a non-Obamacare-doctor.
I suppose the biggest deal is that Fox News wasn't blaring in the waiting room.