Author Archives: RF_Alum

Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb

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dark-sun book cvrThe first several chapters of this book by Richard Rhodes contain a detailed description of Soviet spying on the Manhattan Project. The value of what was provided to the Soviets is well documented. The U.S. only identified and convicted some of the spies. Some escaped detection and others managed to make it to the Soviet Union before they were captured.

The Prologue demonstrates the rich dialogue of the book. “The Hiroshima bomb, Little Boy, was a uranium gun. It used sixty-four kilograms of rare uranium 235, all of that dense, purple-black metal the United States had been able to accumulate up to the end of July 1945.” Luis Alvarz was an American experimental physicist who worked in the Manhattan Project and invented a device for measuring the yield of the Hiroshima burst. The devices were dropped by parachute ahead of the bomb radioed their readings to Alvarez in a backup plane. “Alvarez had seen the bright flash of the Hiroshima explosion, had watched (the) pressure gauges register on the oscilloscopes…(and) felt the two sharp slaps of direct and ground-reflected shock waves slamming the plane like flak explosions…”Alvarez searched for the city below the rising mushroom cloud. “Alvarez could not see the city because the city had been destroyed.” A second atomic bomb exploded over Nagasaki three days later and the Japanese surrendered a few days later with the emperor referring to the “terrible bomb.” Continue reading →

Curry Favor

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Wiktionary explains that this expression originated “…from a French poem Roman de Fauvel, written in the early 1300s; Fauvel was a conniving stallion and the play was a satire on the corruption of social life.” The stallion’s name is from the French word fauve, which means “chestnut, reddish-yellow, or fawn.” There was a medieval belief that such a horse was a symbol of deceit and dishonesty. The expression began as curry Fauvel, which met “flattering the horse.” Fauvel transitioned to favor, and to curry favor refers to seeking “…to gain favor by flattery or attention.”

Update on Colorado Proposition to Label GMOs

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The commentary posted last week stated that I intended to vote no on Colorado Proposition 105. Two readers made comments supporting the decision and one wrote a long dissention complete with links to back up the reasons for the disagreement. You can read the full comment, but I was struck by the statement that you can’t trust “…the FDA (or EPA) to protect your health, just as you could not count on DOE to protect the workers at Rocky Flats.” The last part of that is certainly complicated. Those who have read my book “An Insider’s View of Rocky Flats: Urban Myths debunked” (free at the book link at the bottom of the home page on this site) know that I was critical of DOE about their response to allegations of environmental crimes at the plant. However, today I attended a meeting of Rocky Flats retirees, some are aging more gracefully than others, but we are all aging. Many Rocky Flats retirees have lived well into their eighties and beyond despite the fact many of us worked with plutonium, which the press enjoyed calling “the most deadly substance known to man.”

I don’t intend to get into the “Rocky Flats health debate” in this commentary, but I did feel I needed to at least acknowledge the statement. I do understand it is easy to distrust government, but I’m not swayed that I should distrust the FDA and EPA because “…high ranking FDA and EPA staffers came from Monsanto…” I don’t have to be told GMO opponents emotionally believe Monsanto and all of the current and past employees are evil. Monsanto has indeed done some things that I also dislike, to include that they have sued farmers for patent infringement after their crops were inadvertently pollinated due to winds blowing pollen from a neighboring farm. Hatred of Monsanto inspires emotional responses, but I tend to try to sort through emotions and look for facts to make decisions. Continue reading →

The Truman Presidency: The History of a Triumphant Succession

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the truman presidencyThere are several books about Harry S. Truman, and I started this book by Cabell Phillips with a bit of skepticism. The book was published in 1966, and it does suffer from the fact that much of the information about Soviet spying was still classified at that time. The author therefore writes disbelievingly about reports of espionage activities by government officials. One example involves the separate revelations by two people who turned themselves in to the FBI admitting they had been Communists and couriers for large Soviet espionage networks. The author refers to them as “A tense, overwrought spinster named Elizabeth Bentley and a moody senior editor of Time Magazine.”  Their stories “…were so incredible that the FBI at first refused to countenance them.” It is true that the liberal media chipped away at the credibility of both people and their testimony to the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). The media had stories that questioned the mental state of both people and portrayed them as unsavory or at least unattractive. The eventual declassification of counterespionage information and the opening of Soviet archives validated the testimony of both people.

Getting that quibble set aside, I did find the book to have good information that is well presented. The dustcover sets the tone of admiration the author has for Truman. He describes the Truman’s story as “…one of the most heartening and surprisingly personal success stories in the annals of politics. From the day in April 1945 when the news of FDR’s death shocked the nation, Harry Truman, the unprepossessing ‘little man from Missouri,’ grew slowly and haltingly to become one of the ‘great’ American Presidents.” That tone continues with the first two sentences of the Preface. “Harry S. Truman was a quite ordinary man. He was also a quite extraordinary President.” The author acknowledges the help of Dean G. Acheson, Clark M. Clifford, and Averell Harriman, three people I have read were trusted Truman confidants. I thought that gave the book a stamp of credibility. Continue reading →

Getting Down to the Brass Tacks

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The Grammarist says that the expression “…is an Americanism dating from the 19th century,” and that it means “the essentials” or “the basic facts.” Both the Grammarist and the Phrase Finder observe that the origin is unknown, but it might have something to do with the brass tacks used in upholstering furniture. The preferred origin for the Phrase Finder is that haberdashers measured cloth between brass tacks set into a shop’s counter.  That source says the meaning is to “Engage with the basic facts or realities.” I’ll add that I think of the expression being used as an admonition to get down to business. “Let’s quit wasting time and get down to the brass tacks.”

Colorado Proposition to Label GMOs

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Colorado voters will determine whether to “mandate labeling of genetically modified food products that are sold in the state.” Those who favor the proposition believe it is needed to protect consumers. As one advocate wrote in a letter to the editors of the Denver Post, “Because GMOs are not natural, we simply don’t know what the long-term health consequences might be, and therefore consumers should have the right to know where their food comes from, so that they can decide whether they want to accept those risks.” Another supporter writes, “The GMO debate boils down to freedom—the freedom to chose what I eat. That freedom simply does not exist if food producers are allowed to deny me the information I need to make my choices.”

Those opinions are in opposition to an editorial by Don Ament, former Commissioner of the Colorado Department of Agriculture. He writes that approval of the proposal would “…give Colorado consumers inaccurate, unreliable and misleading information.” What sways my opinion so far is his further statements that “Consumers already have reliable options to choose foods made without GE (Genetically Engineered) ingredients. They can select from thousands of food products labeled ‘organic’ or ‘non-GMO’ under existing federal labeling standards.” Continue reading →