COURTESY PHOTO
Did You Know
By Bonnie Donovan
In final week’s column, we warned of the Chinese language authorities’s infiltration of America.
The day after we launched the column, we obtained a report on how, by espionage in American firms, the Chinese language navy had been capable of produce their fifth era of a fighter aircraft. That is the Chinese language J20, constructed by copying the applied sciences within the U.S. F-22 Raptor. It’s important to know that America has by no means bought F-22 raptors to every other nation.
The Chinese language theft of American secret know-how occurred right here in America.
The principle designers and producers of the F-22 Raptor had been Lockheed Martin and Boeing, with tons of of sub-component suppliers.
China concentrated for 10 years on stealing the applied sciences within the F-22, they usually had been astoundingly profitable. By doing so, they’ve been capable of slender the know-how hole between America and China by 10 to fifteen years.
With regards to new know-how, Did You Know? was uncovered to the ability of a mix of synthetic intelligence know-how, coupled with many drones. We discovered how this mixture can change human efforts for each good and evil.
A.I. and drone applied sciences are growing quick. Whereas not possible immediately, think about the day when 4 giant container ships — with reliable papers and managed by synthetic intelligence — are cruising tons of of miles aside outdoors American territorial waters, alongside the American Pacific and Atlantic coasts.
At 2 a.m., the doorways of their containers open. From every ship, tons of of A.I.-controlled drones rise and fly over all the key East Coast and West Coast cities. Boston, New York, Washington, Miami, Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego. What is going to the drones ship to the hundreds of thousands of individuals residing there?
A number of balloons can fly, undetected, throughout American airspace. How about 4 ships in two pairs, tons of of miles aside on two oceans, hidden amongst tons of of others?
On one other matter, a reader of Did You Know? dropped off a duplicate of 46 pages of extremely detailed, questions which can be very intrusive of private privateness, referred to as “The American Neighborhood Survey,” which they obtained within the mail.
It’s carried out by the Census Bureau and is remitted by your U.S. authorities that the recipients are, by regulation, required to reply.
Did You Know? doesn’t know the complete use to which the collected info might be put. It would nicely be a check for together with these questions in future, full census surveys.
Not solely are recipients required to disclose probably the most non-public particulars of their private lives, however they’re additionally required to establish themselves by identify.
Failure to finish and return the survey or to offer inaccurate solutions will lead to heavy fines.
This isn’t a census survey, in that it has been despatched solely to three million households, out of 123.6 million in America, however it’s already right here in Santa Barbara.
Hope that you don’t obtain one.
This survey is designed not solely to establish you but in addition to probe into each side of your life and your resident household’s life. Your life histories, your employment, and your full monetary state of affairs are all included, and extra.
If it is a check for an entire census, the federal government might have all the knowledge essential to arrange a social credit score system to manage particular person habits, just like that now in place in China.
Did You Know? was additionally forwarded Pepperdine College’s new promotional video that the Malibu faculty launched at its latest twenty fifth anniversary. It options Ronald Reagan in 1976 when he was requested to write down a letter to be opened in 100 years. Try the promotional video, “Shaping the World for the Subsequent 100 Years,” on Pepperdine’s YouTube channel — youtube.com/watch?v=P5tCYePzOzA&characteristic=youtu.be.
I invite you to take a couple of minutes (simply three!) to observe the video, which begins with a well-known voice.
This temporary video is predicated on one among Mr. Reagan’s hottest radio addresses from September 1976. Pepperdine first discovered about this textual content by studying Mr. Reagan’s phrases in “In His Personal Hand” — a guide co-edited by one of many college’s latest school members, Dr. Kiron Skinner.
President Reagan was requested to write down a letter to be put right into a time capsule to be opened in 2076 in Los Angeles. He was requested to say within the letter among the most critical issues confronting america in 1976.
What he wrote in 1976 (47 years in the past) may very well be immediately.
Under are components of what he stated.
“Give it some thought for a minute.
“What do you place in a letter that’s going to be learn 100 years from now — within the 12 months 2076? The individuals who will learn it ‘might be residing on the planet we helped to form.’
“Will they learn the letter with gratitude of their hearts for what we did, or will they be bitter as a result of the heritage we left them was one among human distress?”
“The best drawback america confronted in 1976 was the selection between persevering with the insurance policies of the final 40 years which have led to larger and greater authorities, much less and fewer liberty, redistribution of earnings by confiscatory taxation, or making an attempt to get again on the unique course set for us by the Founding Fathers.
“Will we select fiscal duty, restricted authorities and freedom of selection for all our individuals? Or will we let an irresponsible Congress set us on the street our English cousins have already taken? The street to financial smash and state management of our very lives?”
“On the worldwide scene, two nice superpowers face one another with nuclear missiles on the prepared — poised to convey Armageddon to the world.”
“Those that learn my letter will know whether or not these missiles had been fired or not. Both they are going to be surrounded by the identical magnificence we all know, or they are going to surprise sadly what it was like when the world was nonetheless stunning.”
“If we right here immediately meet the problem confronting us, those that open that point capsule 100 years from now will accomplish that in peace, prosperity and the final word in private freedom.
“If we don’t hold our rendezvous with future, the letter in all probability won’t ever be learn — as a result of they are going to dwell on the planet we left them, a world by which nobody is allowed to learn of particular person liberty or freedom of selection.”
“Will we select fiscal duty, restricted authorities, and freedom of selection for all our individuals?”
Bonnie Donovan writes the “Did You Know?” column at the side of a bipartisan group of native residents. It seems Saturdays within the Voices part.