Context

I have always been fascinated by maps of all sorts. If I was young again, maybe I would have gone to work for the US National Geospacial Intelligence Agency. It used to be the National Imagery and Mapping Agency (stood up in 1996), working closely with the National Reconnaissance Office, the part of CIA that managed satellites. Now its parent organization is the Department of Defense. (a rose by any other name) I suspect that it’s now under the US Space Force, but I don’t know that for sure.

Frankly I didn’t know they existed under the new banner until I was doing some work circa 2007 and there was a small list of consumers of information that had access to that work and one of them that was scoring it high (a fan, you could say) was the director of the NGIA. “Who is that/what is that?” There are a lot of alphabet agencies in the Beltway that many people haven’t heard of, and they change names from time to time. Anyway, the director was most kind and made me feel like a rock star.

So now you know of my obsession with maps, charts, and things like that. I think that it started when I was young, and now that I’m older, that hasn’t changed at all.

Onyx

My favorite imagery satellite is the KH-12 (which is technically an improved KH-11). The KH-12 is a $1 billion satellite that resembles the Hubble Space Telescope, except it is looking at our planet. For security reasons, there are no published orbit schedules for imagery spacecraft. They are supplemented by the 15-ton Lacrosse-class radar-imaging satellites (Onyx Program).

That class of satellite was supposed to be discontinued by now, because of a new generation coming on-line, but that has apparently been delayed. Commercial satellites are also taking on the role that US intelligence satellites used to dominate. Classification issues, make Google Earth more of a go-to by military people in many settings because there isn’t the hassle of using military channels of information.

Anyway, Maps… I just like them.

 

Projected 2020 election results by county.

I think that the map is wrong. I predict a much larger Trump landslide. One can but hope.

 

Are the Gods Angry?

Lightning that sparked two of the California’s largest-ever wildfires was extraordinarily unusual for the state, comprising about 11 percent of the average annual lightning activity.

 

More people live in the yellow area than in the red area.

 

Places ending in -stan

 

Why is there so much dissatisfaction in the UK?

 

Most Famous Brand (from each US State)

I would have expected that Florida would have gone to Hooters…having been to beaches in Florida.

 

Down Under

When you flush a toilet in Australia, the water moves clockwise, which is weird if you’re from the Northern Hemisphere. The first time I went there I must have flushed the toilet a dozen times, just to watch. Because of the rotation of the Earth, the Coriolis effect means that hurricanes and other giant storm systems swirl counter-clockwise in the Northern Hemisphere, and clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere.

I don’t think that has anything to do with population distribution in Australia. I think that I could live in Australia, except that they have this mindset that only criminals should have firearms. They are denied to the law abiding.

 

Alexander

The Empire of Alexander the Great compared to the Ottoman Empire.

  • Red; Only controlled by the Ottomans
  • Blue; Only controlled by Alexander the Great
  • Yellow; Controlled by both

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23 COMMENTS

  1. It appears that West Virginia is the only state that is projected to have no Joe Biden support. And yes, let’s hope for those hidden Trump supporters to swamp the voting booths in human waves.

    If that happens, the left will go absolutely nuts. More nuts that it is now, and that’s hard to imagine.

    • There are so many scenarios. One that I think might be likely will be that the Democrats will split between the old Democrat Party (whatever that is) and the New Communist Party, but they’ll pick a name other than that one.

    • The 2016 election was the first time where every county in a state voted for the same candidate – and it happened 3 times, in Oklahoma, Alaska, and West Virginia.

      I agree that unfortunately the Left won’t accept a Trump win and this time they’ll be ready to use large scale violence; what we’ve seen so far will be nothing in comparison.

      The saving grace for many will be that they are focused on cities and their few attempts to go outside cities and college towns have gone badly so far…

  2. I agree…much more Red/Trump support, even more than 2016.

    I can answer why for the UK (mostly from watching Top Gear BBC, so not actual science or experience): England has more speed bumps and cameras per sq ft and seriously high vehicle taxes and fuel costs…no fun to drive unless way out in the country. Denmark if included would be above 90% satisfaction..they are just happy folks (might have something to due with easy access to Soberrum and Aakavit.)

    God is righteously ticked at California.

    That brand map says a lot. Florida-Hooters/Knockers…funny that.

    • The UK is WAY over regulated. Too many rules and too few of Old Blighty as the demographics switch there. Brexit may have saved them, but barely. They need to navigate a new way forward with about 10% of the current rules now in place. Way too much government.

      California deserves whatever God deigns to do to that state.

  4. I see more Trump support here as well. MAGA caps are common at the range and I have yet to see any Bidenistas there. The other side is simply more vocal so they get more attention.
    Those lightning strikes need to concentrate more on the cities.

  5. i think it’ll be like that guy, what was his name…oh yeah, Mondale. won one state, Minnesota. …..we’re still in the red section that projects into va. but i tell my wife every time we leave the house, there’s just too damn many people ’round here. i’d move but i been moving all my life n i’m tired.

  6. The Eskimos love Slow Joe? I didn’t know that.

    I’ve never heard of Allsup’s or Gino’s, and I can’t read Rhode Island or Delaware.
    Rhode Island should probably be CVS or Dunkin Donuts though… although when I was a kid
    it would’ve been Brown & Sharpe. Sigh.

    Is Gillette really more famous than Smith & Wesson?
    -Kle.

  7. Wasn’t there a blurb out the other day about Trump winning by a landslide on election night; then in the days and weeks to follow the mail-in votes will be counted and recounted until Biden wins?

    • THAT is a likely scenario. Votes will be “found” after election day and they’ll all be for the donkey.

  9. I’m surprised Cat as a name brand is still on the “map”. Jimmuh Cahtear tried his best to kill them in the 1970’s, and I watched several large Caterpillar factories, some newly built, shut down, never to return.

  10. Maps are fascinating. What’s your take on Piri Reis etc ? Ancient maps appearing to show longitude and latitude, coastlines of Antarctic/S America and more.

    It seems to point to the existence of a mathematically/astronomically advanced race of seafarers in a time that’s lost to us. But I’m no expert.

    That in mind, it seems strange to me that modern humans have existed for some 100k years, conservatively, perhaps much longer. Why should they have been capable of so little in such a long time span and we so much in such a short one?

    • Piri Reis – My take is that humans have traveled the globe and in a few cases, made maps that remained, for a very long time. Much of it was simply lost to time and technology didn’t exist to tell the tale until the recent past. “The Book of the Generations of Adam” is said by scholars to have pre-dated Genesis. I don’t know if it’s true, but some serious minds have studied the references and seem to believe it. Nobody came up with the book. It may have existed.

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