What with the focus being on the economy, octuplets, and Christian Bale's ranting on set (somebody give the sound guy a bonus for slipping that one to the media) there's been a couple of bits on international news that kinda got overlooked that are mighty scary...
Iran launched a satellite into space. "Yeah, so?" you say. Well, boys and girls, if they can launch a satellite, that means they now have the capability to build ICBMs. (For those of you born after the cold war, that stands for Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles.) And we know what those are used for... delivering nuclear bombs, anytime, anyplace... and probably using your very own car's sat nav system to target the bomb.
Then there's the little bit about Russia recruiting former USSR neighbors for a joint military system. Putin and company really, really want to rebuild the Soviet Union, kids. And don't forget, all he has to do is turn a gas valve, and half of Europe has no heat. Lovely, just lovely.
Not on the same level, but I see on "Top Gear" that our Japanese friends have unwittingly laid the groundwork for preventing you from driving fast in the future. Can't drive 55? Oh yeah, says we. The new Nissan supercar that's all the rage right now (faster than a turbo Porsche at Nurburgring!) has a clever gadget that can be a bad thing in the wrong hands. You see, cars are computer limited to 109 MPH in Japan... so what's the point of having a bizzilion horsepower supercar? Solution: the GPS system "sees" the car drive into a racetrack, and "click" -- off goes the limiter. Cool, huh?
But think about the reverse application. Your friendly government wires your Ford Focus so that whenever the GPS system sees you on a 35 MPH street -- "click" -- and you can't go above the speed limit. 65 on the freeway? "click" -- and you can mash the throttle all you want, but the computer shuts down the ignition system and fuel delivery so you and every other poor slob all have the same top speed. Outside of making 95 percent of the highway patrol superfluous, it's a great way to cut the nation's wasteful fuel consumption.
Just don't mention this to Congress; I don't think they watch Top Gear, so we're safe for now.
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