It is more or less standard on modern light rail lines. But I am not sure about MAX. Stops are the biggest source of regenerated power.

Portland Streetcar did not have it at first but they were talking about adding it during a tour I was on.

Best Hopes for Energy Efficiency,

Alan

Putin has responded as he has because he understands that ABM systems are essentially offensive systems. They make it so that if you attack, targeting the other side’s retaliatory force, you are able to use the ABM system to handle the few missiles that survive.

The ABM system does not do you much good as a defensive system. If a major power attacked first, they could easily overwhelm your ABM system. If a rouge state attacked first, they would be much more likely to use a sneak attack so that you might not know against whom to retaliate. Like put it on a third country freighter and sail into New York harbor. The idea that such a country would initiate a direct missile attack from their territory against a US or allied target is not credible. But if Bush wanted to preserve the ability to attack Iran, having an ABM system would potentially help a lot.

Putin is right about the placement. In Central Europe, we are threatening him. In the Caucasus, we could only use it again countries in the Middle East. I think it is clear to Putin that that is why Bush will not go along with his idea but it is good for Putin to call Bush on it.

I think Russia itself is the prize, and has been for 150 years. At 17 million square kilometers, it is almost 12% of the world's land area. If you count the breakaway Central Asian republics, it was much more than that.

Before the invention of the railroad, Russia was too vast to be an imperial prize worth conquering, even if your armies could march halfway around the world, how would you bring that wealth back home? Want to ride a horse from Venice to Mongolia? Takes a special kind of people to do that.

We here all know that the Persian Gulf wars are about oil and natural gas, as well as the strategic position of the lands in question.

I think it is a mistake to think that the US Government is securing those lovely fossil fuels for the benefit of its people. It wants them for the political leverage it gives them in Europe, Japan, and China.

If I were making a documentary, I would start with a cold war map of the USSR, including Eastern Europe. Lots of red countries, with a bunch of blue countries (the "free world"). Then I would show the map after the collapse of the USSR: Eastern Europe becomes pink, then pale blue, then bits of it become dark blue. Parts of Central Asia become pink, then pale blue. I suppose you would technicaly color Afghanistan and Iraq dark blue, but they seem to be getting paler all the time. Egypt was probably pink years back, but is a pale blue. Moving the Ukraine from red to pink to pale blue is an enormous victory for the blue team.

Instead of red forces in Eastern Europe pointing at the blue countries, you have blue forces there pointing back at Russia. All without a thermonuclear war.

The Great Game.

Now there are (or are going to be) anti-missile-missiles in Eastern Europe. This gives two chances to shoot down a Russian missile. Once there (best), once again as it reaches the US (not as good).

Shooting down a handful of missiles is truely a useful defense against a North Korea, who can only manage to fire a handful. It is only an inconvience to a massively armed Russia.

Shooting down a substantial fraction of the Russian missile force is a different matter. You can expect to take out a large fraction of the Russian missile force with a first strike. Your anti-missile defenses only need to take out a majority of the missiles that survive.

We move from Mutually Assured Destruction to a "winnable" first strike capability.

They probably think they can dominate Russia once both sides realize the situation.

I don't think so. But hey, I'm not in the White House either.

This is also why I am convinced we will invade Iran, suicidal as it seems. Without it on the blue side, the encirclement is incomplete, and the US does not have the energy resources to hold Europe and Japan.