Meme Scholar with Madness (PhD)

[EndtheMadnessNow]

Oct 25, 1944: U.S. Navy aircraft sank Zuikaku—the last surviving Japanese carrier that had participated in the attack on Pearl Harbor. With Zuikaku listing heavily to port just before rolling over and sinking, the crew salutes the Japanese naval ensign as it is lowered.


Battle of Leyte Gulf on 23–26 October 1944, was the largest naval battle of World War II and by some criteria the largest naval battle in history, with over 200,000 naval personnel involved. The Japanese lost 26 warships during the this Battle.


1944 Sea story: DETERMINED




Oct 25, 1975: The new 14-floor, 817-room Hale Koa Hotel (House of the Warrior in Hawaiian) opens on Waikiki Beach. It sits on the southeast corner of Fort DeRussy on the western end of Waikiki and is owned by the Department of Defense and all guests must carry military identification. NOT open to the public. My last two nights on the island were spent here.




October 25, 1983: Something happened...The US military and its Caribbean allies invade Grenada.




October 25, 2001: Windows XP is released to retail.


In the late 1990s, the Windows consumer and business/server teams were working on separate operating system projects. The business side was developing "Odyssey", the code name for the planned successor to Windows 2000. The consumer side was working on "Neptune", which was supposed to be released after Windows 98.

"Neptune" was being made to be the first consumer version of Windows that would be based on the NT family, and designed to finally ditch MS-DOS. One interesting thing about "Neptune" was that Microsoft had plans to put in a new user interface for the desktop with "Activity Centers"  with sections for Photos, Music, Communication and more.

However, the plans for "Neptune" and its new UI were put on hold as Microsoft decided to launch Windows Millennium (Windows ME) instead on the consumer side, which again also had MS-DOS.

In 2000, Microsoft announced that it was merging the "Neptune" and "Odyssey" teams and projects. Both would work together to create what was called " Whistler" (named after a favorite Microsoft ski resort town in Canada). Betas of "Whistler" would be released in 2000 and 2001. In February 2001 Microsoft gave the consumer version of "Whistler" the official name Windows XP (for "experience").


Former Secretary of the Navy John William Middendorf II who passed away yesterday at the age of 101. Serving as SECNAV under President Gerald Ford from 1974 to 1977, Middendorf increased the Navy's budget by 60 percent and advanced several major programs including the Ohio-class submarine, the Trident missile, the Aegis Combat System, and the F/A-18 Hornet. Middendorf arranged to have dubbed "Hornet", as a tribute to his Revolutionary War ancestor merchant-shipping Captain William Stone, who donated two ships to the fledgling Navy which were then renamed "Wasp" and "Hornet".

NY Times headline for the win...101 not 81!

J. William Middendorf II, 81, Dies; Navy Secretary and Musical Diplomat


October 25, 2025: Future USS Utah (SSN 801) Virginia-class Block IV nuclear attack submarine being christened in Groton, Connecticut.




Germany imploding...




R.I.P. June Lockhart, holder of a lifetime press pass to the White House has died at age 100.




Trump's Ballroom is coming along nicely...


Meanwhile, the USGOV remains closed. Rumors circulating saying rest of year.


Happy "A HOUSE OF DYNAMITE" Day!




A little bit of former director of the White House Military Office Bill Gulley's classic government tell-all BREAKING COVER (1980) found its way into A HOUSE OF DYNAMITE. Pictured is Jonah Hauer-King as the president's military aide.


Jonah Hauer-King on His ‘Frightening’ Role in ‘A House of Dynamite’ and Sharing Scenes With Idris Elba

USMC Lt Col. Buzz Patterson compared the contents of the Nuclear Football to a Dennys Diner menu in a 2005 Associated Press story. "It's kind of like picking one out of Column A and two out of Column B."


Pentagon upset over Doomsday movie...

(Bloomberg) -- The plot of A House of Dynamite, the new thriller from Academy Award winner Kathryn Bigelow, hinges on — spoiler alert —  US missile defenses failing to knock down a nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missile headed for Chicago.

The Pentagon agency responsible for the more than $50 billion system of ground-based interceptors in Alaska and California designed to avoid just such a scenario isn’t happy about it. The movie, starring Idris Elba and Rebecca Ferguson, had a limited theater release and is now streaming on Netflix.

A Missile Defense Agency internal memorandum argues that the doomsday scenario depicted in the movie is inaccurate. The Oct. 16 memo, a copy of which was obtained by Bloomberg News, is meant to make sure agency leadership “has situational awareness and is not ‘surprised’ by the topic, which may come up in conversations or meetings.”

The object of the Missile Defense Agency’s angst is depiction of US missile defense as ineffective, especially in light of the fact that President Donald Trump wants to spend tens of billions of dollars on missile defense, including with his bid for a “Golden Dome” defensive umbrella.

The document, labeled “Only For Internal MDA and Department of War use and is not public releasable,” is dated a day after almost every member of the Pentagon press corps, including Bloomberg News, vacated the building rather than agree to rules that could restrict news gathering of documents such as the MDA assessment.

It was prepared to “address false assumptions, provide correct facts and a better understanding” of the US’s currently deployed system, it said. While the film “highlights that deterrence can fail, which reinforces the need for an active homeland missile defense system,” its fictional portrayal also underestimates US capabilities, according to the memo.

“The fictional interceptors in the movie miss their target and we understand this is intended to be a compelling part of the drama intended for the entertainment of the audience,” but results from real-world testing “tell a vastly different story,” the Pentagon says in the memo.

As guidance for questions about the system’s cost, the memo avoids a dollar amount, saying “the cost is high but not nearly as high as the cost of allowing a nuclear missile to strike our nation.”

A Government Accountability Office report in 2020 said the Pentagon had spent about $53 billion on the ground-based system and planned to spend about $10 billion through this year to continue developing, producing and sustaining it. The system is managed by Boeing Co. and operated by personnel under the US Northern Command.

Pentagon Frets Over ‘A House of Dynamite’ Nuclear Doomsday Film