Meme Scholar with Madness (PhD)

[EndtheMadnessNow]

June 29, 1958: Operation Hardtack I was a series of 35 nuclear tests from April 28 to August 18 in 1958 at the Pacific Proving Grounds. On this day the United States conducted the "Oak" thermonuclear bomb test on a barge in the lagoon at Enewetak Atoll. The massive 8.9 Megaton explosion, the sixth-largest US test, blasted a crater 5,740 feet (1749.5m) wide and 204 feet (62.1m) deep. This device evolved into the B53 bomb/W53 high-yield bunker buster warhead that was in service from 1962-1997.

This test was followed at 12 noon on same day with shot HICKORY detonation on a barge off the west end of Enema at Bikini. This one was a baby firecracker at only 14 kilotons of TNT.






First 2 paras read: "It has been determined as a matter of Federal policy ... that at least 70 million people would have to be evacuated from target areas in case of threatened or actual enemy attack. No urban area in the country today has highway facilities equal to this task.

But such highways are coming. We are at work now, building our 41,000-mile National System and Defense Highways."

During its construction, and for many years thereafter, the entire road network was officially referred to as the National System of Interstate and Defense Highways.



Fun Fact: the minimum clearance required by law for interstate highway overpasses was determined by the height of ICBM transport vehicles like this one, seen below, squeezing under an overpass in Benson, Arizona, en route to the Atlantic Missile Range, on December 1, 1956.



Atlas Takes Flight and Evens the SCORE

In this 2015 article: "One source attributed the 16-foot standard indirectly to "Atomic Annie," which most sources say had a height of 12.2 feet, although it could have been higher if it was in its towing configuration."

Here is a Federal Highway Administration website discussing without referencing ICBM transports specifically how the final vertical clearance standard was arrived at:

Right of Passage: The Controversy Over Vertical Clearance on the Interstate System

I'll tell you, when I was doing a lot of traveling & family summer vacations towing my 5th wheel RV I was EXTREMELY aware of bridge & overpass height!! Trucker paper maps were my best friend! Eventually, Garmin GPS had a software update to alert you of low bridge height, but I always double-checked my paper maps. I seen many air-conditioners (& other roofing debris) laying about the roadside beneath overpasses. Out west there are bridges/overpasses with height less than 12 feet and 12' 6" and my RV was 12' 8". White knuckle, heart stopping adventures going down the non-truck routes that'll ruin a vacation and drain your wallet in a heartbeat!



So, yesterday, Ron DeSantis joined a long line of Republicans who have called for abolishing the Dept. of Energy, apparently unaware of its primary purpose is manufacturing, maintaining, and dismantling the US nuclear stockpile, and cleaning up related radioactive wastes, not to mention the gatekeeper of all Q-clearance files.

Ron DeSantis says he would eliminate four federal agencies if elected president

In fact, 65.5% of DOE's 2023 budget goes toward the US nuclear stockpile, defense nuclear nonproliferation, naval nuclear reactors, defense environmental cleanup, and other defense activities. If you eliminate DOE, these programs don’t magically end.

Department of Energy FY 2024 Congressional Justification (835 page PDF)




Today's free Prime watch: WHITE SANDS (1992), starring Willem Dafoe, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, and Mickey Rourke as a rogue CIA operative.



But, the censor prime nazis strike again: As of April 13, 2022, Amazon Prime Video features a version with some unusual edits: (1) Strong swear words have been blanked out, even though strong violence and sexual content remain; (2) After the closing credits, there is a minute of empty black footage. Then the first couple of minutes of the movie replay, silent and without the opening credits imposed on the screen. This is followed by the final shot of the movie, likewise silent without the closing credits imposed on the screen.

However, I found a possible uncensored version on Tubi.



June 27, 1969: The NYPD raided the Stonewall Inn for serving liquor without a license. Frustrated at gay clubs being targeted; gays, lesbians, and transgender individuals, rioted for six nights.

An Amazing 1969 Account of the Stonewall Uprising

Flashback to 1969 with a modern gen remix:






Back across the pond in America, a behind the disclosure scenes look:





Anyone care to enlighten me on just what in hell is a dwimmercrafty honey badger?