The Rise And Fall Of The Berlin Wall

On the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall the event is being marked everywhere it seems. It was a watershed moment which was overdue. The first signs of the wall were seen on August 15th, 1961. It was at first a simple barbed wire fence that was erected on the orders of Soviet General Secretary Nikita Kruschev as a response to the increasing number of East Germans who were fleeing to West Germany and causing embarrassment to the Soviets internationally. During the construction anything that was in the path of the wall was removed including houses, A church, and a cemetery. Over the years the wall grew to become a double wall actually. It was two parallel walls that ran side by side with a "no mans land" or "Death Zone" in between them. The final length of the wall was 155 kilometers which is about 100 miles. The space in between the two walls was fitted with all kinds of traps designed to prevent anyone from successfully making it across. The ground was fitted with spike strips that would pierce a persons feet or shoes if he walked or ran on them. This area was nicknamed "Stalin's Lawn." The dirt in the "Death Zone" was constantly raked and kept soft in order that a person's footprints would be left behind if anyone had been there. The Wall itself had alarm systems that would quickly alert the armed guards in their watchtowers of anyone trying to get across. There were 186 total watchtowers that had 6 guards each posted. The guards had orders to shoot to kill. There were even barriers to prevent motor vehicles from getting through. At certain points the zone was guarded by dogs and minefields that were triggered by trip wires that would also in certain sections set off auto-fire devices or "spring guns" that would shoot out shrapnel in all directions. The wall itself had doors every so many feet that the guards used to inspect the wall both from the inside and outside for maintenance purposes. These doors each had two separate locks that required two separate keys from two different guards in order to open them. It is estimated that several hundred individuals lost their lives between 1961 and 1989 trying to breech the wall. Over 10,000 were caught and prosecuted by the East Germans for attempting to flee. The wall was finally taken down by a protest that grew out of control on November 9th, 1989. Protesters began hacking at the wall with sledge hammers and picks and knocking pieces of the wall off. Almost immediately President Ronald Reagan was given the bulk of the credit for causing this to happen. He gave a somewhat famous speech in 1987 in which he urged then Soviet General Secretary Mikail Gorbachev to "...Tear Down This Wall." While he is rightly deserving of some of the credit he is not however deserving of all of it. More credit in fact belongs to Gorbachev who deliberately did nothing to squelch the rising protest which led to the collapse of the wall. He could have easily stopped it but chose not to. The end of the Berlin Wall opened up the possibility for East Germany and West Germany to be united again as one country. That is exactly what happened almost one year later on October 3rd, 1990.

Winningest Teams In Sports History

In sports it is as Vince Lombardi once said: "Winning isn't everything, it's the only thing." With the Yankees winning their latest title the other day it got me to wondering just who are the most successful teams in the history of their own sports. As it turns out the list contains the teams that you would figure it would contain. As far as baseball goes The Yankees are by far at the top of the list. With their win against the Phillies they captured their 27th title in the history of the team on November 4th, 2009. They are now officially 27 for 40 in terms of the number of World Series wins relative to the total number of Appearances in the fall classic. They have won the most by far but they have lost the most by far as well with 13 total World Series defeats. An interesting thing to note here is that by the time The Yankees won their first World Series in 1923 The Boston Red Sox had already won 5 including the first one in 1903.
In Hockey for the most part The Montreal Canadiens have been to their sport what the Yankees are to baseball but not so much lately. The Canadiens have won a total of 24 titles in 34 appearances between the years of 1916 to 1993. They have won nothing since.
Basketball has what turns out to be the most competitive rivalry going in sports. It is between the Boston Celtics and the L.A. Lakers respectively. The Celtics have won a total of 17 NBA titles in 20 appearances in the finals over the years. The Lakers, with their win last year raised their total to 15 titles in 28 appearances. With both teams still being very competitive this one is still going strong so stay tuned.
As far as Football goes it's a little complicated. If you go by the total number of Super Bowl wins then it would be The Pittsburgh Steelers with 6 including the one they won this year. If you go by the total number of NFL titles including before the Super Bowl existed then it would be The Green Bay Packers with 12 total titles. They have won 9 NFL titles and 3 Super Bowls. They have however only won once since 1967.

USAF Eyes Pilot less Planes For Future Dogfights

The U. S. Air Force fighter pilot might be going the way of the dinosaur in the near future due to the technological advancements that keep coming along. It has been obvious for a long time now that technology can in fact fly a jet fighter in a superior way to a human and do it without the hindrances and drawbacks that humans bring to any endeavour they embark upon. Probably the biggest and most limiting drawback has been that fighter pilots are not capable of tolerating the massive G - forces (Gravity forces) that are experienced while flying high performance fighter planes and this causes them to lose control of an aircraft and often leads to crashes. Human fighter pilots can usually tolerate about 5 G' s or so depending on the individual provided that they are wearing a G- Suit which is an outfit that is worn over their uniform that is designed to keep them from passing out and losing control of an aircraft in mid flight due to excessive exposure to G - forces. Sometimes G-forces during flight can exceed 9 G's. Without human pilots the jet fighters will be able to fly much faster and maneuver much more sharply in potential future dog fights with any enemy. The Pentagon is therefore looking to get the pilots out of the picture totally and replace them with computers that will not be susceptible to this issue. They are called U.A.V.'s (Unmanned Areal Vehicles) and they are the future of the Air Force. By using technologies like Satellite links and G.P.S. (Global Positioning Systems) unmanned aircraft will be able to fly anywhere in the world without the involvement of humans in the process. They will also be able to identify enemy targets and launch attacks without any people being directly involved as well. It may become total Robo-warfare. Probably the best known of these systems already exists and is in service. It is called Global Hawk. It is a pilot less aircraft, It does not even have windows on the front of the plane, it has a wingspan of about 120 feet, and flies totally on its own. Once all the data is entered into its on board computer systems it is sent off on its way to complete a mission it has been assigned. It is currently serving in parts of Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The airline industry in the civilian sector has had this technology available to it for a while now. It is in fact capable of replacing airline pilots with this kind of system. Planes can now be flown without pilots by using their auto pilot features. They could fire all of their human pilots and replace them with this technology. They have not done so because the general public has expressed a fear and a discomfort with the idea of flying in pilot less planes. The ability however is there to do it and safely too.

Most Stressful Cities In The U.S.A.

Everyone knows that modern life involves exposure to tons and tons of stress every day and from every direction it seems. Depending on where you live you may be suffering through more of it than you need to. A list has just appeared of the 10 most stressful cities in the United States to live in. The list was compiled by Forbes magazine and it considered such things as unemployment rates, loss of property values, population density, air quality, and even the price of gas. Here they are from one to ten:

1. Chicago

2. New York

3. Detroit

4. Los Angeles

5. San Francisco

6. San Diego

7. Cleveland

8. Salt Lake City

9. Providence, R.I.

10. Philadelphia

Sudan Woman On Trial For Wearing Pants

If you think the U.S. is getting more and more uptight and individual liberties are under attack more than ever you should get a load of what goes on in places like The Sudan In Africa. A 27 year old woman was arrested last July and charged with public indecency for wearing pants in a club. Her name is Ludna Hussein and when she was arrested she was charged with violating article 152 of the Sudanese criminal code of 1991 which says that no woman is allowed to wear "...clothing causing harassment to public sentiment..." for which the maximum penalty is 40 lashes and the loss of her reputation. The Sudan is a predominantly Muslim country and it is possible there for any man to simply accuse any woman in public of violating public decency standards by doing something like just wearing pants, or having her wrists exposed or her head exposed. Women wearing pants is very frowned upon there evidently and is punishable by law. During her trial her lawyers were not allowed to present any evidence or fight the case and the judge favored with the police in the matter and convicted her. He had the decency however to spare her from the 40 lashes at least. Hussein has filed an appeal in the case. As a reaction to the trial there has begun the first signs of something of a women's movement in Sudan to get this law overturned and declared unconstitutional.

Beatles Set To Become Biggest Selling Band Of Last Ten Years

Well we all knew that The Beatles were huge but who ever expected that they would still be the biggest selling band around even 40 years after they broke up. They are set up to do just that. Since the year 2000 only one act (Eminem) has sold more music than the Fab Four and most music industry people predict that by this Christmas they will over take him. As of early September Eminem has sold about 32 million CD's since the turn of the century and the Beatles are close behind at about 28.2 million. On September 9th the Beatles record label EMI released brand new remastered versions of 14 of the bands best albums which is expected to increase sales and spark new interest in the band. On top of that you had on the same day the release of the "Beatles: Rock Band" interactive video game. With the game you can pick your favorite instrument and rock on with the Fabs to 45 of their best songs spanning the length of their entire career. Most music experts figure that by the end of the year they will be the biggest selling band of the last ten years. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

"Tonight Show" Ratings Falling Post Leno

There was a time when "The Tonight Show" and its ratings were number one in late night but not so much anymore. Since Conan O'Brien took over the late night hosting gig on the show at the end of May it has lost almost 2 million viewers. This of course is great news for David letterman who has been out stripping "The Tonight Show" in the ratings for a while now. As of the week ending on September 4th "Late Night" has garnered a larger audience for the 9th week in a row. It averaged 3.42 million viewers that week compared to the 2.89 That "The Tonight Show" got. While Conan O'Brien has managed to increase the number of younger viewers who watch the show (ratings are up about 26% among 18-24 year old's) the overall number of viewers keeps dropping. The biggest winner in all this may be ABC's "Nightline" which manages to acquire a larger audience than both "The Tonight Show" and "Latenight" on a regular basis and has moved into the number one spot. Some viewers have expressed that they find Conan O'Brien a little too high strung and his comedy a little too low brow as compared to Jay Leno.