Bullseye!

On a night where the Americas were treated to a lovely copper-colored lunar eclipse, the US military has once again demonstrated the awesome technology at their disposal for the protection of the free world.

A military satellite that had been placed in a faulty orbit by a launch rocket malfunction was due to come down with a full tank of poisonous hydrazine fuel has been successfully intecepted by a missile launched from the USS Lake Erie. Normally, the fuel in one of these surveillance satellites would be largely used up. But since this satellite never achieved a proper orbit, most of the 1000 pounds of fuel was still on board. The Pentagon was concerned that the US craft could come down over an inhabited area and spill it's toxic vapors in a massive unintentional WMD attack. This is not exactly the way to build goodwill overseas.

The US has been building a force to shoot down incoming missiles for years. With rogue nations like Iran and North Korea building atomic weapons, and the missiles systems to deliver them, it seemed prudent for several presidents to continue US efforts to develop a capacity that was known as "Star Wars missile defense" during the Reagan years. President Bush was presented with a way to not only take down a threat of our own making, but to see how well the system works...and whether we should continue to develop it more fully.

Understandably, Russia and China have been most vocal in protesting our development and demonstration of this system. Americans have seen the Russian and Chinese peoples as new friends and customers in the age of free trade, forgetting that these two governments continue to have missiles targeted at our cities and missile silos.

Is it possible that this will become a campaign issue in this election, in the context of the bigger picture of "aren't we just big bullies? No wonder nobody around the world likes us" providing an opportunity to draw distinctions between the two logical candidates this fall: McCain and Obama.

The important work will be for the mainstream media to be honest in its information provided to the electorate to consider in this important election. We can walk through dozens of scanners to prevent bombers from getting on our airplanes, but only the US military can stop an incoming missile from the next generation of Sungs, Husseins, and Achmadinejads.

Congratulations, US Navy...

Edit: You can watch a briefing and a low quality version of the event here.