Antonin Scalia Making Americans Less Tolerant Article By Jeffrey Toobin

Jeffrey Toobin starts off his article in the New Yorker with:

"Antonin Scalia, who died this month, after nearly three decades on the Supreme Court, devoted his professional life to making the United States a less fair, less tolerant, and less admirable democracy. Fortunately, he mostly failed."

Toobin goes on to say:

"His revulsion toward homosexuality, a touchstone of his world view, appeared straight out of his sheltered, nineteen-forties boyhood. When, in 2003, the Court ruled that gay people could no longer be thrown in prison for having consensual sex, Scalia dissented, and wrote, “Today’s opinion is the product of a Court, which is the product of a law-profession culture, that has largely signed on to the so-called homosexual agenda, by which I mean the agenda promoted by some homosexual activists directed at eliminating the moral opprobrium that has traditionally attached to homosexual conduct.” He went on, “Many Americans do not want persons who openly engage in homosexual conduct as partners in their business, as scoutmasters for their children, as teachers in their children’s schools, or as boarders in their home. They view this as protecting themselves and their families from a life style that they believe to be immoral and destructive.”

We need an open minded justice to take Scalia's spot on the court....

Manufacturing--> Burn Your Clip-Boards

Burn the clip-boards and start capturing real-time OEE in 2016.  View this email in your browser Haven't burned your clip-boards yet? Better read this How the lack of real-time data cost 2,080 hours/year Email Sales Consider this example: What if this seemingly random event occurs twice on each shift in a 3 shift 24 hour operation, and its total duration is 150 seconds across 32 of 40 machines in the plant each shift.  That plant loses 8 hours of production, 40 hours per week, for a total of 2,080 hours per year. Tom Goike, MEMEX's Director of Manufacturing Excellence, encountered this situation while trying to improve productivity in a company that introduced the use of Day by Hour charts for manual data collection. Break and lunch were considered planned downtime with no operator input required.  During a Kazien event the plant management team noted that the operators left their work stations approximately 2 to 3 minutes before lunch and break. Through interviewing and reviewing the causes they found the company didn’t provide enough microwaves for employees to heat their lunches, and felt the need to get a head start to access the scarce appliances. If real-time data collection with the MERLIN communications platform were in place, a supervisor would have been able to review data hourly or daily and unfiltered by those who input the data into clipboard and spreadsheets. The supervisor would have instantly detected the underutilization of plant equipment just ahead of lunch breaks, uncovered the issue, and addressed the loss with the purchase of a few low-cost appliances.  With subjectively collected manual data, a few minutes lost due to something seemingly random and obscure most likely will not make the clipboard. With real-time data collection, machine utilization is collected automatically and processed into readable and actionable reports instantly available on the device of choice to those who can make a difference. Real-time data collection delivers truly objective data, allowing all employees the opportunity to stop loss before it becomes unrecoverable. As a manager, imagine being able to know minute by minute or hour by hour if you will meet your daily requirements. And not just know that, but have the ability to change the course of the day based on real-time, accurate, actionable data. IIoT software that employs the MTConnect manufacturing communications standard capture data as it occurs from each machine and operator and provides an accurate picture of the health of any given process. If the software is called MERLIN it also offers the ability to connect machines and related assets of any make or origin and report on Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE). Then, lean becomes a culture of accuracy and accountability based on real time data. Ready to burn those clip-boards yet?  Email Sales IIoT News MEMEX CNC memory and DNC free trial MEMEX's roots are in CNC memory upgrades for a wide range of controller makes and models, plus proven DNC software for easy and reliable machine communication and file management. Click here for free DNC software trial.  Why Cisco and Mazak back MERLIN David McPhail, the CEO of Burlington, Ont.-based MEMEX Inc., loves showing off a new white paper from Mazak, the Japan-based machine-tool giant. Even though its title, “Complete Digital Factory Integration and the IIOT” (Industrial Internet of Things) suggests most people will find it less than a thrilling reading. But McPhail cares mostly about the cover, and its three company logos. The stylized word mark of Mazak, with 7,800 employees and 10 factories worldwide, appears on the left side; on the right, inspired by the Golden Gate Bridge, sits the logo of Cisco, the San Francisco networking giant with 72,000 employees; and tucked proudly between the two is the logo of MEMEX.  This kind of exposure doesn’t happen by accident. The eight-page brochure promoting a new “Smart Box” that enables digital connectivity between manufacturing tools represents eight years of work by McPhail and his team. Click here to learn more.  MERLIN IIoT for Homeyer  NTMA's Chairman of the Board and American manufacturing leader Herb Homeyer introduced IIoT software to his factory in 2016 with MERLIN Enterprise Edition from MEMEX.  “The Industrial Internet of Things, or IIoT, is a powerful trend, and MERLIN makes IIoT real by equipping industrial machines with the necessary interfaces for connecting, collecting, and analyzing manufacturing data in real-time,” said Homeyer. "One of the things that most impressed us is how no machine is left behind regardless of make or vintage, and MERLIN’s ability to implement quickly on our factory floor without costly integration services or associated time-lags. With this real-time visibility, we look forward to a significant boost in Overall Equipment Effectiveness, or OEE.” Click here to learn more.  Our core belief is that successful IIoT technology adoption drives data-driven manufacturing efficiency, and we want to hear from customers like you. Follow us on Twitter at @MemexInc and let us know what you think about our products and support. Your feedback makes us better. Thanks, —David McPhail, CEO, MEMEX Inc.  Copyright © 2016 MEMEX Inc., All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you have indicated an interest in MEMEX manufacturing productivity products. Our mailing address is: Memex 105-3425 Harvester Rd Burlington, ON L7N 3N1 Canada

We Have Seen This Movie Before: Apple Is Correct and US Government Is Wrong On Back Doors

I was surprised to read that Michael Hayden, former NSA and CIA Chief, and I actually agree on one thing - no back doors in technology.  Note, we disagree on waterboarding and mass surveillance of American's phone records (he is for both and I am against both).

When Hayden said in an article in 9to5Mac by Ben Lovejoy titled:

Former NSA and CIA chief says Apple is right on the bigger issue of encryption back door

"Hayden said that while he would have loved a back door into encrypted devices while he was running the NSA, the problem – as I argued – is that others would inevitably gain access to it.

“When you step back and look at the whole question of American security and safety writ large, we are a safer, more secure nation without back doors,” he says. With them, “a lot of other people would take advantage of it.”"

We have seen this movie before with the Clipper chip.  For those who do not remember - below is from wikipedia:

"The Clipper chip was a chipset that was developed and promoted by the United States National Security Agency^[1] (NSA) as an encryption device, with a built-in backdoor, intended to be adopted by telecommunications companies for voice transmission. It was announced in 1993 and by 1996 was entirely defunct."

The image below is also from the same wikipedia article on the Clipper chip.  Where the text along with this image stated:

"RSA Security campaigned against the Clipper chip backdoor in the so-called Crypto Wars, with this poster being the most well-remember icon of that debate."