Galileo and GPS: Euros win Ryder Cup again!

I am irked, perturbed, riled up, down and sideways. The Euros have grabbed the edge again. The European Union launched the Galileo satellite today from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Galileo, for the untutored, will surpass our Global Positioning System (GPS) by nailing object positions down to 3 feet. The GPS standard is 16 feet. Here’s the rub.

My wheel house for short putts is three feet. I don’t mind them at all. Sixteen feet, however, is another ball of Baikonur. Can you imagine all those Europeans laughing their arses off when our US boys are hitting perfect shots … to sixteen feet, while the old-country chaps, monsieurs, and bandidos have virtual tap-ins from one pace?

You may have read, or heard, that the public will not have access to Galileo receivers until 2008. Don’t believe for a second, though, that the European Ryder Cup team is considered public. They’ll have those receivers in 2006, and we’ll be stuck with stinking GPS. Oh, the humanity!