Branson isn’t going to pour any more of his own money into that hole in the sky he started almost two decades ago.
To be fair, though, most of the money that went into it was other (foolish) peoples’. It never made any business sense given how much they were putting into it.
GAO says that Artemis is not going to happen on schedule.
Iowa is going to can overpaid (any pay would be too much) DEI deans.
I rarely eat fast food except when traveling. And I never have it delivered. I think that a lot of people who are paying other people to cook for them and deliver the food can’t really afford it.
Eric Berger judges it a huge success.
I’m sure they learned a hell of a lot from it, which is the purpose of a test flight. The only failed test is one from which you learn nothing.
Per some of the stupid comments, the notion that Elon is a white supremacist is lunacy, but there is a lot of lunacy in the world these days.
[Update a while later]
More thoughts from Eric, a couple hours after the first column: ” I no longer have any regrets about missing Apollo. I am thrilled to be alive at this very moment in human history.”
I would trade having missed Apollo to be twenty years younger, but it’s not an option. Fortunately, I’ve also almost made it to the the point at which I may be able to live a lot longer, and see a lot more happen.
Not in just Italy, but the Dutch are fighting back against the climate/globalist lunacy.
[Update a few minutes later]
Can Europe become western again?
Let’s have some actual “Truthsgiving” to celebrate the holiday.
Conquest without morality was the rule of all peoples and nations until a couple of hundred years ago. Only in the very recent past has morality become a major consideration in warfare.
And the people most responsible for adding moral considerations to the law of conquest were…Europeans.
People pushing the Victim Narrative pretend that their ancestors were morally superior to their conquerors. In fact, they were not. Their ancestors conquered everyone they could conquer. The Commanche Empire conquered other Indian tribes, which is why Indian tribes allied with American government to fight the Commanches.
If Indians had advanced shipbuilding, navigation, and steel-working, they would have conquered Europe.
Native Americans’ ancestors did not refuse to do this because they were more moral. They didn’t do it because they simply couldn’t do it. They were not superior in morality; they were simply inferior in technology.
And all of this endless bullshit whining about generations-old conquests is just a nasty cope.
You’ve heard of “Victor’s Justice,” in which the winner of a war can vindictively set the terms for peace…? Well we live now in an age of Loser’s Justice, when the losers of the war can, somehow, endlessly torment the great-great-great-granchildren of the winners of their ancestors having won in war.
And we’re sick of it, and we’re done with it. We never point this out, because we don’t want to upset people who are clearly insecure about their ancestors’ failures. Who wants to pick on the fat kid?
We need to decolonize academia, big business, and Hollywood, of leftist insanity.
[Friday-morning update]
Revamp education to end the cultural rot.
[Afternoon update]
A brief history of settler/colonialism. TL;DR: Everyone did it.
We’re driving to Colorado for Thanksgiving, so not much posting before Wednesday. Meanwhile, if you have a subscription, I’m quoted in the Sunday edition of the Times of London. The subject is the race between Jeff’s tortoise and Elon’s hare.
[Update a while later, before hitting the road]
This is the quote from me: “‘It appears Bezos is finally getting serious,’ said Rand Simberg, a space industry consultant. ‘To this point, Blue Origin has looked more like a hobby. Jeff saw himself as the turtle to Elon’s hare — never realising that Elon was really the Duracell Bunny.'”
I actually said “Energizer,” but whatev.
[Saturday-morning update]
From my X feed:
Successes today: 1) Successful hot-stage separation 2) Got second stage close to planned suborbital trajectory 3) (And really important for next flight) water-deluge system seems to have protected the pad, so nothing preventing next attempt except fixing whatever caused failures
OK, a fourth success today: There seemed to be no engine failures on either stage right up until both were lost, so they’ve gotten over that hump, especially with the 33 Raptors on the booster. Huge success in terms of data gathered for further improvements in hardware/ops.
Question: Why would an FTS be triggered at that altitude/range? What’s the hazard to the ground? This is in fact the first I’d heard that the second stage even had an FTS.4551
Maybe because it was designed to enter intact, and they were concerned it would be an uncontrolled entry and hit someone downrange. I sure hope they’ll take that FTS off for operational flights with valuable cargo (including humans). Aircraft don’t have one.
Bob Zimmerman isn’t happy with it.
Is it a bigger threat than the ones it’s supposed to prevent?
They don’t mention space, but I think that safetyism lies at the heart of Kelly’s and Zach’s concerns.