Category Archives: Business

Business, Political Commentary, Space

Pearl Harbor, Apollo 17, and Dragon

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What do they all have in common? Well, as it turns out, not as much as I thought, or at least hoped, when I wrote this post at The Corner, because we now know that SpaceX won’t be flying tomorrow, due to a nozzle issue on the second stage. But the main points of it stand.

By the way, if they can change out a nozzle with only an additional two-day delay, that’s pretty remarkable. That kind of problem on the Shuttle could mean weeks. As I noted in comments over at Clark Lindsey’s, though, I wonder how many spares they have for upper-stage nozzles? If it were a first-stage nozzle, it would probably be no problem, because with nine engines, they have to really be cranking them out. But the single engine on the firstsecond stage, while using the same powerhead, has a different nozzle, because it has a higher expansion ratio for vacuum operations. But presumably, they have at least one in Florida, or if not, it’s a one-day trip from Hawthorne.

Business, Economics, Political Commentary, Science And Society

Turn Off The Lights In Cancun

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The global warming party is over:

Who now remembers Smoot-Hawley, Quemoy and Matsu, and the Teapot Dome? But these were once issues on which the survival of the known world rested. The only global-warming news of this week was the announcement that the House Select Committee on Global Warming would die with the 111th Congress. Mrs. Pelosi established the committee three years ago to beat the eardrums of one and all, a platform for endless argle-bargle about the causes and effects of climate change. The result was the proposed job-killing national energy tax, but with the Republican sweep, there’s no longer an appetite for killing jobs.

Rep. Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts, the chairman of the doomed committee, organized one final event this week, a splashy daylong exercise in gasbaggery starring the usual suspects assigned to drone on for most of the day about the coming global-warming disasters, the melting of the North Pole and the rising of the seas that would make Denver, Omaha and Kansas City seaside resorts. Wesley Clark was the only former presidential candidate to accept an invitation, and he was a no-show. The star witness of the afternoon session was Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an “environmental attorney” who talked about how “clean energy” is nicer than the other kind. Mr. Markey himself, as bored as everyone else, didn’t bother to return after lunch.

The members of the committee can now retire with their scrapbooks of clippings to recall the happy days of hearings about global warming (some of them before “global warming” became “climate change” and “liberals” became “progressives”), about how clean energy could replace smelly oil wells and provide Democrats with the means to enact sweeping climate-change legislation. Who could have foreseen that the only “sweeping” would be the sweeping out of so many Democrats?

Well, actually, absent massive voter fraud, it was pretty much inevitable.

[Afternoon update]

Some interesting climate-related Wikileaks, with a promise of more to come. I wonder how Assange feels about having exposed these corrupt con artists?

Business, Space

SpaceX Engine Test

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It was originally scheduled for 9 AM EST, but it’s been delayed. The clock at the webcast is currently at 54 minutes and counting.

[Update shortly after the test]

Well, the webcast was a little glitchy, but it looked like a successful firing and shutdown to me. Now on the launch on Tuesday. Which, coincidentally, in addition to being the 69th anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack, is the 38th anniversary of the launch of Apollo 17, the last mission to the moon.

Business, Economics, Political Commentary

Reality Isn’t Negotiable

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…but then, the so-called “reality-based community” has never been all that into reality.

[Update a few minutes later]

Raise your own taxes, Fareed, but leave ours alone.

The only reason I watch This Week on Sunday morning, particularly since Christiane Amanpour took over, is to see George Will, who doesn’t appear in any other venue, as far as I know. Well, we had a treat this past week, when instead of her panel (which is always too short anyway) she devoted most of the show to Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, who tell us that we’re not being taxed enough. Hey, wrote the feds as big a check as you want, guys, pour more of your own money down the rat hole, and get a receipt. But leave the rest of us out of it.