Thoughts from Bob Zimmerman on the latest overrun and schedule slip, and the shoddy reporting of it.
Category Archives: Economics
The JWST
It’s delayed again, and over budget. Again.
I would have canceled it years ago. It was a mistaken concept from the get go. For what we’ve spent on this program, we could have had orbital servicing capability, obviating the need for the origami, and even allowing servicing in situ.
Marx
He didn’t replace old ideas about commerce and money; he intensified them.
I assume that this is an excerpt or adaptation from Jonah’s new book.
[Update a few minutes later]
This seems related. From the brilliant Sarah Hoyt, who understands the Left as well as anyone: The Russians don’t understand America enough to successfully hack our election.
The Next Big Republican Spending Bill
…is packed with Leftist priorities.
Want to lose the House? This is how you lose the House.
Cabotage
Glenn Reynolds says let’s end it, for the dogs. It’s a law that should have ended many decades ago.
Books In The Mail
I’ve got review copies of Tim Fernholz’s
A Harbinger For Space Policy?
Trump apparently is impressed with commercial space.
The New Challenge To ObamaCare
Will John Roberts get a do-over?
…it is significant that both Ilya and Josh agree that the insurance “requirement” is now clearly unconstitutional under Chief Justice Roberts’ “saving construction” approach. If a court so holds, the entire statute would then be in the same posture as it would have been if he had sided with the dissenting justices in the first place. In that eventuality, four justices thought the whole law was inseverable, and the Obama administration conceded the mandate would be inseverable from at least two key provisions of the Act. So the key issue in the new litigation is likely to be whether the fact that Congress zeroed out the penalty somehow changed this analysis such that the mandate is now severable from the rest of the ACA when it was not before. I look forward to reading much more on this question.
This would be great, if this legislative atrocity can finally be struck down via this method, considering all of the legislative legerdemain and chicanery the Democrats had to use to pass it in the first place.
Stratolaunch
…wants to use Birdzilla to launch a reusable spaceplane.
Not sure what this means, though:
The Black Ice space plane — should it be built — would be about as big as the former space shuttle developed by NASA and capable of staying up for at least three days.
What does “as big” mean? Similar dimensions to a Shuttle orbiter? If it has to carry propellant, it won’t have much payload. I wonder what kind of GLOW that aircraft can handle?
[Update a few minutes later]
Here’s another story on the subject from Eric Berger. Haven’t looked at comments yet, but there may be some discussion of performance there.
America’s Steel Superiority
This reminds me of my piece on how the auto industry did the same thing to itself. Once it had done so, it was easy for foreigners to compete, with or without subsidies.