Category Archives: Economics

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

Mark Whittington

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His latest nonsense:

The problem, from the perspective of commercial space supporters, is that Shank represents an institutional, NASA-centric viewpoint where it comes to space exploration. While at the space agency he supported the Bush-era Constellation program which was subsequently canceled by President Obama. In Congress, Shank helped support the Orion spacecraft and the heavy lift Space Launch System. Many commercial space advocates find these views abhorrent, believing that NASA should simply outsource its space exploration plans to the private sector, to companies like SpaceX and Blue Origin.

I don’t know any commercial space advocates who believe that. What we believe is that there is no need for NASA to be in the launch business.

Shank’s association with Mike Griffin has also raised some hackles. Griffin has been blamed, unfairly for the most part, for the troubles that beset Constellation before it was cancelled. In fact many of these problems, including the fact that the project was underfunded, occurred above his paygrade.

There is nothing unfair about blaming Mike Griffin for choosing a terrible rocket design that was certain to cost more than was allocated for it in the budget sandpile, in the belief that he could somehow talk Congress into increasing his budget.

Business, Economics, Health, Media Criticism, Political Commentary

ObamaCare RIP

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The Republicans have a plan:

While a full repeal would have to originate in Congress, Price’s nomination promises quick action to roll back regulatory changes that come from the blank-check authority given to HHS by the ACA. The controversial contraception mandate will almost certainly be at the top of that list. Price has opposed that from the moment Kathleen Sebelius issued the regulation, specifically citing its infringement “with our fundamental right to religious freedom.”

Twila Brase, president of the Citizens’ Council for Health Freedom, reminded the Examiner’s Robert King that Price can easily undo most of what Sebelius implemented while waiting for Congress to act. “There are tens of thousands of pages of Obamacare regulations that can be rescinded, amended or left unenforced on the way to repeal, and we encourage him to make every effort to begin shutting down Obamacare by shutting down its regulations.” Such are the vulnerabilities of regulatory legacies.

Democrats have been quick to counter with accusations that Trump and his new administration will leave low-income Americans without health coverage. Obamacare also expanded Medicaid, which most states have adopted, and which accounts for nearly half of the claimed 20 million consumers who gained insurance after its adoption. Repealing Obamacare, its advocates claim, will leave those Americans in the lurch.

Trump’s second appointment this week provides a clear answer to those accusations. Seema Verma will take over the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services after having worked with vice-president elect Mike Pence to craft Indiana’s Medicaid expansion, as well as with Kentucky’s Matt Bevin and a handful of other Republican governors. Verma helped create Healthy Indiana 2.0 plan (HIP), a program that mixes the base coverage of Medicaid with tax credits and HSAs to produce incentives making utilization more efficient and effective.

Live by the pen and the phone, die by the pen and the phone.

Business, Economics, Education, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Social Commentary

Millennials’ Political Views

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…don’t make any sense:

Young people support big government, unless it costs any more money. They’re for smaller government, unless budget cuts scratch a program they’ve heard of. They’d like Washington to fix everything, just so long as it doesn’t run anything.

Hardly surprising, considering that they were “educated” in a government-school system, and then went to colleges infested with mindless leftist professors. And I hate that the pollsters say they’re more “liberal” than older people. No, they’re more leftist.

Business, Economics, Space, Technology and Society

Orbital ATK

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This is interesting. The company is getting into the orbital assembly business:

Phase one of CIRAS began in September 2016 and will last a total of two years. During this period, Orbital ATK will lead the team in maturing technologies necessary for robotic assembly of large space structures, such as next-generation telescopes or solar-powered structures for transport or communications. These capabilities include methods to connect or disconnect joints on a structure and address precision measuring and alignment through a 15-meter robotic arm and a precision robot. The team will also develop the technology needed to conduct in-orbit modular assembly of structures, allowing parts to be brought to space as needed via multiple launches, which simplifies the design of spacecraft and reduces cost. [Emphasis mine]

They must realize that this increases the risk to SLS, and their SRB production. Have they decided that this new business focus is a better bet?

Business, Economics, Health, Law, Media Criticism, Political Commentary

Trump Chooses A Physician

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…to heal the health-care disaster the Democrats gave us:

While some Republicans have attacked the Affordable Care Act without proposing an alternative, Mr. Price has introduced bills offering a detailed, comprehensive replacement plan in every Congress since 2009, when Democrats started work on the legislation. Many of his ideas are included in the “Better Way” agenda issued several months ago by House Republicans.

In debate on the Affordable Care Act in 2009, Mr. Price railed against “a stifling and oppressive federal government,” a theme that pervades his politics. His most frequent objection to the law is that it interferes with the ability of patients and doctors to make medical decisions — a concern he will surely take with him if he wins Senate confirmation.

“The practicing physician and the patient could not have a better friend in that office than Tom Price,” said Representative Michael C. Burgess, Republican of Texas, who is also a physician.

That’s “Dr. Price,” to you, New York Times.

I’m sure that the Dems will fight tooth and nail to prevent his confirmation, but Harry Reid screwed them with his nuclear option. Sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander.

[Update a few minutes later]

Here’s how Trump’s HHS pick wants to replace Obamacare:

I wrote about the most recent version of Price’s plan in detail when it came out last year, but here’s how it would basically work.

It would repeal the text of Obamacare, and replace it with a system that would provide tax credits to individuals based on age. Though previous versions had varied the credits based on income, doing so by age is easier to administer (HHS won’t get into the problems it’s had with Obamacare in terms of verifying income for the purposes of the subsidies) and it also provides more money to those who have to pay more for insurance. In addition, there would be a one-time tax credit to put in a health savings account for routine medical expenses.

Unlike previous incarnations of GOP reform proposals, the plan only modestly meddles with the tax bias in favor of employer insurance, and also encourages small businesses to band together to purchase insurance through trade associations and allows for the sale of insurance across state lines. He also calls for providing grants to states to cover those with pre-existing conditions (one way Trump may square his promises to repeal Obamacare while offering something to those with such illnesses).

It’s got some problems, but it would be a huge improvement over the current Charlie Foxtrot. But then, almost anything would.

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Science And Society, Space, Technology and Society

Elon Musk And “Space Exploration”

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Here‘s kind of a typically dumb piece, which reeks of Apolloism:

I am a big fan of space exploration and I think that Elon Musk’s SpaceX is a visionary company that is trying to conduct meaningful space exploration. Yet, Congress might want to take a hard look at the ticket price for Musk’s latest endeavor before spending $10 billion to populate Mars.

First, SpaceX is not “trying to conduct meaningful space exploration.” It is trying to establish human settlements on Mars. And if it could really be done for as little as $10B, that would be an incredible bargain to the taxpayer, compared to (say) spending that same amount on SLS/Orion in the next three years, as NASA currently proposes.

I am a limited government conservative, yet I fully support government funded space travel. But it must be smart and it can’t fund risky adventures. The one concern I have about SpaceX’s plan to travel to Mars is that, on its face, the plan seems more like a for-profit enterprise than true space exploration. I would support pure exploration of Mars and a project that has a stated goal of forwarding humanity. Musk’s idea seems like he is more in it for profit than science.

#ProTip: “Limited-government conservatives” do not spurn profit. And even if making a profit on “science” was really a bad thing, settling Mars has nothing to do with “science.”

According to the Los Angeles Times, Musk has received about $4.9 billion already in government subsidies for his three companies. Now he comes to the federal government wanting more. And he has been the beneficiary of many contracts to put satellites into space that run in the billions.

#ProTip: Tesla and Solar City get subsidies. SpaceX gets contracts. One is nothing like the other two, other than federal dollars are involved.

This is a laudable idea and Elon Musk should be celebrated as one of the great innovators of our time, yet the taxpayers should not be funding for profit space exploration and may want to find another contractor who wants to go to space for purely scientific space exploration.

This is a perfect example of the mental confusion that occurs when (as many ignorantly did with Apollo) we conflate “exploration” with “science” with space development and settlement. Mr. Woodson needs to go read my recent screed.

[Update a couple minutes later]

As usual, the comments over there are idiotic, including a couple appearances of the ignorant “NASA’s Muslim outreach.”