May be going to Congress: “In retrospect, his question, Obama’s answer — and in particular the vicious and law-breaking politico-media smear campaign launched against him in response — perfectly prefigured the Obama Presidency.”
And based on the Ann Romney attacks last week, it seems likely to continue until November.
I was remiss in not posting much from the conference, but Clark Lindsey has some thoughts in the aftermath, with a lot of links. My impression? It wasn’t as exciting as last year, when Gwynne Shotwell came and not only gave a speech but answered questions. I think that both SpaceX and XCOR weren’t there in force this year (the latter for the first time, though ably represented by Mark Street) because they’re busy building hardware that will reduce the cost of access to space.
Some thoughts on overcharging defendants. The Zimmerman case looks a lot like that to me. I like the idea of banning prosecutors from running for political office for five years after their last prosecution. It would have kept a lot of lousy politicians out of office (a former governor of New York comes to mind) and reduce grandstanding.
The other economically ignorant Paul (Krugman) loses a bet. It’s useful to note that Paul Ehrlich’s partner in economic ignorance was John Holdren, the current president’s science advisor.
…as I said in the paper, any opinions expressed on this issue, whether Jim Dunstan’s, my own, or that of (for example) Tanja Masson-Zwaan, current president of the International Institute of Space Law, are simply that — opinions, and will remain nothing more than that until the matter is litigated and adjudicated.
We will agree to disagree until that happens.
[Update a few minutes later]
I did find this comment interesting:
Masson-Zwaan acknowledges that the current treaty is not perfect. “More rules are needed,” she said, “but I am also of the opinion that you do not need to create property rights.”
“More rules are needed.” We agree that the treaty is not “perfect” but I’m pretty sure that we’ll have a major disagreement on what we need to do to approach perfection.