It’s really the end of the Shuttle program, Florida. You’ve had six years to prepare. Deal with it.
Category Archives: Political Commentary
Thoughts On Oklahoma City
And the vile demagoguery of the Democrats in the wake of it, from Glenn Reynolds:
Lies and smears aimed at their fellow Americans, for short-term political gain. This is who they are, and this is what they do. It worked better, however, when there were fewer alternative channels of communication, and when their character was less well-known.
And as he notes, they’re busy going after imaginary “right wing” “terrorists,” while pretending that the real ones, who really do want to destroy our civilization, don’t exist. And they are being ignored to the point that we can’t even describe their motivations. In fact, they were doing it then — the White House and Janet Reno’s justice department shut down any investigation that might have led to the revelation of offshore help for McVeigh. Once they had their white “right-wing” “Christian” (he was an agnostic) terrorist, no need to confuse the American people with John Doe Number Two. Besides, if (say) Iraq had been shown to be involved, they might have had to do something about it.
Are Libertarians Anti-Government?
Short answer: no. David Boaz has a longer one.
“We’ve Been There”
While in general I think that the new space policy is a vast improvement over the previous one, it is marred by the disdain that the administration displays toward the moon as a useful goal. Paul Spudis (who else) defends the moon against the foolish arguments opposed to it. There may be good reasons not to go back to the moon, but I haven’t heard any, and “we’ve been there” certainly isn’t one. I know for sure that that I haven’t been there.
Paul also asks, why wait for heavy lift?
This new document indicates that work will proceed on development of a heavy lift launch vehicle, with a decision on what vehicle to build coming in 2015 (note well: not building a vehicle, but making a decision on what vehicle to build). How will our decision on heavy lift be more informed in five years than it is now?
If there’s anyone who doesn’t speak for this administration, it’s me, but my answer is: if we start doing the necessary tech demos for autonomous docking/mating, propellant storage and transfer, we may be informed enough to finally convince everyone except the die-hard Apollo cargo cultists and giant penis enviasts that we don’t need a heavy lift vehicle, at least any larger than natural growth versions of what currently exists.
Who Needs Apartheid
Mark Steyn, on the ugly elephant in the “Palestinian” living room:
If Muslims are so revolted by Jews that they cannot tolerate any living among them, well, they’re free to believe what they want. What is less understandable is the present position of the United States government. The President and his Secretary of State have made it very clear that they regard a few dozen housing units in Jerusalem as a far greater threat to Middle East peace than the Iranian nuclear program. Why is it in the interest of the United States to validate, enthusiastically, the most explicit and crudest bigotry of the Palestinian “cause”?
It’s not bigotry if it’s directed at the Jews, of course.
IBD Weighs In On Space
Cluelessly, as with many:
Some would argue that in times of budget problems a robust space program is an unnecessary expense and that if we can’t cut there, where can we cut?
We aren’t cutting. The budget is increasing, and in particular it is increasing for things that we actually need to get beyond low earth orbit, which Mike Griffin’s NASA had eliminated funding for to pay for his expensive and unneeded new rocket.
“We’ve got to do it in a smart way,” Obama said, apparently preferring to pay the Russians $56 million a pop to send Americans to fix toilets on the International Space Station.
No, that’s not what he was referring to. That was the George Bush plan, in case you’ve been asleep for the past six years. It’s too late to fix that in the near term, but at least we now have hope of fixing it a lot sooner, for a lot less money, than Ares would have provided.
Why do all of these supposed free marketeers bash private enterprise when it comes to space?
[Update a couple minutes later]
Speaking of which, Falcon 9 is almost ready to launch.
Exposing The Racism Inherent At The Teaparties
How’s that working out for you, leftist morons?
Not so well, apparently.
Is Elena Kagan Gay?
The New Puritans
Jim Geraghty has some thoughts about organic milk:
I like living where I live, but I remarked to Mrs. Campaign Spot that the D.C. area can be a very “pious” place sometimes. Oh, it’s not the traditional definition of devotion to religion, but instead the need to showcase one’s loyalty to all the “right” causes and decisions and proper behavior. It seems that for some of these parents, sending organic milk to school with their kids is insufficient; they need everyone else to know they they only want organic milk for their kids, and that we really ought to be following the same dietary practices.
It’s not just DC, it’s any place with a high concentration of “progressives.” Ever wonder why Massachusetts is such a “blue” state? It goes all the way back to the people who founded it. They’ve merely swapped out their religion for a more secular piety. And sanctimony.
“A Smaller Tomorrow”
Robert Costa has a piece over at National Review Online, with the usual conventional “conservative” wisdom on the new space policy, complete with the Kennedy mythology. I may ask Kathryn (or Rich, who I guess is the editor there now) for space for a rebuttal.
[Update late afternoon]
The Corner has the transcript from the panel on Bret Baier’s show yesterday, with Krauthammer’s comments. It leads with the usual ridiculous hyperbole:
We are seeing the abolition of the manned space program.
That’s right, the extension of ISS, the development of a viable commercial human spaceflight industry, the development of needed technologies (neglected in the past administration) to affordably get beyond low earth orbit is the “abolition of the manned space program.” What is in the water that DC conservatives have been drinking?
And what it does is it ends our human dominance in space, which we had for 50 years. We have no way to get into earth orbit. We’re going to have to hitch a ride on the Russians who are charging us extraordinary rates and are only going to increase that.…
And that was the plan laid out by the Bush administration. But now that Obama is president, it’s terrible. As I told Rich Lowry and KLo via email, this is an important debate, and it has to be debated, but not in such a logic-free and fact-free environment. I’m very disappointed in Dr. K., who is usually quite perceptive on other issues.