Category Archives: Political Commentary

Political Commentary, Space

Reading The Writing On The Wall?

13 Comments

Mike Griffin has kicked off a study to consider Shuttle extension for five years.

The problem, not mentioned by the article, is that this doesn’t close the gap, unless Ares is abandoned. Shuttle and Ares use the same launch infrastructure, and as long as Shuttle flies, pads and crawler cannot be modified for it. Nor does it allow us to permanently crew the station without Soyuz.

The only real solution (assuming that we want to pay the high costs of continuing Shuttle) is to put a capsule on something else (e.g., Atlas, or Falcon 9 if it ever flies), soon. Maybe Orion, maybe Dragon, maybe something else, but it looks like the Stick is on life support. In fact, as “anonymous.space” says over at Space Politics, it’s already dead. It’s just that Griffin and others have been doing CPR on the body to keep the coroner from getting to it.

What a fiasco.

Political Commentary

Buyers’ Remorse

21 Comments

Boy, you really have to think that the Dems would like to have a do-over. They will be wondering for years how they managed to screw up this election so royally. The answer is their identity politics, and arrogance. But that’s not the lesson they’ll take. Which is fine with me.

[Update a couple minutes later]

A good point over at The Corner. This won’t just help with women–it will help with men. Who would you rather look at for four years: Joe Biden, or Sarah Palin?

[Update a while later]

Not that they’ve been high, but watch Bob Barr’s poll numbers drop. McCain just brought a lot of libertarian Republican home, judging from what I read at Free Republic. Hell, I might even vote for him now.

[Update a little later]

A prediction. Sarah Palin, not Hillary Clinton, will be the first woman president. And the first black president will be a Republican as well (of course, I’ve always thought that the first black and women presidents would be Republicans).

Political Commentary

That Will Wrap Up Those Key AK Electoral Votes

26 Comments

We’ll see if Governor Palin can close the deal with the PUMAs (assuming that the rumor is true–she’s reportedly still in Alaska, with no way to get to Dayton by 11 AM–could be another head fake).

People will say that she’s not ready to be CinC. Well, she’s only running for Vice CinC. And she’s at least as ready (with actual executive experience) as the Democrats’ nominee.

[Update a while later]

It’s looking more certain now, but we won’t know for sure for another half hour or so. I wonder if she’ll take Senator McCain on a tour of ANWR?

Bob Beckel looked very depressed on Fox and Friends this morning. He knows how badly the Donkeys screwed up a free lunch this year, even if many others are in denial.

[Update a couple minutes later]

Carl Cameron is reporting that it’s official.

Political Commentary

Who Would You Rather Have?

8 Comments

Here is an interesting poll.

I’d have to go with Reagan (as long as it was the pre-Alzheimers version). Not that there’s much to choose from. Second place would probably be Ike.

But it’s hard to take presidents out of their historical milieu and have a good idea how they’d respond. For instance, what if we’d had a Reagan with a Newt-led Republican Congress? We’ll never know.

[Later afternoon update]

I just went and actually took the poll. Reagan first, Ike a distant second, with everyone else in the noise. I always get suspicious when large numbers of people agree with me. It’s so rare…

Political Commentary, Space

Too Late?

17 Comments

Wayne Hale explains why we should shut down the Shuttle.

Everything he says is true–much of the infrastructure and support contractors for the system are already gone. That’s why it will be very expensive to resurrect them to the degree necessary to fly past 2010. That doesn’t mean it’s impossible, but as I wrote in my PJM piece, we have to decide how much ISS is worth to us. And if we want to keep the option open, and as least costly as possible, we need to stop terminating those suppliers and destroying tooling immediately. It’s probably a prudent thing to do, until the next president can make a decision.

Political Commentary

They Never Learn

24 Comments

They really are setting up a replica of a Greek temple from which The One will give his speech tomorrow. I’ve heard the excuse that they’re just trying to make it like the White House (as though that’s a good excuse…one more time–you’re not president yet). But even if true, it doesn’t fly. Yes, the White House is of Palladian style, but it’s neoclassical, and only the porticos have columns. It looks more like the Parthenon (at least as far as one can tell from the grainy camera photo).

And you know who lives in Greek temples?

Gods.

It will be amusing to see what the McCain campaign does with this one.

[Update a few minutes later]

It’s already started. The Temple of Obama.

[Update a few minutes later]

Here’s another one, from Pethokoukis–Illinois Obama and the Temple of Gloom

[One more, late afternoon PDT]

The Temple of Obama.