Category Archives: Political Commentary

Political Commentary

The Audacity Of Arrogance

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The conventional wisdom is that this election is Senator Obama’s to lose. Andrew Malcolm explains why he probably will:

Several strategists of both parties sense that Americans want to vote for Obama, but something is holding them back. Or several somethings, as we suggested up top.

Maybe Obama’s flips — his outspoken opposition to denouncing the Rev. Jeremiah Wright until he did; his promise to take public campaign financing, since broken; his eagerness to debate McCain in town halls, now abandoned; his apparent unwillingness to see progress in the Iraq troop surge, which he opposed and predicted would worsen sectarian violence?

Is there a simmering concern over arrogance by the Ivy League lawyer and mere candidate who so blithely patted the French president on the back for a well-done news conference? Asked the other day if he ever doubted himself, Obama replied smartly, “Never!” And grinned broadly. Sounded more like a 20-year-old than someone about to turn 47 next week.

I don’t pay much attention to polls before the conventions, but the fact that it is so close in the summer, when Dems are usually far ahead, has to be very worrisome to the Obama campaign.

Philosophy, Political Commentary, Science And Society, Social Commentary

Science As A Religion

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And a fundamentalist one, at that:

When Salon interviewed me about my new book, “Saving Darwin,” I suggested that science doesn’t know everything, that there might be a reality beyond science, and that religion might be about God and not merely about the human quest for a nonexistent God. These remarks got me condemned to whatever hell Myers believes in.

Myers accused me of having “fantastic personal delusions” that could actually lead people astray. “I will have no truck with the perpetuation of fallacious illusions, whether honeyed or bitter,” Myers wrote, “and consider the Gibersons of this world to be corruptors of a better truth. That’s harsh, I know … but he is undermining the core of rationalism we ought to be building, and I find his beliefs pernicious.”

Myers’ confident condemnations put me in mind of that great American preacher, Jonathan Edwards, who waxed eloquent in his famous 1741 speech, “Sinners at the Hands of an Angry God,” about the miserable delusions that lead humans to reject the truth and spend eternity in hell. We still have preachers like Edwards today, of course; they can be found on the Trinity Broadcasting Network. But now we also have a new type of preacher, the Rev. PZ Myers.

And they don’t even recognize it in themselves. Dawkins and Myers and Hitchens are doing more harm than good for science in their evangelizing, I think.

Political Commentary, Space

We Knew This Was Coming

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John Glenn is arguing for an extension of the Shuttle program. I don’t really give a rip what he thinks, but a lot of people on the Hill (particularly on the Democrat side) will take him seriously. The problem is that it’s not just a matter of coming up with more money. NASA has to do pad modifications at 39 A and B to accommodate the new vehicles, and they can’t do that if they continue to fly Shuttle. I suspect that it will also start to get pretty crowded in the VAB if they’re doing Ares and Shuttle simultaneously.

Sometimes, I think that the best thing that could happen to American space policy would be a Cat 5 hurricane hitting the Cape, and scraping it clean.

[Update a few minutes later]

Here’s more from Robert Block at the Orlando Sentinel. Note the comment about there being no appetite on the Hill for a Shuttle extension.

[Update a few more minutes later]

Mark Whittington once again demonstrates his legendary prowess at reading miscomprehension. I agree with Jon (though I’m not going to vote for Bob Barr). As I said, probably the most effective (and perhaps necessary) step toward a revitalization of NASA would be a Cat 5 at the Cape. I don’t think that anything less can shake the space industrial complex up sufficiently to get any kind of new thinking or direction.

Political Commentary, Space

Swashbucklers In Space

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Alan Boyle has another report from Oshkosh (some people get the best gigs).

Griffin downplayed media reports about vibration problems with the Ares 1 rocket, saying that there were “half a dozen means to mitigate that” and that two top strategies would be selected for further study next month. “Let me put it this way: I hope this is the worst problem we have in developing a new system,” he said.

Of course he did. That doesn’t mean they aren’t true. I haven’t seen any ways to mitigate it that don’t involve a lot more weight and performance penalty on a vehicle that’s already out of margins. I too hope that it’s the worst problem they have, because if they have any that are worse, the program is in deep, deep kimchi.

Political Commentary, Space, Space Science

Overhype?

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Is this really as big a deal as NASA is making of it?

Data from recent missions to Mars has been building toward a confirmation of the presence of water ice. However, “this would be the first time we held it in our hands, so to speak,” says Bryan DeBates, a senior aerospace education specialist at the Space Foundation. Evidence from other locations in the solar system, including Earth’s moon, Saturn’s Enceladus moon and Jupiter’s Europa moon, have strongly hinted at the presence of water–NASA confirmed a liquid lake on Saturn’s Titan moon on Wednesday–but no direct observation of water has been made.

Haven’t we been pretty certain for years that there was ice on Mars (and outer planet moons, and comets)? What’s the big deal here? If there’s a story at all, it seems to me that it’s about the amount of water available, not the fact that we have “direct confirmation.”

Humor, Political Commentary, Popular Culture, Satire

Speaking Of General Zod

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At least one will be saved from the coming carbon apocalypse:

Al Gore–or, as he is known in his own language, Gore-Al–placed his son, Kal-Al, gently in the one-passenger rocket ship, his brow furrowed by the great weight he carried in preserving the sole survivor of humanity’s hubristic folly.

“There is nothing left now but to ensure that my infant son does not meet the same fate as the rest of my doomed race,” Gore said. “I will send him to a new planet, where he will, I hope, be raised by simple but kindly country folk and grow up to be a hero and protector to his adopted home.”

Hope the poles aren’t so warm there that he can’t build an arctic fortress of pomposity.

Humor, Political Commentary

The People Of Berlin

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…have spoken.

I particularly liked the Che comparison, and the hope that the messiah will make Americans less “superficial.”

[Update a few minutes later]

Is Obama channelling General Zod?

I am General Zod! Listen to me, people of the Earth! Today I bring a New Order to your planet! One which shall last until the end of time!

Each of you… each man, each woman, each child – all will march proudly together in this New Order! Your lands, your homes, your possessions, your very lives… All of this and more you will gladly give to me!

There is no longer a need for separate nations in this world, no need for petty squabbles between one group and another. All of you will work together, strive, produce, and sacrifice together – and all for a common goal!

Michelle and Barack will make the humans of planet Earth work, and shed their cynicism.

Actually, Michelle can have my cynicism when she pries it from my cold, dead cynical typing fingers.

Political Commentary, Space

Potemkin Rocket Test

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More on the “flight test” of Ares 1-X, which seems to be mostly for show. Though if it’s as risky as indicated here, it may be a more spectacular performance than they count on.

Unfortunately, the same folks who think a flight dynamics test of a four segment SRB with a different propellant, old-style grain design, and inert (that is to say, non-sloshing and stiff) upper pieces is a good idea also thought they could grab a bunch of used equipment (Atlas avionics software, Peacekeeper hardware, etc.), chewing gum, and duct tape (perhaps FEMA is helping the minions) and use it to demonstrate how something “like” ARES-1X might get off the ground after “the gap” has widened to its furthest extent.

And, like all of the shortcuts the Emperor’s minions have taken to date, this approach, too, is soon to come back and bite them. The list of critical components going into ARES-1X that are either beyond shelf life or being put to work in an environment for which they were not intended is astounding. And the risks that are being accepted, because of schedule and budget pressures, are equally marvelous.

Hey, it’s OK. That’s what waivers are for.