Larry Kudlow apparently interviewed Fred Thompson today for his CNBC show. I didn’t see it, but he has provided what he thinks is a summary of the results.

If it is an accurate assessment of his positions, there is absolutely nothing on which I disagree with him related there. Which is pretty amazing to me, because that’s unusual, if not a first, for a major party politician with me.

I think that Megan McArdle (and Tyler Cowen) has a good explanation for one of the reasons that space policy, and NASA is such a mess. It has too much money:

In an altogether excellent piece on medical innovation, Tyler Cowen notes:

The NIH works as well as it does because the money is mostly protected from Congress. It is not a success which can easily be replicated. The more money is at stake, the more Congress wants to influence allocation. We should guard this feature of the system jealously and try to learn from it. If we can.

This is a seriously, seriously underrated factor in public policy analysis, and I include the libertarian variety. The fact that you can do something awesome with $15 million does not mean that you could do something super-awesome with $150 million. It may simply not be possible to broaden what you are doing very much before countervailing forces–such as congressional interference (Exhibit A: the goddamn Acela)–kick in.

This is a fundamental problem of bureaucracies, and one that won’t be fixed with regard to space until private activities are much larger than government ones. Or actual space accomplishments become politically important. They certainly aren’t currently, and haven’t been since the sixties.

[Update a few minutes later]

Speaking of Megan, she’s spending some time in Hanoi, and has a lot of interesting posts about Vietnam. Check out this one, on the state of the economy and human productivity:

The sight of people carrying goods in traditional ways, selling produce off the backs of bicycles, looks terribly romantic. I walked past two tourists today who were agreeably chatting about how beautiful and sustainable it all is. But it’s hard to find anything romantic about human beings using themselves as mules.

As one commenter notes, wealth doesn’t just happen on its own (or rather, it does if not prevented by poor governance), and unfortunately, collectivist economic theories tend to destroy, rather than create it.

This is depressing.

So, Kathleen Willey writes a book about how she was attacked by the Clinton machine when she was forced to testify about his sexual predatory behavior. I put up a post about it, with (what I thought was) a link to an interview of her.

A commenter (anonymous, other than a first name) shows up and implies that she’s lying about her book manuscript being stolen (i.e., slandering her and besmirching her character). I challenged the commenter to go actually follow the link, and read the interview. (S)he said that (s)he had done both.

Funny thing, though. It turns out that when I initially put up the post, I pasted in the wrong link, linking to this instead, a piece by Stuart Taylor on the academic rot of political correctness.

In other words, the commenter lied–if (s)he had actually followed the link and read it, as (s)he claimed, (s)he would have complained about it not being the Willey interview, as Tom (who was apparently the first person to actually follow the link) did.

In other words, a Clinton defender shows up, slanders a Clinton accuser, and prevaricates in the process (while ironically complaining about my lack of “courteous discourse”). Just like the book says. Maybe she can add a new chapter in the next printing.

[Update at 4 PM EST]

This seems pertinent. Brent Bozell talks about the media’s whitewash of Hillary.

[Update about 5 PM EST]

Camille Paglia:

If Hillary is the Democratic nominee, I will certainly vote for her. But I continue to find it hard to believe that my party truly craves that long nightmare of d

Peter Berkowitz writes about Bush hatred, and so-called progressives stated pride in it:

Bush hatred is not a rational response to actual Bush perfidy. Rather, Bush hatred compels its progressive victims–who pride themselves on their sophistication and sensitivity to nuance–to reduce complicated events and multilayered issues to simple matters of good and evil. Like all hatred in politics, Bush hatred blinds to the other sides of the argument, and constrains the hater to see a monster instead of a political opponent.

Some people, based on posts like the previous one, have mindlessly called me a “Clinton hater.” Not just me, but anyone who points out that they are both corrupt liars. But there’s no passion in such a statement–it’s just a clinical factual description. If I state that Ted Bundy, or Charles Manson, or (for that matter) OJ Simpson are murderers, does it mean that I hate them? I don’t. I’m simply making a factual statement.

I’ve noted in the past that I’m often foolishly accused by people of being a Bush lover, simply because I’m not a Bush hater. And I’m also often accused of being a Clinton hater, simply because I (unlike, generally, the accusers) am not someone who loves him beyond all reason. From my perspective, I’m simply rationally evaluating both men based on the record. George W. Bush has many flaws, but doesn’t deserve the vituperation that is heaped on him. Bill Clinton isn’t evil, but he is a profoundly corrupt, narcissistic man.

I don’t hate the Clintons–I just don’t want them to regain political power. Of course, I’m just not that into hate, period, for the reasons that Berkowitz describes–it’s an emotion that clouds reason and judgment. I don’t even hate Osama bin Laden. I wish him dead, but not because I hate him. I simply, dispassionately think the world better off without him, and those like him.

But of course, the word “hate,” like “racist,” has lost most of its intellectual currency as a result of overuse and abuse by the left. So it’s all the more interesting that the same people take such pride in their admitted (and irrational) hatred of George Bush.

John Hawkins has an interview with one of the Slick Grope Vets For Truth, Kathleen Willey, who has a new book out. And who would have thought that there could be a potential new Clinton scandal from the nineties (of course, much of the public remains unaware of the old ones–something that the Slick Grope Vets may rectify if Hillary gets the nomination):

I finally was emotionally able to look at my husband’s autopsy report while writing the book and there were some things in there that got my attention. I’m not an expert and I don’t pretend to be, but I did take the autopsy report and show it to an expert, a criminology and forensic expert, and she saw some pretty compelling inconsistencies in that report and she suggested that I pursue it, that I get further opinions, which I am doing. I feel like I owe that to his memory, I owe that to my children, and for my own piece of mind. I want to know what happened. That’s what I talked about briefly in my book.

It had always been a given at the time that Ed Willey had committed suicide–I don’t recall anyone questioning it. But there’s ample reason to always question when associates of the Clintons supposedly “commit suicide” or meet some other untimely end. They seem to have a lot more such associates than most people.

John Hawkins has an interview with one of the Slick Grope Vets For Truth, Kathleen Willey, who has a new book out. And who would have thought that there could be a potential new Clinton scandal from the nineties (of course, much of the public remains unaware of the old ones–something that the Slick Grope Vets may rectify if Hillary gets the nomination):

I finally was emotionally able to look at my husband’s autopsy report while writing the book and there were some things in there that got my attention. I’m not an expert and I don’t pretend to be, but I did take the autopsy report and show it to an expert, a criminology and forensic expert, and she saw some pretty compelling inconsistencies in that report and she suggested that I pursue it, that I get further opinions, which I am doing. I feel like I owe that to his memory, I owe that to my children, and for my own piece of mind. I want to know what happened. That’s what I talked about briefly in my book.

It had always been a given at the time that Ed Willey had committed suicide–I don’t recall anyone questioning it. But there’s ample reason to always question when associates of the Clintons supposedly “commit suicide” or meet some other untimely end. They seem to have a lot more such associates than most people.

John Hawkins has an interview with one of the Slick Grope Vets For Truth, Kathleen Willey, who has a new book out. And who would have thought that there could be a potential new Clinton scandal from the nineties (of course, much of the public remains unaware of the old ones–something that the Slick Grope Vets may rectify if Hillary gets the nomination):

I finally was emotionally able to look at my husband’s autopsy report while writing the book and there were some things in there that got my attention. I’m not an expert and I don’t pretend to be, but I did take the autopsy report and show it to an expert, a criminology and forensic expert, and she saw some pretty compelling inconsistencies in that report and she suggested that I pursue it, that I get further opinions, which I am doing. I feel like I owe that to his memory, I owe that to my children, and for my own piece of mind. I want to know what happened. That’s what I talked about briefly in my book.

It had always been a given at the time that Ed Willey had committed suicide–I don’t recall anyone questioning it. But there’s ample reason to always question when associates of the Clintons supposedly “commit suicide” or meet some other untimely end. They seem to have a lot more such associates than most people.

For gems like this:

It is interesting that the movie [Transformers] made 403492 grillion dollars, whereas the Cruise / Redford / Streep oration about War Being Bad averaged thirty-seven cents per theater. As many have noted elsewhere at great length, anti-war movies are unpopular. The theories vary: the public is tired of the war, the movies are lousy, the public doesn

My father the presidential election historian thinks that 9/11 is your best head-to-head issue against Clinton. Play this up. In general, hit the main themes of your campaign. View space policy as a highly scrutinized metaphor for the other 99% of your domestic and international policies. Here are some 9/11 talking points.

• Focus on space for visual and signals intelligence to prevent the next 9/11
• GPS as a force multiplier
• Condemn Chinese use of anti-satellite weaponry by China
• Note that the Taiwan straits and the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea are quiet now, but it’s possible they will flare up in the next 8 years so we need to build on our military space strengths
• Resurrect Reagan’s flair for demonizing the Russians as part of your space platform. As Machiavelli says, “[A freed animal that was] brought up in prison and servitude … becomes prey to the first one who seeks to enchain it again.”
• Advocate awareness about a space 9/11 (don’t speak purple prose here–your security firm can brief you) and the ability to cope and quickly recover from such a crisis

Frontier spirit is a traditional Republican (and Democratic) value; sticking to science, technology, the environment and international cooperation when talking about space is a mistake

• Note that space is the new frontier and its inevitable (far) future for expanding the sphere of freedom
• Visit Williamsburg and talk about how Jamestown was settled and how the frontier spirit is alive and well in America and how 400 years from now the Moon and Mars will be settled

Fiscal conservatism is a winning electoral issue (despite it being very bad public policy)

• Endorse some of the Aldridge Commission recommendations, but disclaim those that will implicitly hurt jobs in the states you are intending to win
• Tell NASA that you want them to undertake hard problems (quote Kennedy’s Rice speech) and trust the private sector to deliver cargo and people to Earth orbit; note that sometimes the Russians have good ideas we should copy like harnessing capitalism for orbital spaceflight; perhaps do this standing next to Elon Musk and Gov. Arnold on a fund raising trip to LA after you’ve captured the primaries, but before the general gets into full swing. Musk’s factory is next to LAX. Don’t put on bunny shoes.
• Talk about working smarter and shrinking NASA through attrition–don’t create enemies by firing people

New space gets tons of media coverage and is a feel-good entrepreneurism story

• Make fun of the new race for the next humans to set foot on the Moon and suggest that you’d like to see Google offer a prize to the winner of that race, too (on top of their rover prize). Hinting at privatizing their private billion dollar NASA airstrip and campus boondoggle is unwise. The campaign website might become harder to find on a Google search. Compromise by meeting them in a swing state.
• Praise Bob Bigelow and express interest in the next US space station being leased. Arrange to shake hands with him in Nevada. Don’t put on booties.
• Before the general election arrange to shake hands with Burt Rutan in New Mexico
• Envision a time when the President will make 45-minute flights to Tokyo in a later-generation suborbital spacecraft that is as safe as Marine One, the first presidential helicopter in 1957 perhaps with Rutan
• Arrange to shake hands with Peter Diamandis of ZEROG and Space Adventures in Florida at the Cape–don’t put on a bunny suit or fly in ZERO G; hard to get only good photos
• Visit Air Force Space Command
• Visit Space Explorers headquarters in Wisconsin, shake hands with George French and talk about the importance of space to motivate kids to learn about science, technology, engineering and math

But don’t overdo it.

• Don’t spend more than 1-3% of your words or appearances on space issues