This is not a good look. Looks like regulatory capture.
I’ve always thought it was a bad idea to let Boeing have a monopoly on American air transports, and this is probably one of the consequences.
[Wednesday-morning update]
Some aviation-safety experts have been predicting this sort of “automation surprise” for years.
I think part of the problem is that pilots don’t fly the planes any more; they manage them.
[Bumped]
It’s not being made any better by idiocy in Sacramento.
Though it’s not clear from the headline, Marco Rubio has introduced legislation to amend the Constitution to keep it at nine seats. Yes, make them vote and be on the record for all this crazy process nonsense they’re spouting on the campaign trail.
He may get off the hook for the prostitution rap. When I heard about this, I thought it was stupid, unless he knew that there was human trafficking involved and was part of it. Prostitution laws are stupid, and much more harmful to women than consenting sales of sex.
I favored the removal of Saddam Hussein, but I thought that the Bush administration Charlie Foxtrotted the aftermath, particularly with regard to fecklessness with the mullahs. But I was also continually annoyed by the “Bush lied, people died” mantra (not to mention the “War for Oil” nonsense). The only reason WMD was even an issue is that Tony Blair demanded UN approval, which couldn’t be attained without it. Anyway, Ari Fleischer sets the record straight (again).
One has gotten snagged by the Mueller probe, and another may be. It’s long past time.
Over at The Space Review, Jeff Foust has the story on last week’s events.
[Update a few minutes later]
Also over there a sort of debate on the pros and cons of NASA’s approach to getting back to the moon. I’d note that Hedman’s objection to transpiration cooling is both weak (in the sense that even if Starship was expended, it would still deliver more payload for much less money than SLS ever will) and moot, since Elon has stated that with the steel and standard thermal protection, they may only use it in areas that are scorched when they return.
…want to blacklist academics who write for Quillette.
[Update a few minutes later]
Speaking of Quillette, “Why We Should Read Marx.”
It was apparently much worse than we thought:
As Kennett noted in a recent article in The Current (a university press maintained by UCSB), the crater would have led to widespread destruction, characterized by biomass burning, megafaunal extinctions and global cooling. “It’s much more extreme than I ever thought when I started this work,” he said. “The more work that has been done, the more extreme it seems.”
The discovery was made possible by a Chilean group of scientists who were studying sediment layers at the well-know Quaternary paleontological and archaeological site, known as Pilauco Bajo. Years ago, these scientists recognized changes in the sediment record that were associated with the YDB impact event.These included a “black mat” layer that coincides with the disappearance of South American megafauna fossils and human artifacts dated to the Pleistocene (12,800 years ago), indicating a severe shift in the climate. This was a major find since the vast majority of evidence for the YDB Impact has been found in the northern hemisphere.
Imagine that happening today. And here we’re obsessing over two degrees Celsius.
Better get moving on that vital SLS, so we can protect ourselves. #NotReally
Yes, the gun-control case against it is full of lies. As he notes, this isn’t about the AR-15; it’s about banning all semi-auto rifles, if not all semi-auto guns, if not all guns. That’s always their ultimate goal, because they know that an armed society is a free one.