Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Space

Some Serious Space Policy Questions For Mitt

January 16, 2012 Rand Simberg 8 Comments

I hope that @BretBaier asks something along these lines:

So, Governor, if you want to talk space policy, let’s talk space policy. How about answering some serious questions, instead of pretending that it’s an unserious subject, of no value except to mock your opponent?

In 2008, you said that you supported President Bush’s Vision for Space Exploration, a fundamental part of which was a manned lunar base. Now you criticize Newt Gingrich for the same thing, and imply that it is a frivolity. What happened in the interim to make you change your opinion?

How much do you think that a “lunar colony” would cost? How do you think that Speaker Gingrich would propose to bring one about? Do you think that he would agree with your characterization of his plans? If you don’t know the answers to these questions, on what basis are you criticizing him?

If we are not going to settle the moon and other locations in the solar system, what in your mind is the purpose of having a human spaceflight program? Why are we doing it?

In 2009, when President Obama came out with a new space policy that emphasized competitive commercial services for crew delivery to orbit, and the development of new technologies that would make human spaceflight beyond earth orbit much more affordable, Newt Gingrich was one of the few Republicans to come out in support of it (Bob Walker and Dana Rohrabacher were others). Do you agree with Speaker Gingrich that this is a more promising and cost-effective direction for the program, or do you support the Congress in its demand that NASA spend billions on a giant rocket that won’t fly for many years, and for which no payloads are defined or funded? Or do you have some other proposal?

What would a Romney space policy look like? Given that you’ve elevated the topic in the campaign, I think that those of us to whom space is important deserve to know.

And Bret, if you’re looking for a “gotcha,” probably the second one works best.

History, Media Criticism, Political Commentary

Let Freedom Ring

January 16, 2012 Rand Simberg 10 Comments

Some thoughts on today’s holiday:

we were still blessed by Providence to have had him, because he was the right man at the right time. It was he who rose to be the leader and articulator and symbol of the civil-rights movement, a “dream deeply rooted in the American dream,” and not the loathsome racist Elijah Mohammed or the criminals of the Black Panther movement or even Malcolm X and his late embrace of mainstream Islam. Would any of these men, or the frauds and swindlers who claim to be “civil rights” spokesmen today, give a speech that ends this way?:

This will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with a new meaning, “My country, ’tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim’s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.”

And if America is to be a great nation this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!

Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado!

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California!

But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, “Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”

There is no one like him comparable today. He was a Republican for a reason. His modern heirs are leftists.

Business, Space

More On The Dragon Delay

January 16, 2012 Rand Simberg 13 Comments

Over at NASA Space Flight, but still no details on just what the issue is. It’s interesting to note that this announcement comes nine years to the day after the launch of the final flight of Columbia. Probably just coincidence

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary

The EU’s Prisoners’ Dilemma

January 16, 2012 Rand Simberg 3 Comments

…is ours, too.

Political Commentary, Space

The EU Code Of Space Conduct

January 16, 2012 Rand Simberg 2 Comments

Michael Listner has the current state of play of US participation. And yes, election-year politics are probably involved. That we aren’t signing on is good news as far as it goes, but there are doubtless other shoes to drop.

Space, Space Science