Dwayne Day has some interesting early history of the space program and Bob Truax over at The Space Review.
And Jeff Foust writes about Flexible Path, Plymouth Rock and HEFT.
Leelanau At Last
Looks to me like Howard Lovy has found himself a sweet new gig. And the next few weeks is one of the most beautiful times of year there. Lot of snow in the winter, though.
The Kennedy-Nixon Debate
Are we better off than we were fifty years ago?
This story got me to thinking. If Nixon had won instead of Kennedy, would we still have done Apollo?
The answer isn’t as obvious as many who believe the Camelot/New-Frontier/Visionary myth might believe.
Some Questions For (Racist) Loretta Sanchez
…in Vietnamese.
Also, is it just me, or her Spanish kind of stilted?
Spot All The Errors
The latest nonsense from Pete Olson.
He Never Was
Bill Maher, you know you’re not a libertarian any more, right?
Just as the leftists have given liberalism a bad name, people like Maher do the same for libertarianism.
The Failure
This was utterly predictable, and in fact, smart people predicted it. Of course, to be fair, it was Pelosi and Reid’s “stimulus,” as well. But at least it looks like it did stimulate the electorate to replace them with someone competent, though we’re stuck with Obama for another two years.
The Democrats’ Trained Clown
…trotted out to distract from Obama’s DoJ scandal.
Yes, it seems to have gotten about ten times the coverage, so if that was the goal, mission accomplished.
Unconventional Space Access
I’m doing a piece for Popular Mechanics on alternatives to rockets, and I was going to cover rail guns, gas guns, space elevators, sky hooks, and perhaps the launch loop. Does anyone have any other suggestions?
[Update a while later]
Folks, when I say alternatives to rockets, I am including all vehicles that employ chemical rocket engines, including airbreathers. As I said, unconventional.
[Update a few minutes later]
OK, I’m thinking of three categories: cannons (whether EM, chemical, whatever), external energy (laser, Orion), and momentum exchange (tethers, space elevators, compression towers). I know the latter isn’t really momentum exchange, but it fits sort of. The former don’t work well for passengers, but are well suited to bulk delivery of low-cost stuff (e.g., propellants), and the latter require very high up-front capital costs, in general. With a lot of tech risk.
The Pied Piper
Obama may be an ephebe, an utter novice at the post of command, but it must be admitted that he is a consummate sorcerer who was able to seduce and enchant multitudes, especially the horde of grown-up children so ready and eager to be piped to. Unlike the Pied Piper, however, he did not work alone but arrived on the scene surrounded by a retinue of plutocrats, political mandarins, and clever enablers, and of course by the usual train of cavillers, pettifoggers, sybarites, and janissaries, that is, journalists, feminists, intellectuals and academics. This only facilitated his task which he would not have been capable of accomplishing on his own.
Nonetheless, he had the magic, the gift of bewitchment, and no hesitation in using it. It wasn’t long before he was able to spellbind a vast swarm of believers with the promise of auroral benefictions (if I may coin a term). The tune was irresistible but very few heard the infrasonic lyrics, which actually belied the melody. These poor dupes followed him willingly into the new dawn of mellifluous beginnings, only to find the bright morning of the future suddenly changed into the grim presentiment of the coming debacle. This is what inevitably happens when one invests uncritically in fairy tales and surrenders one’s intelligence and autonomy to the blandishments of a false messiah.
Read all.