Popular Culture, Space, Space History

It

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[Note: This post is on top all day for the anniversary. Keep scrolling for new posts]

…came from outer space:

The aliens did not come across vast expanses of space to eat us. Or take our resources. Or another reasons. Frankly, they’d rather be on their way; they have places to go, things to do. Their spaceship broke down, and it needs repairing. For some reason they have to assume human form to fix it, though, and this means duplicating the bodies of ordinary Arizona townsfolk. As the hero asks them: Why? You built the thing, surely you can fix it without turning into us.

“Yes,” says the creature in an echoey monotone, “but this would require a budget that allows for several creatures, which we do not have. Also, grad students in film school decades from now would not be able to cite the movie as an example of subconscious dread of Communist infiltration.”

And forty years ago, while It didn’t come from outer space, we went to outer space. Apollo XI lifted off on July 16th, 1969, to deliver Mike Collins, Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong to the moon. And WeChooseTheMoon.org went live about an hour ago, where you can follow the mission in real time, from now until they return next week. The Saturn is sitting on the pad, and they’re launching in less than half an hour.

[Update a little later]

Alan Boyle has a lot more Apollo-related links, and a story about the restoration of the original video of the landing.

I’ll be keeping this post at the top all day.

[Late morning update]

An alternate history, from Henry Spencer: Welcome to Lunarville.

[Update in the afternoon]

There’s some stupid discussion over at James Nicoll’s place:

Let’s be magnanimous, and as a thought experiment keep NASA’s budget at its peak as a share of the American economy for the next forty-three years.

Do we get five thousand people on the moon? *really*? Those are some interesting economies of scale. Remember, NASA’s budget would only be six times bigger than its current.

A straight linear extrapolation gives ca. eighty-four American associated space deaths.

It’s entirely idiotic to do a “straight linear extrapolation.”

Could NASA have had that many on the moon by now with a steady budget? Who knows? But I know I could have. In fact, it would easily be an order of magnitude more. But task one would have been a serious effort to reduce launch costs.

[Update about 2 PM EDT]

More thoughts from Derb:

As I’ve made plain in several columns, I am a space buff from far back, and I find the exploration of space, including the manned exploration, thrilling beyond measure. That’s my taste in vicarious thrills. Other people have different tastes therein: They are thrilled by sporting achievements, or medical advances, or cultural accomplishments. If the federal government is going to pay for my thrills, why shouldn’t it pay for everyone else’s? If putting men on the moon is a proper national goal requiring billions of federal dollars, why isn’t winning the soccer World Cup, or curing the common cold, or resolving the Riemann Hypothesis?

As a minimal-government conservative, I’d prefer the federal authorities do none of those things. I’d prefer they stick to their proper duties: defending our coasts and borders, maintaining a stable currency, organizing national disaster relief, etc. Leave manned space travel to the entrepreneurs.

That’s pretty much my attitude as well, but I don’t think that we’re going to shut down NASA, so I will continue to work hard to get it to spend the money less crazily.

[Update at 3 PM]

Andrew Chaikin:

Who would have predicted that in 2009 we would have to go back 40 years to find the most futuristic thing humans have ever done? Apollo 17 commander Gene Cernan has said that it is as if John Kennedy reached into the 21st century, grabbed a decade of time, and spliced it neatly into the 1960s and 70s. Ever since then, I’ve been waiting to see us get back to where we were in 1972.

Now, in the midst of the real 21st century, none of us can say when humans will go back to the moon – or what language they will speak when they get there. If Chinese taikonauts become the next lunar explorers, will we be spurred to action, or shrug it off? Or will we have somehow risen above our differences and found a way to go back to the moon together?

Call me naïve, call me just another aging Baby Boomer who can’t let go of the past. But I firmly believe that Apollo was just the first chapter in a story of exploration that has no end, and will continue as long as humans are alive. And I still want to believe that when humans do return to the moon to follow in the Apollo astronauts’ lunar footsteps, it will have more of an impact than many people now realize.

It will, but only if we abandon the failed Apollo model. If it was a first chapter, the rest of the book is going to have to look very different for it to lead to exploration without end. It did indeed happen too soon, so it cost too much, and it established a terrible precedent for human space exploration that we have not recovered from to this day, as demonstrated by the current Constellation disaster. This will be the theme of my piece at The New Atlantis (which I hope will be on line in time for the anniversary on Monday, but I can’t promise it, particularly since I’ll probably be doing final editing at the conference this weekend).

Political Commentary, Space

The Latest Lurio Report

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Charles Lurio has a new report out (subscribers only). His thoughts on SpaceX’ success this week:

Of course, the present milestone doesn’t mean that all possible problems and failures are past them. Forthcoming in a few months is their first attempted launch of the massive Falcon 9 from Cape Canaveral, then next year, of the Falcon 1e with upgraded payload capabilities. And the company must consistently deliver success at their promised lower costs than other comparable systems.

But what happened this week is a blow to a pernicious and refractory mythology, one that has permeated world perceptions since the hurried but astounding accomplishments of the early ‘space age.’ Consciously or not, among the public (and an embarrassing fraction of the engineering community), so-called “rocket science” was cut off from the possibility of gradually becoming more practical and lower cost, the normal path with so many other technologies. Movement to such practicality was instead often seen to require near-miraculous ‘super-science.” That was always just a negative form of “magical” thinking rather than being based on reality.

A couple of weeks ago I was standing in the forecourt of Westminster Abbey in London. There, atop a pillar, stands a sculpture of St. George slaying the dragon. SpaceX has just contributed a wound to the dragon of a mythology that has kept _all_ humanity from the limitless promise of space. The outcome of the struggle is not certain, but as it has before, the New Space community will continue this battle as long as it can.

There’s a lot more, for subscribers, including a great report on things starting to stir across the pond, particularly in the UK. I highly recommend subscribing. He needs contributors to keep doing this, and there’s no one covering this field better.

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary

Obama As Health-Care Salesman

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He sux.

Who knew we were electing a national mother-in-law? And get a chance to endure increased taxes for the privilege. Obama’s supposed to be rallying support from voters, not castigating them. Outside the S& M parlor, most people do not enjoy paying to be disciplined.

What’s amusing is that his acolytes (including some in this very blog’s comments) are just as bad, because they use the same dumb arguments.

No surprise. The only thing he’s ever really been able to sell is himself. He may be the most spectacular example of the Peter Principle in world history.

[Update a few minutes later]

Uh oh:

When we first saw the paragraph Tuesday, just after the 1,018-page document was released, we thought we surely must be misreading it. So we sought help from the House Ways and Means Committee.

It turns out we were right: The provision would indeed outlaw individual private coverage. Under the Orwellian header of “Protecting The Choice To Keep Current Coverage,” the “Limitation On New Enrollment” section of the bill clearly states:

“Except as provided in this paragraph, the individual health insurance issuer offering such coverage does not enroll any individual in such coverage if the first effective date of coverage is on or after the first day” of the year the legislation becomes law.

So we can all keep our coverage, just as promised — with, of course, exceptions: Those who currently have private individual coverage won’t be able to change it. Nor will those who leave a company to work for themselves be free to buy individual plans from private carriers…

…It took just 16 pages of reading to find this naked attempt by the political powers to increase their reach. It’s scary to think how many more breaches of liberty we’ll come across in the final 1,002.

You can see why these fascists object to the notion of reading bills.

[Update late morning]

The civil war among the Democrats:

Blue Dogs had aired their complaints last week in a letter to Pelosi that caused her to delay the rollout of the bill until Tuesday. But when the bill was introduced, they felt Pelosi and the committee chairmen who wrote the legislation hadn’t taken their concerns into account.

That led to a tense session between Pelosi and Blue Dogs at the group’s regular Tuesday meeting hours after the rollout.

“The meeting did not go well. She just kept saying it was a good bill,” said one Blue Dog.

“There is a growing perception among many of us that our leadership meets with us but doesn’t listen to us,” said another Blue Dog.

What do you expect? She’s a moron. And I hope that she’ll continue to lead them…to a massive defeat next year.

[Noon update]

A modest proposal:

I propose that the government impose a single-payer system on the legal profession. Instead of charging private fees, all attorneys would have to send their bills to LegalCare, a new agency in the federal government. Because the government can bargain collectively, they can impose rational fees for legal services instead of the exorbitant billing fees attorneys now charge. Three hundred dollars an hour? Thing of the past. Everyone knows that the government can control costs through price-setting; now we can see this process applied to the legal system, where the government has a large interest in seeing cost savings.

How will we pay for LegalCare? I take a page from the House surtax method here, which will disproportionately hit doctors in a wide variety of disciplines. In this case, I propose a 5.4% surtax on lawyers, judges, lobbyists, and political officeholders at the state and federal level. They’re the ones who have enriched themselves through this inequity in the legal system. After all, why should we all have to pay for the single-payer legal system when we can penalize lawyers instead?

I think we need a big-bang solution that can integrate a solution to the health-care and legal-care crises.

[Update after 3 PM]

The public-option scam:

Some statements are inherently unbelievable. Such as: “I am an official of the government of Nigeria, and I would like to deposit $60 million in your bank account.” Or: “I’m Barry Bonds, and I thought it was flaxseed oil.” And this new one: “I’m Barack Obama, and I favor more competition in health insurance.”

They must think we’re stupid. And unfortunately, judging by the election results last fall, it might not be a bad bet.

[Update a few minutes later]

A shocking development — honesty from someone in Washington, from the CBO, of all places.

Humor, Political Commentary

Sotomayor Clarifies

1 Comment

In a guest editorial over at Burge’s place:

As a Justicia on the Tribunal Supremo I will be naturally vigilant for any colleague who strays from the law, and will not hesitate to clobber them with the rodillo of established legal precedence. Afterwards, when we have reached consensus, there will be hot makeup majority opinions.

This is exactly the kind of wise, precedent-faithful Latina legal approach that I believe will be welcome by others on the Supreme Court bench, all of whom bring their own unique genetic legal wisdom and instinctual empathy. Justices Roberts and Souter for example, with their aloof, sexless, constipated, emotionally-stunted WASPy intellects and natural affinity for preppy white collar criminals. Justice Stevens has this as well, along with a keen grasp for the legal issues facing Americans with senile dementia. As an Irishman, Justice Kennedy enjoys a natural “gift of the gab” and poetically tragic alcoholism. Like you, I imagine that Justice Breyer can be kind of pushy and whiny, but we should also remember that as a Jew he is probably very skilled at cases that involve complicated numbers and math. To the casual observer, it probably seems absurd to have greasy Italian “goodfellas” like Justices Alito and Scalia working inside the legal system, but if we give them a chance they may eventually break the code of Omerta and finally turn state’s evidence against their Cosa Nostra bosses. Yes, many have criticized Justice Thomas for being a self-hating “Oreo” and “Uncle Tom,” but I like to think that deep inside him still lurks the the DNA of an angry Cadillac-driving streetwise Superfly, ready to show “The Man” that his pimp hand is strong.

As he says, adding a little spice to the menudo of justice.

Media Criticism, Political Commentary, War Commentary

Saving The Mullahs

2 Comments

Obama continues to throw them a life line:

…even as the Iranian people are casting doubt on the legitimacy of the regime (and are being brutalized for doing so) and even as the regime continues trying to kill Americans in Iraq and elsewhere, Obama is giving the mullahs the three things they most need: confidence in their security, international legitimacy, and time.

As I’ve been saying for a month, there is nothing complicated about this: Obama wants the mullahs to win. That seems impossible to believe for many well-intentioned people, but once you accept it — and everything it implies — life starts to make much sense. It isn’t any better, mind you, but at least it makes sense.

Sadly, yes. It’s hard to show how persuasive you are in negotiating with your fellow dictators if they get inconveniently thrown out of office.

Business, Technology and Society, Weird

A Strange Product

4 Comments

I’m shopping at American for flights from SFO to LAX, and they have a variety of non-stops for fifty-nine bucks. But what’s bizarre is that they offer one-stops as well (e.g., through Seattle, or Dallas). And they only charge four hundred bucks for them. How many people buy one? You have to really want the miles, and like riding in airplanes. I wonder if it’s just an artifact of their reservations software, that no one has bothered to fix? Or if they’ve ever actually sold one?

Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!