Media Criticism, Political Commentary

Barney Frank

6 Comments

Liar.

Who in the press will call him on it?

[Mid-afternoon update]

Nick Gillespie has more thoughts:

Frank is nothing less than a trickster figure in American politics, especially for us libertarians who believe that economic and civil liberties are conjoined at the hip, the Chang and Eng of what makes this miserable world worth suffering through. As the comment above suggests, Frank is as good as it gets on most lifestyle issues (indeed, he even had Reason’s Radley Balko testify about repealing online gambling bans) and yet he’s a real lummox when it comes to economic freedom. His role in the banking and housing crisis is genuinely godawful. Not only did he strongarm mortgage companies to extend more and more credit to shakier and shakier customers, he did so all while denying anything was amiss at the government-sponsored behemoths Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that literally underwrote the mortgage mess.

And Frank’s at his worst again, now pushing The Mortgage Reform and Anti-Predatory Lending Act of 2009, which critics charge would vastly increase the level of complexity in lending and make it more difficult for low-income borrowers and others to get access to credit.

As a commenter notes, being a lummox on economic freedom is a problem of the Dems in general.

Political Commentary

Another Disastrous Appointment

9 Comments

Picking the head of MADD for the NHTSA?

The position of NHTSA chief requires an administrator of sound judgment, not a zealot beholden to special interests. Mr. Hurley’s associations and background raise the specter that he could use NHTSA regulations and safety grants to benefit his friends and coerce states into adopting his overbearing pet policies.

And the idiot wants to bring back the double nickel, too.

Political Commentary, Space

NASA Administrator Update

13 Comments

Jeff Foust has a good roundup of the critical issues that are becoming more urgent (what to do about Shuttle and Constellation) and the current rumors.

[Update a few minutes later]

Here’s a lot more from Chris Bergin. This seems like great news, if true:

General Peter Worden, Director of NASA’s Ames Research Center (ARC), will also spearhead a NASA review, which is deemed to have “wide scope” – likely to include shuttle extension – while a main body “Blue Ribbon Panel” will work with the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) in Washington, possibly overseeing all of the studies.

Jim Muncy was hinting at this a couple weeks ago at Space Access. What I don’t understand is what’s been taking them so long to get this under way. It could have happened back in February, and they’d be done by now.

Media Criticism, Political Commentary

Was Janeane Garafolo Right?

3 Comments

Little Miss Attila thinks so (sorta):

Janeane Garofalo is absolutely right: the tea parties are racism straight up. Because if it had been racism on the rocks, PJM would have gotten someone else to do interviews that day, instead of asking Zo to do two jobs. And if it had been racism-and-water, the organizers of the event wouldn’t have imposed upon Alfonzo by asking him to the podium. If it were racism-and-soda, they wouldn’t have recruited Zo to work for PJTV at all, but would have allowed him to continue commenting on events from his living room in the SoCal desert.

But don’t you see, this just proves Janeane’s point, because as all the bien pensant know, Zo (who I had the pleasure to briefly meet at Bill Whittle’s birthday party a couple weeks ago) is obviously a Tom.

Glad I’m not bien pensant.

Media Criticism, Space

Bad PR, In My Opinion

1 Comment

Scaled has issued a press release in response to Rob Coppinger’s speculations about Monday’s rudder-dragging incident that raises new questions. What do they mean when they say:

…you should question the motivations of a publication that reports design or flight test information that is based only on speculation.

Why should we question them? What will it gain us to do so? What “motives” are they implying here?

Also, my understanding is that Rob posted this at his blog, which presumably has less rigorous standards than a Flight Global article, and is exactly the place to do the same kind of speculating that we all were (though I didn’t blog about it).

This seems like an unjustified slam at Rob, with no basis, other than that they’re upset about his speculations. I doubt if it will change his reporting or attitude toward Scaled in the future, but this doesn’t seem like very good press relations to me, and I just don’t understand their purpose in doing this. As Clark says, it would have been a lot better had they left off that last sentence. Also, as Jeff says, that’s why they call them “test flights.”

Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!