Setting The Record Straight

It’s Friday, which means it’s time to go over and read Victor Davis Hanson’s latest. He puts things into perspective:

These are still perilous times. But if anyone on September 12, 2001, had predicted that 22 months later there would still be no repeat of 9/11; that bin Laden would be either quiet, dead, or in hiding; that al Qaeda would be dispersed, the Taliban gone, and the likes of a Mr. Karzai in Kabul; that Saddam Hussein would be out of power, his sons dead, and an Iraqi national council emerging in his place; that troops would be leaving Saudi Arabia, Arafat ostracized, and Sharon seeking negotiations; that new Middle East agreements under discussion – and all at a cost of fewer than 300 American lives – then he would surely have been written off as a madman…

…So far we have lost fewer lives in Afghanistan and Iraq than we did in a single day’s butchery in the Marine barracks in Lebanon. But unlike that terrible sacrifice, this time Americans are fighting back, winning, and changing for the better the lives of millions in the most remarkable, ambitious, and risky endeavor since the end of World War II.

Concrete Evidence

It would seem that my post yesterday (and my Fox column) were quite timely.

I’ve often discussed the chilling effect that regulatory uncertainty can have on investing in private space transportation efforts. Usually, I mean that in the sense that it makes investors hesitant, or reduces the potential pool of them. But you can’t get a more clear cut case than what happened yesterday, when Dennis Tito testified to a Congressional panel, with no ambiguity, that he’s ready to invest, and the only thing preventing him from doing so is fear of the FAA.

I hope that they’re listening.

[Update at 8:57 AM PDT]

The testimony is now on line.

Here’s Tito’s. Key graf:

Please understand me: I am not looking for government funding or technology. I don’t need an investment tax credit or a loan guarantee. I’m not even looking to escape the regulations under which other space transportation companies operate. But I would like to know which government agency, and which set of regulations, will oversee this new industry.

You see, I am willing to risk my money on a technical concept and a team of engineers. I am willing to risk my money on the customers actually showing up. And I am willing to risk my money competing against other companies in the marketplace. But I am not willing to risk my money on a regulatory question mark, on waiting for the government to decide who can give me permission to get into business, and what the regulatory standards for my business will be.

For an excellent tutorial on the history of aviation and launch regulation, and the differences between the two, I also encourage you to read the testimony of Jeff Greason, head of XCOR.

The key point is that the mature aviation industry’s goal is to protect passengers and cargo. At the state of development of launchers, we must be prepared to accept much higher risk to (informed) first and second parties, and focus regulations on protecting third (that is, otherwise uninvolved) parties on the ground, as required by the Outer Space Treaty and common sense.

Elon Musk (founder of Paypal, and now President and owner of SpaceX) also has some useful thoughts, with some specific recommendations for making government ranges more user friendly, and with an optimistic outlook for the industry based on his internet experience:

It is worth noting that the perspective I bring to the launch vehicle industry is drawn from a particularly Darwinian experience in the business world, having founded and helped build two successful Internet companies in Silicon Valley. Seldom have we seen a faster moving, more voraciously competitive business environment or one with more tombstones. However, for all the problems associated with that era, the rise and fall and perhaps rise again of the NASDAQ, it is easy to forget that the vast majority of the monumental work required to build what we know as the world wide web was done in less than a decade.

If you doubt that we can possibly see such progress in space access, please reflect for a moment that the Internet, originally a DARPA funded project, showed negligible growth for over two decades until private enterprise entered the picture. At that point, growth accelerated by more than a factor of ten. We saw Internet traffic grow by more in a few years than the sum of all growth in the prior two decades.

John Kutler’s testimony is worth reading as well, providing the perspective of the institutional investment community. Summary: they’re not ready to jump into this yet, so the startups will have to continue to rely on angels for a while.

Finally, read the testimony from Futron on their space tourism market research study.

As I said, I hope that Congress was listening carefully.

Give Them The Mussolini Treatment

Some people aren’t convinced by photos.

“We will believe they are dead when Uday and Qusay’s bodies are tied to cars and dragged through the streets so everybody can see them,” said Muhammad, an engineer.

As I said, it would be barbaric in western terms, but maybe the most psychologically effective thing to do would be to hang them from something, and tour it around Baghdad on the back of a tank. Just be sure to keep the bodies high enough so they can’t get at them–otherwise, you won’t have much left by the time you get to the end of the first street, vis:

“Death is not enough. They should have been hung up on poles in a square in Baghdad so all Iraqis could see them. Then they should have died as people ate them alive,” said businessman Khalil Ali. “The photographs do not mean anything.”

Bon appetit…

That’s Gotta Hurt

The American public thinks that Fox News is a more reliable source for news than the New York Times. Fewer than half think the Gray Lady credible.

The bleeding continues, with no sign that Pinch gets it.

[Update at 3:30 PM PDT]

Semi-pro Krugman watcher Don Luskin points out none of the Times’ editorial writers have degrees in the subjects on which they pontificate.

That’s Gotta Hurt

The American public thinks that Fox News is a more reliable source for news than the New York Times. Fewer than half think the Gray Lady credible.

The bleeding continues, with no sign that Pinch gets it.

[Update at 3:30 PM PDT]

Semi-pro Krugman watcher Don Luskin points out none of the Times’ editorial writers have degrees in the subjects on which they pontificate.

That’s Gotta Hurt

The American public thinks that Fox News is a more reliable source for news than the New York Times. Fewer than half think the Gray Lady credible.

The bleeding continues, with no sign that Pinch gets it.

[Update at 3:30 PM PDT]

Semi-pro Krugman watcher Don Luskin points out none of the Times’ editorial writers have degrees in the subjects on which they pontificate.

Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!