Ten movie ideas for screenwriters.
A biopic of Norman Borlaug could be good, too.
Another SLS Slip
And NASA (as in Gerst) isn’t happy with GAO’s (accurate) “unnecessarily negative” criticism of its and Boeing’s performance.
[Noon update]
Muilenburg responds with typical BS:
“The first rocket is now about 80% assembled, and we’re going through the detailed system integration,” he said. “These are very complex, sophisticated machines, so the technology itself is a challenge. I think it’s manageable. It’s work we know how to do. But it’s tough, challenging work, and we have to do it in a way that ensures safety in the end.”
Muilenburg said having consistent political and funding support for such a big space project was at least as challenging.
“We’ve seen that to date on the Space Launch System,” he said. “If we’re going to get back to the moon by 2024, we can do that, but we can’t if we don’t have stable, consistent support and funding. So the political and funding side of this, I would say, is actually the greater risk.”
The notion that SLS hasn’t had “consistent political support and funding” is beyond mendacious.
Impeach Trump?
No, it’s time to indict Andrew McCabe.
He’s not the only one, and I suspect it’s just a matter of weeks now.
Samsung Televisions
The company says that owners should virus scan them.
We have a Vizio. I’ve never given it the wifi password. I just use it as a monitor.
Blood And Money
While I think that we could do a lunar return for far less than NASA estimates, if allowed to do so without having to use SLS/Orion, or the Gateway, I certainly agree with the second point that Wayne Hale (new head of the NASA Advisory Council) makes, as he takes more than one page from my book.
Brexit, And The UK’s Future
More Conservatives voted Leave than Labourites, but Labour represents the most passionately pro-Remain constituencies in the country and the most passionately pro-Leave ones. This means both parties have taken to destroying themselves internally rather than dealing with the vote’s implications.
The Tories are more culpable because they formed government during this period. They stuck with Theresa May, a leader who lacks every leadership quality apart from perseverance and who managed to lose a 20 per cent poll lead against an antediluvian Marxist after calling a completely unnecessary general election. This election produced a hung parliament and forced May’s Tories into a confidence and supply arrangement with the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), a Northern Irish outfit that is, to put it mildly, full of strange characters.
…In days gone by, superannuated elites refusing to accept defeat on existential questions of this type finished up with their heads on pikes. Democracy put a stop to that by doing what democracy does best: facilitating the peaceful and orderly transfer of power. But democracy means you elect a new parliament, not a new people. That, in truth, is the only deal that matters.
Link via Iain Murray, with whom I had lunch last week in DC, and who personally knows Boris Johnson, and most of the other candidates. When I noted that Theresa May has probably been the worst PM since Neville Chamberlain, he replied, “Since Lord North.”
Life Extension In Mice
By giving them a protein from the blood of young mice.
Faster, please.
Bet On Bill Barr
An anonymous, but wise, Wyoming rancher recently summarized special counsel Robert Mueller’s report in clear middle-America language: “We know that old boy didn’t actually steal any horses, but he’s obviously guilty of trying to avoid being hanged for it.”
Yep.
Jim Acosta
…risks life and limb to sell his dangerous book.
Federal Agencies
Yes, let’s move them out of Washington.
And as Glenn suggests, it would be smart to move them into hinterlands of deep-blue states, so they don’t affect swing states.