A. J. Mackenzie has run the numbers on the probability of the new hires flying, given NASA’s current (lack of) plans.
The cynic in me says that the only reason to apply is for a chance to get some training to fly in the private sector.
Defeating Aging
…using AI?
Faster, please.
Sweden
The terrifying way in which it’s killing itself:
This is a country where rapes by Muslim men are systematically ignored by the authorities or responded to with minimal punishment. Routinely, Swedish courts refuse to return these monsters – some of whom have repeatedly subjected small boys and girls to violent sexual abuse – to their home countries for fear that they’ll be put in danger. In other words, Swedish judges care more about the safety of foreign rapists than that of Swedish children.
Across the straights, Denmark seems to be trying to be more sensible.
The War Of Ideas
The Democrats and the Left are losing it, because they don’t have any ammunition. And really, have they come up with any new ideas in the past half century? Governments running peoples’ lives is as old as civilization itself.
[Late-morning update]
Who killed the Left?
The only thing one can be sure of is that the Republican Party didn’t cause it; nor did their tame and feeble publications. In fact, not even publications like Breitbart, valiant though their efforts were, can claim credit. Trump couldn’t have done it either, since the proud tower that Gerlenter describes would have been impervious to the mere touch of the orange-hued real estate mogul without some other factor in play.
Yet most of us know who did it, though we hesitate to name the obvious suspect. The Left, even in its downfall, has stilled our tongues. The word comes to the edge of our lips before we choke it back, fearful even now of the ridicule and abuse we will get should we blurt it. That word is God. God killed the Left. Of course one could legitimately use some other term. “Reality,” “consequences,” the “laws of nature,” “economics,” even “truth” will do. Through some process of increasing entropy, failed memory management, or unanticipated side effects, the status quo — the one dominated by the Left — is collapsing.
Not fast enough. And sadly, there is something in human nature, in our envy, our greed, our self righteousness, our lust for power, to which their toxic ideas appeal.
A Living Constitution
Randy Barnett thoroughly dismantles a “living Constitutionalist.”
The Sarah Palin Smear
Was the New York Times sloppy, malicious, or careless? I think they were reckless. I won’t discuss the interesting parallels to my own legal case.
[Update a couple minutes later]
I like this comment:
Any settlement must include an apology printed on the front page of the Sunday Times, in large, boldface font, above the fold, including the statement: “The New York Times hereby acknowledges that the editorial was written by dishonest, ignorant, malicious idiots who perfectly represent the quality and tenor of this publication in general.”
If I were her, that’s what I’d demand.
So Much For That Narrative
Pr0n featuring violence against women is more popular with women than with men. I’m not entirely surprised. But it sure blows a hole in the “rape culture” theory.
Trump And Putin
He has Vlad over a barrel (of oil).
Interesting to compare current to previous president. One is a stooge of the Kremlin, and then there's Donald Trump: https://t.co/4QtnX0HrYr
— Rand Simberg (@Rand_Simberg) July 8, 2017
Funny, I’m old enough to remember when Barack Obama told Sarah Palin we couldn’t drill our way out of our energy problems. But then, I’m old enough to remember lots of stupid things that Barack Obama said.
The Leftist Freak Out Over Trump’s Speech
Why yes, yes they do hate Western civilization:
So, for Jamelle Bouie, a Westerner asserting the value of Western civilization is barely-veiled racism? If that’s true, then the term “racism” is meaningless. In fact, it’s worse than meaningless: it’s dangerous. If you tell people that to love and to want to defend the culture of the West is a racist act, then they will cease to care about your judgment on the matter, because you are requiring them to hate themselves as an act of virtue. In that regard, Jamelle Bouie’s sentiment here is a much greater gift to the racist alt-right than anything Donald Trump said in Warsaw.
I mean, really, how ignorant and provincial do you have to be, Messrs. Beinart and Bouie, to hear Trump’s speech and think of it as a #MAGA version of a Nuremberg Rally Address? Is the degree of self-hatred of the West required to be a virtuous, woke person such that you cannot tell the difference between Handel’s Hallelujah Chorus and the Horst Wessel Song? Do they really think Kenneth Clark’s Civilisation (all of which is available on YouTube, starting here) is a plummy version of Triumph of the Will? If standing against this kind of liberal insanity means I have to stand with Donald Trump, well, okay, I’ll stand with Donald Trump. I won’t like it, but at least Donald Trump doesn’t hate his own civilization.
It’s why they find common cause with Islamists. Also (as usual), want more Trump? Because this is how you get more Trump.
[Mid-afternoon update]
Jonah Goldberg: In defense of western civilization.
[Saturday-morning update]
Trump defends the West, and the Left cries foul. They’re really showing their colors. So to speak.
[Update a few minutes later]
Some of the critics of Trump’s speech in Poland reject the idea of the greatness of Western Civilization. You don’t say.
Pence’s Speech At KSC
Bob Zimmerman listened to it, so you don’t have to. It was pretty uninspiring, at least to anyone who knows what’s going on.
[Update a few minutes later]
Keith Cowing has a word cloud of the speech.
[Update a few more minutes later]
And more from Loren Grush:
it was a speech with very little substance. There were many anecdotes about the US’s past achievements in space, Pence argued that recent administrations had failed to “match the spirit of the American people” when it came to creating space policy. Multiple times he insisted that Trump would open “a new era of American space leadership.” But the most recent presidential budget request calls for cutting NASA’s funding, as well as canceling some of the agency’s offices and programs. Space is expensive. How does Pence plan to match our ambitions with our missions if there isn’t a detailed money plan?
So, six months into the Trump administration, NASA doesn’t have any space policy priorities or definitive leadership. NASA administrators are often instrumental in steering the direction of the space agency, and without one, the agency will lack a strategy for how to move forward. This is now the longest amount of time NASA has been without a new permanent administrator; the record was previously held by President Richard Nixon, who took 164 days after his inauguration to fill the position, according to the Planetary Society. NASA’s current acting administrator Robert Lightfoot, who took over temporarily when Trump was inaugurated, has now served longer than that. And there’s no indication when a new administrator will be named.
“Depending on the details, this backwards speech could signal a backwards space policy, meaning rolling back the progress that’s being made instead of building on the commercial space policies that Reagan started and Obama continued,” says Larson.
I have no particular expectations about civil space from Trump. But I’m happy that at least milspace seems to be undergoing reform.