Category Archives: NASA
Elon Musk Moon
Was bored with Trump and Russians when I came upon this piece in the Telegraph. It’s about the private space race. Elon Musk is the owner of Space X. His company plans to send tourists to the moon in 2018. His other company is Tesla.
He’ll be competing for the $20 million Google Lunar X prize. The competition includes a team featuring an Audi lunar rover.
iPhone Smarter Than Uncle Sam
Michael Hayden, the former head of the NSA, is on Apple’s side in the fight over cracking the iPhone of dead terrorist Syed Rizwan Farook. So is Ted Olson, former Solicitor General for George W. Bush. His wife was killed in the original 9/11 attack.
iPhone Smarter Than Uncle Sam
The FBI says Apple’s reluctance to co-operate is a marketing stunt. The government’s computers can be hacked but the government can’t hack Apple’s phone.
Seems hard to blame Apple for wanting us to know about it.
Cancer Cure Czar
President Obama appointed Joe Biden Cancer Cure Czar.
Obama said he was putting Joe in charge of mission control for a “moon shot” to cure cancer. Politico reports that cancer researchers like the resources but not the “moon shot” approach.
Cancer Cure Czar
Maybe a war on cancer approach would be better than a moon shot. President Nixon tried that in 1971.
Russian Bombers
NATO fighter jets scrambled last week as Russian bombers probed European airspace. US officials think President Putin is making a “show of force”:
“It’s concerning because it’s moving in the wrong direction,” said one U.S. defense official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the air activity publicly. “It’s not helping to de-escalate the situation in Ukraine. It’s not helping to improve relations between NATO and Russia. It’s not helping anybody.”
Also last week a NASA resupply rocket for the International Space Station suffered a “catastrophic anomaly“. Normal people say it blew up. The rocket used a 40 year old Russian engine. The U.S. relies on Russia.com for all manned space travel needs.
Update: It was a bad week for private sector space flight says, National Post. The Russian engine powered an Antares rocket designed by Orbital Sciences. NASA hopes to outsource payload flights to private companies like Orbital Sciences.
A Virgin Galactic rocket also blew up last week killing the co-pilot. Virgin is planning to offer sub-orbital flights to private paying customers.
Smug Koskinen and a Smidgen of Corruption
IRS Commissioner John Koskinen smugly insisted there isn’t a smidgen of corruption at the IRS. Oh wait, those were President Obama’s smug words. Koskinen smugly insisted he’s never been called a liar before.
He must have meant before he promised to produce Lois Lerner’s emails. Emails he knew at the time were missing.
Michael Gerson says IRS has, “undermined respect for authority. And it doesn’t seem even to understand the damage it has done”.
Well, they’re not the only ones. A year ago EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson conducted official business on an email account under the alias of Richard Windsor. Clever, no? She gave herself an ethics award for the scam. Windsor is now a fat cat at Apple, where Climate Change skeptic shareholders have been told to get lost.
The governing class is losing its fear of humans. Is it too late to yank the chain?
To Victor Davis Hanson the federal government has evolved into a sort of a “rogue organism”.
Add up these various alphabet-soup pathologies — well apart from the NSA, AP, and Benghazi debacles. Government agencies are now eager to venture into areas well beyond their mandates. They will use any means necessary to further the careers of their executives, massage data to enhance the administration’s agenda, or simply abdicate their responsibility to enforce the law at all if it is found to be politically incorrect.
In other words, we are witnessing a new federal government that is a sort of rogue organism that exists for its own enhancement and is willing to do anything necessary to help those who help it.
