Outrage over TSA “naked scans” grows
It appears the outrage over the TSA’s new security measures is growing.
Year: 2010
China releases Chang’e 2 images of its proposed lunar landing sites
Take a look at these spectacular images China released from its Chang’e 2 lunar probe that they say show potential landing sites for later Chinese probes.
Senate to hold hearings on NASA’s budget
Orbital Sciences tests the first stage engine of its Taurus II rocket
Orbital Sciences today successfully completed the first test of the first stage engine for its Taurus II rocket, the rocket the company plans to use in sending cargo to ISS.
More cracks found on Discovery’s external tank
Bad news for that November 30 shuttle launch date: Two cracks have been found on the aluminum body of Discovery’s external tank.
James Webb Space Telescope in trouble, again
The James Webb Space Telescope is in trouble again, requiring an addition $1.5 billion and an additional year to get finished.
I’m a denier!
An evening pause: Global warming, from a somewhat different perspective. Those who remember the 1960s TV show, The Monkees, will especially appreciate the humor of this video.
Deficit panel is recommending eliminating NASA funds to private space
Am I clairvoyant? Clark Lindsey notes how Obama’s National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform is recommending a $1.2 billion cut from NASA’s private commercial space budget.
Pat Condell on the death of free speech in Europe
Pat Condell, whose never minces words in his commentary on youtube, has decided to speak out about Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff’s upcoming trial in Austria, where she is threatened with three years imprisonment because she expressed an opinion about Islam and the Koran. It is worth watching.
The purpose [of these trials] is to silence dissent, by example. To show everyone else that they too will be treated as a common criminal if they dare to express a negative opinion about the world’s most backward, intolerant and violent religion. This is where we are in Europe today. It’s like something out of the old Soviet Union.
By the way, Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff’s legal defense fund can be found at http://english.savefreespeech.org/ .
EPA sued over ethanol increases in gasoline
The EPA is being sued by oil and grocery organizations over its decision to allow more corn-based ethanol in gasoline. Too bad the EPA didn’t listen to environmental organizations like Greenpeace, who say ethanol in gasoline is bad for the environment.
New airport security checks causing protests
And people wonder why I now drive from Maryland to Chicago: It appears that no one is happy with new TSA airport security checks, requiring either a full body scan or a full body pat down. Protests are coming from pilots, flight attendants, passengers, and the airlines. Key quote from the “passenger” link above:
The aggressively enhanced TSA pat down involves over-the-clothes searches of passengers’ breast and genital areas. You can opt not to go through the backscatter body scanners, and thereby keep your genitalia private from pictures, but then a TSA screener will use a front-of-the-hand, slide-down body screening that Ars Technica called “nut-busting pat-downs.”
And there’s National Opt-Out Day, November 24, 2010. (I wish I could participate, but as I said, I will be driving to Chicago for Thanksgiving, mostly to avoid the police-state of the TSA.)
Highest point on the Moon
Eat a Bagel, Lose Your Baby
Cassini to be back in operation by November 24
Engineers expect to get Cassini, which went into safe mode on November 2, back in operation by next week.
The state of the Iranian space program
The up and down state of the Iranian space program.
Mystery missile an optical illusion?
At least one expert claims that the mystery missile launch off the California coast on was merely an optical illusion. Key quote:
John Pike of the security analyst group globalsecurity.org said the video shot by a news helicopter owned by KCBS is an optical illusion. Pike said the video is of an airplane heading toward the camera and the contrail is illuminated by the setting sun. He said the object can’t be a rocket because it appeared to alter its course.
Triceratops never existed?
The uncertainty of science, again! The three-horned dinosaur triceratops might never have existed, paleontologists say. Instead, it might simply have been the youthful stage of another less well know dinosaur called torosaurus.
Flash flood
An evening pause: Flash flood in the desert.
Pluto might be larger than Eris after all
The uncertainty of science! Eris, the distant planet in the Kuiper belt, had been thought to be larger than Pluto. Now astronomers have doubts.
Leftist cartoonist calls for armed revolution against the right
Feel the hate: Leftist cartoonist Ted Rall calls for armed revolution against conservatives. The quote below from Rall’s writing nicely summarizes what he thinks of people who disagree with him:
The millions of partisans who follow Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, and right-wing televangelists happen to be the best-armed people around, and they despise just about everyone who doesn’t think and pray like them. They will see collapse as affirmation of their beliefs that secular liberalism is destructive. They will also see it as an opportunity to create a new, ordered world atop the ashes. They will act to stop teenage sluts from getting abortions, teach niggers a lesson, and slaughter those spics, dots, and everyone else who doesn’t fit into their vision of what and who is right. [emphasis mine]