Finding the Higgs: what’s next
Finding the Higgs: what’s next.
Year: 2012
Europe’s new Vega rocket successfully put nine satellites into orbit this morning on its first flight.
Competition: Europe’s new Vega rocket successfully put nine satellites into orbit this morning on its first flight.
Abraham Lincoln – A tribute to the song Ashokan Farewell
An evening pause: A tribute to Abraham Lincoln, on his birthday.
Want to buy a former NASA radio dish? All you need is $4.2 million.
Want to buy a former NASA radio dish? All you need is $4.2 million.
“The longer we go in this presidency, the less relation MSM headlines have to reality.”
Eleven months after the earthquake/tsunami in Japan, a collection of amazing and inspiring before and after pictures.
Eleven months after the earthquake/tsunami in Japan, a collection of incredible and inspiring before and after pictures.
Boney M – Belfast
An evening pause: From 1977.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced Saturday that the nation will reveal “several major achievements in the nuclear domain” within days, state media reported.
Fiddling while Rome burns: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced Saturday that Iran will reveal “several major achievements in the nuclear domain” within days.
For its second attempt to launch the Orbiting Carbon Observatory, NASA has finally decided to dump Orbital Sciences’ Taurus XL rocket, the same rocket that failed on two previous launch attempts.
For its second attempt to launch the Orbiting Carbon Observatory, NASA has finally decided to dump Orbital Sciences’ Taurus XL rocket, the same rocket that failed on two previous launch attempts.
The decision to change launch rockets will delay launch by at least a year. Still, this is better than losing a third research satellite.
“The villain of the piece.”
LightSquared and GPS: “The villain of the piece.”
The answer emerging from countless legal filings and Congressional hearings is that the government itself is the villain of the piece, the absence of collaboration between agencies allowing one to act without consulting the others. In bypassing its normal processes to expedite approval of LightSquared’s plan to use its mobile satellite service frequencies for a terrestrial broadband wireless network, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) left its fellow Defense and Transportation Departments, Homeland Security and others, scrambling to protect GPS signals on which they now depend.
Actually, saying the “government” is the villain is too vague. Let us name names, highlighted in bold below:
An independent agency, the FCC claimed to be acting in the public interest by boosting the Obama administration’s national broadband plan when it approved LightSquared’s proposal, but in bypassing the normal notice of proposed rulemaking step it short-circuited a technical process that would have addressed the GPS interference issue in an orderly matter. In the subsequent rush to perform tests, critics were quick to point out close personal and political links between President Barack Obama, FCC chairman Julian Genachowski and hedge-fund manager Philip Falcone, LightSquared’s majority owner.
“Substantial federal resources, including over $2 million from the FAA, have been expended and diverted from other programs in testing and analyzing LightSquared’s proposals,” John Porcari, deputy transportation secretary, testified to Congress on Feb. 8. “This level of investment in assisting a commercial applicant to achieve the successful approval of its government application is quite unusual,” he said. [emphasis mine]
Shall we put it more bluntly, as I like to do? Obama and Genachowski attempted to bypass the normal licensing procedures in order to help Falcone (who had given mucho contributions to Obama’s campaign war chest) and in the process wasted millions of taxpayer dollars while simultaneously threatening the operation of millions of GPS units used by the general public and the military.
The chief architect of Obamacare now admits — in complete contradiction to what he claimed before the law was passed — that Obamacare will cause medical insurance premiums to rise.
Surprise, surprise! The chief architect of Obamacare now admits — in complete contradiction to what he claimed before the law was passed — that Obamacare will cause medical insurance premiums to rise.
Gruber’s new reports are in direct contrast Obama’s words — and with claims Gruber himself made in 2009. Then, the economics professor said that based on figures provided by the independent Congressional Budget Office, “[health care] reform will significantly reduce, not increase, non-group premiums.”
During his presentation to Wisconsin officials in August 2011, Gruber revealed that while about 57 percent of those who get their insurance through the individual market will benefit in one way or another from the law’s subsides, an even larger majority of the individual market will end up paying drastically more overall. “After the application of tax subsidies, 59 percent of the individual market will experience an average premium increase of 31 percent,” Gruber reported. [emphasis mine]
Monty Python – Lumberjack Song
An evening pause: