The Seattle city council has seized a privately owned parking lot in order to turn it into … a parking lot.
Government marches on! The Seattle city council has seized a privately owned parking lot in order to turn it into … a parking lot.
Year: 2013
Planning the first launch abort test of the Dragon capsule.
Planning the first launch abort test of the Dragon capsule.
The in-flight abort test will take place along Florida’s space coast. During the test, a Dragon spacecraft will launch on a standard Falcon 9 rocket and an abort command will be issued approximately 73 seconds into the flight. At that point, the spacecraft will be flying through the area of maximum dynamic pressure, or Max Q, where the combination of air pressure and speed will cause maximal strain on the spacecraft.
Dragon will be outfitted with about 270 special sensors to measure a wide variety of stresses and acceleration effects on the spacecraft. An instrumented mannequin, similar to a crash test dummy, also will be inside. The spacecraft’s parachutes will deploy for a splashdown in the Atlantic, where a ship will be pre-positioned for simulated rescue operations. The test spacecraft will be returned to Port Canaveral by barge so data can be retrieved and incorporated into the system’s design.
The test is presently scheduled for the summer of 2014.
The rise of government-sanctioned home invasions
The rise of government-sanctioned home invasions.
These incidents underscore a dangerous mindset in which civilians (often unarmed and defenseless) not only have less rights than militarized police, but also one in which the safety of civilians is treated as a lower priority than the safety of their police counterparts (who are armed to the hilt with an array of lethal and nonlethal weapons), the privacy of civilians is negligible in the face of the government’s various missions, and the homes of civilians are no longer the refuge from government intrusion that they once were.
Plain and simple, every single one of these SWAT raids is illegal under the Constitution. They are an abuse of power, and are exactly the kind of abuse that helped inspire the American Revolution in the first place.
A new Federal Reserve report links Obamacare to the decline in employment in ten different areas.
Finding out what’s in it: A new Federal Reserve report links Obamacare to the decline in employment in ten different areas.
Thank God the Democrats held firm, even shutting down the government, so that Obamacare could be saved! My gosh, if they hadn’t done that we might actually have seen the possibility of a small jobs recovery.
The White House has now delayed the deadline for signing up for health insurance by six weeks.
The White House has now officially delayed the deadline for signing up for health insurance by six weeks.
Gee, didn’t Obama just force a 16 day government shutdown when some Republicans suggested he delay the Obamacare mandate?
Note that this is only the first delay. Before they are done I predict the Obama administration will do exactly what those evil Republicans suggested: delay the Obamacare mandate for one year. Which will essentially prove that the Republicans were right in the first place.
Obama: Always the victim.
And then there’s this: Obamacare and the project of doom.
An IT guy analyzes the problems and faults of the Obamacare website and concludes they pretty much did everything wrong.
Private space in control
Today it was announced that SpaceX has signed an agreement with NASA’s Stennis Space Center to test a new methane engine there beginning in 2014.
This story is significant in two ways:
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Europe turns off Planck
Europe turns off Planck.
Planck operated four-and-a-half years, three times longer than originally planned. Launched in May 2009 on an Ariane 5 rocket shared with ESA’s Herschel telescope, Planck measured the cosmic fingerprint of the Big Bang, detecting subtle variations in background light originating 380,000 years after the genesis of the universe.
The Mars rover Opportunity is heading up hill.
The Mars rover Opportunity is heading up hill.
Even after a decades, this rover is still functioning and doing real exploration. It is an incredible engineering achievement.
While Comet ISON continues to disappoint, another comet suddenly gets one hundred times brighter.
While Comet ISON continues to disappoint, another comet suddenly gets one hundred times brighter.
Neither is yet visible to the naked eye.
Boeing has finalized its lease for building its manned capsule in one section of the giant Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center.
Boeing has finalized its lease for building its manned capsule in one section of the giant Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center.
Astronomers have discovered a galaxy farther away than any previously seen.
Astronomers have discovered a galaxy farther away than any previously seen. More here.