The competition heats up: The government of the United Kingdom today outlined its intention to build its first spaceport by 2018.
The announcement listed eight potential sites, six of which were in Scotland, which is presently threatening to break away from the United Kingdom. This announcement I suspect is less a call for British space exploration and instead a political effort to encourage Scotland to remain in the UK.
If true this is very good news: In the present conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, Israel is getting either support or fair treatment from a number of very surprising sources both internationally and inside the Arab community.
These sources include important leaders in Egypt, France, Lebanon, the United Nations (!), and even the press. As the author notes,
In large part the coolness toward Hamas results from the belated realization that Islamists pose a greater threat than Zionists. But media sobriety suggests that, in part, it also follows from a weariness of Hamas’ vile tactics and revulsion against its hideous goal of destroying Israel. As Hamas’ goal in this war is political, this lesser support is of supreme importance to it.
The religion of peace: Muslim protesters in Paris today chanted “Death to the Jews” while attacking Jewish businesses and synagogues.
The firebomb went off Friday night at the entrance to the synagogue of Aulnay-sous-Bois, a northeastern suburb of the French capital. A Middle Eastern man assaulted a Jewish 17-year-old girl on a Paris street near the Gare du Nord train station by spraying pepper-spray on her face, shouting: “Dirty Jewess, inshallah you will die.”
In Belleville, an eastern suburb of Paris, a demonstration Saturday by a few dozen people against Israel’s attack on Hamas featured calls to “slaughter the Jews,” according to Alain Azria, a French Jewish photojournalist who covered the event. The crowd also chanted “death to the Jews,” he said.
These stories are only a sampling.
Guess who said it and about what. The answer will surprise you. And my immediate reaction was, “If only this could happen here!”
The 45 most ridiculous things global warming will supposedly cause.
I especially think numbers 13, 14, and 16 illustrate best how absurd the fear-mongering has gotten. More jellyfish attacks?
All is go for a 12:52 pm launch of Cygnus’s second operational cargo flight to ISS.
If you live on the east coast of the U.S. you should be able to see some part of this launch when it happens.
Cygnus has lifted off.
The main engine has cut off and the first stage has successfully separated.
The second stage has ignited successfully. It has now completed its burn and has separated from the spacecraft. Cygnus is in orbit.
They might be strongly against gay marriage, but they also don’t like bigotry.
When openly gay police chief Crystal Moore was fired by a mayor who condemned her lifestyle as “questionable,” she feared her two decade career in law enforcement in this town was over.
Then, this conservative, small town rebelled.
The people of Latta, who voted overwhelmingly for a state amendment banning gay marriage eight years ago, turned against the mayor, stripped him of his powers and the town council rehired Moore. They said her dedication to the town mattered more than her sexual orientation.
This story illustrates how shallow the debate over gay marriage has become. It is entirely possible to oppose gay marriage (which I do) without a hint of bigotry in your heart.
Guess who said it? More:
“I just want your viewers to imagine the United States being bombarded, not in one city or two cities, but in every city between New York and Colorado.
“Maybe 20% of the United States would be exempt from this,” he said, “80% of your citizens would have to be in bomb shelters or ready to go into bomb shelters within a minute to a minute and a half max. No country can accept that, we can’t accept it, and we’ll take the necessary actions to stop it.”
But they should exercise restraint! They are only Jews after all. And we mustn’t offend any Muslims!
After more than a full Martian year, Curiosity has finally traveled beyond the area of its initial landing zone.
The 1-ton Curiosity rover has now cruised out of its landing ellipse, the area — about 4 miles wide by 12 miles long (7 by 20 kilometers) — regarded as safe ground for its August 2012 touchdown within Mars’ huge Gale Crater, NASA officials said.
The interesting factoid from this article is how much smaller this landing zone was for Curiosity compared to all other previous landers, illustrating how the technology has advanced during the last four decades since Viking.
The furor over TSA policy to allow illegal aliens to fly without identification has forced the agency to change its policy.
TSA employees at Laredo International Airport notified Border Patrol agents last night at 11 p.m. local time that a new policy was in place that would not allow illegal aliens to fly solely using an I-862, otherwise known as the Notice to Appear form. TSA employees stated they will allow illegal aliens who had been released on their own to travel with a foreign passport or ID in addition to an I-862.
The TSA continues to deny they ever had a policy in force that allowed illegals to fly without identification, but the fact that they have announced “a new policy” proves that denial is an outright lie. Moreover, so does the willingness of many Border Patrol agents to testify to the earlier policy, under oath, which also probably contributed to forcing the TSA to quickly change its policy.
From my perspective, this entire story proves once again how completely worthless the TSA is. We would be better off without it entirely. At least then we wouldn’t have to be subjected to sexual abuse whenever we boarded an airplane.
Ten of the most common, debunked or confirmed myths about Isaac Newton.
These stories give us a feel for the person, the human, that is normally hidden by the superficial superlatives given to geniuses.
After spending a month dropping down deep into Venus’s atmosphere, engineers are now raising Venus Express’s orbit.
Thus routine science operations concluded on 15 May, and the spacecraft’s altitude was allowed to drop naturally from the effect of gravity, culminating in a month ‘surfing’ between 131 km and 135 km above the surface. Additional small thruster burns were used to drop the spacecraft to lower altitudes, reaching 130.2 km earlier this week. Tomorrow, it is expected to dip to 129.1 km.
After eight years orbiting Venus, the mission is finally ending. They will use the spacecraft’s thrusters to lift it back up to almost 500 kilometers, where they will then allow its orbit to naturally decay, eventually ending the mission when it burns up in the atmosphere. There is also the chance they will run out of fuel during these last burns, ending the mission slightly sooner.
