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Readers! A November fund-raising drive!

 

It is unfortunately time for another November fund-raising campaign to support my work here at Behind the Black. I really dislike doing these, but 2025 is so far turning out to be a very poor year for donations and subscriptions, the worst since 2020. I very much need your support for this webpage to survive.

 

And I think I provide real value. Fifteen years ago I said SLS was garbage and should be cancelled. Almost a decade ago I said Orion was a lie and a bad idea. As early as 1998, long before almost anyone else, I predicted in my first book, Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, that private enterprise and freedom would conquer the solar system, not government. Very early in the COVID panic and continuing throughout I noted that every policy put forth by the government (masks, social distancing, lockdowns, jab mandates) was wrong, misguided, and did more harm than good. In planetary science, while everyone else in the media still thinks Mars has no water, I have been reporting the real results from the orbiters now for more than five years, that Mars is in fact a planet largely covered with ice.

 

I could continue with numerous other examples. If you want to know what others will discover a decade hence, read what I write here at Behind the Black. And if you read my most recent book, Conscious Choice, you will find out what is going to happen in space in the next century.

 

 

This last claim might sound like hubris on my part, but I base it on my overall track record.

 

So please consider donating or subscribing to Behind the Black, either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. I could really use the support at this time. There are five ways of doing so:

 

1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.

 

2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation. Takes about a 10% cut.
 

3. A Paypal Donation or subscription, which takes about a 15% cut:

 

4. Donate by check. I get whatever you donate. Make the check payable to Robert Zimmerman and mail it to
 
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652

 

You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.


SpaceX launches 23 Starlink satellites

SpaceX tonight successfully launched another 23 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral.

The first stage completed its third flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

92 SpaceX
61 China
17 Russia
8 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches 105 to 61, and the entire world combined 105 to 96. SpaceX now trails the rest of the world combined (excluding American companies) 92 to 96.

This was the 201st launch this year, the first time ever that the global launch industry has exceeded 200 launches. Before 2021, annual global launch totals were generally less than 100. It now looks like there is a good chance they will never again be as low as that. (I should have noted this at the 200th launch, but missed it.)

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

4 comments

  • The other Kyle

    The fact that you Bob of all people missed the noting the 200th launch milestone just goes to show you that we are truly living in the space age where space flight is as routine as airflight.

  • john hare

    I would put the significant thought as the week and a half between SpaceX launches felt like a drought. Especially considering that any other company on the planet would consider a week and a half gap as a blistering pace.

  • Ray Van Dune

    Sad that an American company that showcases our dazzling technical prowess is regarded as a threat by the aged criminal class in DC.

  • Edward

    Ray Van Dune wrote: “Sad that an American company that showcases our dazzling technical prowess is regarded as a threat by the aged criminal class in DC.

    Sad, yes, but expected. The aged criminal class in DC and elsewhere insist upon punishing the successful by taxing away their lawfully, morally, and ethically gotten gains.

    Instead, these aged criminals try to play “Robin Hood” by stealing from the rich (taxing the successful) and giving to the poor (paying the lazy to continue to not work, to not contribute to society).*
    ____________________
    * “Stealing from the rich and giving to the poor” is a marxist misinterpretation to the Robin Hood story. Before the 1930s, the Robin Hood story was that he protected the downtrodden Saxons from the tyrannical Normans, and he stole from the corrupt in order to pay the ransom for King Richard. Watch Errol Flynn’s “The Adventures Of Robin Hood” again.

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