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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.


A Millennial Job Interview

An evening pause: The future, or maybe sadly, already the present.

Hat tip Jim Mallamace.

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

13 comments

  • wayne

    “Nice resume, Mr. Hendrix, but are you Experienced?”
    https://www.lovethispic.com/uploaded_images/193110-Nice-Resume-Mr.-Hendrix…but-Are-You-Experienced-.jpg

  • Mitch S.

    “I work best in the morning about 10:45”
    Hey, she could be President!

  • I try to hire people over 30; 35 is better. No one else knows how to work.

  • Skunk Bucket

    My young adult children report that a lot of their coworkers are like this. One got high at lunch on her first day and was indignant when she got fired upon her return. These kids have been taught that the world revolves around them and are gobsmacked when they find out that it isn’t. Scarier is that, out of desperation, some employers are accommodating this kind of crap.

  • wayne

    Spent a major part of my mental-health career in vocational-rehabilitation, and specifically in job-development and employment-training. (in brief, I found competitive employment for people with disabilities.) ((‘productivity is only limited by the division of labor’)) The unemployment rate for persons with disabilities is somewhere north of 80% on a good day.
    Personally, I wouldn’t hire the girl in the film, to feed my cat.

    Door to Door (2002)
    https://youtu.be/uYQdXvo469c
    1:30:44

    The true story of Bill Porter (1932-2013) an individual born with cerebral palsy. He convinced the Watkin’s Company to hire him for a 7 mile door-to-door salesman route in Portland Oregon. He became their top salesman and worked for Watkin’s for 45 years.

  • Col Beausabre

    Wayne, I can remember reading in National Geographic as a child that the majority of the personnel in the Quality Control Department of Timken Roller Bearing were blind. Their sense of touch was so refined that they could detect imperfections in the bearings that their sighted colleagues couldn’t. The one concession to the lack of sight was that they wore red baseball caps so if there was an emergency, sighted employees could spot them and guide them to safety. Even at my tender age, my reaction was, “What a great idea!” As an adult I think even better of it, providing the dignity of work to those people.

  • john hare

    “”As an adult I think even better of it, providing the dignity of work to those people.”””

    Totally agree. I have known so many people that overcome problems with just minor help that I have quite low tolerance for those professing helplessness. I think some of the “helpless” should be provided the dignity of hunger, and the motivation it brings.

  • wayne

    Col Beausabre-
    (Spent my first 5 years in mental-health working at a sheltered-workshop; we had 70 client-employees, and none of them worked at anywhere near the ‘industrial-norm.’ We broke the tasks down into as many steps as was necessary.)

    –can’t find the exact film I want to reference, but the one below is typical from WW-2, “all hands on deck,” was not just a platitude.

    “Employing Disabled Workers in Industry”
    https://youtu.be/FiHdnQRSCn4
    19:20

  • Chirs

    About 30 years ago I worked with an individual who ran a software company. He was bound to a powered wheel chair but showed up everyday in a suit. When he got to work he reached down to his partially lifted hand to grab it with his teeth and drop it on his keyboard. He cranked out code, and was an expert in all things Microsoft. (Had I listened to him and invested in Microsoft then I would have retired earlier than I did)
    When I say ran a company above I do mean a company. Although this person did design, write and debug his code, he also ran employees, kept books, did sales calls, …etc. His wife helped with the business in her field(s) as well.
    Although this person was stricken with Muscular Dystrophy he never felt low (that showed) and never, never quit.
    He was an inspiration to me and others.
    The world was a better place because he kept moving.

  • wayne

    “No Help Wanted: The Employment of Disabled Workers”
    (1946)
    https://youtu.be/xtMPWv-9W8A
    10:31

    “…he does not want your sympathy…”

  • Related:

    Heard on the radio that Walmart of Mexico will not be bringing back baggers. Apparently, it is a societal tradition in Mexico for older folks to work as baggers in stores. Interviews suggest that the folks appreciate the dignity of useful work, and the opportunity to earn a few coins. Walmart De Mexico claims that customer no longer want others handling their purchases. COVID-19.

    I’ve noted that societies prior to the welfare state found useful employment for even their meanest members. Everybody was encouraged to help out, because there weren’t that many people around. Now a societal solution to a problem is being circumvented by false fear and corporate fear of liability.

  • Michael

    “Walmart De Mexico claims that customer no longer want others handling their purchases. COVID-19”

    How do they suspect the stuff got on the shelves?

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