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The time has come for my annual short Thanksgiving/Christmas fund drive for Behind The Black. I must do this every year in order to make sure I have earned enough money to pay my bills.

 

For this two-week campaign, I am offering a special deal to encourage donations. Donations of $200 will get a free autographed copy of the new paperback edition of Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, while donations of $250 will get a free autographed copy of the new hardback edition. If you desire a copy, make sure you provide me your address with your donation.

 

As I noted in July, the support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.

 

In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.

 

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Branson sells another $300 million in Virgin Galactic stock

Capitalism in space: Richard Branson has sold another $300 million of his Virgin Galactic stock, reducing his share in the company to only 11.9%.

When Virgin Galactic went public, Branson sold off 49%, so that he was still the majority owner with 51% holdings. Since then, he has made more a billion dollars reducing his holdings to a point where today he is a very minor player in the company. Meanwhile, after that one suborbital passenger flight in July, that included Branson, the company has delayed further commercial suborbital flights until late next year while it overhauls WhiteKnightTwo and Unity.

Branson’s entire strategy with this company sure looks like a classic case of a pump-and-dump scheme. He pumps the company up for fifteen years, goes public, and then times his stock sales to maximize the value of the stock. And in the process he gets out before the company begins any commercial operations, when its viability will finally be demonstrated clearly.

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. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. 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

3 comments

  • Ray Van Dune

    “And in the process he gets out before the company begins any commercial operations, when its viability will finally be demonstrated clearly.”

    You forgot to append “…, or lack thereof.”

  • Jeff Wright

    A perfect example of how wrong Rand Simberg is: profit over safety? Check! Why we could reduce gov’t spending by getting water from the Flint river too! Maybe Branson could fly Rand to that libertarian paradise of Somalia where everyone has an AK and no real gov’t…and be their Jim Jones.

  • Jeff, this is the mission statement of legitimate governance:

    We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,

    That is what small-l libertarians support, and it as far from Somalian anarchy, as it is from your trust in the soft-socialist status quo.

    If our government was to focus upon that mission statement – to secure these rights, not to micromanage our lives – a lot of what we complain about here would be resolved positively.

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