First head of Space Force to be officially sworn in
First head of Space Force, General John Raymond of the Air Force, will be officially sworn in today at the White House.
Raymond assumed the duties of the first head of the Space Force on December 20, 2019, when U.S. President Donald Trump signed into law the National Defense Authorization Act that officially launched the new force. “The Space Force will help us deter aggression and control the ultimate high ground,” Trump said at the NDAA signing last month. Officials say the Space Force will organize, train and equip military personnel who primarily focus on space operations.
Raymond was named commander of the new United States Space Command upon its creation in August of last year. That command, which sought to better organize the U.S. military’s space assets and operations, is being phased out as personnel are transferred to the Space Force.
Not surprisingly, a twitter mob immediately formed to protest the fact that a bible, officially blessed by religious leaders at the Washington National Cathedral, will be used during the swearing in. I especially like the over-the-top outrage expressed by the childish leader of this twitter mob:
Mikey Weinstein, president and founder of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, said Sunday’s ceremony displayed overtones of “Christian privilege” within the Defense Department. “The MRFF condemns, in as full-throated a manner as is humanly possible, the shocking and repulsive display of only the most vile, exclusivist, fundamentalist Christian supremacy, dominance, triumphalism and exceptionalism which occurred at yesterday’s ‘blessing’ at the Washington National Cathedral,” he told Military.com on Monday.
My response to Mikey-boy: You are a very bigoted, very anti-Christian, and a very hateful person. You should get a life.
Meanwhile, back in the real world, it remains to be seen whether the establishment of a separate organization for handling the space-related military needs of the U.S. will do more harm than good. The idea makes sense, as the military for the past two decades has had a problem giving priority to space matters because of in-house turf wars between the various military branches, and thus the U.S. effort has stagnated somewhat.
The track record of Washington in the past half century when such things are attempted however is not good. Instead of getting more focused and accomplishing more, Washington has instead consistently grown a bloated bureaucracy that actually gets less done for more money. And in this case, it appears that might be what will happen here, as the giant budgets for the Space Force put forth by the Pentagon have suggested they are aiming to use it to build new empires rather than streamline and focus operations.
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 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
First head of Space Force, General John Raymond of the Air Force, will be officially sworn in today at the White House.
Raymond assumed the duties of the first head of the Space Force on December 20, 2019, when U.S. President Donald Trump signed into law the National Defense Authorization Act that officially launched the new force. “The Space Force will help us deter aggression and control the ultimate high ground,” Trump said at the NDAA signing last month. Officials say the Space Force will organize, train and equip military personnel who primarily focus on space operations.
Raymond was named commander of the new United States Space Command upon its creation in August of last year. That command, which sought to better organize the U.S. military’s space assets and operations, is being phased out as personnel are transferred to the Space Force.
Not surprisingly, a twitter mob immediately formed to protest the fact that a bible, officially blessed by religious leaders at the Washington National Cathedral, will be used during the swearing in. I especially like the over-the-top outrage expressed by the childish leader of this twitter mob:
Mikey Weinstein, president and founder of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, said Sunday’s ceremony displayed overtones of “Christian privilege” within the Defense Department. “The MRFF condemns, in as full-throated a manner as is humanly possible, the shocking and repulsive display of only the most vile, exclusivist, fundamentalist Christian supremacy, dominance, triumphalism and exceptionalism which occurred at yesterday’s ‘blessing’ at the Washington National Cathedral,” he told Military.com on Monday.
My response to Mikey-boy: You are a very bigoted, very anti-Christian, and a very hateful person. You should get a life.
Meanwhile, back in the real world, it remains to be seen whether the establishment of a separate organization for handling the space-related military needs of the U.S. will do more harm than good. The idea makes sense, as the military for the past two decades has had a problem giving priority to space matters because of in-house turf wars between the various military branches, and thus the U.S. effort has stagnated somewhat.
The track record of Washington in the past half century when such things are attempted however is not good. Instead of getting more focused and accomplishing more, Washington has instead consistently grown a bloated bureaucracy that actually gets less done for more money. And in this case, it appears that might be what will happen here, as the giant budgets for the Space Force put forth by the Pentagon have suggested they are aiming to use it to build new empires rather than streamline and focus operations.
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 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
This worry: “Instead of getting more focused and accomplishing more, Washington has instead consistently grown a bloated bureaucracy that actually gets less done for more money.”, …*may* be ameliorated, if Congress allows it to be. In large part, that is why a separate service to focus on MilSpace tasks is needed.
The inaction problem in MilSpace has finally grown worse than the fear of over-spending in Space, since the formation of the PLA Strategic Support Force (PLASSF) in 2015. It is expectable that a government hierarchy will spend more money than a market-based society would like. It is a pre-industrial institution. Its resources are thus politically assigned, rather than needs driven by those focused on a particular task. In “peacetime” it has become all too normal for politicians to “do things to spend money, rather than spend money to get things done.”
BTW, …this is incorrect:
“Raymond was named commander of the new United States Space Command upon its creation in August of last year. That command, which sought to better organize the U.S. military’s space assets and operations, is being phased out as personnel are transferred to the Space Force.”
US Space Command is a DoD “Combatant Command”, that will operate US MilSpace assets into the future. Space Force is a military Service, that will provide US Space Command with personnel, planning, budgeting, procurement, R&D, training, and all the other things a military Service provides the various Combatant Commands in DoD.
What is being folded into Space Force is the personnel from USAF Space Command, a subordinate Command of Strategic Command, with lower budgeting priority, which will, in fact, disappear. I have sent a correction on this to VOA. We will have to see whether or not they bother to correct the error.
Will they have a full time member on the Joint Chiefs?
My response to Mikey-boy:
You do not understand the United States and especially not the freedom of religion aspect.
From the second article: “religious texts aren’t typically used when officers take an oath of office, though leaders can opt to do so.”
This option is what freedom of religion is all about.
From the second article: “Others maintained that, by using the Bible, the Space Force will ostracize commanders and officials who practice a different faith.”
If we are not free to opt for our own religious text, then why are we not the ones being ostracized? If we must do things only the way that the MRFF directs, then where is our freedom of religion — or our other freedoms, for that matter? What is the difference between forbidding us from using our chosen religious texts and requiring us to use a specific religious text?
What is the military and the new Space Force protecting if it isn’t the right to freedom of religion?
From the second article: “‘The MRFF condemns, in as full-throated a manner as is humanly possible, the shocking and repulsive display of only the most vile, exclusivist, fundamentalist Christian supremacy, dominance, triumphalism and exceptionalism which occurred at yesterday’s “blessing” at the Washington National Cathedral,’ [Mikey Weinstein] told Military.com on Monday.”
Just how American can the Military Religious Freedom Foundation be if it does not understand even the most basic purpose of the United States: Liberty.
Excerpted from the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution:
“We the People of the United States, in Order to … secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”
We are that Posterity for whom the government and its military is supposed to be securing the Blessings of Liberty. Mikey and his foundation have no clue.
Here is a note that I sent to John Bachelor on your appearance tonight.
Sir John
I have had my Space Force Tee shirts since November
Patriot Depot has sold them, a take off of the Old NASA vector design.
https://patriotdepot.com/space-force-t-shirt/
Alton Blevins: See this essay by me from January 2018.