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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
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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.


“Limited in attention span, all about big talk and identity politics, but uninterested in substance.”

Link here. Read it all. The disgusting refusal of the Republican leadership to lead, to do what they have promised for seven years and repeal Obamacare, demonstrates their fundamental corruption. Another quote:

In this case, the hardliners were playing a productive role by pointing out the real policy consequences of the piecemeal approach being pursued by the House leadership. Though we’ll never know for sure how the numbers might have looked if a vote had taken place, it’s clear that many centrist members of the Republican caucus were also prepared to vote this bill down. House conservatives, if they could be blamed for anything, it’s for having the audacity to urge leadership to actually honor seven years of pledges to voters to repeal Obamacare. If anybody was moving the goal posts, it wasn’t Freedom Caucusers, it was those who were trying to sell a bill that kept much of Obamacare’s regulatory architecture in place as a free market repeal and replace plan.

And then there’s this. Make sure you read it all.

Update: And read this as well: “While Democrats lie in pursuit of their goals and aspirations, Republicans lie in pursuit of the other side’s ideals.”

I am reminded of the political situation in the late 1960s. The baby boom generation wanted a leftist Congress passing leftist laws. They had the momentum and the culture behind them. Congress was reluctant to go that way. It took more than a decade, until Jimmy Carter’s administration, before a really leftist Congress was in place and able to pass that agenda.

We are in the same boat now. The left is losing ground steadily. The conservatives are on the rise, and want their agenda passed. The problem is that Congress is behind the times and refusing to face this new cultural reality. Whether it ever will remains a question, however, since it is unclear to me whether the right has the same determination and no retreat approach held by the left in the 1960s and 1970s.

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

10 comments

  • Commodude

    The problem with the titular “right” as it exists at the moment is the issue of underlying principles. The right (in theory) believes in individualism and creative solutions. A such, it gathers supporters who defy group-think. The left, on the other hand, in their push toward socialist policies, embody group think.

    It’s easy to herd sheep, not so easy to herd cats.

  • Cotour

    I find it very interesting when listening to the media concerning this issue, all they concentrate on is “who’s” to blame, like its a big EFN mystery. Is it Trump? Is it Ryan? Did they reach out to the Democrats? Its all a big mystery.

    I say this was a failure, and when you look at failure you must always look to the top for their lack of basic understanding of what needs to be accomplished and how to get it done and so they “outsource” (Trump) it to those who “Know” (Ryan).

    The straight truth seems to be that Trump, for what ever reason, forgot how he became president. The Conservatives that exist within his party and the conscious and reasonable people of America who voted for him and them are outraged at the corruption and perversion that is our government and put him there. The media is unable to see this though.

    All the media are mainly talking about is that Trump did not reach out to the Democrats, but the last I checked the Republicans had all of the votes they needed in both houses and at the executive level to accomplish what was needed. So to me Trump should have been conferencing with the Conservatives and reasonable Democrats (they do exist) to see what compromises might be had in order that they vote as needed. Are the Republicans going to be stymied again by there need to pander to the Democrats on Gorsuch? I suspect not.

    And that leads me to coming to the conclusion, this is either rookie mistakes or purposeful stupidity or some combination of the two. In the end I remind myself of basic S.O.M. theory and I really trust none of them, anything for the acquisition or retention of power. ANYTHING.

    In the end Trump pays the price and so it is in his court to lead, the finger points directly at him and this low accomplishment standard that has been fashioned is not acceptable. I point out once again, if Trump sits in his office and is jammed up for 4 years, that’s all good to me, he has already accomplished his main task, deny Hillary the presidency.

    This is not rocket science, and if it were rocket science nothing would ever leave the ground.

  • Joe

    I think big business likes Obama care and are pushing to keep it in place, the republicans refuse to challenge the aca in any kind of meaningful way when it is up for vote, wave election after wave election has shown that the public is against the bill, republicans keep winning and not producing. At some point this will bite the republicans as they don’t do what they say, only the freedom caucus has demonstrated a willing commitment to push against the aca, the crony chamber of commerce seems to own the rest.

  • Cotour

    Joe:

    I like that your comment was posted directly after mine, they belong together. I agree with you.

  • Wayne: Right on the money. I have added this column as a link in the main post.

  • wayne

    Mark Levin reviews RINO failures
    https://youtu.be/YldD_Q8D5tU
    (8:43)

  • Cotour

    A little reminder about how Obamacare came to be and why it is now a third rail, as per design, on the road to the utopian “single payer”.

    Jake Tapper on Jonathan Gruber, 2014: CNNhttps://youtu.be/tLOV4oUXawg

  • Cotour

    The Jake Tapper CNN Gruber commentary: https://youtu.be/tLOV4oUXawg

  • Max

    Alabama congressman submits to committee one sentence repeal of Obamacare. Just the thing most of America has asked for…

    http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2017/03/alabama-congressman-files-one-sentence-bill-repeal-obamacare/

    So far, no one else has cosigned. No one will touch it. By their fruits you shall know them.

    From Zimmermans above link,
    “Most of all, Mark Meadows needs to apologize for not understanding what a Republican really is: a liberal who is not talented enough to run in a Democrat primary.”

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