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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.

 

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Nicaragua forms space agency

The new colonial movement? In what appears to be a complete surprise within its own scientific community, the government of Nicaragua today announced the formation of its own space agency.

[T]he National Assembly approved the creation of the agency for the “defence of supreme interests” in space. It will seek “to expand the country’s capacities in the educational, industrial, scientific and technological branches”, according to president Daniel Ortega´s proposal.

The article at the link provides little information about this government effort, and instead is mostly filled with commentary by other scientists expressing their opposition to it. Nor can I blame them. Unlike rich countries like the UAE, Nicaragua is one of the poorest in Latin America. It can’t afford to buy the educational resources of the United States, as the UAE did.

Moreover, it is ruled by a socialist/communist government whose ability to produce wealth is exceedingly limited. If anything, the nation’s poverty is because of that government’s top-down policies. Establishing a space agency is merely another aspect of this approach, and will likely only act to provide photo ops for its leaders and little benefit to its citizens.

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

7 comments

  • Matthew from Miami

    With the internet these days I’m sure they could learn it all from youtube

  • Phill O

    Most probable scenario is it gives them an out when the Chinese launch from there and put even more pressure on the good old USA.

  • Jerry Greenwood

    True, It’s China. They have been poking around Central America for years and have a space tracking radar on the outskirts of Managua.

  • Jeff Wright

    Wasn’t that where the replacement for the Panama Canal was to be located? I thought Ortega died and FARQ hung up their arms. Coffee and coke are about all they have.

  • Jerry Greenwood

    Yes, there was a revival of the sea level canal idea and lots of hoopla surrounding the Chinese investing a bunch of money in the project but nothing ever came of it. I’m sure the Chinese spread lots of money around and made lots of friends in Nicaragua and now have their foot in the door for future endeavors. They are a patient culture and when the time is right will spring the trap.

  • Jeff Wright

    I hope they do invest there-maybe jobs will draw folks away from our boarder. Instead of a Bering Strait bridge-maybe they could gradually link the Antarctic ‘spur’ which reaches up towards the tip of South America. It will be hard due to constant winds and currents-but that makes it the one place alt energy takes place. Each platform can serve double duty as bridge supports-so trucks and trains can harvest ice. No tropical illness-and no terrorists driving on Silk Road II to Bejing. That’s gonna backfire on them. Saudi oil money needs to back this for water-and if the Greens try to stop it I will actually cheer the China soldiers as they start laying rifle butts upside some Greenpeace skulls

  • Star Bird

    Come on they need Jobs down there so they wont be coming up here Astronuats from Nicararua

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